asciilifeform: well, speaking generally, 'microscopes' move ~from~ the collapsing industrial reich that they fall out of.
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: mircea_popescu had essay the other day where 'typesetter works for the bigger bux, elsewhere.' the folx with uboat capability, are moving 'white gold', not microscopes.
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: i suppose if mircea_popescu ever feels like putting his to use for such thing.
asciilifeform: presently we're limited there to uninteresting-looking objects that can be hand-carried.
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: there's no way in heaven or hell that i can get these through orc customs; not without uboat
asciilifeform: it's the only reason i dun have e.g. electron microscope, etc
asciilifeform: all sortsa surplus gear is sold for less 'per kg' than those platform shoes. principal difficulty for asciilifeform specifically, is floor space
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: only reason i did not go with it prior, is that overestimated the expense
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: i've had this notion in the pipeline for ages.
asciilifeform in process of buying surplus industrial xraytron, built for scanning corpses of laboratory animals, 70kg 'bank safe' with shields etc
asciilifeform: 'i didn't get rich by writing a lot of checks!'(tm)(r)
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: iirc mircea_popescu had this essay where 'why wouldja give money to a bear ? bear can't spend money, may as well give it straight to hunter'
asciilifeform: if the 'countries that do shit' can't be arsed to keep his lights on...
asciilifeform: it's 1 of those brit-empire algos the current derps 'inherited' (brits packed it in india but left behind a pakistan; usg , then, in germany (standing), korea (standing), vietnam (oops), taiwan (standing), etc
asciilifeform: slow zimbabwefication. ( with the diff that ~this~ zimbabwe has winter )
asciilifeform: and whoknows what else, i'm not even aficionado of subj
asciilifeform: or when they switched from iron pipe to corrugated aluminum + rubber hose ( yes exactly like one sees on sovok kitchen stoves, but ~buried~ and km-length )
asciilifeform: 1 , not far from asciilifeform , used to have 3 concentric concertina fences ( dunno whether minefield b/w or not ) , then coupla yrs ago all but 1 removed , i suspect they got tired of painting 3
asciilifeform: or the pumping stations ( unmarked on maps, cuz 'strategic', but quite visible from street )☟︎
asciilifeform: leaks on erry other street intersection ( and for years at a time, folx call'em in, diggers dig, 3days later again leak )
asciilifeform: for bonus lulz, the gas infrastructure of these people (gringostan, not shoemaker's ro, i cannot comment re the latter) is a lul. not even to mention the fact that they pretend to also ~export~...
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: i was digging for that 1 trilema piece where 'the housewife... waits until wolf's hour of night to cook the food, that's when gas pressure' but didn't in o(1) find
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: iirc in usa they traditionally use sugar, rather than salt, for these.. ( why -- i do not know )
asciilifeform: mod6: iirc he moved coupla yrs ago, it was in the log
asciilifeform: hm i thought jurov lived in germany nowadays
asciilifeform: seals imho are a very interesting subj, ~after~ one subtracts the homeopathy and outright disinfo
asciilifeform: after reflow, 'all the king's horses and all the king's men' cannot make the ball look exactly as prev.
asciilifeform: iirc we actually had a thread re solder-as-seals. (or possibly meat convo at c2?)
asciilifeform: there is indeed. can even get a3-sized film. but ordinary, rather than polaroidistic.
asciilifeform: ( loox like a kind of opaque condom, with film in it. after exposing, you hand-massage the thing and it develops. )
asciilifeform: for some uses this actually suffices tho.
asciilifeform: i did obtain a crate of 'polaroid'-style self-developing films (and, i shit thee not, 'made in UAE') but they're tiny 35mm things. intended to put in mouth, for teeth.
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: the real bitch is that one is stuck doing old-fashioned b&w chemistry for each shot ( there are digital sensors, but they cost like toyota.. )
asciilifeform: if you set the kilovolt knob to the right spot.
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: they work a++ on pbfree just the same
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: the tricky part is that 'just get dentist's' dunwork, ~over~penetration is problem for pcb.
asciilifeform: can , for instance, determine whether solder has been reflowed ( given a control photo )
asciilifeform: originally intended just for the bolix, but nao thinking it'd make for a decent added molestation search for certain items.
asciilifeform: incidentally, re molestations -- asciilifeform's ad hoc xray box suxx balls, 20kV doesn't penetrate anyffin, even the oil around the tube. i'm considering getting a proper ( with adjustable voltage, and closable banksafe-style shield box ) industrial board xrayer.
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: snap a photo of the new one plox also.
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: thing doesn't (as far as anyone knows) contain any writables on board. so test of new unit is limited to BingoBoingo's visual inspection and the ordinary smoke test.
asciilifeform: btw this is a 4GB rk. and moved in record time, also, <6d from gringostan to BingoBoingo
asciilifeform: ty BingoBoingo , lemme know when it's ready for the smoketest
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: 'remove or forge bad once' << lol, apparently even used the mandatory spamglish ( where idea is that reader with 3 neurons to rub together stops reading in <5sec, and doesn't waste the scammer's time)
asciilifeform: ( tho not necessarily, it's a fairly big ru isp )
asciilifeform: shinohai: iirc that was 1 of mircea_popescu's
