adventures / hobby / photo / Wednesday / woodworking, sorta — Comments Off on No splinters here
11
Aug 21

No splinters here

My lovely bride asked me to make her a computer stand. We settled on a less-is-so-much-more design. So awhile back I trimmed a nice piece of scrap board to the desired dimensions, sanded it to down to 400 grit and, this weekend, she started staining it. Monday I showed you her patent pending dot-dot-stain technique. We put a few coats on Sunday and Monday. Yesterday she attached the legs and put the thing into practice. This is what it looks like this morning.

To personalize the project, I stamped a little love note into part of the board. And now everything is the right height for when she wants to stand up to use that machine in her home office.

I tried standing up in my office office. It just seems silly and boring.

Today, I do my best writing and reading and emailing while sitting. Now, back in my broadcasting days, I did my best work will standing. Maybe I should have a movable desk in a studio set-up.

Or a split level desk! With risers! And wings!

You can see how this could get out of control. (My first desk did.)

I’ve got a list of other projects to attend to and finish, before even drawing up plans on another one. Miles to go before I sleep, and so much sanding to be done, as they say.

Elsewhere, today was quiet. Spreadsheets and email and heat indices well over 100 degrees. The heat is supposed to break tomorrow or Friday. Or maybe by the weekend. Until then, hydrate much, sweat as little as possible.

books / history / Tuesday / video — Comments Off on Not everything here is from the last century
10
Aug 21

Not everything here is from the last century

I’m reading through this book right now. It’s the 1960 version of a long-winded, well written Wikipedia series. Each chapter covers one particular moment, almost all of which can and do have several tomes you can dig up. This book is the city bus tour of the historical period. It’s a great read to get an overview, an easy way to discover a new interest.

The San Francisco earthquake and fire gets 24 pages. And, for me, for that, it was plenty.

I’ve read three of the definitive biographies on Teddy Roosevelt, and two on the Wright Brothers, you see, it’s the subject, not the period. Some things are just more interesting than others. There’s one chapter here about a particular insurance man and his social life. Didn’t do much for me. There’s another on how J.P. Morgan forced the American banking system into avoiding a an economic collapse by force of will. It was intriguing, but you got the gist. Right now I’m reading about Peary’s sixth Arctic expedition. I’d probably enjoy a bit more of that. Here’s a bit from the chapter on the Great White Fleet, and a full telling of this story would probably be worth trying. Roosevelt sent the vessels around the world as a projection of American naval power — 16 battleships, 14,000 sailors on board them and their escort with ports of call on six continents — it was one of the first signals of the American century.

I’ve looked a fair amount. Several accounts refer to these cheers, but no one seems to know where they are from. I Assume some Chilean naval officer went to Cornell and brought all of that back. And when the Americans arrived in January of 1908, that was just part of the fanfare. A surrealistic bit of home for the American sailors who’d been on this mission for a month, making just their third port of call.

I wonder how many of the Americans recognized them. Cornell was a big player in early 20th century athletics, but still there wasn’t a lot of opportunities to Google this sort of thing in 1908.

This is from the same chapter. Walter Lord diverged a bit, which is rare in this book, but his point was what the returning sailors came home to after their historic circumnavigation. It was one of those moments where things were changing quickly in the culture.

If you’ve read about Europe in this period, or the American experience just before entering the Great War, you can see an entire world-shaking bit of foreshadowing going on there. It’s a good book. Written in 1960, when some of these things were frozen in memory, rather than frozen in amber. And while new perspectives and information have no doubt come along in the intervening years — Lord was much closer to his subject than we are to him here — the book holds up. Click on the cover, above, and pick up a copy for yourself.

And if you’re not interested in that …

Here’s a bit of Poseidon, god of water, bathtub mortal.

Achilles had his heel, Poseidon has his back paws, I guess.

I like to think he’s not fascinated by the water, but by the physics of the water’s retention and movement.

adventures / Covid-19 / Monday / photo / running / woodworking, sorta — Comments Off on So we let another Monday sneak up on us
09
Aug 21

So we let another Monday sneak up on us

I’m not sure why we let this happen. Again. By now, you’d think, someone would have noticed a pattern. Perhaps they could have gone down to the Office of Naming Things and said something. You probably get brushed off there. They’d send you to the Department of Reorganizing Units of Time. Now, if we know one thing, the humorless people in that office are no help. They’ll let you know straightaway. There’s a sign there that says it takes five business posplexes to get a response back on the paperwork.

The solution then, is obviously to get back to the time machine project. I’m planning on building the next test version in the body of a front-loading clothes dryer.

Unless future me comes back right now to tell me that’s the wrong approach.

…

No future me. So the dryer version it is. I should make some nice progress on it over the next few posplexes.

How was your weekend? Lovely and restful and productive in all of the proper proportions, I’m sure. I had a nice little run on Saturday morning. It was nice until my entire body rebelled. And that’s what you get when you try to run more than a 5K on no fuel. My blood sugar was a bit low, so I walked the last mile. That let me discover some of the largest milkweed plants you’ll ever see.

I wonder if anyone ever just decided to go for it and crack one of those seed pods open, to see what was inside: no tools, no rocks nearby, just hands and derring-do. I’d bet they were sorely disappointed. And their hands were sore.

