High Rise Fire In Dubai

In the US, high rise fires tend to be limited to one or two stories. 9/11 notwithstanding.*
This is due to the fire suppression systems designed into the buildings.

This fire, in a Dubai high rise, not so much.
I was unable to crib a photo, so go here.   Note the spread of the conflagration across many stories.

This particular fire is not the result of a computer monitor power supply overheating and flaming out.
So, I'll go out on a limb here. I suspect Lloyd's of London will be receiving a rather large insurance claim here shortly.   Followed by a stringent investigation wherein the claim will be denied due to arson.
Of particular note is there was no loss of life or injuries.  Also, it's the dead of night.
Interesting that.

The occupancy rate in Dubai high rises is rather low these days, well actually it's been rather low historically.  Hard to make the monthly till with no paying tenants.






*  A note to 9/11 conspiracy nuts:   A fire does not have to reach a high enough temperature to melt steel for a building to collapse.  All it has to do is raise the steel temperature high enough to lower its yield strength at which point the steel can no longer support the weight upon it.
"Fire Proofing" is nothing of the sort. "Fire Proofing" is insulation to insulate the steel for 2 to 3 hours, keeping the steel from heating beyond its yield strength.  So as a public service, I recommend getting your fat ass up and out of a high rise fire.  You have 2 hours on the short side, if the toxic smoke doesn't get you first.

A day without a meeting is like...

Totally productive!
I loath meetings. The decisions and useful information that can be distilled out of a 6 hour meeting could be accomplished in twenty minutes or so if the participants were willing to make a decision.
However, plausible deniability seems to be a fundamental defense tactic.
" If I make a decision, and it goes South....I could get in trouble. Egads!  Quick, deflector shields UP!

I've had two whole days in a row with only one short meeting. Yesterday I got a butt load done. At the end of the day* I got in my car and realized my stress level had gone down noticeably.
Today I got a butt load done and was feeling quite peppy at the end of a 10 hour day as I got into my car.

I've come to realize meetings are sucking the life out of me. I've known, and do know people that actually love going to meetings. They tend to be the ilk who's one contribution to the discourse is, "If we used Fedex Ground delivery that would only cost $2.67."



* Stop me if you've heard this preface in a meeting before,  "At the end of the day" is the preamble to, "We've run out of time, the deadline is TOMORROW, Please make a fucking decision!"

TANSTAAFL

WEEEE!  Yay! Free apps for my phone!

Need a sound meter? There's an app for that!
And it's free!

Well, not really because like many free apps, it accesses all the naughty bits of your phone and reports you location to god knows where.

I have very few apps on my phone because of this. I did install a sound meter app to do some empirical testing* a few days back.

As usual, my battery life diminished rapidly and my phone remained rather warmish for the 48 hours I had the app installed. So, I uninstalled it when I was done.  The code for apps, by and large, is not written for free.  The publishers of said apps will make money off your metadata somehow.



* How loud is a commercial wall mounted toilet when it is flushed?  How much does a cheap ass gyp board partition reduce the sound?  Every now and then, my profession requires that I wander off into the weeds.
Sometimes I find my way home.

70 dB btw.

Tables

This ain't your dining room table.

How things get built is truly an amazing process. Imagine if you will, starting with nothing but air over your head and framing up all this stuff to create the same deck you are standing on, and not one square foot of it level.  I know. I designed it.  Hat tip to the contractors that are building it.
12th level of a double helix parking structure soon to be poured.*
Pan slab, for those that know what that means.

The "tables" are what you see in the pic. They support the fiberglass forms on the top side.

p.s. that is not me in the pick, I am much taller and more handsome from the backside. ;)


* A double helix parking structure consists of two continuous ramp systems intertwined. One 360 degree revolution on one ramp systems takes you up two levels. Where the two ramp systems coincide in elevation, a crossover is provided to access the other ramp system.  While  you may not be aware that you've parked in double helix garage, chances are you've lost your vehicle in one at some point in your long driving career.  It's my way of sticking it to the libtards. They have the shortest attention span and memory of all Homo sapiens. I am an evil Artichoke and I aim to misbehave.

Fractured Day

I had such finite plans for today.
I was going to focus on my small project to make some headway for a deadline next week.
The small one*, 26 million dollars that I'm single handing like a 26 foot sloop across the Atlantic.
I'm not sure what happened. I had a meeting with my Nashville team, then a conference call with some folks working on the small project, during which my son tried to call me. Not getting me on the phone, he texted to let me know he was at a gas station not far away, at the gas pump and his Jeep wouldn't start.
So, I'm trying to listen and talk on the conference call while texting back and forth with the man child.
The call wrapped up and I headed off to save the day.  I've nary a tool in the Scion and I'm thinking that I'm going to have to call my neighbor yet again to tow the Jeep and have his mechanics  breath some life into it.

I get the key and give it a good crank, no fire. At least I can smell gas, so it's not the fuel pump.
Pop the hood and start checking sensor connections. Check the wires routing into the fuse box under the hood. Pop the top on the fuse box and start pushing down on fuses. Hmmm, 30 amp fuse not seated all the way. Hmmm, 4 of 5 relays not seated all the way...by a lot.  Get back in turn the key and the Jeep coughs out the excess gas and sputters to life. 20 minutes round trip from the office and back.
I'm thinking, "awesome, I'm on top of it today."
Then things just kind of went to shit.
I can't recall what happened to my afternoon.
There were some phone calls, some email which needed response, then something, then something.
Around 5pm, I finally put some "lines on paper" for my small project. At 7pm I crapped out and went home.



*  Don't be impressed, there ain't a lot of Architorture in a 9000 square foot central plant expansion.

Living in the Closet

Not... what you were thinking...

The world's narrowest house, in Warsaw, Poland
 .
 47" at its widest. (my walk in closet is wider)
An independent, "boat inspired", water and sewer system.  (water tank and chemical toilet? Niiiice)
No windows.
No views.
No natural light.
No yard, no patio.  (where do I put my "old smokey"?)

The architect notes that the house,

"will require a "spaceship-like adaptability." But that's why it's being built for artists and thinkers, as it's "intended to stimulate the inhabitants with the unusual feeling of being restricted by their surroundings,"

I'll have some of what he's smoking pleeze.
Unusual feeling of being restricted...isn't that claustrophobia?
This is supposed to be "inspiring" for agoraphobes artists and idiots intellectuals? Useful idiots will buy anything.   If they had their way, they'd cram us all in to these sardine cans because it's

a much more sustainable way of living

 You do know that "Sustainable" is the new "Global Worming", right?  The biodiversity schtick never did get any traction.

The U.N. is hard at work for you, as a citizen of the Earth, to figure out how to turn Sustainability into massive cash transfers from first world countries to the ruling despots of third world shit holes. Personally, I'd prefer that the U.N. be sustained somewhere else, like Cuba.

A slap to the face of the People's Republic!

The Capitalist Dogs are going to tear down this Icon of Soviet Architecture to build a luxury apartment building!