New telescope.

New telescope.

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My son and I were walking through the Brea Mall and I spotted the Discovery Store had a sale. We entered and found out that the store was closing down in a few months. The company was retreating to Internet sales only. By August the stores expected to close their doors. Immediately, I took a look at the Meade telescopes. I had always wanted a good telescope but could not afford one. They were marked down 30%. I jotted down the model numbers and prices. When I got home I went on the Internet. I found three telescopes that I wanted. My family talked me out of the $1,400 one, a Meade LX90 LNT. I looked at the ETX-125 PE and it was my next choice. I went to the store again and it was sold. I wrote an e-mail to one of the Orange County (California) Astronomers guru’s to ask for some advice and here is part of his reply:

“Big question on what telescope to buy…..
As a general rule one should not buy a telescope without knowing a lot about it., especially if you are interested in photography. The Orange County Astronomy has a beginner’s class to deal with these types of questions, unfortunately we have just completed the sessions regarding telescopes and that doesn’t help you if you must decide in the next few days…. first decision is whether you want to do photography and then what type of photography (in other words what kind of camera you will be using?)
If you want to do top quality photography with a CCD specialized camera, then you should probably go with a Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope
of no less than 8 inch aperture with a very stable mount…..cost $1800-$2000 and above without camera, or eyepieces. If you just want to take a picture using your digital camera or web camera then about any telescope with a motor drive can be used to take a picture of moon & planets. If you don’t want to take pictures then the Dobsonian type telescopes offer larger aperture for less money. Once this decision is made than you want to purchase the largest aperture telescope you can afford, store, lift and transport.

I wouldn’t purchase your first scope to take pictures (8inch or larger scope)……I would recommend spending a lot less money to get a 3-5 inch aperture Go-to-scope first…..if you stay interested then upgrade to a telescope to do good quality photography at a later time.

The Meade ETX -90 would be a good first choice…….the ETX-70 is a little small unless you plan on backpacking with it and want a lighter scope or the ETX-90 is more money than you wanted to spend. I would not recommend anything less than a 70 mm aperture (ETX-70).”

Good advice. I went back to the Brea store and purchased the ETX-90PE for $527.22. I was later to discover that this purchase gave me credit to help pay for some lenses in a few days.

 

 

Updated Tags: May 18, 2019
University with junk yard “art”, broken “statue” and sunken boat.

University with junk yard “art”, broken “statue” and sunken boat.

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Here is a profile of a state university where, allegedly, enrollment is preeminent.

Overall, this university, allegedly, has a suspiciously low staff to customer ratio but this apparently does not show itself to the customer. This is remarkable as there is, allegedly no upward communication mechanisms existing on this campus except through the approved management tree. Here are some examples of missing communication opportunities:

  • No exit interviews when exiting this institution.
  • No ombudsman to hear complaints and resolve conflicts.
  • No staff council to hear staff input.
  • The staff and faculty union is allegedly not consulted on any issues.

No other mechanisms exist to hear what is going on at the front lines. Allegedly this is your typical medieval management system campus.

Another negative factor is this; allegedly the administration holds self-promotion as being important, sometimes at the expense of properly serving its customers.

Example: Their TV channel, on the local cable company, allegedly only offers self-glorifying pump pieces. The campus appears to not be a part of the community, if one watches their TV channel.

Example: TV equipment package that was configured by staff to produce sport and community remotes for local high schools, middle schools and community groups but was allegedly anchored in place, on campus, to thwart connection to the community.

Example: The Department of Radio-TV-Film, an academic department, was removed from a fully functional facility and folded into the president’s TV production facilities to allegedly create an illusion of an expanded complex. The sum is not greater than the parts but less.

Could it be that huge enrollment might be sited as an excuse for any discovered and reported transgressions?

