Dave-O turned up after a week. Got himself a job framing houses for the bank. The Florida population is about to triple and the banks are refurbishing their foreclosures, though I think the market has not yet tanked. I would give most anything to grab a hammer and go framing again, it is the one construction trade that gives me a sense of real accomplishment at the end of the day. Stick-framing. One thing I will never be able to do again. And I've learned when Dave-O goes missing for a few days, don't go looking for him. He'll show up sooner or later with a perfectly good explanation.
It was another late study on the Arduino. Let me explain another facet of my studies that makes 2011 different than earlier years. It is security of home base, something I did not have for the past few years. Electronics is an advanced subject compared to electricity or electromechanics. House wiring, like drywalling, does not involve bit arithmetic, boolean equations, or data mapping, despite what some people would have you believe. Electronics cannot be learned half-way, but that is not to say a half-educated person could not learn it. Anyone who has every tried to delete a page out of their print queue knows about half-educated engineers.
But electronics demands a commitment. The last thing you want to do is start learning it, get half way, then be forced to abandon the study. This was a very real threat for me over the past three years. I tell you that study is no different than any other accomplishment. When you get 2/3 done, some bastard will come along and pull a stunt that makes the final 1/3 more difficult than you imagined. This world is full of malicious malcontents. That is why geniuses and mad scientists alike prefer to locate their laboratories in abandoned castles. It's the drawbridge thing.
