One year ago today: April 6, 2015, but I rarely like them . . . .
Five years ago today: April 6, 2011, I’m hungry again.
Nine years ago today: April 6, 2007, the breakfast of “loosers”.
Random years ago today: April 6, 2010, what middle class?
[Author's note: these are random entries during the day whenever I take a break. I'm killing time, which I hate to do, until Saturday when my new sidecar starter is slated for installation. Things will likely revert to the usual format after that. The random year link is always sporadic, as that single link takes twice as long to produce as the others combined. And Wiki pic of the day is doomed. I see now their photographer is the lazy ho-hum type who started off great but lacks what it takes to keep an audience coming back.]
Celestial navigation. I like the way it always grabs your interest. Or at least the way I like to think it does. This is the blog where you learn things, so enjoy. You know how often I’ve calculated the single point on the Earth’s surface (the GP, or geographic position) that is directly under the sun at any given moment. Lookie here, I found a video on another topic, but watch this closely. You can actually see the reflection of the Sun in the ocean.
It’s blurry, but theoretically that is a single point and you can buy an Almanac that allows you to look up where that point is. If I’d never looked into navigation, this video would probably never have gotten more than a glance out of me. I can even tell you this recording was taken on June 21 of any year since the 1400s, but I’d narrow that down to the Space Age, clever chap that I am.
The point is, spotting that moving sun was for me an “aha” moment two years in the making and while the reflection is obvious, not so with the connection to using it for navigation.
The news, which I just got myself. Except for Crazy Michael, who was the youngest of the regulars, I am now the sole survivor of the original Jimbos crowd. All fifteen of them are deceased and all were similar in age to me. I know, it’s peculiar since I was in poorer health than many of them. Anyway, that’s three per year kicked off until there were none. If it is true only the good die young, Crazy Michael will outlast us all. That’s the yahoo who used to fight people for not playing thrash metal on the jukebox.
What a terrific windstorm, no chance of riding the scooter in that. So sit back for another good read, lots of opinion and controversy because I’m in a crotchety mood. Aside to my sixth grade Lit teacher, I finally used “crotchety” in a sentence. You owe me. First topic, the so-called Panama Papers, or maybe they are really called that, how would I know. Until the mainstream media starts publishing real names, it is all smoke and mirrors. But I still have an opinion.
And that opinion is “serves them right”. These totally corrupt politicians and lawyers go about kissing rich people’s arses to set up these tax havens. Then listen to the squealing when they get bested at their own games. I often thought if I ever got into the games of high finance, the best way to make any real money is to not pay taxes. The only people surprised by shell company mechanics those too far down the food chain to matter.
The European influence is there but you get everything from context, which is often deliberate. What we’d call non-carbonated, they call “still” drinks. And the vehicles are pointedly non-American. But the bad guy, so far, he’s an Anglo Yank. The evil American is a constant theme in African literature. It’s everywhere, even the songs on the radio. By comparison, this book is tame.
I’m half-way through and the author has maintained the pace. The “movie rights” influence is there in the form of character bloat and there is a certain sameness about all police forces that are based on the British model. They are all subject to the same bribes and illicit methods, like beating confessions out of suspects. And those suspects are now defined, but somehow I know this author is setting the reader up, there has to be a surprise ending.
And the weather dial picture? It’s only here for looks. This morning it was 64F, 30.5” and 92%.
My point is these people were not the ones who made the resource valuable. One does not “discover” the wealth of anything, it is largely a painstaking and usually destructive process. The tribe sat around, sometimes for thousands of years, developing nothing. Most times, they did not even recognize the asset, and more than often considered it a nuisance. But along comes progress, the people who explore, stake out, mine, process, ship, and sell the commodity. That’s where the value is and those who do the work deserve 100% of the profit.
Yet from North American Indians to Ashanti clans, they suddenly demand a share. It smacks of a tacit claim that the only reason they didn’t capitalize on the resource was they were “conquered” before they could get around to it. In what? Another few thousand years of goat-herding? The mining is ruining the rivers and countryside they say. And that’s my point, they only talk, but talk as if when the big companies were chased away to save the forests or whatever, that the tribe could then magically extract the same dollars from the same land, but without a grain of pollution in the process. Complete nonsense.
