Each as if my own.
My goal of $9,000 is to establish a small trust fund that will continue to provide should anything happen to me.
Tales From The Trailer Court™
Wednesday, July 29, 2026
A moment of your time.
The price of quality doggie chow has gone out of my range. I try to donate 50 pounds per month of the best, but this time I had to limit July to 36 pounds. That's why I have established a GoFundMe to help out. In memory of my beloved JeePee who passed away in 2024, please join me in providing what may be the best meal many of these doggies will ever have. You may view more at:
My goal of $9,000 is to establish a small trust fund that will continue to provide should anything happen to me.
My goal of $9,000 is to establish a small trust fund that will continue to provide should anything happen to me.
THIS IS A HEADER - scroll down one page to begin blog--->
VIDEO HAS NO SOUND.
===============================================
THIS BLOG IS NOT FORMATTED FOR ANDROID.
If buying is not owning, then piracy is not stealing.
DOES NOT represent any average American life-style.
This blog GoFundMe: Each as if my own.
A reminder to the reader this is not a political blog, but commentary on human behavior. I am not for or against any political party. Liberalism is not a political party, but a social cancer. It is wrong to steal money and it is just as wrong to elect people to steal it for you. One more thing, never argue with a man who buys his printer ink by the barrel.
Here is the movie Citizen Vigilante for free.
If blocked, paste & go this link: https://old.bitchute.com/video/iLjCEmvPzHjO
Not quite a classic, but fun: Beverly Hills Ninja (1997).
Be patient, this is a tricky process.
Getting the video to play through my world-class ad-blockers.
Remember to use the back-arrow to return here.
You will forget and get hijacked by Google.
Tuesday, July 28, 2026
July 28, 2026
One year ago today: July 28, 2025, a COM port coincidence?
Five years ago today: July 28, 2021, some Tallahassee cardio.
Nine years ago today: July 28, 2017, fluffy clouds & mufflers.
Random years ago today: July 28, 2010, her clientele.
Thank you anonymous, for the first donation. I worked some more on the presentation and came away less than hopeful. What I mean is, this one fund seem lost in the thousands. The hosts try to be helpful but I’m not a community organizer or a celebrity. In fact, other than a link to this blog, I’m not really equipped for any other type of appeal, outreach, or broadcast. Neither are most others, but they fake it. This is all so new to me, I’ll record my thoughts, see addendum, about what others do that I like or don’t like. My, you are up early today. And yes, Greg Langdon is a pseudonym.
So much for the wonders of A.I. and search engines. I’ll explain this circuit below. Back to search engines, it has finally happened. Front pages are now loaded with watermarked “shop” photos for sale. And no easy way to filter them, they often blot out real search results. It makes the “Picture of the Day” feature significantly more difficult. Trust a GenXer to paint a line on a parking lot and charge you extra to cross it. Worst offenders? Alamy, Dreamstime, Gettyimages. I’m not saying don’t advertise, I’m saying do it in a catalog. Respect the fact that most people who search on a picture are not looking to buy anything—or these days, rent it for an hour.
And always pesky are Pinterest and Facebook. Predicting the rise of corporate spyware decades ago, this blog contains very few links to paid sites, and hopefully none to any subscription sites. I am anti-intrusive advertising to the core. But I realize this blog now does contain one single link to a money site, but I’d hesitate to say it is in your face on search engines.
The picture this morning won’t mean a lot without some details. On the left if my only Arduino model “Micro” and I do not like it. It requires a special USB plug and has two pilot lights, one of which blinks when powered up and these cannot be switched off. You see here the other is blue and faces downward. This board runs a sketch for 20 seconds, then stops. I will never have time to research and deal with this.
But the significance is I also loaded the Micro with the circuit on the left, which is the first Arduino sketch I really studied that was laid out by A.I. (Folks, remember which blog showed you your first A.I. microcontroller schematic.) I examined several, hoping to find something new. Wrong, instead these circuits are nothing much more than complicated. That’s why I said it was laid out, not designed. I would hesitate to be tasked with writing the code for this complicated circuit. It contains multiple sensors and serial outputs, even the wiring so well-presented, would challenge a hobby breadboardist.
WARNING: PAINFUL HUMOR ALERT. While researching Etch-a-Sketch, I tripped over the worst, I mean the worst, joke of the decade. So bad it gets the blog. The factory was in Bryan, Ohio. Are you ready? Once during a violent shaking earthquake half the building disappeared.
Don’t hit me. Please stop hitting me. I'm the innocent disseminator. My gawd, that was bad.
Once more, the events in Tennessee took up most of the sunny hours this morning. This is a study for the history books, the Reb & I are different personalities in most ways. We have to remain a team on the few categories left over. Today’s issue was a surprise bill for $1,350. I came up with the cash, but she is as uncomfortable as I am touching other people’s money. I explained to her that once things are settled, I may go back on the people who create such surprises (for the delivery of an already-paid-for document) but for now it is just the next adventure. And I have been known to pay much more for an adventure in this life.
I’ve also taken stock and another well is running dry. I’ve cashed in 74.2% of my silver holdings. There’s still a buffer so no panic. However, we may see some troubles with Caltier. Not responding is an old problem with that outfit. They seem to have new people every time you call, and you can easily call a dozen times before getting through. Is it time to send Parker a hand-written letter?
