March 31, 2011

           This is the mobile home of my French buddy. The guy had a small wood-working shop making souvenirs, salad bowls or something. He sold out for $5,500,000 at the peak of the market. He says if he’d waited six months he wouldn’t have gotten two million for the place. Anyway, here’s his $410,000 retirement mobile home and you should see his retirement mobile wife. Everything the best money can buy.
           It is true I mean-mouth the C programming language. That is because it is terrible. Some say it is “elegant” but won’t point out why. Others say it can do things that other languages can’t, but duh, the same back at you. Show me what these things are, for I can program a half-dozen languages and if those “things” exist, they have little practical value. My main objection to C is that the code is not clear.

           Thus, I say about the C the same as [I have said in writing about] all languages: an idea is not clear unless it can be written down. I’ve met dozens of people with great ideas who, when told to put them in writing, either failed or took such inordinate time it made the original idea dubious. No idea can be clearly written in the C language. I was not surprised to learn that C was invented by telephone employees (Bell, 1972). That explains to me why, though they were adroit company men, they still could not behave, spell or communicate well with others.
           Take the time to read the nearby snippet of C code to realize my point. It is not evident what the code is doing like it is with almost all other languages except Assembler. Try to guess the purpose of this code. You can’t expect a man to do a good job if half his time is spent wrestling with the tools.

           The most noticeable feature is the profusion of spurious punctuation. There are several instances with 5 punctuation marks in a row. This makes for code difficult to follow and to debug and that is not “elegant”. The users say that memorizing all these quirks are part of learning the language. I point to how the Chinese did the same thing with their language. They said it was open to all, but in reality it took so long to master it was actually a barrier to improvement.
           Don’t you hate it when your least intolerable radio station changes format? No, I don’t have a favorite, just one I disliked less than the others. It was 102 or 105 dot something and they used to play hits of the 70s, 80s, with lots of commercials. Well, they changed to total slow sucky married-people rubbish. Just when I was trained to listen to the station, too. Now it is moaners like “If You Don’t Know Me By Now” and the "Pina Colada" song. Gag me with a spoon.

           I’m at a loss on what to follow up the LED dot matrix experiment with. I don’t have any advanced (expensive) sensors or gear to build mechanical items. If I can’t come up with ideas, I’ll go back to radio which always fascinates. I think I will systematically go over any trials that failed and find out the reasons. I can also prepare by reading advanced material, though finding that material is always tough going on the Internet. There’s a lot of water out there but it isn’t very deep. The solution is to turn this into an opportunity
           Meanwhile, here’s my scooter that Patsie bought me getting the 1,000 mile oil change. Only she does not know she bought it for me. She’s only good at being a bitch, not at figuring things out. I’m a firm believer in routine and preventative maintenance. I don’t let walls and ceiling fall down on my own, and that Patsie could use an oil change herself. Thanks for the scooter, Kenora. It works just fine. Don’t get too steamed, I’m not near finished with you yet.

           [Author's note: My French is terrible and I may have reported the sale of the business above at $15 million. That was an error, it was $5,500,000. If you try to say that in French, you will learn the source of the error.]

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March 30, 2011

           Due to the danger of losing another key, I bought a new combination lock for my bicycle chain. Only this one has no numbers. Can you figure it out? It will become commonplace, but for now nobody I showed it to could devise the operation. It works by sliding the large black center knob up, down, left or right in a pattern of any length. The little stickers are meaningless. (This close-up photo is by the camera I made from spare parts, isn’t that something?)
           I took a head count of ads for college courses while testing my antenna. How strange these ads touting career choice, but those careers are a sad joke. How many chefs, cosmeticians and photographers does America need? How many can we even afford? Those are not high-paying occupations and what is the sense of spending all that money at school to earn less than $20 per hour? I don’t know the answer but expensive education for a questionable return is a dumb plan.

           Another amusing ad is the real estate people plugging how home ownership puts $60,000 into the economy and creates 2.5 jobs. Are they nuts? True, they want a return of high house prices, but forget it was caused by a credit fiasco. Questions: $60 grand is a lot of money, but what happens to the rest of the price tag? Does it evaporate? How many carpenters and roofers does America need?
           I saw that NCIS show, there’s another bad example. Again, why do we need courts and lawyers and Constitutional rights when all we need is more police training on how to trick, blackmail, and threaten people into confessions? In today’s episode, they set one suspect up to think he was being sent to Nigeria to have his hand cut off. He confessed to save his body parts, yet our noble courts will uphold such a confession. It’s the olde English way, trial by ordeal.

           A question I asked on April 7, 2005, finally has an answer. I was speculating on the source of canola oil. My new diet restricts my use of corn oil. And I suppose canola sounds a lot better than “rapeseed oil”. So there is a big field of canola somewhere. Funny I didn’t follow that up in 2005. There must have been a reason but I’ve made do without the answer for 6 years. I was using up the last of my vegetable oil when I finally met a potato that could not be deep fried.
           They weren’t on sale, just one ordinary bag of white potatoes. Even ten minutes in the oil barely browns the edges. I once knew a food worker who said they had to boil their potatoes first. I put that down to some management theory shoved onto the people who had to do the actual work. I tried that, too. Yet, today I met my potato nemesis.

           Who would sell a potato that won't fry? I’ve got the suspect list narrowed down. It is one of the following:

           New York marketing. You have to pay extra for something they didn’t put in, like unleaded gas.
           Latino marketing. They want more money to make it work like it should have.
           Chinese marketing. The potatoes are a by-product but miraculously they are good for the spleen, bowel movements, and many grandchildren.
           Florida marketing. They are a defective batch, so they unload them with impunity since the dolts over at Florida’s consumer branch think caveat emptor is a sink hole.
           Genetic engineering gone wrong. I mean, a potato that won’t French fry is like a you-know who won’t you-know.

           One thing that is working superbly is my food budget. I notice prices but I don’t complain. I’ll leave that for the people who didn’t listen to my warnings about this, n’yuck, n’yuck. The hard times are on the way for that crowd. Look at this tomato. It is just an ordinary type, the kind we used to call salad tomatoes.

           We ate them like apples, with salt or sugar. Once cut, they had to be used quickly. The price tag on this one single tomato was $2.01. That must be hurting a lot of those people we hear about who have a “fixed income”. Hell, they couldn’t manage back when their income was variable. Let them spend cake.
           Friday is gas up day, a gallon of premium is $4.05. Between fossil fuels and large vegetables, it’s a good thing I’m staying home tonight with a gallon of iced tea. This morning I rigged up a shelf in the shed for all my canned goods. Like spray paint, furniture polish, brake fluid, transmission oil, insecticide, hand cleaner and WD-40. Most of the work I do in the shed is working on the shed. But that will change and you know me when I’ve got an equipped shop. I’ve been monitoring the interior temperature and it is a winner.

           Taking a few measurements shows I have enough spare gear to completely wire the shed to spec. Right now it has one extension cord dangling from the rafter. One shortcoming of most sheds (for me) has always been that you can’t work on an eight foot length of material. I’ve devised a flap on the hidden side of the structure where I can temporarily slide a long piece through to outside until I can manage it. Time to build a sailboat in my basement.
           I certainly have the time to plan. Just me, the giant tomato and fifty pirated bit torrent files to spend the evening right here and see who drops over. Somebody always does now that they’ve learned how comfortable a place becomes once I’m back in charge. I’ll bet you Dave-O buys a place as soon as he gets his settlement. Like myself, he didn’t know about living by the French-Canadians. They may be gruff and have bad reputations, but they aren’t trailer trash.

