Highlight #129 at 3:53 PM

Hey y'all, Garage sale season is officially in full swing. I found a small pump at one sale for 3 bucks that I can rip the valves off of to make a air circulation system for my airsoft mask. I'm going to call my latest technological achievement "Automatic Internal Recirculating Thermally Internalized Mechanical Expansion" or AIRTIME for short :-)

AIRTIME works like this:

Basically, a mouthpiece is rigged up to two valves, an "in" valve, and an "out" valve. These two valves are attached to two tubes, one which runs up to the goggles, and another which runs out of the bottom of the full-face mask, respectively. This way, I am constantly removing the hot, steamy air (that's the stuff that fogs up your mask) and sucking in cool, dry outside air through the vents on the mask itself. The hot air is then pushed out the second tube by way of my regular respiratory system. Breath in: hot air out of goggles, Breath in: hot air out of mask. It's as simple as that :-) This system is designed for full-face masks because that's where the problem is usually the worst.

AIRTIME systems are available, pre-assembled, for the low, low price of $19.95 from the GL Highlights airsoft products division ;-)

-Graydon L

Highlight #128 at 4:45 PM

Hey y'all, It's done! my very first modern Air Force fighter, the F-15 eagle, is complete. It took me approximately 7 hours to finish over the course of about a week, and I must say, this is my favorite plane I've made yet.

The construction is actually quite different from the WWII planes I've made before because those other planes were made by gluing clothes-pegs together and attaching wings to them. This F-15 is constructed out of various pieces of wood cut to precise dimensions in relation to the other pieces. Well I should stop gabbing and just show you the pictures, here you go!


I took this picture with the aircraft on top of my computer's mouse pad and I think it reflected the camera flash onto the plane making it a tad discolored. Oh, and yes, the slight darker color on the wings is intentional; a real F-15 has that same darker wings and fins.

Here I am holding it in my hand to show you the approximate size. As I've said before, it's almost 5 inches long.

I guess I did pretty good on it, but I'm not so happy about the canopy as I hoped I would be. Sure it looks cool, but It's a tad too long and wide for an F-15. Also, I couldn't get the curved canopy to work out, I had to go with the traditional "square" glass canopy.

Maybe I'll do an F-22 or F-35 next :-)

-Graydon L

Highlight #127 at 5:24 PM

Hey y'all, I hope you all enjoyed your memorial day celebrations. We stayed home and worked in the garden and then went to see "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Christal Skull" look for my review on Monday! (oh the Suspense! mwahahaha!)

As for new stuff in school, I'm taking the Rosetta Stone Language Learning program in German, or Deutsch to the native German. I know I'm a bit old to start learning a second language, but ya' gotta start sometime! the cool thing about it is that I can check my grammar/pronunciation with my brother-in-law, Tim, who grew up in Germany and can speak German fluently.

Check out these pictures of a new "discovery" in action-figure technology. I invented it myself, and it actually works pretty well! check it out!

Basically I cut some army-guys up at the joints and inserted pieces of paper clip wire to act as a joint. It may look immobile, but these guys are so small and the wire is so thin, that it works quite nicely.

Here's a close-up of the the upper torso of one of my "subjects". As you can see, the head is connected to the neck by a piece of wire and the arms connected to the shoulders the same way. the process allows movement which was (of course) not there before, making dozens of other tasks possible. this one used to be your basic, run of the mill, pistol-pointed-one-direction-head-turned-another commander dude. Now, he can command the troops, wave civilians along, shoot the bad guys, and look before crossing the street, all with just a few twists and turns :-)

anyway, Happy Memorial day (again). If you make some maneuverable army guys of your own, take some pics and email them to me, I want to see 'em!

-Graydon L

Highlight #126 at 1:11 PM

Hey y'all, again it's Movie Review Monday and as I promised I'm review the #1 Movie in America right now (and It's easy to see why)... Iron Man

Iron Man

year: 2008

Starring Cast: Robert Downey Jr. (Tony Stark/Iron Man), Jeff Bridges (Obadiah Stane/Iron Monger), Gwynith Paltrow (Pepper Potts)

Supporting Cast: Terrance Howard (Col. James 'Rhodey' Rhodes), Lesslie Bibb (Christine Everhart), Faran Tahir (Raza), Sayed Badreya (Abu Bakaar)

Written by: Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby

Directed by: John Favraeu

What's it Rated?: P-13 for violence, sensual themes, and some language

Synopsis: When genius inventor/Billionair Playboy/Weapons company CEO Tony Stark is taken hostage by terrorists, he is ordered to build a missile for them. But instead of a missile, Tony creates a bullet-proof iron suit designed to break out of the cave he is being kept prisoner in. After arriving back in America, he reinvents the metal suit to fight the terrorists that his weapons company is selling missiles to under the table.

My Take: Cenematicaly, this is an amazing film, I can see why it's the #1 movie in America. The CG is fantastic! the story develops well and is easy to follow while still being as tech-savvy and suttley humorous as say, the Bourne Ultimatum. It's really fun to watch, not only for the action, but just to see Tony Stark 'evolve' so to speak, from a self-serving jerk, to a super-hero.

Unfortunately it has some inapropriate scenes, as does almost every hollywood film, so I would advise Parental Discretion.

As with most super-hero movies, it takes on a 'one-on-one-final-battle' kind of ending sequence, which is a tad anoying, but unlike some other movies, it actualy fits quite nicely.

The only character that could have used some more explanation would be Obadiah Stane; he is a complex character with hidden motives that are somewhat hard to follow.

Overall, I really liked this film and I would love to watch it again soon, but remember, it is rated PG-13 for a few things more than violence, so you might want some sort of filter to skip those sertain scenes that really need skipping.

Good job John Favraeu! you've really done a great job!

Story: 8 out of 10

Humor: 7 out of 10

Action/Suspence: 10 out of 10

Overall: 8 out of 10

-Graydon L