February 15, 2024

Yesteryear
One year ago today: February 15, 2023, spreadsheet limitations.
Five years ago today: February 15, 2019, a brush with celebrity, sigh.
Nine years ago today: February 15, 2015, educated, not lucky.
Random years ago today: February 15, 2001, locked in.

           Late last evening we got a report that Russia took out a USA satellite that was relaying GPS info to Ukrainian targeting devices. There is no confirmation and one must be careful of media manipulation, but that would be a first in space.The ramifications are untold as it changes the entire dynamic. Satellites are highly vulnerable and if it true, it’s a warning. Neither side can afford to lose communications. Modern war is all about rapid response and real-time data. Good morning, as failed talk-show hosts claim if Trump is elected, he’ll start WWIII and draft our 13-year-old boys to die in the war. Yes folks, there is chaos in America—but it’s all on one side.

           Here is something that awestruck me momentarily. Walking in last evening, I snapped this photo of the Moon and Venus. As I downloaded the picture just to see, I stopped to ponder what just happened. I was born into a world where man had not landed on the moon and computers existed only in university basements. I had just taken a digital photo with a wireless telephone with the intention of posting it electronically on the world’s biggest network without giving it a second thought. I’ll say it again, my one hope left is that I live long enough for life to be discovered out there.

           Have you seen the girlfriend of the son of Soros? My gawd, all that cash and that’s the best he dan do? That, folks is why you learn to play music and get on stage. She would not pass muster at the dog pound, even if she wasn’t so obviously politically connected. Or how about HP, announcing that they want to make printing a subscription service. Then they’ll have a hard copy of everything.
           I have sad news. Sammy, the little white Havanese is not doing well. He’s just passed his 16th birthday and has reverted to puppy behavior. Some of you have come to love him as we do and I assure you he is happy, comfortable, and still does walkies over a mile per day. He’s regularly checked at the vet and has led a wonderful life. Just be prepared.

           After an hour of checking a few sources, I took the entire rest of today to work in the shed and think. Last evening, I basically told the guy at the jam to either fix his PA or quit complaining. For about the tenth week in a row, he plugs both microphones and guitars into the same channel, then bitches and moans about the levels. But old Keith won’t set the PA or let anyone else either. Thus, my slightly more pronounced bass playing and generally louder singing strikes him as out of balance—a balance that he evidently knows nothing about.
           He’s also misinterpreting the Prez, who has a natural tendency to just enjoy playing. It’s when he insinuated that he had “disovered” the Prez that I chuckled at that got his goat. So, I did some research and the results are indistinquishable from gossip. First, I don’t by Keith’s story that he was sick for three weeks. Somebody that ill doesn’t recover enough to show up and rag on the bass player. Let’s just say I’ve had Florida guitar players suddently disappear on me before, ahem. Keith is also unprofessional. According to Wilford, who is at the club on weekends, old Keith began mean-mouthing me right after that weekend rehearsal in Eagle Lake. I described at the time how he did nothing, so the Prez and I used the time to learn a new tune. Sounds like old Keith did not like that at all. But that’s just conjecture on my part, otherwise I give Keith no nevermind.

Picture of the day.
It’s an agricultural tractor.
Honest.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

           While pondering all this drama, I’m building boxes and doing chores. The phone rings, or does whatever phones do these days instead of ring, and by chance I was close enough to hear it. I’m invited to Earth Day in April. It’s a big park cleanup and a chance to visit with Alaine. It’s penciled in. My project of building two matching boxes is clamped and glueing. It works but the tolerances are much finer than I’m using. The pieces were cut as identical as I can, yet they were not interchangeable. I’ve made similar single boxes joined by just glue, but these ones had to be brad nailed and clamped to stay square. I learned a lot.

           Two hours later, this is a view of the incomplete boxes. There is no hardware yet and the lids have not been cut. They may look okay at this distance, but there are gaps and small imprefections that scream “amateur”. It’s a milestone and I will soon have the proper sled and jigs to make box joints, my original plan now five years past due. The box joints do away with the fuss of miters, which are hard to fiddle with. I still have the pocket hole jig but don’t much use it. While they are strong and excellent joints, pocket holes are too difficult and expensive for the grade of box I build these days. I’ve always been more interested in strength than beauty, evidenced by the thick sides of even these small boxes.

           They are a specialty design for me, but they will wind up storing valuable tools that nowadays arrive in plastic. Example, my nice new calipers, which while not designed for woodworking, have done wonders for certain cuts and drill holes. I sure wish there was some place that would teach me to use a small metal lathe. I see my PNP transistor demo was a popular post. It too benefited from better measuring. So the process is clear, the circuits are first tested on breadboards. Only upon success are they rescontructed on a permanent wooden base. We find that regular printed circuit boards are not great for teaching as all the wiring cannot be seen.

           An impasse has been reached with the insurance company over the Civic. They want to pay only 75% of the claim as the car was previously in a collision. Yes, it damaged the rear bumper and trunk. Fully repaired the car was listed for $16,300 and that is what it was insured for. I composed a letter explaining that we had paid the full premium in good faith that we were covered, and being the general public, we were not equipped to know about such things. Since we paid for the insurance on that basis, we are entitled to the full benefits. If there were any clerical or procedural errors, they occured at the insurance office and are not something that concerns us directly.

           They are also saying if there is any difference, we should go after the other insurance company. I say no, we have zero experience and that is unreasonable. They shoudl pay out our claim and they go deal with the other guy. So far, it’s been polite but both parties are digging in their heels. I detect they have some kind of performance deadline. Thus, I will slow down any responses and explain that we are not staffed over here to follow their directions concerning searches, quotes, links, and the like. Oddly, the difference between their offer and what I’ll accept is only $1,750 but they don’t know that. I framed in a small cabinet around the air compressor, so once I build the door, the sound will be baffled twice. The church neighbor should like that. Last evening was Festus Tuesday. I was too young to see these shows but I knew the original sidekick was Chester. We may have stumbled across the episode that got Festus hired. It was about him hunting down his own uncle for murder. We fell out of our chairs when we saw the guy’s girfriend, April. Played by Elizabeth McRae, she was an instant hit with those of us who remember what real women looked like.

           Her bio reveals where we’d seen her before. She was in “I Dream of Genie”, “Dr. Kildare”, and “Sunset Strip”, those I have seen in reruns. However, in “Gunsmoke” she still looked 18 (born in 1936). She played the girlfriend of Festus, and later, Gomer Pyle. She now lives with her husband in North Carolina. So, she was actually 26 in the episode we saw, a lot better looking than most that age nowadays.

Last Laugh