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March 29, 2011

           It is great to be productive again, particularly my brand of productive. My productivity is not at the expense of an open and active lifestyle. I get out plenty more than most, and when I do, it is not sitting in the audience drinkin’ and talkin’. However, I need a certain conditions to be productive because it takes place during the times most other people waste watching TV. That is correct and I’ve said that for years, all my hobbies with the exception of music take place during the same stretch others are wasting their lives.
           However, I require the same parameters for my hobbies as the TV watchers. Quiet, comfort, electricity, coffee, and long uninterrupted stretches, all must be present in the right combination. Whether I am reading, thinking, writing, studying robotics or planning a trip to Colorado, I require all the factors listed. Let’s just say, thanks to some greedy people, since last year I’ve gotten way ahead on my reading and am now catching up on the rest. But as far as socializing, it is my critics who need to get a life.


           The lady who was going to rent until she find out Wallace was an old guy who smoked, finally reports success getting the donated cooker and water purifier past customs in Haiti. The system there is like Canada, where they intentionally charge more to import something than it costs new. I’ll look up the island location, cape something I think. The cooker holds two pots at a time, so it can’t feed the whole village. I’ll pass the hat around for donations, as the guy they sent there had to pay the customs out of his own pocket, something like $230. You may recognize the cooker from pictures here last December 19.
           I may have a new camera sooner than planned, my Jazz 150 began acting up exactly like the old 152, it won’t turn on when connected to a computer. It has a removable SD card so I get the download. I’ve been looking for a camera to modify with the Arduino for time-lapse photography anyway. Hang on, it’s a good thing I double-check, the mounting brackets were the same in both models, so I got the 152 working again. But the 150 has a real contact switch, not a circuit switch to trip the shutter. Darn, now I have to think.

           Windows 7 and Vista have two major changes. One, they’ve done a MicroSoft classic and scrambled all the commands. That’s so you get to relearn everything all over again. But they have made a travesty of the search command, the one that used to block half your screen. Now, search makes no distinction between file names and contents, so you get incredible numbers of results to sift through. Hooray for MicroSoft. Try to find the screen saver, and good luck.
           I tested their Voice Recognition. What a piece of shit. It has no settable options, no list of commands, no simple interface, and it cannot be set to work with word processors other than those from MicroSoft. Isn’t there a law against lock-ins? MicroSoft voice recognition is one more reason to hate overly political software companies. The other change is that many of the more useful items have been unbundled and now cost extra.

           Recall “Sleeping With The Enemy”? I saw the movie today. It has the same plot but takes a different emphasis than the book. Good, since the book was about the airhead logic that too many women use to justify not doing things either right or logical. For example, in the book, the woman opts to take several pairs of sensible shoes instead of food in her getaway kit and nearly starves.
           Once the producer wisely decides to sidestep that theme, it was actually decent entertainment. Too bad more battered women don’t look that good, one might say, but not me. Then, I’ve also met too many divorcees whose real complaint is that after marriage they could no longer do as they pleased without consequences. I didn’t say that was right or wrong, I only said I’ve met a lot of them.

ADDENDUM (added March 30, 2011:)
           Here are some photos of the solar cooker and pasterurizer in Haiti. The pasteurizer is the long object behind the little girl in the front with a red shirt. The solar cooker is in the upper right side. The pasteurizer looks like a heater but produces water far too scalding hot to be used directly, the water comes out around 40 degrees hotter than tap water. The cooker is set up on concrete blocks for stability and safety. Note the dark colored pots that just barely fit into the cavity. These are a matching set. Light colored pots won't cook the food.

           [Author's note: some years later I've concluded these solar cookers work best when fixed in place at an ideal location. They are also too heavy and bulky for camping. I consider it feasible that advances in solar panels may gain the upper hand over, making it easier to cook with electricity than sun rays.]

           Note also the cooker, with the traditional Haitian breakfast of bananas and eggs. I'll talk with management at Jimbos to see if we can run an extra 50/50 or something to offset the scandalous fees charged by the government in response to this charitable act. In the end, it seems the fees amounted to $300. I can't cover that, but I feel obligated as I attended the free show and a simple wave of my hand can make the largest single donation to the committee. Check after Saturday for the results. Other than casual acquaintance with some of the volunteers, I cannot vouche for this charity.

Charity Address -- only if you are personally interested, this is not a recommendation:
          Time Of Now
          1926 Madison Street
          rear
          Hollywood, FL 33020

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March 28, 2011

           My next acquisition must be a camera with macro capabilities. I’m making fine progress with my electronics, but can’t take decent photos. I’ve gone back several times to re-do failed experiments. Huh? Doesn’t everybody? I got my first failure, Experiment 001, to now work perfectly. This was a design that turns on a yellow light when the current flows in the correct direction, but a red light if the leads are accidentally reversed. Originally, one LED would not stay lit. This time, after two months experience, it worked like a charm. Here is the blurry photo.
           The gadget looks spidery, but that is because there are three circuits on one breadboard. My budget only allows one breadboard, so I often run several experiments simultaneously. Also shown here are, on the left, a light sensor controlled transistor motor speed circuit, and on the right, a 7805 power supply. Today’s experiment is the two rows with wires plugged into the nearest rail in the foreground.

           Smart move insulating the shed, and I did a top rate no-deficiency job of it. Don’t take me no 30 years to learn to do one thing right. The south wall is shaded by a concrete wall a foot back, so I left it as a large cooling fin. Despite the heat, it was shirt sleeve comfy inside all day y’day and with a single fan, almost livable. I’m hooking up a coffee maker in there. I got through the entire day without having to run an A/C but this was an unusual dry heat, so that wasn’t a real test.            The president is going on TV to explain the ongoing role of the US in Libya. Don’t that just beat hell? The lambs will watch, nodding along, never the thought once crossing their tiny minds we have no business there. None. Not ever. But, there is oil in Libya and only 2 million people, so what one president or another says won’t make a lot of difference. We can land spaceships on Mars, but still play Stone Age politics at home, constantly “liberating” neighboring tribes the minute they exhibit any weakness.

This may be the day Google disabled video in blogger. If so, you will see a blank spot.


           The inevitable rainstorm after a dry spell caught me in the library at the circle, always busy as one of the few libraries near the coast with free parking. Inside for two hours, I read articles on German V-2 rockets that were launched in 1946-1947 in the USA. One was launched from an aircraft carrier with mixed results. That’s how narrow the margin was, if Germany had one more year they might have won. Whereas the V-2 could barely reach London, the Germans had production-ready rockets that bore individual names. Nice German names like “Philadelphia”, “Chicago” and “New York”.
           Four hours later I rode home in the rain (I have a poncho). This is not a hurricane which is the only other times it can rain more than a half hour. As I got in the door, Carlos called from New York. It seems Wallace has been not answering any other calls, either. I filled Carlos in on how what has been going on. He figured as much, Wallace talking big and thinking small and everybody knows it.

