Cool, dry and a light breeze. Sunny later. I hope.
Yesterday was a perfect weather day. Really nice. I hope today is too.
I summarized our experience of Halloween in Houston in comments last night, but for completeness sake- it was good. Not as busy as previous years, but we still got beggars, and we sent ours our foraging too. Fewer people in the neighborhood giving out treats, but at least one couple is both sick and elderly so I can’t really blame them at all.
I was so busy I didn’t have time to even look at the moon through binos, but I did notice when the bright full moon rose. I wish I’d had a bit of time to at least look.
I really hope that doesn’t become a mantra – ” I just wish I’d had more time…”
I saved a bit of time and got deliveries from HEB and Costco. Fridges are full up again and that is good. Instacart makes it convenient. You’ll save time and exposure but won’t save any money. Still, sometimes that’s the tradeoff you need to make.
Bacon, sirloin, and hamburger added to the stack. Bread added to the stack. Milk and cream added to the stack. Other stuff too. Time is FLYING by. Do what you can in the time remaining. Keep working on your own stack.
nick
And more importantly, how many of them will be fraudulent ?
https://www.lifezette.com/2020/10/florida-officials-uncover-massive-election-fraud-scheme-to-register-dozens-of-dead-dems-as-voters/
What? Broward? The Sun-Sentinel reporting? Again?
I’m shocked! Shocked!
We had a fairly busy Halloween, but it could have been much busier. The greed train of German grocery getters from the neighborhoods in North Austin, rolling along the bigger roads in our development, never made it down our street.
HEB was stripped bare of candy when I went on an emergency run on our way back from getting dinner.
Sam’s Club run yesterday. Paper goods in short supply, but most other items were available in good quantities. TP? Again?
Awesome!
We (ok, the boy) gave out candy. We didn’t have the normal amount, but did have a good turnout – probably 30 to 40 kids in all. He wore a mask and just handed out candy like any other year.
+1,000,000 Ms. Jenny.
I won’t use the Paul Henreid line again today. I’ll go with Dr. Pournelle’s, “Well, soooprise!”
Tyler Durden cowardice.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/nearly-50-arrested-blm-protesters-seattle-are-white-other-cities
“It’s hard to believe. We don’t know Jake like that. It’s not the kind of boy he is,” said Little. “He’s not a troublemaker. Not normally. He doesn’t go out looking for trouble.”
That line doesn’t really surprise me having lived among that mentality for four years. If it was my kid, he’d have to figure out his public defender situation for himself.
Our first Halloween in the Indian country home.
I was told they take it seriously here and they were right. The police put a car at one end of our U shaped neighborhood to make it a one way circuit to keep the little goblins safe. I dressed in my Dread Pirate Roberts costume from my old SCA days to interact with the kids, my favorite part. I had a little spiel I gave the kids about joining my crew, and was surprised at the number of kids who wanted tosign on. I had a full size scarecrow with a pumpkin head who minded the bucket of sweets. I introduced him thus. “This `ears me mate, he’s Pumpkin Pete; he minds the barrel full of sweets; he tells me that there’re good to eat; but they’ll make you fat and rot your teeth; so be nice to Pumpkin Pete”. Then I would ask something special of each kid, usually comments on their costumes.
We had at least 300 kids from 6 to 9 when I shut it down. The vast majority were very polite
– I had decorated the yard with scarecrows and skeletons on hay bales to make it multi dimensional. I had a couple of large inflatables and used the old bluetooth controlled LED spotlights from Christmas to illuminate it all. I replaced the outside house lights with the LED torch effect bulbs. The one thing I neglected was a light to illuminate the street so I could see the approaching groups. In our old house we had a nearby street light for that.
@Harold
What a marvelous Halloween! I love that you made it fresh for each kid.
SCA – cool beans! It’s been a lot of years but I miss heavy fighting in the 1990’s in SCA. I sucked but it was tremendous fun. I hung onto my helm and whenever I start misremembering the quality of my fighting I trace my fingers over the -many- dents. I miss resurrection wars, comparing bruises, hanging out with the guys. West / Mists and Oertha. I miss Bardic a lot. I don’t miss the retarded politicking (seriously pretend king in a pretend kingdom and folks are politicking? Gargh!!!)
