March 31, 2014

Yesteryear:
One year ago today: March 31, 2013, Easter in Miami.
Five years ago today: March 31, 2009, Wilmington, NC.

           Meet Ruby, the part shepherd that is addicted to cheese. You may have met here before. This is up at the club just before sunset. In a way it is sad how domesticated these beasts become, this animal is so tame it would starve in the wild. No instincts of any protective nature left in Ruby. But she knows cheese from pretty impressive distances. If you search on whether cheese is healthy for dogs, you get a massive array of contradictory evidence. Like that nonsense of not feeding dogs any chicken bones. Chicken bones are the reason dogs are extinct.

           The dog reminded me of Wallace, I kind of miss the old guy. Just think, if he was here today, he’d be living in Boca Raton, with all his money back, and a property bringing in $450 per month pure profit. He’d have a free place to live for life, a gas allowance, and be living miles away from Patsie, his mentally imbalanced daughter. But like Ruby, his days of learning new tricks are all over.
           I stopped at Fred’s and he maintains the Win 7 computer performed flawlessly on his workbench, and that Win 7 has been a favorite of all his other clientele. We have agreed to set my system up and put it to the test. Why? Because this is around the seventh time we’ve been through this rigmarole. If he’s right, I’ll admit it. If I’m right, he is to sell this computer to somebody else. The computer environment here is ideal, yet I have to reboot Win 7 two or three times per day. No, there are no viruses.

           Win 7 has more hidden and gimp features than ever. But they still put the file delete and rename commands right next to each other. And if you do an F7 synonym search on the last word in a sentence, it still selects the period instead of the word. And folks, it is already 2014. I’ve come to realize that such blatant shortcomings are no inconvenience to either MicroSoft or the majority of their users. That’s why they are so widely reknown for their intelligence.
           I’m in month’s end conservation mode, something you yourself will experience upon retirement. This is where the certainty of next month’s income lulls you into the “spend your last dollar” syndrome. It isn’t only the fixed income thing of so many newscasts, because I adapted to that instantly. I’m not the least phased that money gets tight, no, it is the realistic hunch that it is still not wise to live down to the last penny. As for me? I’ve got plenty to do. Here’s a mini-account of me doing it.
           Reading polls. Does the government express the will of the people? According to NewsMax (Dec 2009), 70% of Americans want all illegals deported outright. Only 1% would extend any type of amnesty. (The other 29% think there are more urgent problems, but you can predict of those, another 69% would opt for deportation.) There is a huge majority of Americans who want illegals out and immigration stopped. So, what was the question? Does the government represent the people? Not on this issue they don’t.

           [Author’s note: the date of the above survey is not outdated. I admire NewsMax because they are one of the few outfits whose questions don’t suggest an answer. They don’t apply Time Magazine style pressure to elicit proper or politically correct responses. And NewsMax surveys are taken in private, as people will lie about their true feelings if they think they will be broadcast or labeled a racist. Clearly with a 70% decided vote, the immigration issue is by far the most urgent problem in America today.]

           And what is with all the backlash about my GMO-restricted diet? I did not make the change because of the pseudo-science out there. Those fake surveys and lying doctors, all of them bad actors, all using fear tactics to sell magazines and herbal supplements. If any readers here drew the conclusion I was swayed by such nonsense, well, they don’t belong in this blog. We have, in the past, suggested what sort of blog they should be reading. Celebrity pregnancies or something more their speed.
           My reasons for abstaining (GMO) are from a study of the genetic part, how the modification takes place, and an elimination of causes for bad health. A full year earlier, I read up on genetics and DNA studies with no connection to foodstuffs. I noted there must be some reason why Americans get sick twice as often as the rest of the world. I’m not saying there is a correlation with modified food, I’m saying that here, in my case, is the single outstanding suspect. I’ve ceased eating only a few of the most-modified, namely corn and soy. I’d rather have sugar than high-fructose corn syrup. As for rejecting certain foods, listen when I tell you I don’t get any other major exposure to suspected bad agents on a daily basis. I don’t smoke, eat snacks, breathe smog, or take Prozac.

           But I do agree twenty years is too short a span to claim there are no side-effects and the companies that do such studies have been caught lying just too often before. Monsanto, Dupont, who brought us DDT and Agent Orange. Mind you, I disagree with the premise of the DDT ban in many cases. Would you rather have thin chicken eggs or your kids dying from malaria? This brings up a topic in this month’s Popular Mechanics. The vaccine scare. Some twenty years ago, an English doctor named Wakefield published, for a bribe, some fake data to support a court case. He had his medical license revoked over it, but the vaccine phobia exists to this day most strongly amongst the poorly educated.

           I said a few days back my hobby involved (going back and) reviewing electronic circuits (and many other subjects but choose this one) after I had built a working model. I also read a chapter on early computer design. It now seems so easy. Why didn’t somebody tell me all this when I was 15, living a hundred miles from Redmond, and convinced the entire world was doing it all wrong?
           I also reviewed several articles about Enigma, the German code machine of WWII fame. Something is ringing a little too cute about the British version. There is also something else that mystifies me about “radio silence”. Why was the opposite tactic of flooding the airwaves never used? It seems compared to the cost of a single U-boat loss, the Germans could have had their long-range aircraft regularly drop small floats that emitted fake radio signals. I’ve long asked the question why a torpedo that homed on ASDIC (sonar) emitters was never developed. If the enemy (on both sides) has so much listening equipment, why not give him something to listen to?

ADDENDUM
           Once more, I express my disappointment at the way the police system works. I believe that police should be busy chasing criminals and not be allowed, except in extraordinary circumstances, to get involved with traffic tickets. As it stands, the police use motor vehicle law as a springboard into areas of conduct that are questionable at best. Enter the era of the celebrity bust. I was in court to plead not guilty, the second of at least three half-days I would normally have to take off work to not remain innocent, but to be judged not guilty. Public complacency has allowed it to come to this.
           The third day will be in court. That means sixty to eighty days from the time the ticket was issued, I must remain at the court’s beck and call. Cancel any vacations or business trips. Any delay or misstep on my part defaults to making me guilty of something, somewhere. If we go to court, my background will be brought up in an attempt to discredit anything I say, but I can’t use the same tactic on my accuser. I know that’s how the system works, but it is sad because America was founded on resistance to such rule.

           Each person that showed up in court today, there was a guy with a computer who looked up their driver’s records whether or not they pleaded guilty. He then determined their fine or punishment based on what he saw there, a violation of their rights. How so? The law is clear. All searches must obtain a warrant, in advance. And it is illegal to punish a person more than once for something in their past. A law-abiding clerk would need to get a warrant for each record he pulled up—the founding fathers intentionally put this inconvenience into the Constitution for good reason.

           I’m not saying I’ll do anything about this old English system, which was largely responsible for crumbling their empire, but I am saying I’m disappointed. I would stand idly by if those who support this system got into some real trouble.
           I took plenty of reading material with me. By the time my turn came up, I had learned an odd fact about dinosaurs. How do they know if it was a herbivore? It has to do with the front knee joints. If they bend forward, like a horse, that’s a grazer. If it bends backward, like a human, it uses the limbs to bring food upward toward the mouth. A carnivore. The clerk doing the illegal record snoops in the court today was a carnivore. And in the American court system, it is the worms that are at the top of the food chain.

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March 30, 2014

Yesteryear:
One year ago today:March 30, 2013
Five years ago today: Missing or no post.
Instead, here's a decade earlier March 30, 2003 where I mention Acapulco.
And Russian spies.

