Hot later today, but started cool. It was 75F and chilly last night. I’m sure it will be smoking hot and sunny today.
Did my hobby meeting yesterday, and had some good chats with folks. It was well attended and we had a new guy. Nice to see new faces in the hobby. Then I did a bunch of chores and it took a while to get ready to go. I finally got to the BOL around 9pm.
Wife and D2 have been up here with a couple of D2’s friends and have been having a great time in the sun and on the water. Kids are very polite and crazy smart. There is hope for the younger ones.
Today I will try to get a few things done. Swapping out the laundry machine and testing that will be top of the list. Doing some more organizing and putting stuff away is on the list too.
There is always something that needs doing.
Try to get something off your list. It’ll give you more time to stack!
n
77 F and about a million percent humidity here on the west side of the Brazos River. The river is back to a foot deep of recycled pee water.
All of that rain water has gone away but the humidity did not with us being just 30+ miles away from the Gulf of Mexico.
Been awake since 530am. Could not get back to sleep after getting up to pee. The life of an old man. The wife and dog ignored me, both snoring away.
@lpdbw
I live in Manchester and regularly socialise in the city centre. There are very few incidents to be concerned about in Manchester if you don’t go looking for it, and generally it is a very friendly and welcoming place. (I take time to talk with hospitality workers from abroad who without exception are happy living in Manchester; excepting the weather if they come from warmer climates).
I would recommend not looking at the headlines as a guide to how it is living in the UK. (Although many trends I must agree are concerning.)
The spousal unit and I have been talking about taking the train across the south part of Canada. It is a four day trip on the train. Sleeping on the train. Really nice scenery. The cost worked about $14K in US dollars. That was for a premier cabin, basically 1st class. After further research we discovered the bed is just a full size bed, difficult for two people to sleep on that have been married for almost 50 years.
Then there was the problem of multiple delays for freight trains as the freight company owns the tracks. Certainly nice views. The food is rated fairly good. But the delays sometimes minimize the time in the stops. Remember my trips on the German trains, a couple of them 8+ hours, there were long periods of utter boredom. Stretching that to four days might not be such a good thing. And we have to make two one way flights, one to the destination, and one from the arrival point. Those tickets were much more expensive than a single round trip.
We have canned the idea of taking the train trip in favor of another option.
The next trip we have talked about was an Alaskan cruise. I found a trip from Vancouver to Alaska, seven days with multiple stops, and return to Vancouver. I tentatively picked an upper deck cabin with a balcony, the largest room without booking a suite. The cost is about $4K. First class plane tickets from Atlanta to Vancouver is another $3.5K. For slightly more than half the train trip I think the boat trip would be a better option.
We would need to add in the cost of two hotel nights in Vancouver, the night before the cruise, and the night after the cruise, say about $500.00. Round the entire trip cost to $8K versus $14K, a savings of $6K. We would have more space, larger room, scenery probably as good as the cruise included a fjord passage and time to spend time in four different destinations.
My biggest concern is sea sickness. I get it easily. I have heard the neck patches are good and the ship’s doctor actually have some really good medicine to minimize the problem. I have been so seasick that I could barely walk after having puke my guts out and continually dry heaving. It was not at all pleasant.
What is the cost to fly into SeaTac instead?
86F sunny and not as humid as I feared. Nice breeze too.
@ray, my parents enjoyed their AK cruise.
——-
Breakfast and coffee are underway. Then it’s work work work. Kids are having fun…
n
Yawn:
Secret Service APOLOGIZES for Breaking Into Salon to Access Restroom for Kamala Fundraiser (WATCH)
Anybody else would be arrested for B/E. Remember plugsy’s “nobody is above the law?” Except the goobermint. The PLTs need to take a shit…call the SS. I wonder if someone will be sacrificed to save face. They got caught. What a disgrace.
Perhaps a trial short cruise to see if modern medicines work for you? Jamaica or the bahamas for 2 or 3 days. I don’t know if there are cruise up the Maine / Canada way, tho the sea state might be more comparable (stay away from Sable Island).
Everyone these days carries a device in their pocket/purse capable of capturing broadcast quality video and transmitting it anywhere in the world at the press of a button, and that’s not counting the endless varieties of security cams. What used to happen “out of sight, out of mind” isn’t so out of sight anymore.
My wife and her mother just got back from that exact cruise (last week). They really enjoyed it. They paid for a room with a balcony and said it was absolutely worth it. Lots of animal watching/sightings.
Btw, it was a Holland America cruise.
Cabin location can make a difference:
https://freestyletravelers.com/blog/sea-sickness-best-cabins
It is about the same. But then we have to deal with a rental car and transportation to Vancouver. I have made that trip before from Seattle to Vancouver. Dealing with the border agents I felt like I was a criminal, the agent was really looking for something to make his day.
I’m going all in, damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead, if I can manage to speak that while hugging a toilet.
That is what I am doing. The upper deck and the largest room possible without getting a suite, such being way overkill.
The last time we crossed on I-5, the border agent drilled into us about guns after seeing our Florida drivers licenses which were still valid for crossing at the time.
We never went to Canada when we lived up in WA State.
There are several Alaska cruise lines that operate out of Seattle. During the ‘cruise season’, I see them every day between 5-6pm from my living room window which has a small view of the Strait (somewhere opposite Mutiny Bay WA). Some of them are quite large.
I believe the cruise lines have (free?) shuttles from SEATAC to the cruise departure locations. No need for a rental car.
Those cruises go up the ‘inside passage’ to Alaska. The return trip is usually off the west coast of Canada, then into the Strait of Juan de Fuca to Seattle. That happens overnight, so I don’t see the returning ships out on the water, as they arrive back at the Seattle docs in the morning.