Besides, if you look into the transactions behind the exploitation, you often find it is the natives who think they are conning the newcomers. Has anyone seen the recent article suggesting the Indians believed they conned the Manhattans out of $24 worth of beads. (That’s the article of today, this concept was first published in this blog decades ago.) There are embarrassing incidents against aboriginals everywhere, but I’m referring to those instances where you’ll find they gladly sold their mineral rights to them stupid foreigners who didn’t know the land was useless.
This is commonly the case in Africa. The people knew the gold and diamonds were there, but they had no use for them. They lacked the brains and the brawn to develop the resource, but godammit, just you listen to the wailing they put up when somebody else comes along with any incentive. Don’t ask how I know so much about that mentality or I’ll tell you. As far as I’m concerned the very concept of income tax is the doing of the ultra-greedy. Tax anything, but don’t tax motivation.
Dettifoss, Iceland.
Trivia. Air Force One, the presidential sitting duck, has twice the weight of wiring found in a regular 747. A fox eats 2 pounds of food per day. Since Apollo 17, last manned trip to the moon, no human has been high enough in orbit to take a photo of the whole world. Roses outsell all other flowers combined. Wolf spiders are called that because instead of webs, they run down their prey. Mixed drinks (cocktails) were invented during American prohibition to mask the taste of bad alcohol. It was nine years ago today I calculated I had money “enough for a motorcycle”. (Bear in mind, this was at one of the worst income periods of my life, but that’s what happens when you have a budget.)
This photo shows my somewhat growing sophistication at producing controls. It is just two switches for a bulb testing circuit. But the plate is metal, it’s a matching set, the face is angled, and it looks prettier. Also, I’ve developed a prototype battery holder of scrap wood. I don’t know if it is any cheaper than the plastic models, but I can now quickly make them to any size. Shown here, I’m holding only the switch plate, not the entire circuit.
In fact, let me see what’s what already this month of April 2016. In six days I’ve already spent $176.01. Although I’m very well-stocked in food, I spend an average of $10.815 per day on groceries, mind you I just replaced a lot of basics, but even flour is how a buck a pound. There is little I can cut back on, other averages per day on my budget are gasoline at 81.2¢, coffee (which includes a newspaper) is $1.251 daily, and if I do go out for a beer, the average I spend is $7.66 including tips and jukebox, if any.
So it is unrealistic to put oneself on a $20 per day limit, as JZ suggests he can do. That is outdated thinking. Even $30 per day is a tough call for those used to spending spontaneously on anything. Too low a budget is asking to cause overruns, much like New Year’s resolutions that aren’t backed up by alternative changes of habit. The best I’ve ever managed in recent years is $30 per day, although that includes motorcycle repairs and “avoidables” like the foreign cinema, haircuts, and certain household items that have cheaper substitutes. I’m leery of under-advertised dishwashing liquids.
The object of having a hobby rears up the instant anyone decides to spend more time at home. There seem to be two choices: either be alone or have the constant backpressure of a woman, kids, or roomie. And folks, it is virtual constant struggle to have a hobby around those who do not, I can carve that in stone if you would like. Your hobby is a fascination to do-nothing types. So even though JZ has a super place on Snapper Creek, without a hobby, very few people can spend long hours alone, particularly when a TV bombards you with the message the rest of the world is having fun.
He’s got a big screen TV that is on all the time, even when I am visiting and nobody is watching it. I have nothing against TV, but I’ve failed to train myself to watch it. JZ has mountains of unread books, but reading is a tough call for anyone who even once falls out of practice. And against those like myself who read for hours every day, catching up is utterly out of the question. Can’t be done. Logic decrees that anyone smart enough to catch up is too smart to have ever stopped reading in the first place.