Reading this morning centered on that clever Arduino Etch-a-Sketch clock. The video was super slow, so I made up this gif for you. I look at it an know the programming is easy, so I’d just download the code. Wrong, the code is only for the Leonardo model and won’t work on my Uno. Plus it libraries galore. Those hidden modules of other people’s code are the epitome of blind trust. I’m looking at the code structure to see if that element can be adapted. I know what vector graphic code looks like and I know I could eliminate the libraries. As I researched more, it is harder to find code that does not use libraries, a step in the wrong direction.
The challenge is to get it to print something other than a clock. Your turn.
Shanghai bra musem.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.
Tuesday without Festus. We had to settle for an otherwise quite dramatic hour episode of Matt facing off with an old cohort. A marshal who went bad. Matt runs him out of town and he returns, the usual plot until then end. Then the lady friend of the deputy he killed shoots him. Life was different back when women were crack shots. Instead of vice versa. (Hey, that was not as bad as the factory joke.)
Five bucks. I got my first box sale. It was to the neighbor, a button box, which are also excellent for keeping pencils. Only $999,995 to go, and my total goFund after a day is $7. I was downtown around noon and the Hundy is beginning to misfire slightly. With electronics and fuel injectors it will be easy to find and expensive to fix. The PPP here is I drove it to Tennessee last month ad it’s not a new ride. I had the same kind of day.
We’ll continue, but first examine this new burrow in my birdie paradise. Time for the game cam, guys. (Everybody knows that only the males of the species use game cameras.)
Causes of heart attacks. Doing my business accounts which have lapsed since Iate January. Knowing I might not make it, there were a “flurry” of deposits to cover a lot of contingencies. I waded into it once again wish I could find the bastards who came up with the upside-down bank statement, and this “average balance” bullshit. I once had a lady explain to me what was about, and it actually makes sense to the severely uneducated mind. The largest part of reconciliation for me is printing out the statements and entering them into my books right-side up. Also, nut the bastard who puts the checks and deposits in different sections instead of different columns like decent folk.
Since August last year when the current crisis began, over $18,000 has been drawn out of that account. But it is all accounted for with a couple small exceptions. The Reb is not to pay for gasoline on that card. But it happens. If you weren’t here ten years ago, I bought this house for $18,000. Prior to that purchase, I was caught up in the same no-win situation as most of America these days, I saw it coming—but it is amusing that a lot of the spots I’m digging cash out of today are a result of having survived 2005 – 2015. Other’s put on blinders, I moved into a trailer court. And here we are.
That’s not clear. What I’m saying is that once I got into the trailer court, I kept up the same intensity of saving and investing. Silver, CDs, and cash put away in addition to saying up for a house. This was difficult, but it paid off. When I bought this house, true, I had less than $200 left—but I had ten years of experience at smaller investing. Most people won’t invest small, so the never get to anything large. That’s still not clear, but years later, I still have silver. Most don’t.
ADDENDUM
GoFund is already a rough lesson for me. While a great concept, the prospect of “free money” does not attract the best of people. What’s clear is that without promotion most of the fundraisers are lost in the background noise. I was wrong about the $10 minimum, that was just the lowest number on the suggestion popup. Some of the highest total funds indeed and predictably go to those with the wherewithal to advertise. Like the TV station that got over $1.5 million. Now that is self-promotion! That is also where I saw the worst example yet of buying-without-owning.
Pets do well, but a lot of it [many of the blurbs] seems pretty fringe to me. Like the lady who already has $40k raised to put a down payment on a house for cats. There is a segment for profiles, where I see top position goes to Paris Hilton. Isn’t she in France or something? Her 18k followers get swept away by some of the weirdest people I’ve ever seen. Fact is. goFund is the massive presence of people who have been trained from birth that it is okay to ask strangers for money, while I was raised to believe such behavior is alien.
Again, I commend goFund on a very slick and airtight webpage. I draw the line at their continual advice over what they call sharing. It is the pestering of everybody you know and I had my fill of that 15 years at the phone company. Remember all those little 1/4 per cents that added up to 7% of your paycheck if you didn’t watch out? That’s where I uncovered our union was paying for ethnics to take ballet lessons, but that is another tale from the trailer court.
Currently (it is 4:00AM) I’m reviewing videos on how to reach donors. Honestly, folks, I’m asking for dog food and I don’t want it to get much more personal than that. This blog is a natural outreach for what they describe—but trust me, do not even think about starting a blog for such a purpose. I agree with their daily input suggestion, it matches the time I dedicate already. In conclusion, I will, unless some surprise arrives, leave this blog as the only link and promotion.
Later in the day, I checked in and my readership has dropped in half. This is the blogoshpere, you can evaporate in a day. No big deal, blooms are common, but I was hoping to monitor any changes that asking for donations would have. Right now, nobody knows, and I still have just the one anonymous donation. I'm thinking of asked the donations be limited to $2, as I see another guy has done so and made $688. And, did I just say "breadboardist"?
Monday, July 27, 2026
July 27, 2026
One year ago today: July 27, 2025, odd blog coincidence?