My wISP radio blew up early May. Nearby lighting. The same storm zapped the GFCI in the boat shed and the two battery maintainers I had on the tractors.
I need to replace the GFCI. It trips after a couple of seconds. With or without the LED Christmas lights plugged in. The battery chargers were a worry. I’m not worried about the Yanmar. It will outlive the grand children of anyone here. The Mahindra was a worry. It has a Mitsubishi motor and it seems to have more than enough electronics to be a problem in several years..
I just started both tractors. I think I forgot to pull the compression release on the Yanmar and it started, no problem. I don’t remember pulling the release but it’s mostly on automatic for me. The Mahindra started right up too. Neither acted like they had a low battery.
We chose Vancouver because a couple of our friends have done the same cruise. It is no more difficult to get to Vancouver than it is Seattle. The plane ticket prices were within a few dollars for Seattle or Vancouver.
I have a plan for tomorrow.
The truck is loaded with 16 kitchen bags of crushed cans. 98% Miller High Life. Judge if you want. It took a few tries to get the tail gate closed. The Dodge was good for several more bags. 22 I think.
I have five kitchen bags of clothes to take to Goodwill. That will fit in the back seat of the truck. I have a couple of boxes of useful kitchen type stuff. Clutter. Don’t worry, the travel cups with no lids and the multitude of things like Mole sauce mix “juice glasses” have been trashed already.
My plan is to go to Walmart and buy a couple of boxes of k-cup coffee. Goodwill is next door in the old Walmart building. Drop off the clothes and stuff.
Then to the re-cycle place to sell the cans. Cool folks there.
Then to Tractor Supply for dog and cat food. I’ve ordered it, so curbside pick-up. Then home. Perhaps by Noon.
Wife and kids have headed home. It is HOT now… I think I will mow the grass and call it a day. I’m not motivated to start a new project in the next couple of hours.
n
We took the Miller tour in Milwaukee last Fall.
The tour was just restarting a regular schedule at the end of the tourist season last year after being shuttered since 2020 due to Covid. Everyone in the gift shop/tasting room was a new hire, but the guide was a holdover from before the pandemic.
What really sucked for just about all of the tourist attractions in Southern Wisconsin is that, despite relatively nice early Fall weather, the student loan repayments resuming on Nov. 1 cut short what was a really nice recovery season. The tour guide was mystified by the sudden drop in the numbers.
I just finished watching 300. Meh. Rated R for violence. Yeah, whacking off arms and heads with lots of spurting blood does that.
Troy is a better movie.
Anyway. The Persian God/King dude, what the heck. Was that stolen from Stargate? Or did Stargate steal it?
Over The Hedge: It Is Hot
https://www.gocomics.com/overthehedge/2024/08/11
Yes, it is.
Real Clear Politics says that Harris is up by 0.5 percent right.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/
But it says that Trump is ahead in the Electoral Collage with 219 votes, Harris has 208 votes, but there are 111 votes up for grab.
https://www.realclearpolling.com/maps/president/2024/toss-up/electoral-college
Things should get clear after Labor Day which is the usual time for the Presidential Election. But this year seems to have been going 100 mph since Feb 1 or so.
xkcd: Meteor Shower PSA
https://xkcd.com/2970/
I have no desire for a meteor to imprint on me. Nor to return one to orbit.
Explained at:
https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2970:_Meteor_Shower_PSA
https://www.echopress.com/news/charges-filed-against-wendy-and-judd-hoff-in-douglas-county
Mr. Hoff is/was a candidate for the MN House and some signs were repurposed to his campaign.
Words fail.
File under “The Crazy Years”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/people-react-to-theft-of-244-yard-signs-in-alexandria-allegedly-by-political-candidates-wife/ar-AA1oxPcV
History of machete wielding?
Candidate is too toxic for the state party, but the county is all in?
“2008 Video Shows Tim Walz Implying He Suffered PTSD from Afghanistan Deployment”
https://www.infowars.com/posts/2008-video-shows-tim-walz-implying-he-suffered-ptsd-from-afghanistan-deployment/
“Newly resurfaced video from a hearing in 2008 shows Minnesota Governor Tim Walz implying heavily that he suffered PTSD from deployment to Afghanistan as part of Operation Enduring Freedom.”
“Walz was speaking to the family of a Gold Star veteran at the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee on Veterans and Mental Health when he made remarks that suggested he had personal experience of PTSD after serving in Operation Enduring Freedom in 2004 with the National Guard.”
Unfreaking real. This guy is a liar from the getgo.
“Open the pod bay doors HAL”
“I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that”
We’re Entering an AI Price-Fixing Dystopia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lsExRvJTAI
>> What really sucked for just about all of the tourist attractions in Southern Wisconsin is that, despite relatively nice early Fall weather, the student loan repayments resuming on Nov. 1 cut short what was a really nice recovery season. The tour guide was mystified by the sudden drop in the numbers.
https://www.businessinsider.com/save-plan-blocked-cheaper-student-loan-payments-relief-new-ruling-2024-8
Don’t worry…Joe, the Kamel, Big Mike, Mr. Green Jeans, somebody will fix it…or not…
>> “Walz was speaking to the family of a Gold Star veteran at the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee on Veterans and Mental Health when he made remarks that suggested he had personal experience of PTSD after serving in Operation Enduring Freedom in 2004 with the National Guard.”
Unfortunately, Sargent Shriver passed in 2011.
Made it home. Cut the grass, did some other stuff, but I’m headed to bed. More tomorrow…
n