Hot and humid, but less so. It got up to 99F in the shade and it was scorching in the sun. Waves of heat coming off the grass in the yard.
Spent the day working on the projects list. Got a bunch of stuff done. Nothing major, but making progress where I can.
Got some new names of contractors to try.
Then we finished up, ate dinner, and had friends over for movies and drinks. Watched “Pixels” and enjoyed it.
Just a few minutes after the movie ended, we, and a bunch of our neighbors lost power.
In our neighborhood, it started on our street, starting with my house… and other places around the lake also went dark, with about 104 subscribers affected.
We were back up in almost exactly one hour from reporting the outage. Of course you need to use the website to report an outage. Good thing my wife’s phone had service without the booster….
A big UPS will be headed up here for the networking and comms. And another big one for the freezer, with backup power moving up the list.
Oh, and a bunch of cheap LED lanterns will be headed up here too. We all have our personal flashlights, and I’ve got a couple of headlamps, so we were good, but a few of the little lanterns that are cheap copies of the Streamlight Siege are very handy. Just don’t drop them.
I’ve realized that my focus has been on getting the place ready as a family vacation spot, and prepping it up has come after that, and slowly. That balance will shift a bit starting this week. If we’re here, we need the same level of backup we have at home, and for the same reasons.
As an aside, the two most useful things I’ve brought up with me are batteries and my jar of miscellanious hardware. I brought a big pack of each type of battery and I’ve been tearing through them. So much stuff uses batteries, and a lot of the tools, remotes, radios, and other things need fresh batteries. I’ve even brought up some eneloops and their charger because I was using so many batteries.
The hardware is all the random screws and nuts I collect while fixing other things, tearing them apart, or stripping them before getting rid of them. I throw all the hardware into a coffee can and when that’s full, I start another. If I have a bunch of similar stuff from one project, I put it in a peanut butter jar and keep it separate. I figured I’d be fixing random things here so I threw one coffee can worth of hardware into a box for use here. I’ve been dumping that out, and sorting through it for replacement parts, screws, and nuts, since I got up here. Crazy useful.
Today’s plan is more work, a quick dip, and head home in the afternoon. It’s been a great weekend despite the challenges but it will be good to be home too.
It’s much easier to stack it up at home… and I still need to. So do you.
nick
The PLTs, Lame Stream Media and NWO protect plugs because, as Mr. SteveF says, he is their sock puppet. It would be fantastic watching Killery Kankles primary him, then lose to tRump again.
Barbara has skipped two days posting. Should we worry?
@JimB, thanks for the heads up, I’ve sent email to her checking. If I don’t get a response, I’ll ping her sister.
n
84F with 74%RH and partly sunny this morning.
The power stayed up for the rest of the night. Haven’t seen anyone to see if there is an explanation.
Used to just be “the joy of living in the country” but urban areas are more at risk now, I think.
Better get some breakfast going for the savages.
n
Oh, and a bunch of cheap LED lanterns will be headed up here too. We all have our personal flashlights, and I’ve got a couple of headlamps, so we were good, but a few of the little lanterns that are cheap copies of the Streamlight Siege are very handy. Just don’t drop them.
I like this 4 D battery LED lantern for $18. I have almost a dozen of them. They are plastic but tough. “Coleman LED Personal Lantern”. I really like the low power setting.
https://www.amazon.com/Coleman-Carabineer-Classic-Personal-Lantern/dp/B00S57J49S?tag=ttgnet-20/
Man , it is already 95 F with 56% (72 F) humidity. ECOT is forecasting a 75,000 MW demand today in Texas.
https://www.ercot.com/
I know that ERCOT has set a new peak this summer, here is the June 12, 2022 notice: “The Electric Reliability Council of Texas’ grid conditions showed that the state saw 75,083 megawatts of demand at 5:20 p.m. Sunday, which is the highest ever.”
https://www.wfaa.com/article/news/local/texas/texas-ercot-largest-demand-ever-electricity-heatwave/287-8fa7f1cd-5362-4edc-9fef-409125b184ff
As the PLTs scream for assault weapons bans, do we even know what long gun Creepy Crimo used?
