April 30, 2011

           How to read the bingo barometer. If you see me sitting out in the sun reading the Sunday newspaper until noon, it went okay. Today, I was just taking it easy for no reason while making another big batch of borscht. You can't make it in small batches. This is Russian beet soup, a totally vegetarian dish to which you add sour cream. Most Floridians have never heard of it. Either you like it or you don't. Later, I'll give you the recipe. Meanwhile, here is a Florida sunset. No matter how I tried, my camera would not capture the big red ball--but you can see it here on the horizon.
           Time to buy some new reading material. And I mean new, current books. Sure, electronics hasn't changed much, but the outdated stuff I'm used to reading doesn't offer any challenge. I'll likely spend tomorrow at Barnes & Noble. Now that I can afford it again. I'm also watching for the media to pick up on the fact that as of today, the first 1,000,000 babie boomers have retired since February 1, an event to be repeated every three months another 84 times.
           I see gold has topped $1,500 per ounce. That should shake up the mortgage-based pension funds of the land. Alas, the date at which I will again buy gold is in 2013, at which time I may not be able to afford it. I last bought gold at $364 per ounce. I sold it to buy toothpicks. You may have detected I've been doing my 2010 taxes.

           That year, I cashed in the last of the granddaddy of all my investments, my once vast holdings in Eaton-Vance, the tax-free dividend fund. We go back a long ways and it was my top producer. After thousands in dividends I had to sell at a market low (last year) due to renters and partners who let me down, and even then, I only sustained a $63 capital loss. That was a fund to admire.
           Arizona has voted to build a solid fence along their border with Mexico either with or without the cooperation of other states. Good. I'm all for legal immigration provided the people who have lived here legally since birth are in approval. What I don't like is theories of assimilation that ignore the opinions of the white Christian majority. As for the argument that immigrants take jobs no American would do, such jobs should not be allowed to exist until they do pay enough. Let's see if the Feds stick their noses in on this one.
           After the successful performance y'day, the advice is pouring in from all angles. Many say we have to "diversify". That means they want us to play their brand of music. 'we are a country band and that is all that is in the works, peeps. There are still tons of logistics to be ironed out, like how to move the PA system until I can afford a Fishmann. I've run the numbers and it will be a while yet, since I have to retain the old system until the new one is reliably incorporated, what is known as "parallel implementation".
           Dave-O hasn't been around, so I scootered over to see. He is flat broke, and cannot put gas in his truck. Then, he lends his bicycle to a kid to go to his job, and the bike gets stolen. No, Dave-O, you cannot borrow mine. It was irresponsible to lend out your last resort form of transportation. Worse, when he doesn't bring over chicken parts, how can I cook them? When there is no chicken, I can't make up enough for the next week and devote the time to reading. The good news is he gets his money in another 15 days and his worries are over.

           Besides, I've been reading anyway. Electronics, sewing, and non-fiction, just what you'd expect these days. The yachting book had this one memorable line concerning boat races: the only thing that beats cubic inches is cubic dollars. Is it true they keep a pig on board to toss in the water if they get lost? The rumor is the pig will immediately start swimming toward home, but is that an urban legend?
           Later. Bingo was packed, the prizes were the largest yet, besting almost every individual record. But then, the more people, the more times the prizes get split between multiple winners, as was the big enchilada this evening. Still, tips for me remained at the disappointing level and I am still considering some time off. And the trip to Okeechobee. I said disappointing, not non-existent. Bingo is just as hard on equipment as performing and it does not have the same intense rewards as music, so imagine my feelings when my $120 DVD player exhibited signs of conking out tonight.
           The borscht recipe. "There is no recipe, why are you bothering me with numbers?" Okay, I'll give the outline of what to do and you can wing it. First of all, you need a large pot, one that will hold eight cups of water with enough head room for a good simmer. I don't recommend cutting the recipe in half because it rarely works and besides, borscht can be frozen up for later.
           Before I list the ingredients, a few words on procedure. Although beets are the dominant flavor, they are just one of the vegetables, and the primary spice is paprika. They used to make a brand called sweet paprika, but I cannot find it any more. Instead, you add a tablespoon of brown sugar to taste. Some peope boil everything, but I saute the onions and carrots first, as this gives them a quite different flavor.
           There is disagreement on shredding the vegetables, but I find this a messy chore that does nothing for the flavor and makes the end product too "soupy". I like floating chunks of carrot and such in my bowl. I find cutting or slicing thin gives good results.

           1 teaspoon vegetable or olive oil
           2 medium beets, peeled and sliced
           2 medium carrots, peeled and sliced
           1 medium "Granny Smith" green apple, sliced
           3 level tablespoons of tomato paste, don't use tomato sauce or it tastes "tinny"
           1/2 medium size head of cabbage, I cut out the core
           1/2 teaspoon of dill weed
           1 teaspoon paprika, I sometimes use more in hot weather
           8 cups of water

           Saute the onions and carrots in oil and paprika for 15 minutes, yes a full 15 minutes while you prepare the other items. The onions should clarify and with the paprika, form a nice coating when the carrots get soft. Add everything to the big pot of water, bring to a boil, then simmer for 20 minutes. Taste and add brown sugar or salt, an acquired taste. Serve in deep bowl with a generous dollop of sour cream.
           I once shocked half the town by using sweet cream once when they ran out of sour. "You can do that?" Shows you how traditions can die hard. Results can vary depending on how "sweet" you vegetables are. In the past ten years, I have taken to sometimes adding pepper, though it is customary that each diner add his own spices to his own bowl. I used to eat the cabbage core separately with just mayo.

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April 29, 2011

           [Author's note 2016-04-29: originally there was no picture. This one has been assigned later to enhance this entry. This is the most expensive photograph sold in auction up to 1999. It is an 1850-ish photo of a French locomotive coaling station.]

           This finds us feasting on baked chicken and ice-cold orange juice as we bask in the afterglow of victory. Not complete success, but success just the same as Staci and I do a half-show at Jimbos as proof of concept. This didn't happen all at once, so first here are some details of the day.

           I was in the government office just forever, filling out forms. The fun part was one of the clerks took a shine to me and we were getting along nicely. Then some old mother hen supervisor spots the 25 year age difference and sticks her nose in. The forms were 30 pages long and I'd ask the babe for clarification. The old bat would answer. What is it with old women who do things like that? Do they think they will prevent nature from taking its course? She needn't have made a fool of herself, for I don't do black girls.

           The tornadoes out east are knocking the weather here around, with constant rain squalls. I had to ride fourteen miles in the rain. But I could not be late for the gig. We've rehearsed around five times and I've noted that progress had slowed. Lack of inter-week hours put in. That's when I schedule a ready-or-not performance. Nothing brings musical technique into focus as well as playing next to me on stage without knowing your stuff.
           You see, I'm the victim, er, the veteran of 150 guitar players who tried to pull that stunt. What you do perfectly in the studio guys is usually useless on stage. This isn't a recording session. Where I used to fill in, I will now jump in and take over--to the extent which covers what would otherwise be a musical lapse. Several key ideas came about during this, our first "live" show through a PA. First, we don't need 55 pieces of paper on stage for the 12 songs we know, ahem.