           Here’s the graduate engineer’s concept of an LED “lightbulb”. Why so? Because it is an outdated design, uses an old format, is five times as expensive as what it replaces, and throws about half the light in the wrong direction. I went to Senor Café for breakfast and the lineup was so long I missed the window for breakfast. However, a few chosen Spanish words got me a big plate of sautéed potatoes with bell peppers. Sorry, onlookers, you have to get your own. The staff here knows me. This late morning bite was on bingo, which surprisingly is slowly edging back toward profitability.

           Relax, I told myself. And you too. Take the day off and tell them I said it was okay. My background in military history had me listening to translations of what German tank soldiers who survived North Africa in the early campaigns had to say. I was interested in what changes, if any, they talked about when American equipment began to arrive on the battlefield. I was surprised to find they were somewhat flattering. They considered the Grant tanks a vast improvement over the British Crusaders. (I have my doubts that was a compliment.)

           What kept me reading, however, was an insight into the tank crew as they fought. On the English side, you hear of screaming, yelling, swearing, and mayhem. On the German side, the speaker invariably spoke methodically, even calmly. “We shot the first tank. Then we shot the second tank. The Commander said turn left and we saw a Grant tank about to shoot us. We quickly fired two shells and disabled it.” Some of the crewmen would describe knocking out six or seven Allied tanks and driving on like it was routine.
           Then around noon I trucked on to the Frenchie flea market. Did you know that all French tourists are over 70? For the first time since I was last in Acapulco, I bought a new wallet. That means something like twenty-five years. Like jewelry stores, wallet-makers will never get rich off me. I’m not expecting to find such quality any more. Here is a picture of the old grey leather, now cracked and faded like my neckline from driving a motorcycle. Below it is the cheap pseudo-leather half-plastic replacement made of Chinese pigskin from India. And they both cost the same. Five bucks.

           Let’s talk a little electronics. I have the Arduino ready to read in sensor data, but I don’t have any sensors. If I never said, I’ll tell you now they cost around $30 to $35 each, way over my budget. So, if the engineers can build a dumb light bulb, I should be able to devise a cheap sensor to test my Qbasic system for reading an Arduino data file.

           Here is my plan. The data is analog but interpreted by the Arduino as digital. This is a format which is fixed: analog to digital. There are no naturally occurring digital functions in nature. What I have in cheap supply are LDR (light dependent resistors), a component that changes resistance depending on the amount of light falling on it. My plan is to put these in a row facing an ordinary bulb thermometer. Then finagle things until the resistors tell me the temperature by the amount of light blocked by the colored fluid.
           I’ll try to post a diagram if I draw one, for now it is just an idea I got riding the bicycle. Did I describe it clearly enough? Say I put the LDRs in a small, long trough. Then I put the thermometer above this arrangement. As the temperature goes up and down, the shadow of the thermometer fluid will move over more or less of the resistors. I presume this would work best on sunny days. But it would be easy to shut it down if it was cloudy or dark. That’s like one or two commands. Ah, I heard that from the back row. Someone muttered this is just another project I hope to sell to the science fair people. You, step to the head of the class.

           However, this does not solve the problem of the expensive Arduino. We are aware of the Arduino circuit board that uses a chip removed from the original Arduino. But we can find no clear instructions on how to accomplish this. Nor are we predisposed to ordering something first and hoping we’ll be able to decipher the instructions that come in the package. And we still have to find a supplier willing to cooperate as did Hacktronics. Did I tell you they are back in business? Yes, but without our former excellent contact and their offerings are skeletal by comparison.
           Wait, there’s more. The five-piece band finally plays a good 20% newer material from the lady singer. This may result in more and better gigs. I don’t regard this as chance, for this new music and lady combination has done something I could never have accomplished without excessive arguments—it pushed weaker old material into the background. You’re darn tootin’ I pay very close attention to what she’s up to. While the music is still a generation earlier than even my folk-country list, it is boomer music and that’s your paying crowd. I’m the first to vote yes for house parties and the new sound is a much better fit for such venues.

           If we get booked often, this is the happy situation that would stop me from traveling. It is practically the only thing that would, I’ll let you know. If we get any type of weekly work, I much prefer playing to spending my own cash to get out. It is the way I’ve been geared for a lot of years. Don’t extend what I just said to conclude I like playing in a band on the road. I don’t. That is a rotten lifestyle and don’t you believe a word about the constant wild parties. I’d change my mind if we were given free accomodations for playing the Smithsonian. But that’ll be the day.
           Did I really start drinking decaf on December 5, 1992? That’s what y’day’s link said. It makes sense. I was living in Venezuela about that time and would have just met that Argentine jet pilot. The guy who got me to quit putting sugar in my java. I’ll say the date must be accurate, as this blog back then was a hand-written journal. That’s a huge difference in effort expended to make a point, so the point stands.

           Band rehearsal today was discouraging, but a bad session before a gig is expected somewhat. The problem I see is the band has changed the PA system a few weeks ago. The new setup has a heavy bass midrange. This means the lower guitar riffs clash with the upper bass runs. But this band has a solid, uncompromising resistance to anything originating from or by the bassist—whatsoever. Even when I am totally right, and you can judge that by how often I am totally wrong, I often have to wait a week for somebody else in the band to grudgingly allow the change. My goal is defeating that PA system, since it muffles the bass. It’s a Peavy, with tricky harmonics. I’ve done it before but can’t recall the solution. And the gig is in five days.

ADDENDUM
You know, I don’t arbitrarily view material about WWII. I have an associate degree on this era of history and I as well have an interest in the subject. I regularly plan the topics I’m going to investigate. Back when I studied for finals, questioning of this history was not permitted. Any but the official versions meant a wrong answer. Here is a list of some items I’m planning to look into more closely.
           The first Battle of El Alamein. The few roadways in the area are shown clogged by British vehicles, thousands of them. Even if the claim of Allied air superiority was true, that was a dumb thing for any commander to leave exposed for days on end. There has to be some other explanation.

           Here’s one that smells to high heaven. That half-baked story about the broken water distiller on Midway Island. Even if the Jap code had been broken, I don’t see that a bunch of white boys from West Point learned to read it well enough to do what they claimed. And I don’t see the Imperial Navy being set up that easily.

           When do I find the time for such study? I do it concurrently with other things. Sometimes I learn better when distracted. And here is a nothing circuit that baffled me for a week. See where the yellow pencil is pointing? There’s the error. If I didn’t say, I got a batch of transistors that were wired backward at the plant and this circuit was built before I figured that out.

           That copper wire is to be replaced by a resistor that partially biases the circuit. What is bias? It means to use a voltage divider to step down a larger voltage to a level that matches the input design of the transistor. What I’m trying to do here is adjust the blue dial so this circuit turns itself on at a certain spot. Just like you do with your outdoor security light.
           This is a fascinating hobby. Getting something lifeless thing like electricity to do all kinds of outwardly intelligent things. Tomorrow I pick up my new parts delivery from the warehouse. Alas, it was missing the LDR pieces I needed for my A/D (analog to digital) thermometer project. Actually, it would not be the first time I got an idea seemingly at the same time as a whole whack of other people. Then the supplier sells out due to over-demand. Seriously, this happens a lot in my life. What irks me about that is there is no mad scientist I can compete with. Rather than an individual who repeatedly bests me, I seem to be up against countless masses. And the stream of them is never-ending.

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March 29, 2014

Yesteryear:
One year ago today: March 29, 2013
Five years ago today: March 29, 2009

           "Caribecana". That’s the name of Prof. Oz’s newest book. I haven’t read the book since I don’t have a free copy, but I did read the press releases and some of those phony book reports written by plug agencies. The protagonist, Dave, well, how about I tell you a few things about him and you can connect the dots. Then see if you can get the ditto marks right around that link "Caribecana".