Five years ago today: July 27, 2021, never buy the last . . .
Nine years ago today: July 27, 2017, one liter per week.
Random years ago today: July 27, xxxx, WIP- repost
A first. Today I ask for charitable donations, the first time in my life. The fact is, the premium doggie chow has doubled (in some case tripled) in price and gotten out of my range. I have donated for years, and try to provide the best I can afford. For many of the doggies, this could be the best meal they have ever had. Please take a look at GoFundMe, link in the blog header, above. End of pitch.
Here is the gif I tried to slip into my presentation. No dice, goFund has a team of very sophisticated people working their webpage. I can also tell by the discrete security measures they have been hacked badly in the past. Everything is well-hidden with very few of the parameters exposed in the browser settings. When in comes to posting your fund, you will obey. Yet, I am the arch-proponent of allowing talent to compete against sheer numbers. It is easy to tag this as unfair advantage, but I do not agree that anyone should be held back just because some larger group can’t match their skills.
I accessed the latest in Arduino activity, watching the combination of 3D printing and the robotics application of the microcontroller. I was not surprised to see the device become just a component in an assembly process. One of the very tasks that robots were conceived to free mankind from drudgery. All projects I viewed were like this photo, connecting up prepared pieces and voila, instant robot-maker. No muss, no fuss, the code is downloaded and even the wiring is now convenient adapter plugs.
Yet, I will do something similar later today. It has been
Then a phone call which brings the morning to a standstill. Caltier. They have not responded to our inquiries. Part of the problem is that screwed up millennial ass-clown policy of using an e-mail address as an account name. The cucktard who came up with that one needs to be “adjusted”. Because your average millennial imbecile does not comprehend that e-mails become changed and outdated. They insist on sending e-mail to the account name no matter how many times you slap them in the head. They are millennials.
We have put the ball squarely back in their court. My account balance has not changed in a year despite the on-going nature of them collecting rents on properties I partially own. I think, unless they totally see things my way, this could turn into a sticky situation.
To clear my mind, well always start with coffee, I did some reading on microcontrollers. Aptitude is a strange thing in my world. Here, I have programmed maybe twenty sketches (the correct term for microcontroller programs) in my life, to make lights blink, which is kindergarten level. Yet I’m reading the highest levels of low level programming in a book. What am I reading today? I’m glad you asked, it will take my mind off Caltier.
When you move your mouse, the computer is processing millions of signals per second. Even to keep the “shadow” around the cursor in place is a programming feat, and every command happens one at a time. Microcontrollers don’t possess the power to do such things. What often occurs one operation will cause others to cease. Most tutorials focus on one task so as to avoid this problem. Servo motors and sensors, a logical combination, pose a big challenge. You see, you want the sensor active to catch new conditions, but the servo requires a constant incoming signal to hold a position.
So, order your sensor to collect data and your motor returns to zero position. Crank up the motor and your sensor goes dead. At the microcontroller scale, you can’t do both at the same time. Thus, I’m reading up on the minimum signal requirements. For instance, the servo needs a pulse every twenty microseconds. To make it run smooth, all other operations must “fit” into the other nineteen seconds. And in my opinion the best way to do this is to have one microcontroller issue signals to another—a concept I mentioned ten years ago but never followed up.
Alsatian “lower east end”.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.
Arduino progress, here is a short video of a simple operation, but it isn’t, I’ll explain the difference. While I did download the sketch (code), it was deliberately chosen to test equipment that has been in storage for years. It is the most basic operation, making a light blink—the microcontroller equivalent of “Hello, world.” It comes included with the software. What’s happening here is a bit more involved.
I’ve been using the laser etcher, which has more than once scrambled these ports on me. An older USB-A (printer) cable is required and they are now either rare or expensive. And old, so I am testing that as well. In the early days, it was necessary to wire up an LED into the correct output pin (set in software) and ground, but this must be one of the newer (Uno) models with a built in LED, shown flashing here.
I just missed it on camera, but you can see my hand inserting the transfer cable, which also powers up the unit. There is no start/stop switch, so the program runs endlessly as long as there is power. There is a battery connector for remote operation. The other green dot is the pilot light. What I’ve managed here was a successful setup and test of “ancient” equipment. I still have not found my big box of Arduinos, which also has all my servos and steppers. These are specialty motors that require controllers to function.
This is also a demo that my coding and software studies far exceed most of what I’ve ever wired up. The project matched my energy reserves today. Maybe not so exciting, but that might depend on how many other people you know of any age that spent the afternoon using such a device.
Tampa radio barely mentions the attack on tourists in Hawaii ten days ago, except to say the local police have not labeled it as a hate crime. How much longer, America? What a laugh, looking at the pattern of store closures in Chicago. Three years ago they voted in a communist mayor who promised them free everything, but the biggest joke was the government run grocery stores. All boarded up due to shoplifting, even Wal*Mart is pulling out. The media will undoubtedly begin a long presentation of interviews with “poor folk” all with something in common. Well, that, and they are hungry, too. Imagine that.
A number of follow-on problems kept me near the phone, and [also near to] the computer I use for this blog, the only unit I allow an Internet connection. (Yes, Internet is a proper noun and capitalized.) I like to watch and criticize “success” stories I find ridiculous. Like the number of people in my age group who claim they “worked their way through college”. That had already become impossible a decade before I got there. I met other students by the hundreds and have never met one with the part time job so many seem to claim.