           But more importantly, our voices appear to be two octaves apart. This raises the chance that we could get away with singing in unison. Most people won't try it because it is, well, unison. But the large spread is a fake or poor man's harmony. Think of Johnny Cash and June Carter, although there his voice is naturally so low she can stay well inside her envelope. My act has to leave out guitar lead breaks so we run through a lot of material fairly rapidly.
           This is the novelty of the act. I know you've heard me say it many times. This is not a new idea, Robynette and I did a bass and vocal routine back in 1989. But that was for 25 minutes, not for two hours. It also served to bolster Staci's motivation to get these things down pat in a way no amount of pep talking on my part could accomplish. I've warned people before that on stage I am far too busy with my own to coach others along. You've got to put in solitary time to learn your parts. The last thing you want is me getting the idea I'm doing all the hard work myself.

           The show was great, an absolute captive audience. Everyone turned around in their chairs paying attention to the band. That is the desired effect. I know it is stunning to see something, anything, new these days, but I am also aware that the novelty will wear off quickly. Only with constant innovation can we keep delivering the wow. Nonetheless, the effect was enough to get a single bill in the tip jar from the owner that will pay for our extra practices all the next month.
           Where did I pack all my stage gear? My cow hats and cow boots? I forgot which box since I moved. I even have a rare bottle of real Old Spice aftershave secreted away in there. For reasons unknown, it is hard to find this in Florida. Trivia. Old Spice is the original "branded" aftershave, first brought out in 1957. All such products can be narrowed to less than five basic scents and (oddly) Old Spice is the one that reminds women of a certain age of their own fathers. Figure that one out.

           I have now finished reading at least 12 books on sewing. I see it is similar to electronics, where you can go pretty well anywhere with the design once to knuckle down and learn the basics. But, it took me 13 weeks to build my first working LED dot matrix, a telling amount of time at my stage in life. That means I have to be selective, at least initially, and that means I confine my learning to cuffs on trousers and shirts. That’s 12 more books than the average beginner reads before running out and buying a machine. Always think ahead, it is easy once you know how.
           There is an old [Australian Aborigine] saying. People call them primitive because they don't even own a cup to drink water. They reply saying the more you know, the less you need. I can confirm that, so remember that the next time I show up apparently empty-handed. And Bogart said the whole world is about three drinks behind.

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April 28, 2011

           [Author's note 2016-04-29: originally there was no picture. This one has been assigned later to enhance this entry. It's a portrait of Benjamin Franklin.]

           It happens, both my main computer and backup computer crashed within the same hour. Again, my excellent backup system means nothing was lost, but what a hassle. I used the library computers, so expect some delays in the blog, and remember to glance over the previous few days now and then, as not always the final edition makes it to press.

           Out at rehearsal this evening, I suspected my co-musician, Staci, has not been putting in the time. This is not unusual with a house full of kids, but remember, those are factors to be considered before joining a performing group. That is why I scheduled a live practice at Jimbos tomorrow. No amount of coaching or pep talks gets people to practice better than hearing their own performance and deciding for themselves what is lacking. There's bad ideas and then there is getting on stage with me without being ready. Still, it is Jimbos and they always appreciate where effort has been expended. That part has been done.
           Marion's testimonial to eHarmony found me looking at their complaint sites. All big outfits will have plenty, so I am watching for a pattern. I found them and although some people don't want to be satisfied, I also found eHarmony has strong defense statements in their own favor, except for the issue of continuing to bill people after their account has been cancelled. That, eHarmony, is a stunt for con artists. Do you really want to be clumped with that crowd?

           I also remember Theresa getting rejected by eHarmony, so I kept an eye out for that factor, and I found it. First, the trivia on eHarmony. The CEO is one clever but also slippery operator. The original concept back in 1997 was that standard dating clubs ask people what they want, whereas eHarmony has them state what they have to offer.
           I've used this method since I was a teen, but eHarmony cashed in on it. People answer some 300 questions about themselves and eHarmony claims to have algorithms that do the matching. They have an interesting slogan on that. "Opposites attract. Then they attack."
           They say their success rate is 20%, but I doubt that. They say the rate of people who never find a match is 20% also. Does that mean the other 60% are in limbo? And are these ratios an improvement on real life?

           Now I said the CEO was clever because he re-defines failure. He can easily make up his own statistics with impunity although when he ran his American style advertisements in England, the courts declared them blatantly misleading. That'll teach him. This is where we part company, for beyond that, he seems able to squirm out of any corner they place him in. When the fags and lesbos sued that his site was unfair to them, he countered by saying he "didn't know enough" about their lifestyles to build an algorithm. Smooth, with a big element of truth.
           Or stranger yet, this supposedly progressive company defines "success" as two of their members getting married. It has been decades since a marriage ceremony was the pinnacle attainment of a man-woman relationship. eHarmony provides no statistics on the durability of those marriages, nor is there a control group for comparison. This is so typical of American business practice that we think it fools the whole world.

           It was the nature of complaints that got me deep reading. The majority were not just people who didn't get responses (at all), but that the matches were totally wrong. It is impossible to assign blame here, for they may have lied on their profiles. Instead I'm talking about matches that were in the wrong country, and sometimes the wrong continent. There is no excuse for that, eHarmony. I will attempt to get a copy of the eHarmony questionnaire.
           Second biggest complaint category goes to people who cancelled their accounts and whose credit cards continued to be charged by eHarmony. However, as far as I am concerned, that is a matter for people dumb enough to give an Internet company their credit card number in the first place. I also blame the government for not clamping down on this companies who practice this after-billing.

           [Author's note: I do allow for the results of several studies I did of dating ads and clubs over the years. Where men tend to state what they have to offer, more often than not vastly overstating, women tend to describe what they want. One day I'll tell you about how I was the member of a club that dated women based on their want ads, them not knowing the club shared the results. But hey, I was in my twenties. Then again, every one of the women dated was a liar who expected the world on a silver platter long after she had wasted her charms.]

           Back to the mismatches. This is tricky to follow, so read carefully. One of the most recurring complaints was from women who felt the male prospects did not reflect their applications. In fact, all 100% of the sixty complaints I read in this department were from women and I don't think that can be chalked up to men being reluctant to speak.
           One has to suspect women are, as in real life, totally unreasonable in their expectations. I know women seeking marriage aren't immune to physical attraction, but they are supposed to be. Many women complained the men were too fat, short, or ugly. Can you imagine the squeal if men said the same thing? The world loves a double standard. I mean, did these women specifically state they only wanted trophy catches? Where they thin, tall and beautiful themselves?

           Last, the eHarmony reasons for rejection, the topic you've been waiting for. Well, the most common of the common are being married or being under 21. I can commend eHarmony for those standards. If you are married, butt out, slimeball. And if you are under 21 and can't get laid these days, I dunno. I mean, it is a poor substitute, but there is always law school.
           eHarmony also tells you where to go if you have been married and divorced more than four times. Good, because it shows they are on to your mating ritual. Serial marriage is legalized date rape.
           By far the curious category of rejects are the 20% (coincidence?) of applicants who display symptoms of dysthymia (say "diss-THIGH-me-ah"). Yes, eHarmony is headed by a degreed social psychologist. Dysthymia is a condition, that while not in itself a mental disorder, is a disorder present in all mentally depressed people. It concerns rapid mood swings, and I can tell you from recent experience those swings are never toward the good. I would say that explains a lot.
           Oh, and the last big category of rejections are for the classic reason: lying.

