One year ago today: April 26, 2016, heap good reading.
Five years ago today: April 26, 2012, Google removes blog videos.
Nine years ago today: April 26, 2008, flat on the Tamiami.
Random years ago today: April 26, 2004, Hawaiian Days.
There’s a law that says other laws have to be understandable to the layman, but not enough laymen know about it so there is no public outcry when things get ridiculous. Like the Florida boat registration laws. If it is over 16 feet, it must be registered unless it is stored on private property. It does not have to be in the water. That means to move it across the road, haul it by trailer, or crate it up and ship it to your cousin, you must register it with the DMV. Not so fast.
The boat we have is already registered. Leaving it in the back yard, I took Agt. R down to the river. He was shocked. The water is not only higher than he’s seen it off-season, but it is green and putrid (see photo). With dead fish (tilapia, or African grunt fish, same thing) rotting on the banks. There was a bloom a few months back and this is different than the brown water I saw y’day. I would not have waded knee-deep in what was present today. He pointed to where he used to walk with his kids up the gravel banks miles to the north. When I saw the river last December, it was mountain creek clear. Now it is like stinky green mud.
Why has none of this made the papers? And where is the green water coming from? If Lake Hancock smelled this bad, there’d be an outcry. The whole situation smells of something more than dead fish, Polk County. Who’s in charge of these things? Find him and run the guy off.
[Author’s note: I discovered later that the river is the responsibility of the Fish and Wildlife Department, and they are “looking into it”. WTF? The thing is green and so polluted the fish are rotting on the banks. Looking into it, they say. They’ve got money to drive around in brand new trucks and check boat registrations, but when the river dies, they are “looking’. Get in a rowboat, go up the river till you find the source, and clap the cuffs on him.
Drive a bulldozer in and back the slush up into his own property. Shut off the valve, clean up the river, and send him the bill. Then put yourselves on report for letting it happen in the first place. End of problem. Department of Losers, that’s what it is.]
They don’t much advertise, but I found two outfits who sell gold equipment in Florida. One is in Orlando with no phone number, the other is in Pompano Beach and sells mainly metal detectors. Some pretty amazing things have been found on Florida beaches. But not the beaches you see because most of the sand in the tourist photos is trucked in off season. I also took the time to demonstrate to Agt. R that at our level, the tin pie plate is an adequate panning tool.
Titanic's turbine animation.
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Welcome to April 26, another of those productive days when nothing gets done. I steered matters away from the gold, a captivating topic, toward the mundane topic of lantern replicas. Many people are aware that management performance is measured in dollars. They’ve just never met anyone so trained how to do it. It isn’t easy to understand that although we may never make that many, it is important what level the production line is set up for. My estimate was 400. We should not make decisions based on less, even if we never run such a number.
We need a source of cheap lumber that can be cut to 6-1/2” square and a way to tarnish the brass-plated hardware. It’s plate because it sticks to a magnet. Each of these cumulative steps is aimed at getting the labor down to 25% of the initial estimate. I’ve approved enough materials to build twenty as a test case. I have only room here for production, not for final assembly or storage. My dunk tank is a plastic homer bucket and can paint one lantern at a time.
I’ve documented the steps required, except for what I can’t do, like cut the glass. Twenty-eight steps for now. Each time you touch it, the cost goes up. Beginning Friday, I need a week off to finish the room. Plain and simple, my house is a priority and I already know how inclined I am to work in bursts when the time is right. All the cutting and shaping will be in the white shed, so I’m throwing a roof liner on that asap. What I report on in the next week should already be familiar to my regular readers.
“Somebody stole my mood ring and I’m not
sure how I feel about that.”
One thing I’ll probably never understand is how people like Owen Wilson become movie start. Same with Aniston and Sheen, I know it happens but I’ll never understand it. I’ll watch the movies when they are available cheap, but these people are at there very worst when put into light comedy roles. Then, when you consider the caliber of people that would pay for movie tickets to see such cheap-ass productions, it kind of makes sense. The way stupid people outnumber smart people, I mean. There will never be a shortage of simpleton roles in Hollywood, nor the people to identify with them.
Next, I find out that last night that Karaoke was packed full of young single women and nobody called me. I use music to ensure I’m not stuck dating the kind of women I’d be stuck dating if I didn’t play music. For me, that’s a prime mover. The mere chance of fame, fortune, and sexy babes is better than what you get waiting for the right situation. There is a jam session in the east end on Thursdays, but I’m not the biggest fan of jams. Too many of them play the same tunes and don’t play anything else. I’ve never successful begun a band with any musician I’ve met at a jam session.
On Sunday, there is a classical guitarist on the lineup, the blurb says “acoustic classics”. I have to check it out, but I fully expect another bobble-head doing a mixture of old Eagles, Neil Young, and flamenco renditions of the usual Guitar Center material. Not a single original note—unless he wrote one of those boring love-song ballad dirges full of minor chords so dear to the hearts of guitar freaks the world over, several times.
Last Laugh
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