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Month: December 2021

Sat. Dec. 11, 2021 – ahhh, the sweet relaxing weekend is here…

Cool and damp. Maybe rain. Maybe not. Maybe for some people. It certainly threatened all day yesterday, and even got misty in various places for short periods. But it didn’t rain on my parade. Today should be more of the same.

I did a bunch of my stuff yesterday. Made some more slow progress at my client’s house. I was working well, and briskly, but didn’t have enough time on site to finish. My fault as I did other stuff before heading out there.

I think I finally got the port forwarding sorted out so my business partner can do the programming remotely. He sent me a list, I did it. We’ll see if he gets anything done this weekend.

I intend to attend a Christmas party. My non-prepping hobby would normally meet this morning, but we’re getting together at 1pm for our Christmas party instead. We’re having a potluck at the church we’ve been using for meetings as no one really wanted to host the event in their home this year. Given that the membership is also mostly in the prime ‘killed by covid’ demographic, a certain prudence is called for. On the other hand, we’ve been meeting monthly (albeit in a large space) mostly maskless since Feb? and had a regional meeting/swapmeet/tradeshow without incident. LARGE venue though, not shouting in each other’s faces. I think I’ll bring mango cobbler.

I’m on my own as D2 is away on a sleepover weekend, and D1 is with my wife at GS camp doing a backpacking overnight. Weather permitting I’ll get the rest of my holiday decor set up, and the rest of the auction stuff out of the foyer and library, then we can get a tree up and the inside decor set up and it will finally feel like Christmas is coming. I need to pack and send family gifts out too, and inventory what we have for the kids. If there are still any gaps, we don’t have a lot of time to fill them, and my wife told me she hasn’t purchased any big gifts for the girls yet. OH MY. I hope that doesn’t bite us on the @ss. We’ve got gifts, I just don’t know if the balance is good.

‘Cuz I’ve been stacking gifts all year. And I forget what I have. And gifts don’t go on a spreadsheet or out on shelves where I can see them. So it would be a good idea to get them all in one place and see what’s really there. Kinda like my canned goods. Or vac sealed meat. I’ve probably got both more and less of things than I think. And I know I’ve got stuff squirreled away.

Stack all the things. Really. But do a better job of managing the stacks than me.

nick

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Fri. Dec. 10, 2021 – finally Friday! for about the 48th time this year.

Warm. Damp and warm. Who knew? No rain but some very low clouds. Or heavy mist. Well, that was yesterday so I expect today will be like that. Unless it isn’t.

Had a busy day. Got myself and the kids to the dentist. Teeth all cleaned, treated, and apparently rubberized. The last to decrease sensitivity? It sure felt rubbery.

Picked up two lots at different auctions, one of leather crafts stuff, one of needful things.

Went by my local auctioneer, dropped off a couple of things. Talked about the poor sales. He’s going to recycle the unsold stuff one more time. And he doesn’t want any more stuff until he sees if it sells. It could be that his audience just doesn’t want estate stuff, but new and open box stuff. In which case, I’m screwed because I was counting on moving a bunch more stuff through his auction. He did agree to take the TVs from my client’s upgrade.

Went out to my client’s and did the port forwarding. Don’t know yet if it worked, or was correct. Did some more install and working in the rack. Removed some more of the old TVs.

And today will look pretty similar to that. I’ve got a visit to the gub store planned, drop off the TVs, and head out to my client’s.

All the while, hoping that the chinese real estate ponzi doesn’t burn up like a paper tiger soaked in lighter fluid, and bring the rest crashing down. SOMETHING has to be the trigger. China distracting its people from their paper wealth vanishing by getting all nationalistic and militaristic isn’t unthinkable. And real economic woes could easily spread worldwide. It’s always something.

So I stack. And I think you should too.

nick

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Thur. Dec. 9, 2021 – a totally not infamous day.

Cool and humid, but less chance of rain according to the national forecast. Was 64F when I went to bed. Wednesday was mostly overcast, except for a bit in the NW Houston area.

Did some stuff in the morning, sorting ebay, local auction, and stocking stuffers, then headed out. Stopped by my buddy’s store to drop off something he needed. Several people in buying, one actually looking at long gubs on the rack. Then headed out to my client’s house.

Got everything on the network, finally. Found one bad connection and a couple of mis-labeled cat cables. When you’ve got a six foot air gap, it’s safe to say that run isn’t ever going to work…

Partner’s remote access mostly works, but I’ve got to add a couple more ports to the forwarding. That will be later today.

Early today, I’ve got the annual fang polishing. Hopefully no new holes in my head. One tooth is more sensitive than usual, and it’s been an ‘almost an issue’ for a long time. Might be that it’s moved into the ‘has a problem that needs fixing’ category.

Naturally this is the one day in the semester that D1 has to be physically present at school in the morning for a standardized test. (normally mornings at her school are all ‘electives’ and aren’t really classes, so it doesn’t matter if you are absent.) I’ll be shuttling back and forth, but she’ll have to deal with me and my appointments before getting back.