           Hero Dave is an accountant. At age 53, he suffers a heart attack. He leaves the stressful life behind and buys a bar. This bar has a sign that blew over in a hurricane and they never repair it because all the regulars know where it is. Does this bar have a name? Sure, it is called “Jumbo’s”.
           I may read the book just to find out if Dave also sings Karaoke. Anyway, the prof and I met up at the bakery. Accidentally a fancy coffee cup got knocked off our table. We will long be remembered. It was one of a fancy set of Hungarian cups that were a special wedding present to the lady owner. Irreplaceable.
           Otherwise, the day dragged along, a sign that I’m not having as much fun as I should. I can avoid boredom but that’s hardly enough for me. Last night’s take was a near record, and one of the bills was a “Where’s George”. I listed it and took note of how that site is doing. It is tracking around 240 million bills, so I am a small player. The majority of the bills on my account were tips. That says the places I normally go are not, by and large, occupied by an Internet type of person.
           There is a comment space on “Where’s George” where I mention this blog. But it is not good advertising since I’ve only had five hits on my bills since 2007. One bill made it to Panama, the only other bill that went further than Michigan is a single that arrived in Seattle. It was described as tattered and torn. That’s the excitement for today, I’m afraid.
           The days are too short again. A sure sign I’m doing too much for what I’m getting in return. What can I drop, besides my IQ mating club membership? That club is history. I’d rather put the money into another foot pedal or a new set of bass strings. I got to thinking if I’d showed up at a soiree or toga party with most of the women on that site, what would be my impression? For fun, let’s make this a multiple choice.

           A) Home free!
           B) Pardon me lady, are you sure this is a party?
           C) Dweeb alert! Get me outta here.
           D) None, some, or all of the above.

I chose another old tune to give “the treatment”. That’s where I re-write the bass line to make it sound more like the original. This accomplished two items. It took all afternoon and took my mind off everybody messing up and calling me for help. Oh, and what did I tell you about the Canadian dollar? It is down to 90 cents from a peak of $1.05 on July 11, 2011. The Canadian loonie is one of the most manipulated currencies on the planet. Be very cautious about investing in it. It has been as low as 61 cents living memory.
           Next I spent an hour with graphics programming, in particular, the modules that make up most video games. Terrible. As long as droves of retards keep spending money on the third-rate rubbish that keeps them occupied, why release any of the good stuff for the past fifteen years? If you’ve ever met a “gamer”, you know the level of retardation I’m talking about. Computer innovation ceased the day someone realized they could sell computers to that crowd.
           I’d say this morning’s meeting was a dud. But it emphasizes that some people have a totally misplaced trust in the computer and the Internet. No, it is not “all on the Internet” and no I don’t “have to read it”. Even if I was impressed, I know it doesn’t work or you would not be asking me how to do it. And I’m not pleased with people who have 700 unread emails in their in basket trying to find a particular item while I’m waiting. That’s essentially how the meeting went. Sorry, I have experience. If you want to get work done, you don’t show up to a meeting with a computer.
           The issue was promotion of product. Too many people are convinced—and I mean really obsessed—with the crazy idea that you can have such a fantastic web site that it will trounce all the competition. Such as site does not exist and if it did, it would be instantly copied and lose its advantage. If you don’t know my history on this, I’ll go over it quickly here. Advertising the same way as everybody else is so ridiculous we won’t discuss it. The very purpose of advertising is to stand out, while still obeying the rules.
           I notice very few web pages advertise on the television (directly) or in the newspapers. Your product requires an easy way to purchase it, although I’ve noticed people will persist with an on-line order form where they’d long since give up if it was on paper. My plan is to combine these in the cheapest possible fashion and see if it works. Take out a blanket (one million ads) classified and direct them to a blog that links to where they can order. The ad is cheap, the blog is free, and it has a built-in counter so you can see the number and source of the responses.
           Unless you want to try this, then stick with all the money wasted on these “book promotion” sites. We don’t want to hear about it. We don’t want to read their e-mails. They are not computer or Internet geniuses. They are small fry after your dollar for doing as little as they possibly can. And their sales pitch comes across like the idiot’s short-cut to legalized scamming. It smacks of Los Angeles acting schools, where you always need to spend just a little more on your portfolio and they are right there to help you spend it. I know a BS business model when I see it.
           And that is all that happened today. In the whole world.

March 28, 2014

Yesteryear
One year ago: March 28, 2013
Five years ago: March 28, 2009

MORNING:
           Favorite Fridays, the grand opportunity for you to read and enjoy what I do on my day off. Can’t beat that for sheer ecstasy. What? In that case, write your own blog. Ha! I went to Radio Shack and spent $17. Most of it was on the five chips you see here. Before this week, I had no reason to buy such items, which in this instance are used to test configurations of memory bits—the exact opposite of what they were intended for. But that’s how it makes sense to me. Most electronics men never actually ever build a memory circuit, you know. Thinking you may want to see a comparison, each chip on the left represents approximately four times as many circuits as my pilot project on the right.

           What’s more is the [integrated] chips contain memory bits of a superior type in that they don’t exhibit an effect called “racing” or “racearound”. Sorry for the poor photo but I’m not taking those chips (five of them) out of the anti-static pouch until time for use. I used to think integrated chips were so mysterious. Now I realize they fit into a few easy categories except for the big computer CPUs. But who knows, maybe a short time from now I’ll be toying with those.
           And don’t think I’ve forgotten our Qbasic graphics code. If you just arrived, I’m coding to draw a line on the computer monitor which will not cross itself. Easier said than done and a week later nobody can spot the logic error, the worst kind to look for. Stay tuned for the solution to that. If it is compact enough, I’ll publish the code. Yes, you can copy the code, paste it into your XP or earlier computer, save it with the suffix .BAS and run the program. Hint, in cheesy MicroSoft computers, you can often do the same in reverse. If you get my meaning.
           The Big Band, my 5-pc has some new promotional material. My name consistently appears as last on the lists. We all know that is so wrong, but I figure if it imbues others with an impression of happiness or self-worth, we can let it go this time. So don’t say nothin’. I mean it. In an equally important topic, I kept thinking y’day was Friday, so I spent most of the day reading. By this morning I’m over-read, I guess you’d call it? Because I know it’s happened to all of us. Well, most of us, Hector.
           I installed the newest Adobe Flash Player (I no longer trust that company concerning spyware) and watched some documentaries. Where is this much touted hydrogen car? Last I heard they cost $4 million bucks each. And I watched this old German tank commander describe how he had been knocked out five times in World War II. You would never find me inside a tank by choice. He said a hit caused incredible dust inside the crew compartment, and then it would be silent. He’d ask, “Fritz, are you living.” “Hans, are you living.” What a horrible ordeal that must be.
           Within moments, I uninstalled Flash Player 12. Get that crap off your computer if you value your privacy. It tries to auto-install Google Chrome, another item you do not want. Adobe has really gone downhill. Even an uninstall leaves all kinds of changes to your computer registry. I would stick with a single older version but Adobe has taken measures to ensure you can’t do that. Their revisions are not backward compatible.
           Now that I have a working memory circuit, I followed my acquired habit of going back and reading material that I could not understand before. Oh yeah, it makes perfect sense now—a sure sign that author was not a good teacher. The logic is that I have been through college and can follow the lousiest of teachers. It takes a royally dismal individual to confuse me in writing and no topic has done that as much as electronics. For example, now that I know how transistors work, I realize if I’d had one good teacher I would have learned it all in ten minutes, not ten months. That is not an exaggeration.
           I moved my propane tank. I have not used it since my pilot light died last year or the year before. The cylinder was giving the Frenchies next door the heebie-jeebies. They smoke and despite the full empty lot between us must have decided to worry about an explosion. So, keep ‘em happy, I rolled it around back beside my work shed. It’s much the same distance but they can’t see it. Did the trick, lads.
           The expected spring [real estate] price drops are trickling in, but still too far north. I don’t like the middle area of Florida around Jupiter and Hobe Sound, nor do I care for the interior. Too isolated and if you are going to live here, being near a beach is the meaningful part. And if I was going to move a hundred miles away, I’d likely move all the way back to Texas.
           Mike, the last guy I shared a place with in college, came to mind when I opened my cupboard and found three spice jars of nutmeg. How’d I manage that? Anyway, Mike was one of those guys who was never home, but when he was, he was helpless. The guy could not go shopping. That’s how the nutmeg reminded me. I once sent him to get a jar of chili powder. He couldn’t do it. Mike was 35 years old. He only stayed home once a year, on his birthday. Then next day, broke as he always was, he’d go out to some greasy spoon diner and order the biggest meal on the menu. He’d tuck the napkin in his collar for a bib. I’m sure that was to let the world know we were from Montana. (At that time, I mean. I have not been in Montana in over twenty years.)

