One year ago today: July 28, 2016, on monolithic virtue.
Five years ago today: July 28, 2012, JZ & batbike.
Nine years ago today: July 28, 2008, bad laws & disgusting taxes.
Random years ago today: July 28, 2013, not one thing else.
Now I’ve done it. I should not have finished that back bedroom. I walk in the door now and instead of getting any work done, I head for the cool quiet and time to think, shouldn’t I have this, etc. That’s the relevance of this picture, it’s from mid-morning today. There I was, in the yard, laying face up gazing at the clouds as they floated past, thinking, “Gee, they look so fluffy today.”
Tell me I didn’t watch another Sherlock Holmes remake last evening. This is the one where Holmes does all the karate moves when the evil Blackburn comes back to life. I liked it, a fast moving plot, always an asset when a movie lacks plot originality. Still, if I was a detective up against super-criminals, I would be far more suspicious of faked hangings, antidotes, and apparent states of death. I was planning the removal of floorboards but the scooter muffler has worked its way loose. It’s that continuing problem with the joint where the muffler pipe meets the engine housing. It is easily snapped off and has been replaced by an 11mm [metric] bolt that will not stay put. If I fix it, I may go for a day’s ride on the Rebel.
The floorboards were easily broken last time we pried any up. More precisely, the tongue and groove edges would split. I’ve concluded that could be because the boards were pried up in the reverse direction they were nailed in place. This time, I shall try to pry them up from the other direction. The boards will still split, no doubt, but it will be more confined, I think, to where the nails are placed. Why sure, I’ll let you know. Nothing else going on these days. I have tentatively canceled the trip to view the eclipse because the boss of my heart clinic turned out to be not the doctor.
Abandoned airport.
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Here is the chore that found me lying in the yard, sweating like a rhino. This difficult picture is the underside of the red scooter. You get a series of photos showing this repair that has to be performed every year or so. In the first panel, I’m pinpointing the problem. That bolt stem is not factory issue, it is a reinforced patch up, the result of a design fault on this brand of scooter. That part is normally 10mm, like the matching nut and bolt on the left. This is an 8 x 1.25mm machine bolt affixed to a hole reamed out to 11mm. Because that damn part is the first major thing to break on this vehicle.
Worse, it is often broken flush with the engine head by accidental overtightening when the muffler is replaced. This one has been drilled out and extracted I don’t know how many times on my unit. The middle panel is a better close-up of what I’m talking about. The muffler pipe has been removed to get a better view. This is greasy, uncomfortable work even if you regularly stop for recess. The last panel shows the completed repair. The bolts are just tight enough and you can see a double bolt on the right side. Nice shiny stainless steel. Yet, within a year, these will both work loose and fall off. It has to do with the constant expansion and contraction.
And a lot to do with my now-considerable experience taking photos with a crappy digital camera, don’t you think?
Engine mufflers, I thought they worked by deadening the sound, like you would wrapping a towel around a speaker or something. Not so. The loud sound is the sonic crash as the shock wave emerges from the engine. I found this out reading that recent article about plans to fly supersonic passenger jets again. The USA and others prevent these jets from breaking the sound barrier over land, but the plan is to have these jets fly up above the stratosphere. The sonic boom is dispersed by the thin air and distance at that altitude.
Back to how car mufflers work. They don’t actually “muffle” anything. Instead they channel the shock waves back onto themselves, thus using their own pressure to cancel themselves out. Hmmm, that makes sense why a hole in the muffler is so loud. It disrupts the pattern needed for the internal shock waves to stop roaring. Does this also explain why the exhaust gasses exit the tail pipe rather tamely as well? I don’t know, I’m a bass player. For all I know, this is also how they “tune” a muffler because I’m certain that’s how some people I know tune their guitar.
I’m still tinkering with the microscope, learning its considerable limitations. It has an extremely narrow field of vision and lacks a fine-tuning knob. Often my curiosity is tweaked by nothing more than looking at ordinary objects. That sounds dull unless you know that I’m hyper-aware of how many important discoveries have been made by ordinary people who recognized some anomaly. How can you tell if something is extraordinary if you don’t know what it normally looks like?
“If I were two-faced,
would I be wearing this one?”
~ Abe Lincoln
We need a picture in this segment, so let me go find one. Okay, how about this mystery object? In front of my tie rack. It isn’t edible, but does smell good enough to eat. Actually, I could make a joke that it is only a mystery to scruffy-looking people, but since I was once one of those, I’ll pass. That’s back when scruffy was not considered “fashion” and there was a bit of originality to it, you guys. This is replacement soap for my lather cup. It contains various extracts and has a mild scent. It’s because you’ll never get a really close shave with a product that comes out of a can. (Later, I fished the label back out of the trash and read the ingredients. Oddly, one could probably eat this product without ill effect.)
Careful here, I am not taking sides. I am only mulling over some evidence. While I won’t say what I believe one way or the other, I will say that I know this book is full of the answers you would be compelled to give if you seek a college degree in America.
Alas, this book’s version of history is so distorted, I don’t think any truth is to be gained from reading it. The prime example is that nobody has ever found a single order by Hitler to persecute any particular religion or sect—an astonishing fact that defies explanation. Yet this book claims Hitler was personally responsible for everything. You can’t have it both ways. I would point out that what the West so highly criticizes about war-time Germany is hypocritical because most countries, including the USA, have the same laws. Namely that you are not allowed to do a lot of things in America unless you are a citizen. I mean, how do you suppose the USA react if a group of people arose in their own midst and stated they were not American citizens and therefore not subject to its laws?
I don’t have any theories how DC would deal with that, but I heard that 150 years ago the inhabitants south of Mason-Dixon found out the hard way. In a more recent example, so did some women and children who once lived in Waco.
ADDENDUM
Cultural marxism. I must say now that Trump is becoming a major disappointment. He’s letting down the people who voted for him by dragging his feet on campaign promises. And remember, a lot of those people voted for the first time because they thought they had a candidate who would, how was it put, “drain the swamp”. People understand things take time, but Trump should be naming names. If he can’t get something done, point at who is blocking the way. The message will get through to millions on-line who would not bother to read reports or minutes. If the wall is being delayed, myself and many others want to know specifically who is behind it, where they live, and who voted for them.
Here’s an item, I’ve been asked why I don’t use the term “cultural marxism” when so many of my views concern the behavior of those very people. That’s an easy answer. Just like I put forward easier to understand explanations of topics like Arduino and music theory, I’ll trade absolute accuracy for a version that is easier to comprehend. I find terms like cultural marxism are not in most people’s vocabulary, so I avoid using it. For the permanent record, I do not like any of the wide variations in definitions of that phrase anyway. If you don’t know what it means, here is my less accurate but friendlier description.
Cultural Marxism is the rationalization that all things wrong with the [non-white] world are caused by the white race. Only when the entire white race is bred out of existence, the theory goes, will true equality be achieved. The way to do this is to undermine white culture, and since this is a process of destruction, that means they want white culture brought down to the level of other cultures. That’s the kind of equality they intend. The Marxist part means they utilize the standard methods of the old communist infiltrators and agitators.
Keep the enemy fighting between themselves. Shout equality and free immigration as if they are lofty goals while covertly demolishing European culture piece by piece. The end product is a New World Order, where of course, the leftist liberals are in charge. After all, somebody has to mind the shop. There are many philosophies of who is behind all this, but all agree it is a single entity that has trouble being accepted any other way, so they must force themselves on the world. They are the chosen few.
Last Laugh
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