Monthly Archives: June 2025

Sideband #81: Tangent Cones

It’s been a while since my last Sidebands post. That’s partly because I’ve been working on a project that I’m sure will become a multi-post series and thought it would be nice to start with #81. But I’m not done (or actually started on the writing) yet, and this one has also been lurking for a while.

Essentially, I needed to figure out how to join a cone to a sphere in a seamless way (as in the picture here). This requires the sides of the cone meet the sphere at a tangent point.

It’s yet another case of actually needing the trigonometry I learned in school.

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Juneteenth 2025

Today is Juneteenth, formally Juneteenth National Independence Day, a national holiday commemorating the ending of slavery in the USA. Here is the official Juneteenth flag:

It uses the same colors as the American flag because the descendants of slaves are Americans. (It has been suggested that these days that any Americans protesting a tyrannical government should wave as many American flags as possible to highlight that they are Americans protesting an unamerican government — unamerican as defined by our founding and 200+ year history.)

Here is a good post giving some background on the flag, and here is another good post pointing to more background on Juneteenth.

Black Lives Matter!

P.S. If you’re a science fiction fan and have never read Octavia E. Butler, I highly recommend checking out her work. She’s among the best I’ve ever read, and each book is a unique gem. [see Octavia E. Butler for details].

Stay antiracist, my friends! Go forth and spread beauty and light.


Subscriber Purge

Back in 2021 I got tired of having lots of supposed subscribers but almost no views (let alone engagement). I issued a purge warning post. A month or so later, I went through my subscriber list and mowed down the bulk of them — people I’d never heard of other than their subscription.

I’m aware that some subscribe to blogs they have no intention of reading just to publicize their own blog. To be blunt, I do not like this practice. Don’t subscribe to this blog unless you’re interested in this blog. That seems so … obvious to me.

In any event, it’s that time again. A purge is at hand. The Blog 14th Anniversary is coming up July 4th, and I intend another massive purge shortly after that date (after the usual post of charts and graphs).

So. If you’ve been silently lurking, if I don’t know you from past interactions, then speak up now or face being removed from the subscriber list next month.

That is all.


Friday Notes (Jun 13, 2025)

Hey, how about that, another Friday the 13th. Not that I have ever had superstitions about the number 13 or black cats (or ladders or salt or whatever). Long-time readers may recall that Sister and I were raised without any belief in Santa Claus, let alone other false beliefs. I never had monsters under my bed or a boogeyman in my closet.

But I do sometimes notice things. When I realized I’d publish this Friday Notes posts on the 13th, it caused me to wonder how many other times I might have done that.

Turns out this 50th Notes post is only the second time.

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Bad Grammar

Grammarian William LillyMaybe this is on me; maybe I lack proficiency with English grammar. That’s always possible. I certainly have no pretension of being a grammarian, but I like to believe I have some grasp of it. In any event, lately I’ve found myself bemused by the Microsoft grammarian embedded in Windows™.

It seems to have gotten weirder. That, too, could be on me; maybe I just don’t remember it being this amusing (which is one way to put it). In the past, even though we sometimes disagreed, I seem to remember it as being more useful than distracting.

But recently it seems to have become a lot less helpful.

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