AFTERNOON
           I’m giving Canon the camera maker a bad review. I’ve been generally satisfied with the new A1400 until I tried to produce a series of similar recordings of me playing bass. What a piece of crap it turned into. It will go out of focus without any indication that is going on, you don’t see it until you play back a clip. By then it’s too late, you have to start over. It even has a bastard-rat setting that turns the original around by 90 degrees. That might be useful for post-production, but Canon alters the original. And just you try to figure out how to change it back. You have to go into a completely different menu. Stick it, Canon. You may have a sudden urge to turn pictures sideways, but intelligent people don’t do that much.
           Then a documentary on U-boat tactics. Like the tank, it was another weapon the Allies were ahead in numbers but harnessed to faulty tactics. It says the Germans only had 12 boats at any given time in the Atlantic. What if they’d had the 100 boats that the navy had asked for before starting any wars. When was the planned date for that many? May of 1942, so they didn’t miss by much. Why was a looking at this ancient situation? Because Germany in the late 1930s had much the same of military-technical advantages that the US had after the Roswell incident. I have no conspiracy theories. But I’m less skeptical about what I thought was propaganda about the German leadership looking for the Lost Ark and reading horoscopes. Did they have their own Roswell and were looking for answers? Did they have an Operation Highjump?
           My ordinary ten minute weekend financial review turned into a series of comparisons. You see, I’m too broke to afford that Bass Buddy foot pedal drum box. That’s a metaphor, as the cash sum is here, but there are so many other priorities. We are very aware over here that although progress has been fine since early 2011, some 75% of that progress has been in a few narrow fields, none of which have paid off well. Think music, electronics, mechanics, robotics, and other entertainment. Everything else accomplished in the same time period has been “small scale items whose wins and losses generally balanced out”.
           Add in my concerns that my recent foot pain was too gout-like to ignore. I thought I’d find some preventative measures. There isn’t much by way of authoritative advice. Increase potassium and vitamin C. Don’t eat mushrooms. I’d rather not take supplements or chemicals, As far as extra fluid intake, low blood pressure, and no strain on my joints, I’ve always been well ahead of the existing advice. Mostly, the Internet is not helpful on this. Maybe I should just do what seems natural.

           I further reviewed what I said about the new band promo shots. They are still using a few silhouette shots of some other bass player, as I never held my bass up that high. The few shots that clearly show me represent me as a bow-legged old man. I don’t care for the poses but I admit that is accurately what I look like on stage. At least I definitely look like I know what I’m doing, Mike.
           I put in four hours of intense bass study on selected music before dark. These were chosen for intense or complicated bass passages and I polished them up mighty fine. I admit my motive is self-interest. I am not denigrating any particular guitar player, but these tunes were chosen because a guitarist said they were “easy”. (Quote, “It’s just A and F#m and then a D”.) This does nothing but tip you off the guy thinks you are a flunky, but bear in mind this is how they think naturally, why, they don’t even suspect there is anything wrong with such arrogance. What I like to do, n’yuck n’yuck, is play the real bass line that isn’t so easy.
           An audience reacts to bass lines that are pressed beyond perfection. How is that done? It seems to have two components. Choose a song like Orbison’s “Pretty Woman” where they’ve heard every sloughed off bass version for years. Then play it note for note and make it look easy. A similar tactic is to ace some so-so or nothing bass tune right when they aren’t expecting it. Like River’s “Memphis”--99% of bass players do that song wrong. Oddly, I don’t consider this my method, I consider it what bass playing should have been all long.
           The guitarist who thinks you are his follower, you see, is not expecting much of a bass line. This is one of the few times you can steal a march on him without getting any backlash. How so? When they hear the real deal, it is not like they can suddenly steal it back. There are two options. They could knuckle down and learn better guitar (I’d like to see that) or they could be a jerk and overplay at the moment, which fools nobody, Zack. And since you are playing the real bass line, the guitarist can hardly complain that you are showing off. Warning, although I told you how to do it, that is not an excuse to go cop an attitude. I have only once or twice in my life every been fired from a band, and only once on bad terms. The other 40+ bands, I quit or fired them.

EVENING
           In preparation for tomorrow’s meeting with Prof. Oz, I went over some of the Internet offerings for book promotions. I quickly concluded same as forty years ago—most advertising on a small scale doesn’t work very well. The fact is, advertising has nowhere to go except a change from the unwelcome to the outright annoying. The Internet has spurred that along. What I’m seeing with these “book promotion” sites is a rip-off from the point of view of effectiveness. Rip-off? Yes, in the sense that the purpose of advertising is to increase the odds of a purchase, and the odds have fallen below any level I can imagine.
           These promoters want a fee to list your book on their site, say $15. Not that you are going to get much for that kind of money, but let’s generously suppose the actual listing is worth 25 cents in effort. Because that is all it is. An alphabetical listing of books. The literature says you should write and send press releases, add links to your blogs and website, tweet, and facebook all your contacts. Question. If you are going to do all that on your own, what is it they do for the fifteen bucks? Ah, the book list. Nothing like a shallow-thinker with a web page to make my day. Worse, the more “successful” the site gets, the worse your book gets buried in a list so long nobody can find your title.
           Has the Internet entered an era of these “indexes”, as such listings are known in computer parlance? While there is some remote chance of a connect with your product, most of these listings appear to do nothing except hit you up for extra money to do anything. That might appeal to those who cannot do anything on their own. And when was the last time you wanted a book and dragged out some interminable listing of titles and read down the pages, hoping to find something? I thought so.
           I went out at 8:30PM. To Karaoke. Not an exciting time, for some reason all the other singers chose mournful, dreadful dirges. Mind you one guy did attempt “The Perfect C&W Song”, a number I dropped from my list two years ago. There was one episode unusual enough to make this blog. A mousey type bar bunny showed up, working the single men in the room. As in “accidentally” using one of his drink chips when he isn’t looking. And when he gets back and spots it, she does the old, “Oops, me bad, you are gonna buy a little lady a drink, aren’t you?”
           The chips come in packs of four, I quickly put mine in my pocket. Sure enough, she would leave with a guy every once in a while and by fluke she did this exactly whenever I was singing. Then she’d walk back in just as the crowd was applauding. And what applause! So she starts to give me that who-do-you-think-you-are look. In an hour’s time she was really worked up over nothing. But I’m just telling you what happened. I left later by which time she was stewing in her own juice. One weird lady.

March 27, 2014

Yesteryear
One year ago: March 27, 2013
Five years ago:March 27, 2009

           Still looking for a sidecar kit (that’s a kit, not a sidecar), I see these smaller units for scooters. This is a Vespa and terribly over-priced. Just the scooter shown here retails for $6,000 roughly. I can’t find the sidecar prices as shown, but I infer another $2,600. This puts them into the range of a good used car and I’m not so sure on a 150cc scooter I’d want a passenger in the sidecar. Cargo is different. My Chinese knock-off has so far cost me around $1,200 $1,600 including a new motor. The original scooter now has 11,500 miles on it. And it is starting to look like it.

