Hot again, with a chance of rain. It was crazy hot in the sun yesterday. I took my time, and went inside to cool down for an hour after working for a while. It was nice when the sun went down. Today should be the same if it doesn’t rain here. Houston had rain, areas around here had rain, but we didn’t get any and might not today either.
I got a late start, but I attacked several of the tree issues. I used a rope saw (chainsaw blade in the middle of two ropes) to cut down the huge dead branch of the tree closest to the house. It’s been worrying me for 2 years. It came down WAY too easy. Spent the rest of the day cutting that up and doing some trimming and cutting in other trees around the house. I got most of the ‘widow makers’ down, but there are couple hanging on, but not over the stairs to the yard.
I used the lawn mower with a trailer to move the logs and branches. Stacked some, burned a lot. Threw about a third of the “dry stuff” burn pile on the fire too. Big pile of coals, and there will be bushels of ash. Maybe I’ll add the ash to the garden plot. Can’t hurt, right?
Today I’ll do my wrap up in the morning and try to be homeward bound by noon or earlier. I’ve got pickups in Houston at 2pm. Wife will work remotely, then head home with the kids when she’s done. Starlink is working out well for her. I’d stay if it wasn’t for the pickups. One of the lots was 500 count of needful things, and several of the lots will be good additions to the BOL.
Chatted with my buddy and he’s continuing to pick and pack the purple hull peas. I think he said we were up to 17 quarts and they still have blooms, so we’ll get more. The experience is eye opening wrt the amount of space a real food garden takes without a lot of tricks. I’ll have to put some more thought into our fall garden. It would be nice to have something grow besides peas. (he loves them)
I think I need to buy some fresher seeds too.
There’s always something, and many of the things have steep learning curves. Hunting, fishing, and gardening are among the steepest, and considering the importance of food, it’s past time to start climbing the curve if you aren’t already on it. Since I suck at all three, I’ll keep stacking food.
Stack some for you and your dependents…
nick
Well, I’ve been hunting off and on for around 35 years, mostly “on” in the last 20, and I think I am starting to figure it out…
Internet is magic. I needed a Picatinny rail for an odd gub that a friend has (a Browning “European”). Ten minutes with the ducks and I found a company in Italy that makes that specific item. Two emails later and I have a pricelist and a rail on order. Magic! I don’t know how we lived without it in the olden days…
Anyway, these look like good stuff…
https://www.contessascopemounts.com
About Bowdlerising Forsyth:
Did Tom Clancy give permission for deleting the “how to build a boosted fission bomb” part of The Sum of all Fears? I recall reading it when the book came out, but it is missing from later editions.
Check out the big brain on Brad!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxekqhrjxCM
He’s the Real Live Tony Stark. He doesn’t need an environmental impact statement if he’s advancing humanity to the stars.
Bernie was literally paid off to go away. The Dems arranged for him to have use of a very nice lake house and Mrs. Bernie’s potential legal troubles from her vaunted stint running Burlington College got swept under the rug.
Which reminds me – we had to watch Nexstar local news the other night due to baseball, and the anchors and reporters in the national wire stories must have received new talking points to refer to the First Lady as “Dr. Jill Biden”.
Continuously. Every other sentence.
Dunno if that is just Nexstar or the entire state media.
Nexstar is 100% held by institutions, complete with 10% held by Vanguard, 3% in VTSMX. No retail.
In 2020, Rush Limbaugh would joke that Bernie was looking for a jet to go away again.
Maybe it wasn’t a joke.
IIRC, Limbaugh was recommending Bernie hold out for a G-IV or whatever the military designation is on that model.
I can’t imagine that flying under the radar. Just about all of the Clancy books were huge mass market paperbacks in the US and a lot of libraries across the fruited plain have donated first edition hardcovers.
I doubt it would have happened while Clancy was still alive, and “Sum of All Fears” is from the period when he was still huge.