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April 27, 2011

           Dang, I'll be heading into the hospital again for some checkups. Again, I say phooey to anyone who still thinks I'm where I am because I didn't have insurance. Such people are just being thick-headed. I personally must have bought a new Mercedez for every doctor in cardiology and they should name a wing of that new hospital after me. Here is a photo of my least favorite corridor. What I didn't have was permanent income-loss insurance, and neither do you. Yeah? Show me. It would require a $50 deduction off your weekly paycheck.
           Here is a catch-22. Once I got out of that situation caused by Patsie's interference, my blood pressure dropped to normal. They were able to cut back my dosage and that goes to show you how evil that woman is. Attacking when I was at my most vulnerable. This will not be forgotten. The good news is that I weathered the storm and resources are building up again. The remaining issue is when to strike.

           Speaking of storms, I finished "Fair Winds and Far Places". Around half-way through the book, the author loosens up and starts to act like a real person. He acknowledges that other people besides married couples like to fool around. But I doubt he could admit someone like me who has never raised a family could still lead a full life. You won't find me clinging onto the last spark of life like some, desperately hoping they can get back all they've missed.
           Zane finally gets off the boat and tours the islands, giving a credible description of some history and what-not, though not a candle of what to expect from me if I had a fraction of such resources at my disposal. By chance, he went to and describes both people and places I know in downtown Caracas, Venezuela. But if he remembers gas at 11 cents a gallon over there, he was much younger than when I first arrived.

           Okay, here's some free computer advice. What do you do if your disk player won't eject a disk. I get enough phone calls on this one to spread the word. This happens when you or somebody on that computer uses an application that has and "eject" command on screen. It disables the physical button. Until you find the offending program, the easiest solution is like this:

           1. Right-click on My Computer
           2. Go to Manage
           3. Find Device Manager
           4. Uninstall the drivers to the problem optical disk. (Careful, don't uninstall anything else.)
           5. Reboot the computer.

           Now you know enough to do some real damage. But hey, then call your local computer whiz. He can use the money. I didn't say it was advice for klutzes. It was so warm by noon, I headed for the library, where I read a volume on tailoring. That is way over my head, and for now, my intentions. But you pick up handy bits of information along the way. Like with electronics, where I have read my 29 chosen articles 130 times. That is a proper study. With sewing, mind you, there is much more material available at every level.
           I can’t believe I watched an entire Mel Brooks movie, “Screw Loose”. Other than “Blazing Saddles”, his stuff is so juvenile it is embarrassing. Even then, it was the expensive choreography and actors that he could afford by then that carried it off. We all start somewhere but for most of his life, he stayed there. Not that I wouldn’t do the same, but you know what I’m talking about.
           After more exhaustive testing, I’ve concluded my motherboard is the culprit. When the computer sits idle long enough, it will begin to issue random disk commands that made me suspect the disk controller. If so, that’s $64 down the drain—but now I can afford it. This took all evening and I caught another mouse. I know there is still one more. Maybe I could borrow Pudding-Tat? Return for the final verdict on this computer crash.

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April 26, 2011

           I’ve debunked a theory, and admit that I was taken in by it myself. Remember the piece of tape over the ink cartridge that was to fool the Brother into using all the ink? Mine quit after a few days so I dismantled the printer and took a look. There are no sensors there at all. Here’s a photo of me inspecting the assembly in detail.
           The theory is that there was a little light that shone on the ink and said empty when it did not get a reflection. But these days, I know precisely what a light, or a laser, or an LED would look like and they are not there. That means the dozens of others who reported the tape had worked were also wrong, although it did produce temporary results. The culprit has to be the print heads, and Brother has stopped including a command to clean them.
           Another day of working on my old computer. I believe I’ve extended its life another three years, an amazing track record for a 2004 unit. I cloned all the drives up to the point I ran out of money. Everybody is in the same position near end of the month once the tourists leave. That tells you how fragile the Florida economy is. I had to put 19 miles on the scooter going out for spare parts, which makes me wonder how others think they can afford to operate a van.

           News from the old digs. There is a “For Rent” sign in the window. I have no idea what those crazy people are thinking, but let them waste their wampum. Tenants will always agree to pay the rent—as long as they have a job. I know the Latinos across the way can’t begin to afford whatever rent Wallace is talking about. He convinced himself he’ll get $1200 a month by reading brochures about the seafront condos during peak season. Tourists don’t come to Florida to rent a trailer a mile from the beach.
           If it’s for rent, that means Wallace went ahead and finished the repairs that I started. Of course, he’ll call all my hard work to be damage and bad design, but in reality, he’ll just be painting over and otherwise finishing the 90% I completed. That work came to a standstill when he went cranky under the influence of his insane and slightly retarded daughter.
           The place is too big for one person to live in without taking a half day off a week just to clean and maintain. The minute Wallace put a stop to the routine upkeep, of course the place went for a dump and it will never be the same. People have taken to calling it “Wally’s Folly”, how he snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Why isn’t his daughter paying him for her “ensuite”, or was that all Ontario oysters, too.
           The sad news depending on how you look at it is Pudding-Tat. She was comfortably living with the neighbors when I made the decision to leave her behind. But ever since I moved, they say she will not go inside the house. They set a sleeping box up for her on the porch. I may have to reconsider what is best. They report she spends hours of each day looking for me at the old place.

           By mid-morning, it was a broiling 94 degrees inside the building, but I have a big 20” fan in every room and the work shed. Soon, they will turn on automatically when I walk in and shut off when I leave, a 7/8ths dollar savings over running the A/C. I have chores to do that allow me in the shade all day and still be productive. Other than when I run the scooter, I can avoid the summer heat. As I told everyone, once I got back into a steady situation, we’ll begin to see incredible things. Too bad the wrong people didn’t listen, eh?
           I mentioned automating the fans. Except for building a robot, I’ve already passed the goals set for my electronics hobby, though I have no intention of stopping. I didn’t say, but I’ve been practicing soldering and reading up on sensors. I’ve noticed that sensors tend to be used in a certain fixed manner, which I’d like to deliberate on. When a sensor, say an infrared, is used, it is rigged up as a single unit.
           And the range of these off-the-shelf components is disappointing. When I can afford it (things are moving in that direction), I’d like to see if these can be coupled up. The performance is dismal, but what if many sensors could work together? Like those radio telescopes that are really a bunch of smaller telescopes. I speculate the sensors have to cover too wide a range of values or something to that effect, and that limits their usefulness.
           Can I hook up two sensors and thereby tweak something to extend the range? I mean, if I can multiplex, I should be able to focus a sensor and coordinate its performance in a wider scope. Could a series of cheap sensors emulate one big expensive unit? These are the type of things you can ponder if you are wise enough to plan how to keep out of the hot sun all day long.

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April 25, 2011

           Here’s some sewing gear. We got a thimble and a seam ripper, the basics. I dug out my sewing box and had a look. Then it cost me 97 cents to find out I require a large thimble rather than the medium shown here. Funny, it seemed larger in the box. Maybe it was packaged by Cadbury’s? I took a peek at WalMart sewing machines. All total junk. Bottom end Singer and Brother.
           I waited too long, now I have a family of mice. Time to set out those sticky traps before I have a colony. I was up past 2:00 AM reading more of “Fair Winds and Far Places”. Since it repetitiously describes Caribbean Islands that could only be described as repetitious, the book can be put down for a few days and you won’t miss much. It includes just enough facts and history to keep me reading.
           While I agree people who can afford to live on sailboats are a fairly exclusive bunch, it is still wondrous how Zane, the author, has sailed for years and met only other married, middle-aged, monogamous, white couples. I hear taking your wife on a cruise is like taking a sandwich to a banquet. He does once mention jealousy over seeing hippies and renegade stock brokers who make more in one illegal operation than he did in his lifetime. But he never meets them or anything.