           I even ran into Kim, the lady who was friendly with Wallace, but she told me she was within an inch of punching out his teeth over his constant “sex jokes” trying to turn every conversation into a bragging contest. Don’t believe me? Mention the word “Reno” around Wallace. He talks like he discovered the Mustang Ranch. Kim said that got on her nerves to no end.
           Even during my tenure at the phone company, I have never met anyone as totally obsessed and preoccupied with strippers and whores as Wallace. I attribute this to a mental condition which he is unaware he’s suffering. His daughter has an equal obsession with dominating every conversation, which she does to cover up her lack of social standing and poor education. She thinks she is winning because people are too polite to call her what she really is. Now I know it runs in that family.

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March 27, 2011

           Would you like a little maple syrup on your hotcakes Sunday morning? Think twice, this jar will cost you $18. And it is the dark variety which the public have been hoodwinked into thinking is more desirable than the very light variety. The weather takes top billing again. It has been unusually perfect for months but don’t get fooled. That also means some bozo in Pompano is going to start a brush fire and cars will boil over on the causeways. It is still Florida, the most disorganized of the states. Some may say that is New Jersey, but by comparison, their crime bosses are very efficient.
           I get to report my worst month ever, though it isn’t quite over. Hot sunny weather places people outdoors and revenue plummets. It was the smallest bingo crowd since the game got popular over there. Cancel my trip to Miami until later in the week and I was really looking forward to that. For entertainment, I may have found a free parking spot near the Ft. Lauderdale library, the big main branch. That could make for a relaxing summer.
           They got radiation traces out west from the Jap reactor. I personally had no idea the Japanese were locating nuclear power plants on coastlines. That is just plain dumb. It is an earthquake zone, for crying out loud. Have they learned their lesson?

           By coincidence, the pre-bingo movie today was Pearl Harbor. One American general warns the Japanese would invade as far as Chicago before they were stopped. How, pray tell, were they supposed to get there? Take the Amtrak? Organize a wagon train?
           That dork “warrior” mentality is one thing that’s never changed. Now these soldier types are bombing Libya. Again. There is an old saying that stupidity is indivisible. In the military, at least. I agree with Jefferson, that the USA has no need for a standing army. Nobody could invade this place, it would be suicide.
           Get that CEO of Starbucks, who tells the employees he would never ask them for anything he wouldn’t ask of himself. Oh? Would he work for near-minimum wage? Starbucks has always overcharged but what I have against them is they destroyed the American tradition of the free refill. The main reason I don’t patronize them is they have the people who are supposed to be working the cash register mixing up lattes and pouring chocolate syrup while you wait in line. Dreadfully slow service at over $2 per cup. I don’t think so.

           Gee, it seems a lot of the people with nothing to hide may have been all talk. As a reminder, my objection to government records has never been a privacy issue, but that the authorities will sooner or later use every record they have against you, so it is advisable to have as few records as possible. Classic example of abused records: the DMV.
           Now, the state of New York used Google satellite photos to issue $70,000 in fines to people who had unregistered swimming pools. Ah, you say, they were scofflaws. Yea, well your turn is coming, we’ll see how you like it. My point is the satellite photos were never intended to intrude on privacy. That only happened once the government got their greasy hands on them. I believe most people want increased privacy, but they are afraid to say anything for fear their objections would just draw more attention to themselves.

           Take Europe, where they have much more experience dealing with government records. A huge portion of the populace has succeeded in preventing Google from displaying images of their houses. Yet here in American, there are enough naïve people to allow it. What do the Europeans know that Americans don’t. The answer is, “Plenty.”
           AT&T is plugging a country-wide database that follows you around. They want to put your medical records on the Internet is basically what they are saying. This May will be 15 years since I left the phone company, the youngest retiree on record, and trust me, the last outfit you want with your database is the telephone company. Oh, and I’m likely to remain the youngest, for after I left with my 6-figure buyout, they promptly changed the rule book. Employees must now be age 55 minimum to retire. How did I do it? Let’s just say I was the only one in 15,000 who read the rule book.

           It’s wise I have lots of things to do indoors; the temperature outside by mid-afternoon was 91 in the shade, maybe a record. I crossed another barrier, getting my Arduino to read and display analog sensor values. In this case, a photoresistor, which brings my project of an automatic fan one step closer. A fan that turns on and follows you around the room, that is my useful idea. First, I need to build one that turns on automatically.
           You can read about today’s experiment at Minutes, look for Experiment 008 . It is an experiment that failed in January that I went back and revisited with success. My guess is that it won’t be too long before I build an anti-barking deterrent. I’ve seem some on the market, disguised as a birdhouse. They are frightfully expensive, I believe in the $280 to $400 range. The working principle is a snap. It detects the dog bark and sends a 110 ultrasonic decibel beam at the little bastard for ten seconds. The dog can hear it but people can’t. If the dog continues barking, the decibels go up. I know it is a pity to punish the dog instead of the owners, but ask yourself, “Which animal is easier to train?”

           I found my electronics blog (the companion to this blog) has a built-in glitch. It is very difficult to link off the first page that gets displayed. My works run into many pages and the thing will not link, it has been designed that way. If there is a workaround, I’ll find it. Meanwhile, I found some trivia that might help any web page developers in the audience.
           When you do a link, such as to www.msn.com, it is wise to include a slash as a suffix, making www.msn.com/. This is because without the slash, the server has to process two requests. I don’t know the technical reason why servers are so dumb, or rather the people that designed them, but it makes sense to streamline anything you can on the Internet. Oh, how I dream of something that puts the Internet out of business by actually working right.