“Highland Park Fourth of July parade shooting was nation’s 309th this year”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/highland-park-fourth-of-july-parade-shooting-was-nations-309th-this-year/ar-AAZca3X
What the heck is going on ?
Hat tip to:
https://drudgereport.com/
Fundamentally incorrect.
OK24, groomer24.
Long weekend wasted by lack of energy, mental blahs, and heat. Not my usual thing. Better today. Temps are in low 70’s and house cooled down to 60’s with overcast night / light breeze. Phew.
So naturally my plan is to overdo it in a feeble attempt to make up for lost days -cackle-
Watched a bunch of 80’s movie and lazed about while husband and daughter did Independence day stuff.
Oldest doe was due over the weekend. Husband / daughter were doing rabbit duties for me and report no kits though she built a fine nest. I‘ve been putting off freezer camp / rehoming because she’s such a nice beasty. Guess I need to pull on my inner farmer and move her on.
Due for rain later this week. Last weeks rain was an hour of moisture followed by too much hot hot hot.
Didn’t note any fireworks last night. City declined to put on a parade, private parties pulled one together at the eleventh hour. I skipped it but family reports it was nice if small.
Disconnect and widening divides. I’ve got a wide range of beliefs represented in my real life friends. Those voting Democrat are making increasingly sharp remarks and sweeping statements about moral character and mental capacity of those voting republican. How to discuss rationally when their stated belief out the gate is you are a Neanderthal or worse for drawing different conclusions from the observable data?
I do forgive a lot of their words and beliefs because I hope under different media pressure they wouldn’t hold those beliefs. If push came to shove I am not confident the reverse is true. We don’t discuss politics or education or genders or any of the other flash points. Neutral shared interest topics. Our conversations lack their early richness.
There is a fundamental disconnect between who holds responsibility for individual actions and care. I, perhaps like most on this site, hold that self-determination and self-responsibility are the key to freedom and independence. I further believe that God himself gave me the freedom to self-determination, right down to the freedom to make self-destructive choices. One hopes to make God-pleasing choices, in spite of Sin. I fail regularly but keep trying. Being human is hard.
My liberal friends hold the government responsible for those tasks, even the church attending ones. Baffling. How can the government know what is best for me and mine? How can the government, which is at the end of the day simply many individuals equally as flawed as myself, have any clue what my family requires to thrive?
That’s a gap I don’t see getting bridged in my lifetime.
I suggest that your Dem-voting real-life friends are not your friends. They are acquaintances who have not turned on you yet.
Cool. Now do the January 6th protesters. And James O’Keefe. Oh, and Donald Trump.
HAND
They are acquaintances who have not turned on you yet.
– harsh but someone turned in Anne Frank.
The left’s politics are generally “It’s not my fault” and “someone should make them do x”.
I’m seeing it around me too, mostly in relatives on the wife’s side. They CAN’T be so wrong about so many things, yet they see it every day. So they look elsewhere for causes.
Envy drives most of it at the root.
Social media is all about generating envy.
Envy is very easy to turn into righteous anger, which is VERY dangerous to the target.
More food for thought.
n
Headed back to Houston in about 30 minutes. I think my wife and kids will be here long after I’m gone today, for a big change.
I’d like to stay another day, but I’ve got too much to do in town.
Hopefully the traffic won’t be too bad.
n
>> I like this 4 D battery LED lantern for $18. I have almost a dozen of them. They are plastic but tough. “Coleman LED Personal Lantern”. I really like the low power setting.
I try to stick to lights that use AA batteries as I find them a better value as compared to D batteries. Of course, YMMV.
Lots of LED Camping lanterns on the Big River. Here’s one that has USB charging in addition to using 3-AA batteries – here.
