One year ago today: December 20, 2020, wood work.
Five years ago today: December 20, 2016, Immokalee, FL.
Nine years ago today: December 20, 2012, remember the e-Bike?
Random years ago today: December 20, 2009, remember Pete the Rock?
Interesting how back in 2013, I was complaining about [computer] chip prices, suspecting a company called NTE of manipulating the market. Much like I suspect these days, it is not about shortages, but more about lack of availability. They are telling us the expensive and unpopular chips can still be churned out but not the ones in demand. Give me a break. Good morning it is already 7:00AM and what luck, it did not rain. This is my first planned eight hour work day since late 2004. If all goes as planned this is a milestone in my recovery, just nobody go thinking I’m back. I’m only pointing out at the end of such a day, it is no longer my heart that protests the most.
That front porch the city would not let me build unless I hired their cronies to do it? It lives on in the form of my laundry deck, and the beam in my workshed. This pic shows the mix of new and weathered lumber. All morning to mid-afternoon, I worked steadily and got most of the area cleared out, and most of the deck framing done. I ran short two boards, which gives me a reason to take a break and drive to Winter Haven. I’ve got a meeting at 9:00PM tonight, so depending on the light when I return, I just might finish that deck. Once that is in, it won’t be long before we are full service.
The report from Utah is some millennial nerd kidnapped a 19 year old coed. And tied her up in his coal bin. I’m keen on women who date men they meet on-line but this case has my interest for an oddball reason. When I heard about the guy, some turkey millennial, an image formed in my mind and now I’m curious how close it will match. I see some bland-looking scruffy top-knot unshaven millennial, wearing legwarmers. The geeky type that never scored in high school or college, but thinks if he hangs around campus long enough his luck will change.
Kouros statue.
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Later, nope I did not make it, either the eight-hour day or the drive to Winter Haven. I worked until four, effectively a 6-1/2 hour day for me. It was overcast so I dared not leave the tools in the open. Once I got those away, it was nap time. I will need some help putting up the ledger board, the only twelve-foot piece I have. I forget how I got that here so long ago. My plan for the canopy is 2x4’s, again one-foot on center. Right now, I need some shut-eye.
Here’s the only other pic of the day, the sheet of plywood that will be the laundry area roof sheathing. It’s peeling and not the best, what do you want for $9. It looks like part of the shed here, but it is just leaning up under the eaves to keep out of the rain. It was already peeling badly.
Now for the business report. The evening was taken up by a webinar. You know the sequence, those long boring people who try to wing it. Thing is, I paid for this so attendance is semi-compulsory. It was the same old, just like business meetings. The pace is too slow for fast people and too fast for slow people. So they make it slow. The hilarious part was these lawyer types. You know how these guys show up at Happy Hour and try to pretend they are just regular dudes unwinding. For once, the webinar did carry some important messages.
Without going into detail, I’ll just say the procedures they suggest mesh very well with the record-keeping system already in place over here. For that matter, they are still learning, meaning they still use practices abandoned here decades ago. Spotting their support staff is not used to dealing with people who already know more than they do, I ensured a commitment from them to review any complications that come up with us personally in the startup phase. Otherwise, we really don’t need much as we already correctly guessed how this was going to play out, giving us a great head start. What tipped me off was not so much their words as the order in which they dealt with things.
Put another way, their advice is no longer needed to set things up. Turns out we were already capable. Where we need them is on the finer details and I made sure they know we will be in touch if anything goes wrong. There is actually very little financial risk here, but I intend to rely on them for legal technicalities should anything get out of hand. I have not forgotten that Chinese lady, Susan, I knew in the 1990s who went to work as a filing clerk for a real estate lawyer. Dumber than dirt, but she could type fast. Not long later, she owned five or six houses. She eventually over-mortgaged them all and lost them, but that isn’t the point. Over here, we have plenty of what they call self-control.
Another aspect I’m adding to this new venture is segregation of duties. I reviewed the list of counties and 22 out of 43 gave me the on-line runaround. These will have to be shoved to supply the lists and I suspect some will not react unless presented with a Freedom Of Information Act form. Segregate. That is, I prefer, to approach in two stages, so there is no direct link between who requests the list and who acts on it. It is how I roll.
ADDENDUM
iFart, the product, just topped $400,000 in sales. This is where you call somebody and when they answer, their phone makes a sound like they just lit one. Not bad in a world where Sill Putty still makes $5 million per year. Trivia, the first wave of 108 Japanese planes that hit Midway in 1942 were launched in just 9 minutes and 55 seconds. That’s one plane roughly every 20 seconds from their four carriers.
