One year ago today: April 29, 2022, which nobody believes.
Five years ago today: April 29, 2018, the three-minute day.
Nine years ago today: April 29, 2014, a rambling post.
Random years ago today: April 29, 1981, yep, 42 years ago.
Unoffically, the Brownng .50 caliber machine gun sold its record 3,000,000th unit today. That’s a lot of firepower. This huge beast is still the standard on tanks, where it can knock down houses and brick walls without wasting a shell. I’m up early, how about you? Ah, 9:00AM and good, the neighbor started running a saw. So I won’t be the one who makes first noise. It’s going to be a coffee day, my kind of pace, and you can follow along for the exercise. One of the weapons I keep an eye on is Ruger revolvers. Normally the lowest price is $200 but that’s if you can find any. Shop after shop seems now to be sold out. I mean, what good is a .22 but for target practice?
This is a schematic of the jointer, turns out I really like the results. But it remains seized in the wrong configuration. The penetrating oil has been left in place, we’ll give a try tomorrow if the predicted rainstorm arrives. According to the pundits, the problem is common. The outfeed table is not exactly lined up with the top of the cutter blades. Consider yourself lucky if you know this by those of us who never had the chance.
What is a “displaced heart”? Howard Hughes got one from crashing his F-11 into a golf course. That was a strange airplane, proof that if you have enough power, a piece of plywood will fly. With four contra-rotating propellers and four turbochargers, the tiniest thing that went wrong would drop the power and airspeed to below minimums. I just never heard of that heart thing before. There was a detour on the way to town, I have a question for you. If you got 5th Street and 7th Street, what do you call the street between them. It’s not a special street, just a few blocks long in a residential part of town.
In the pre-Google Maps day, you might have been right. It displays as the Spessler Gremholland Pkwy. Who remembers Florida Route 66, the shortcut between Zolfo Springs and Hwy 27? The county saved a few bucks by not putting up a “No Trucks” sign and now it is so bad I advise you to avoid it. Ragged potholes over 50% of the way and no indication they will soon be fixing it. Have you ever tried curried potatoes? Not bad at all.
Have you ever heard of a motorjet? In the 1930s, the technology to make metal compressor blades was poor, so somebody got the idea of using a regular piston engine to drive the compressor for the jet. It’s one of those ideas that looks good on paper. Anyway, I found out the Japanese actually developed this for their “Cherry Blossom” kamikaze. It never flew, still I was amazed by photographs of a working model. The bombers that launched the suicide craft were vulnerable, so the idea was increase the range away from carrier support aircraft.
Horses on a plane.
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A windstorm gave me time to get some shopping done. If it’s a prelude, we are in for some flooding. There’s talk of a tornado hitting North Palm Beach, which is not that far from here. That’s it for exceitement. Except I got a reply from my music ad from lady who seems pretty sharp. She’s got a common name but I’m sure I’ve not met this one already. She asks the right questions and am awaiting a song list. She might be a folk singer, although my ad does specify Nashville country and the classics. Either way, I’ll play in any band now after seven years in Polk County. The only negative so far is the number of times she has to “ask her partner”.
Looking for some resistors, I found a small booklet that contains records from Venezuela in 1999. The pages got wet but all the entries in pen are crisp and legible. Here is a scan of what appears to be a log of daily gross and net income from one of the drivers, Ivan. I have not decided what to do with this but it is the best material I have for that period in time.
What looks like scribbles and corrections are changing information as the driver’s give their reports. The expenses are listed first, as they often got reported before taking the tally. Also, the drivers better understood this method. If you know what to look for, you can tell I was probably crying for a computer at the time.
There was no blog or journal that year, as I was still kind of in mourning. I knew years earlier there were not many good women left but I foolishly figured if anybody could find one it would be me. Don’t laugh, I had some compelling reasons for that thinking. There were some standards I would not sink below, I did not know there were standards many women would not go above. Make sense? Let me put it another way.
You know the saying that if you have a young, pretty wife, you’ll have to watch her like a hawk. Well, the offshoot is that if you have an old, supportive husband, the same goes—except that all women just know men are apt to cheat. It is so because they insist it is. To this day I shun women with no talent the way women shun men for having too much. In 1999, I was convinced some woman would see the value in me beyond my ability to bring home a paycheck. It never happened and it took a while to quit blaming myself.
ADDENDUM
An article in El Pais (The Country) suggests human DNA lacks some 10,000 genes that are present in every other mammal species. The study also concludes that this “molecular deletion” is responsible for many of the traits that humans find highly desireable. Makes sense to me, as DNA also controls the timing and intensity of such things. If something advantageous arose using a gene that was turned off, why just leave it turned off when you can eliminate the mechanism that does so altogether?
The FBI says Chinese hackers outnumber us 50 to one. All I can say is that makes things about equal, and the FBI finally admitted they have hackers. Canada jails a man for producing A.I. kiddie-porn images. For all the talk of “surface branded” accessories making your mouse and keyboard obsolete, I have yet to find anything on the web that shows it and explains it. I think they mean the objects will appear on the screen. You know, like they did twenty years ago.
Something I don’t like is the latest round of documentaries that try to include the viewer as if part of the production. I watch them for information, not to listen to them continually pretend to care what I think. It’s a lame technique to get likes or worse, to get you to sign up. I’m not saying it is wrong. I’m saying I don’t like it.