I love the saga of the DC-3, but today the Lougheed Electra tweaks my curiosity. That’s the Amelia Earhart airplane. I know little about that company except hearing as a lad that it was “saved” from the dreaded “bankruptcy”. I was too young to know that meant they didn’t have to pay their bills. Kudos to the airport guy in Atlanta, when forced to give his unlock code, instead gave the cops the distress code (Graphene) which wiped the phone. I had this idea back in the late 80s for computers, but never followed up.
My stance is simple. The provision that no man can be compelled to testify against himself holds sway over any other argument, including those who say it only applies to criminal cases. It especially applies if a hostile party wants something to use against you. He has been charged with destroying evidence, making the State a real bastard on this one. I hope he demands the court submit evidence that he destroyed evidence. Just sayin’.
ADDENDUM
This is a building in Wyoming. You might mistake it for a shack until you discover hundreds of LLC companies are registered at that address. Wyoming changed its law some 15 years ago to allow anonymous business licensing. One address in Sheridan is shared by 120,000 LLC. TMOR, LLC is the US version of the limited liability company. The law provides complete secrecy of ownership, which is, as far as I am concerned, is a right. My stance is that unless the accuser can prove at his own expense otherwise, it should be highly illegal to even cast aspersions.
I will never be convinced by lame arguments or suspicions. Before I retired (when I was 41, by the way), one of the factors I hated most about my job in the cubicle was the way so many co-workers felt they had a right to your private information. And to me, my home address, for example, is private. I’ve had complaints. I actually have complaints on my work record from ass-clowns who claimed they “felt unsafe” working in the same room as myself because they did not know my life history.
This is what is happening in Wyoming. I feel it is not the governments business who owns what, but there is a push to equate absentee ownership with crime. I say if that is so, call the police, but you must leave everybody else alone. Which side you choose depends on character. Those who think anonymity is synonymous with “nefarious intent” are not popular around me. The anti-privacy lobby seems offended by the provision that an LLC in Wyoming can declare it has no assets in the State. So requests for filing and information just get ignored.
One of their strongest objections is these LLCs pay no tax in Wyoming. But they also cost the State nothing and bring in millions in license fees. I’ll say it again, I will support no law, which for its enforcement, entails the blanket monitoring of innocent activities. You can guess where I stand on flocks.
Sunday, July 26, 2026
July 26, 2026
One year ago today: July 26, 2025, it’s not real MP4.
Five years ago today: July 26, 2021, Wal*Mart on ‘tard day.
Nine years ago today: July 26, 2017, I don’t actually dissect.
Random years ago today: July 26, 2013, six dollar popcorn.
This could be another fun day of contrasts, or I could play it safe and read. I like days that sway between robotics, music, boxes, and food, but I also like energetics that last that day. You see, y'day happened. I slept for 17 hours and right now, I feel supercharged. Let me check the day count for you. Aha, day 117, meaning I’m likely heading for full recovery, but I've been tricked before. Maybe I'll write, what a boon to the blog community, some might say. The old kitty in the yard got a scrambled egg, with half & half, and a tablespoon of beef drippings. And yes, I will, later today, turn up the doggie donation site.
That wonderful aroma is grits with a hint of garlic. If you want the best, you have to wait a bit longer. We can’t record everything, so this morning’s topic is electronics theory. This photo shows two advanced components. Some recognize the Uno in this photo, the dots are a 5x7 array of LEDs called a matrix. What’s the challenge? The wiring, for the way the pins are manufactured into the array is not geometric. I’ve wired the pins to a circuit board, then over to the Arduino, and here’s why.
That pin configuration is a headache, so much so there are “driver” chips to match the various array styles. One common chip is the MAX7219 for around $3. They are just a bunch of logic gates that let you interconnect the array in a more human-logical pattern.
The latest model of the Uno, called the Robo Uno is in the hands of a few, but not available on the market yet. How did they manage that? I want one.
Figuring out these chips is not what is going on here. I feel these chips do not teach anything new. My goal is always to create the code that uses logic to operate the chips. It’s more fascinating work that forces you to think with reason, something I’m not the only one needing more practice with. There is another consideration, which is software in the Arduino, called “libraries”. This is a major reason Arduino fell out of favor with me—lack of control and standards over these files, with the attendant lack of documentation.
You could just download a library that claims to operate the array, and learn little to nothing. Also, that is placing a vast amount of trust that the author of the library knows what he is doing, follows good coding practice, and has not taken even one shortcut that deviates from Arduino protocols. Nor is there a known location to seek these libraries, no naming convention, and if anything goes wrong, you are in the dark. Often literally.
Another consideration is that, although the Arduino community has been shit-brick lucky so far, libraries are executable code off the internet, written by strangers, and downloaded into files and folders you [probably] do not monitor.
For the advanced user, be aware that there is no “reset” or “clear” function on the Arduino that restores the ATmega chip to factory defaults. You can overwrite what is there, but the overwrite only affects the memory locations which use the new incoming addresses. Fragments of these libraries can persist where you least want them. You done been told.