           I rigged up a new antenna, which took me four hours and the signal I’m getting remains only 10%, or about 11Mbps. Not enough to support much more than e-mail and the weather report. I’ll overcome the difficulties but not without frustration. It is going to require something I don’t have: a parabolic dish. Oh well, there is no such thing as a computer problem that cannot be solved.
           Looks like I won’t be going to Colorado before the summer is out. Good, that just means I’ll have more money to travel with. I spent and uncharacteristic 1:41 on the phone tonight, but we had a lot to talk about. Plus, it was birthday time over there. Plus, it was our 30th anniversary, we met in 1981 when Marion was just a baby. Let’s tally up, she’s divorced twice or maybe thrice, has five grown adult children, all sons, and is married again. This brought up the topic of my being single.

           Marion swears by eHarmony, citing four personal cases of people she knows that gave up ever finding anyone. She’s half talked me into a the one month free trial, but let me look at the situation first, as in complaints and performance data. When I reviewed it several years back, I was not impressed. I was also put off by the ads I’d looked at, determining that 90% of the people were full of it.
           By that, I’m saying the ratios were all wrong. I know that every second person I meet does not have an advanced university degree or a professional career, but they did on eHarmony. Marion assures me that has changed, so without question I will follow up. Besides, even if I meet someone, my built-in rules will eliminate the gold-diggers. For example, I always insist the first few dates are Dutch. It has the secondary advantage of ensuring that both parties enjoy whatever you do. I doubt I would go Dutch to a biker bar, but the symphony or the planetarium sound good.

           Last, I tackled the hard drive trouble on my computer. Here’s some technical data you might like. Five years ago, a 100 Gigabyte drive was top of the line. Now it is 500 Gigabyte. But the technology has not improved. Instead, they added more disks inside the casing. There used to be a couple, not there are up to eight.
           Sadly, they still use the same fragile read-write heads. Now there are eight of them to jam or crash. So I decided to Ghost my drives up to the newest models only to find out they no longer make IDE drives. I had to go SATA, which do not include either a cable or a power cord in the box. The cable alone is $30, which is a blatant rip-off since no internal computer cable is worth that much. Fred had some spares.

           And we got to talking. Turns out I am not the only bachelor who considers $18 outrageous to have trouser cuffs sewn. Remember, I don’t run with a crowd that is ever likely to converse about such topics, but once I mentioned the sewing course, that changes things. I may already have some customers, you know, another one of the “little things” I can do for “extra money”. Surprise, Fred knows a guy with a small warehouse of used sewing machines.
           And to think I was using my seam ripper to strip insulation off stranded wires.

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April 24, 2011

           We got ourselves another beautiful Florida Sunday. The one major way Florida is ahead of the pack is that Spring arrives months early, evidenced by these flowers. And this being a five-Saturday month, I do believe that means heading out for the day and wasting all the bingo money without a care in the world. I just wish cupid would hurry up as there is enough for two.
           Next, I took my dress shirts out of the closet and minutely examined the sewing, particularly the “hems” in light of my new knowledge. Now I understand why these were expensive shirts. However, how expensive is a shirt one cannot wear in the heat? One of the things I’ll do today is drop into a sewing shop for a look-see.

           I took the early morning hours to do complicated research on genetic engineering. All the real advancement has taken place in the past fifteen years since I last looked. I’ve got this pending expectation that a breakthrough is headed this way. Look at the progress against cancer once they learned it was genetic.
           I stumbled over a few passages that confirm what I have always thought. Some people, from an early age, simply “prefer” to be stupid than to be smart. The motive appears to be that for here-and-now, stupid is totally easier. There is instant gratification to being stupid, whereas smarts are a delayed reward. So, are they stupid because they are lazy, or are they lazy because they are stupid? These are the people who see nothing wrong with having to show ID to vote in a secret ballot election.

           There were so few books in the household during my childhood. That means I witnessed the “stupid is as stupid does” behavior countless times when others read the same words. My theory now has excellent company as Dr. Crick, of DNA fame, agrees. He has shown that all brain activity can be reduced to neuron connections and we lack only the instruments to measure them. Aha, so I was right, there is no such thing as “born stupid”. It is an acquired behavior.
           How is it acquired? Let’s see, for mental exercise, do I read that textbook or do I watch Oprah? The same goes for the half-loony and over-emotional set as well. They only get away with it because there are so damn many of them they can define themselves as “normal”. I dream of the day when court cases are won by IQ instead of jabberwocky. “Mrs. Smith, you are ordered to pay damages because your stupidity caused the accident. The court rejects your claim that you didn’t know you were stupid.”

           Mr. Will and Sammy were on the same floor of the hospital. Sammy is fine, he’s there for observation. Mr. Will is not so lucky, but he is in a top-notch facility, Memorial Hospital. I forgot it was Easter Sunday, same as I forgot it was Good-For-Nothing Friday, so I was the only visitor until Will’s children came by.
           Now for today’s trivia. I’m given to understand not many people are clear on where Intel, the chip manufacturer, comes into the picture. Intel did not invent the transistor or the integrated circuit. That was Bell Labs and Texas Instruments. Those integrated circuits were enough to scare me away when I saw my first one in 1975. It required a spider web of wiring to connect anything in a meaningful way.

           What Intel did was to sandwich all that wiring as well as the components right into the chip itself. Then instead of needing an engineering degree, all you did was plug the chip into a socket and voila! Instant computer (although that is misleading). Apple and IBM are nothing more than designs utilizing these pre-made chips. As far as I know, the only other big chip companies are Motorola and AMD, since it costs a couple hundred million to set up a factory. Think of how long it would have taken you to get this information on your own.
           Another hour was devoted to examining sewing supplies in detail to get a feel for what is out there. Do I really need pinking shears? The array of offerings is monumental, from expensive tools to cheap kits. Many choices make value-neutral choices difficult. It is no happenstance that cars come in fifty different colors. The selection of thimbles alone is bewildering. Perfect for them women shoppers.
           Then, to combat any temptation to be stupid, I sat down and wrote the code to display the numbers counting down from 30 to 1, hitting every problem along the way. This was a phenomenal effort. I had to cut a couple corners, such as having the numbers flash separately, but the plan was to keep the code readable by avoiding embedded loops. This is one case where it would be just as educational for me to go look up how others did it.

           And I finally killed the little mouse. He was making too much of a mess.

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April 23, 2011

           Here’s a little photocomposition I call “Scooter & Rolls”. Ahead of me is your “Type A” successful Hollywood drug dealer. A Rolls-Royce with the windows down blasting ghetto rap along the boulevard. The car, probably a repo, is factory new except for the magnesium tire rims. You just know what that home-boy is overcompensating for.
           Remember Mr. Will, from Jimbos? He was finally going to take everybody’s advice and retire to go live in Tennessee. The cancer treatments left him permanently exhausted but they couldn’t do a thing about him being so stubborn. He landed in Memorial last week with complications. So did Sammy, the bartender, who managed a case of pneumonia. How do you catch pneumonia in Florida?