We picked up the traditional Chick-fil-A lunch, parking right by the front door for the curbside pickup, watching people walking in right by this sign, maskless.

This county went back under a mask mandate last week. I understand, and am sympathetic, to some elements of the current vaccine debate. Because of that, I’m of two minds about the anger. But masks, this is a different category altogether. Masks are effective; they’re no infringement on your rights. You can breathe in them, and we all should know by now that our noses are connected to the respiratory system.

At which point we’re talking about people who, for some reason, want to conflate self-interest and public health. Like there’s a difference.

Went for a nice 25-mile bike this weekend, too. I only just realized that I didn’t take any pictures or videos. Just imagine me falling well behind on a short ride and going much slower than I should.

That was yesterday afternoon. And last night we stained a bit of wood. This is second or third coat, but you can still see The Yankee’s patented dot-dot-stain system.

I’m not sure where that came from, but that’s how she does it. She enjoys staining — now if I can just show her how much fun sanding is! — and has done a lot of the little projects we’ve built around here. I’ll show you what this is later this week.

Because, right now, we must get to the regular Monday check-in on the cats. They’re doing great, as you can tell. Phoebe is enjoying a bit of late evening sun here:

And here she is sleeping. This must be comfortable. She often finds herself wrapped around the arm of the sofa as a part of our evening cuddle.

Upside down is the way to see life, apparently. Poseidon thinks so, anyway.

So rare that the two of them agree on something, it’s worth noting as a universal truth.

And, finally, here’s Poseidon’s latest portrait.

And that’ll do for now. See you tomorrow. It’s only a posplex away!

Did you know that Phoebe and Poseidon have an Instagram account? Phoebe and Poe have an Instagram account. And keep up with me on Twitter. Don’t forget my Instagram. There are also some very interesting On Topic with IU podcasts for you, as well.

Friday / IU / photo / Twitter — Comments Off on They grow on trees
06
Aug 21

They grow on trees

The joke around here is that the maple is nature’s first quitter. They turn and fall and they miss out on weeks of glorious summer. That’s coming and, along with it, the awe of autumn. But that’s later. Today? This is just hurtful, oak tree.

Speaking of trees … We have an apple tree in our backyard. Big enough to duck under; not tall enough to climb. We only just discovered this year that it was an apple tree. Five years here and this is the first time it’s bore fruit. Some sort of green apples, but not bitter like a Granny Smith. I set out, then, to identify the apple variety. There are 27 green apples out there, and isn’t that a delightful thing to learn?

We started plotting what we’d do with a whole tree of apples. So many pies! I was mentally picking out the knife and the cutting board, excited about the prospect, you understand. I figured, without knowing the exact apple, we’d just have to estimate when they were ripe, but that’s OK. Nature is a great teacher and there’s a window for this sort of thing.

I have this nice thin knife and a small glass cutting board and it makes a pleasing sound when you work through a fruit or vegetable. Just add cinnamon and enjoy. I have plans. Had plans.

I just noticed the apples are gone. All of ’em.

Squirrels.

(That’s a recreation.)

They didn’t leave a single apple. Here yesterday, see ya’ next year.

Hungry four-legged smugglers.

Let’s wrap the week up with a few things I put on one of the work accounts. Interesting studies performed by interesting people. A lot of grad students, in this case, which makes it even more fun. Watch them all, so you can stay abreast of the latest in social science research.

And within the next week or so we’ll have even more new research to highlight. But that’s for next week. For now, the weekend!

cycling / site / Thursday / Twitter / video — Comments Off on Faster than Olympians
05
Aug 21

Faster than Olympians

I’d like to tell you about a great adventure on the day, but the truth of it is that there was the office, and then there was enjoying the evening in the backyard, and then enjoying the Olympics into the night.

Two weeks of Olympics following three weeks of Tour de France, mean a lot of televised sports. And the Vuelta a España starts next week. And then you’re into football season. Honestly, being in a safety-first, approach to going to as few places as possible has done wonders for my sports viewing this year.

I’m getting bored with it.

I did update my 404 page today. I noticed, to my great chagrin, that there was a broken link in my missing page. That’s mortifying. Better that I found it myself, rather than someone pointing it out. The error had been there for an embarrassingly long time. I can only assume that means that people don’t run across the 404 page that often.

But isn’t that exciting? I tested links! I moved tables! I saved and refreshed and changed some language!

That is a full on Thursday!

I wanted to share this amazing track event we discovered this evening. It is, in fact, from a few nights ago. Perhaps we missed it, or maybe NBC, burdened by time zone problems covering the Olympics half a world away, couldn’t figure out where to show what’s being called “the greatest race ever” many hours later. I wanted to share it, but NBC has limited where their programming can be shared, and where their pre-rolls can run. It’s a business model, I guess.

Here’s a video you can see on my humble little site. I did the math, we’re going faster than the world record hurdlers. We had better gearing, and fewer hurdles.

It was to be a 90-minute ride. Before we’d gotten through the second neighborhood on the route The Yankee had a problem with her aerobars. She got that resolved, and it allowed her to go faster. So, before we’d gotten through the third neighborhood on the route she dropped me.

Just as I caught back up to her, some 15 miles later, we called it just a bit early, right about the time I shot that video. Sometimes, catching back on feels like the greatest race ever.

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