Slum tourism.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.
Nothing for you this afternoon. Some quiet reading and hot coffee. I got some planning done and one item I would like to address is the time it takes to stain the boxes. It is done by had, with sponge brushes, as bristle types drip too much if you get them wet enough to get a good cover. The solution is to dunk the boxes and let them drip dry. But I’m short a suitable container. It must be deep enough for the Z-box and at least 12” x 9” and capable of being sealed shut or at least easily drained and refilled. Any ideas?
That’s interesting. The gang members shipped to the prison in San Salvador are suing the airlines that deported them and the US government. The claim is they knew the prison was torturing prisoners and nobody has ever come out of there alive. Imagine that, prisoners not liking the prison. Folks, that prison is for gang members and the US continues to send more. The courts have declared illegals have no rights to such protections.
At dusk I went Wal*mart for business envelopes. Not just any, they must be tinted and peel ‘n’ stick. Many an idiot thinks is makes no difference. Fools they be, if you know anybody who works at the post office, talk to them and never use an untinted envelope even for a birthday card. Gummed is also out, no Glenn, not because the government takes DNA samples. Because the smallest box of 40 envelopes is a nine-month supply. And in the Florida humidity, you are just wasting money. It’s not the paper, its making the trip there and back that costs more than the goods.
Then an hour on the phone with the Reb. Yes, there is a security breach. We cannot place the connection but I can tell you our passwords are not allowed to be written down. And the only time we would say them is in a private room where even an eavesdropper would not know they were passwords or to which account. In any case, each password has a suffix that is never spoken aloud. Everybody besides us who knows that suffix has been dead for years.
I will mull over the remaining possibilities. The one that stands out is a laptop computer. People do leave those logged on and unattended for what they think is too short a spell to pose a risk. I don’t think that way. The Reb judges people on personality where I judge by character. Seems a cute twist of words until you see us work together.
ADDENDUM
For the goFund account, I used one of my dormant e-mails. That was 18 hours ago. I have already received 6 junk-mails and they sold my addy to Sport Mazda North, who got a piece of my mind. I never do business with intrusive advertisers and neither should you. It encourages on-line delinquency. By now, I have dropped [viewed] most of the goFund menus and do not like their general attitude. Likeable people do not, repeat do not, hit up their friends and neighbors for donations. It stinks of Amway. But, as long as my surrogate doggies get a good last meal, I’ll go along with such GenX nonsense. I hope these people think they’ve invented something new.
Way down here is some math. Last day I posted a method whereby the Enigma output could be used to narrow a key search. This does not work on computer generated codes, which use unknown prime factors to scramble text. Instead, there are massive investments going into recording your data now on the premise that in the near future, quantum computers will crack all keys. It’s the SNRL “store now read later” acronym you never heard of, but you will.
So, how does quantum theory find these elusive factors? One theory begins on the principle that if you guess a small number close to the answer and keep multiplying it by itself, you will eventually find a number that, when divided by the prime itself, will have a remainder of 1. The math formula is x = mN + 1, where N is your guess (your multiplicand) and m is your multiplier. None of this will be on the exam; the point here is that a simple formula can be used to eliminate, you guessed it, millions of wrong combinations. Cubits can crunch the smaller numbers that result, this theory only works in certain cases.
This growing threat has been known for years, so what defense is available? Some of the world’s best brains are working on it. My prediction is it will be lattice technology. Lattices are fixed but equidistant points on a grid. To get from A to B, you can go, say, three steps east and two steps north. But you can also get there by many other paths. Here is where you remember once learning that computer arrays have no problem dealing in more than three dimensions. With 1,000 dimensions, even quantum computers will take too long to give meaningful results.
Saturday, July 25, 2026
July 25, 2026
One year ago today: July 25, 2025, unusual tiredness.
Five years ago today: July 25, 2021, the Netgear blues.
Nine years ago today: July 25, 2017, applied for permission . . .
Random years ago today: July 25, 2023, a nothing day.
I like a fun Saturday as much as anyone. Instead, I was up, had coffee, and fell back to sleep until 4:40PM. Today I have nothing new for you—but I do have some minor items that have stacked up over the past week. We can walk through that. Like the remote started for the van, the remote alarm trigger. It fails on two counts. One, it requires an AC power source due to the design of the solenoid. And two, that power supply must be constant, not momentary. I set it aside, it will come in handy yet.
Now the facts have emerged and tongues are wagging. The winner is the kid brother of the mostly corrupt mayor of Little Rock. I detect a pattern here. Something actually happens in Little Rock once every 60 years and it is never good.
Where is my box of Arduinos? I have at least five units but where? I still have not built a successful amp, but I have three correctly-wired breadboard circuits. This joins around five of my most useful items that have “gone missing” since January. It’s a conspiracy, I tell you. The Prez, who used ChatGPT to generate a small booklet, sent details on the process. Alas, this so-called A.I. product cannot do much better than that. I’m searching for something more capable, but so far most are the same.
That is, unless the script is tailored to the capabilities of the software, it produces only short clips of cartoon graphics. Next, the doggie chow for the pound is in peril, the prices have shot up ten bucks a bag unless you want the brands consisting of mostly floor sweepings. I don’t have a lot of options left unless I goFund something. See today’s addendum for my thinkings on that.