           No matter how you streamline, the world is designed to make sure there are always entire days you have to do things their way. To get some nagging chores out of the way, it took me from 7:00 AM to 3:10 PM. It was like having a job. I wound up at Flippers, the movie theater out on Taft. But that is one oddball movie place in that their movies start around 1:00PM or 4:00PM, matinees I’m talking about of course. Both finish times are inconvenient for me. I missed a movie today which would have been paid for with the money I found last day.
           The Prof. emailed to say I’d left too early, in that later, they found another $105 on the floor. See, that’s why I don’t go out in the afternoon. Normally I would have looked myself. We were talking about advertising, mainly newspaper ads. The quick rundown is what I’ve said since day one on the Internet—the ads websites do not draw readership in themselves. That premise originated back when there were few sites. That's changed, website market philosophy has not. There must usually always be some exterior factor present before large numbers of people will view a web page. Fame and fortune seems to work (in which case who needs the website), but let’s talk about the rest of us, Ken.
           My research involves the cost of conversion, or whatever the proper term may be. You must usually take a customer away from his current vendors, in my case, away from what they are reading now instead of this blog. I find the cheapest untapped form of advertising is newspaper classified ads. They still exist so they are by no means out-dated as was once predicted. It is impossible to get a straight answer from those people without telling them your life story first, yet they persistently deny your personal information has any bearing on the price. That has hypocrisy all over it, but it’s been half a century since being a hypocrite bothered anyone in the American newspaper industry.

           FYI, here are some full page prices, black and white only:
           Washington Post: $100,000
           Wall Street Journal: $164,000
           LA Times: $70,000

If you want color or anything extra, expect to pay up dearly. It’s a good thing most of us don’t have to reach out on a national scale. I know that I promptly remove all visible advertising and inserts before I even begin to read the paper.
           What I’m proposing to Prof. Oz is that we place newspaper ads directing the reader to a blog which then makes the sales pitch. They say a 0.7% rate of return is successful. Thus, I returned to the offer by Nationwide to place one million ads for $180 (up from $140 last year). While these ads are meant to test an ad campaign, they would be themselves my advertising. My plan is to attract enough readers to draw attention by word of mouth, thought it is impossible to say how many that is. 7,000 new readers would make me happy. (I reject the old typsetting rule of not beginning a sentence with a number, in case anyone says otherwise.)
           Reverse mortgages. Here’s something else so many people don’t understand. Let me tell you the major downsides. First, a mortgage is a loan and loans must be paid back. In this case, it must be paid back when the borrower moves out. “Moves out” is an inclusive term for selling the house or dying. The loans were designed to take advantage of upward house prices, the premise is that the homeowner could easily pay back the loan one day from price increases alone. Then along came 2006.
           With a reverse mortgage, it is quite easy to borrow more against the house than it is worth. But the real hardship is if the owner dies and he isn’t the only family member that was living in the house. I read of one episode up north where the mortgage was $309,000 and the survivors were given 30 days to pay it back or move out. This, good people, is what you get for trusting money-lenders, yet they are not doing a thing that was not agreed to. For clarity, a reverse mortgage is a loan against the equity in your house with payments that do not have to be made until you move out. But interest accumulates from day one.
           We all hate those misleading labels that state the calories per unrealistic serving. I propose a change to the law saying the package must state the entire number of calories in the container. Let the consumer decide the size of a serving. I can hear some producers scream that will hurt sales. Well, you jerks, it is supposed to. I figure you must be the ones who have been fudging the labels over serving size. Thus, honest packagers would welcome my proposal. The dishonest will scream, because they will lose, but they had it comin’.
           I was an hour is a waiting room, reading the newspaper. Here are some of my thoughts on the articles:

           The US leads the UN committee that is condemning China for putting export duties on “rare earth metals”. History will peg the USA as the first empire to collapse because they never learned to mind their own business. Come on DC, who is more guilty of price manipulations than America?

           The Supreme Court finally agrees with my blog of November 3, 2013 where I stated it is none of a company’s business how employee’s use their health care benefits. (Read the addendum that date.)

           TSA want’s police stationed at airport checkpoints. Okay, but send ‘em the bill. The mentality of those people sucks. By that logic, maybe we should get the Russians to protect the US Army to protect the police to protect the security guards to protect the grope girl.

           Some Miami types are saying the drunk driver who killed was given a harsher penalty because the jury was anti-queer. They would say that, wouldn’t they?

           How about the condemned prisoners who got a stay because the executioner would not reveal what was in the death injection. Um, folks, when you are convicted, you give up at least some rights. And I think stays should only be granted toward proving innocence and such. Not arguing about the lead content of the firing squad bullets.

           How about that Bin-Ladin relative finally convicted thirteen years afterward. No wonder the world thinks America is screwed up. That amount of time essentially means he got away with it. Turban and all.

           What’s this some sports team is forming a union. Might as well. Get some of that $20 per beer back from the stadiums. Besides, there is hardly any chance of the fans forming their own union. Not if they are dumb enough to pay much that for a beer. If you get my drift.

           A Belgian paper apologizes for a cartoon that depicts the president as an ape. What a horrible precedent. Apologizing for a cartoon, I mean. That shows disrespect for the readership. Some pansies said the cartoon crossed the line to racism. Oh, doodness, tweetie. I’ll go so far as to admit the cartoon was probably an insult, but not so far as to specify the president or the ape. I don’t know if the president said anything, but I will say any president who is offended by satire is not fit to lead a troop of girl scouts.

           Here is the cartoon.

March 26, 2014

Let’s see who likes this feature, blogs of yesteryear:
One year ago today: March 26, 2013
Five years ago today: March 26, 2009

           Aw come on, you don’t really want to see a picture of a warped dry-erase board. You can’t be serious. I’ll change the subject on you. See this photo? This is a representation of the string of good luck I’ve had for nearly 36 hours now, and I promised to tell you. First, Prof. Howard missed the meeting Tuesday because he thought it was Wednesday. So by the time he called, he wanted to go for a beer. So we sat down at Artie’s and darn that chair was uncomfortable. The cracked upholstery kept scraping my beltline. As I got up to leave, I looked at the offending item and it was a $20 bill. Did I give it back? In a bar? Are you nuts?

           Seriously, we were there an hour, plenty of time for anybody who missed it to speak up. So I headed to Office Bunker for a whiteboard. What luck, I found one slightly warped with a $45 price tag. I’m equipped to repair such things, so I talked the guy down to $26. With the money I saved, I dipped over to Goodwill and found a perfect condition chrome desk lamp. Got that for $8. Wait, there’s more. Refer to the picture.
           So this AM I’m finished at the clinic and that’s near Harbor Freight. I zip in there to pick up batteries. As I get up to the counter, the guy ahead of me asks if I’d like a battery coupon. Sure. Surprise, it said two packs of free batteries with any other purchase. That saves me $8 because any other purchase is the 57-cent coil of wire you see me holding [later at the bakery]. There, is that enough serendipity for one day?
           No, not quite. Guess who left me a text saying we are finally back in communication. Marion. I should have married that one. If you are thinking I’m on a winning streak, I’ll end it later by going out and buying a lottery ticket. Nothing makes stocks, silver, and luck go bad as me investing in them. But until then, allow me to revel in my good luck. I mean, that is a really nice desk lamp.
           I solidly lost that bet about the women I’ve been emailing. I’ve concluded it to be a squandering of $60 to renew my Brainiac on-line mating site. Even if those women actually possess the educations they claim, they are surely not the fast crowd I ran with in my co-ed days. There were crowds on campus that had a definitely quitter social agenda than most, but I never had much to do with them then.            These women, same as my brothers, obvious went through the sexual revolution without choosing sides. If you get my drift. The truly thinking woman over 40 would acknowledge the importance of being proactive about relationships. It is hypocritical to crouch behind adolescent notions about being considered “loose” as an excuse to do nothing. Toward the end of my12-month membership, it got so I was afraid to ask these women any ordinary questions like how they felt today. I never met Ann Landers in her day, and after this club, I hope I never do, either.
           Struggling with Win 7 again gets my goat. There seems no easy way to get a folder to remember how it was last opened. A change in one makes a global change, something a programmer recognizes as the work of a complete retard. But worse, when you rename a file, sometimes it automatically alphabetizes itself and thus appears to disappear. Other times, it concatenates. One of the key elements of being stupid is to be so unpredictable that other people around you can’t do their work. Also, the files will only manually alphabetize in detail mode. I could not find how to enable/disable it anywhere else. This had me cussin’ until I figured it why they did it that way: who would MicroSoft know that would have any use for alphabetizing things?

