One year ago today: August 18, 2024, mostly about tubes.
Five years ago today: August 18, 2020, on old-school programming.
Nine years ago today: August 18, 2016, it’s lost already.
Random years ago today: August 18, 2023, seeing what’s inside.
I’ve found a spaghetti sauce I like right out of the jar. Anything to you add to it makes it better, in this case fresh onion and canned peas. Except, it isn’t spaghetti sauce, it is pizza sauce. Alaine emailed to say it got up to 100°F on the coast, meaning between 74 and 85 minutes later, that is the weather that will be right here. So I strung out the tools to work on that counter in the front bedroom. No sense trying anything outside. The compressor is ready to go, right after a late, late Italian breakfast. Remind me to air condition that room.
There’s a picture of it now, behind the banana. I’ve never taken any training on using a jigsaw and know I’m not that great with it. So how about we stay out of the heat and see if there are any tricks to that trade. Today is the day nine years ago we found about JZ’s truck begin taken, so I emailed picks of the last day he was here to his sister. And there it was, a cane. Proof that I had back troubles long before the recent round of slow-me-downs.
What a surprise, public radio (NPR/PBS) made a big deal of how only 15% of their funding was from grants. But now that it’s gone and USAID is cut off, they are screaming and begging for handouts. In DC they are so broke they had some seniors out banging on pots with hand-painted “Free DC” signs. A far cry from their professional rioters not that long ago. Here is a pic making the rounds, it is the leaders of Europe waiting to see President Trump. Not one of these people came to his aid when his enemies were trying to put him in jail for a thousand years. This photo is being compared to naughty children waiting to see the school principal.
Did you know I’ve had a smart kitchen door long before IoT? It requires no electricity, the sensor is in the wood itself. It works like this. If you have one bag on grocerles, you open the door, walk in a set the bag on the counter. But the door will not swing shut by iself, you have to walk back and close it. Unless you have many bags of groceries. Each time go back outside for another armload, the door will swing shut and latch. It especially knows when it is raining, so you have to set at least one bag of groceries on the wet landing to turn the knob.
This news is too early and from an iffy source, but rumor has it some federal agency has seized Fauci’s phones and computers. There is now some sort of organized group petitioning for the arrest of Bill Gates. The NFL has replaced their cheerleaders with faggots, some people never learn. California is not being let off the hook for giving that killer truck driver a license. It says here half of young Americans consider friendship too expensive and half “skip events” due to the cost. I am baffled by the number of people who complain they cannot meet anyone.
The perfect bundt.
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Any adventures today? Depends on one’s perspective. Here is a 30-minute task that turned into two hours, making it today’s headline. Let me add some descriptive editorial. In the left panel you see the tools laid out on the table top, but you can’t really see that the upper ply has warped and I’m going to glue it down and tack it in place. Nothing to it. You can even see my nice new jigsaw in the upper left corner. It is not needed for this job, but that does not stop me from showing it off.
Actually, it has a purpose. It is quite heavy when the battery is installed and the plywood has to be held for 24 hours. That’s where things go wrong. In the left panel you see a lot of clamps. What happened? Well, the glue and clamp and tack it down idea only has merit if that combination has more strength than the warp in the plywood. The glue I used is leftover from theat 2x3” bench I build. By the way, that is in pieces. It did not hold up to Florida weather. So I may get back to it some day.
While looking at jigsaw websites I noticed there are not advanced projects like so many other tools. Just the saw and cutouts of tacky furniture and lawn ornaments.
It took a lot of screwing around to get the plywood flat. The brad nails did not hold well, so I was out to the shed to get these clamps and staples. They aren’t easy to see but the far end of the plywood I heavily glued and clamped and even then I don’t know it will hold. Tough plywood. With the glue drying I wrote two letters and I’m fixing to drive to Bartow for a couple beers since I missed out y’day.
The job also turned messy as the glue squeezes out easy even when spread very evenly. I left it the recommended two hours to set, with another 24 to cure. But after three hours I could see the defects. The glue allowed bubbles in places . And parts that had separated from each other did not fit back together. Hey, it’s work bench so we’ll deal with what we get.
Turns out few people have ever heard of Streamsong around here. Trent was impressed by the website, I wrote back it is even nicer in person. Did I mention even the swales were planted and mowed with grass, no easy upkeep feat in these scorching summers. A text from Steve, the guitarist. He likes his new place and it’s only half the distance away. Good, and if I didn’t say. I’ll be meeting up with Jack to hear him drum. I hope he can hit the ground running, as the tone of his emails says he’s way past set in his ways. Yes, I can play “The Thrill Is Gone” but it has been twenty years since there was any need to. That crowd does not exist any more in this part of the world.
I never made it out, there’s lots to do here and in the background an old movie auto-played after a documentary. It’s “The French Connection”, which I’ve never actually watched start to finish. But I have seen it all as a collection of clichés such as the night club and waterfront scenes. The bad guys left dumb clues everywhere. The movie is 50 years old and portrays an America that is now lost.