My motive [for looking today] was not funding, but investing. Some time back I researched small home equity loans and fractional ownership. I sidestepped that route because, although it can be done casually, to really make a return it demands lots of good, experienced and talented account monitoring and management. One might as well get a job and let others do that kind of worry. Still, I am familiar with the concept. It would be new to me, which I can explain.
Prior to 2012, most jurisdictions made it difficult to fund or form any organization with more than 25 investors. The market was dominated by an elite who knew the rulebook, and it was a sticky mess for beginners. I did not know until recently that was the origin of the term “accredited investor”.
The change in 2012 was called the JOBS act, but I never paid it much attention. All it did, from my viewpoint, was remove the 25-member cap. It was also a regulatory look at the massive pool of scams generated by the early Internet. I never did understand why existing laws did not cover these shady operations just because they were on a computer instead of a typewriter. For now, this research is a towering task, but like myself, you can simply open an account and hope for the best. The only difference is I will document the goings-on.
Something I was not expecting is that you can open an account and accept donations before you meet the requirements. That means you can set up a fund for your cat without specifying the bank account or your ID. They will still collect donations for you. It’s when you want the money out they put the screws to you. No anonymous charity antics in today’s on-line America. What’s weirder (to me) is that you can even have them send the money (with proper criteria) to somebody else’s bank account.
Abandoned Lynnewood.
(The “Titanic” mansion)
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.
Later, I’ve decided to go ahead with a goFund account to feed the Sheriff’s doggies. Reviewing the other (mostly self-centered) appeals, I quickly felt I could do better. From what I can tell, the minimum donation is $10 which I feel is far too much. I’m looking through the suggestion lists of how to “drive” people toward your listing, but is that the proper attitude? I’ll tell you what, let’s work together. We have this blog, the other’s do not. Tomorrow, Sunday, I have planned to announce the donation link.
I also notice others do not thank or report back, which I consider necessary. Asking for help is not something that comes natural to me, so again I’m starting from a zero knowledge base. I still think $10 is a bit hefty, but welcome anyone who wants to give. I have also noticed a 100% lack of videos. I see they have video capability, but meant for phone transmission. Ah, but it does not say that and if this blog isn’t social media, then what is? And we have some experience producing top-notch short videos, wouldn’t you say?
There was no afternoon, told ya, I slept through most of it. Even missed a planned night on the town. Instead, I read a chapter on human-computer interaction that a lot of today’s coders could benefit from. It involved the early experiments with computers that gauged how people reacted to button-presses. That remains a majority part of how such devices are used today.
It was a fascinating delve into the computer world before today’s “that’s-your-problem” menus were brought to you by thoughtless coders. Who remembers my 11-button “speed dial”, that’s what I’m talking about. The time back when computers were designed to be easy to use.
Realizing the internals of a digital gadget were alien to users, the early makers designed a system of feedback to make life easier. There’s too much to cover here, but the basic concept of the pilot light has never been improved upon. This was no chance development, I read two chapters on the speed and reaction times. Why come buttons fade, others grey out, and the technology of what happens when the timing is wrong. (Usually, if nothing apparently happens, the human will push the button again.) The point is, the activity was a wondrous and complete study that today’s thoughtless coders have chosen to ignore.
Included in the early study was menu design that put considerable emphasis on the proper and logical groupings of the commands. It is another lost art. Today’s junk menus must often be memorized for each device. Classic example is your GPS. Most just find the few features they use most often and leave the rest at the factory defaults. And ignore Brandon & Tyler who call that progress.
ADDENDUM
The concept of on-line charitable giving is noble, but a quick glance at the prime site, GoFundMe, (goFund in this blog) shows that it allows begging. Too much of it, but that is to be expected in a welfare state. There is no excuse for people to be begging for food in America. I also find some of the donation categories to be in poor taste. Can you see funding some lady’s European tour when you can’t afford one for yourself? Me neither.
You can also rule out tours to Disneyland, dream trips (final adventure stints), and you’ll not see my money helping people move to “safe neighborhoods” if you get my drift. I’m a plain-clothes redneck and I’ll not help export the problem.
Still, goFund is the largest and best designed location for this activity. I’m carefully going over the donation reports and find some of them suspicious. Many, especially gender-change and predictable adult crises just flip past. I’m after how the system works and I see right off that those with a legitimate cause are a minority. The sit is primarily donations, which is a different premise than crowdfunding. Most people lack the skill set to keep tract of dozens of investors, much less pay them back according to a contract.
The sites also report only success stories. I arbitrarily chose Kickstarter, who (in 2025) report 42% of users get at least some funding, also report 358,000 failures. There is a blurry line between investing and donating, but I’m certain when any profit is made, the SEC will make it very sharp and to the decimal point.
At best, I can only hand you an overview of my own experience here. I will set up a donation site to help with the doggie chow which will likely get swamped by the thousands. I’m skeptical how the top donor in so many sites is anonymous. As usual, just keep reading here over time and I’ll report what I find as it applies to my own goals. There are umpteen places offering “rewards-based” funding, where for $10 you get a thank you e-mail, for $20 you get a plastic pen, etc. At this time I will have nothing to do with that. Hmmm, this is something new, are you sure I'm not too old to be picking up on all this modernity?