Killing at East Michigan University

Killing at East Michigan University

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I was troubled reading an article in the LA Times June 19th, 07, front page entitled “A killing kept in the shadows”. Here is the background to the story. It seams that Eastern Michigan University allegedly tried to keep from the public the killing of one of its students in Hill Hall. Hill Hall is located in Ypsilanti and is a ten-story brick building. A 22-year-old women student was killed in her room. Allegedly, the college officials knew a lot more than they were willing to divulge to the public in a timely manner. There is some indication that the campus was sitting upon the information for their own gain. There are more empirical indicators that show the management is allegedly lacking and self absorbed. In the LA Times article it states that a two week strike by staff took place because there was an under reporting of costs amounting to 6 million dollars for a mansion for the president of the university. It is all about me, self-promotion, and attitude trumps the truth and community responsibility on many college campuses. To climb the ladder of management on a college campus, allegedly, one must self promote. Self-promotion comes in many styles. It is exemplary when truthful and despicable when contrived. The word self-promotion works for administrators wanting to advance. If an administrator is smart it is no hard stretch to see that institutional promotion works really well at the department chair level and above that level. My point is this; letting out the fact that this young woman was killed in her room definitely works against the reputation, the promotion of the campus, in the public’s eyes. That is obvious, but anyone should expect that the general public at some point would know this event. Here is my take on the administrator’s actions. The gut reaction of the administrators might come from how they got to their positions by self promote and institute promote. If they hold tight to that attitude then they lost perspective. They hunker down to the value “it is all about me and who I work for” and fail to value the community. How sad for the family of that child and the campus that some administrators allegedly put themselves and their campus first.

Fund base accounting might have a flaw.

Fund base accounting might have a flaw.

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Most state universities have what is called “fund based accounting”. This is where a staff member or department applies for money by making a proposal. Sounds pretty straightforward and simple. Problem is this. There is no incentive to spend less money after the project is approved. Usually if less money is spent a dean or VP sweeps it up at the end of the fiscal year. Very few staff members will try to cut costs. Guess who gets to pay for this little problem?

Lack of focus at koi and roses university.

Lack of focus at koi and roses university.

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Reported to us is this situation at one state university campus known for its koi and roses. The president of the university has a vision, which appears well thought out and probably does properly serve the customer. Part of the problem is this; the focus is lost. Allegedly there is a large turn over of managers at various levels for a variety of reasons. One reason is the hiring practices are manual meaning that no Internet or e-mail processing is part of the hiring process. Even when Internet and e-mail communications is used in other campuses, the time it takes to hire a person can take months. Truly qualified individuals often times do not wait for the campus process to play out. Another reason is the university allegidly, for whatever reason, does not have a good track record of performing good hires. According to one staff member, allegedly, the management team from VP level on down is sometimes lacking. This allegedly results in the campus not gaining focus and maintaining the direction outlined by the university president. On average, managers last about two years.

Good entertainment.

Good entertainment.

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I was able to obtain four tickets to the NCAA baseball super regional game against UCLA and CSUF, Saturday, June 9th at Goodwin Field in Fullerton. I was able to get my tickets from Mr. Mel Franks the CSUF Sports Information Director. I banked on the fact that Mr. Franks might have remembered me from our days of covering his athletic events with our student crews (KDOC). Not sure his rational for letting me in to see the game, as the ticket office was slammed for requests; I was appreciative.

This field seems small and intimate, which is nice. It was a hot clear day with an infrequent cool breeze. I was amazed to see some vacant seats in the higher priced seating’s but out toward the field wings where the cheaper seats were, it was packed solid. What does that tell you about baseball fans? The Titan (CSUF) team came on strong right away and appeared over time to be likened to a slow steam roller, rolling over the UCLA team with good hitting. CSUF took the lead right away and just piled on the scoring to end the game with a 12 to 2 score to end the game.

All in all, it was a good played game for UCLA and the Titans. Baseball is all about pitching and hitting and fielding holds much less importance, in my opinion.

The officiating was very good for the game. I wish the program had a page that showed all the hand signs. I saw the home plate umpire do a chop with his right hand downward and no one around me knew what that meant.

Our seats cost $12 and we sat just two rows behind the box seats located right behind the plate. You just can not beat that cost for a fun event like this.

[Aside: The UCLA web site is really good. http://www.happenings.ucla.edu/
It is clever in that it targets the younger, college aged, visitor with its color choices, less formal presentation and comic strip balloons. ]