           I’m half-way through another murder mystery, this one called “Cop Killer” by Tom Philbin. Finally an author with a different-sounding name. It is very well-written compared to the current schlock on the bestseller list. Researched to the level of complete believability, Philbin overworks the cop-as-reluctant-hero angle. The book is 74 short chapters though it could be trimmed to 65 if the author could figure out a police detective’s recent divorce is really not central to the plot.
           I’m on youTube. I discovered the one brand of video (wmv) I can produce on this computer will post. That doesn’t mean the other side can play it, but it is a Microsoft product. I posted five videos which youTube somehow counts as six. Go to youTube and search [veryaltantic].

           After this initial success, I will attempt to find out how to produce the more common flv format. It is probably done by some manner of conversion software. I have hundreds of unpublished videos on disk including a lot of Everglades’s footage. (Yes, that is the correct possessive of “Everglades”.)
           There is an interesting value system over why someone my age would post nonsense videos on the Internet. I am fascinated by the technology, but the real reason is playing the odds. Like most idealists, I would like to get rich without selling out to the man. Riches are bittersweet if you sacrifice your youth or enjoyment of life. Working for a living is pure certain surrender without even the corresponding hope.
           We are surrounded by nonsense that all you have to do is find something you enjoy doing. Find? Whaddaya mean find? People who say such crap were born rich, because they don’t tell you how to survive for twenty years conducting the full-time search. Well, my said value system is similar to but far from identical to that of a wannabe rock star. There probably isn’t a musician alive who doesn’t dream of the big one. That’s where we differ; they keep trying the same thing for life (usually at the same blues bar) where I tend to try different approaches after a failure. Both methods have worked in the past.

           It just takes that one hit and you are set for life—only if you are prepared. Unless you were born particularly talented (I’ve met such people, and we aren’t among them) the best odds you’ll have are to constantly probe until something connects. True, it takes time, but that is why they call it gambling. This produces missed opportunities since most people don’t have a mechanism in place to capitalize on even a tiny chance win. If they were offered the winning lottery ticket for a grand, they’d have to run off and ask their uncle to lend them the money.
           But remember, I’ve done my homework. I just need that one post to go viral and I’m permanently rich and famous. No matter how deep people look after that, they will find another layer and another layer. It’s there and it is no flash in the pan. I’ve even thought of selling this blog. Why would people pay for something that is free? Simple, this blog is too big to read on-line and printing it out would be more expensive than buying the book. And I can always write more.

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April 22, 2011

           We all gotta start somewhere, and this is where I started. See that perfectly straight seam? There are many like her, but this one is mine. Design and material compliments of Learn 2 Sew Inc. which by pure coincidence is just five minutes from here. This lesson was proof of concept, I now know that I can do this and the hem and cuff class is the obvious next move.
           There was also time to sew a small “pillowcase” and a round doohickey that, once the basics of the machine are understood, came off neatly on the first attempt. I regret now throwing out two loads of clothes last year when I moved, but there are plenty of used-to-be long-sleeve shirts still in my closet. For $25 per class, guys, get over any insecurities and sign up. It is worth every penny.

           Let’s take stock. I can bake. I can fix shoes. I can type. When I finish Home Ec 101 and can sew, I’ll be my own butler. These are not hobbies, these are practical moves in the face of what is heading this way. Ann Landers would say I’m making lemonade. I pity those who are not taking an active hand in their own self-reliance. The very last of the affordable service shops are about to retire. Have others not seen American businesses will go bankrupt before they’ll lower their prices?
           I kind of had two choices with the sewing machine. I’ve decided to investigate the Kenmore, though even that model has a shitload of features I’ll never use. The other choice, from what I understand, is to get a fancy machine, but then sit around watching over-30 dating on cable TV and bitchin’ how swell everybody else has it, letting the machine rust. My calculations show that a Kenmore will pay for itself just fixing the tiny wardrobe I have already.
           When I stepped out the door this morning, I saw a diminutive black lady standing beside her car in the empty parking lot. The traffic was ignoring her so I went over to see what gives. It turns out the plastic fenderwell lining had fallen off and was making a terrible screeching noise which she could not stop the car to investigate without also stopping the noise. You can just make out her reflection on the door panel with me snapping this picture.

           I examined the situation and pulled the whole piece loose. Then I put it in her trunk and told her to get it fixed soon. Why? In the old days, the fenderwells were empty space, but these days they are crammed with the windshield washer bottle and all kinds of delicate wiring and gadgets that have to be expensively removed before you can change a damn fan belt. That plastic is the only thing between these parts and the road. Incidentally, the plastic piece gets broken by driving like an idiot over those yellow parking chocks. I sent her on her way.
           Trivia for the day is another of those gems that would take forever to find out on your own. Everybody knows each cell in your body, your skin, your hair, your tears, contains an exact replica of your entire DNA. Well, not quite. Red blood cells don’t have DNA. That gallon of red blood at the crime scene won’t help the cops catch the bad guy. But don’t worry; the white blood cells supply all the DNA they want.

           How about a little dating philosophy? My client and I got to talking again about dating and how she was to do a little matchmaking. Where do you meet single women? This has got to be one of those fields where, for some reason, 99% of people start from scratch, but they will never say they don’t know. They start by suggesting church groups or eHarmony, as if you’ve been living under a rock.
           Church groups are where I met that weirdo nurse who left her cell phone on the table between us “in case her son called for bail money”. That’s same nurse who emailed for months after I quit calling to pray for me because I “could not deal with the complexities” in her life.
           And eHarmony is the new dive bar, the new bus depot, where the only truly available women are the skanks. The rest have cell phones on the table. The rule of thumb is: when you take dating advice from a woman, remember she already considers you a deadbeat for being single in the first place.
           Myself, I’ve only dated one woman in my life I did not meet through music (Judith Ann Minty). She was, like myself, single never married. My complaint is not the commonplace version that I’m meeting them and can’t connect. I can connect any time I want. It is that I’m not meeting anyone to connect with. The supply dried up years ago.

           Yes, as a matter of fact, I would prefer a woman who has been a natural blue-eyed blonde (like myself) for at least one tiny, eentsy moment in her life. The other facet of dating is how hardnosed women get when you mention looks. If you even suggest you are attracted by attraction, they pop a fuse, get antsy and bent right out of shape. Why, you are being unreasonable. You only want a beauty queen. You must be a child molester. Your standards are too high. You are robbing the cradle. You have outrageous expectations. You are also about to leave. That’s what I do.
           [Author’s note: Yes, I know the obvious conclusion if you want to date when you are past a certain age. Since you won’t get much being single without also being rich, tall and handsome, that leaves one option for most men. The only way for them to avoid monotony is to get a woman at home and cheat. I did not say that was right, only that most men have no choice if they want variety. I concede that the men who cheat for sexual adventure are universally the simple-minded azzholes who have done nothing to deserve it, but I won’t lecture them on this fact nearly as often as I did my own brothers. Nice guy that I am.]
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April 21, 2011

           Meet Ruby. The parrot who thinks a fax handshake is a mating call. Kind of like Lester over in shipping and handling. Especially handling. As with most birds and women once you marry, she goes dead limp and silent when she should be participating. Ruby knows to say “bye” as anyone leaves the room, which I found significant. This picture has been enhanced to show the true color of Ruby’s plumage.
           I believe the new printer here will be a Canon. During further tests this morning, I determined that my client’s unit was defective in that the fax function would not draw dial tone. The Canon tech support tested the same and the next incident came as a surprise.

