One year ago today: October 22, 2024, raccoons, cats, and boards.
Five years ago today: October 22, 2020, smart phones configured dumb.
Nine years ago today: October 22, 2016, uncharacteristic intelligence.
Random years ago today: October 22, 2006, “up close & personal”.
Our first winter fog also brings quiet stillness. Good, the last couple days that distant “pile-driving” sound was around again. I indulged in another hobby last evening, the lost art of personal letters. I realized I have not introduced you to Settler. That is the nickname of LizJohn’s big doggie. But hey, it’s not like this blog is the only thing I write, so pardon if that slipped past. I reminded her again we all want to see pics of this noble critter, now weighing 100 pounds. What an eerie stillness and I cannot see my own yard trees. Time for another coffee, right?
This photo won’t make sense until you read all of today. There’s the perpendicular mailbox. I’m so nice I went out there and took this picture special for you. Easiest to see is the off kilter telephone poles. That’s not a lens distortion, all posts and poles on this street are embarrassed by the elegant perfectionism of this peach of a post.
Watching the banksters go after silver was the high point of the morning. The way it works is now standard, they agree between themselves to simply keep trading batches at progressively lower prices. The tactic is called slamming. Silver is subject to the “snowball effect” when it passes certain price levels, such as $50. The key players in this game are the so-called Bullion Banks, which include many who have been convicted in the past of manipulation, but just shrugged off the fines. That would include Sachs and JPMorgan.
They hit the morning New York trading with a series of “tamps”, or artificially low price trading. Pay attention, they trade silver certificates, not physical silver, and they were able to keep silver around $32 for the longest time while gold surged. The banks prefer morning slams, when the Asian market has closed, which is why they also prefer Fridays. There is often a pattern of morning price declines and afternoon recoveries.
And to close the morning, news from the heist of jewels at the French museum. Turns out the two women responsible for security were both DEI hires. Part of a drive in to have equality in management positions. The funny part is neither woman has expressed any anger over the thefts. They have, instead, gone on camera to complain about people calling them DEI hires just because they are, in fact, DEI hires. Interesting.
Trivia. While the total number of droughts is unknown (did you know America had a four-year drought 2020-2023), the vast majority of all recorded doughts (I said ‘recorded’) have been in China, with around 2,000 that we know of.
What is all that noise? Ah, Mrs. Red. She used to perch behind the feeder, but I positioned the two drippers, which she loves, so that the tinkle of the splashes is toward the window side. So she now dines in full view of the yard picture window. With all the corresponding news and announcements she faithfully reports. The Three Squirrels have not (yet) defeated the latest baffles, so she gets all the gourmet food she wants. And I would say she is taking on a more matronly bearing than this spring, a more pet-store plumpness.
Downtown Celina, TX
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This is out of sequence, you’ll see in a moment I had planned to take the afternoon off. Instead, I got the floor up again and finished the last hard part of the flooring. Shown here is the completed new joist support where all the migraines stem from. The wiring, plumbing, drains, and cupboards all meet along that beam I just put in there. Took two hours, that’s one man with one jack. No help to be found.
Hopefully this repair brings the worst of the renovations to a close. This was originally slated for 2020, so yeah, I’m a little behind. Hey, it’s not like the time was wasted. Anyway, I still have to do more wiring, but it is now straight easy cable. The flooring is not going to be very fancy, as I never want to have to rip it up ever again. The work took 6-1/2 hours but was light because now I know what I’m doing. Now reverse back to earlier this afternoon and start again.
It is now 1:00PM. Ignoring an unexplained pain in my shins, maybe from shunting around a fence post like I should have quit doing ten years ago, I too to chores around here. You never forget gout once you’ve had a session and avoid any possible provocation. So, I cranked on the radio and let’s see where I get. The connection here is two-fold, one is that there are a number of activities that can set off this pain, including everything from a sneezing bout to carrying one too many bags of groceries. The other is what I may finally get around to, follow my thinking here, building a box in my wall.
Have you ever met people who go through your medicine cabinet? I have not, but it says here this is a common problem. Do you really want a snoop knowing, (or inferring) your health issues? Thus, I find a need for a locking medicine cabinet. I have seen several models, including the ones you see on the wall at the doctor’s office. Between these, I find them too expensive, or not suitable for recessed installation. Now, who do we know that can build a simple 3” deep box with a hinged lid that fits into a wall opening? This does not have to incorporate fancy mirrors and shelving, it would more resemble a spice rack. But much more sturdy.
Then I cut the handle of my new project box to size and found myself exhausted. That’s a first, then I checked the game camera to find zero footage. But I know that area north of the laundry deck to be a traffice area. Hmmm, those are new batteries. Next, since the semaphore team is officially three people, the signalman, a scribe, and a runner, I’ve decided to replace two of them. I could search a million people in Florida and not find one with any interest. So, the scribe gets replaced by a voice recorder. And these days the runner can be e-mail. Problem, my almost new Sony voice recorder doesn’t work any more. Rip-off.
Well, screw that. This is ancient technology and the expensive brands are still junk. I’m going to Wal*Mart to find the cheapest one they sell, and why not? I’ve had three of these recorders now and none of them lasted.
Fine, I’m exhausted but cannot sleep. I was in the pit for hours but made sure I kept within my own limits. The only real heavy lifting is moving the 30-ton jack. I took a break and watched this useless video of a guy who crushed up and smelted seven pounds of aluminum. I don’t even know if it is saleable. I learned a lot, especially about recycling. That the metal can be recycled at 5% of the cost of new. Then again, new aluminum does require a lot of electricity.
It’s now 3:00AM and I filled the time watching all kinds of how-to videos. One of my favorites is the somewhat annoying guy “King of Random”. I see they finally caught that bellboy who stole the $15 million cash from the casinos by wheeling them out on a baggage cart. Turns out he planned it exactly as I would have The how-to videos are mostly odd topics, like DIY repairs. There is something the people in all these videos have in common that always astonishes me: access to resources which, at their age, I could only have dreamed of.
ADDENDUM
The mailbox post video clip was unusually popular, last day. It was trimmed from a larger e-mail version that went out to a select few, explaining the comedy of the undertaking. Hmmm, the Internet liked how I referenced them as “my crew”, you know, I don’t think when they started they realized they needed a new 4x4” post. If I said that was one of the extra Tennessee posts, my error. It was new, on sale because it had been cut a foot short. Fine, because I had to cut off another foot. (Reminder, this day’s post is out of sequence, expect repeats.)
The next phase was driving down the street afterward. That is now easily the straightest mailbox on the block, I’ll try to get you a pic. It’s more perpendicular than the lamp standards. The e-mail included a description of how this mailbox episode was proof that we are the last generation of fix-it-yourselfers. With the conclusion that we deserved to be “sitting at the old pier with fishing rods 50 or 60 miles from town.” Seems all are in agreement.