And a pile of these mini-flashlight LEDs to go on key rings and belt loops and backpacks is a good idea. 21 of them for $15. (Added: I just ordered a set of 21 – for the grandkids and their backpacks. Probably will wear out before they are really needed, but a fun and cheap ‘gift of spoilage’ from grandparents.)
The best FLASHLIGHT is the one you have with you. The little LED FLASHLIGHT for your key ring are good, as you usually have your key ring with you. Add a couple to your vehicle truck box, bug-out bag, purse, etc.
You can even get a flat FLASHLIGHT here – about credit card size.
@SteveF, @nick
They are acquaintances who have not turned on you yet.
– harsh but someone turned in Anne Frank.
+1000. It has been on my mind throughout the last few years.
Who benefits from the hate and discontent, the covetousness? Certainly not the hoi polloi.
Don’t forget the FLASHLIGHT in your cell phone. I often do, but I usually have real lights.
Reminds me, I wonder how long it takes the built-in light to significantly run down the phone’s battery. Never used mine much, so untested. I saw Tony Maglica, the Mag Instruments (Maglite) guy interviewed on a business show. He claimed that cell phone lights quickly drain the battery of what could turn out to be an essential communication device. His cure? A Maglite, of course! He has always been a good salesman for his products.
Oh yes. In my case, I get a “free” one with every order from Battery Junction. These little wonders seem to last close to forever if not used much. I must have some that are well over ten years old and still bright. As you said, cheap enough that you can sprinkle them around. Oh, and the BJ ones are squeeze-ON and squeeze-OFF, very convenient. Just don’t forget to turn them OFF. I call all of them “squeeze toys.”
I also have a couple with user replaceable batteries that are at least twenty years old. Don’t use them any more, but they still work.
Don’t forget the laundry list of permissions that 3rd party FLASHLIGHT apps often demand. The Principle of Least Privilege should apply – why does a FLASHLIGHT app need access to your email, or messages, or even the phone’s filesystem?
Anything like that is a total no-no for me, even before I worry about battery consumption. And I suffer from powernoia. Not as badly as I used to, when I would carry 26AH or more of external USB battery, but I’m still nervous about it.
My EDC FLASHLIGHT is a single-AA LED one, which lives in the kangaroo pocket of the belt pouch that holds my phone, and Just Works, whenever I (rarely) need it.
G.
My phones (and most, I’d guess) come with a FLASHLIGHT app. You might find it in the Settings area.
And just like any other app icon, you can tap/hold to move a copy of it to your home screen or another screen. I don’t see a need for third-party FLASHLIGHT apps.
My Garmin Tactix 7 has a good FLASHLIGHT. You can even switch it to green for night vision.
Go back a year and many people were ready to turn in the neighbors and coworkers over vaccinations, viewing it as the cost of being able to return to “normal”.
The C suites are still willing provided they get the cover of a mandate from the Feds.
This. +1000
Nothing grew my misanthropy quite like the people calling 911, “Someone just came to my neighbors house and is giving them a haircut in their living room!” Pieces of shit, all.
@rickh:
I’m on Android. And this is supposed to be true since 5.0 Lollipop. It’s certainly the case on 8.1 – swipe down from the top of the screen. Seems to be true for Android 12, too – the icon is there, in the same “swipe down” location, but it doesn’t work. I’ll need to research further.
But powernoia still suggests, “no”.
Edit: Finally got it. Probably still won’t use it, but I’ve learned something.
G.
Barbara posted an entry for July 5th.
from here, and other news sites,
@jenny
Very well put and a view I empathise with. I have come to believe this is the big divide in politics, those who believe you start with self determination, or those who believe in the state solving all problems.
“Last Day on Mars (Chronicle of the Dark Star, 1)” by Kevin Emerson
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0062306723?tag=ttgnet-20
Book number one of a three book young teenage science fiction series. I read the well printed and well bound new trade paperback published by Walden Pond Press in 2018. I have ordered the following two books in the series, the second of which is new and the third of which is used as the new copies are gone.