           Without the supreme nonsense of Sony or Brother, Canon shipped out a replacement unit at their own expense. That is almost unbelievable considering the degeneration of customer service in America. Canon offered the option of a repair or a replacement, this being Florida, I chose the replacement. That is superb service, Canon.
           I may further add that I am an old hand at such testing and know when I’ve got a real technician on the other end of the line. The Canon tech zeroed in precisely on the problem with no wasted moves. Best of all, Canon tech support did not have some bubble head answer the phone and give me the third degree or try to do the census on me. I reached a real English-speaking professional within two minutes of picking up the phone. Are you listening, Hewlett Packard? I didn’t think so.

           Dave-O may want [to buy] Enrique’s place. I see Dave-O pulled up again while I was on the service call. He’ll probably arrive tomorrow while I’m at my sewing class. I’ve pretty much decided on the wisdom of having two extra hours of instruction to learn specifically how to do cuffs. There has got to be some English saying to the effect cuffs make the man. Any country with an economic system regressing to wool farming and dull poetry wouldn’t miss that one.
           Here I am, reading about sailing again. This time it is the weird book of the 70s. The author was a bond trader who ditched everything to go sailing. Back then they still made wives who went along with such things for the sake of the relationship and the marriage. The title, “Fair Winds and Far Places” initially put me off, as in reality, it took rich parents to be a hippie. Everybody else had to cut their hair eventually go to work.

           As it turns out, the author, Zane Mann, has a lot to say and a keen way of putting it. He is very aware he comes across as a cheeky “if I can do it, anybody can”, but goes on to explain rather believably that he was never part of the corporate culture that supplied him the assets to leave them behind. I kept reading, as it has parallels to my own life, where I worked just long enough to not have to work. If you can’t work to get ahead, why work at all?
           The book describes what I myself might have done if I’d made millions instead of mere thousands. In a manner of thinking, since I can’t any longer sail or drive, maybe I am doing the same thing on a limited scale. You know, I’ll do a little deep thinking on this subject. He’s got a sailboat and a harbor; I’ve got a scooter and a trailer court. Let’s see what else he has to say.
           Last for today, let me tell you about the social issues of troubleshooting a fax machine in Florida. I do believe it was only my exposure to my family that allowed me to get through the process without walking out. You see, to test a fax machine, you need to know somebody with another fax machine. For me, that is no trouble, but for others, it becomes an insurmountable morning-long challenge. Don’t go thinking you just call up somebody in Florida and ask for the favor. It don’t work like that.

           I recall the time I tried to get my brother to send me a fax. This is how my half of the conversation went. Try to imagine the responses I got that produced these questions:

           “Do you have a fax machine?”
           “Does it work?”
           “Is it nearby where you are?”
           “Is the fax machine hooked up?”
           “Do you know how to send a fax?”
           “Do you have the fax number?”
           “Is the fax on this phone line or a separate phone line?”

The conversation produced those questions, but also these follow-on sentences, so again use your imagination.

           “I meant a fax machine that you could use, not just whether you owned one.”
           “Well, could you go out to the garage and get it?”
           “It’s okay if it has no ink, you’ll only be sending a fax. No, I’m not joking.”
           “You will have to plug it in to use it, you know. It won’t work otherwise.”
           “Wait for dial tone and dial the fax number.”
           “No, no, this fax number, not your fax number.”
           “Then you’ll have to hang up before you send the fax.”

That’s the point where I lost him. Once he hung up, he was lost and without phone service for two days till I drove over there. He accused me of lying to him because I didn’t tell him he’d have to plug his phone back in when the fax was done. Thinking fast, something not hard to do around my brother, I was able to shut him up by telling him I really did try to call him back but his phone was out of service. Could be he is still working on that one.
           And that, folks, is why it took 3-1/2 hours today to test a Florida fax machine.

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April 20, 2011

           A little more midnight oil, and we have success with the LED lamp displays. Shown here, I can get two different numbers to display in pairs, in this case 75 and 36, chosen arbitrarily. I can’t get them to count or time anything, but the fact it works is good enough for me. Importantly, it uses the same 7 resistors as the single lamp display (plus the two resistors on the transistors).
           I did not have to double the number of leads for two lamp displays. This is a full-fledged operating display, multiplexed and transistor controlled, completely designed using on principles learned with no outside kits or directions. That’s why these things get mentioned so often—they are the most significant events of a given day. I’d say I gotta get out more, but the hobby is intended to stop me from doing just that.

           It isn’t all roses. If you look closely, the elements are only half as bright as a single digit. They are one atop the other instead of side-by-side. There is a faint back-glow from the elements that are supposed to be off. And I won’t tell you what having to look through all the wiring reminds me of.
           How about some trivia? When Bill Gates was 25, he paid $50,000 for CP/M, the operating system he illegally copied to produce his first disk operating system (DOS). Did you know the reason the Beatles quit performing live is that they could not hear themselves on stage. No, not the amplifiers. The fans. This is where I like to point out Eric Clapton never had a top ten single. Cotton is 25% stronger wet than when dry and under the right circumstances can stop an arrow on the same principle as Kevlar. During WWII Germany produced 142,000 aircraft. The Allies destroyed 116,000. What happened to the rest? I know.

           Rehearsal tonight was a disappointment. We chose 12 standards which we individually knew and so could be expected to mesh. No mesh. It is rarely a good plan to get on stage with me without knowing your part inside out and backwards. Thus, I’ve scheduled a live show a week from Friday. I’ll be watching the audience, not the people beside me.
           It was so early, I stopped in to see Laura’s Karaoke show at My Buddie’s Place. With maybe ten regulars, imagine the surprise when I got a standup cheer for singing “North To Alaska”. One gal in the crowd said she knew some guitar players who could play like me. The first three she mentioned are men I’ve fired years ago, the “Hotel California Gang", right up there with the "Mustang Sally Bunch". She was old enough to have bought into the guitarist-as-hero ticket. But not old enough to realize times have changed.

           Sleuth that I am, I got home and saw the tire tread marks in my driveway. A lot of people came by after I left for the library at 4:00 PM. The trick is to catch me in the mornings, when I’m likely to be sipping coffee and working the computer. And taking lunch out of the oven, even though I like my microwave. My newest antenna is able to detect the signal from the nearest Dunkin’ Donuts. And what can be detected can be filtered and amplified. (It took them a year to figure out to put in a passworded log-on.)
           Here’s a reward for those of you who read this far. A nugget of information that could take countless hours of research on your own, I give you for free. Most of us have heard that scientists have found meteorites from Mars on the south polar ice cap. Ah, but how do they know they are from Mars? Sure, all meteorites come from outer space, but what makes them think a particular few are Martian?
           Actually, it is done by matching up a factor that can be measured very accurately from Earth. Spectroscopes allow us to examine the finest details of atomic structure in the distant stars, so there is no problem analyzing the atmospheric gases of the nearby planets and moons that have them. It turns out Mars has, as planets go, a distinctive atmosphere. Its rocks contain entrapped pockets of gas that are like a fingerprint of origin. Now you know.

