October 21, 2023

Yesteryear
One year ago today: October 21,2022, war impedes marriage?
Five years ago today: October 21,2018, hot dog matters.
Nine years ago today: October 21,2014, I was censored.
Random years ago today: October 21, 2011, 4,000 miles.

           I popped downtown for last call and they had a disk jockey. It was like listening to FM. I found out they are paying him $160, and I intend to undercut him if it comes to that. I have a innate dislike for people who equate playing recorded music considering themselves entertainers, much less musicians. Take half that money and tell him to go play the juke box all night. And will I go to Karaoke tonight at the trailer court? You must return to find out. I hung out at the club past last call and two dumpy ladies were giving me the look so bad that Wilford came over to warn me. The city of Bartow is considering licensing pubs to open on Sunday. I’d be first in there, like a dirty shirt.

           This morning I investigated all I could find on Moonwalkers versus Escend. The former costs $1,400 per pair, the latter around $950. The comparison is over, Moonwalkers is the superior product. Escend it little more than a powered roller skate that requires a hand-held remote. The Moonwalkers are better engineered, they even have the overlapping road wheels used to give Panther and Tiger tanks a smooth ride, and alluded to the “big diameter” concept I have rarely seen ever mentioned. Remember those funny looking British tanks of World War I? They were mean to emulate the bottom portion of a sixty-foot wheel to roll over the German trenches. But that’s a heft price tag, I should offer them half price for a set of their best returns. You see, one look at this product tells me they get returns that are slightly damaged.
           Here’s an updated view of the dividers going inside the ammo case. There are plenty of imperfections, but at least they are now types that if I had the motivation, could be fixed or sanded off. This is the amber shellac, now down to a tiny few drops left. The tray will soon have thumb-holes to lift it out. It is a very tight fit meant to be planed to spec. I’m learning.

           One truly odd thing about on-line stocks these days. If you want to invest, it can be hard to find the listing. Only the truly stupid make their stocks hard to find. The Moonwalkers are made by Shift Robotics. Try to find them. They are on NASDAQ, but so are 18 other companies with Shift in the title—and once you bring up the listing, there is nothing on the display to tell you if you have the right one. Stupid freakin’ millennials, stock reports made by man-bun goofs groomed to disguise prices rather than reveal them. The shoes have a claimed range of 7 miles, which is 100% of my local scooter travel. That distance would get me all the way to Mulberry.
           The only thing holding me back is the $1,400 price tag, but bear in mind the scooter has so far cost me $1050 and requires repairs, storage, gasoline, registration, and has never been reliable. In other news, I confirm what Ray-B showed me. That ChatGPT has to be coaxed and the longer people use it, the more channelized their queries become, the opposite of intelligence. Sad. Instead of testing it more, I’m going downtown to buy six more clamps. An hour later, due to inflation, it is four clamps. Plus a new 18V battery, total $47. Roughly double the price from a year ago.
           Harbor Freight, where the tool is $9 and the battery is $21. On the way home, I stopped at Sav-A-Lot for soy sauce and that spritely gal from Lake Wales was on duty. The one who likes me, so I mentioned the possibility of the jam session next Wednesday, that I would be happy to see a friendly face in the crown. Now before you go thinking that’s smooth, remember I would have no problem just asking her out. But she looks good and likely gets hit on at the till all the time. Better to give her huge leeway to make up her own mind no pressure.

Picture of the day.
Low tide in Britanny.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

           The afternoon was in the shed. I put together more planks, I can now put six feet together in twenty minutes instead of a hour, and with complete confidence. The biscuit joiner has a trigger lock, so I finally used it to cut groves to lay a spline instead of using expensive biscuits. Works great and I got the basics of another box done in a half-hour, another record. The item of note is that I’ve learned not to let the wood fit together and drill pilot holes afterward. I’ve learned to do things in a different order. Now, instead of wrestling with the wood, I pre-drill the holes in advance and use clamps to make the wood go where I want. It took time to learn this. There should be a picture, I’m basing the next box on that doll trunk pictured last day.