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March 26, 2011

           See the propane bottle on the scooter? This is the way I like it. When you run out, you go get some more. No credit score, no address on file, no usage charts, everything is your business. Even with nothing to hide, I still like it that way. It is the best arrangement in an “open” society. Remember, it is not facts that cause trouble. It is the malicious abuse of facts by those who twist things for their own purposes. It is legal in America for the stupid to cast negative aspersions with impunity. If all propane service did was mess up people like that, I would like it.
           Best of all, there is no standing monthly charge. A refill is $17.43 at Kmart Tire making a trip up there on the scooter an excellent bargain [since it is $22.95 everywhere else]. Yes, my friends, practicing for my own retirement was one of the smartest moves I’ve ever made. That’s how I learned most people only think they know how to retire, Lord help them. Although they don’t open for another three hours, I’m headed up to Kmart, which is coincidentally right next to Barnes & Noble where a coffee and a cookie cost the same as the money saved on fuel.
           Last evening I was testing my home-made HDTV antenna when I saw a program on the “Shark Tank”. Some guy, and he was clever, invented a bacteria filter you place over your nostrils. You hold the semi-clear plastic disks “like a contact lens” and place one over each of your nares. It filters out “99% of bacteria and viruses” although I don’t know about the virus part. The pores would have to be so small it would obstruct your breathing.
           And he knew his product to the limit, that guy was cool under fire, turning down a $4 million offer. I think he should have held out for $10 million, since his exposure on that show alone could easily net him millions enough to avoid having hard-nosed partners like the panelists.
           In two months I will be celebrating my fifth anniversary at Jimbos. That beats all records for a house gig from any entertainer I’ve ever met in Florida, even allowing for their inflated claims. (It also beats a lot of testimonials by people who brag they ran a successful business.) With around eight exceptions, I’ve performed there every week. Do recall I classify bingo as another form of entertainment because it is.
Don’t write bingo off as unmusical either until you’ve seen one of my shows where the game has to be halted while I lead the house in a rousing round of “You Don’t Have To Call Me Darlin’”. That is something to see.
           I’ve already looked back at my [very complete] records of the performances. The equipment necessary to put on this singles act cost me $3,842.42 and I’ve spent $743.63 in gasoline traveling up there. I’ve had $114.53 in material wear out on me, mostly cables, and I spent $57.35 on batteries. All told, my costs of doing business amounted to exactly 16.0% of revenues. All equipment has been perfectly maintained and is in new working condition except for surface wear and tear. Five years, and they told me it couldn’t be done.
           On the way back I checked in on Dave-O, the doctor has him all wired up again, like California Johnny. Such doctors get people dependent on painkillers and don’t cure a thing, but I can see it from the doctor’s point of view. The patient is in pain and it is nothing treatable now. But how long do you go for that?
           A taste of summer weather this weekend means a scooter trip tomorrow, the distance determined by Jimbos’ tonight. I’m staying indoors and reading, why I may have even discovered why all my sensors won’t read. It is because I’ve been connecting the leads to the port that receives the signals. Apparently, they work like voltage dividers and one has to tap off a central area, meaning a very transistor-ish behavior. This is why I chose to build from scratch. The available directions leave out too much important small stuff.
           I’m staying out of the sun and making fish chowder. Dave-O does not eat herring, while I’m a fan of such fish. I like them filleted, dressed and I’d even buy them in little steaks if somebody would pack them like that. If you don’t eat raw fish, you aren’t getting any natural iodine. To me, herring is the most “fish-like” of the ocean fishes. Dave-O reports he has never eaten a sardine in his life.

March 25, 2011

           It was one of those Friday evenings I’ve trained myself to stay home and listen to the radio. That means nothing on TV but that’s a given. That is not to say I did nothing today, life is to short to laze around very long. Here’s an account of what I did on a nothing day.
           First, I supplied Office Depot with all the statistics they need to realize they have been stocking shoddy merchandise on their counters. My evidence was a landslide to them, they agreed I was right but that I was the first customer who ever brought the problem to their attention. Brother ink cartridges are designed to fail. Ink cartridges are already borderline illegal from an anti-trust standpoint. But Brother has stepped over the line duping their distributors into handling a product they do not guarantee or accept returns.
           Then I published the instructions on-line of how to defeat the Brother ink sensor. I still do not have a macro to take a picture for you, so I lifted one off another site. Everything I show you has already been published elsewhere, I am merely lending the significantly larger and better educated audience of this blog as support against Brother. To make the printer work until the last drop of ink is really used, place a piece of black tape over the plastic rib on the front of the cartridge, as shown here.

           It is my sincere wish that this knowledge costs Brother an awful lot of money. Then I spent a couple of the cooler morning hours working on my shed. I’ve decided on only temporary repairs to last a few years, since I’ll be buying a big new house in around 18 months. So what if I’ll be a little broke until then.
           At the scooter shop I set up a super fast Internet computer for the manager. It has a graphics accelerator card that really cooks. It’s nicer than what I use here. I’ve made a deal they will teach me how to tune carburetors, a skill I’ve always wanted to pick up. Then I proceeded to scroll down my entire contact list and call everybody with my new phone number.
           Cowboy Mike reports he did a tour of the beachfront last weekend. Of the six places that still have entertainment, five were solo acts with backing tracks. Only McGowans had a real orchestra and it was a piano player and a standup bass. Not my style. I don’t grieve over the loss of venue, I understand that bands must now compete against those very single acts and not expect to be paid much more than a soloist.
           That’s another reason I’ve made certain that backing tracks will never be able to match my duo arrangements. Never. Not now that I have a guitarist willing to adapt to my methods instead of secretly conniving to become a soloist at my expense. I’ve really had it with guitarists who are really playing solo material in what is supposed to be a band. You know what I’m talking about.

           It’s a crazy thing, but I don’t know anybody who likes to hang out. Dave-O is company, but he won’t go out to a show or anything like that. Since there are no single women in town between 18 and 48, I have to go most places stag. I went to the free Friday show at Young Circle. It isn’t really free since they do take to plugging politics and religion, to which I strongly object. There was nothing to see, it was a fund-raiser for cancer research disguised as a free show. But there was an incident that stuck in my craw I should report.
           There were many rows of chairs set up in front of the stage. Take a close look at this photo and note the fake blonde on stage to the left, the one standing in front of the kids with her fake blonde hair blocking her face. I could not get her name or a better photo, but that folks is one prime example of Florida shit-head ignorance. Let me tell you the stunt she pulled.

           Many people arrived early and the chairs began filling up. That stupid broad waited until all the chairs were full before getting on stage and, get this, asking the front row to give up their seats. Of course, the screwy bitch did the old guilt trip saying it was for recovered cancer patients—but why did she wait until after all the other chairs were full? That is pure Florida stupidity. Now the people who waited the longest had to stand or sit on the ground. That woman is a crude asshat too stupid to smell her own stench of stupidity.
           To top it off, she had her microphone about 5 decibels too loud and she had one of those grating, raspy, whiskey voices that is a divorce looking for a place to happen. She was too wrapped up in her own little do-gooder sequence to realize she was offending people. My God, Florida, where do you find such an endless supply of these useless specimens? Do you advertise for them in Hell?

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March 24, 2011

           At the corner of 441 and Hollywood, see the KFC smorg, a.k.a “The Colonel’s Buffet”. I finally made it there. I managed three pieces of chicken, that’s 24 less than the last guy I know who was there. It was a decent $5.99 plus tax and it was all top quality fast food, not a pun. All the basics were covered, including dessert. You get one choice of salad, and it is lettuce. There are sides of pickles, beets and there are croutons. Leave room for the mashed and gravy or cheesy scalloped potatoes. There is no bread or hot beverages, only soda or water.
           Still, it is worth the trip, I plan to go there again next month. My new diet restricts so many things I like to have all the items I’m not allowed at once. You’ll find the locals also know it is a good place to tie on the feedbag, yet it is a quiet and decent atmosphere. I was impressed.

           Unbelievable weather. Jag was over for rehearsal and we are back on track. We have half the tunes needed to play out, this time we’ve really focused on duet arrangements that only sound right when both parts are played. I’ve found most duos don’t do that, especially if either member can also play a solo act. Funny thing, that. When a musician is wrong, he is not off the mark a little, he is dead wrong.
           Recall what I’ve been saying recently about the two-hour gig? This is a mature concept, not something I cooked up one day. Yet most musicians would reject it immediately. That’s because they aren’t thinking. The real test is whether or not you are working and making money. In fact, let’s look at two more misconceptions that are ingrained in the music business because I don’t mean just musicians.

