May 11, 2017

Yesteryear
One year ago today: May 11, 2016, top of my bucket list.
Five years ago today: May 11, 2012, I wanna “sir-kyuu-larr” driveway.
Nine years ago today: May 11, 2008, this picture is not PC.
Random years ago today: May 11, 2011, perfectly impossible code.

           That was actually fun wiring up 16 boxes, I could probably make money at it. Instead, I took time to do it to perfection and watched the Tom Selleck moive. That must have cost a pretty penny, it looked filmed on location and I found no holes in the plot or the presentation. But when I got to the ending, with the wagon chase, I realized I’d somewhere seen that part of the movie already. That will be 24 outlets in the shed, consisting of 12 duplex receptacles. That doesn’t include any power bars, which inevitably find their way into all work areas.

           What’s this? More French toast? Don’t you ever get tired of French toast? Think of it this way. The early arrival of the hot weather means I’ve got to get the work done either before 10:30AM or after 5:30PM until dark. Well, except for things like the prewire, which I can do indoors, and hopefully many more things will now be moved into the shed.

           The Romans knew about the solar chimney. The trick is to have the heat exhaust upward from the south side of the building, creating a natural suction or vacuum inside, which will draw in cooler air from the north side. The idea attracts me because I don’t like the way the grid operates. And if it ever implodes from it’s own weight it would be nice to have some hands-on with some way to cool a building. The design I like best continues to be the one with the scrap tin cans.
           I’ve also discovered that the double outlets don’t take twice as long to wire up. Who hasn’t notice that sooner or later, every room needs an octopus or extension cord. Well, since my labor is free and each receptacle is only 57 cents, and the box itself is $1.68, why not just wire it double in the first place? As for the wire, I’m just now using up the last of the big roll I bought to upgrade Wally’s Folly before the pig-woman convinced him he was the landlord. That place is probably worth three times what I negotiated it down to, for which I got no credit. Wallace’s family puts the “fun” in dysfunctional.

           Ha, have you seen the Mormons announce they are backing their sons and support out of the Boy Scouts. You bet, they waited an appropriate period so as not to be accused of walking over the issue of “gay and transgender” admission policies. But this fools nobody. I mean, what part of “boy” don’t you liberals understand? As I’ve said before, equal, but separate. The queers don’t want their own beaches and clubs and organizations—they want to take over yours. Of course, it will be shameless if the other Scout group protests, but you watch, they will eventually show their colors by trying to infiltrate the new society.
           Go Mormons, I don’t support made-in-America religions, but I support anyone who stands up to those who enforce unpopular laws, a right enshrined in the Constitution. Nor do I take the phrase “petition for redress” to literally mean signing a list. That is a narrow modern interpretation. To petition can mean any tactic used to enforce the dissolution of laws that encroach on personal freedom. In my America, you don’t tell people who can stay overnight in their pup tent.

Picture of the day.
Miss Nebraska, 2013.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

           As the substitute for mercury climbed near 100°F I made my way to the library. Remember the Judge’s house? It’s for sale again, asking a half-million. It has been upgraded in the library historic section as in “excellent” condition, up from “fair”. Head’s up, the only crew that worked on that house were the painters last year. Nobody put in anything like the time needed to fix any of the termite damage. I know a little about how long that takes and what is involved. Also, the date in the log was changed from something like 1890 to “c. 1900”.

           Buzz Aldrin, the moonwalker, in the news. He says the only way to Mars is to stop funding the ISS (space station). Gee, Buzz, in another fifty years, you might catch up to this blog. As it stands, the job protectionists at NASA are chewing up just under $4 billion per year dry-humping the entire Low Earth Orbit fiasco, a humiliating failure. NASA lost their precious but useless Shuttle, now they will do anything to pursue only those space projects which last more than two presidential terms. Mr. Trump, it’s clear that NASA has not produced, discovered, or invented a damn thing since the Apollo program. Cancel the pathetic space station and immediately direct the money to landing on the Mars by 2020. And fire anybody who turns it into a political issue.

           Face it, the worthwhile people on Earth have to leave. The planet is no longer good enough for the liberals, so the best solution is to let them have it for themselves. If only to see how the parasite fares without the host. Who are the worthwhile people? Read “Planet 107”, or at least read it after I get around to writing it. I think it is safe to say that when mankind picks those who are migrating to Mars in the 2030s, there are certain categories of people who will not be on that flight. They will be staying behind to have a free and unhindered opportunity to re-make the Earth however they want.
           What’s neat about the Mars colony is they could make it Australia in reverse. If anybody opts to become “non-worthwhile”, there will be regular cargo ships back to the mother country. Where the liberals will welcome back the refuse of society with open arms, much like the Muriel Boat Lift. Right? I mean, how could they not?