Unfortunately, I got rid of my stash of Clancy hardcovers in one move or another. I stopped reading him the moment I hit the “Minister Sausage” line in “Bear and the Dragon”.
Clancy became such a perv after the divorce that even the NFL didn’t want to deal with him as part owner of the Vikings.
And the NFL is home of Robert “Day Spa” Kraft and still waiting for a last hurrah Spurs winning season from Coach Pop to expand into Austin.
Pop, as minority owner, will bring the women and wine to the owners’ box in San Marcos.
Yeah, that was a crappy example.
I have these in AA and AAA that come with a charger. They work fine in remotes and FLs, but I don’t have a high drain thingy to test them in. I switced to these hoping they would have the same non-leaking as Lithiums in the bubble pack.
A/C technician just left. The unit is low on refrigerant (410A). He said it is not uncommon for a unit that age due to leaks and that many times the leak(s) is/are so tiny that it may not be an issue for five years. He added some refrigerant and said to just watch the unit. If I have any more problems the unit will need to be replaced. He stated the cost would be between $8K and $14K depending on the features, such as dual speed, and SEER rating. I think he said 16 SEER is a good number for units in this area.
For now I will live with the unit and see how it goes.
Enelope makes good rechargeable batteries. Made by Panasonic. I got two sets at Costco for not a lot of money several years ago. I use them in my electronic flashes which are really high current devices. Using regular AA Alkaline batteries in the flash recharge time from a maximum flash is on the order of 20 seconds. Recycle time on the Enelopes is about 4 seconds.
Indeed. When I lived on the farm we had ½ acre for a garden. It was easier than most because we had a tractor to till the garden at the start of the season. And a lot of manure to fertilize during the growing season. We grew corn, onions (green and regular), squash, zucchini, cucumgers, radishes, eggplant, watermelon, carrots, and stuff I don’t remember.
My aunt would spend part of the summer and fall canning what we grew. She also purchased flats to augment what we grew. We had hundreds of jars of canned fruit and vegetables. It would last us all winter. This was for four people and I suspect that even a one acre garden would not have been enough space to grow what we consumed.
We also had the advantage of being able to water the garden using water from the field irrigation system. The garden did take a lot of water.
My uncle and aunt lived in the second house of our family farm. After they retired, they had a garden, about an acre in size.
Corn, okra, potatoes, tomatoes, snap beans is what I remember. I’m sure there was more.
I remember helping them plant potatoes, and putting up the sweet corn. There was a period of several weeks where he’d pull the corn, and we’d sit around a table and shuck it, and then blanch it, and then wrap it in Saran wrap, and bag it in freezer bags. We filled a couple of chest freezers just with corn on the cob.
He also raised a steer every year. And they did some canning, but gave away a bunch of fresh veggies to extended family.
We had T-bone steaks and sweet corn a lot. Even in the winter.
We’ve gone through a lot of different composting systems over the years. Everything from piles on the ground (too many weeds), to a fancy drum composter (wet and stinky). Right now I have two homemade composter bins made of spaced wooden slats, but they are (1) too small, and (2) a pain to empty or turn. I hope to replace them by the end of the summer. But…with what?
I have literally never had a system I was totally happy with. It seems to me that we need three spots: new, maturing, and a place to turn one of those into. We have a fair bit of garden waste, so each spot needs a capacity towards a cubic meter (cubic yard).
Anyone have a system they are really happy with?
Back in the early 80’s, I used 5 pallets to create 2 side-by-side bins. Think of a sideways letter E.
Fresh stuff went into one side, and got turned into the second side as it aged.
I can’t say I was happy with it, but it was contained and not too difficult to deal with. Even so, I wanted something better.
Can’t beat if for cheapness, though.
85F and a beautiful sunny day.
Eating bacon and coffee for breakfast. I should have just defrosted a quart of liquid eggs when we got here.
Getting ready to wrap up and head out.
