One year ago today: December 30, 2014, “NO” means normally open. . .
Five years ago today: December 30, 2010, breakfast special, my eye.
Nine years ago today: December 30, 2006, dodo-brained geeks.
Random years ago today: December 30, 2012, electronics, tea, casinos.
MORNING
Another amusing thought, if the rest of the world would quit trying to behave, there would not be a shortage of anything. There is no mandate that everybody in the whole world has to drive a car and have a cell phone. Remember, these “ancient” cultures consider themselves to be vastly superior to Americans, To this day, the Japanese still consider America to be the land of jazz music, booze, and prostitutes. The Chinese know that definition is mostly New Orleans and metropolitan area, New York (both city and state) and vast tracts of western desert.
Next, up to Homeless Depot to find some fittings. I should know they don’t stock fittings and I will have to go up to MacDonalds in Ft. Lauderdale. But I did find this ½” inside diameter pipe, it is called CPVC. I figure the fittings I need are those plastic things used for aquarium hoses. On my way out I saw a scary display. The Depot is now selling 3D printers. They offer Makerbot, one of more reputable brands, but I have to repeat my warnings over this product: 3D printers are an immensely long way from becoming a household product.
This is a bit of a cluttered photo, but there’s the display showing two printers and an acrylic case of samples. Be further informed the product is brittle plastic, similar to “Lego” material. There are other plastics, but you don’t want to pay for them. The printer is best suited for prototype objects and face it, how many people do any of us know that are inventors or developers?
You need to buy spools of plastic. Right now, those who buy the printer are paying a premium price because you are helping pay back the loans that built the printer factory. Once the market gets the printers down in price, you can bet your ascii that some outfit is already planning on pulling a Hewlett-Packard. That would make the price of the filament go from $40 spool to $420 per spool. Then move the factory to Ireland to escape any class actions.
NOON
Returning from the lumber place with my cash still in pocket, I went into the Goodwill. Look what I scored for $8. Nearly brand new, real leather, real brass fittings. They sell for about $45 on eBay for the chintzy knock-off models, so make that over $55 by the time you are done with the eBay bullshit. Now I got my executive “tatchie-case” so will the competition take two giant steps back.
Trent introduced the concept that the meteor strike may have occurred at a period when the terrain was underwater. That contributes (does it not) to the “skipping-stone” effect, even though an important component of that is still imagination. Yet, would that not help explain the lack of debris and the shallowness of the lakes? We discussed the real absence of ordinary lake-formation geography in the area. No rifts, no faults, no natural drainage pattern or real reason for why we got what we got.
He also found a snap on the Internet that makes the meteor pattern incredibly obvious, but I somehow didn't ask for it. I'll see if he can find it again. If so, you'll see the picture here.
EVENING
Trent called from the airport, we met up at the club. What happened was Trent got off the afternoon flight just up the road and we decided to slum it. That was a total hoot. Let me count, yep, four women came onto us, one of which had to be thrown out of the joint for being overly-boisterous. Can't do that while there were gentlemen present. Um, Ken, that would be Trent & I. You, on the other hand, would have followed that one out the door and come back in three minutes forty dollars poorer.
Now last day you remember the report on the “guilele” and this is something new. Trent brought it into the club, and in fact it was so new nobody knew how to play it. He brought up a chord conversion chart and I was so tempted to say, “see, if everybody had listened to me about the I-IV-V rule, we’d be slamming this joint by now”. With remarkable self-control, I remained silent, ahem. More women came on to us tonight than many a man experiences in a lifetime. Four, that’s how many. What? Some guy says what? He’s plainly lying. Again. I got brothers like that.
Trent has an opportunity to relocate up north, and a grand position to advance himself. Ha, I got a semi-promise to meet one of my heroes, Ann Coulter, if that happens. No, not her political stance, but her clear thinking and her behavior when slimy commentators tried to (what’s the term for trying to twist questions or answers to botherate a person). I like the way Ann keeps them in No names, like Oprah, mentioned.
Now while this is going on, I remain used to the ebb and flow of the club. I like veterans who were not wounded. And musicians who did not sell their banjo for $300 back in the 90s. I may have been more focused on my “sleeve valve” project that I should have been. But there were also fewer total babes in the room than to my liking. For instance, the one who came over that was decidedly more integrated than you’d expect to be advertising her wares in such a redneck bar. Then again, I tend to have more experience rejecting women than your average guy. I you ever have time, ask me about this.
I opted out on that lady, as I often do, and began to examine the valve system. This is why I carry my notebook on outings, I always have work to do when there is no work to do. More that one lady can tell you that. It took a while but I finally spotted that two drill holes in the reciprocating mechanism will do the job of three. I subscribe to “simpler is better” and am getting okay with designing every linkage to be adjustable a little bit rather than one big adjusting screw with 53 settings, the way Sony would do it.
ADDENDUM
Another tale from the trailer court. You been good. Actually, that title isn’t just random. I doubt I ever explained where it came about, since it is probably not what most people assume. Yes, I do live in a trailer court, but it was meant to be temporary while I scooped up enough cash to buy a house. I did not know it would turn out to be so comfy I’d stay in one for what, nine years now? It’s the “tales” part I’ll cover today.
I thought what a coup it would be, if while living in a “trailer”, I discovered or invented something that pulled me in a cool million. In the end, I got about 10% of that combined, but the idea was to record the process. Experience tells us most people are all talk. Sooner or later, everyone gets fed up with such people, which explains why Trump is so far ahead of politicians. As time went by, people were not bothering to vote because there was nobody to vote for.
Same with inventiveness. I often hear people with big ideas that go nowhere, just like politics. The premise of the blog title was to record those ideas when they came along, but to contrast them with the tiny fraction of projects I actually manage to undertake. And that segment of my life has, as you’ve seen, grown both absolutely and relatively since I retired.
The tale today was a guy who wants to invent gloves with reinforced fingertips. But he has a brilliant idea to do it a certain way and I’m not telling that part. It would be complicated and no, there is nothing like it on the market. But I could use a pair many a time. As usual, the odds of that idea getting anywhere are practically zilch. You might as well bet the money on a 3D printer or something.
You know what surprised me? Hearing the mainstream media admit over the past few days that Trump “just might” win because people that have not voted for decades realize he is the last chance for America. They weren't voting, that is, because there was nobody to vote for and they didn't want their hands dirty voting for yet another establishment crook. Another four years of the establishment, says Trump, and America is finished. How about that crazy broad that wrote into the Herald this morning, that if Trump gets in, democracy as we know it will be finished?
I thought that one through because, if you put the emphasis on the correct clause of that sentence, she may unwittingly be absolutely correct. Democracy, “as we know it” has not existed in this country since the day the first dollar of income tax was collected.
