One year ago today: January 26, 2025, a day at the market.
Five years ago today: January 26, 2021, ha-ha, remember Parler?
Nine years ago today: January 26, 2017, but actually impossible.
Random years ago today: January 26, 1980, ah yes, crazy Heather.
Happy Australia Day. Here is $3,000 worth of silver this morning. Kitco, who would be decent if they cleaned all the BS off their web page, listed at $110 this morning. In real life, you may get $100. First, breakfast, toast and gravy. I called ahead in case I have to stick around Miami past next weekend, which reminds me pick up breakfast chow if I crash at JZ’s. To him, anything with fried egg on the place is breakfast. Not just grits, I mean spaghetti or kale or ravioli. At 6:00AM across the street, a huge trenching machine started up.
Later, I almost lost it today, but then I remembered my own words about how Florida just knows when and how to screw you over. It was the alternator on the van, but that’s the only part I guessed right. The part is $400 and two weeks ago I know guys who would put on for $100. But can’t do that this time, Florida knows I 100% need that van to get to Miami, so the bill it $995.05, I get the shop shuttle to take me to the silver store. Who decide they aren’t paying cash, and I can’t wait.
So I take it out of Regions, leaving myself short and the shuttle driver is getting antsy, he has to go get this lady. So I said I’d ride with her to save time, turns out her big emergency is she has tree roots poking up in her driveway. We get back to the shop to discover the distro sent the wrong part, will I come back tomorrow, it’s closing time.
Sure, if you drive me back to my place and come get me tomorrow. The shop then saw the wisdom of having the right part sent out from Orlando and kept the mechanic on duty until 6:00PM. I’m home now, when I paid the bill, after wasting half my day, instead of handing me $5, they counted out the pennies in change. And half-days have become mighty precious around here. This may have been the last warm one for a while.
The Reb called, she knows this is the end of any speculation. It’s funny to hear so many people say they risked it all when they didn’t have anything much to risk. Or the rich kid who risks his last $50 on a pool game. We are stuck somewhere in the middle, if this flops, I will never recover totally—but because there is no time left. It’s not laziness or non-ambition that’s done me in, but 60 years of trying is enough for anyone.
The same can be said about looking for the right woman. At 25 I quit looking in Hawaii, at 30 I quit in Mexico, at 35 in Thailand, and at 40 in Venezuela. I didn’t quit finding, I just quit looking. I’ve been in Florida 26 years without finding a keeper, I have not even found a woman who was honest or good company. But I never quit trying and it’s to the stage where now maybe I should. I’ve read of men much younger who say staying at home, puttering, and going for Sunday drives can be fulfilling if you let it.
I would, if things go awry and I wind up destitute, have the advantage of enjoying reading. But I would recover, for I’ve learned how. The Reb remains the only other person I know who does not watch TV. None of my opinions are based on television. It’s an odd thing to have in common, but nor do we suffer 99% of the predictable crises of adult life. This is not off the topic, which is that recording contract—we are considering the consequences of a failure, which is the rule, not the exception. I would be content to spend the rest of my days reading, if that is all I could do.
This puts another topic into the spotlight. I would point out that he present situation is not musical, but financial. I have never trusted the music industry and chose performing over recording. I have never, even as an early teen, viewed “selling records” as something I’d do for enjoyment. At the same time, I recognize the trade of selling files is much more lucrative than passing around the hat.
Thusforth, today I can hit you with a double whammy. Music and silver. Do not get into these unless you have a very, very, very high tolerance for loss and disappointment. Hint: you don’t.
Amity Park
(Disney spoof band.)
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All this has the famous Florida ripple effect. Now I can’t check the mail until after bank hours and the silver shop is closed for the day. The going price was $115 and they offered me $94. That’s a $21 per ounce bar charge. The shop has free coffee and popcorn, so I lived on that, I was expecting to be here by 10:30AM. I got a lot of Arduino study time, I now laugh at people who say they know how to code those things. They know how to key enter what others have published.
Example. The task of a programmer is getting the task to work right. An Arduino coder is more concerned with remembering which command lines end with a semi-colon and that an int (integer declaration) is two bytes long, so to determine sizeof( ) you must divide by 2 an add 1 because there is an invisible null character at the end.
How much trivia did I read today? The average credit card debt is $7,668. Polk County minimum wage is now $15 per hour and the term artificial intelligence was coined in 1956. The cold front moved down just in time for me to get home. That alternator, almost a thousand dollars, tells me my $100 per month maintenance budget is too low. But raising it to $150 or $200 per month crosses the line of where I could just buy a better unit that requires fewer repairs. Ah, but these days, what are you buying?
I believe the kill switch will soon be a reality and the automobile will soon become both your enemy and a necessary evil. As usual, society will march into this disaster fully aware but ignoring the consequences. It is how our society operates. I am quite willing to let others die for their causes and freedoms when they are the ones who let it come to that. You can’t spend a lifetime voting for the nicer candidate and expect a happy ending.
ADDENDUM
Tell you what, let me search my camera disk, see it I can find some footage I took out the van window. Ah, lucky you, here it is, just let me clean it up for you. The surviving orchards have resorted to netting, shown here in two varieties. I question its effectiveness against hurricanes and the upkeep must be a sinker. But if you wonder why orange juice is pushing $12 per quart, try counting those posts. Hey, sorry for the crappy video but it was cold that morning.