SCA led me to Alaska. Quid Non came to the Mists for several events, including Crown. A group of us got to know them and they invited us to come visit Oertha. I took them up on the offer and wound up staying. California was getting pretty bad even then (early 90’s) while the possibilities seemed endless in Alaska. It was an easy decision from a mundane perspective.
@Harold, that is awesome! I used several of the blutooth lights to good effect inside the Candy Conveyor, and behind it on the porch.
I put one of the cheap copies of the flame effect LED bulb in a big plastic pumpkin. It’s funny that the chinese bulbs have even cheaper copies…. The good one, ~$13 is way better than the cheaper ones.
I thought about putting those bulbs in tiki torches, but never got to it.
n
@Jenny – a girlfriend got me into the SCA in the bay area in the 70s. I completely agree about the play politics being taken so seriously. Wild times at Blackpoint with some really wild people. I started to take the costuming and language seriously and traveled to the UK for research. Never got into the fighing much, was more interested in being a rogue. Former girlfriend moved into SCA management and now runs the SF Dickens Fair (not SCA)
If this video hasn’t been altered, there is something seriously wrong with Joe. (and his speechwriters for choosing such an awkward phrasing) it looks like he slurs there, and can’t say ‘elected’ properly.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/10/wth-joe-biden-tells-voters-dont-need-get-elected-video/
One more log on the fire.
n
I thought about putting those bulbs in tiki torches, but never got to it.
The former owner of our house was a wedding planner, and she left her stash of wrought iron tiki torches back behind our shed. I tried wiring a couple with the solar-powered “lids” with flicker effect bulbs from a cheap line of Chinese knockoff torches, but the lids had zero durability and were done in about six months.
Still, it looked cool for a while. The only piece missing was a piece of PVC cut to the length of the fuel canister and inserted into the torch under the bulb.
And I still have the stash of torches. Another project for the pile.
I put out a bowl of “help yourself” candy at 5:00pm. By 8:30 only one group had come by with 4 children so I brought it in. I didn’t expect much so I didn’t buy much. I also bought what I like so it’s Kit-Kats and peanut butter cups for me for the next week. yum.
On a completely different subject. I had wired one outlet on the main living floor to the inverter on my solar panel and battery system. That outlet is only an extension cord away from the fridge so its easy to keep it running during a power outage. I also have a few other items and a lamp plugged in there. Free electricity. Well, the old curly-cue fluorescent bulb in the lamp has been getting dimmer and dimmer** for the last month so I replaced it with an LED. That was a problem, it kept randomly flickering. I’ll keep the story short: the power output from my inverter varies by about 1 to 1.5 volts. The LED bulb is of a “dimmable” variety. Putting in a “non-dimmable” bulb solves the problem. The circuity of the bulb must be reacting to even a tiny drop in voltage (1V out of 120V).
**Remember when bulbs went out with drama? There was a flash, an audible “pop”, and then darkness. A slowly fading bulb lacks closure. I feel cheated.
Wife went all out on solar tiki torches this summer
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rLaKVfTmACfcKE2Pnfukg5_sBhWMW7dR/view?usp=sharing
Actually I like them and the flicker effect is realistic. Have both large and small ones and they’ve held up well even under the intense sun here. These were about $10 each for the larger ones. In the summer they ran all night, now with shorter days the go out before dawn.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/nearly-50-arrested-blm-protesters-seattle-are-white-other-cities
“It’s hard to believe. We don’t know Jake like that. It’s not the kind of boy he is,” said Little. “He’s not a troublemaker. Not normally. He doesn’t go out looking for trouble.”
That line doesn’t really surprise me having lived among that mentality for four years. If it was my kid, he’d have to figure out his public defender situation for himself.
There are going to be a lot of legal problems added to the rioters if we do not go straight to a civil war. Many of them already have legal issues from continuing bad decisions, beating up women and minor robberies.
