Hot. Yup. Hot and humid. Although we have a forecast that puts us on the edge of some possible storms for the next few days, that usually means we won’t get any rain. We could use some, both to break the hot streak and to water the world…
It was only 94F in the late afternoon, so I cut the grass.
You know it’s hot when 94F is a welcome respite, that allows you to get some work done outside. Of course, I lived in the Phoenix area for 4 years, and it was hot, really hot, but the humidity is lower and that makes a huge difference. When it’s 110F and the humidity rises to 30% from 3%, it’s MISERABLE. We used to know that Fall had arrived when the nighttime temps were finally below 100F. I’ve got some experience living in hot areas… and 20 years in Houston too. Still, this year has been hot.
That is kind of amazing to me, the “20 years in Houston” part. Time flies when you are having fun. And life is what happens to you while you are waiting for something else.
Don’t wait. If I’d kept up my practice, I would have a couple of decades of martial arts study under my belt. If I’d spent just an hour a week, I would be fluent in at least one other language, maybe two. There are many other skills and growth opportunities that I didn’t keep up, and suddenly it’s 20 years later.
I did start preparing to live a robust and resilient life, no matter what happened, and without much help from outside. And I’m years along that path. That, in its various aspects has been a motivating and organizing factor in my day to day life for years. It’s only intensified as time went on and the things we prepped for have happened. I’ve seen earthquakes, riots, terror attacks, fires, floods, hurricanes, financial troubles, personal injury, pandemic, government overreach, urban decay, inflation, social decay, crime, and many other things worth preparing for happen- some more than once. Whatever else happens, we’ll likely see some of those come back again.
You don’t have to devote your life to it, or change your lifestyle significantly. You do need to start, and continue to work at it. Over time, you will build the buffer, the resources, the resiliency, that prepping aspires to. You will have the peace of mind of knowing that you have taken control of what aspects of your life you can control, provided yourself and your family with options, choices, alternatives, and a path forward, even if horrible things happen. Even if ORDINARY things happen.
We still have time. The resources are out there and they are available. There are even bargains to be had, if you are alert and ready. You can improve your situation. You can make a difference in your future. But if you don’t start the journey, you will never get to the destination.
———————————–
Today I’ve got pickups, and shopping to do. I am trying to get a load of stuff to one of my auctioneers, and if not, then I need to sort and bin stuff for another guy that I’ve bought from but not sold through. He’s looking for consignments, and I have stuff to sell. I need to sort it, so that it’s stuff that will sell in his auction, and stuff I don’t need to make a bunch of money on, because he doesn’t get the big money buyers.
I’m also picking up stuff for my non-prepping hobby and our upcoming swapmeet/convention/tradeshow in late August. I can’t keep trying to sell the same old stuff, I need some new stuff. I think I found something that will sell and I got it at a good price. I do need to do a bit of custom work to show it’s potential though. I also need to start going through my stuff and deciding what I really have a chance of selling. It would be nice to see the stuff again before unloading the bins at my tables…
This week should be me catching up on the stuff I didn’t get done last time I had a week at home. We’ll see if that happens.
There is prepping and stacking to do too. It’s hurricane season after all, and the Gulf is warm. We should get at least one big storm this year. That’s in addition to ongoing preparation for our slide into economic collapse. There is always bad stuff out there, coming down the pike. There is the good stuff that happens too. So.
Be of stout heart, but stack some stuff.
nick
Labor Day “gas shortage”.
A Clear Channel/I Heart Radio production in coordination with Faux News, brought to you by GasBuddy.com.
Don’t laugh. That’s exactly what Central Texas had in 2017.
The big blowtorch station in San Antonio got people so stirred up that the state later released figures showing Labor Day Weekend gas sales at 50x the normal volume for the holiday.
Buc-ee’s made out that year because they had plenty of everything but gas. This year, however, on the day after July 4th, they were essentially out of most soft drinks.
My wife and I have a theory about why Buc-ee’s, particularly that location in New Braunfels, was out of fountain soft drinks, but we had never seen that before.
My SIL and I watched the Women’s Soccer the other night and will do so again this Wednesday. His daughter, my granddaughter, played on a girl’s AYSO team 15 years ago with one of the players on the USA team. We know her as we attended those games.
84F this morning, but sunny so it will rise…
As I must- to start my day.
n
added- never hit submit, been up for a while…
PHot. Yup. Hot and humid. Although we have a forecast that puts us on the edge of some possible storms for the next few days, that usually means we won’t get any rain. We could use some, both to break the hot streak and to water the world…
It was only 94F in the late afternoon, so I cut the grass.
It was 82 F when I got home at 6pm yesterday. It was 100 F when I left my parents home then it poured on me at Ganado, Texas. It was raining so hard that the traffic on I-69 actually slowed down to 60 mph from its normal 80+ mph. We went for a walk early and reveled in the spring like weather.
If you didn’t have that connection, you would have watched something else.
The cold front stalled parallel with San Antonio yesterday. Austin was dry all weekend except brief rain on Saturday.