Friday, July 24, 2026
July 24, 2026
One year ago today: July 24, 2025, finding its limitations.
Five years ago today: July 24, 2021, bleak Okeechobee.
Nine years ago today: July 24, 2017, the stench.
Random years ago today: July 24, 2012, the latest blog protocols . . .
Show of hands, how many recall that a gig-less Friday for me is a day off? Hmmm, that’s what I thought. To make amends, you get to learn lots more about boxes today. Here’s a box I’m about to cut in half because of a tiny sawing error y’day. One edge of one piece was off by a kerf width.
Another PPP, poor people do not stock up on business-size envelopes and I just ran out. I have to waste more gasoline, and because my security and scanning equipment is here, I have to return, then go back downtown to mail the letter. You watch, Wal*Mart will be out of the security tint peel & stick, so I’ll either have to drive to Winter Haven or buy a whole box of the wrong product. Florida is the leading edge of PPP, but you know, other places like Mexico and Canada are hopelessly worse.
Meanwhile here are two assembled button boxes ready to be stained. One is the “naughty box” and a “radioactive” box. Don’t be too critical, they are both prototypes and I cannot find a good font for the lettering. This view is the two logo patterns suggested by Bryne at this is the photo he will get via e-mail. Along with a reminder to get into town for a jam session, you cannot go wrong in East Texas for that.
Even if you succeed, the result is apt to be inferior. So why do I do it? May reasons which include I am not rebuilding the box, I am repurposing it entirely. I am dissecting looking for the source of the error. I’m saying until you have and experience eye, don’t bother trying to correct mistakes. Adapt, not correct.
Next was more banking and more PPP. Because everybody was “too busy” to get me the updated ATM cards, I’ve had to make the deposits by mail. The bank slow-walks mail-in transactions because they are AOLs about it. Not a problem every other month, but this month ten deposits and they have begun holding back funds. Because other people are too friggen busy to go get me that new ATM card I asked for last April. Hold it, on this account, it was last October.
I had to get downtown to verify the clearing dates, fortunately the money place had a business size envelope (for 25¢), which gave me time to get home, process, and get back downtown hopefully before last collection time. If I missed it, that is another PPP and the pieces are not even added up on that one yet. I’ve put 178 miles on the van, and tomorrow means another trip to Winter Haven.
Driving the Dolomites
(Italy)
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.
Another thing about data cables is they can go bad for no apparent reason. Slow Friday’s are a bit of an unofficial “test every battery in sight” day. And the blog rule to record anything unusual reports today we had 30 dead batteries. I have a load tester and the most dead were the most important. The back shed has a combination lock, and if the power goes out, trust me it is dark back there. I have dozens of those old plastic lights Harbor Freight used to give away (shown here dismantled) in excellent operating condition. Enjoy the view, that, folks, is your fancy picture for today. What other blog entertains you with dead batteries? Hey, if you like to see only the good parts of a video, there is always BitChute, har-dee-har.
By late afternoon I just sat down. Man, am I pissed off. I opened the Caltier page and the friggen password has been changed again. And not to one of our standing password keys that would let me change it back. I’m not a happy camper. Neither is Norway, on whom California is trying to copy their wealth tax. That’s where certain things (such as a speeding fine) cost, instead of a fixed amount, a percentage of your net worth. Problem, rich people don’t hang around for that bull donkey. They move away. In the case of Norway, they took $50 billion with them. Now Oslo is going bankrupt because they can’t fund their precious social programs.
Stress is something I avoid, so I sat down and put a layer of the pecan poly on a bunch of small boxes, including this morning’s. Time to think. I can’t fathom the Enigma mechanism yet but neither can most people. Did you know that after the war, the British kept the codebreaking a secret for another 30 years. Why? Because other nations like Russia began using the Enigma machines believing they were secure. I never said they weren’t, I said I find it impossible to accept that nobody anywhere suspected a thing.
News, the MSM has a new tack, putting about that America is in danger because Trump has destroyed trust in their journalism‽ Apparently one does this by pointing out they are liars over a period of ten years.
Here you go, the recycling of this morning’s box. Left frame shows the tiny lip difference in the cut, meaning the box cannot be made “square”. Middle frame shows the two small boxes resulting from the cut. Right frame is the “short bank” trays being placed into the staple box. This has to be done right before the saw cuts, or the lid won’t close. I’ve switched to a smaller but no cheaper 7/8ths staple for these smaller units. They must also be spaced properly.
In that same vein, let me mention more about the pneumatic stapler. This is the tool I drove all the way to Parrish to buy on sale for $19. It is now an essential and anybody can use it with a few moments training. However, by learning what’s going on, I’ve discovered it is possible to make the staples look much better by positioning the tool carefully. Sorry, no close-ups, I use Vivitar, but I’ll bet you can’t even see any staples here.
ADDENDUM
I began a casual look for what those casings [from y'day] might be. They were there for a while, and I found more, but doubted they were termites for the simplest reason. There was no source of water or moisture. Here is a photo of more specks, and do they not look like they could once have been ovoid, but are now dried husks.
