IEEE Consultants' Network of Long Island

Captain Easy - John Dunn, Consultant, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

There was once a comic strip entitled "Captain Easy", created by Roy Crane in 1929. Please see http://www.toonopedia.com/easy.htm for more information about that.

Two of the recurring characters in that comic were a neer-do-well man named Kallimak (his first name now forgotten by yours truly) and his rather dim witted son, Buster who one day came across a flying saucer that had crash landed on the beach.

Being a sort-of helpful, but quite opportunistically inclined pair, father and son met what turned out to be a little green man (an LGM) and asked him what was going on.

The N-1 Law - John Dunn, Consultant, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

When I was still a young engineer, my boss told me of his absolute belief in "The N-1 Law" which may be stated as follows:

"If for any purpose, a quantity of 'N' items is required, availability shall be limited to a maximum of 'N-1'."

With this tidbit of wisdom once again repeated to me on one particular occasion, he sent me to the company stockroom to obtain exactly six six-lug phenolic terminal strips. Don't come back with five, I was told. Make sure you get six of them. Off I went.

Ground isn't Ground by Larry Rachman

A recent article by John Dunn (Ground - 6/9/11) brings to mind a classic story. Its most likely an urban legend, but its such a good one that it bears retelling, especially for the young folk among us who may have never heard it. It dates back to when telephones were too big to lose, and  actually had wires attached to them.

The phone man was sent out on a call with the following bizarre

complaint: When the little old lady received a phone call, the caller complained that the phone had rung many times before she answered. But she knew she answered on the second ring. Interestingly enough, though, whenever the phone was about to ring, her dog barked first.

Ear Wax - John Dunn, Consultant, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

The goal was to devise a customized infrared sensor for remote temperature measurements, something similar in purpose to hand held sensors already being sold. Using a blackbody hot plate as an infrared emitter, I arranged an infrared lens and a thermocouple to monitor the emissions. Thermistor readings were also acquired for comparison purposes. 

 

Epiphany - John Dunn, Consultant, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

Epiphany. From http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/epiphany

"A usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something. An intuitive grasp of reality through something (as an event) usually simple and striking. An illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure. A revealing scene or moment."

I had one a while back after driving my son to his college in Albany. I needed to find some supper before driving back to Long Island, so I went to the only place that was open in the area, a T.G.I.F. in a nearby shopping center.

Corner Reflectors and Bonner - John Dunn, Consultant, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

"As I went to Bonner, I met a pig without a wig, upon my word and honour." - Mother Goose rhyme

Upon my own word and honor, I once met an engineer, a living and breathing, bipedal, mammalian being, seemingly well educated in the sciences, who insisted that the entire Apollo space program was a fake and that nobody had ever actually landed on the moon. 

I told him how when Armstrong and Aldrin were at Tranquility Base, they installed a set of corner reflectors that are still there and which are still operational. NASA and other groups send pulsed laser beams to the reflectors which bounce the beams right back from whence they came. Measurements of the round trip transit times tell how far away the reflectors are and thus how far away the moon is.

He'd never even heard of corner reflectors, much to my further astonishment, so let's take a look at that.

Police Emergency Incompetence - John Dunn, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

We took a walk on the Jones Beach boardwalk this afternoon and then got back in the car to drive back home.

At 5:10 PM today, October 9, 2010, the drawbridge serving the southern extreme of the Meadowbrook Parway both to and from Jones Beach here in Nassau County, was opened and raised to allow passage of a boat underneath that bridge. Following that boat's passage however, the bridge failed to close.

On the parkway approaching the northbound side of the bridge where I and other drivers had come to a stop, three overhead traffic lights turned to and then remained red, the safety crossing gate descended and then remained down with its red lights flashing and an extremely loud siren began to sound.

Using my cell phone, I called 911 for assistance, but the response to my call was quite unsatisfactory.

The Verizon Show - John Dunn, Ambertec, P.E., P.C.

I simply cound NOT have made this up.

My phone stopped working yesterday, so I tried to report the problem to Verizon using their web site. However, the part of the site I needed to use didn't work. Two links were inoperative, one of them giving an "Error 404" response, the other one simply not there.

Therefore, I contacted their "customer support", also by way of that web site. Oohhhhh boy!!

Sometimes, I have to wonder what drives me to bother, but this exchange of e-mails should at least be good for a chuckle or two.

Dilbert's Salary Theorem

Dilbert's "Salary Theorem" states that "Engineers and scientists can never earn as much as business executives, sales people, accountants and especially liberal arts majors." This theorem can now be supported by a mathematical equation based on the following two well known postulates:

Postulate 1: Knowledge is Power.

Postulate 2: Time is Money.

As every engineer knows: Power = Work / Time.

Since: Knowledge = Power,

then Knowledge = Work / Time,

and Time = Money,

then Knowledge = Work / Money.

Solving for Money, we get: Money = Work / Knowledge.

Thus, as Knowledge approaches zero, money approaches infinity, regardless of the amount of work done.