One year ago today: September 16, 2017, panic buying.
Five years ago today: September 16, 2013, Ft. Lauderdale = No Parking.
Nine years ago today: September 16, 2009,they stopped a bullet.
Random years ago today: September 16, 2011, me, soldering? Impossible!
Isn’t it nice to hear something besides hotdogs? This device claims to recharge disposable batteries, which mostly means old-style alkaline types. I think it works by some type of trickle charge that reverses the chemical reactions which created the current. It’s barely visible, but you can see six tiny bars that show the progress of each individual battery. Six are installed at the moment. The unit can only handle one type of battery at a time, but it also works with most rechargables.
I’m again finding time to pursue projects put on hold, for instance, I have a book on how to build small boxes. Now that I have the tools, I would like to build a rack for my various external computer accessories. Like my USB devices, such as the 1 terabyte video backup and the 3.5” floppy reader. I wonder if they make a 8” reader, I could use one of those. My files go back that far. Oh, and if I ever die, please, no mad rush to get that video backup. There’s nothing there if that’s what anybody is thinking.
Let me put it this way. I had a rich and varied life in that department when I was younger and never had any inclination to look at porno. I first did when I was 28 or so, when this guy [Bob Lineham] came over with this brand new technology, he said, called VHS. You didn’t have to sneak into the neighborhood theater, to which one could presume he knew all about. He put on a tape and really, there was nothing in there that I had not done enough times to lose count. Plus, all the women were old and fake. That’s when I learned most men have never had the real thing and so they don’t know it is fake. That “oh honey oh baby” stuff is boring as hell.
Did you know that 80% of America’s porno movies are made in the San Fernando Valley?
Bridge in Brasilia.
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I was up early to get some work done on the exterior before the day got too muggy. Then promptly lost the file, so if I’m telling you this tale from the trailer court twice, there’s you explanation. The good news is I was up and down that ladder thirty times without hurting myself. Shown here, I cut the lumber to match the existing framing on the door and window. The unit looks off-square, but that is an illusion. It is perfectly level. I even got a coat of white paint on before the heat drove me inside.
My big screen has no high-def TV socket and I learned there is no adaptor available. Pricing out the smallest screen that would work, it is a 16” and costs maybe $64. Maybe I’ll wait until next month and get myself something super nice. I’m taking the rest of the day off to read, must be nice. And it is. I have a book on the way airlines cover up their accident and death statistics. It’s that old and misleading deaths per passenger mile ratio, it throws off the meaningfulness of the measurement because so many miles are covered so quickly. What I’ve learned so far is that the airlines only report fatal crashes and don’t let on how many near misses there are.
That’s correct. Most accidents happen near the airports and upon take off or landing. I rode from LA to Seatac in the cockpit of a 747 on Xmas day, 2000. What an amazing trip, but I also described how the flying was completely automated except for the approaches. The pilots did not “fly” the airplane, they more like kept an eye on the instruments. Kind of took the fun out of it if you ask me. I was the only passenger on the airplane that trip and asked if I could sit in. Except for to California in 2003, I have not been on an airplane since. It is no longer the friendly skies, the terrorists have won that war. Airports have always been inconveniences, now they are an ordeal.
I’ll fill you in if I find anything new in the book. Later, yes, the book, although written in 1981, is full of gems of information. Like the heights below 10,000 feet in the USA are known by airline pilots as “Indian territory”. A 1958 law guarantees Americans free use of air space, so that range is full of private Apache and Cherokee brand private small planes. Air misses are numbered in the tens of thousands annually, but are not reported because the pilots, even if not at fault, can be criminally charged.
ADDENDUM
The canopy was small enough that I could make it in components on the chalk table. This is ideal working conditions. Evening let the A/C keep the room cool and the coffee pot is less than two steps away. And Tarzan was on the radio. The evil Byron, who kept his wife a virtual prisoner, was killed by his own mute animal tracker after Tarzan saved him by killing a python. It’s kind of neat how the writers of the day portrayed the female characters, but they got the schizoid parts right. Funny thing about radio dramas back then and sound effects. I never knew the jungle was full of Indian tribes.
The airplane book was written by a Brit in 1981 but the material is eerily relevant. In America, the controllers tell the pilots what to do, while in England they can only advise. But it makes for more competent pilots. The book also gives the side of the air controllers strike in the news at that time. They numbered 17,000 at a time 20,000 was the minimum requirement. Some were juggling up to 70 planes per hour and the report states for every controller reaching retirement age, there were eight more out on stress-related conditions, such as heart attacks. I knew there was more to the story and strange that when I finally hear it, the version is British.
There’s another book I’m reading on Nashville country music. I didn’t know Conway Twitty left his money to city orphans. But he left his even more valuable property to his ex-wife and therein began one of those media circuses that involve infighting with the relatives. Apparently his kids turned out not much to speak of and to make matters worse, Twitty died while having his new will reviewed for tax purposes and it lacked some required signatures. The kids were convinced he had stashed $80 in overseas accounts.
Then I read the chapter on Loretta Lynn. Some time ago I’d seen the movie and I see now that the production was exceedingly accurate. So accurate that I see the movie producers picked only the cutest parts of the story. Although as a lad I did not know the names of any of these people, everybody was fully aware of the stories of the poor kid who made it to the top. I spent days that became years trying to figure out how I could do the same. But in the end, after 30 years of busting my chops, I realized those people had things I did not. Like talent and connections. I could not sing a note until I was well past my prime.
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