           [Author’s note: pieces of Mars get to Earth when Mars itself is hit by a large meteorite. Mars gravity isn’t enough to stop chunks of the planet from being flung off into space when this happens. Some pieces eventually reach Earth.]

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April 19, 2011

           A few more hours of research raises the probability that all five of the diagrams I used to test my transistor circuitry were wrong. As shown here, somebody is dead wrong, dead stupid, or both. I long for the days when it was necessary to consult only one or two authorities. Now I discover a dozen publications that show I must use the exact opposite type of transistor and place the LED in the exact opposite position.
           Never read a safe or poison mushroom chart off the Internet, the greatest medium for dispensing misinformation ever invented. In fourteen hundred and ninety three, Columbus sailed the deep blue sea. Stupidity can now spread at the speed of light, which is actually quite slow for the town I grew up in, where it moved at warp 9. That town was so small it still doesn’t have a gay dating post on the Internet.

           I found another blog, Paul's Electronics , (which will not link) with much the same research I’m doing, the author is looking into LED matrix displays. While he occasionally mentions he is reviewing things from his degree in electronics “15 years ago”, my studies date back an entire 15 weeks. That’s a nice boost. Since his site is glossy with perfect spelling and grammar, I intend to study it for answers.
           Already, many questions about my sewing class. Folks, I don’t know. That’s why I tend to wait until after I’ve done something to report it here. Revealing advance plans attracts people who will wind up interfering in some manner. You know what I mean. My family never learned to mind their own business because they were always 100% right 10% of the time. I just signed up and have not taken the lessons yet. It teaches how to sew a straight line using a sewing machine. Maybe fashion design is next semester. I don’t even know how to cut cloth yet.

           Nor do I own a sewing machine and was hoping to learn about that, too. I’m also going to the class to meet women, hell, I’ve tried everything else. A woman learning to sew is a better bet than one who can, but doesn’t, no names mentioned. It is intended to be a money-saver, not a money-maker. But I’m a fast learner and I intend to thread her bobbin, whoever she is. (The sewing machine was completely eclipsed by a electronics in a matter of months.)
           Later, by early afternoon, a small breakthrough, as I rigged up a series of known voltages to the transistor circuit and stepped through progressive stages of resistance. I am on to something in that if the load is light enough, it is easy to supply enough current through the transistor base to operate the circuit. I have the lightest of loads, an LED with a 1,000Ω resistor. I surmise the correct resistance is somewhere between 5,000Ω and 100,000Ω, the only combinations I can’t test yet. (I have an aversion to doing the math because I don’t learn anything that way, which I realize is the opposite of most people.)

           It is even later and I went to the Barn for the afternoon, reading up on transistors. In another flattering discovery, a new book by that Simon Monk guy shows that we independently reached the identical solution to the 7-segment LED display. In fact, I would have bought the book ($25) except he did not proofread it himself. There were several diagrams that could not exist in reality.
           But it was with great interest I read his passages on multiple LEDs. He started off using arrays, something I avoided to make the code more understandable. The standing joke right now is my time machine (The Spirit of St. Jimbos) can only go back to single digit years. I need four LEDs and I will be forced to multiplex (use arrays).

           As I chug along the railway of knowledge, I’m developing my own theory of ganging these LEDs together. By now, I am curious to know if my thinking will match the published sources. I’ve been doing okay so far. I’m thinking these things are “common cathode”, meaning maybe I can get away with controlling just the positive pins and using transistors to turn the ground (the common cathode) off really fast to fake the display. Like I mean, really, really fast.
           My last calculation today was to note new clothes prices, and I went to the so-called discount stores. It has been years since I could shop for fashion rather than what I could afford. That is why I also read several sewing books on how to modify and follow trends. Even though this sewing course is costing me $17.50 per hour, it could be a fantastic bargain if I accomplish what I set out to do. Hems, sleeves, and pockets.
           I’ve also examined how to follow sewing patterns, but only for curiosity at this point. Paying close attention to the measurements that match my size and shape, I can already see why some shirts I own are not favorites, and more valuably, what can be done about it. However, that is far off the scale of what I set out to do for now.

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April 18, 2011

           My nose in the books during y’day’s rainstorm found me reading up on 7-segment displays. That is our trivia for today. These are those neat tubes that showed numbers, and when you looked into the tube you could see they were 3-D. They were the precursors of flat 7-segment LEDs. Remember those 1975 Casio wristwatches you had to press the button to see the time? That’s what I mean.
           I had a 1976 calculator with a tube 7-segment display, the one you turned it upside down to spell various words like 07734 for “hELLO”. It used a set of batteries every four days even when turned off. I believe it needed six volts to operate. Rusty laughed when I spent $40 on it but we later planned nine years of our investments with that gadget. Proving again, it is not the calculator, but the man behind it, that really counts.

           [Author's note 2020: they were called nixie tubes, last made in the 1990s. Production has recommenced in Czechosovakia. They cost $22 each.]

           I discovered the workings, that the display requires an integrated circuit to input a 4 digit binary number which gets translated into a 7-segment display. As luck would have it, there was one (shown here) in my toolbox. Thanks to my studies with LEDs, a different technology, I was able to see the chip was upside-down in the package and I knew exactly the significance of “common cathode”.
           I also discovered the digital readout on many gas price signs is a 7-segment display because LCDs themselves are too fragile for outdoor temperature changes. That’s the gas signs guys, known as a “totem”, and not the gas pumps. Notice the display is slanted slightly to the right. There is a reason for that, too. If becoming a mad scientist is fun, how come I have to work so hard at it?

           I believe I have the knowledge to unintegrate the circuit, that is, to get this thing to display without resorting to a factory-made chip. What an accomplishment that would be (for me)! Let me check my records, hang on. Back. The lamp cost $1.99 making it far cheaper than a LCD, but still expensive enough that I will calculate the voltage from the Arduino pins, something I have avoided before. Don’t even ask me how to display a two-digit number at this point. It is now 6:50 AM.

           Less than two hours later, I report complete success. Please read the meeting minutes for details. Using only components in my tool kit and planning the entire Arduino code on the fly (as I typed it in), I got the entire setup of code, brainboard, breadboard and components to work the first time. The only snag was it took me a few minutes to realize I needed two delays between the flashing digits rather than one. Well, because if it doesn’t flash, how do you really know it is working? Congratulations if you can figure out why.

           In celebration of this landmark achievement, I’m spending the rest of the day in the library. But not to get carried away, I still do not have any practice or good methods of wiring circuits permanently. That is an area I will eventually need to concentrate on, which probably means learning to etch printed circuit boards.
           Wait, there’s more. Didn’t I mention sewing? I signed up for a $35 sewing course. It’s a basic “how to” on a machine, since I have no intention of learning to sew by hand. This type of skill is, in my opinion, going to be important soon, although it has not been worth much over the past 40 years. But today, it does not make sense to pay $18 to get a cuff put on a $4 pair of thrift store trousers.
I           have three goals with sewing, and I’m not likely to forget typing class, where I was the only man in a room full of single women. That was a long time ago, but man that was a fun class and for six months afterward. I want to cuff my own pants, I want to make all my shirts short-sleeve, and I want every t-shirt I own to have a “tit” pocket that fits a DVD. These are noble causes, and you’d agree if you ever made the mistake of wearing a long-sleeve shirt in Florida. I have a right to bare arms.

