One year ago today: May 20, 2023, I was invited.
Five years ago today: May 20, 2019, donations.
Nine years ago today: May 20, 2015, alligator alley.
Random years ago today: May 20, 2010, six lousy dollars.
That cabin in Crossville. Do I throw in a low-ball offer? It’s worth $20,000 to me, but that’s all. A quick background shows it has all services (just not connected) and the driveway means somebody was living there. It’s a one-room shack, but it is on two full-size wooded and fenced lots. You know that northeast arm of Tennessee, where Johnson City sits? If you want to live out there, prices are lower than Joe’s poll numbers. It was built in 2005 and dropped $20,000 since February.
If you find this property, those posts in the ground are the foundation for a larger building. The annual taxes are $86 and the sale has listed for 95 days so far. Surprisingly, it has had over 10,000 views, which rivals this blog for popularity.
People who shelled out $40 for that 8k flash drive reported to keep data for 200 years have discovered the USB port plug is made of metal that rusts in 5 years.
I’m working on more of the tubes today. This has become a curious project. My guess is many people have given up by this point and just put batches of tubes for sale. The reason is an old challenge I studied in cost accounting, how do you price lots of small items with it becoming more that it is worth? There was no solution, the recommended route was to create a “trail mix” based on a desired target price. Wholesale diamonds are sold this way. To get a few good ones, the buyers have to pick up the whole lot.
My approach is a bit different, since I am willing to do more of the work part. It takes an hour a day to key in a batch, but then I have a database that can be sorted and sifted. I can then make more uniform batches. My first trial—I emphasize that I have not sold anything yet—is seventy of the cheapest RCA tubes. I’ve texted the shop for the eBay account to commence. I’ve learned other bits of the trade such as how to list the tubes more efficiently. It is not enough to know what you have, you must be able to find a particular tube once somebody decides they’ll buy it.
That’s why I sort by brand. The tubes have exclusive enough names that I can include just that in the listing title, which is the criteria most searched on. But in the warehouse, those same names are far harder to read and it gets worse with 50 or a 100 to a box. Distinguishing a 6MU6 and a 6NU6 gets tedious mighty fast. As luck would have it, those two sorting trays I made to separate the categories are also the right size to organize the tube names alphabetically. I’ve noted other sellers don’t sort this way, yet that is how eBay conducts their search. Knowing individual prices seems the best way to maximize income, but it is slower.
Next, I conducted bench testing on the simplest way to package these for shipping. It must cheap if not free. So far, I’ve found that eleven small tubes in their original boxes will fit inside a standard “double” CD postal box. Some packing will be needed to keep smaller numbers from rattling about, but shredder material arrives in my mailbox without even being asked.
Another week passes and Caltier is still “paused”. No explanation that I can find, though these places usually have some outlet you are magically supposed to know about. I was more curious at the pages of tax documents received—and which I do not understand. I was pissed off to see a page full of credits that most people will never be able to utilize. My stance is any credit that is not used by 51% of tax filers in a given year must permanently removed. Items that irked me include orphan drug credit, Indian employment credit, empowerment zone employment credit, and credit for increasing research activity. What the? Indians and orphans aren’t getting enough of a free ride already?
Alaskaland.
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And what about slingshot progress We’re not the type that likes sitting around waiting for stutt to start. My blog readers know it is waiting for things to finish that takes forever. We need some design changes, one being a longer handle. The “handlebar grip” size is a bit too short to get really good leverage when the bands are pulled really taught. The whole frame tilts back and you need extra space to put your thumb above the grip, but not enough that it is in the line of fire if you aim wrong.
Six more hours with the vacuum tubes and I have a sort of system to sort them. Maybe I’ve even found a box that’s the right size for the warenouse. If you hear me say “Jumex” it’s the label on the box, meaning juice from Mexico. The boxes hold exactly 80 small tubes each, about the right size to both handle and to keep in some sort of order. There is still no protocol for keeping track of what sells. Since I have the database, that won’t be a problem, it’s getting everyone to keep track of it. I know what would work, have all sales recorded, but that makes it a several step process, exactly what the shop out there wants to avoid.
I mulled over the 45 mile round trip to the kava bar and decided against it. I thought maybe downtown, but in the end baked some ribs, put on the coffee, and did some planning. The voice text feature on my phone works much better than I’ve seen other apps work, what a help that would be to just speak the tube names into the computer. I have DNS but never did install it an use it much. One reason was it did not work well for even mild tech vocabulary, such as found in this blog. It was no time savings having to go back over and correct the input.
The eBay vacuum tube page has two outfits with an insane approach to selling. They advertise prices like $60 for tubes that otherwise sell for $5. Same brand at ten times the price. I notice also that their ads appear first. This was one of the original reasons I disliked on-line operators. The information that comes to the top is rarely the best, rather the one who paid the most. Then again, they don’t have to sell all that many tubes at those rates. I’m also calling the BS on the sellers who claim they test every tube that sells for under $10. It would not be worth it.
Not that many years ago I looked at New Caledonia as a retirement destination. Too remote and non-English, but it presented a peaceful if underdeveloped island with lots of room. Now I read about riots and killing. It outwardly appears to be a mini-Africa with local have-nots attacking the haves. As usual, the tribes don’t see the wealth was slowly accumulated in most cases because they’ve never accumulated much of their own. I know this scenario very well, judging by news reports. People who have never had a car and have no concept of what it takes to keep the thing on the road are suddenly underprivileged and oppressed when you buy one.
ADDENDUM
I’m weak on plotting sheets, although I understand the rules and could do it if I had to. My pad of sheets flattened out well enough to be useable and I may practice to say I’ve done it. For tutorials, I watched several on-line videos. My favorite is this ditzy lady who has only the shallowest clue what is going on, but gets it right anyway. The sheet is a blank diagram used for constructing the all-important LOP (line of position) when you are out on the featureless ocean.
She uses the sheet itself to measure angles and draw grid line, which I like better than using fancy instruments. She’s doing it correctly, my potshots are about her choice of words and point of view.. When she draws a line that is pretty accurate, she means pretty, with accurate being secondary. But I like it because she produces the results. I wanted LOP but she uses the sheets to plan a sailing route between two points. This involves a compass heading and a distance, which she gets totally from the chart with a straight edge and a pair of dividers. I must try this.
It was during this study I saw a radar plotting sheet. It was advanced and presumed I knew all the terms and abbreviations. I gather a large part of this radar work is collision avoidance. If I ever have time, I’d like to learn more on this.