           For siesta, I put on an old John Wayne movie. Black and white, from the 50s, it’s called “Island in the Sky”. It’s a bit like a documentary on flying, but so were many movies of that era. This civilian pilot on a military flight crash lands in the Canadian arctic. They can’t radio anybody because Canada uses the military frequencies for French radio. It’s somewhat realistic, considering how little they knew about the northern winters at the time. Don’t rub snow on frostbite, that’s idiotic, though I perfectly understand how idiots would think that. They’d rub whatever was handy on a wound rather than admit they don’t have a clue what to do. So don’t break your nose near a stockyard.
           The cinematography may seem corny today, but it’s very good for the era. Today’s Millennial stars are following an established trail. For all his bad acting, John Wayne didn’t follow anybody and he was one of the people who created the concept of the superstar. Moving on, HP is defining Millennial-think by being caught shipping new laptops with a build in keylogger. That’s code that records every key you press. When caught, HP was quick to point out the keylogger purged itself when the computer was turned off. But the point is, the code is there and they said nothing until exposed.

One-Liner of the Day:
“Next time you wave, use all your fingers.”
           The shed roof is going to cost me three times the original estimate. I forgot to allow for the treatment of the eaves, which must line up with a rake in the material, and I misread the instructions that said 2” over lap. They meant 2” on each sheet, meaning over three sheets I need an extra foot of material, and that stuff is $22 per sheet. But it is easier to work with than shingles. I was up on the shed roof until it got too dark to work. I’d like to finish that roof tomorrow. Sooner or later the summer rains off the Gulf will have to start. It keeps the atmosphere cooler than otherwise.

           What did I learn today? Other than that square footage of roofing material is not the same quote as the area it will cover. I learned it takes up to three times as much electric cable to properly wire up a room, not including the length needed to run back if you need a new breaker. My estate manager sent me a recipe for Cumberland pie, which I won’t publish because you can look it up. I’ll try it only if I can substitute for the beef, which I no longer eat at home. Hint, it is identical to Shepherd’s pie, which uses lamb. (I still cannot understand why lamb is so expensive in America.)

           In return, I sent a recipe for Seminole chicken. Seminole cuisine is curious because nobody is sure how they cooked anything before the influence of Europeans. But I can give you the basic recipe for most meat dishes. Melt a half cup of butter and the juice of one lemon. That’s a tablespoon. Put the chicken in a pan, pour over the lemon butter, spice it, and bake. Cover with tinfoil for the first half. This is where we know the recipe is not all that traditional. The Seminoles use instant soup mixes for most spices. It makes sense, the mix is foil wrapped and will keep in this humidity. They sprinkle the soup mix on top like salt.
           There’s one exception. They love paprika. I’ve seen pepper shakers that were half-and-half paprika. Use lemon, never lime, don’t ask me, I dunno. Seminole cooking of any kind has pretty much disappeared from Florida in the past ten years. They had a couple restaurants but the prices were outrageous. Twelve bucks for bannock.

ADDENDUM
           I’m reading a mystery of the type I dislike the most, but it’s the only unread such book I’ve got left in the house. “The Cat Who Saw Stars”. I’ll tell you the plot as we go, as I don’t expect you read this one. When I say I don’t like it, I mean because the author has that trite late century style of going overlong on what people are wearing and what they eat. I find such prose targets the lower IQ readership and transparently solicits movie rights. The Stephen King treatment of detective stories, kind of.

           This backpacker goes missing after stopping at a farmhouse, who gives him water and cookies. Later they find the backpack and water, but the cookies and hiker have gone missing. I thought, this could be good, but hundreds of paragraphs later, we’re still reading about cat’s names and twice-baked potatoes. And talk about character bloat. I quit memorizing names after we met the librarian (Polly Duncan), the store clerk (Eddington Smith), and the lady who painted the walls (Fran Brodie). Enough dammit, can you imagine trying to read a newspaper that wrote like this? “The prisoner, wearing a chique cuffed striped polo shirt and matching cotton twill trousers, was led . . .” etc.

           To keep the book interesting, I put on a DVD in the background. “My Blue Heaven”, with Steve Martin playing a mobster in witness protection, containing some of my favorite scenes. By chance I noticed the executive producer was Goldie Hawn, the poodle-cut not even that good-looking archetypical right-place-right-time got-lucky horseshoes up the nostrils American success story. The aforesaid scenes are the night club mambo, the love-at-first-sight at the grocery freezer, and the handcuff scene at the airport. And Rick Moranis who can’t act playing once again the role of a character who can’t act, but hey, it’s a job I can identify with.
           While all this is going on, I’m sketching a plan to put a privacy fence across the back third of my yard, or at least plant a hedge to accomplish the same thing. And instead of rolling chopping up the bigger logs, roll them in a semi-circle to create a small courtyard outside the new bedroom double windows. That whole back area could use some shade, but no more big trees. Can’t anybody tell me of a shade tree, preferably evergreen, that grows twenty feet tall and stops? What did I do with that little green African tree book?


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