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April 17, 2011

           This time, I really took the transistors through the paces. That’s why they get top billing today. It seems there are two schools, one that says the transistor should control the power supply, others that it should control the ground. Both will work, but the ground method seems more logical to me. You don’t have to match the transistor to the voltage being supplied. Here is the circuit that kept me busy for three hours. You can clearly see the 3V battery on the right (yellow wires) controlling the 9V power supply on the left (red and black wires).
           That single trip to Miami took care of all the final details concerning my new establishment. Now back on my own schedule, I’m already operating at a surplus. Tanned, rested, and ready to go to court. The only reason I didn’t do the trip around Okeechobee today was I didn’t feel like it. Instead, I baked chicken and meatloaf, and watched the Canadiens.

           The strange part is I knew all along the neighbor was going to pull those cable TV wires down. The main wire hung slightly lower than the roof of his mobile home. I just knew he wouldn’t check and he would rely on that clueless woman to help. Oh, she’s pretty, but she’s clueless. Nobody will call for repairs, since they were all connected illegally. (Anyone who’s lived in Canada automatically knows how to steal cable TV.)
           Around a third of their number have not left yet. Within a day, they were at work, as a team, trying to reconnect their own service. But the guy ripped the wires right out of the distribution boxes up high on the telephone poles. He couldn’t have done more damage if he tried. As he dragged the cables along the street, his woman was screaming. Not at him to stop, but screaming to save her little dog from all the sparks.

           Bingo was average but I may have to take a week off to emphasize that my show isn’t free. It costs money to put on a good show, plus a computer, disk burner, players, cables, cords, disks, planning, and things that are valuable if only because they take time. I’m thinking of not showing on the 30th, which will be a bad weekend anyway because it is rent week. It would remind people of how dry bingo can be when you don’t tip. And I could spend the weekend in Miami.
           It tuckered me out y’day, but I connected a Canon printer that pretty much made up my mind to go with that brand. Purely by coincidence I got a callout for this wireless printer and was able to determine it does have a USB connection in a recess of the back panel. Compared to the bloated software requirements of Brother and HP, the Canon was a breeze.
           Earlier, I may have misread the lack of an Ethernet connection [on newer model printers]. Let’s see if I can explain this right. The lack of an Ethernet cable and presence of a wireless is only a concern for a networked printer. I rarely network my home gear. The way they worded it, there was no direct connection at all, but they meant no direct connection that could be networked.

           While working, I got talking to the owner, a lady with green eyes around my age. She has a parrot, meaning we were instantly on the same plane. Remember my budgie, Memphis? You can always tell a man by his pet. I never had to own a vicious dog or a macho convertible or get a hair weave or go into politics. (You see, guys, that’s because I’ve got a big yoyo.)
           That single callout will probably make up my mind on the new printer. We got to chatting about what I like in women and she indicated she has a few acquaintances. It will be curious where that leads, as I certainly haven’t been meeting any contenders on my own lately. I’ve established that local women don’t do any of the things they say they like to do. Even my traditional approach doesn’t work in Florida. (That’s where you buy a woman’s magazine on where to meet men and go hang out there.)

           My blog schedule says I must report the most outstanding event of today. That’s a poser. I didn’t go out. I drank coffee. It rained. I took a nap. What can I say? That I finally spent a day like 99% of the rest of Florida? I better point out some differences fast. Okay, I didn’t watch TV. I read books, non-fiction. I didn’t stay home because I was broke; there’s $450 in the cookie jar plus the bingo money in my pocket. I reviewed videos of my first trip to Okeechobee back in 2000, when I didn’t’ know what sugar cane was.
           I set up the Yamaha and figured out the real chords to “This Kiss” and some original bass runs. I made rice and took all my pots and pans out of the cupboards and washed them for no reason. I double-checked my income tax projections for the next quarter, noting Texas is back in the picture. But other than that, I spent an average day at home.

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April 16, 2011

           Here’s a photo of the neighbor pulling out of the lot next door with his $410,000 motor home. He could have asked me to help, but I was taking an afternoon nap. I never heard a thing until too late. Instead, he got his woman to guide his path. Big mistake. Read on.
           Her priority was that little half-rat poodle cradled in her loving arms. “Don’t you worry, Fifi, that big scary man is not going to drive over you in his trailer, wuv you, wuv you, wuv you.” She was shielding the dog’s head instead of watching the vehicle, actually waving her hand in a most unnatural manner as one pretending to help without doing so.

           I heard the scrunch. By the time I ran out there to stop him, he had peeled off a his dome air conditioner on a tree branch, shaved off several inches of the office carport (shown here) and dragged the entire neighborhood’s cable TV drop wires some 60 feet down the roadway.
           She was standing just to the left, she had stopped following him so she could keep her precious doggie in the shade and he clipped the building. She had this quizzical look on her face wondering why he was dragging all those wires along. At $8,500 damage in a minute, it’s a miracle little Fifi survived the ordeal. Poor, poor little Fifi must have been scared half to death, the way that man started shouting.
           What’s this? The average house price in the USA has dropped $26,000 in a year. Isn’t that roughly equal to most people’s mortgage payments? Another coincidence? I can’t tell you what to invest in, but I can tell you the traditional avenues won’t work. That’s stocks, bonds, real estate, all kaput. Actually, I got out of bonds back in 1985 when I calculated that after inflation and taxes, you got nowhere. I also noticed the same about real estate in 1987.

           [Author’s note: here’s a reminder about JP’s sister, who used to brag in 2007 that her $200,000 house purchased in 1996 was now worth $400,000. My calculations are that she made 120 mortgage payments of $1,879.94 totaling $225,593.11, plus paid taxes of $7,500 per year totaling $75,000. That means by 2007, she had paid out $300,493.11 and still owed $100,000 on that house. By my calculations, she lost $493.11. And 90% of the working class in this country is headed for the same fate. And I first said all this back in 1987.]

           Here’s some information. I’ve been experimenting with olive oil and decided it is just too expensive for general use. I’ve also discovered other characteristics which I’ll describe, since they aren’t exactly listed in the cookbook. The oil is light, more of it will absorb into what you are cooking. My guess is almost twice the quantity of corn oil. I don’t use oil that often, so I store it in the freezer to notice that olive oil freezes very easily and takes longer to thaw.
           The next trial will involve canola (rapeseed) oil. (Rape is the core Latin word for “turnip”.) I’ve noticed a product on the shelf that is a mixture of olive and canola. I’ll eventually choose a replacement, hopefully somebody finds this informative. At least I’ve gone from merely changing my diet to finally looking closely at the ingredients I cook with. And, it was the most exciting thing that happened so far today.

           Oooohhh, what do I find out about canola oil? It is a contraction for “Canadian Oil Low Acid”. It is “considered safe”. It has a “reputation” for being healthy based on the theory that absence of saturated fats doesn’t cause heart disease. Are you reading what I’m reading: Canadian? Considered? Reputation? Theory? These words are all abstracts. I think I’ll move on to the next cooking product on my list, pending a little more verification and fact, there Ottawa.
           From what we hear, the same Queen’s Justice means the absence of a law doesn’t necessarily make you innocent. Meanwhile, Mr. Minister of Justice, shouldn’t you be calling it Revcanol for “Revenue Canada Oil”? You know, the brand you used on Charles Vernon Meyers.

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