           Here is that thing from Jimbos that we suspected was one of those game puzzles. After finding nothing on-line, I posted this photo on CL and the most promising reply was that with was a leather upholstery repair kit missing the curved needles. We’ll go with that. Other contenders were alien weapon, horse bridle bit, and “I don’t know but Bob’s Auto service claims they found one in my carburetor”.
           Following the planning meeting y’day, I’ve scrounged around to find what I could possibly sell on line. I don’t have a lot of time. The major criteria is that it be easy to produce and be so cheap it is an obvious bargain. That likely means to hell with quality. What have I come up with? Well, by and large, I video record most of my bass lines. One reason is that the existing learning material fails to teach how to play bass on stage in front of an audience. You can’t get that from sheet music.
           I tend to forget passages unless a song is played regularly. Thus, I have five minute amateur videos of around 120 very successful tunes. They clearly show every note before I actually play the riff. Even better, I can usually hear myself describing what is going on, as in “don’t use that octave” or “come in off the 5th”. In other words, these are excellent lessons for somebody who wants to get on stage in a hurry.
           The existing covers (musicians playing other people’s music) on youTube are generally difficult to learn from. It is always (no exceptions) some guy playing full speed, which means his hand covers up the notes—the way guitar teachers act. Not me. Mind you, my style clearly shows I’ve never had any lessons—but most of the bassists of my day never did either. Psst, that’s why they didn’t all sound alike. Over the next few days, I’ll be seeing what I can come up with by way of selling these videos as lessons. I believe it a strong selling point that these videos show what is actually played on stage and that is backed up by other videos showing undeniable and successful audience appeal.
           Until a later time, I remind everyone this is just talk.
           Um, I just got texted from the pub. After I left, they found more money on the floor. No word yet on how much.

ADDENDUM
           This segment repeats my chat about bass videos from above, but at a later time in the same day. I’m describing what I think might be turned into a product for sale while hoping what I already have will do the job. In real life, that happens quite rarely, so nobody get their hopes up.
           I’ve reviewed around a third of the videos of me playing bass lines and I just may be on to something. What’s different? This raw footage show how to play the music live, a considerably different focus than 100% of the other “tutorials” I can find on-line. Slight problem, in many of the videos my anti-guitar trait shows up with me saying things like “don’t guitar-riff that” or “this passage stinks of guitar player”. And I’ve developed my own vocabulary to describe bad guitar elements which are probably easy to get from context but would still benefit from explaining. The way I made this clips, it would be harder to overdub those comments than to redo from scratch. I’m used to starting from scratch.
           Nonetheless, the videos are a distinct departure from “lessons”. This alone makes them valuable to somebody. Remember, I have proof I can train most anyone to play in a band in six hours. (Remember the Hialeah Five-Oh-Five?). Let me pursue this a bit and see if I can’t standardize the videos, I mean, if I’m going to do them over again, why not go for broke? I thought of calling the series, “Bass Players Talk About This”, but found out there is a book by jet pilot with too similar a title. But I will come up with some powerful language. I cannot be the only bass player who is sick and tired of big shot guitar-types.
           And here is your photo of the warped white board, already. Happy now?

March 25, 2014

           I'm experiencing a run of good luck. All small, but involving money. This can't last, but it it continues until tomorrow, I'll give you the details. Meanwhile, today's top story is a shaving mug. If your day held even less excitement, well, let's just say I've not yet had so bad a day that writing this blog was the high point. Anyone who doesn't follow that last sentence, well, go away. Don't come back. Real people have bad days.

           Wow, $35 for a shaving kit. And that doesn’t include the razor. Let’s inspect this. You got your 50 cent bar of soap. And your ceramic mug, like the ones in my kitchen cabinet but which I never use. And there’s that plastic thingee to hold the brush. Okay, let’s assume the brush is made of extremely rare imported um, alrightee, hair of platypus. Let me add this up. Time to start a platypus ranch. Or is it like a plantation?
           I stayed put last evening mainly trying to fix that memory circuit. It’s become a matter of honor, me or that circuit. What makes it the more frustrating is that over the years, we have become exceptionally well experienced and equipped to deal with this kind of problem and it the solution is still nowhere in sight. I’m even out of theories. Be informed this new circuit was purpose built from the ground up to eliminate any construction errors.
           When circuits fail at this stage, time to look for a logic error. The worst kind of quest because you have to really think, really use the old noggin. This may shock those who rely on the Internet for the facts, but I’m wondering if the diagrams I downloaded from the super-expert professionals could all contain the same error. I don’t know the answer, but the circuit is behaving as it would if the transistors were upside down.
           I’ve thrown out many a computer text because the code was proofread by an English major instead of the author. Am I up against the same thing with this flip-flop (a rudimentary RAM device)? I certainly don’t trust electronics experts any more, and an error not checking the people who check your errors is still a major mistake, get it? There’s nothing to say the logic error isn’t in somebody else’s head and if you’ve ever tried to figure out how somebody else thinks you know it don’t come easy. Insert Hippie joke here.
           The rest of today’s blog will read more like a lecture, but there is a lot of information presented if you care to read it all. I met up with Professor Howard (the “Oz”) concerning marketing. Do we need a moment for reminders? Yes, I see we do. The Prof wrote a textbook some decades ago that paid off handsomely. But upon trying to repeat the success, which measured into six figures, he ran up against the entrenched publishing industry.
           The conversation went through the standard phases, which quickly reveals that I appear to be, as an author, wrong, greedy, and distrustful. I say stuff it. Put another way, I don’t consider any venture of the kind to be a success unless it nets a handsome profit. There is too much work involved for any but the idle rich to do it for free. In that same sense, I am not even a successful bass player. So I don’t fit the mold—until the conversation gets to the money part. Suddenly everybody figures out who knows what’s going on. I know what not to do. Like making huge payments to a promotion firm without knowing specifically what they are doing with the money.
           Here’s where plenty of clarification is due. Like all newcomers to the industry, if I write a book, I want it to be a definitive work. If it becomes a bestseller, it should reflect my professionalism and be something of a testament to my hard work, a book others would consider a reference. Now hold on—I never said that. I was checking to see if that is what others thought. While I would like any book I write to be an epic, I would no longer insist on it.
           How so? Well, ask yourself, my long-term readers, how many times I’ve grumbled that computer books are not proofread beyond Chapter Three? How many texts are written to pass the exam rather than teach anything? Aha, this is the change that has come over my thinking in the past decade. If people only read the first couple of chapters, as long as those are well-written, you’ve made your mark. By that logic, why write the whole book unless there is a demand for follow-on chapters. This dove-tails with my now-shelved plan to sell “how-to” books one chapter at a time. Is any of this ringing a bell?
           Hmmm, you’re still here. Selling one chapter at a time is no different than how newspaper columns operate. A nice aspect to only writing one chapter at a time is you no longer have to be an expert on a given topic. Is that ethical? I don’t know and I point out I’m not planning on doing any of this. I merely want it recorded that the ground has been covered. Wanting to be paid for work done is not greed in my universe. Nor is wanting extreme pay for extreme work.
           Having said that, how does one go about selling a chapter at a time? Would this not cost just as much as plugging the whole book? I say put it to the test. Are you more likely to pay $1 for a chapter or $30 for the whole book if there is no guarantee you will finish it? The Professor’s book, in the long run, netted him $4,675 per chapter. But it took a very long time, and in my thinking, it was the first couple chapters that brought in the bulk. In my theory, I’d sell ten thousand people Chapter One for a dollar. You and I have gone over this before, but now I have some real numbers to ponder.
In fact, we’ve already talked in much more depth than I’m going to go right now. My contention is that if you have something to sell, then do so. Forget about old-fashioned concepts like quality or content. Sell hard and fast regardless of the consequences. It works for MicroSoft. It boils down to marketing, the most parasitic of American industries. We gave agreed to collaborate on a simple venture or two. Since he has already written the books and I have plenty of short videos, we have very little to lose. Famous/infamous is has much the same outcome after one is fifty. I also pointed out that most advertising does not target the rural population. I very well recollect the demand from the farm about how fancy folks live in the big city. It worked for Sears & Roebuck.
           Last, I have not been following the missing airliner news, but I did see the map of where it went down. Now I know there is something funny going on. It changed direction and started flying over an ocean where there is absolutely nothing? Heading toward Antarctica? Watch for the crackpot theories to emerge. Myself, I’d apply Occam’s Razor. To me the simplest explanation is hijacking. Now explain how all the search parties were in the wrong area.