Around 7:30PM, I scrolled through some 800 pictures until I found this one, labeling the specks as “frass”. First time I’ve heard that word, and me over 25 years in Florida. It is termite poop, in this case a “drywood termite”. The literature says they do not require open dripping water, so that explains one thing. It also means if I want to live here until the end, it means another tenting, which is conservatively priced at $1,200. But there are bait controls I will try first. Termites are year-round in subtropical places, so I will start looking tomorrow. I will hit the attic first. I have not been up there since last summer.
Thursday, July 23, 2026
July 23, 2026
One year ago today: July 23, 2025, now that’s vegetarian!
Five years ago today: July 23, 2021, twice the honking price.
Nine years ago today: July 23, 2017, descriptions and prescriptions.
Random years ago today: July 23, 2016, hula-hoop earrings?
What nonsense will I get into today instead of fixing my kitchen floor? Can’t say but how about an early peek at the options. I have that German car alarm controller that I’ve tested every way, it has remote keychain buttons that can be paired to operate the alarms. It is off on, but I have two other remotes I have not tested. The idea is to see if I can get at least one of them to work with the broken starter on the Hundy. Yes, I still operate that with the momentary switch under the grill. But that’s unpopular when it is raining.
Here is the controller and the clips, but not the keychain switches. This is kind of expensive an approach. It’s the challenge. It has become trial and error since the instructions are in German and have terms I have never seen before. What else while I’m out in the shed? There’s the dowel maker. One of my questions was how fussy is this contraction about the wood it will use? It has to be pre-cut to a list of sizes needed to fit into the assembly. The dies are in standard, the stick dimensions are metric.
This is why I have the calipers out, and notice that they do not agree on any measurement using the test stick . The difference is miniscule, but these are supposed to be precision instruments. These are meant to calibrate other tools, not need this form of adjustment to start with. I will try to save space by having the sticks correct in two dimensions each, these are meant to be placed on the saw table to space the blade. Is this too ambitious? We shall see.
I have not been satisfied with my work lately. My recuperation is fine in a big way that while relapses occur, they are never back to the helpless level of two months ago. I find myself dropping more things and bumping into furniture a big more, though that has diminished. I wrote letters to both the Reb and JZ to take it easy. I cannot commit to any visits, but there is a chance in August. The blog is experiencing a great bloom, the only bright spot for now, I will require some extra nap time. As said, I’m at a strange period of reverses that are getting progressively weaker. Hmmm, that reads funny. What I meant is I'm still getting fatigue bouts, but they are shallower and don't last--but still not any fun.
The real South Park
(Houston)
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.
An afternoon tired spell had me checking the news for four hours, thank the stars I picked up 32 coffee pods y’day downtown. It took the father of another gunned down knife attacker less than 14 minutes to get on TV and say his son was “no threat”. Do these people have their speeches written and ready? Trump endorsements are running at 100% this year and I first heard of Nancy Mace. The first woman to graduate from Ft. Bragg’s Cadet school, were her father was the commanding officer, no less.
What did I learn this time? Other than the zero depth of yellow shading, I did not have to alter the original. On the top left, the logo is only partially burned. There is around a ten-minute time limit running the laser below 4000 mm per minute. One does this to make the etch darker [in a single pass]. You could make multiple passes if you have all day. This one fizzed out at 3500 mm. Also, these larger logos are harder to center, or I should say differences are more apparent if you don’t get it spot on. (Later, the radiation logos take ten minutes each, so this becomes uneconomical without a commercial laser,)
In the background, I’m watching more video on the Enigma code machine, having a laugh at the sheer extent of propaganda shoveled into the facts. I mean, some of these videos were made last year and the 1940s brainwashing still works on some people. One thing mentioned in most videos that a “flaw” in the Enigma meant a letter could never represent itself. There is no explanation how this worked, so I’ll provide one.
Every message is usually a string of random letters, so you write them out in two long strings, here is one string of sample code with a second string slid one position to the right and below. The codebreaker is looking for combinations, and if you notice on this short message there are three locations where the letters match up. The codebreaker knows not to bother with those combinations.
He is going to keep sliding the bottom set of letters along until he finds a position where none of the letters match. This eliminates millions of combinations and now he begins seeking a probable known phrase, like the date or “Heil Hitler”. Another favorite was Nichts zu berichten, the German phrase for “nothing to report”. I have watched every major code-breaking video on line and not one of them explained this. I’ve seen videos of people doing it, but as far as I know this is the first place most of you will see it explained. “Spelled out”, one might say.
ADDENDUM
Next, I made a ham sandwich and watched video on casino cheating. I was hoping to see some sophisticated electronics. Most of it was nothing new. Card marking, loaded dice, hand signals, and crooked dealers. Still pretty interesting because cheaters have to keep coming up with new ways to do old tricks. I was looking for the impact of A.I. and there wasn’t any. That just tells me the casinos are using it, but not yet the players. That will change.
By watching so many videos, I gather it is almost impossible for the house to monitor the countless ways of cheating, so they don’t. They rely on a small set of telltale signs, such as somebody winning consistently as well as information exchanges on known crooks. Myself, I’m just glad I never bothered with gambling. I don’t like the people at casinos anyway.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)