“Ten Recent Wins for Gun Owners”
https://gunowners.org/na10222020/
“Victory #1. President Trump nominated and confirmed two (soon to be three) pro-Second Amendment Supreme Court Justices and over 200 pro-Second Amendment Federal and Circuit court judges.”
“Victory #2. President Trump recently renewed his promise to sign Concealed Carry Reciprocity if Congress put such a bill on his desk.”
Yup, yup, yup.
**Remember when bulbs went out with drama? There was a flash, an audible “pop”, and then darkness. A slowly fading bulb lacks closure. I feel cheated.
The last LED bulb failure that I had started cycling on and off and on and off. This is apparently the new behavior for LED bulbs when they are failing.
There are going to be a lot of legal problems added to the rioters if we do not go straight to a civil war. Many of them already have legal issues from continuing bad decisions, beating up women and minor robberies.
It won’t go as far as a hot civil war. The low intensity nonsense will continue, but open warfare would cut into streaming time for Baby Yoda.
The fringe preppers who are quietly divvying up areas of the country as their zones of control as “Warlords” need to be monitored and arrested under the RICO act just the same as BLM or Antifa.
Hey! I’ve already got my dibs on Indian country. Hands off.
I’ll just start a Dread Pirate Roberts dynasty here.
What’s the underlying charge that you propose? Making plans in case society collapses?
”
The last LED bulb failure that I had started cycling on and off and on and off.”
–I believe that happens when a capacitor in the oscillator circuit fails. It’s common in big arrays, like for parking lot lights.
n
Ah, SCA days. I was never hugely involved, but spent a good bit of time on the fringes. My group was more into RPGs, but I had friends who were seriously into the SCA (I knew the the local King, gee, wow).
Elder son is into LARPing, which seems to have succeeded the SCA, at least here. It’s the fighting and the costume making, but none of the politics. There’s just a group of people who get together every couple of weeks to beat each other up with foam weapons. And the weapons – wow, they have come a long ways. No more rattan sticks: the swords and spears actually look like swords and spears. Stiff foam over some sort of hard core.
– – – – –
So: three more days until we see some election results. No clue what will happen. Biden is a senile creep, and would be a puppet run by…somebody. Meanwhile Trump is a Dunning-Kruger buffoon who surrounds himself with yes-men to avoid hearing contrary opinions – but he’s certainly not a puppet. What a choice to have to make.
FWIW, I would vote for Trump. But choosing the lesser evil is not a great way to select a President.
I tried to buy some sweatpants on Amazon. What I wanted to pay was all out of stock or in bright red or purple. No to the red and no to the bright almost neon purple.
Off to Wal-Mart. What do you know? Fruit of the Loom sweatpants for $7.44 a pair. Some of the comments said they were “thin” which is what I want. I have some thick sweatpants that put “sweat” in the name.
The local Wal-Mart hasn’t had sweats for a few years. Or sweaters. I don’t know why. It does get cold enough for a few months to want more than mesh nylon shorts.
Free shipping and FedEx is supposed to toss over the fence on Friday…. because pushing a button to open the gate is too hard.
Given he has not gotten us into any foriegn wars and is working hard against the Pentagon to bring our troops home, he’d get my vote on that alone. Not to mention his successes in the middle east and ending our dependency on China. So many positives.
The prospects of a Harris presidency is easily enough for me to vote against.
I’ve had one LED bulb fail.
I have a circuit in the living room that flashes. It did the same with the previous dimmable LED floods. I suppose the dimmer isn’t happy with a 27 watt load. I should swap one out for a 75 watt incandescent to check that before replacing the dimmer.
The other circuit is fine. Same model dimmer but with 6 bulbs.
Nick’s Halloween decorations looked great!
Foam? Back in my day, we used hand forged iron and steel and lots of training to prevent fatalities. Wimps.
“need to be monitored and arrested”
What’s the underlying charge that you propose? Making plans in case society collapses?
Monitored .Arrested if they’re breaking laws, just like BLM or Antifa.
Fringe is fringe. Warlords. Seriously?
That’s how I see it.
Oh, and if Joe knows how to “fix everything” how did he suddenly figure this out after 47 years on the public’s teat? That he says “we’re taking your guns and raising taxes” is not winning me to his side.
