Palomar Mountain News

Subject: RX on Palomar Mountain
Just wanted to inform you that we are going to do a prescribed pile burn in the Palomar Observatory Campground on Dec. 2nd and 3rd.  

Alberto Lara
Engineer 36
Palomar Ranger District
Cleveland National Forest
alara@fs.fed.us
Work (760) 742-3491 (Summer)
Alt. Work (760) 782-3472 (Winter)

Everyone is invited to an evening of Christmas Carols on the Mountain.  Dutch Bergman will be leading with his guitar and has song sheets for you to sing along or just enjoy the music ushering in the Christmas Season.

Sunday Evening, December 5th, 2010

6:29 pm at Round House Ranch  760 742-5022 

Directions: From the Summit, take the road to the left which is State Park Road.  Go just over a mile.  You will see the big metal buildings on the left of the County Road Station. On the right is a round sign: Fern Meadow Road.  Turn right and drive to the top and turn right at the big stone wall.  Drive up to the Round House. Lots of parking. Come one, come all!

Subject: [PMVFD] Next Board Meeting and Agenda

The next board meeting, will be held on Saturday, December 4, 2010, at 10:00 a.m. at the fire station. Everyone is welcome to attend.

Click for the agenda:  PMVFD 120410 AGENDA

Palomar Mountain Volunteer Fire Department
21610 Crestline Road
Palomar Mountain, CA, 92060

I turned around a message recently from Jim Billups and for fun clicked on his website.  WOW!   From his home workshop on Palomar, Jim produces products that have gone into space!  Dutch Bergman has done the welding at his barn  on the Mountain.  Isn’t that cool!?!  I asked Jim for a little more info to share with you.  Keep reading to learn about what he creates and check out the You Tube video!  Very fun!

From Jim:   

Building a calibration mechanism for the POLAR BEAR telescope currently.  Was built by UCBerkeley, UCSanDiego, and many others.  Was at White Mountain, up on the east side of the Owens Valley; currently being moved to one of the telescope sights in Chile,  the Atacama Desert in fact. 

Also have a small series of solar arrays which will fly in Antarctica late this month, the BARREL project, UCBerkeley and Dartmouth.  If that is successful we will provide another 200 solar arrays to the project over the next couple of years.  Dutch Bergman welded all those for us.  Also, he welded the frames for the SUNRISE project, NCAR Boulder CO and Max Planck, Germany.  Those were good size frames.  Along with some frames for the CREAM project which has been flying in Antarctica (separate yearly flights) for the past five years.  SUNRISE flew out of Sweden. 

Haven’t update my site for about 6x years; many links are not there.  Been meaning to revamp the site, but I am using old MicroSoft FrontPage, fairly obsolete.  Even my server in the Bay area, does not support it any longer.  Have to pick up some bare bones software, no frills.  Just have not got around to it yet.  Maybe when there is a couple of feet of snow on the ground, I will feel the ‘nudge’.

This will give you an idea of what these balloons are all about.  At float, 130Kft into the stratosphere, the balloon will expand to 450ft in diameter; pretty big when you think about a 300ft football field.  They, NASA, launch these balloons from Texas, New Mexico, Antarctica, Australia, and Sweden.  The Antarctic flights are circumpolar, the US born flights are just 24-48hrs.  Australian flights go from Alice Springs to the coast,  Swedish flights terminate in Western Canada. 

Typically, these are astrophysical instruments: studies on black holes, solar magnetic fields, Cosmic Microwave Background (Big Bang), etc. 

This is a clip of the SUNRISE launch in Sweden last year.  Typical launch.  We build the power system, including the solar arrays noticeable at launch with Dutch Bergman’s welding talents.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4Rz7c0NJSE

Jim Billups

760.390.3065

www.meer.com

From: Rebecca Schultz

You are invited to drop off your All Green Electronics Recycling for FREE

Saturday,  Dec 4th

9am-4pm at Pauma Valley Country Club

Rebecca Schultz
Promotions and Events Coordinator
All Green Electronics Recycling
www.AllGreenRecycling.com
Office:   (800)780-0347   Mobile:  (949)606-4717
Fax: (949)859-7313
15561 Del Amo Ave.
Tustin, Ca 92780
e-Steward Electronic Recycler

Please watch these videos to learn about the importance of All Green’s e-Stewardship:
http://vimeo.com/10383952
http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=cVORBbZBbOk

There are more and more turkeys out and about these days!  Here is one that is escaping the table sent to us by Mike Stevens.  Thanks to Mike who also sent this link about turkeys in the back country!

Happy Turkey Day to All!

Bonnie Phelps

Thanks to Rosemary Johnston for passing on the following link: 

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/nov/18/will-county-get-an-11th-indian-casino/

This morning we woke to our first fall dusting of snow on Palomar. Wish you could all be here to see! It was a beautiful beginning for our celebration of one of the great holidays in our country, Thanksgiving.  It is a time to gather and be with those we love and reflect on what is most important to each of us.  Despite all of the changes we have all experienced and all of the things we can find wrong in today’s world, we live in a great country and we have so much to be thankful for. 

Don and I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving.  And, know that I am very thankful and appreciative for the connection that we share and the opportunity contribute to your life from time to time.

Bonnie Phelps

This message has come my way from quite a few of you.  Jerry Johnson sent it tonight and I thought since he did get the virus message, maybe this might save even one of you from a bit of computer stress over the holidays.

Subject: The newest virus circulating is the UPS/Fed Ex Delivery Failure email

I received this E-mail about a week ago.  I did not print the attachment as it did not make sense.  Jer

Felt this  worth passing along. With Christmas coming up, I can see where this  could be a real problem.

The newest virus circulating is the  UPS/Fed Ex Delivery Failure. You will receive an e-mail from UPS/Fed  Ex Service along with a packet number. It will say that they were  unable to deliver a package sent to you on such-and-such a date. It  then asks you to print out the invoice copy attached. DON’T TRY TO  PRINT THIS. IT LAUNCHES THE VIRUS! Pass  this warning on to all your PC operators at work and  home. This  virus has caused Millions of dollars in damage.

Snopes  confirms that it is real.

http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/ups.asp <http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/ups.asp>

What is your favorite season?  Enjoy them all at this 3700 sf home on 8+ acres.  Relax on the deck and look out to the islands, watching the weather roll across the county.

Like a family retreat with a one bedroom apartment and a barn that has also been a caretaker’s quarters?  Click through a few more photos then come on up for a tour! 

Bonnie Phelps

888 718-5358

www.PalomarMountainRealEstate.com