—————-
The other thing about a real garden for food, you aren’t buying seeds at Home Depot in little envelopes, you are buying them in bulk in little paper bags…
n
Forgot to mention that family game night was Settlers of Catan. It was a good game, kept D1 engaged to the end. D2 loves resource accumulation games so she’s always up for it, and the wife and I enjoy the game. It rewards flexibility and adapting to the reality of what you are getting vs what you want.
Not my favorite, but I do like to play occasionally.
n
I am pretty sure that the “how to build a sound moderator” scene has been expunged from late editions of “Without Remorse” too.
Compost. I used some fenceposts and prefabricated wooden fence panels to make a bin about 3m wide, 2m deep and about 1m70 high. Half a panel is hinged onto one of the posts as a “door”.
I just dump everything that comes from garden and kitchen on top, and if I want potting soil, I open the door and shovel some from the bottom of the pile. It produces soil faster than we use it.
It took about five years of adding to the top and never turning until it had really good stuff at the bottom. Zero maintenance so far, though the fence panels will eventually rot out. Repurposed shipping pallets would have done just as well, but they are a bit lower than the panels.
Sooprise! Sooprise!
The Gaslight Is Strong With This One: KJP Says Videos of Biden Struggling Are Republican Deep Fakes
Deep fakes. Sure, don’t believe your lying eyes. Yeah, tRump is a wreck, but plugs? Watching him walk alone shows he is having problems.
Yeh, right. A few hundred videos of the same thing were all faked in exactly the same way. I don’t know how KJP keeps a straight face. Unless she is also a deep fake.
She’s well paid, and playing to a preselected, friendly audience. Any serious journalist, even a Dem, would have called her out, since the videos are obviously real. So, there weren’t any serious journalists in the audience. Only NPCs.
However, she gives people something to hang on to, to support their belief that Biden is a viable candidate.
Needs a different approach, then. Like what was used for the Chunnel, maybe?
@gavin:
The Chunnel was dug through chalk, possibly fractured chalk, but still chalk. Texas coast is probably sand/mud. So a Chunnel-style tunneling machine probably couldn’t keep the water out.
G.
When Sponge Brain loses and she gets fired, she can try for a role in a Brillo Pad commercial.
You may have heard of the musician Memo. Or not. Anyway, he is the Swiss pop singer who recently won the Eurovision Song Contest. He is “nonbinary”, and has been trying to turn Hus popularity into a political movement to officially create a third gender.
Anyway. I trued to post a comment about this on Reddit. Not hostile, but just pointing out that folks may be getting tired of having private kinks shoved in our faces. I put it much more politely than that.
Impossible. Even on the LGBT thread of “unpopular opinion”, the post was promptly banned as hate speech. Talk about a bubble…
Curse of Oak Island: The Next Generation
Beyond the terrain, the ecosystem in the bay is beyond fragile, and the infastructure is not going to be anywhere close to being able to support a major transportation hub.
Long term, Musk will have to cut a deal with Florida to fly Starship passenger service out of the Cape, but he probably doesnt want to deal with DeSantis and will wait for the next occupant of the FL Governor’s Mansion.
DeSantis don’t surf. 🙂
“Why automakers are backtracking on their ambitious EV game plans”
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-automakers-are-backtracking-on-their-ambitious-ev-game-plans-162555455.html
“As summer unfolds with spring in the rear-view mirror, sales staff at car dealerships across the country are clearing out inventory to make way for the new 2025 models coming in the fall.”
“But one car group is still clogging up dealer lots: EVs. The relatively high cost of EVs, range anxiety, and American consumer preference for hybrids are a few factors to blame.”
Time for the old buy one get one free game.
“Given that automakers other than Tesla are selling EVs at a loss, it’s not surprising car manufacturers across the board have been backtracking. Last week, Ford (F) CFO John Lawler said COVID boosted EV sales. But once those buyers and early adopters were accounted for, the broader group of buyers failed to jump in.”