Kamala is just, no, no way would I ever vote for that whiny HS sophomore cheerleader that sounds like like she’s defending pulling a train with the football team. Yeah, poor un-happy hooker.
The last LED bulb failure that I had started cycling on and off and on and off.”
–I believe that happens when a capacitor in the oscillator circuit fails. It’s common in big arrays, like for parking lot lights.
n
I had it occur in a 10 watt outside LED bulb with a medium base.
I find it funny that in his latest commercials here, on “defeating” covid, 4 of the 5 things he lists as to-do, have already been done by the current administration, just the news hasn’t covered it so people don’t know.
I’ve had one LED bulb fail.
I’ve had about 5 or 6 LED bulbs fail so far. Of course, I’ve got about a hundred of them between the new used house and the commercial property. I’ve had so many CFL’s fail that it is easily over a hundred. I don’t think that I have any CFLs left. But I do have about 20 or 30 four foot fluorescents.
None of my five 150 watt LED fixtures have failed yet. I’ve got four more 150 watt and four more 200 watt fixtures to install at the warehouse soon. Maybe this week. I have to rent a boom lift for $300/day so it is a pain.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B083TTBRQF/?tag=ttgnet-20
“15 Space Opera Books for Firefly Fans”
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/sci-fi-fantasy/missing-firefly-15-space-opera-novels-to-help-you-find-serenity/
I have read “Downbelow Station”, “Shards of Honor”, “Ancillary Justice”, “Coming Home”, and “Ringworld”. 5 out of 15.
No high school football team would touch her after Willie dipped his wick.
I find it funny that in his latest commercials here, on “defeating” covid, 4 of the 5 things he lists as to-do, have already been done by the current administration, just the news hasn’t covered it so people don’t know.
What? Plagiarism? Not Joe.
32 years ago, I walked into my Business Comm. class lecture on the topic of plagiarism, and I’ll give you one guess as to whose face was on the first slide the prof put on the overhead, a blurry reprint of a newspaper article — maybe even the Times — from the year before.
The press used to be more even handed. I’ll never forget the look on John Cancellor’s face the night after they caught Gary Hart. Pure glee.
“Nick’s Halloween decorations looked great! ”
—Thanks! I’ll add that it is only PART of what I had out… I didn’t post any of the pirate stuff, or the cutesy stuff for the kiddies…
n
If he was on the team, they would.
HS locker room stuff was really bizarre. That I hit puberty a year or so later than the rest didn’t help. Run around and get stinky sweaty and then you get five minutes to take a shower. Because the shower system was on a timer. Woe unto those who “come to attention” just by taking off their clothes.
Yeah, how does that work? Is it a potty training thing? Anyway. I used plenty of paper towels wet from a sink faucet. Late to next class? Flunk me, talk to the coach about the 5 minutes shower timer, I don’t care, but I don’t stink. More than usual.
I pretty much hated HS. The last two years were almost a total waste of time but for a couple of classes.
I pretty much hated HS. The last two years were almost a total waste of time but for a couple of classes.
“Freaks and Geeks” gets 80s high school correct.
My high school Physics teacher openly predicted to anyone who would listen that I wouldn’t finish college.
Really? Do tell.
I don’t know what “Freaks and Geeks” is. But “Bi-Centennial Seniors” I got that. I did go to college because “they” decided I must. So I did.
Then I had my motorcycle wreck.
Flying through the air, cracking my helmet, four pins in thigh bone almost into the socket and after most of a month in the hospital, almost a year on crutches. Addles your brain it does.
Meh. It seems to have worked out. Other than my stupid leg aching almost all of the time. Then again, the Doc said 50/50 if he can save my leg. I have a leg, I almost never limp. Can’t tell the weather….. 🙂
I don’t know what “Freaks and Geeks” is. But “Bi-Centennial Seniors” I got that. I did go to college because “they” decided I must. So I did.
If you went to high school in the very late 70s through mid-80s, find a way to watch “Freaks and Geeks”.
I can’t believe the show’s only season was 21 years ago.