           Does your band have a following? If they did, they would already have followed you to the place you are playing now and you would not be asking around for work. Plus, if I had a following, in about six months I would own my own pub. It only takes twelve steady paying customers to keep the doors open. Ask the Octopus and Jakes, they’ve been proving it for years. Yet club owners will still ask if you have a following.
           Or another good one is the bar owner trying to bring in customers when it is dead, like most Tuesdays. Dudes, you hire a band to play when you are busy so the customers who are already present will stay longer and spend more. The club should learn they have to accept the dead times as part of the business plan. Bands require an audience, they don’t generate them.

           Now who disagrees with what I just said? Okay, prove to me that you have turned a club around with your “following”. I’ve got $50 that says you’ve never done it, that you are all talk and no action. Second, it isn’t rocket surgery to know that you don’t hire a band to play to an empty room. I’m merely pointing out that some of the most entrenched ideas in some people’s heads are not based on clear, positive thinking.
           Too bad Jag is too young to realize how fast we are making headway. Again, we are not learning specific tunes, rather how to play all of the more popular country and country-like rhythms. This makes for a slow start but pays off in the end. We played out seven of the first eleven weeks we rehearsed; the first time was at the end of the third week we’d met. Even among seasoned musicians, that can be rare. It is an eye-opener for me to see him hit the same pitfalls I did at the same age. But I had nobody to steer me right, no good examples in life. I had no local heroes.

           To keep things in perspective, by the time I was Jag’s age, I had already been playing in a band for several years. What is more, they are bands that I organized single-handedly, not some existing group I joined up like my brother, who was a first rate copycat. I had to find, convince, and train the musicians myself. There was no pool of guitarists or singers to choose from, although I did know a kid named Barry White who had a guitar.
           Cancel my trip to Texas this Spring. I’ve missed the window and the previous two months saw an unexpected $681 in extra payments, putting my budget behind this quarter. That budget is geared toward comfortable and interesting day-to-day living, not the disaster survival antics of some people I know. Any surprise expenses stall my projects, not the electricity bill. Big difference, you know.
           In trivia, somebody has invented a “smart” bandage. I did not know the majority of burn deaths are from infections, not the actual heat damage. The bandage knows when it is to be replaced and can (I think) react to conditions by releasing medicine as required. That makes one bandage that is smarter than my Brother 420CN printer. I got through to tech support and finally got them to admit that the printer is built with a faulty ink sensor that will keep reporting a cartridge empty when it is not empty. However, that sensor is not covered by warranty. Ever notice that Brother and Bozo both start with the same letter?

           So that you will know, the ink sensor is not faulty. Brother has deliberately designed it to “malfunction” in this manner if the printer is not used for several months. In fact, when I reported this to Office Depot, they said I was the first person who had ever pointed out the “defect” to them. But see how Brother is taking advantage? People are conditioned to call it a defect. It isn’t, it is made that way.
           Once you are aware Brother is selling the ink for $20,000 per gallon, it makes sense they would pull a stunt with a sensor. The part is too complicated for the average consumer to troubleshoot, so they’ll bite the loss. I suggested to Office Depot that as a good customer service policy they not stock Brother cartridges until Brother guarantees the cartridges will work in their printers. Otherwise it is bad business for Office Depot to knowingly sell flawed merchandise.

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March 23, 2011

           Here is a sneak peak at my 3 x 3 matrix. The blog rules say this was (by far) the most significant development in my life today. Maybe this century, for I have outdone myself on this one. Matrix construction is top-level electronics, something in which I have no background. You can imagine two things here. First, a container of small, valuable parts that should must be kept clean, dry, and separated kept somewhere in the house while I was growing up. Last, how long something like that would have lasted in that house.


           This view is the reverse side of my matrix, showing the tiny (30 AWG) wires connecting all the anodes to a column of resistors. It is challenging working with such components and you may notice how I intentionally spread things out. My soldering still isn’t up to par, but I’m ex-phone company and I can wire-wrap like only a pro.
           Back in the picture is the Red Devil drum box (from August 2009). In the end, I never did meet anyone in the entire state of Florida that could pursue this project, but on-line the outfit that sold me my Arduino may be a good place to start again. If nothing else, they are quite aware that I tend to follow up on my plans.
           With my regular drum box, the Zoom, I programmed another seven tunes. All this did was remind me how unsuitable these existing products are for live performing. An hour later I’m still pushing buttons instead of rehearsing. The programming itself becomes so tedious that a lot of the beats I’ve put in there are compromises. Again, there are settings for drum maniacs to let them customize some damn snare drum, but not one setting that says “sounds like Jimmy Buffet’s drummer”. I do not know what planet those designers are living on.

           I’m going to sell my wagon trailer. It takes up too much room and I’m not using it often enough to justify keeping it. You watch, right after I sell it, guess what. I’m still working on the interior of my new shed and I need the extra space. Summer will be here before I finish insulating if I can’t pick up the pace, and that wagon trailer is in the way.
           Meanwhile, things are moving efficiently again. So efficient I don’t have anything to do these days. True, I have my new electronics hobby, but it is an intellectual hobby (the way I do it) and one cannot putter away all day long for there is an upper limit to how much one can think. Those who can know what I mean. I’ve also got one of those analog to HDTV converters so much in the news a year ago. The one the government supplies to people with old TVs. But I’m not a TV person and thus it is not logical to me how the thing operates. Do you hook it to cable? I’ll try that first.

           Dave-O now has one of those subsidized cell phones, something like “Safe-Link”. Where you cough up your $5 per month and you get a recycled unit that is supposedly to keep you in touch with people during an emergency. They don’t say which people want to hear about your troubles, but assume there are some. The ambulance maybe?
           With time to spare, I also took another look at Twitter and Facebook. No, I didn’t miss anything yet I still can’t fathom what all the kerfuffle is about. The sites are just not that academically appealing. I am really not a fan of what people are doing right now in 140 characters or less. But fads are the real thing in America. I think if I could watch somebody else work their Facebook for a while I might catch on to what they are doing that is so addicting. As I already said, I am one of the 63% of people who just have no use for whatever it is these sites are supposed to do.

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March 22, 2011

           The essence of Florida, a sign telling people the bus doesn’t stop here any longer. For those that cannot figure these things out by themselves. Bct stands for BCT or Broward County Transit for those who can spell, a rarity in Florida. Don’t be fooled by the fact the bus shelter, sign, and bench are still in place. This notice is the official one, yep, by golly.
           I’m still waiting for the breakthrough with my electronic sensors. I’m getting nowhere. I should not say that, you know. I’m learning what isn’t so. People say learning is difficult, but it isn’t really. In my time, I grew up and worked with a lot of people who put themselves in that strange no-win situation where they could not learn a single new thing without admitting they were dead wrong in too many other areas. They get so sick of themselves they eventually move to Ontario, where they can feel at home.

           Yep, call me grumpy today. My excuse: I just found out from my Seattle lawyer that my retirement home investment fund is taxable. Looks like it might be cabin in Colorado time, folks. Taxes will take away half what I had forecast as available cash on my normal retirement date, years from now in case you ask.
           One unknown is house prices could conceivably fall below the disaster values I’ve projected (a 2/3rds drop of their early 2006 selling price). A real glut of houses is about to hit the market so I’ll be watching for a steal. Not a bargain, a steal. Another unknown is gold prices. They could be headed for the exosphere.