Water restrictions are starting to get tough in Fancy Lad places drawing on the big lakes.
The cold front stalled parallel with San Antonio yesterday.
Was it an actual cold front or was it a cool front with water in it ? Whatever it was, it was huge and had torrential rain in it for Ganado.
Not MSNBC!
I’ll watch many individual sports, like tennis or judo or track-and-field. Men or women, doesn’t matter – it’s nice to see what an individual can achieve.
I generally don’t enjoy watching team sports, men or women. Boring…
If we simply divided based on “Junk” and “No Junk”, my bet is that not 1% of T
Trans-women would get trimmed.
“These places near Houston will be underwater by 2050, study says”
https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/texas-cities-houston-sea-level-18257463.php
“Portions of Galveston will be below sea level as waters rise due to climate change, according to a new interactive map design.”
Yup, this is a fear article.
“Memes that made me laugh 169”
https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2023/07/memes-that-made-me-laugh-169.html
They are all good this week. Especially the piper.
@CowboyStu: How was Kennedy Meadows itself? My calendar is finally cleared up enough to consider some car camping.
September at Indian Wells sounds attractive, though not much better than August, TBH.
But it ain’t Borrego Springs hot.
SWMBO kept us up late last night to watch the final episodes of “The Americans.” Excellent series, well done ending with a few surprises. A couple of loose ends that would have been nice to wrap up. Didn’t know until now that Rhys and Russell have been in a relationship since 2014.
Now to find something else to watch…
@EdH: For years, from 70’s until Covid shut downs, we have camped in July or August, in Fish Creek and Kennedy Meadows Campgrounds and just loved it. Went to the Kennedy Meadows General Store for meals and live music when they had Cowboy Day.
However, this year we went up just for lunch on Sat. June 10, and it was totally different. Dozens of Pacific Trail back packers stopped for lunch as they were going up north. Waited 1 ½ hours for our burgers, not enjoyable and we never saw that in July or August. Then we heard that the south bound hikers filled up the place in September. But we always loved it when not flooded over. Grandchildren loved playing in the Ken River South Fork.
We just spent an hour or more at Indian Wells Brewery to meet and talk with JimB. Next trip up we would like to stop around noon at The Joint in Randsburg and hope that you and Jim can meet us there.
We always got to Borrego Springs on Thanksgiving and Easter weekends…..never too hot.
No one here should be short on rice…
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12331565/Indias-rice-export-ban-triggers-panic-buying-supermarkets-sparking-costs-20-pound-bag-soar-16-50.html
And we grow the stuff in Texas.
n
Wow, an old bar on the road to my house was just turned into a muslim mosque. Shows the changing of my area.
North Texas got slightly cooler. Lubbock. Maybe Dallas.
“Coffee with Scott Adams, July 24, 2023″
“Is the American incompetence crisis caused by women dominating policy?”
“If that didn’t wake you up, bring coffee.”
https://scottadams.locals.com/post/4330492/coffee-with-scott-adams-july-24-2023
Scott Adams gets further and further out there.
He has got Dilbert in jail in Romania with the Tate brothers right now on the daily strip that he emails to us.
Basmati grows in Texas?
We buy Thai Jasmine. The last time I topped off the bins, a 25 lb bag was $37.
“Here’s why Windows PCs are only going to get more annoying”
https://www.zdnet.com/article/heres-why-windows-pcs-are-only-going-to-get-more-annoying/
“As the PC market slows and Microsoft’s Windows income stream declines, the company is looking for fresh revenue in all the usual places. The pitches are going to get more persistent.”
“”Increasingly, Microsoft is treating Windows as a giant billboard where it can promote and cross-sell other products. Don’t believe me? Here’s Nadella’s summary of the initiative in the memo titled “Microsoft’s Growth Strategy: Plan of Record”:”
Well, that sucks. Gonna be 90% advertising and 10% usefulness.
I saw this strategy in the “Ready Player One” movie.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1677720/
“Amazon is getting ready to launch a lot of broadband satellites”
https://arstechnica.com/space/2023/07/amazon-is-getting-ready-to-launch-a-lot-of-broadband-satellites/
“Amazon unveils satellite facility in Florida, may switch prototype launch to Atlas V.”
“Within a few years, Amazon hopes to be building and launching up to 80 satellites per month to populate the company’s Kuiper constellation, a $10 billion network that is similar to fleets already operated by SpaceX and OneWeb providing Internet connectivity around the world.”
Why ?
Why ?
–dick measuring.
n
India only stopped NON basmati exports.
n
Remember when I had issues with handbrake ripping dvds with audio sync problems? The answer seems to be to run it again, using the FILE copy, and be sure “sync AV” is chosen. That creates a new file and the audio is synced.
Has worked on a bunch of files so far.
n
Anyone got a preference for turning MP3 files into a CD playable in a normal CDplayer?
Greg Norton says:
In San Antonio yesterday afternoon, we got a “trace” of rain; enough to wet the ground, but not enough to measure in my rain gauge. The temperature fell from 101F to 83F, and for just a few moments, it was quite pleasant outside. But today, we’re back to 98.