“EV-only startups are especially feeling the pain. California-based Fisker just filed for bankruptcy protection on Tuesday. Its demise follows Lordstown Motors’ filing only a year ago.”
Ain’t nobody jumping in to the EV buying until they become a good deal. EV’s are not a good deal, too much uncertainty and cost.
“Storms, heavy rainfall should be manageable for Houston today and Wednesday”
https://spacecityweather.com/storms-heavy-rainfall-should-be-manageable-for-houston-today-and-wednesday/
Looks like the cyclone is headed into Mexico, not Texas, not Florida.
Reddit is being scraped for AI. LLM for now, and XXX in the future.
I imagine some forums are not being used at all for the models, but going forward they probably have an official (if unstated) policy of no new “bad” content contrary to the progressive line.
This on top of the little mini-fuhrer moderators that already run the place.
Absent significant discounts, a dealer with 2024 EVs on their floorplan now is toast since 2025s are starting to roll out of the factories and the masses are wise to the battery deterioration issue.
Plus, anyone attempting to sell a $60,000 vehicle in the current interest rate environment will have a serious problem, EV or not.
Tesla is too big to fail. That is because I have stock in TSLA. When plugs is re-elected, my TSLA stock will rise thanks to the bailout.
“Scientific” American:
THEY’RE NOT YOUR KIDS! Corey DeAngelis Obliterates Call for Federal Regulation of Homeschooling
The Public School stats sum up what SA should be talking about. The Shite Public School system. Like a Federal plan would fix things. The PLT/Dumbo/DS always used more regulation and $$ to fix something.
The important question is what do *you* drive? Subaru is FUJHY
Regardless, the whole market is NVDA right now.
Where is the quote from Tommy Boy?
You can get a good look at Bankruptcy by sticking your head up an F150 Lightning’s undercarriage, but wouldn’t you rather take the CFO’s word for it?
I did not get all my planned mowing done. I mowed up one side of the driveway. Then I mowed the area between gate and cattle guard, aka, fence line. That’s almost 40 feet. I think the gate is 14 feet wide. At the fence line the enclosed area is about 35 feet wide. It’s an odd triangle shaped area. Then back to the house on the other side of the driveway. I made it about a third of the way and ran out of gas.
Walked down to the shed and toted the gas can to the mower. It tries to run and starves out. The mower, not the gas can.
By now my hair is wet. So I’m past sweating shins stage.
Tomorrow’s little chore will be to clean out the fuel bowl and clear the jet. It’s easy, it’s just the gathering of tools and squatting down. I might check the fuel filter and replace it.
On the plus side, this morning I checked the oil and it was fine. Topped off the gas tank. Gave the rope a couple of pulls to get the oil going. Turned on the gas, rolled 25 feet out of the shed and it started on the first pull. I thought that was cool.
What I have mowed looks ok, like someone lives here ok.
“Turned on the gas”. I added a shutoff valve to the fuel line. I run the mower dry when I’m done mowing.
“Scientific” American on home schooling;
95% of Federal law is unconstitutional.
“The Congress shall have Power To” https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/article-1/#article-1-section-8
AND THAT’S ALL!!!
The Constitution does not have any provision allowing for a federalized police force, so the FBI and the ATF must both be abolished. The Constitution does not give the Federal Government any role in education, so the Department of Education must be abolished. The Constitution does not give the Federal Government any role in health, so HHS and Obamacare and the FDA must be abolished. All those functions that the Federal government must eliminate can, if desired, be devolved to the States, to manage as THEY see fit.
The Constitution does not have any provision allowing FJB to spend money without congressional approval, forgive student loans (another unauthorized area) or ignore federal immigration statutes.
Try ethanol free gas from WalMart and put a little Sea Foam in the can every time you fill it.
The storm will be a non event in Austin looking at the SpagettiModels.com forecast
The big lakes which provide water to the city haven’t been full in two years, and we are entering what is usually the dry part of the year.
