One year ago today: February 27, 2024, early tube inventory.
Five years ago today: February 27, 2020, anti-Samsonite.
Nine years ago today: February 27, 2016, my last sick day.
Random years ago today: February 27, 2017, Florida eats batteries.
I guess by now most have heard about Gene Hackman. The Reb once attended his seminars. Now he’s gone at age 95, along with his wife, 30 years younger. TMOR, no it is not common for wealthy, talented American men to marry Japanese women, it’s a telling commentary on what is available. The authorities say no foul play, so that leaves the option of a suicide, That is one that just would not make sense. But, I have my own situation. A leaking water pipe under the old hot water heater that may have been there a while.
Now don’t misread me. This cabin has been a godsend for my retirement. I maintain, upkeep, and improve this place for a third of what I used to pay in rent alone. And renters these days are definitely being soaked. In a roundabout way, millions are in the position I was the first fifteen years I was on my own. Rent was so much that I could not save a down payment faster that prices were rising. Where I was a casualty of poverty, these people today are the norm.
Extra sharp cheddar makes the best grilled cheese and I’m reading a complicated chapter on binary division. These are things I’d rather do than fix plumbing these days. I’m fascinated by the way the electronic logic gates are arranged into registers. I felt math inside the computer was performed on memory locations. Most is done on registers. I do not understand what I’m reading, but it is one fascinating study.
Another situation I find diverting is the people and fields of work who are whining about the impact of A.I. My position remains that if a machine can do the job, a human should not be in the first place. That would extend to people who choose that form of career. It seems the hardest hit are graphics designers and web page coders. That gives you some idea of the actual talent involved. Another lawyer using A.I. to generate false case histories has been fined (nobody notices these lawyers are always of a certain ethnic background). And yet another “ebola-like” disease is discovered, where else, but the Congo.
That was the Reb calling, one hour to catch up. Chooks got into a tangle with a raccoon in the lake park and was in for a vaccine. This was in the daylight so that means something is wrong, so it was into the vet for the third rabies shot in his life. We are aware that people over-vaccinate these days, so this was a judgment call. (There is no ‘e’ after the ‘g’ in that word, it is an exception best memorized.) She had company that dropped a shot glass down the garbage disposal so that needs fixing again. Oh, and the trip out west could be as soon as May.
Lily, the younger cat, is now the crown princess and has reputedly quieted down and much better behaved. Oh, she could be a demon. Did I mention I once saw her leap from the kitchen table to the arm of the sofa, a distance of twelve feet. Yes, I am aware the world record is just over eleven feet, but that is from a standing start. Lily was at full gallop when she began this leap.
The Reb being one of the new left who can talk politics without emotion, she reports the media is flooded with reports that Musk is cutting off Social Security. In a way, this is true. Anyone over 150 years old is cut off, and that age is being dropped to 105. But if your nose is clean, there’s nothing to worry about. The Democrats would make this stink, wouldn’t they?
Reddit made a big deal out of some 12 y.o. kid who used a $1,000 birthday present from his grandmother to buy BitCoin back in 2011, claiming he is now a millionaire crypto-genius financial advisor. But the responses restored a bit of my faith in humanity.
a) Qualifications: gambled $1,000.It was also pointed out that any 12 y.o. who gets that kind of money from his family has such a huge parental safety net that he can risk everything and still turn out just fine. It has further been claimed he had an older brother who talked him into buying. Myself, I question the story on one major basis, which is that buying BitCoin was so utterly complicated in 2011 that no kid could do it. Not to mention, you had to be 18 to buy crypto back then.
b) Step 1 – have a rich grandmother.
c) His advice – go back 10 years and buy BitCoin.
d) Same credentials as most financial analysts.
e) Now he is broke, 25, and still a virgin.
f) All morons who hit it big think they are savants.
g) At age 12 most of us got a birthday card with a $5 bill.
h) Who the fk gives a 12 y.o. a thousand bucks?
i) Grandma just called and she wants her cut.
j) There’s enough salt here to rule the East Indies.
k) The marshmallow experiment revisited.
l) Can’t wait for Musk to offer him a cabinet spot.
m) Funny how money makes you an entrepreneur overnight.
n) He talks like getting $1,000 is a normal childhood experience.
o) Let’s see him do it again. (Submitted by some smart aleck.)
p) Like winning the lottery is a skill now?
Even today, I won’t invest in Lofty.ai for the same reason—never invest in anything you do not understand. PBS, the left-wing radio station, is handing out mugs with the logo “Made in Texas” that were made in China. Turns out USAID bribed Time magazine $4 million to choose Zelensky as Man of the Year. Disturbing news from Venezuela as the leader reveals that the Biden administration paid him to send gang members to the USA.
Here’s a corker, the Australian government has banned Kapersky—probably the best endorsement that company has ever had. While the ban is presently just on government equipment, there is talk of public enforcement. The US banned the product is 2017, saying it was a threat to national security, but tried to imply it was because the product was leaky. The ban was renewed last September. Significant private sectors continue to use it, as the ban seems largely based on it being a Russian product. That hints the security threat is the Fed's inability to crack it.
The Kansas Zinger.
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We got more done this afternoon than planned on, me and all the birdies. Sadly, grandma raccoon is starving, she how scavenges in daylight, kind of sad unless you know how Nature works. The majority of the kitchen floor got ripped up and we found the water leak. It’s fixed, but not fixed. One of the splices worked its way loose an the jet of water was managed to spray way over to the east wall, where I heard it. But I ignored it as I said, there was no plumbing near that area. I tightened the joint and slowed the spray to a drip. It’s the hot water pipe, so I have t go back and make a permanent repair.
You get to see part of the underside of the building. Make no bones, this amount of work is not typical. Even if I could sustain this pace, which is dreaming, I would not finish what I want until I am 73 or 74, and I doubt I’ll last that long. But, just maintaining an active life got me past the times in 2005-2009 I could not walk a single block. It’s not a substitute for an exercise regimen, but shifting plywood and clearing floor space is easily more of a workout than most people in my category.
The last time it was repaired was done as cheaply as possible. I see there are two spots where somebody caved through. The original floor was painted white and the repair was a sheet of plywood over the worst areas. I ripped it all up and I must say that white paint was incredibly durable. This is also the opportunity to connect the wiring for the new hot water tank. This being the third major repair or upgrade, the earlier wiring is a holy mess. While the work was done right, this is a cabin and it was not done to last.
Total time, over seven hours. The contents of the kitchen had to be moved aside or taken outdoors. The new floor will be sheets of plywood over the joists, which had to be manhandled in the door and the kitchen table taken down on taken out. One break, for a soda, around half-way because I’m more in the mood for a couple beers, but tomorrow is Friday. Karaoke at Kooters is more my style for a weekend and just having the band ready to go the past 17 months is enough to keep me at home.
ADDENDUM
The marshmallow test is a study by Stanford about delayed reward. Children were offered on marshmallow now, but two if they waited. Of the 600 tested, 402 failed, which is not surprising. It is not known if the kids had siblings or trustworthy parents. What is know is that the kids who were willing to wait, even if they never received the marshmallows, had higher SAT scores, had lower obesity levels, and were less likely to be drug addicts later in life.