I buy Riceland rice.
I tried the HEB rice, I forget if it was Hill Country Fare or HEB. Made it a couple of times and threw the rest into the trash. It had a strange taste, not “old” and it was well within Sell By date. Might have been an off batch but ya know, life isn’t all about buying the lowest priced product.
HEB Pasta? Never a problem. Skinner brand might be better but not by much if at all.
Then you have something like canned Cream of Mushroom soup. Campbell’s, always. The various store brands I’ve tried are saltier and watered down.
No clue over here. The van can play mp3 files from a CD. So can the truck and the truck has a port for a USB stick so that’s what I use. Yeah, it’s a 32GB stick and not half full, I run it on shuffle, works for me.
My Mom use to have a CD playing boombox in her car. She liked it.
iTunes for Windows might still have that functionality, including the burning part.
ImgBurn *might* have the capability. I haven’t done that in a while.
The CDs will only sound as good as the MP3 compression setting allows. All of the “unnecessary” components of the music were removed in the compression to MP3.
>> “These places near Houston will be underwater by 2050, study says”
I put a reminder in my calendar to check on this 27 years from today.
my hearing isn’t good enough to hear much difference between any of the digital algorithms, especially in the noisy environment of the car. This is an audiobook, 10 hours long, so it will probably be easier to find a way to keep them in mp3 format.
FWIW, the easiest way to hear the degradation mp3 adds is in cymbol crashes. They sound terrible as mp3s.
n
>> Why?
Doubleheader in the Octagon
Tony vs Zuck
Winner vs Jeff
Anyone got a preference for turning MP3 files into a CD playable in a normal CDplayer?
I use FreeRIP to convert audio CDs into MP3s for a thumb drive for my truck which does not have a CD player. FreeRIP says that it can convert MP3s to an audio CD but I have no reason to try it.
https://www.freerip.com/
Obama’s kill their chef:
Barack Obama’s chef Tafari Campbell drowns in paddle boarding accident near $12m Martha’s Vineyard home of ‘heartbroken’ ex-president
LOL, just kidding. It was Killary.
At least it wasn’t at the tidal pool at the Hawaii estate. Barry and Moochelle can continue to recreate the scene from the opening credits of “Magnum PI” nightly.
Now try to erase that image from your mind.
“Robin’s Nest Hawaii” takes you to the estate in Google Maps, but the images haven’t been updated since the wrecking crews demolished most of the buildings. Of course, that could be intentional.
Looking at the images, it looks like Magnum’s guest house was spared. The main house and the building which stood in for Rick’s club are definitely gone, however.
The estate must be really out of the way for it not to have become a tourist attraction. The “Dallas” house still packs ’em in daily up in Parker, TX.
The estate must be really out of the way for it not to have become a tourist attraction. The “Dallas” house still packs ’em in daily up in Parker, TX.
No, not that out of the way. Kailua on east shore of Oahu. 30 years ago we rented a vacation home that was next to M PI house. It was very tightly fenced, even on the ocean side, with heavy vegetation. Hard to see any of it. Didn’t look well kept. Lots of old big stone houses over there at that time.
>> Anyone got a preference for turning MP3 files into a CD playable in a normal CDplayer?
IIRC I used to use Nero Burning ROM. Looks to be still around but not free, except maybe in ‘torrent land.’
I probably still have the install CD somewhere in my long-term storage. Milk crates FTW.
I should have nero somewhere. I don’t throw that stuff out.
n
The house was old and the interiors were shot at the CBS stage which they built for “Hawaii 5-0”.
“Magnum PI” started as a way to keep the stage busy after “5-0” was cancelled and Jack Lord’s follow up pilot didn’t sell.
Still TV history. The last time we were at the “Dallas” house, the series had just been sold into Bangladesh and Cambodia for the first time, and that was 2017!
We were the only Americans on the tour. Most of the rest of our group were German.
For the most part, “Dallas” only used the exteriors of that house, but certain scenes were shot inside when the producers were concerned about history. 50% of “The Shower” scene was in the master bath, and the real main stairwell was in the reboot as the lobby of the Mexican hotel where the PI found “JR’s” body in the first episode shot after Larry Hagman died.
“JR’s” grave is also out back.
The real kitchen is pure “Southern Living” circa 1976. My mother had the same cabinets, appliances, and lighting in our Florida house.
USA Debt Clock
https://www.usdebtclock.org/
Round and round she goes, where she stops, nobody knows…
Two in the news this week. Here’s one.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-12333141/Tori-Kelly-rushed-hospital-COLLAPSING-dinner-shes-treated-potentially-life-threatening-blood-clots.html
n
>> Well, that sucks. Gonna be 90% advertising and 10% usefulness.
We’re already on the road there with Tiles, “Make Edge your default browser” nags, etc. But until they take away RegEdit and fully lock down “your” PC, there will still be people out there working on work-arounds, menu replacement programs, etc. that will satisfy the needs of the advanced users.
Of course, @lynn could be working on a fully Win 11 compatible open-source OS that will put M$ out of business 😉