ADDENDUM
           Aha! I got the circuit working. It was transistors built backwards causing the problem. They were from that free batch received last year, now I know why they were free. Here is what the circuit looks like. There are millions of these in your computer, it is RAM. I’ve already built ROM, this is RAM, but not a very sophisticated type. For those interested, I’ll describe this. Elsewise, you won’t much care to follow along. These four transistors, the black dots, are grouped into two NOR gates, the upper and lower halves in this photo are the same arrangement in duplicate.

           A basic memory circuit requires these two switches, because it is going to remember where it left off. See the two red LEDs? When the upper one is turned on, it cannot be turned off except with a different switch connected to the lower half. This is called a SR flip-flop and I’ve heard some fairly creative explanations why it has that name. The trick is the two green wires that cross the center line. (The red and black wires that do the same are just power and ground leads.)
           I had difficulty designing this arrangement since most sources use block diagrams to explain flip-flop memory. That is, they don’t show the internal workings, or if they do, they don’t show how to hook it up to anything. I put this together using information from earlier chapters, then hooking them together with the green wiring. Only now do I completely understand how it works. I’m surprised that nobody teaches it in this fashion.
           The way it works is the NOR gate, which you can easily look up so I won’t elaborate. It has two inputs and the light is off unless both inputs are off. If one or both inputs are activated, the light goes out. In itself, not that useful. Two inputs, one output that follows the rules of a truth table. Remember those?
           The fun begins when you wire two of these gates together. The output of one gate affects the input of the other. The convenient way to think of it as a switch that disables itself. You can only use one switch to turn the light on, you must use another switch to turn the light off. The upper half is the on-switch, the lower is the off-switch. Hence, the light “remembers” which switch was hit last. Of course, there is another option because it is RAM, you could just yank the plug and lose the memory. Anybody with a computer knows that part.
           And if you connect enough of these together you could theoretically build a computer. I intend to build four of these RAM circuits, so I can represent the numbers from 0 – 7. I fully expect to get no help on-line trying to connect these together or make them work as a unit. I still consider this a milestone, in that if I had to, I could now build memory circuits. To those who belittle anything that is self-taught, this is as self-taught as it gets.
           For the technical types, I am fully aware that ROM is not really memory. My referral to it as such is from following convention.

March 24, 2014

           Has anyone but me noticed the number of overloaded site messages on the ‘net these days? Is it my computer? The connection? The provider? Don’t know, but I know why I don’t know. Because I can’t get a straight answer out of anybody about how the Internet connections work. That’s right, like most people, I don’t clearly know how the Internet connection to my computer operates. I’ve read the books, asked the experts, and I still don’t know. That tells me not that I’m too dumb to learn, but that they themselves don’t know. I’ve heard and read their BS how many times in my life?

           I’ve hooked up countless computers, and been on trouble calls, and tried to set things up on my lab bench. But you ask anybody and they draw you that stupid, stupid diagram that does not make sense. If it made sense, I’d grasp it in an instant. When you point to a part of it and ask, what happens here, or ask them what a gateway is, they get that fabulously famous drop-out goof-look and start talkin’ shit. I once worked with an entire office building full of such people. For fourteen and a half years.
           And here is a $15 magazine that tells you how to protect your privacy on the net. Well, that’s a waste of money, but I’m okay in that it is a slap in the face to those who called me paranoid. What I really said was not “Internet privacy”, but that you should not give out your personal information to anybody you don’t know. I had that rule long before the Internet came along. So, who’s paranoid now? My information never went on the Internet in the first place. This magazine contains only juvenile patches that might make some people feel a little better about being so naïve and trusting. But in reality, if you’ve put even one scrap of identifiable information on the Internet, it is probably too late already. And to my critics, you could have saved the $15 by reading my advice right here all along for free.
           While we are talking magazines, this month’s Popular Mechanics is an unaccustomed gem compared to their last few years of spiraling out of control. Worthwhile articles I liked this issue are:

           A rubber spray-on paint. If you don’t like the results, you peel it off like tape.
           Micro-pacemaker inserted like a stent through your leg artery.
           A CNC milling machine for $650. Like a 3D printer, I’d get one but I can’t draw things.
           A still. Yes, a copper moonshine still. Kit form. Lightning’s legal to make, not sell. $140.
           A bike cam, records up to ten hours, freezes on impact. See who killed you.
           Conductive ink for drawing electrical circuits. $21.

I certainly hope this type of reporting isn’t an anomaly. It restored a lot of faith in the magazine for me. I was weary of the blimps, jock stories, and Jay Leno. I know the conductive ink isn’t new, but this isn’t for repairs, it is for new designs, so call that new. The major downfall of these new products is their price tag. That is ten times what I’d spend, I mean, I can do an awful lot of soldering for $21.

           But I can’t do much shopping. I stopped into the mall and picked up what you see here. The magazine, at $4.99, is the most expensive item in the photo. Yet this cost me $20.45. I stopped immediately afterward at Panera for coffee and a bagel. This little trip and back cost me a total of $27.55. It’s getting scary. I was the only person in the checkout who paid with cash.
           Further reading tells me I have just too many of the same symptoms as gout to ignore that possibility. The one lacking indicator is inflammation. It was indeed an “attack” when it comes upon me in the morning at first light. People ask what triggered it. I cannot think of anything. There has been no change in my regimen. But, like most people, I don't usually recognize what went wrong until it happens a second time. Next, I read the spec sheets on the medication prescribed. None of it treats the condition.
           Sure enough, most of them “work the brain, not the pain”. For this reason, I do not take painkillers before I go to sleep. The one pill that might do some good is an anti-inflammatory which I have no doubt was given to me to be on the safe side. I knew it was anti-inflammatory when I started drinking extra quarts of water every day. Those things make me thirsty-thirsty.

