TARDIS Doors and TIME WALLS

Today we made significant progress towards repairing the damage to the Tardis and have continued to paint all the walls and bulkheads. The thing with time machines is, daily use leaves wear and tear on the finish - causing some associated time dilation and disruptions. Regular maintenance, along with proper shielding should prevent nearly all of these distortions from occurring. As you can see here, the main time wall has had its first junction installed and while there remains some minor damage to the finish of the bulkhead - structurally and, most importantly, time-wise - the junction has turned out even better than we expected.

All Junctions between time-walls need meticulous attention to detail,
you do *not* want time running out inside of a functional time machine!
<this is Dulux's "timeless grey" and "guild grey" (darker grey) after one coat>

Tardis Door blueprints, ready for final pricing and purchase order

While there is still a large amount of work ahead, with more repair work and painting, progress from this point forward will certainly be much slower. This doesn't mean that anyone is being less productive. More often than not it just means that progress is made in other less obvious ways, such as spending the requisite hours on researching options and sourcing required parts and materials. Or narrowing down options regarding lighting and other technological components and gadgetry planned for installation. I guess my point here is to point out that the updates from this point forward may not fall as frequently as they have been occurring ;) Also, the new boss could be here any moment. Operator called today as expected, however, it had something to do with a totally unrelated matter, so we are still in the dark over whether or not we will get a new boss anytime soon.

Why some time machines require flux capacitors

Well, still no sign of a new boss yet. I get a feeling that we may hear from control tomorrow. Or not. That's not usually something minions get told, so we are all out of the loop in that regard. Initial blueprints for the new Tardis door have been better than we could have hoped for and the budget for stage one has subsequently increased to reflect more items on the initial purchase order. The lighting also needs to be thoroughly re-investigated as hiring an electrician is not an option. Why is that you ask? Not a budget issue so much, It is more that this particular Tardis has no earth-return circuit. This results in a flux capacitor being a required device to act as a time machine version of a circuit breaker. This way, should we encounter a particularly dangerous surge or disturbance in the space-time continuum, we won't fry everything. The fact that the walls were distorted and cracked as much as they were could explain why the old boss ended up getting vaporized so thoroughly.

cracks repaired, time leaks sealed, surface prepared and
and the first coats of painting underway inside the tardis proper.

Today we managed to repair the majority of the cracks in the walls that were the likely source of some of the alleged time leaks. It is now apparent however, that the portion of the blockade (seen here highlighted with the slightly darker "guild grey" dulux colour) has just been boxed in rather than bricked up. This means that in order to affix the new blind to the time-machine's primary viewing port, the window will require some sort of reinforcement and blast shield upgrade. In the mean time, the repainting of the interior and refurbishment of the lab can progress now that we have secured some of the required supplies and equipment. Time lord Rassilon was also kind enough to post some schematics, which will be very useful to the team (reposted below). We will still need that flux capacitor (pictured) and most certainly some banan... uh, more of the "adhocracy"(*) empowering nutritious delights to motivate the team. More updates soon?!?

time lord rassilon where generous enough to upload these
schematics online in a wonderfully detailed forum post <HERE>

FLUX CAPACITOR : This example is one fitted to a Delorian-built,
 home-made time machine. (Doctor  Emmett Brown).

(*) adhocracy; "A minimally structured business where teams are formed as they are needed to address specific problems".

wolves wearing wooly woven wellingtons

It has been several weeks since we have all had a boss in charge. Operator has yet to contact our team with details of a new boss yet, and none of the other minions want to disband just yet. We all work together so well, you see. It is not unusual for several months of down-time to pass without an operator organizing things. Although to be fair, since the "explosion" that vaporised the old boss, they have sent cleaners in to sort out some of the ensuing chaos and mess. We also still have the time-bubble that used to contain the original tardis too, as evidenced by the "new" couch, so that is a definite bonus.