Tomorrow is “Juneteenth“, a politically correct woke holiday. Local city officials will use the day to show their face, get votes, and otherwise show they care. When in reality, they don’t.
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2024/06/guest-column-no-horse-sense-at-the-pentagon.php
January 20, 2025
President Trump orders Christine Witworth to muck out the stables.
Home with only spotty rain as I drove thru various parts of the Houston metro area.
Got confused about which auction I was picking up, and went to the wrong one. I’ll be going back tomorrow.
Fell asleep when I sat down to read a bit.
n
The important question is what do *you* drive? Subaru is FUJHY
Regardless, the whole market is NVDA right now.
NVDA = Not Very Double Action ???
Entirely correct. These are clear violations of the Constitution, and are grounds for impeachment – except that the Congress is mostly equally corrupt. And the Supreme Court, which SHOULD be looking at this, is itself tied up in knots.
Nvidia. As in the manufacturer of the H100 chip, the flux capacitor which makes firing white collar workers possible.
Servers with AMD equivalent chips should ship soon.
I was in WinCo today, a rare mid-week & mid-day visit since I happened to be nearby.
And I actually thought while standing in the molasses slow line (self check is gone): “If there is a REAL depression, and real jobs go away, then EBT and SS and AFDC and Disability and Medicare go away as well, so what is everyone here going to do?”
I am in that group…
Dang it, I might have a problem with my garage fridge. Temps seem too warm, but there is ice in the freezer. I’ll check in the morning and see if it’s just in a defrost cycle…
n
Even back in my day, in the early ’70s, the public schools sucked. Just as one example, I remember 6th grade math. One friend and I were good at math, therefore bored out of our minds. We sat in the back and quietly wrote notes back and forth. Give us a challenge, or extra work? Support our interest in math? Nah. She just separated our desks and put a cabinet between us. As I recall, we then started tossing notes over the cabinet, which I’m sure wasn’t disruptive at all.
Thankfully, my parents managed to get me into an academically oriented private school starting in 8th grade. The teachers didn’t have teaching degrees, but generally masters degrees in what they taught.
Since I had started to blow off math in public schools, the private school put me in the “slow” math class. First week, I corrected the teacher for an error he made on the blackboard. I think it was some sort of proof, so not just a silly error. Anyway, he took me out of the class and marched me down the hall – I’m thinking “oh sh!t” – and he dropped me off in the “fast” math class. That’s a lot of insight from a single incident, and typical of the quality of teachers they had. That was a great school.
Anyway, want to fix the public schools? (1) Get the feds out of it – they have no role to play. (2) Ensure teachers have basic competency in the subjects they teach. (3) Put the students into tracks according to ability: slow, average, and fast. (4) Students who refuse to learn and cannot behave get expelled, maybe sent to military-style schools. Oh, and (5) fire at least half of the administrators at local and state level, and use the money to hire more/better teachers.
None of those are politically possible, of course, for all the obvious reasons.
Me either. I’m still moving a bit carefully, after the surgery last Friday. I have to mow, because the wet Spring means the grass is growing like crazy. But just a little bit each day. Interestingly, the pain from the surgery is now mostly in secondary areas. Warning, TMI: Turns out that fixing a hernia involves messing with the nerve and blood supply to the testicle on that side. Which has turned interesting colors and is the source of most of the discomfort. Doc says that’s all normal, and will take the longest to go away.
Brad, at least your doc is honest. I have a friend who had a double hernia repaired. His doc said it would be minor discomfort. My wife and I took him dinner on his first day home. He took a really long time to answer the door, because he could barely move. He was better after a few days, with full recovery eventually. Thankfully, he didn’t share any details.
@JimB: Yeah, sorry if that was TMI. he doc tells me that this discomfort is fairly “minor” compared to a classic operation. “Minor” is relative, of course – I surely didn’t want to move much, and then veeery slowly, the first two days.