In the year 2213, mankind has abandoned Earth and moved to Mars and the other planets. The sun started converting into a red dwarf a hundred years ago and is expanding rapidly. Sol has already consumed Mercury, Venus, and Earth and will consume Mars soon. Mankind has rapidly built many 100 million passenger spaceships and is moving to another star system almost 15 light years away. The humans will use stasis pods to make the 150 year dangerous journey. All of the spaceships have left except for one, the Starliner Scorpius.
Thirteen year old Liam and Phoebe are spending their last day on Mars with their parents at the project in the old volcano to convert their new planet into an Earth atmosphere. An marsquake has caused a cave-in of the old volcano walls into the large area being used for the test equipment to terraform the new planet.
My rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Amazon rating: 4.6 out of 5 stars (206 reviews)
whewwwww…..
109F in the sun here at Casa De Nick.
Made it home fine, house is fine, wife and kids are following.
hot hot hot, and no lake to jump into.
n
“FedEx to Stop Using Mainframes, Close All Data Centers By 2024”
https://www.pcmag.com/news/fedex-to-stop-using-mainframes-close-all-data-centers-by-2024
“The company is moving to the cloud and in the process will save $400 million a year.”
I hope it goes well for them.
@Lynn
Did they use ruby slippers or some other form of fantasy transport?
“Oh, Toto, there’s no place like Mars!”
@Nick
Get a couple misting heads for the hose and see if you can squeeze out the last bit of humidity.
“Recoverable oil in downward spiral, report claims”
https://www.offshore-mag.com/business-briefs/article/14279045/recoverable-oil-in-downward-spiral-report-claims
“The volume of global recoverable oil now totals about 1,572 Bbbl, according to Rystad Energy, down almost 9% on the estimate for 2021.”
The peak oilers are alive and well. Even if they have been wrong oh so many times.
Did they use ruby slippers or some other form of fantasy transport?
“Oh, Toto, there’s no place like Mars!”
Necessity makes amazing things happen.
>>I have come to believe this is the big divide in politics, those who believe you start with self determination, or those who believe in the state solving all problems. <<
To put differently, some people believe “Everything happens for a reason — and it’s not my fault!”
Others believe “Shit happens — so what can I do to help?”
*****
I think, and Lynn is welcome to comment, that the tight refining capacity and the time and cost of creating more is a serious problem even if global growth rates shrink to 1-2%. That doesn’t begin to factor in what happens when the other shoe drops on the alternative energy floor.
Hot Skillz!
They probably got a deal from Microsoft.
Server sales to big companies are actually up for the last year. Not everyone is going in that direction.
In re “Shit happens — so what can I do to help?”
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-62050348.amp;
Do without bread baked over a fire? Do without wine and the concomitant CO2 released in its production?
Naw, I’d rather use cyanoacrylate (a petroleum derivative?) and glue myself to a painting. Yeah, that’s going to solve the problem!
First museum that removes the painting, nails the frame and “gluees” to the wall, and charges extra for admission in to the live modern art gallery…
wins.
@Nick
I seem to recall you had some storage tanks with olive oil in them and I ran across these today at a restaurant supply store and I think they might come in handy.
In any event, the composition must be useful for something and the brand name tickles me.
https://www.amazon.com/Fryer-Puck-401304001-Cleaner-Tablets/dp/B009EC76NO?tag=ttgnet-20
https://questspecialty.com/product-specs/40130-Specs-FRYER-PUCK-Fryer-Boil-Out-Tablets.html
I think, and Lynn is welcome to comment, that the tight refining capacity and the time and cost of creating more is a serious problem even if global growth rates shrink to 1-2%. That doesn’t begin to factor in what happens when the other shoe drops on the alternative energy floor.
Refining capacity is not tight at this time. Crude Oil and Natural Gas are tight so their prices are up by a factor of 3X in the last two years.