While we wait for operator to organize a new boss, a few of us thought it would be nice to brainstorm some ideas on how we could go about rebuilding the lab. Needless to say not everyone's opinion was the same on the matter, however, after a couple of weeks without a boss and some mass debating by the whole team, we determined that we will need to build a new tardis door and a flux capacitor as well. Having a time-bubble in the same area as the new door will also help with a lot of the "heavy lifting" that constructing a tardis entails. While we still need blueprints, lists and further research into some of our basic ideas on how to approach such tasks - there is more than enough work to get the team focused and working together once again. It is amazing what you can get minions to do when you use the word b-a-n-a-n-a in its context or construct, and while I like to consider myself a connoseur of such yellow bendy things of goodness, simply the promise of it is enough for some. This is because sometimes the dream of it alone can become a powerful motivator.

So, it looks like there is more work ahead, at least until operator sends or spawns that new boss. Until then we shall press on with creating the interior of the tardis as best we can - the new boss can furnish it and/or redesign it when they get here. When I have some photo's of actual work in progress (in other words, once I find enough bana.. uh .. motivational tools?), I shall attempt to tweet them as work progresses. Until then, this is oddly abe signing out.

Oh, and as for the title of this post? think double-ewe!

NAUGHTY DOG?!?

The boss has kept pretty much to himself today. I am down at the farmhouse keeping an eye on things, which includes monitoring his current activity (to ensure he doesn't accidentally kill himself) and  to ensure that the sheep don't wander out onto the road or think that some of the vines are fodder (feed) they can eat. That's the trouble with evil geniuses - they are completely psychotic and mentally ill and probably considerably confused over a great number of things at any given moment of time during their existence. Part and parcel with the territory i'm afraid. However, just because he is an evil genius doesn't automatically make him a good guy or an evil dude. What some see as a madman, a lunatic, a killer and a psychopath - I see as a means to an end, a way forward, even a methodology to this madness? all the negativity and disappointment, all that hatred and anger he must feel towards others who try and shake him from his path. <shudder>. thank goodness we have the digital world here, even if it is only wireless at this stage. I would hate to see how ruthless he would be in real life if he wasn't afforded the daily mecha carnage that result from those giant-robot battles we wage online. Remember, all life equates balance. Black and white, ying and yang, day and night... you get the idea. In fact, it is much the same way that knowing the question precludes you from knowing the answer. For example, I know the question, my boss knows the answer. It's apparently 42 by the way. Not that it's all that telling unless you know what the answer actually means, right?

Sure, the boss is considered evil by some, he pisses people off. I personally know of several occasions when I've lost my shit (temper) at him every now and again. If you have ever watched him operate, you soon realize that no sane person could hold the blueprints and answers he has swirling around in his head right now without feeling a little crazy. Most people learn how to turn the volume down and go about growing up, not everyone can. It's hard to think your boss is up there planning the destruction of the world when he does things like treating the team to ice cream after a hard days work in the heat. We were cooking both GPU's and CPU's yesterday while it was over forty degrees celsius outside. This was while several other devices that also generated even more heat were running. In the end, we almost pulled an all nighter in front of the air conditioners and fans. Got a ton of work done though, even if it felt like we achieved very little actual progress. The boss was back up in his office this morning, cackling like a madman at pictures of dogs with descriptive notes photographed in front of them. The notes contained what naughty thing that dog did. wait a minute....  <HERE> is the original link.

REFERENCE

Hahaha... Ok, Ok. I just checked my inbox, the boss has created a meme from one of the photos on that list above. Apparently, his photoshop-fu from last night inspired the choice and creation of a new meme this morning... Anyway, I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

<--- another example of this type of meme

BOSSES WORK FROM THIS MORNING

Oh well, looks like its back to work. Time for a quick banana ... ... ... <checks watch> with just enough time for a fresh cup of coffee it would seem.... :)

TIPPING TOOTING

I have been a fan of the Oatmeal for a while now. It's a webcomic that is always good for a laugh and this one is no different. While I have my favourites (including the mantis shrimp, my dog the paradox and how to suck at your religion), I shall instead re-post "Tipping Tooting" here....

Now, I make no claim to the ownership of this material, it is, in fact, hosted on theoatmeal.com.  If you like this re-post then you will love this site. As I said, this is not my work and all I hope to do here is to share (and preserve) some of them with others who may not find theoatmeal.com in their daily webventures. I have not modified anything and have kept them in the original order. I hope this is OK with its creator, if it is not then I will gladly take it down, until then... enjoy :)

TIPPING TOOTING