February 2, 2020

Yesteryear
One year ago today: February 2, 2019, some celebrity joint.
Five years ago today: February 2, 2015, that funny smell.
Nine years ago today: February 2, 2011, 1:5,500,000 scale.
Random years ago today: February 2, 2003, explaining the million.

           Keyboards. I’m typing this on my new Anker Bluetooth™ but it was not easy to find. The local Wal*marts don’t stock them. The talk is that because of smart phones, the keyboard is out. Yeah, well they said that about Windows XP and look how many big players went back to it. Corporate software these days is inherently crooked because it is produced by crooked people. Some sources say the keyboard is dead because of kids. They no longer learn to type. That makes sense as they don’t learn how to spell or write either, ha-ha. Anyway, I took a closer look at the situation.

           I understand the concerns of people who use smart devices and I’m appalled at their low productivity. The world changes and nobody disputes new times require new skills. But if you watch, they are using these new skills in ways that don’t seem like advancement. Some work, like producing food, has inherent value. But social skills, I’m not so sure. There were two guys in the coffee shop this morning trying to work with smart phones. They were getting things done but not efficiently or effectively, there’s an important distinction.

           It was amusing because while they thought they were researching, the search engines were just leading them down the garden path. If it wasn’t on a web site determined by Google, they could not find it. This continued for an hour as I was charging my batteries. They seemed unaware how drastically they were being channelized and not really in control of what they were seeing. They seemed to have no clue how slowly they were plodding along. This is a betrayal of the American system, which thrived by moving toward efficiency. I understand the appeal of slower work to the people who have to do it. But it creates an overall decline in our competitiveness. These guys, and many like them, do work that is intangible. You can base monetary systems of empty belief, but I don’t know about an entire economy made up of selling each other information.
           And that photo is Sparkie. He’s asking where I am, he sleeps on my blanket and pillows. He’s finally over the cat food binge that gave him a half-and-half digestive tract syndrome for two weeks. Yuck, cat pellets. But he got the lid off the big can and went for it. She wasn’t happy but I just said, “That’s my boy.” Tell her we’re “maturing at our own pace”.

           Here’s a view of training the chickens. At first they would not go near the ramp, but this is after a few days of trailing feed into the henhouse. The idea is to get them to associate it with food, then hopefully with a warm and dry space. The white chicken is the faster learner. It was too nice a day to work inside. I threw down some concrete blocks for a new shed in the far back corner where the fence forms a triangle. I want to move all pesticide and petroleum products out to their own location and as far away as possible. Same with fertilizer, paints, and solvents. In related news, my radishes are supposed to sprout tomorrow. If that’s a go, it almost guarantees some type of garden in the back yard. I’ve grown tubers before and maybe I’ve kept the knack.
           Is it just me, or has anybody else noticed these Wal*mart USB hubs seem to have a shelf life? I mark such items with the date purchased and these gizmos seem to last about a year. That’s the little USB “octopus” plugs that split into four and use line power. And while we’re talking short lifespans, another two bulbs went out today. Four bulbs in four days. One of them went out just as the neighbor started up a tractor, which could be freaky to the skittish types.

Picture of the day.
Slingboy, Southeby’s.
(Bidding is closed.)
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           How’s this for a weird picture? How you interpret it will be a peek at your character. Is this holding on a broken car door that I’m too cheap to fix? It’s a repair in progress. The door trim was coming loose so I glued it with epoxy. The brand I use has to be clamped for twenty minutes. I didn’t feel like standing around that long and this was my solution.

           Remember the little Viet Nam FM transmitter for a couple days back? I’ve finished testing it. It works but it eats batteries and has no provision for a cable. Battery life seems to be around a day and there is no idle mode. Forget it in the car and you’ll need two batteries a day. It got cold by mid afternoon which found me indoors, looking for a pipe bender. In another engineering milestone, the most popular size of small pipe is 1/2” and guess which size is hardest to find. The brand called “mini” only goes up to 3/8”, the next size up has 1/2” as the low end. The price is significantly higher and that model has a curve radius too large for what I’m seeking.

           I’ve decided to level the floor, not the fixtures. That flange repair kit I installed did not properly solve the problem. This will mean removing the new bowl, so while I was making plans, I threw in a furring strip and screwed down these cedar rails. It is so nice to work with the right tools. This was just a test and I’ve decided to completely remove the drywall you see here and insulate the exterior wall. Shown here is just the mock-up. The final design will be familiar to chicken coop buffs. The sequence of photos shows the initial cut, the first furring strip, and part of the panels that will be behind the tank, the hardest part to get at. This design isn’t for everyone but I think it is brilliant for a guy with no imagination in this department.

           This also solves the problem of the not so fancy drop ceiling where I installed the exhaust blower. It just does not match the rest of the bathroom. But, with some fence pickets mounted upside down so it resembles an outhouse cubicle, I’ll hide the dropped ceiling almost completely from the outside. You’ll see. Since the side pickets won’t reach to the top, I may paint the exposed area sky blue for that total Texas rustic effect.

           The question is, do I put those little florescent stickers on in constellation patterns for the late nighters? Just kidding, but I need the cheering as the monkey chatter station has lately been drowning out Boss Hogg during daylight. I’ve been listening a bit to the Lone Ranger Station. I believe that is in Bushnell.
Getting back to the bathroom, I researched some designs for copper plumbing lines. Why? Because the lines can be left exposed. They don’t have to be hidden behind the walls and this might be better for what I want with that shower area. I saw pictures of modern houses that purposely left the copper exposed and some of it is charming. I already have the feed lines under the floor roughed in so it would not be that costly to have the few feet of tubes exposes in the shower area.

           I have not checked, but the copper piping must be compatible with as fancy a set of shower heads and taps as you can find. The only snag I found right away is that the best valves for wet areas are levers, not knobs. And all the lever valves are “right-handed”. It’s not trivial, pal, I know it is easy to get scalded by taps that turn in unfamiliar directions. Take Tennessee. The upstairs shower is weird. The water gets hot so you hop in the shower, but a minute later, when it finishes heating the pipeing, it gets too hot. So you reach for the knob to find it turns the “wrong” way. Stick around and see what sort of arrangement I come up with.

Last Laugh