[time-nuts] Tool Needed to Access my Timer Battery

[jimlux]

On 2/15/11 11:10 PM, cook michael wrote:
> Le 16/02/2011 07:21, Heathkid a écrit :
>
>>
>> BLING?
>>
>> Really? Seriously? A "watch" is considered "bling" now? Can you build
>> a mechanical watch in your workshop that is as accurate as those
>> manufactured 100 years ago? That's technology! Otherwise, a precision
>> watch.... mechanical or electronic is just as on-topic as a Cs
>> standard and I'd like to hear more about mechanical watches. Btw, the
>> "tick" sounds nice too!
>>
> You appear to have misunderstood my comment. I entirely agree with you.
> When I mentioned "bling" I was talking about the fashion content.


having watched "The Devil Wears Prada" again, last weekend..  There's an 
interesting monologue in there about the value of fashion..in re Andi's 
poly blend blue sweater.

Fashion is important.. otherwise we'd all live in identical functional 
minimalist boxes.  Yes, we need things to work, first, but I don't see a 
problem with style and fashion on top of it.  Sometimes, it is the drive 
to make something work in a "pretty" way that results in new 
technologies that enable it, too.

Brunelleschi's work on the Duomo in Florence wasn't necessarily 
motivated by the desire to build a bigger dome, per se, but because that 
big dome enabled an architectural vision of a large clear span in the 
building.  To build that dome required (re)inventing a bunch of 
technology and engineering.

This winter, I was in Egypt doing the usual monuments thing.. The 
pyramids are impressive for their scale. What was impressive to me was 
not the first step pyramid at Saqqara (which was basically piling 
mastabas on top of each other) but was the adjacent temple (also 
designed by Imhotep), with the idea of the colonnade and roof, etc.  He 
wasn't bold enough to try self supporting columns (they're sort of half 
columns with a buttress to the surrounding wall), but he had the vision 
of a room with a long clear span. That was something that hadn't ever 
been built before.  The idea of a pyramid is obvious to anyone who has 
ever built a pile of rocks.. But a room with a big roof... that's not as 
obvious.