           Another advantage of the quick turnaround is multi-tasking, limited only by the supply of clamps and the speed at which glue can dry. What luck, at the Thrift I found this under-counter LED light that fit nicely in the “microscope” rack I built not long ago. I’ve grappled plenty with various work lights that were either awkward, cast shadows, or did not last. You’ll get pictures probably tomorrow. Take a closer look at these views. On the left, the evenly spaced screw holes are recessed and, using shiny exterior screws, they will be left exposed like this. Note how evenly the planks line up now. In both photos, the dark colored spline is visible. This is not the strongest material but the fourth screw in each side keeps the lumber in line.
           This is a shift of focus on how the box is assembled. Less time is spent keeping the box technically right according to the plan, and more on finishing. That’s finishing period, not just sanding the boards smooth and plugging the holes. Such gaps as still exist are tiny and the end grain faces the sides of the box. This is from the pallet salvaged a few days back. Even the lumber is chosen less for what fits and more for a color, grain, and texture match.

           My incentive is partially to get a decent case built for my bass. Something rugged for the instrument that has lasted over twenty years and still does the job. My 7/8ths scale Danelectro Longhorn. Strange how many people have never seen a bassman using a plectrum and equate it with amateurism. Like the bunch that before they even hear you play, say things such as “Like wow, man, you aren’t still using a pick, are you?”
           Sure, there was work to do but the afternoon begged me to stay inside the nice cool shed with the radio and the dust. There’s always enough back-and-forth to get healthy exposure to the sunlight and the birds, even when fully fed, have learned to follow me around the yard. Curious behavior, that, and people notice the chirping. I made a batch of “food muffins”, shown here. These are not sweet, but in this instance made of cheese, turkey, and biscuit dough. Excellent, but it made me discover that unlike sweet muffins, only one does not satisfy. And two makes them not diet food. This is a real hurdle, since nobody around here can eat 1-1/2 muffins. The trick is, of course, to make them smaller and have two.

ADDENDUM
           I checked out the Karaoke in Lakeland. Never again, it was dreadful. How can I put this, it is all the boring aspects of trailer park living coupled with an “old people” lifestyle I worked damn hard to avoid. I was handily the youngster in the place, the few that were within my age group were “old”. Good thing there was no stage or none of them could have got up on it. I glanced through the Karaoke book to realize I didn’t know most of this ancient music. The crowd consisted of four elderly couples and ten single granny types, including Peggy. Only four people were singing, five if you include the cheerless DJ.
           And what mournful hymns, dirges, and movie themes. As I suspected, the sample Peggy sent me two months back was her hand-picked best material. She is no stage performer, she did not know the music, the lyrics, or the melodies, but to be fair, neither did any of the others. Honestly, I understand what she wants but she will, at the pace she’s set for herself, not going to live long enough to get up to par. The PA was so quiet, I sat the mic back on the desk and sang the songs in what is called “unplugged” mode. The later comments told me the room had plainly never before seen anyone who had dared turn their back on the Karaoke monitor, it genuinely shocked them. I had to be careful she did not consider this some kind of date. I left after two songs. I posted this picture because it reflects how boring the place is in real life, though one supposes it has had its moments

           There was a bigger crowd in the laundry room across the lane. The whole atmosphere reflected largely what I set out to avoid, namely that depressing empty old-age nothingness, waiting to die or something. They were all in trailer park mode, it reminded me of the phone company. They are “TV smart”, they could tell you what was on the 6 o’clock, but beyond that, a void. The only thing they can talk about is their grandkids, but they can’t help them or keep up with them. No academic pursuits, no hobbies, can’t sing, can’t dance, can’t follow analogies, and have a thirty-year out of date vocabulary. I asked Peggy if she knew any fast music and she sang “Let Me Be There”. That’s “pretty fast” she said. These are people completely in touch with the world as it was in 1995, I mean.
           Peggy is thus a disappointment. I was hoping in real life she could ditch the granny look and granny style. She forgot to mention the place was not licensed so I could not even grab a beer. Oh, she said, you could bring your own, like it never crossed her mind a musician on a day off might want to have a few on a Saturday night. Give me a break. It’s sad to see people who can’t think out of the box who can’t think inside of it either. Like so many people who lead lackluster lives, she had that marked element of “we’re all alike” about her, that stance that belittles the forty years you’ve put in to NOT wind up that way.

Last Laugh