           [Author's note 2016-03-22: keep in mind the information that was available at the time, in 2011. At that point there were slightly over 100,000 houses ready to hit the market. Myself and many others were poised to leap at the bargains. But we did not know the extent to which the big banks were conspiring to keep those houses off the market by a legal trick called "pre-foreclosure". Nor how the banks would then dribble the houses onto the market at around 200 units per week, and even then, only grant mortgages that showed a fake housing recovery.

           To cheer us up, I made headway with the LED matrix, if only to discover it is known by the natural and intuitive term “multiplex”. Why, is that not the very word that sprang to my brain the instant I wanted to connect some lights together so they would flash in a pattern? Google, the world’s largest search engine, was no help at all since its creators can’t grapple more than a single word at a time. In the end, I wound up painstakingly tracing the paths of single LEDs on blurry schematics until the connections made sense. I’m on the right track no thanks to anyone on the Internet.

           [Author’s note: I am quite aware that multiplexing is not an exact description of my task, but the concept of using an array to control an array has always been part of my goal. I’ve known since before day one the Arduino, with 16 pins, cannot by itself control the huge number of circuits in a useful matrix. However, multiplexing makes it possible and if that is what it takes, then that is what I will learn.]

           I swear again I will never waste my money on another Brother printer. It is criminal the things that go wrong with that junk. Now my 420CN sits there with $65 worth of brand new ink cartridges telling me to replace the cartridges. There are no instructions with the software on how to fix this problem. But that is typical of the Brother bastard-rat mentality, that they even build a printer where this can happen. I’ll start looking on line tomorrow, but what slope-headed dickweeds they are. And of course, the place that sold you the cartridges denies responsibility for the printer.
           Yep, I just got off the phone with their customer service. They say it is a bad “ink supply sensor”. Funny, the error message did not state any such thing before I spent my $65.00. Other weird features include an off switch that does not work, it merely places the printer into standby. And no print head cleaning function, so can’t even try that.

           They referred me to a service center. What’s the bets the most basic service is more expensive than a new printer? And none of the new printers will use the ink cartridges I just bought. I dream of the day I read in the paper that Brother has gone bankrupt due to poor customer satisfaction.
           Ah, but later. I successfully built and programmed a 3 x 3 LED dot matrix display. To take my mind off the world, I sat down and designed, wired and coded an LED array. You’ll find details at Minutes . Suffice to say I would not have believed such a feat possible two weeks ago. Since I applied the code to different patterns, that means I thoroughly understand what the apparatus is all about. One has to know the subject inside out and backwards before coding a computer. Unless you work for the school board, but that is another story.
           I documented the entire process, including a video of the final stage as the matrix alternated between two patterns, both programmed the hard way. There must be other ways to do all this but I’ll wager when I see them I’ll be glad I took the five hours to build this one from scratch.

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March 21, 2011

           It’ a good thing I take one last look in every box before throwing things out. I found my old contact book from my days at the phone company. All the computer passwords and unlisted numbers for internal departments. And this photo, the last date. Yep, this is the last photograph ever taken of the Reb & I out on the town. This was somewhere in Hollywood, CA. Those were indeed happier times.

           One place I won’t be buying a solar panel is the FAFCO counter at Home Depot. When I asked for prices on items they had on display, I got nothing but double-talk and the old runaround. They kept saying, "It depends". They wanted my home address so they could come out and case the joint, er, I mean, evaluate my needs. I said my only need was the price but I couldn’t corner those rats.

           Seriously, two squirming hooligans who could not be cajoled into a straight answer thought I was [actually] going to tell them where I lived. All I wanted was the price of the solar panel I was pointing at. They claimed not to know. That folks, is how you pay for things with your personal information, and that folks, is what is wrong with American business today. Every last damn salesman is a con artist. How do I know they were shysters? "It depends".

           What the? I just finished reading the strange theory of the century. Imagine me in my ideal encounter. I meet a woman that is plainly above the ordinary, she is young, slim, precocious, talented and takes an instant liking to me. I chat her up a bit, but I’ve never had to ask women for sex. The right ones will suggest it on their own after a short acquaintance to determine I am for real. I never promise relationships or marriage, I don’t have to and never have. The sex is recreational and if we meet again it is only by mutual agreement. And that occurs 63% of the time.
           Yes, I do tend to see such an event as a classic “score”, although I do not brag about the numbers ever, much less in a locker room. For that matter, I am the only one who knows how many women I’ve been with. But I will point out I’ve never had to beg, seduce, pay or sweet-talk a woman, meaning I’ve never been with a prostitute either. I’ve done all the dating activities, such as movies, dinners, walks on the beach—but only after we had been having sex a while, never as an inducement.

           [Author's note 2021 - I'm surprised how candid I was about my modus operandi on-line. Some may recall that at that time I thought I was dying and had nothing to lose. Read below, I was partially writing in response to being called names because my approach to women is not the same as most men. By the time I was twelve I knew that the way most men went about getting women was not the correct nor the easiest method. I watched the entire male population of my classroom and both my brothers fall into that trap. I chose music and have no problems admitting that as my motive.
           And before anyone goes thinking that's all there is to it, look around. Tons of men to play music still wind up with no good women and have to pay for what little they get. You can't just grab a guitar and get the babes, ask every guitar player I ever met in Florida. But odds are you'll do better than by memorizing pick-up lines and lifting weights until you look like a gorilla.]

           Most of the women I date tend to be self-supporting or better, often operating at a surplus and I can state many times the woman has taken me out on the town. I am not threatened by high income or educated woman when they ask me out. But the best things in life are free when I meet the right woman, no doubt about it.
           Well, according to Alex Thio, a Malaysian sociologist, that makes me a “deviant”. He lumps my ordinary behavior together with drug addicts, murderers, prostitutes, self-pitiers and the mentally ill, making no distinction between the wise, the ill and the criminal. Anything not in the majority, he calls deviant. To me, Thio is denigrating a lifestyle he only wishes he could have. Alex, you are proof that one can be a sociologist and not know a thing about people. Imagine that, you calling me abnormal.
           Since the average person doesn’t tinker with electronics, it could be said I conducted some deviant experiments last night. I burned a little deviant midnight oil over a repeat failed experiment. I cannot get my Arduino to read the values of a variable analog resistor. No matter what I do, it reads zero. And I put it away after 27 unsuccessful revisions to the code. Do I have a whole box of faulty sensors? Is my Arduino a lemon? Or a deviant?

March 20, 2011

           Look what I found! All these years I’ve talked about the computer from Taiwan, the one that was, in those days, not supposed to exist. (Clones were a later development in this country.) This is a photo of my first Apple ][e from 1981, with the top cover off. I had this computer working on my desk back when you thought computers were science fiction. Note the expansion cards and the two-button joystick. That box on top of the monitor is a 7” floppy drive.
           This is the same computer I did my initial experiments on artificial intelligence and the spread sheet “Visicalc” that I was too early to make any money off. The screen was green on black, 8 shades of green. I claim to have the first word-processed letter in Canada on this computer, but that is another story.

