Miss Shilling’s orifice

How one woman’s engineering skills helped the Allies win WWII.

At 15, she decided engineering was the career for her. The problem was that it was 1924. “The average woman does not possess the same engineering instinct as the average man,” was one opinion recorded in the Daily News at around that time. It belonged to the manager of the Education Research Department at British Westinghouse…

The Battle of Britain was a success despite a serious flaw in the Rolls-Royce Merlin engine used in both the Spitfire and the Hurricane. The Hurricane was still the workhorse fighter of the Royal Air Force (RAF), thanks in part to production issues with the Spitfire. It was a more than capable machine except for the engine issues it shared with its glamorous sibling… Quite simply, an answer to the stalling problem needed to be found, and quickly…

Years later, Keith Maddock, chief engineer at Hangar 42, an RAF base during the war, went so far as to describe the restrictor as a war-winning modification. “Beatrice Shilling helped us to win World War II⁠—of that there is no doubt,” he told the BBC in 2017. Her war efforts weren’t limited to improvements to the Merlin engine. She also contributed to a range of engines to improve starting in freezing conditions, and operation at higher altitudes.

3,600 words: https://www.damninteresting.com/how-miss-shillings-orifice-helped-win-the-war/.

Walmart Wine

BENTONVILLE, ARKANSAS

Walmart customers will soon be able to sample a new discount item–Walmart’s own brand of wine. The world’s largest retail chain is teaming up with Ernest & Julio Gallo Winery of Modesto, California, to produce the spirits at an affordable price, in the $2 – $5 range.

While wine connoisseurs may not be inclined to throw a bottle of Walmart brand wine into their shopping carts, “There is a large market for cheap wine,” said Kathy Micken, professor of marketing at R. Williams University in Bristol, R.I. “The right name is definitely important.”

So, here we go…The TOP 12 suggested names for Walmart Wine…

12) Chateau Traileur Parc

11) White Trashfindel

10) Big Red Gulp

9) Grape Expectations

8) Domaine Wal-Mart “Merde du Pays”

7) NASCARbernet

6) Chef Boyardeaux

5) Peanut Noir

4) Chateau des Moines

3) I Can’t Believe It’s Not Vinegar!

2) World Championship Riesling

And the # 1 suggested name for Walmart Wine…

1) Nasti Spumante

(This is all over the net in slightly different forms. The above is from https://jokeoftheday.wordpress.com/2006/07/30/joke-of-the-day-for-wine-connoiseurs/.)

The Terminator on masks

I didn’t expect to be citing Arnold Schwarzenegger here, but he makes important points about the history of our country and the responsibilities of every citizen. And I love the writing style: blunt and clear. Just a few paragraphs:

Some people are complaining, “Well, my freedom is being kind of disturbed here.” Well, I told them, “Screw your freedom.” You have the freedom to wear no mask. But if you exercise that freedom, you’re a schmuck—because you’re supposed to protect your fellow Americans….

I knew I’d be called a RINO, but that doesn’t bother me. Honestly, rhinos are beautiful, powerful animals, so I take that as a compliment. I anticipated being called a Nazi and a Communist. But I’ve got thick skin stretched over my metal endoskeleton, so I knew I could take it….

I am not an academic, but I can tell you that selfishness and dereliction of duty did not make this country great. The Constitution aimed to “promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity.” It’s right there in our founding document. We need to think beyond our selfish interests.

Full link: /https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/schwarzenegger-schmuck-mask-vaccines/619746/. 1,200 words.

More tweets about pets

I especially liked: “The World Health Org. said dogs can’t get Covid. Dogs previously quarantined can be released. To be clear, WHO let the dogs out.“

Another favorite on that page is “Some doggos aren’t built for the obstacle course. Wait for it…” That link is no longer working but the video is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAFMCbO43jM.

See them all: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/funniest-tweets-cats-dogs-july-17-23_n_60faebbbe4b0733516263be4

“I’m sorry, but it’s too late.”

If this post persuades one person to get vaccinated, it’s worth it.

Dr. Brytney Cobia said Monday that all but one of her COVID patients in Alabama did not receive the vaccine. The vaccinated patient, she said, just needed a little oxygen and is expected to fully recover. Some of the others are dying.

“I’m admitting young healthy people to the hospital with very serious COVID infections,” wrote Cobia, a hospitalist at Grandview Medical Center in Birmingham, in an emotional Facebook post Sunday. “One of the last things they do before they’re intubated is beg me for the vaccine. I hold their hand and tell them that I’m sorry, but it’s too late.”

“A few days later when I call time of death,” continued Cobia on Facebook, “I hug their family members and I tell them the best way to honor their loved one is to go get vaccinated and encourage everyone they know to do the same.”

“They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color they wouldn’t get as sick. They thought it was ‘just the flu’. But they were wrong. And they wish they could go back. But they can’t. So they thank me and they go get the vaccine.”

Full article: https://www.al.com/news/2021/07/im-sorry-but-its-too-late-alabama-doctor-on-treating-unvaccinated-dying-covid-patients.html.

Precision cancer treatments

We (with the help of artificial intelligence) are more and more able to find exactly the right chemical to attack an individual’s cancer. This article looks like an excellent overview of the state of the art, the possible future of precision treatments, and the obstacles.

Doctors are taking a far more nuanced view of what drugs and treatments will work on which patients and on what different kinds of cancers. The idea of this so-called precision medicine, or personalized medicine, is that ultimately doctors will use genetic tests—of both the patient and the cancer tumor—to determine the exact drugs or treatments that have the best chance of working.

(…)

To wring useful insights out of the data from 170,000 cancer patients that Caris has access to, the company enlists hundreds of different deep-learning algorithms. The programs essentially compete with one another to find patterns in the data that indicate which drugs will work best with which patients. “Different algorithms will miss different patients, but together they can do a better job,” says Spetzler.

3,500 words. https://www.newsweek.com/2019/07/26/targeting-each-patients-unique-tumor-precision-medicine-crushing-once-untreatable-cancers-1449287.html

“The shape of you”

Putting together a smash hit song involves a lot of pieces. Ed Sheeran didn’t even write this one for himself. You probably remember these lyrics:

Girl you know I want your love
Your love was handmade for somebody like me
Come on now follow my lead
I may be crazy don’t mind me
Say boy let’s not talk too much
Grab on my waist and put that body on me
Come on now follow my lead
Come come on now follow my lead

Remember to watch the video in the article, 8 min 44 sec.

Good news on child mortality

Some things are getting better:

Two decades ago, nearly 10 million children did not live to see a 5th birthday.

By 2017, that number — about 1 in every 16 children — was nearly cut in half, even as the world’s population increased by more than a billion people.

…

The overwhelming majority of child deaths are preventable. Adequate nutrition, water, sanitation, vaccines and antibiotics can save many lives.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/09/17/upshot/child-mortality.html

Non-paywalled: https://archive.is/PWY6R