One year ago today: September 13, 2015, Josephine who?
Five years ago today: September 13, 2011, pizza scissors.
Nine years ago today: September 13, 2007, “Often wrong, but never in doubt.”
Random years ago today: September 13, 2012, Spanish gold.
MORNING
I found a misfiled note booklet from December, 2010. It shows during that December I looked at a double-wide trailer in Bamboo Isles for $40K. I had not yet decided to move out of the Deep South. Let’s see what else was doing in 2010. I did not check to see if any of this was already recorded.
An Amtrak roomette Washington to Chicago was $290 per person.
I responded to 23 advertisements on December 12th.
The Los Angeles Adventure Hotel said I could stay a month for $45/night.
I spent $40.85 at Hacktronics in San Diego (by money order).
On New Year’s Eve, the red scooter odometer read 7,938 miles.
I conceived the idea of driving the scooter to St. Augustine.
Ray-B sent me a list of open mics in Davie, FL.
Another five hours on the floor, mostly getting the new end plates level, that’s the new block you see diagonally down this photo between the old joists. As typical, each one has to be custom fit, hence the long hours. The new joists will be hung from these plates, you can see some of the 2x4” sister joists along the old lumber. I opted not to put 2x6” because the old joists were already notched. Plus they were solid enough that the 2x4” reinforcement was already overkill.
This photo is the north end of the building, where the effects of weather seem to have been minimal. Not all of the boards shown here are fastened yet.
Land’s End, England
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NOON
The cool hurricane week was a false alarm, the heat wave is back. Good thing I started at 7:00AM. By mid-afternoon it was unbearable outside. There is a breeze, but it is a hot blast. I got a pal to help move the 2x6”s to the back yard where I can feed them in as needed. I bought five and got stung an extra $15. The boards were $3 more apiece at Lowes than Home Depot. In the end, I’ll essentially have two sets of joists. That floor is staying put for the rest of my life. And that living room will seem like a romp in the park now. Because now I know the place isn’t falling down.
I also go to the stage of rerouting the electrical and the last owner ran into the same snag. The breaker box is too small and an expensive sub-panel may be required. The modern code standard says each air conditioner should have its own dedicated circuit. In this case, that could be a messy proposition.
Then, there is the attic insulation. Agt. R says to rent an insulation blower. I have no idea how to operate the thing. I’ve seen demo videos, but those tend to gloss over the hard parts. And it sounds like a two-man operation. I think I’ll feed the batts up through the cubby-hole myself. All exercise is therapeutic, so if you want some, go buy a house. You’ll thank me the next time you actually jump to your feet.
NIGHT
If there’s one confusing component to beginners, it is the op-amp (operational amplifier). It is an electronic component with two inputs, which for some dismal reason are called “inverting” and “non-inverting” inputs. To anybody with a functional brain, that means one of the inputs inverts the signal. If you put 4.5 volts into it, it will invert it to -4.5 volts. Wrong. The engineer who named them lacked the required functional brain.
If A is greater than B, the output switches to low, if A is less than B, the output switches to high. Neither of the inputs ever gets inverted. It is comparing input A to B where the output gets inverted. Got it? When A is higher output is low, when A is lower, output is high. Hence, some dorkball called input A the “inverting input” when in fact, it is output that gets inverted.
An analogy that might help is to think of your furnace thermostat. It is like an op-amp that turns your furnace on when the incoming signal says “cold” and turns it off if the incoming signal reads “hot”. All you do is set the steady value. And then your old man stomps in and turns it 5 degrees cooler to save money. Doing shit like that explains why he is so filthy rich.
The op-amp has a similarity to transistors, in that it behaves differently depending on the input signal. The op-amp can therefore act as an amplifier (analog) or as a switch (digital). Apparently it is much more efficient at this than transistors. There are many ways to connect the op-amp up to a circuit, but that is a different topic. Right now, I’m explaining that to the beginner that the naming convention of the op-amp pins was created by an idiot.
I wrote this because I have known people who were electronic engineers their entire lives yet never knew how these op-amp works—because they lacked the ability to explain it. That’s disgusting, but it happens all the time. Now I have only told you the principle that helps to understand the op-amp circuit. There are dozens of other quirks about the way it operates, but I needed to clear up this needless confusion over “inverting” and “non-inverting”. It’s is situation that would have been better if the engineer had just kept his mouth shut.
ADDENDUM
Here’s a tale from the former trailer court. I was trying to concentrate on my work, but a memory, a really rotten thing Bill and I, my old guitarist used to do kept distracting me. In my early twenties we played in bars out near Spokane and after hours there was only one place that served any alcohol. It was a pizza joint opened up by these two city guys, who were going to establish a big major chain. As usual, thirty years later, they were still nowhere.
Anyway, the catch was you had to order food if you wanted to drink there, and neither Bill or I were into pizza after midnight. So what we used to do was spot a table with a couple of local gals by themselves and pretend we were hitting on them just so we could order booze. Back then, Bill and I were the only guys in town who had been to university and we kind of walked over these farm girls. They wanted out of that town, we just wanted another round of Budweisers.
The sad part is two-fold. One, we did wind up scoring with quite a number of perfectly-shaped farmer’s daughters, something you just don’t find in America any more. Bill and I were only interested in fancy city women. So that’s sad part number one. The second sad part is that today, I would give anything to meet just one more gal like any of those again. But you don’t know at the time that is the last real fun you’ll ever have. At least if you are the type that likes your hay green, before it’s been through the cow.
Last Laugh
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