           I lost money on my first venture, the famous 1982 attempt to sell mortgage tables. I was too far ahead of my time. Also, in late 1981, I got my infamous job with the phone company and that brought everything to a standstill for the next 15 years. The phone company makes it impossible to get on with your life when you work there.
           I had first programmed a computer in 1971, ten years before what you see here. Rusty and I later worked in Jerry’s orchard that summer, and had concluded computers were “something interesting”. Years later, Rusty found this clone in the market in Taiwan and sent it to me in pieces, parcel post. I retired that computer in late 1992, when PCs became so cheap Apple no longer sufficed for my uses.

           Not my best day at all. I see the current issue of Time is warning people about the same thing I did 15 years ago. In fact, the author has lifted a few too many of my phrases verbatim, which is annoying at the least. He warns the same as I always have, nothing on the Internet is free, you are paying for it with your private, personal information.
           The author is a reporter and he isn’t thinking ahead, but I repeat myself. He concludes the mass of private data collected is not that bad. He’s wrong, the system has not yet begun to abuse the cloud. It is already past the stage where people who do not have profiles can’t get jobs, loans, or insurance—no profile makes them social outcasts. And he says “not that bad”? The whole article smacks of plagiarism.
           There is talk of legally limiting this information skimming. It is probably too late for most people. The bottom line is, do not use your real name on the Internet unless you have no other choice. There’s a lot of sinister people out there and the abuse is propagated by indifference, no shortage of that. Myself, I don’t care, since I can get anything on you but you can’t get anything on me except what’s already on my hospital birth certificate. But I saw all this coming in 1995 when I found my first cookie.

           How about trivia? Did you know Plato’s real name was Aristocles? Plato in ancient Greek means “wide”. It seems he was rather broad-shouldered. Tough if that’s not trivial enough, you see I also made another prediction four years ago and I just came back from grocery shopping with my own money. A gallon of milk is $6 and loaf of bread is almost $4. I told you this inflation was going to return with a vengeance. It costs big time to ship food 1,500 miles, the average distance the food Americans eat has to travel to reach their plate.
           No, don’t plan to grow your own. First of all, most of you can’t, you’ve lost the touch. Second, you still can’t grow it cheaper, although that day is arriving. Last, most communities in city limits prohibit growing vegetables in your yard unless it is in a hidden garden in the back yard.

           You want to hear about robotics, I can tell. What if I told you I’ve been mis-using the term? It’s true. But I can’t think of another thing to call it. Perhaps I should define my experiments, will you settle for that? To me, robots that emulate humans are not the best solution. From a robotic sense, humans are a general purpose machine, while a robot that specializes in a few tasks probably suffers if designed after humans. For the technical types, a robot based on humans is called an android.
           Non-human models include those that move by wheels or legs and the robotic arm also called the “appendage” robot. Some works sub-classify robots into wheels, tracks and so on, not me. But to point out what I mean, take a specialized robot that moves on six legs, a very non-human number, at least until China gains the lead in stem cell research. Six-legged robots are very stable and adaptable. One day we may need robot spray.
           It is not my intention to pursue a robot that can listen, see, or talk. There are plenty of other activities more in my scope. Like driving a motor, which I did last week. In ways like that, I’ve already exceeded what I set out to do. But I would like to continue until I automate some simple task. This will probably include using sensors, detectors and something that measures distance. Those are far beyond anything I can do at this point.

           How about an example? Who recalls my frustration with my earthquake detector back in 2004? I could build the device, but had no way of recording data while I was away. I’d considered trying to modify an old turntable or clock mechanism, but then there is the pen and ink. Now today, I can already see that an electronic sensor wirelessly connected to a computer is the solution. There you go, a very non-human robot contraption.
           One place I won’t be buying a solar panel is the Fafco counter at Home Depot. When I asked for prices on items they had on display, I got nothing but double-talk and the runaround. It depends, they said. They wanted my home address so they could come out and case the joint, er, I mean, evaluate my “needs”.
           No way was I telling two shifty, squirming, snake-oil types where I lived. All I wanted was the price of the solar panel I was pointing at. They claimed not to know. That folks, is how you pay for things with your personal information, and that folks, is what is wrong with American business today. Every last damn salesman is a con artist. How do I know they were shysters? It depends, I said.

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March 19, 2011

           That’s me, the California bartender. In case you wonder where I was on many of those long vacations I took from the phone company, here’s a partial answer. I believe this is not a bar, but a school where I was giving a speed demonstration. I normally wore a shirt and tie in those days, this is nothing special. I had mixed those seven drinks in front of me in the 30 second time limit. The only jobs ever I got were slinging beer, mixing drinks like this was for show only.

           We get a lot of nice days, but a pattern of perfect days in a row like this is too rare. It was a freak week like that what suckered me into moving to Florida. Dave-O was over for tea and we wound up sitting in the Florida room for a couple hours taking it easy. He’s still got trouble eating and they are treating it with painkillers, a weird medical philosophy in my books. Aren’t you supposed to cure things instead of chancing getting somebody hooked on drugs?

           I love my new work shed. Everything is slowly shaping up right. I ran the scooter up to Home Depot, I sort of like that place. Not as much as the library or anything, please understand. Have you seen how stingy they are getting with prices? They now sell wing nuts by the package of four, cost is $1.14. That may be going past the point of no return, since it costs more money to sell things that way. Only the scooter made it economical to zip up there for two nuts and two bolts.
           Bingo was harsh. This means Dunkin Donuts instead of the Diplomat munyanna. The core crowd was away on a cruise and I can’t compete with Norwegian. Did I ever mention my first girlfriend was Norwegian? Natural redhead. They used to exist, you know. I speak with authority. Anyway, her being first makes me and the cruise lines even.
           But don’t give up, cruise ships may have had their day. One can only play so much shuffleboard. It as Patrick’s birthday and he brought food for everybody. Sausages and sauerkraut and all the wonderful things the doc is going to take off my diet next week, just you watch. The gang got him one of those walkers, but this one was equipped with a headlamp, holsters for a trowel and glue gun.

           Ha! Patrick’s is a spry 50. If you look closely, you can see the walker. The trowel handle is on th left, you can just make out the red glue gun on the right. Patrick was the guy who wanted to fix Wallace’s roof for free. Well, in exchange for me playing a few pool parties. Now he’s got no pool parties and Wallace got no roof. Double ha!

           I also rewired the computer work station to give myself a shirt-sleeve environment to study my robotics. I’m telling you, I was busy all week. If I don’t get out of the house much, it doesn’t mean I’m banking my sleep. When I’m done, in say another week, I’ll be living in almost luxury considering the circumstances. There will be some changes, and it is only my need to get things in order that stops me from heading to Okeechobee tomorrow.
           In my tons of spare time (that’s a joke, son) I programmed the Zoom drum box to match most of the music now in focus with Staci and Jag. Never put too much into a drum box where you cannot make cheap, easy computer backup copies, such as the outdated but affordable Zoom or Alesis. Tapping out the beats, I thought about what Ray-B said whilst we were jamming last week. He noticed, since I did not have a lead player, I regularly played fills on the bass.

