One year ago today: February 7, 2022, a 12-hour day.
Five years ago today: February 7, 2018, the porch that wasn’t.
Nine years ago today: February 7, 2014, an “aha” moment.
Random years ago today: February 7, 1982, Canadians everywhere.
This is your view of what took so long today, actually this afternoon. But the picture would not fit there. Shown here is the fence to the north of the building, keeping snoopy noses out of my laundry deck. The view tells more than apparent. If you look, the very north end of the fence is new and vertical, the eight-foot main panel has sagged and leans to the right. The posts need to be re-sunk. There is no extension at the top to make the fence 9 feet tall, but I will have the lumber by tomorrow. The vulnerable part of the fence can’t be seen. It is around the corner, and I’m tempted to sink an extra deep treated post where it will do the most good. That’s the segment that catches the full wind blast if anything comes out of the northwest.
Google rushes its incomplete version of A.I. to market to compete with ChatGPT. Called Bard, it brings with it a whole new series of flaws destined to become accepted standards by the clueless wonders of today. Have you seen that freaky video of the birds in Turkey before the earthquake? Funny, if you look at a map of the fault line how that is where most people live. It’s become a standing joke how when A.I. applications are given a free hand, they quickly become “White” even if build to avoid such behavior. They also become redneck, segregationist, and distrustful of authority. A New York outfit pronounced a lady dead when she wasn’t, then threatened to call police when asked about it. All this, and it isn’t 9:390AM in the morning yet.
Denver now has the highest crime statistics in America, you can read up on that elsewhere. Happens whenever the Democrats take over. I’m exhausted thanks to this statin relapse. It’s not any one symptom, more like an array of small changes I remember very well from 2012-2014. The most annoying is constant heavy thirst. But drink a pint of ice water and you’ll want to lie down, then you’ll want a nap. It’s all coming back to me in pieces.
I finished the “Lock Artist” and it was no big deal. The rich call married while he was in jail, but sent him a cartoon comic she drew about waiting for him. Too many loose ends left over in this too obviously written for a movie book. Real life crooks don’t have that stereotyped look. Then I read an article on the development history of the Jumo 004, this is the jet that powered the Me262, world’s first jet fighter. It’s in keeping with a number of articles I’ve been reading on early engine design. It seems the big deal is not the jet part, but the turbine blades. Find a better way to compress air and get rich and famous.
I read a heartbreaking story of a lady on Reddit who was constantly beset by a sister as she was growing up. She went through much the same as I did but [she] was plainly defenseless and never seems to have developed ways to protect her privacy, belongings, or efforts. Trust me, I know how she felt, whenever she appealed to adults to correct the situation, she was told it was natural and normal and she was intolerant and should try harder to “get along”.
Normally, since the gal did not fight back or block the problems, I would have said tough luck. But then she described how years later, (she’s now 30-ish) suddenly her family wants to reconcile. Now she’s back in focus and I would warn her it’s a trap. People who let you down suddenly wanting to make nice? I now had to keep reading her story.
Sure enough, the family has no intention of atoning for their wrongs. Something is up, they have some ulterior motive to pretend they tried coming clean but the victim would have none of it. Expert manipulation. They want or need what they never provided. Refuse to play along, I say, and watch how fast they turn on you, calling you the callous ingrate. Now I’m curious because, as I said, she did not break contact and move on. They know where she lives. And this is where I’m interested. She should have not told them anything and now I’m curious if she’ll need a restraining order.
She went on-line with the story and what a laugh listening to all the do-gooders get on her case, like it’s her fault her family are arse-holes. Folks, I’m on her side. Since I quit telling my family where I live, I’ve never had my mail opened, a car stolen, no money has disappeared, and I’ve had no “emergencies” involving my possessions while I was away. I have to watch this gals story now, I have no choice.
Russian comic book hero.
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Barely awake enough to concentrate, I took out some electronics (see addendum) and find I’ve misplaced a box of expensive parts. This is theory, see below for the project. Around 2011, I bought a book on easy circuits and one chapter that confused me was several circuits that worked because there were imperfections in the way electricity behaved. You could delay a signal by adding, say, a diode, into one path. I had grown up thinking all electricity traveled at light speed and such differences were either impossible or undetectable. Instead, here were dozens of circuits at a beginner’s level that charged capacitors and flashed lights due to adjustable timers. Shown here, I’m using two meters to measure the same on-off cycle. Digital meters are not the best for moving voltages.
Because I’m behind on too much. By mid-afternoon, I dragged myself out to the back yard. I knocked down the solar heater but did not dismantle it until today. I salvaged enough lumber to fix the north corner of the fence. That’s the area knocked over by the hurricane covered by a tarp. And that tarp liked to flap in the wind. Around two and a half hours. I found the fence post most damaged and I may be able to simple re-sink it just a little deeper. The fence has to be ten feet high to keep prying eyes off the laundry deck. A nice warm breeze kept the skeeters away so I got almost all the lumber moved. That alone was quite some fun. I think I can dismantle the old fence parts to do a full repair, you see the old fence was needlessly nice on both sides. Yet nobody ever sees the good side inward from that part of the yard.
ADDENDUM
For now, I want a practice key, since I’ve never really transmitted any code. I foresee just a small contact, say a spring made from a strip of old bandsaw blade and a microswitch of which I have lots. Here’s a blow up of the parts I hope to salvage. The 4093 chip is on top, then a photocell, and a high-quality diode, though that last one will be a challenge.