           Turning my immobility into lemonade, here is a failure I am quite proud of. My second attempt at a memory circuit, and my second failure at it. Those in the know can see how my approach is now much more modularized, that comes from experience. The memory part is the light at far right center. I’m beginning to suspect the nails I’ve been using as binding posts may have some oxidization issues even after being securely soldered.
           Show here is a power override test using wiring of my own design to test parts of other circuits without cutting any wires. A successful connect causes that lovely purple blue glow at lower left. Result on this experiment? Each segment works, but the full memory circuit doesn’t. The second "suspect" is that I’ve somehow managed to acquire a batch of poorly-made transistors who’s base current must be biased oddly. I normally accomplish bias (matching the input current to the transistor design) by trial and error.
           Maxim for the day: No matter how long you live, you will never own enough sharp pointy tools.

March 23, 2014

           Look upon my duct tape and weep. Yes, boys, this is what a real roll of duct tape looks like. They don’t sell this size down at WalMart, son. At least not with a brand name on it. If you don’t have duct tape, what is holding your life together? And other rhetorical questions. You see, band practice did not go well today. I was distracted by pain, but that didn’t explain all that went wrong. Don’t be concerned, the momentum alone will keep this band on course. I suppose they noticed my limp but I only told them it was “like gout”. Is it true duct tape will keep down swelling?

           Just kidding. I was going to zip to the Russian market where I bought y’day’s pate but they are closed up. So I went to the strange one over on Wiley, strange in that the people who work there are very unfriendly. Gruff, you’d call it. Hey, not only do they have it, but they have a much larger selection. I’ll be over there soon when I have time to read labels.
           Back to the music, we learned another Turtles hit today, who knows, “So Happy Together”? It’s the only Turtles song I ever heard of. And it was first called “Nobody But You”. It was typical of the heavily-vocalized hits that came down the pike in the backlash of The Beatles. And all that harmony singing was the one thing I could not find back on the farm. Yes, I was still working in the fields as forced grunt labor when that song came out. It was about this time that I began paying close attention to two- and three-piece bands with minimal vocals. But any hint that I could do something like that (front an entire musical endeavor) myself would have to wait another forty years.
           I’ve taken up the issue of buy or move with my people. Those who say move all, like myself not long ago, have an aversion to living in a trailer court. I don’t believe that should influence the decision but I listen closely to my people. I would point out that I am the only one of my group that has been wiped out by a single incident. That heart attack took my life savings and it is understandable that I look at registered assets differently. Despite the fact I’ve never borrowed a penny, the credit system had every one of my assets on file and gladly supplied that to creditors who should have come up against a brick wall. I can’t let that happen again.
           It seems to me the two dangers are bad health and law suits. The old saw says if you are rich, people are more likely to slip on the ice in front of your house. I believe I’m shielded from the medical part because hey, there is nothing more to take from me. But I learned how easy it was for strangers to get a handle on your net worth right down to where you park your car at night. I noticed law works in the same fashion, take for example how the law lets end-users bypass the seller and sue the manufacturer of faulty goods. Automobiles come to mind. To me that is only possible when there is a clear chain back to the source. I believe computers have now created that same chain with some of the most private areas of people’s lives. Want to avoid the whole mess? Live in a trailer.
           So let’s be reasonable here. Even if I had my half-million bucks back, is there any chance I would ever go back to being middle class again? Not bloody likely. I worked a lifetime for that money and it was gone in six months. Next time, I take care of number one. Live in the cheapest, most comfortable place you can afford and use the money you save to enjoy your remaining time. Once I figured this out, the past ten years have been the most consistently pleasant and gratifying of my life, the important word being “consistently”. During my entire working career, I never was able to drive a motorcycle halfway across the country and hang out for three months.
           There is a downside to trailer court living. Neighbors. I’m okay here because every one of my neighbors is a snowbird. By and large, however, very few other people wound up in a trailer court for the same reasons as myself. Most of them got here by, shall we say, “less than optimum decision-making”. One of the reasons my next place, if I buy, will include the land, is because that added expense by itself weeds out most of the riff-raff. Those who buy the land must necessarily have at least something in common with me, if only a sense of permanence. I don’t like the sort of people who live in a trailer solely because they can’t afford anything else. Avoid that bunch.

           Here’s something else you can do without. These roach traps. If you live in Florida, you have roaches. If you don’t see them, it is because your place is laced with chemicals that are slowly killing you as well. That’s why I tested these glue bait traps. Under precisely controlled conditions, including new stock and placement behind a stove where adult roaches have been observed, this product is a complete fail.
           In eight months, not a single critter has been trapped. The literature says the bait is irresistible, I even tried putting my own bait in one of these. Nothing. Made by PIC from New Jersey, this product is a complete waste of money. If the bottom photo doesn't make sense, this is looking through the trap, which claims to also work on ants and other critters. As you can see, it has not even trapped any dust. FAIL!

ADDENDUM
           I lost a little bet on the side. No names mentioned but I have a person (female) that I discuss my findings in my on-line dating membership. I told her about the lady out west and the lady up north and she bet me that if I didn’t write to them for ten days, not one of them would make the effort to contact me. She was right, and proceeded to lecture me about what I’m like when I get around boring people. It takes a certain mental attitude to really get out there and enjoy life, she says, and women who wait for me to write first don’t have it. Well, she was right.
           Ten days, not a peep. I’ve had my fill of sluggish women. That’s all I’ve met since I was 40, but from what I hear, this is par for the course. They have no spirit, you have to drag their asses out of the mud to get them to even try something new or different. And my friend made me realize I was in danger of falling for it again. I went back and read all the correspondence and sure enough. Everything they wrote me was reactive. I had to bring up every subject; I had to initiate every e-mail. All replies strictly adhered to my first letter, no new or interesting subjects were introduced. Sex was never mentioned, even as a joke. If nothing happens soon, I should direct them to this blog and let them run with that. I would never be happy with such women.
           I’ve dated a lot of women in my life, but careful here because dating could mean we went to the movies. It doesn’t, but it could. Plus, no names, as these were nice girls. I’ve only dated one bad girl in my life. But these women were spread over 30 years and in that context, like most men, I was left wanting more. However, the lasting legacy of these babes was they made it so difficult for me to settle for what is left after I turned, what was is it? 46. At age 46 was when the supply of decent women completely dried up. It’s easy to say a woman not taken by then is a write-off, but oddly, I know a few really nice ones who just aren’t my type.
           I’m talking about meeting women who are, by that age, at lease self-supporting. These divorcees who are supposed to be in such great supply and such fine catches simply do not go out to the same places I do. That’s libraries, lounges, parks, book stores, swap meets, bakeries, malls, movies, parties, bike rides, vacations, train trips, motorcycle tours, museums, coffee shops, you get the idea. In the fifteen years I’ve been in Florida and the probably 1,000 such places I’ve been, I have not met one winner babe. I’ve struck up with around 200 or so, but it was me that, after a few minutes, pulled the pin. My advice to women if you want a man—don’t talk right off the bat about how close you are to your mother.
           And there are certain other issues we don’t really want to hear about either. I wasn’t there, it is not my fault, so don’t think to take it out on me. Every other day I see a picture in the news of some lady escaping a brutal man—but I take one look at that guy and sorry, I can have no sympathy whatsoever for women who date creeps like that. I mean, are you women blind? Deaf? Or what the hell is wrong with you? Jesus Murphy, ladies. You are the reason nice guys finish last, and you want sympathy too?
           There, I feel much better now.

           What? You want to hear about the bad girl? Okay, just a tidbit. First, I no longer take women out until after a relationship is established. I used to take her out on an expensive date in my fancy Cadillac and I'd drop her off home at her parents by 10:00PM. I found out she would make it a point to later go out later the same night and screw some other guy till noon the next day. I asked her years later, when it was all over and done between us, how she could do such a thing. She could only say that she didn't see anything wrong with such behavior.