SOLAR/WIND HANDBOOK FOR HAWAII

From Worldometer (new deaths yesterday):

        DAY  USA  WORLD   Brazil    India    South Africa

June     9     1093     4732       1185        246        82

July    22     1205     7128        1293      1120       572

Aug    12     1504     6556       1242       835       130

Sept     9      1208    6222        1136      1168        82

Oct     21     1225     6849         571       703         85

Nov    11     1479     10178         564       550        60

           17     1615     10502        676       472        118

           18     1964      10970       754       587       124 

           19     2065     10758       644       584       115

           25     2304     12025       620       518       118

           30     1238       8291        317       482        58

Dec       1     2611       11891       697      500       109

Summary:  I told you to wait until today.  On 15April2020 2,752 people died from COVID-19 in the USA.  That was the highest one-day toll.  Yesterday was #2.  There are predictions of 3000 deaths/day sometime this month.

About the phasing out of The Donald from the White House, Attorney Bill Barr is doing something that deserves a Trump firing.  He has essentially removed the possibility of fraud in the 2020 presidential election.  Only one Hail Mary left for our PUS (President of the United States):

Prickly City by Scott Stantis for December 01, 2020

 

Random

 

About  the topic of the day, what an adventure, as you shall see.  Way back in 1979, 41 years ago, I co-authored with Waqidi Falicoff and George Koide, Solar/Wind Handbook for Hawaii.  A whole lot of people were involved.  Just look at that Acknowledgements page.

What you do is double-click on that image, and scroll to Acknowledgements.  Those Hawaiian petroglyphs depicting some solar/wind activity at the start of each chapter?  Those were my contributions.  If the above does not work for you, write to me (patkentak@hotmail.com).  I'll send you a copy.

Putting together this manual was a huge challenge, but the adventure came when Waqidi (photo in those days) very recently transferred the contents of the text into the world wide web.  First, he did it.  Second, just in time, as there was a massive forest fire in Oregon where he lives, wiping out his whole region, where he and his wife essentially lost everything.  They are, however, alive and well.

I've lost track of him, but George Koide was an engineering professor at the University of Hawaii Hilo Campus.  Waqidi (more recent photo) was in the Architecture Department at Manoa.  Below, one of his activities:

I should talk to him about a design for the Blue Revolution headquarters.

Favorite song #26 comes from Johann Sebastian Bach:

• Air
• Toccata and Fugue
• Brandenburg Concertos

German composer Johann Sebastian Bach was born in 1685, a third of a century after Johann Pachelbel and 71 years before Mozart.  Interesting that Bach and Handel were born in the same year, only 80 miles apart, and never met, probably because Handel spent most of his active life in London.  Like the Beatles and other rock stars not showing much evidence in my top 100, George Frederic Handel, even with his Messiah, Water Music and Music for the Royal Fireworks, did not make my list.  I thought about making these song #101.  Then again, what about #26B?

Bach, Handel and Vivaldi, who was seven years younger, were dominant in the Baroque Period.  I was tempted to add a  #26C:  Vivaldi's Four Seasons.  But on further thought, I will try to find a place for this masterpiece in my top ten, as my finest day of travel occurred in Venice, where Vivaldi was born.

While Bach (pronounced like loch) was orphaned at the age of 10 when both parents passed away, he lived a relatively cushy life.  He mostly played the clavichord and organ.  No great tragedies or illnesses, but he had terrible eyesight.  He lived a full family life, siring 20 children.  He was always well respected, although jailed once, for an employer did not want to him to leave for another opportunity.  He is credited with composing 1128 pieces of music.  Not one opera. 

He was into mystical numerology, and incorporating numbers 14 and 41 into his works.  Air in G String is one such, was composed around 1730.  It took August Wilhelmj in 1871 to re-arrange the second movement of Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D Major to make it sound as it does today.  In 1997 Sweetbox released Everything's Gonna be Alright.  That rap version is based on Air.

Toccata and fugue in D minor was written as early as 1704 when Bach was 19-years old.  Yet, some say this came sometime in the 1750's, posthumously.   The length can be from 8min15sec to 10m30s, usually using an organ, but sometimes on a piano.

Has been part of numerous horror films, like the 1931 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, 1940 Disney's Fantasia,  1950 Sunset Boulevard, 1954 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, 1960 La Dolce Vita and 1925 Phantom of the Opera.  It seemed like only yesterday, but remember Vanessa-Mae, originally from Singapore?  Here she is at 18 playing this tune on her violin in 1997, making the Billboard charts.  She actually became an Olympic skier and is now 42.

The Brandenburg Concertos (1 hour 32 minutes) numbered six, and are considered at the top of the Baroque era with Vivaldi's Four Seasons.  They were probably written between 1708 and 1717.  The Karl Richter recording went into space in 1977 on the Voyager Golden Record.  Here is No. 1, part 1.

There are numerous best 100 classical music lists, but one shows 13 music works are from Bach, 11 Beethoven and 11 Mozart.  Clearly, they can be considered at the top.  Handel only had three, but for my purpose, all three Bach pieces are #26, while those three of Handel are #26B.

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