There have been twenty refineries closed in the USA in the last 10 to 15 years (actually converted to tank farms). There have been two refineries opened in Texas (Port Arthur Motiva) and North Dakota in the last 10 years. I know of at least one 230,000 bbl/day refinery in Houston (LyondellBasell) that is planning on closing on Dec 31, 2023 unless they have an incident between now and then, in which case they will abandon the refinery. Unless they sell it.
Did they use ruby slippers or some other form of fantasy transport?
“Oh, Toto, there’s no place like Mars!”
Actually, I was expecting someone to gig me on Sol becoming a red dwarf and expanding to Earth’s orbit. Red dwarf’s do not expand, it is another type of star that I cannot remember at the moment.
Can you imagine the panic if Sol suddenly starting expanding and encompassed Mercury ? We would go nuts. There would be a thousand nations and companies building space ships like SpaceX’s Starship. We would see them taking off daily and maybe 10% of them would reach Mars at first. And then we would watch people running out of O2 and food on Mars because they did not engineer the you know what out of the situation.
@NaNo
“Go ahead and explain.”
As has said before “Do your own homework.”
If you haven’t figured it out in a week or so and posted an answer, I might post a little something.
@Lynn
Red giant. It is not expected to expand to Earth’s orbit.
We don’t have any real data on the process, but it’s unlikely that the expansion would be orderly in the sense that there wouldn’t be a lot of deadly shiite going on with radiation and particle emission that would be beyond our technological capability to deal with. We don’t even know how to keep astronauts safe from a simple solar flare during a transit from Earth to Mars, and the latter doesn’t have a magnetic field that could shield settlers from good-sized flares, much less a Carrington event.
For the person here that has a “Jackery” solar system, I came across a review of their latest product – the Jackery 2000 with portable solar panels – here.
Seemed interesting.
Red giant. It is not expected to expand to Earth’s orbit.
We don’t have any real data on the process, but it’s unlikely that the expansion would be orderly in the sense that there wouldn’t be a lot of deadly shiite going on with radiation and particle emission that would be beyond our technological capability to deal with. We don’t even know how to keep astronauts safe from a simple solar flare during a transit from Earth to Mars, and the latter doesn’t have a magnetic field that could shield settlers from good-sized flares, much less a Carrington event.
Thanks ! I could not remember Red Giant and my googlefu eluded me.
Do you want to get to Mars from Earth in 45+ weeks or two weeks ? Pournelle and Niven wrote a wonderful documentary on how to build a spaceship with an Orion Drive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)
It is my understanding that the spaceship crew will need a hideout space from any solar flares. I have read a proposal that two to three feet of water will absorb radiation in the amount needed. So, there will need to be hideout space in the middle of the water tank.
BTW, the conversion of Sol to a Red Giant in the book aforementioned was not natural. Somebody else living in the Milky Way did it on purpose. In for a penny, in for a pound for suspension of disbelief.
Niven also has a technique to move the Earth into a more distant orbit, because the Sun WILL start expanding into a red giant in the next billion or so years. In “A World Out of Time”, rammer Jaybee Corbell returns from visiting the center of the galaxy to find the Earth orbiting Jupiter. The humans in the intervening years had developed a massive fusion engine using the atmosphere of Neptune to drive Neptune around like a tug, and successive passes in front of the Earth had slowly dragged the Earth into higher and higher orbits. The physics will be quite simple; it’s the engineering that is way beyond our current ability.
>> I’m on Android. And this is supposed to be true since 5.0 Lollipop. It’s certainly the case on 8.1 – swipe down from the top of the screen. Seems to be true for Android 12, too – the icon is there, in the same “swipe down” location, but it doesn’t work. I’ll need to research further.
But powernoia still suggests, “no”.
Edit: Finally got it. Probably still won’t use it, but I’ve learned something.
On Android 11 (and prior but not sure how far back) there’s a FLASHLIGHT icon in the Quick Settings top pull-down. AFAIK, in vanilla Android (e.g. Pixel phones), there’s no FLASHLIGHT app.