Who knows those Radio Shack Snap Kits? See below, they are for basic learning, even the pieces are oversized for little hands. I picked one up at the Thrift for a dollar, missing all the fun parts. I got a motor and a “music” IC. I examined the system closely, it is a good idea. Too bad it does not come in any practical size. For now, prototyping remains the same cumbersome methods of the 1950s, breadboards and temperamental wiring, along with many components that break off or pop out on their own.
And how about that picture of my finished birdfeeder? There is more to that tale from the trailer cout than meets the ear. You see, I do not consider myself either handy nor artistic. We all learn from a young age that really talented people can neither explain nor teach what they do. My ex could not begin to say how she could sing like an angel, it just happened when she was six and the teacher asked all the kids to sing a note.
Fred gave me a stern lecture when I complimented his hobby, which is carving acrylic sculpture. It’s not what you think, he carves the statue hollow inside a block of acrylic. His latest project is a team of four horses pulling a wagon of wine casks. Unbelievable. He scolding me for saying I wish I was artistic. Huh? It turns out he considers the things I build like wooden gears, saw handles, even the bird feeder to be valid artistic endeavors. To me they are mechanical contraptions. So, which is it?
Food. There was a chill in the wind, so I made a supper of nothing but dry ham fritters. It’s a dry ham you get at the Russian store, it would remind you of dried out bacon. Diced with onion and deep fried in biscuit dough absolutely home made right down to the melted lard. Rolled on wax paper on the counter with my tin can rolling pin. Served with a dip of melted butter and unlimited banana and nutmeg smoothies. Sorry, no pic, the batteries were still in the charger when I polished off the lot.
Say, that reminds me, if you don’t like stirring the fritters to an even brown, squash them a little flat. I see I forgot to say that. They’ll cook better on their own and it makes them easier to flip over.
Prices continue to fall slightly in the interior, but what really aches is that places that sold for $18,000 in November and December last year are listed for $36,000 now. Double your money in four months. But I did not have the $18,000 at that time. So all of this will go down in my history as an incredibly unfortunate missed opportunity. The bright side, academically, is that I’m learning the trade. What I’m deliberating over now is some method of conveying to sellers that I have an offer. Since the majority of my searches are overwhelmed by real estate company listings, I just know I’m missing places whose owners detest agents and commissions. I’m thinking.
It is not an easy task. I can’t just put that I’ll pay X amount of dollars. Or specify a percentage of their list price. Is it possible to find someone who is already offering at a certain range and contact them privately by mail? That’s why I’m waiting for my real estate lady to return to the vacuum shop. She knows all these things. But unless there is another bust, I’ve got nothing. Other people keep saying these things happen for a reason. And I wish they’d quit with that.
And how about that Fox news, trying to inflate a rare Cruz success event in Wisconsin into the biggest threat yet to Trump. What a joke. I was in the coffee shop near a TV, although the sound was not on, whenever I looked up with was some message of doom for the Donald. These Fox mental perverts never quit with that, do they? It’s a kind of innate subhuman guilt trip. Anyone doing well has to be attacked. One has to wonder what hidden agenda could make them continue pursuing their now totally discredited Liberal brainwashing. It’s embarrassing to even watch them.
Yeah, Cruz had 100 people show up to Trump’s 18,000 in New York. You know what Trump should do? The next time a slope-head says walls don’t work? Have the Donald send a bulldozer over that idiot’s house and take away a couple. One thing, though, Mr. Trump, that’s not your daughter-in-laws, that’s daughters-in-law. Grammar counts. Trump did point out Obama was dangerous before 9/11, but guess who said it before Trump? You got it, this blog. We were months before Trump. Look it up.
Or how about that dolt who wrote Dear Abby. He’s “bisexual” and has AIDS, the whole standard sequence we’ve all heard before. How he went through his crisis. Yeah, well if you wimps could quit being so self-centered for a stretch, maybe you’d learn what real suffering is. And it ain’t about your petty little personal problems. Or the Harvard student who said she could not sit at a desk across from somebody who was not pro-life, or the student in the dorm who was offended when his roomie put up an American flag. God, this country has gone downhill. My advice to Harvard is to start expelling such spineless freaks, or your reputation as a class institution that produces world leaders is headed south.
Last Laugh
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