One of my morning stops is my local auctioneer. Time to do some settling up, and talk about the next one. Hope he’s still willing. I don’t think it will be until the new year though. The leftovers and pieces my other auctioneer is running this week are starting to get bids. The vintage lindsey matchbox cars are doing well so far. The pokemon cards (that were never paid for last time) are getting bids too.

It’s mostly smalls, but every bit helps.

So I’m off, gotta see the ‘tooth doctor for kids’* and to make way for stacking all the things.

n

*yes, actual sign on a building by my secondary. How far we’ve fallen, but plenty left to go, after all, we still HAVE pediatric dentists.

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Wed. Dec. 8, 2021 – progress made, finally

Cool and breezy, easy peasy, lemon squeezy…Very cool yesterday after the sun went down. Moderate temps before that. As I drove around there was sun, and there was overcast.

Today should be more of the same on all fronts.

Be careful out there, y’all.

n

(turns out, I can sleep for 4 hours in my office chair.)

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Tues. Dec. 7, 2021 – a Date that Lives in Infamy

Cooler. Breezy. Still damp though. Cool front for a couple of days then possibly warm. Not holding my breath. Yesterday started warm and humid, ended cool and breezy.

I spent the morning and early afternoon hanging new TVs at my client’s house. The new projector didn’t fit on the old mount so I have to work that out. It’s light enough that I can hang it by myself if I have to.

All the new TVs are spy devices. “Google TV”s. Don’t let them near a network. I’m a long time TiVo user, and they collected a lot of info, but only on watched shows. They never had mics listening. And I opted out of as much as I could. It’s truly 1984 when your TV is watching you back.

Spent the evening sorting and cleaning 16 pounds of ‘costume’ jewelry from Goodwill. Lots of nice vintage pieces and even a 925 silver ring, 8g worth. Whoohoo, $5 in silver. Since I paid pennies for that ring, it’s a pretty good return on investment. When you consider the ~$20 I paid for the whole 16 pounds, maybe not. But I didn’t buy it for the metal, I bought it for the vintage. I’ve got a shoebox of nice stuff in baggies headed to the local auction. I’ll bring her the shoebox of bracelets and of necklaces that I didn’t pull out. She’ll go through and see if anything needs to be featured in a single lot, and she’ll lot up a bunch of the rest too. Oh, and a Citizen men’s dress watch that will clean up nicely too. It’s late 70s, early 80s quartz, and has a decent looking band. There is still treasure to be found.

Plan for today, interview for PreCheck. Then client’s house. Working either network, or control, or just continuing with MY issues and video routing. There is plenty of stuff left to do.

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Japan’s sneak attack on the US was probably one of the biggest military blunders in the history of really dumb blunders. Of course that’s looking at it from today. It might have made some kind of sense, the US was divided and demoralized, and disinclined to fight. The Japs thought we couldn’t rebuild the shipping because they couldn’t have. And our style of warfighting was very different from theirs and was hard for them to take seriously.

Lot of parallels to that today. Someone somewhere could be miscalculating at this very moment. The mad mullahs maybe… Just something to think about.

And one more reason to stack it high.

nick

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Mon. Dec. 6, 2021 – I can feel it in the air tonight…

Damp and cool. Possibly sunny, possibly rainy. Possibly both. Although not necessarily in the same place. Weather. Witchdoctors have better prediction skills.

Got some of my stuff done. It was overcast and damp most of the afternoon and evening. I put up a few more decorations but got side tracked looking for one. I hate not being able to find stuff. I was thinking it was in a bin, but after talking through the problem with my passing neighbor, I realized it was in a bucket. And after looking around, I believe I might have taken the bucket to my secondary thinking it was food.

Oh well. Plans. I got ’em. Just don’t get to do them.

Today I’m headed back to my client’s house. I’ve got a buddy joining me to hang the TVs and projector that I don’t like to do alone. If I have time I’ll poke at the networking some more. Otherwise, it’s a short day so I can pick up D2. Maybe we’ll put up some more Christmas decorations together.

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There are some people in the blogosphere that see glimmers of hope for sensible and freedom loving people. I think it doesn’t matter. There is too much momentum built up and this will need to play out. Some small push back here and there isn’t going to ‘right the ship of state.’ The thieves are still in control of government and culture. And the world is bigger than America. Lots of indications that the rest of the world is still going authoritarian and jackboot.

All that will mean even more violence, even more disruption, even more extremism. It’ll be a good time to hunker down for a while, pull in, and save what you can. Put the ‘conserve’ in ‘conservative.’

And stack it. Stack it high and deep. (and don’t forget the rat poison.)

nick

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Sun. Dec. 5, 2021 – maybe I can do some outdoor stuff

Possible rain. Yesterday was overcast most of the day and then we got a rip roaring gully washer around 4:30 or 5pm. Really came down. Nice and clear air when it was all done though. Killed any thoughts of a second trip to storage though.