Android 12 has a new feature called At a Glance (AAG) that allows on/off access to the FLASHLIGHT from the Home screen.
Android systems; if you have voice command enabled, “Hey Google, turn on the flashlight” will do it. Or click the microphone in Google Assistant and say “Turn on the flashlight”.
>> The company is moving to the cloud and in the process will save $400 million a year.”
I hope it goes well for them.
Hot Skillz!
They probably got a deal from Microsoft.
Server sales to big companies are actually up for the last year. Not everyone is going in that direction.
I expect some time-critical applications (e.g. Fed Reserve communications, stock exchange trading) will remain on “big iron” for some time to come.
>> As DCD reports, FedEx is going to retire all of its remaining mainframe computers and close its data centers before the end of 2024. Instead, the company will operate solely in the cloud, which parts of its operations already rely on through contracts with Oracle Cloud and Microsoft Azure.
No slice of the FedEx cloud ‘pie’ for AWS – not unexpected.
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/mitchpicasso/2022/07/04/alec-baldwin-threatens-twitter-user-ill-find-you-n1610264
Pray I’m not there too, Alec.
~jim, thanks for the link. It is very hard to get that last bit of olive oil out of the seams….
It’s not clear from a glance if you need heat to use those pucks, but I suppose I could rig something.
I never use my phone as a light. I carry a light for that… my wife uses her phone as a flashlight all the time though.
n
>>It’s not clear from a glance if you need heat to use those pucks, but I suppose I could rig something. <<
Heat would help, I’m sure. Reminds me of an old joke:
Why is flattery like soft soap?
Because it’s 90% lye!
Niven also has a technique to move the Earth into a more distant orbit, because the Sun WILL start expanding into a red giant in the next billion or so years. In “A World Out of Time”, rammer Jaybee Corbell returns from visiting the center of the galaxy to find the Earth orbiting Jupiter. The humans in the intervening years had developed a massive fusion engine using the atmosphere of Neptune to drive Neptune around like a tug, and successive passes in front of the Earth had slowly dragged the Earth into higher and higher orbits. The physics will be quite simple; it’s the engineering that is way beyond our current ability.
“The Wandering Earth” on Netflix.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TDII5IkI3Y
Oh, and I confirmed one thing about the lake, there are crawdads in it, and you can catch them even this late in the season. Now I need to explore that in earnest.
n
>> I never use my phone as a light. I carry a light for that…
Next EDC item and I think I’ll need a Sam Browne.
“Claim: “I led the US lawsuit against big tobacco … Big oil is next””
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/07/05/claim-i-led-the-us-lawsuit-against-big-tobacco-big-oil-is-next/
Get ready for the price of gasoline to double again as the lawyers in the USA all buy new electric Bentleys.
FedEx isn’t that dumb.
The Hot Skillz have shifted from AWS to Hashicorp products which are not tied to a specific vendor.
@nick
crawdads in it, and you can catch them
We used to catch crawdads in the 70’s at Letts Lake in California. We teased the snot out of them with sticks until they fiercely clamped onto the stick. Then we flipped them into the bank and tossed them in a pail. Cooked them over the fire and ate them with lots of butter. I don’t remember them tasting good. The fun was in the teasing and catching
“
Oh, and I confirmed one thing about the lake, there are crawdads in it, and you can catch them even this late in the season. Now I need to explore that in earnest.
”
Mmm. Water cockroaches! If you can keep them for a couple of days in clean water before cooking, it clears out the intestines and gets rid of the muddy taste.
We had great fun in New Zealand “fishing” for freshwater prawns that were being raised in ponds heated with vulcanic warmth.
https://hukaprawnpark.co.nz/
@alan:
Applies also to my Nokia 8.3, which is Android ONE. And the Nokia 7 Plus before it – also Android ONE. One of my requirements for an Android phone is “unskinned”, which immediately removes all Samsungs, and most Chinesium phones from consideration. Including the Xiaomi handsets that are skinned to resemble iOS.
G.