April 20, 2026

Yesteryear
One year ago today: April 20, 2025, having a sip.
Five years ago today: April 20, 2021, remember Frankspeech?
Nine years ago today: April 20, 2017, ingenious.
Random years ago today: April 20, 2008, never seen the dust.

           We know what April showers bring. In Florida, it’s appreciative birdies. This view caught the morning sun just right, you can see besides the birdbath, there is a spray to emulate a natural waterfall. You can’t leave it on all the time or it attracts larger birds.

           You’d think it was easy to find lab supplies in Florida. It must be a racket the way they’ve got the market closed up. Minimum blank slide order in Winter Haven, $324. And try to find glass covers. You cannot, by ordinary means, filter out LabCor, they can erase the “minus sign” from your search criteria. No, I don’t want to talk to a rep in El Paso. I want to know if you have a used microtome in stock that I can buy today. It’s Monday and my coffee maker packed it in.
           A perfect 78°F morning, I got the van ready for the inevitable call to Miami. The small “back-up” battery of last trip did not work out, I’ve got the two newly-located units on the charger. It’s now mid-morning and you’ll get lots of photos today. Another early start got the pressure sprayer loaded up and my patience worn thin scraping resin residue off the windshield repair, see addendum. I’m in the yard again, finding all manner of neat things I’ve forgotten over the years.

           Here is a typical battery recharge setup, but two of the units are likely beyond help. The charger has that new-fangled “recondition” setting but it only works when there is some residual charge. The two small batteries have been sitting since 2022. They are sealed. I’ll leave the charger on a few hours to see if they kickstart. This morning was all about small chores like this, I’ve reached a type of plateau.

           Except for a tightness across the chest muscles (not my heart), the rest of me seems to have stabilized, a welcome consistent level all day long. I have a calendar from the hospital that shows January 2027 as the time line for full recover. Did you know, that is also the date by which all cell phones sold in Europe must use the same, improved, user-replaceable battery.
           On-line age filters are usually hacked within 120 seconds of being deployed. The first laws against “surveillance pricing” block only food retailers and delivery outfits. Real estate agents have been doing this for fifty years, the old “leave your name and number” scam, where the price depends on your credit score. No, I don’t feel sorry for stupid people, who may suddenly after all have something to hide, it would seem. BWAAAA-ha-ha-ha-ha . . . . . . . . .
           Earth.com reports a plant-based serum that grows hair. Unfortunately, the hair is green and some folks don’t like the smell of coconuts. Any my taste cells are still wonky. They wear out after less than six or seven bites, up from three or four. The solution is to haul out my old casserole cookbook.

Picture of the day.
Hijacked South African building.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

           Here is a kitchen shelf I slapped together. That is the uninsulated back wall I’ve been getting to for years, and now must put a shelf in the way because, fact is, it may wind up right there for a long time. I’m saying I have no idea how long this could wind up being temporary. The kitchen floor has been a year. So you know I wasn’t snoozing in the shed, I also made this small glue box. See picture around here somewhere, note the pre-laser lettering, GLUE. Kind of a nice touch. These bottles usually get 2/3 empty before going bad, this box keeps them easy to drain because the shape can hold them upside down. It’s a pity this town has so few parties I can devote paragraphs to glue bottles.

           Then again, don’t blame the wrong people for dull times. It wasn’t senior citizens who shut the County Fair down until suppertime. The van is ready for another trip and we have this month’s $60 travel budget, so think of something. The museum cost only a $10 donation and we feast like kings. I returned via Punta Gorda, I’m saying with the right attitude, we could make this trip into mini-adventure, what say you?
           Think about it. Generally the van is ready for two days on the road, so three is nothing if just over to Miami. There has to be something to do more rousing than glue bottles, but hey, I tried to get JZ to play drums twenty years ago. Did you know I can play a forty minute set with just bass and drums? The trick is finding a drummer who can hold it together.

           I required a short siesta, taking half the time to read. One issue I followed is the “right to repair” battle, tractors so packed with software that turning a wrench voids the warranty. Then I see this article about a Canadian company building new units from refurbished Cummins diesel motors. Brilliant, even I have seen those units run forever.
           Taking another look at my south facing roof, I’m again lured by the huge drop in solar panel and installation costs since 2020. I wrote a six-page letter on the topic, centered on the latest “plug-in” style, a.k.a “balcony power”. I’ve not kept up but I know enough that 4/5ths of the new power generated each year is now solar--partially because nobody is building new conventional plants outside of China. The new panels are portable but I’m not planning on moving. They plug into your existing home wiring but cannot be used in a blackout. (Feeding power back into the grid could electrocute repairmen.)
           Where I am most interested is I knew a few years ago that these panels required a microcontroller to interconnect with home wiring—and until I studied microcontrollers personally, I would have been leery of such voltages. Now, I’m comfortable with them, but still suspicious, preferring to let others find out what could go wrong.

           Last for now, a boost to my brain cells, I got up this morning and was able to easily figure the coordinates for some Sight Reduction navigation plots. Mentally flipping the triangle over, then back again once I get both moveable points (the North Pole does not move). Mind you, I can only do this in the northern hemisphere, so you and your yacht in the south seas will have to wait.
           No, I don’t play any Pink Floyd bass lines. They are great, but they came into prominence right at the poorest, brokest, most devastating era of my life. I have picked the riff to “Money”, but found the rest of their material too over-orchestrated for my tastes. It was a musical dead time for me and by the time I picked up the bass again, I had met the Reb and country music was beginning to throw me challenges. Country bass can be simple, but getting the right sound isn’t. Pink Floyd was just never in my repertoire.

ADDENDUM
           I built model airplanes up until maybe ten years old. I did not research and paint them, I just liked building. But only WWII planes, I did not care for later jets or big bombers. One I never cared for was the B29 Superfortress. And today I found a documentary that explained why in terms I never thought of. The thing was a beast, killing more crew than the enemy. It was ordered off the drawing board and the flight manual was written by those who escaped crashes. I was just a kid, but knew the plane was a loser simply from all the hype.

           Now I find out the plane was far worse than all that. The engines, which liked to catch fire, were mounted in magnesium housings, which likes to burn. There were innovations, like pressurized crew cabins, computer controlled turrets (analog), and ground-mapping radar. These would be fine, if this was a prototype. It was not, it was taken almost directly into combat. I laughed at the Chinese bases where the supplies had to be flown over the Himalayas. I learned today it took six flights to ferry enough material to fly one bombing mission.
           I knew as little as most Americans where the island airfields were built, Saipan, Tinian, and Guam. Fact is, I learned more about them from studying navigation some sixty years later.

Last Laugh