I did get one load out of the toy room and foyer. One more today and then maybe tree shopping. I’ll let you all know how that goes.

Turns out that I have some stuff in another local auction. The lady who I did the pokemon cards, and collectible toys through finally relisted stuff that either went unsold, the buyer didn’t pay for, or didn’t make it into the previous auction. I’m hopeful for a good sale.

On ebay I got a low offer for some books, but I did sell a dvd today. At least that proves ebay is showing my stuff to people. They have always penalized me in the past for putting my store on vacation hold. I better get some more stuff listed and take advantage of it.

And I need to put out a whole bunch more rat poison…

I bought all that was in the store last time. That is definitely something to stack…

Stack what you use all the time. Stack stuff you only use infrequently but couldn’t substitute. Stack stuff you put off buying until you need it. Get spares for critical stuff.

If you see it, buy it. Stack it high.

nick

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Fri. Dec. 3, 2021 – work work work. While the world burns…

Last day of cool and clear this week, maybe. ‘Cuz they lie. And they’re wrong. It’s been clear but really quite humid for as cool as it is. That isn’t a super comfortable state.

Spent the day at my client’s house working on his upgrade. Felt like I really made some progress, but there is a bunch more to do, and some of it involves more Ubiquiti UniFi stuff. I will get to that last, I think. And I’ll be back over there next week as well.

Puppy is doing fine. Eating, running around the back yard, sniffing frantically. There was some sort of stinky wildlife skulking around last night. Zeus was very excited, and he got to bark at a cat! Made the cone of shame more tolerable, I’m sure.

Home Depot had several green leafy vegetables in pots for planting when I stopped in two days ago. It must be still fall planting season down here. Not much dirt for the raised beds, but at least most of a pallet in bags of the kind I like. I think I’ll try to get a few more bags this weekend. I didn’t see ANY seeds and the whole display was missing. Could be they were cleaning up and changing out that area, or it could be that they sold out. If you want a garden this year, you might want to secure some seeds, bug killer, fertilizer, and whatever else you need. Stock up early and avoid the rush.

Might go look at a lake house this weekend. The house looks nice, the part of the lake is less developed, and it’s difficult to get to the property. All good things in my book. Septic, propane, city power, and water. There must be a reason that part of the lake is under developed though, and I think it’s because the lake is very shallow there. My wife will be checking the lake depth chart today. 5 ft is ok, 1 ft of depth is not. Inflation continues to eat away at our savings. Buying a white elephant property would too, but they call it “real” estate for a reason.

I am trying to get to Costco today, but I’ve got other things to do before heading to my client’s place. I got more of an item that is a steady seller for me. Not huge profit, but every sale counts. I also got some stuff for a future lake house in another auction. It’s either a great score, or there is something I couldn’t see in the photos. I’ll find out later today.

The doddering old fool in the Whitehouse continues to decline. He can’t help but make up stuff, and he’s as incoherent as ever. If it weren’t our country and our lives on the line, it would be funny. As it is, it’s just a harbinger of bad times ahead.

So get to stacking. Because they are coming.

nick

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Thur. Dec. 2, 2021 – snip!

Cool and clear, warming with sun. Like yesterday, and possibly tomorrow.

Really nice day yesterday, so I was too busy to enjoy it.

My storage unit was in fact broken into. A tenant cut the lock on several units and poked around inside. That was my industrial stuff unit, so nothing was missing that I noticed. Met the manager and had an interesting chat. He got red-pilled by the Trump campaign and presidency, moved here from NYFC because he felt like ‘all my freedoms were being taken away.’ Yup.

Eventually made it out to my client’s house and did a couple of hours work there. Wife eventually returned from her training. Got home, made dinner…. normal domestic bliss. These are the good old days.

Today, my wife is taking the dog to be neutered. He’ll be wearing the cone of shame for a few days. I’ll be back out at my client’s house, trying to make a bunch of progress.

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I’m definitely getting the feeling that I’m barely keeping the lights on here lately. It’s hard though, as I don’t want to keep repeating myself. We’ve beaten the beginning prepping to death, we can’t do anything about 95% of the B.S. we’re constantly being bombarded with, and just talking about it increasingly feels like ‘bread and circuses’. It’s a distraction from the ongoing collapse. On the flip side, we also have to continue living our lives as if there will be a tomorrow, because that is the smart way to bet, for all of recorded history. SOMETIMES it ends up being snake eyes, but most of the time, the future is like the past only moreso.

On the gripping hand, we know that ‘what can’t continue, won’t’ and that the center can not hold. So we prep.

The holy-days are coming, or if you are like me, and you just practice the secular aspects, the Holidays! Make plans to enjoy them in whatever way best suits you. Find your joy where you can.

Stack it high, especially the joy.

n

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