Here in the ‘Cuse, today is supposed to be the kind of day that some people (mostly women, I think, based on the local news twit’s reaction to the local weather dork’s forecast this morning) seem to think is “really great,” but which I think sucks. That is, it’s supposed to be hot — in the upper 80’s, which is too damn hot for me (and the dogs). And my wife, so maybe it’s not a “girl” thing after all. Come to think of it, I seem to recall a time when I was young and actually liked the heat (that was back when heat meant the beach and bikinis, as opposed to sweat and bugs). So maybe it’s just a miserable old bastard thing (speaking only for myself, of course).

How fitting it is, then, that I’m here watching a show about an effort to build a million square mile solar shield made of 16 trillion 2-foot diameter lenses (that are a micron thick and have enough tiny little holes in them to diffract about 2% of the solar energy passing through) and launch it into space. The idea is to put it at the “Lagrangian” (or L1-point), 1 million miles away from Earth. This is a a position in space where there’s no gravitational influence from either the sun or the Earth — so the shield will just kind of hang out there and not move. Little solar powered gizmos will keep them evenly spaced apart.

As an aside, here’s another difference between men and women. They’re getting ready to put a rocket into space to see if these lenses can survive the launch, and after they discuss how many thousands of pounds of explosive hydrogen and nitrous oxide this thing’s loaded with, and how it’s basically a big ass bomb, one of the folks involved in the launch remarks, “I hope it doesn’t blow up.” Then the countdown begins, “10…9…8….” At which point, my wife gets up and leaves the room. Let me tell ya, when a big ass bomb is about to blow up, guys do not leave the room.

Anyhow, according to the egghead who thought this idea up — Roger Angel; Johnny’s brother, I think — deflecting 1.8% of the sun’s energy is enough to return the planet’s average temperature to what it was back before the industrial revolution.

Sounds good, but as far as today goes, I can either sweat my ass off cutting the grass (which I hate to do, because it only seems to encourage it) and trying to get some other shit done around the house, or I can take the dogs up to visit their cousins in the country, where it will hopefully be cooler (and there are a couple of ponds to splash around in), and I can sit in the shade with my sister and her husband, and we can watch watch the dogs play while sipping a cold beverage or two.

Hmm, tough call there.