Basically, I'm Annoyed!

Here's a rare picture free post.
This is just words, about words.

It's not uncommon for fad words to come and go in daily use in our culture. Some words stick around, some peak and then decline rapidly, some not fast enough. The word; "Problematic" thankfully has faded away. It's not a bad word in itself, but so few people used it correctly,
it would set my teeth on edge every time by reflex.

What has me growling this time is the word; "Basically".
What really set me off was an American reporter in Haiti being interviewed by another reporter over a live feed right after the recent earthquake. This guy said "Basically" at least six times, but never kept it basic. That's as bad as a hippy saying "Like" and/or "Y'know" every sentence. This guy was educated and experienced though, how embarrassing. I hope his colleagues make a blooper disc of it. I wouldn't mind "Basically" so much if it didn't precede the LONG version of an explanation so often. It should be followed by one or two concise sentences of explanation tops, otherwise it's not basic is it?

After listening to enough people say "Basically", I realized that a lot of the time it's thrown in while they're collecting their thoughts or composing the next sentence before launching into an explanation, thusly it takes the place of dead air or the more honest; "Uhhh" or "Um".
No excuse!
After a few times though, it has a negative effect on one's appearance of intelligence.

OK, I wrote; "Basically" 5 times, [including this time] but only USED it once, in the title. There it was used correctly and concisely, IF you don't bother to read the post.

The Ace MonoKopter in Action

This is my Ace MonoKopter when I flew it in Oct 2009.
The motor was an out of production [rats!] Aerotech G33-5J.
I've wanted to do a post about the MonoKopter for a while
now, but a lack of decent photos held it up. You must agree,
this sequence of pics are well worth the wait.

To give y'all an idea, the MonoKopter is 48" from motors to
wingtip fin, the wing is 27" x 7" x 3/4"thick, the flybar is a
1/2"dia x 36" oak dowel.   The weight is approxx. 28oz less
motors.

I ordered the Monokopter from Korey Kline in person, along
with a couple of his other Ace kits at LDRS-6. Being an ARF,
I had a bit of a wait for it to be produced and shipped. Well
worth it though. After numerous flights in the late '80's and
throughout the '90's, I considered it retired after a bad
landing damaged it. In fact I planned to give it a Viking funeral
after I completed CAD drawings of it. I'm glad I decided to
start flying it again. I figure by next fall I should have a serious
replacement for it after my smaller [and cheaper] monocopter
autorotation experiments are concluded.  Ummm, lets say
instead, when the experiments progress far enough.

You might wonder why MonoKopter is spelled with a capital K.
Normally monocopter is spelled with a lower case C. I can't
recall for sure at this point if it was correct, but the MK's
designer Korey Kline, like myself, Ken Kzak, are fond of K's.
I do know I've always spelled it that way.
The photo set was a good bit longer but I left a few out.
Blogger.com will only let me upload five per post.

25% More Goblin

Pics by; KeithAlanK

Welcome to 2010.

This is my slightly upscale Goblin. I originally built it
for a halloween Goblin contest that was going to be
held at a launch at McGregor TX about 10 or so years
ago. The launch got rained out as I recall, but I'm
glad I built the new Goblin anyway.  It uses an Estes
Citation Red Max/Patriot black plastic nosecone. The
fins are 1/16" plywood through to the MMT, and the
airframe is BT-60 with 1 layer of 3oz glass. The
motor mount is 24mm for D12's thru small F reloads. 
Like the original Goblin it uses streamer recovery.

The demon artwork came from one of my favorite
comic books; Those Annoying Post Brothers by Matt
Howarth. When I first saw that demon I thought of
the Goblin artwork, they're from different artists
but appear to be from the same Hell.
The Indecline art on the left fin is from a stenciled
graffitti that is on freight cars all over the country.
I skewed the art slightly to better fit the fin, and
now the character looks like he's walking downhill.
Indecline inclined.

As a kid I built an original Goblin kit, making it my
first D kit though I never flew it on more than a C6-5.
The trees verging on my local field were already well
enough decorated with my model rockets. That Goblin
got scrapped long ago, but its' nosecone still flys on
another rocket.
The stand is a cast iron star that came from a Texican
gee-jaw store.  My brother gifted me several different
stars one Xmas after I flashed on the concept of using
them for rocket stands. Thanks bro.