The whole movie viewing on the stranded Swiss family needs revamping. The theme is overworked. I even watched the “new” remake set in the South Seas. I have the same question as anyone who pays attention to the plot. If these shipwrecked souls have the tools and know-how to build such a fancy tree house, why don’t they just build a boat? The water is amazingly clean for what I saw in the harbors back in the 80s when I toured the place.
The priority is the solar panels, as the rest of the wagon is a waste without those lights. I do have the option of rigging up some kind of generator, say to the sidecar axle, but that gets complicated. Agt. M. says it isn’t, but he’s the guy who rewires his own dashboards to accommodate computers. I still have no proof that this system will even work, or if it does, that it is adequate. Careful measurement shows the Honda alternator can’t even keep up with the sidecar, so I’m installing a cutoff switch for daytime travel that keeps only the brake light operational. Don't worry, the sidecar is the most visible vehicle on the roadway in the daytime.
It was maybe a good idea to buy the most expensive undercoat, as I’ve decided the side walls of the camper will be unsanded plywood. The likelihood of me making a major mistake is so great that I think it best to avoid high-quality materials on the walls. Unsanded plywood can really soak up paint. But the panels will be ¾” thick and I’ve found that to be strong enough to resist any torsion twisting over the short lengths I’ll be using. It gains 3” of interior space over all but the weakest [wooden] framing. This camper is vastly stronger than the ones I've seen in the how-to videos.
Bingo was a success even without allowing for the end of the month, when rent day really puts a damper on things. I’m truly disappointed that my band first said they would and then backed out of playing last Sunday. It was my ass in the sling. In a sense I’m glad I found out at the expense of Jimbos, who will forgive me over stuff like that. But this changes matters. For all they say about wanting to play out, I will now probably wait and see what their real parameters consist of. Mine are easy: to play out at every opportunity and quit rehearsing old material.
The problem with endless rehearsing is many-sided. You get used to playing in static surroundings which doesn’t happen on stage. You fall into the habit of seeing cues that won’t be there anywhere else. I find practice does not “deep learn” that music the way needed to play correctly when there are distractions. And certainly, we have to go over and over the same material because we are not playing it live, which is the only way to really solidify your act. I’ve already planned to multi-band again as a backup in case this one doesn’t get any gigs. Yes, it really is that important to me.
This town needs a country bar. No, not a downtown night club with fancy trimmings and weekend cover charges. No, not some top 40 country show band with pedal steel and fiddle. No line-dancing lessons or dress code. Just an ordinary juke joint with a ladies night and local guitar acts on the weekends. I know the six musicians who work the circuit and none of them do any real country. Where is that open-minded guitarist who has the brains to realize he must be different to succeed? Give me that musician and I will make it happen. I could buy Jimbos, you know, it is for sale.
Everybody complains the place is a bad location, yet it is dandy for any southbound traffic that wants to avoid downtown. Mind you, the traffic lights suck even for Hollywood. (The city maintains anybody who complains “doesn’t understand the big picture”.) The lights are not set to merely regulate the traffic, they are set to purposely slow it down if you go anywhere except toward downtown. Some say there isn’t enough parking, but after American Breakers closes, what’s available is never full. That’s sixteen spots. The seating capacity is standard, around forty people. There is a huge back yard for another 100 that has never been used. Besides, many of the local bars have zero parking at all.
I’ve proposed a title for the yellow streaks of paint on so many cars that pull in near the big lamp pole at Jimbos front door. It is one of those concrete collars to “protect” the pole but it ends just at the eye level when seated in your car. Nobody can see it when backing out. If you forget it is there, you acquire a “Jimbos Racing Stripe”. I’ve christened it so after my station wagon felt the heat. I’ve often thought of ringing it with something that would hit people’s tires instead of body panels.
Fred called. That infected computer doesn’t have a hard drive. It uses some kind of internal memory stick arrangement, which explains why it could not be booted to reinstall the operating system. There’s a way, we just don’t know it. Mike was the laptop guy. The decision here is to tear the thing apart and see if we can gain anything from experience. Odd that a fixed drive wouldn’t have a recovery partition, or at least a restore feature. I still view even the fact that this could happen to a computer as a major failure on the part of MicroSoft. They never did produce a quality package that endured.
For another spectacular failure, who remembers Tobruk? It is a port on the African Mediterranean coast that seems to be famous for nothing. Other than the battle there in the last big war, who ever heard of the place? It is a port that supplies nothing, since the entire surrounding vicinity is empty desert. I was amazed by how many times the name comes up in history as some major event although all it ever did was threaten some supply lines. Nothing has happened there since, is my guess.
My comment last day on the lack of smart potatoes on the farm is not idle commentary. I know what I’m talking about. The farm is not the place that encourages intellectual competition like what happens in the urban environment. I always felt cities were good for civilization because they foster competitive behavior, though I also believe that “unbridled” capitalism overdoes it. Not enough credit is given by historians to the motives provided by city environments. It is very difficult to live by ones brains when stuck in a farmhouse with seven other people bent on making sure there is no way you get away with that. And on the farm, it is far too easy for the parents to control the exposure that children get to forms of living that do not involve backbreaking labor.
ADDENDUM
The end of a month of dieting means I have some stats. Of course, an accountant would keep track. During the month of August, 2013, I consumed a total of 14,202 calories. Based on a 2,000 calorie per day diet, I’m down 47,798 calories. This alone explains at least 13-1/2 pounds of the 22 pounds I’ve lost. I’ve only dropped four pounds in the past two weeks, so little as to be quite discouraging. And there is no indication that the weight would remain away if I moved back to my former 1,200 calorie per day diet of previous years. For clarity, I do not and did not lose weight on a 1,200 daily diet for three long years.
Changes are no more diary products. I even take my coffee with Splenda only. Also gone is snacking, this is something you have to cut out completely. You only eat fixed amounts that are planned in advance. I never thought I’d see the day I’d look forward to a tin of sardines as a meal. You get two 250 calorie meals per day and nothing before the afternoon. No candy. No alcohol. No rice. No oils. No eating or drinking a thing only because it is fun. Even that morning coffee is now relegated to keep me from craving my usual “Trump” sandwich.
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