September 3, 2014

           The following features have been brought up to date. Be sure to take a peek.
                      August 30 yesteryear
                      August 31 yesteryear
                      September 1 yesteryear
                      September 2 yesteryear

Yesteryear
One year ago today: September 3, 2013, new mixer.
Five years ago today: September 3, 2009, downtown bites.
Ten years ago today: September 3, 2004, almost rich.

Since it was a short day, I'll add the trivia I liked from a handy copy of the bathroom reader:

           The last US train robbery was 1933.
           Ford made $2 profit on each Model T sold.
           Pontius Pilate was born in Scotland.
           French has only 100,000 words, a tenth as many as English.
           Country with the second most guns per capita: Finland.
           Your right rear tire wears out the fastest.
           Charles Darwin's cousin invented the IQ test.
           Jimmy Hoffa's middle name: "Riddle".

           This is a country band advertising for a bass player. Do you think I should audition? They look like more of a fun crowd than the one I've got. I only recognize five tunes on their song list. However, I am the dude that learned 60 completely new songs in three months last year. I'll see if their ad is still around in a week.
           I skipped out today, some sit around time. I did a search on "documentaries" and left those running in the background. Later, I zipped downtown for a haircut--there is that exciting enough for you. It was about as exciting as working for a living. My barber always wants to team up and head out chasing women, but the guy is 15 years younger than me, totally better looking, and he's a retired real estate agent. The cards are stacked against me enough than to take my own competition along.
           So I went for a ten mile scooter ride down the back roads to see what's there. Nothing but suburbia in that radius from here. I stopped at the local Burger King for coffee, clearing out just in time to miss Silly Sally, or whatever her name is. That lady who can't make a decision, the one that probably has still not made it to Key West in what, five years? A small drink is now $1.99, their dollar menu had to be renamed after a couple years to the King menu, where prices rose 50%.
           Then I walked next door to look for two items it seems impossible to buy any more. A good cheap digital camera--they keep making them more complicated and expensive. And a good manual pencil sharpener. You are not the only one to notice that Chinese pencils and pencil sharpeners don't work right together. They are off center and the final piece wood never shaves away to a point. But if you try to bend the pencil to trim the wood, the lead will break. You know what I'm talking about. The last five sharpeners I've bought have that same problem.
           One documentary I watched was The Corporation, a chilling history and dire prediction of where corporations are heading. It is over ten years old, but since 2003, corporations are one of the few segments of the nation getting richer. They also cover the way the government went back on their word and allowed the patenting of living cells. It is well known that only private property gets adequately protected and thus the corporations are moving to own everything, such as the water supply. Some poor in S. America already pay up to 25% of their income for water.
           It is all change, but is it progress? I think we can all agree that every facet of American society is in decline. Every institution, every system, every part of every traditional institution in Canada and the USA is going downhill. The numbers get bigger, but the value doesn't keep up. When the money is worthless, all that is left for the greedy to fight over is power. Still, the USA is the interesting case. Unlike any other period or people in history, the population is armed to the teeth.
           I skipped the memoir club last evening. Just not feeling up to it. I finished the gold shipwreck book and for mental exercise, reverse engineered a circuit board that an idiot had worked on. Ah, how can I call him that when it was obvious the same things confused me at that same stage? Easy--I didn't plow ahead and wreck my materials. This bozo ran out and bought around six kits. But he didn't read the manuals, like I did. He grabbed the most complicated kit, the Internet interface, and started soldering. "Gonna git me on that there innernet, duh-yup".

           But he didn't know the cards are stackable, so he cut the expansion prongs off. Probably swearing away that they were so hard to snip compared to component leads. Then you can see he stopped, looking, and gave up. I have extra parts so I will see if I can save the board. It is what is called a "shield" but you never know that unless you read the paperwork. Also, he did a lousy solder job. You can see the pin stubs all along the bottom and the row where the pencil is pointing.
           You mess up, it's okay. Unless you mess up because you were so smart you didn't need to read the instructions. This characteristic red colored circuit board is usually Adafruit or Pololu. That's enough for today, I'm bagged.