Other than morning coffee, the day was all electronics. Playing with my new toys from Colorado. For reasons unknown, the blog video upload doesn’t work any more, way to go Google. Blogger was better before you stuck your noses in. The good news is I’ve got the “gambling” circuit done, for the most part. This photo reveals the more sophisticated circuits now in the works, a good sign of progress, as you can see the string of ICs along the bottom panel of the breadboard.
Some things I can’t do are reset to zero, play matching music, and count past 999. But those bells and whistles are not the important part of the game. Music and displays are the minimum wage aspects of the programming field. Get the conceptual done right, then call in the flunkies, I say. All this could be done probably easier with the Arduino. That wonderful device has fallen by the wayside as I learned regular electronics but to understand why, try to imagine that my perspective. Without electronics, I often had no idea what the Arduino was trying to accomplish. Learning things backwards was unorthodox, but when I return to programming, it will be with an unworldly understanding of real-time coding.
I hear the people at the bakery have a Ruby Two Shoes in their condo. She hasn’t paid for a year and constantly bangs around including moving furniture in the early AM. Believe me, people like that need to be physically and financially hurt badly before they quit. You are not interested in their situation, only that they cease making the noise. And a condo association that won’t do anything. Of course, I find this strange, because whenever I had noisy neighbors, in no time at all they never made any noise again.
I won’t say how, but folks, when somebody is depriving you of your right to quiet enjoyment of your own home, it is time to strike them at their weakest point. You merely have to find that point. If you want to be nice about it, you lose your right to complain. Trust me, some people only learn things the hard way and that is not your fault. Don’t try this today, but years ago whenever somebody left their dog out barking at night, we’d call 911 from a phone booth as “concerned neighbors”. You get the idea.
In my return books from Denver, I have a copy of the Bedford Reader. Must have picked that up as an oversight, I’d think, because I don’t normally read pseudo-intellectual tripe. But since I know I must have had a reason to get it, I actually read a number of the articles. They are the sort of shallow literature that an uneducated person would read if they decided they wanted to sound informed. Topics like should they televise executions and skin color is not related to IQ. The same weary arguments by the same hack writers. Why did I buy that book? Don’t tell me I have to read it to find out.
Keeping an eye on Colorado real estate. I don’t trust most of the ads, the houses are listed as “auction” or “foreclosure” without explaining exactly what that means, price-wise. Foreclosure entails dealing with the bank, but I do not agree with banks advertising a listed price as if it is the amount of the foreclosure. It isn’t. And this whole nonsense of a reserve bid makes a joke of the word “auction”. I also know that Quit Claim means the seller does not have to reveal any outstanding liens or debts on the property, which should be illegal as far as I’m concerned. Quit Claim allows the sale of property not entirely owned by the seller.
During mid-evening I took to reviewing Craigslist, the drainpipe of the Internet. There is nothing like a free place to advertise to squeeze the sap out of the waterlogged Florida woodwork. I did buy my sidecar from that source, but after four months of intense scrutiny and waving real cash around for the deal. The musician’s list has totally degenerated into lessons and repairs, with one ad in maybe twenty relating to a connection. I have to laugh, how idiots don’t realize by posting in the wrong list drives away the very people they think are going to buy anything. Duh.
And guys (it is always men) that put ads on their videos on youTube need to be dehydrated, with a very big and rusty knife. Same with those who post slide shows--what part of “video” don’t they grasp? They are about as bright as the little boys who post scenes of tanks and jets to blasting indie rock music, like it’s a big party and they’re hooking you up.
ADDENDUM
That was Colorado on the phone for 30:39. Things went exactly according to plan after I left, but as we all surmise, that doesn’t last. One thing is Marion has to move, and I’m concerned. We snap at each other, we have our disagreements, but the relationship has stood the stress and strain for 30+ years. I do not like the concept of her moving into a place as a renter because she will find some place to share rather than a self-contained unit. That leaves her vulnerable to the whims of strangers.
However, in the short run, everything is on queue and all documents have been processed. We have a standing arrangement whoever travels has half the distance to be covered to call for assistance in getting back, so she knew I was okay; although she laughed at me having $38 left when I arrived, as she says only I “could do that”. She recalls the days I’d get off the plane after 19 hours over the Pacific at 6:30 AM and be at work at 8:00 AM. Five times per year. Sigh, those were the days.We had the small town discussion. She likes living in small towns, but she has a more idealistic concept of that. The bottom line is we have to consider our options. If anything goes wrong before May, 2015, when possibility becomes likelihood, I’m the only one that has seen any small towns recently. Worse, I only drove through them. But I was impressed by Muskogee, OK, where I saw a beautiful 4 bedroom, 3 bath asking $52,000. Here’s the sun room, part of the 2,465 square feet.
The good news is these are backup plans and the positive nature of our lifestyles means we’ve rarely been pushed back on nothing. I mean, if silver popped up to $250 per ounce even for a day, our problems would be over. And that is no far-fetched speculation. Silver is far more volatile than gold and the financial world is a house of cards awaiting a demo of the domino theory of credit-based economies. And it is not exactly like silver is something we intend to look at some day soon.
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