SteamCon 3: some photos

More later. Tired!

SteamCon 2010: 19th Century Firearms

At long last, Gordon's 19th century firearms talk from SteamCon last year!

Good Books: The Big Burn

The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America by Timothy Egan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Captivating account of the Big Burn of 1911 in (mostly)Idaho. More than that, it's a good look into the M.O. of Teddy Roosevelt and the first Forest Service Director, Gifford Pinchot, and how they set up the National Forest system in the face of clear-cutting by industrialists. Explains a lot of what we take for granted today re. conservation.

View all my reviews

This year SteamCon will be in Bellevue, just east of Seattle, on October 14-16. My other half, Gordon Frye, will be giving a few talks and hosting a few more. Here's his schedule:

Friday, 6-7 PM "19th Century Submarines, Fact and Fiction" (moderating)
Saturday, 10-noon, "19th Century Firearms"

Naval gatling gun at Pt. Gamble, June 2011

Saturday, 1-2, "Steamy Sailors" (moderating)
Sunday, 11-noon "Ironclads of the Civil War and the Race for Naval Domination"
Sunday, 2-3, "Confederate Privateers"

Hope to see you there!

'bye, mom!

My mom passed away a week ago tonight. I'm still sort of in shock. It wasn't a surprise. Her cancer of many years ago sprang back, this time in her liver. From diagnosis to death was less than a month, but she had been declining before that.

I'm not really sad, because I'll see her again in a much better place. We're both Christians, and that really does make these times much easier. Still, it's a jolt, and especially hard for my dad. They were married 55 years. He'll never go through a tougher patch than he is right now.

Cowboys & Aliens

I haven't seen a movie this good in awhile. Going to have to think about it a bit. Going to need to see it again soon. Good work all around.