           He’s got a point, saying I “took out the lead and play it on the bass”. It reflects the difficulty I’ve had finding a rhythm guitarist. When I find one who can play rhythm, he can’t play lead, but if he can play lead he will not stop. I have been soloing for years, so Pat-B is right, I will play intros and riffs on the bass right where I am lacking the guitar part.
           But in my defense, I would point out I am playing melody riffs, not 1970’s style disjointed cliché lead take-offs designed to clobber the other musicians. Still, Ray-B is right, I do play them. Hey, can’t leave ‘em out. How else to play “Tennessee Flat Top Box”? Just you try playing that without a lead guitar, and if I had to bet five cents it would be that you’d wind up playing it exactly like I do.

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March 18, 2011

           Time to clear up a rumor. Wallace has been putting about that in 2008, he “bailed” me out. He states I was destitute and without him I would not have made do, and I should be eternally grateful for his benevolence. This is nonsense and here are the facts. That January, I had asked a dozen people if they would lend me money to buy an excellent mobile home I had found.
           I told everyone, not just Wallace,that the place could be rented and could be flipped for a profit (because I had negotiated the price so low), but not for at least two years as I was facing some legal proceedings which might result in my having zero income for that period and I would have to occupy the premises during the meantime. In return, I would maintain the property and pay my share once I won my case. The bank receipt shown here states on January 29, 2008, I had $9,606.42 in the bank.

           One should allow it may be that nobody told Wallace most destitute people don’t have ten grand in the bank. In which case he could be forgiven for not figuring that out on his own, being Canadian and all. Let’s see if he’ll go for the double or nothing question. Why did I, right at that time, suddenly have so little money in the bank? (Hint: medically related.)
           The deal was I needed to stretch that bank money to live on for two years. Then Wallace showed up in September 2008 (four months late) and tried to squeeze me for full market rent or he was going to sell “his” place. Since I know he is smarter than that, you get one guess where he got such a stupid idea. More on her later. You will not believe what I found out. It seems Miss Honorary White Woman isn’t so white at all. Or at least not so honorary. Also, it seems what she tells people about her job is not consistent with the truth.

           [Author's note: Wallace had originally said no to my offer, but changed his mind several months later when he came into an inheritence. That is further proof I was in no way destitute, and proof I never needed him for a landlord, only a partner, contract or no contract.
           Further, the fact that he inherited it where I saved up and invested for mine is all that needs to be put forth for his attitude. How dare somebody who can't even save up a lousy few thousand bucks of his own go around considering himself a financial expert. That's save the money, not make it, anybody can make money. Complete fools can make money, it takes a breed apart to save it. Don't believe me? Try it. Put $5,000 in the bank and leave it there for five years.
           Ah, but how do we know the bank slip is genuine. Well, now we get into another matter, that of veiled accusations. If it came to that, I still have the slip on file, along with the previous and following consecutive printouts. But at that point, proving anything to an idiot is going to cost him money.]

           Time to clear up the weather. No, wait, it was perfect by itself. A completely cloudless day with a western breeze. I took the scooter for a run around town, from my bicycle rides, I know where all the shady streets are. I wound up at the library and updated all my social networks. A surprising ratio of women write a note, but all are from so far away, the nearest response was Orlando. I won’t drive that far unless she looks like Taylor Swift.
           Here’s an emerging pattern. It is difficult to tell if the women are really reading my profile. They don’t ask any of the questions that arise from that. I automatically delete any responses that hint of cybersex, so these are the legitimate replies. They say things like my profile photo is cute. I love shallow women. I’ll make you a deal, I promise to follow up with the first one that is decent looking and says anything intelligent. Don’t wait up for me.
           No headway with the dot matrix LED. As usual, the topic that gets my interest is so off the beaten track there is not a single article on the World Wide Web that comes close. This week I’m fixing up a small electronics work area to begin building my own matrix. I’ve got the plan in my head, but no way to set it up without considerable soldering. One quickly learns available breadboards are not at all compatible with matrix wiring. Some sharp entrepreneur ought to build one.

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March 17, 2011

           Happy St. Patrick's Day and if you are going to Kelley's on Harrison, have an extra one. They are closing the doors permanently end of this month. That's another landmark replaced by some shigga-booga restaurant you can't afford.
           This composition I call Guitar and Scooter. That’s Jag’s guitar in the grass while he ran back inside to get a helmet. Another perfect day, we spent two hours going over material to provide a rhythm that sounds super-country with just bass and guitar. The parts are so over-played, it is not so easy at all. It is acoustic music but neither of us can afford a hollow-body, so we are stuck with the unsuitable Fender sound. We’ve both agreed to take a closer look at some rhythm harmonica.

           Of course things are accelerating again, moving back up to speed like I said would happen. Instead of coming along for the ride, certain other people are being left in the dust. I admit I had a difficult go over the past couple years, but dammit, I was setting up what takes most people half a lifetime.
           There’s two ways to be broke, one is flat busted, the other is no cash but all the bills are paid. I had to make the transition in record time and I know who tried to shaft me because I appeared vulnerable in the process. We shall now have to teach that person a lesson. Actually, they’ve already been taught, they just haven’t realized it yet.

           Enrique passed by again, he’s got no water at all now. Dang, don’t you hate it when that happens? Lucky for him, I found my complete set of couplings and fittings I was going to use for my home-made X-ray machine. If it ain’t in there, they don’t make it. He owes me, you have any idea what it would cost to get a tradesman out there? I worked in the sunlight half the day and that’s enough. I gave him the whole box and told him to return the balance.
           After an hour I went over there to find he has snapped the metal fitting off the water heater, not just the plastic feed pipe. I gave him his old water heater back, the one that was under the counter, since it was originally his. Careful, that last sentence is carefully worded to be misleading on at least five counts. Those who make assumptions will be fooled. Wallace was never going to let me connect it anyway.

           As I went to study, I noticed the Jeopardy was on again (I tend to have regimented habits) and the Tom guy was on again, racking up another $30,601, but they are finding him tougher competition. They must be having a rough time, he tends to stay well ahead unless somebody gets lucky. I can identify with Tom. If you assume the others are normal, he’s a genius. I know the feeling, but the reality is this: he is normal and the rest are damn idiots.
           I was up past 11:00 PM last night and I’m beginning to suspect no amount of ingenious wiring can rig up a 3x3 dot matrix on regular breadboard. I may have to settle on a 2x2 as proof of concept. I got a brain-ache from trying to figure this one out. Tell you what else doesn’t ring up is the claims that e-books and e-publishing are taking over. True, the sales are growing annually. But if you tally the numbers, most of the assertions about big times are manipulated statistics.

           Here’s a real statistic. A third of the prisoners in Federal prisons are not American citizens. Mexicans mostly. Why are we not shipping this element back by the busload? It is a given that the Washington Whimps will never grow a spine, but don’t the border states have some authority of their own? And I don’t just mean Arizona.
           Last, I read a detailed report on people classified as “non-survivors”. These are the first people to die when anything goes wrong. I’ll tell you the terms, see if you can identify who all this reminded me of. Primary trait of this brand of loser is they do not have a history of normal life participation. Instead, they lock themselves into family, church and fiction entertainment. They tend to dislike others who are knowledgeable of the world around them. Then, there are the four tell-tale clues: they are apathetic, easily discouraged, quick to anger, and isolated from the mainstream of society. Yep, that’s who I thought of, too.

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