“Biden: ‘Nothing to’ Hunter Biden Laptop Story, ‘My Son’s an Honorable Man’”
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/10/30/biden-nothing-to-hunter-laptop-story-my-sons-an-honorable-man/
“Biden responded, “By the way, there’s nothing to any of that, nothing to any of that. It’s all a smear. Every major outfit, every serious investigator has pointed out that this is a smear. This is classic Trump. We have four days left, and all of a sudden, there’s a laptop. And you may recall, there’s also talk about, four months before, there was a similar thing that somebody had, allegedly. There’s overwhelming evidence that — from the intelligence community that the Russians are engaged. I mean, look, this is — my son’s an honorable man. And all the investigations that were done around the issue of what was going on in Ukraine, if you noticed, every one of the major people who worked for Trump, during the impeachment, went under oath, and under oath said, [Joe] Biden did his job. No law was broken. … Hunter Biden broke no laws.””
Wow, Biden definitely has dementia.
Hat tip to:
https://thelibertydaily.com/
Wow, Biden definitely has dementia.
No, Biden has to say those things and maintain the charade. Keeping his son out of an orange suit is the #1 reason he’s been in this race and acting as figurehead.
He’s a gaff riot, a real gaff a minute guy. It’s been a meme for decades but suddenly he’s Presidential material. He being next in line probably kept Barraraak alive FFS. That seemed to be Dan Quail’s only job…
Spent the afternoon taking some of the Halloween stuff back to storage, then picked up a nice marine battery charger system at an auction. Then it was home to put my repaired drain snake machine to work. Yup, it’s November so it’s time to snake the drains. It worked well, cleared the drain, and after the next time I think the cost will be equal to the two rentals. Of course it will be a big savings in time as I won’t have made 4 round trips to Home Depot. It didn’t take all that long and wasn’t any more obnoxious than doing it with the rental unit. I got the pressure washer fired up and cleaned the part of the driveway that was getting the overflow spill. I didn’t quite get done, so I’ll have that on my list tomorrow.
Then it was dinner time. My wife made curried butter chicken in the Instapot. It was very tasty over rice with canned peas.
I haven’t turned back all the clocks yet. Did one truck and one watch. I will do a few more watches tonight. I’ve got a lot of clocks in the house.
added- and I have to look up how to set my G-shock every time. It must have an old table for DST as it didn’t change.
n
I signed up for “spot the station” alerts. It should be fun! Most of them seem to be ~6am.
n
added- and I have to look up how to set my G-shock every time. It must have an old table for DST as it didn’t change.
The G-Shocks set DST automatically? I have an Edifice which requires manual intervention.
I had to implement a Unix time library in the bad old days, back when SGI’s implementation wasn’t thread safe. Congress has done a lot of tinkering with DST since the 70s, and all of the changes have to be taken into account when calculating the seconds since the “epoch”.
A watch setting DST automatically would be cool, but Congress is bound to tinker again.
It’s got a DST on and off menu, so I guess it should work, one whatever day was the day when the watch was new. It’s a G7700 so nice an ‘vintage’. Well, I don’t think vintage applies yet but some people consider it to be old enough to collect. I just know it’s the only watch I have that is for sure waterproof, and if it isn’t, I won’t cry like when I ruined my Rado…
n
It’s got a DST on and off menu, so I guess it should work, one whatever day was the day when the watch was new. It’s a G7700 so nice an ‘vintage’. Well, I don’t think vintage applies yet but some people consider it to be old enough to collect. I just know it’s the only watch I have that is for sure waterproof, and if it isn’t, I won’t cry like when I ruined my Rado…
I wouldn’t take my Edifice scuba diving, but it has gone to waterparks and the beach without incident.
Casio says it is good up to 10 bar (90 m). Call me skeptical. A few feet is the limit of my comfort.
“Trump Dubs Today ‘National Day of Remembrance’ For Americans Who Have Been Murdered By Illegal Immigrants”
https://www.lifezette.com/2020/11/trump-dubs-today-national-day-of-remembrance-for-americans-who-have-been-murdered-by-illegal-immigrants/
Bold move. I am good with it.
It all depends on the phasing of the orbit. They will change from morning to evening at some point.