Well, it might be wet today. Or not. National forecast says ‘clear’ but Houston has been saying ‘some clouds and looks like rain’ when I look at the sky. Either way, I’ve got stuff to do. It was very nice yesterday despite some clouds. Shirt sleeves comfortable all day and into the evening. It was a bit cool and overcast in the morning, but I’ll take that to get gorgeous afternoons.
I slept in, then went and did pickups. Chatted with my consignment auctioneer but they still don’t want my stuff. I’m going to have to find another seller. Oh well. Then I headed to my shop to unload the lathe. It went without incident, and nothing even sketchy or pucker inducing. Just slow and steady.
It’s on the concrete in the shop and now I can move it around. I got a chance to see the motor nameplate and it is 3 phase. That means running a VFD or a static phase converter. I’ve got both, and if I was keeping it, I could set it up with the VFD. I might put the static on it to test and sell it if it’s the right capacity. I had a guy want to buy it off the truck but his english wasn’t good enough. I gave him my number and told him to text. Hopefully he’ll get some help with the language…
I then spend a couple of hours breaking down scrap. I got about half way through the remaining pile. I’ll be back over there today if it’s nice out. Another month’s rent on my storage unit is due on the 1st, and I REALLY want to be out of there. I need to make more room at the shop though. That’s job one today and Monday.
There is always more to do.
Always room for improvement.
Not always room for more stacks. Do it anyway.
nick
Sunday. Good morning! The clocks went forward in the night, and gremlins stole an hour of my sleep. Grr. Daylight savings nonsense.
Back at base after Iceland and BOL. Buddy sent me photos of our Biltong. It looks very good. I hope some of it survives until I can get back to the BOL for a taste test!
W1 informed me that the Easter holidays will include replacing/repairing her mother’s garden pond, the rubber liner of which has developed a hole. A nasty, wet, slippery, smelly job.
I indicated extreme reluctance, as that is well within my “get a profesional to do it ” category, but I suspect the wimmenfolk will insist, so I will be spending some time today gathering tools and supplies for the job.
I know from the past that my in-laws have woefully inadequate equipment for DIY activities at their place. I have already stashed a toolbox of my own there for electrical and general household DIY, but I will need to bring my own gardening gear and clothes for this. Grr.
I suppose I am storing up treasure in heaven by helping the elderly and infirm. I just hope it doesn’t result in an injury or infirmity for me…
Irish people use “plug out” too. Perfectly normal, if you ask me!
Weird is “unloosen”, like Joe Pie, a YouTube machinist in Austin, TX, says for the opposite of “tighten”.
Paul, it’s not that strange to quasi-understand German if you had some exposure to it as an infant. English is anyway about half angelsächsisch, a Germanic dialect, and about half Norman French, with a few words robbed from Greek, Latin and every other language for good measure.
It is not so very long ago that German was the second, or even first, language of many people in the US, especially the Midwest.
An Australian friend of mine told me that his immigrant missionary grandparents lived in a completely German-speaking community. English replaced German there only upon the outbreak of WW I; they hid the Gothic script schoolbooks and Bibles in the attics. Even the Battenbergs became Mountbattens.
That guy was a trained agent just like Jill Biden is a doctor.
You could do such a calamitously bad job that they don’t have you help anymore.
Or you could simply say No.
54 F and clear. Mr. Fusion is trying to come up and heat us up to 85 F. It will probably happen.
I did not get my corn fritters yesterday since the we had a birthday party for the wife yesterday. She has been around the sun 68 times now. We are getting old.
Coffee is good, real good. I had to make it this morning as the wife forgot.
The blue bonnets were still blooming at Home Depot in Austin yesterday.
Just be carefull about stopping for pictures on the highway outside Brenham. Rattlesnakes like to hide in the flowers.
The trip to Texas has now been scheduled for April 16th departure in the afternoon to Atlanta for the night, arriving Bryan on the 17th of April. Then from Atlanta to Bryan, about 12 hours, without stops, probably 14 hours with stops. Should be able to drive from Atlanta to Bryan with just one stop for gas with half a tank left on arrival.
I will probably use the BlueCruise some in the light traffic areas. The seat massage will probably help some in the long stretches.
We have another problem. There is $250K+ left from the MIL inheritance. Wife was the sole beneficiary with verbal instructions to split it with her brother. The instructions included saving that money to pay for the BIL healthcare. We will follow those instructions. Legally we don’t have to, morally we are obligated.
The BIL’s wife does not know about the money. Do we now tell her? I think it will affect the choice of a care facility. They don’t have a lot of money and without the extra funds would probably be relegated to a poverty level facility. With the funds there is enough for several years of a higher quality facility. We also fear the BIL’s wife would spend the money as she did with the $67K they got when the MIL died.
We could give the money to the oldest son, a very responsible person whom we trust. But he would have to tell his mother, again for the decision on a care facility. Giving it to that oldest son gets us out of the loop. Part of the verbal instructions was that the BIL’s wife was to not have any of the money. If the BIL dies before the money is used, what is left is to go to the BIL’s four children.
Certainly I think the BIL’s wife is going to be pissed that we hid the money. We were following verbal instructions from the MIL, something which I think takes priority.
The certificate matures in September. I am thinking we tell the BIL’s oldest son on the trip and provide him with instructions. I also think we should tell the BIL’s wife the money is available. I think that may reduce some stress and most certainly affect decisions on the choice of a care facility.
Regardless, I think this trip will result in some surprises, some resentment, and some anger.
And I am rambling again.
Sometimes there are no good solutions, just do the best you can do, then let it be.
Family & Money are often like that, unfortunately.
I was going to grocery shop, arose at 6am local, but might pass on that.
Not much that I need that can’t be bought at the little local market, milk and a weeks worth of fruit.
There will be a markup over the big supermarket, but a 25 miles round trip behind the truck’s hemi has its own extra cost.
Pflugerville is dominated by Colonist tastes these days so Gunther’s is long gone.
The irony is that the Colonist restaurants which dominate the area are expensive and not very good.
House of cards collapses
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/03/28/shock-new-evidence-showing-no-link-between-co2-and-temperature-over-last-three-million-years-stumps-net-zero-activists/
Turns out Arrhenius was not a climate scientist, and the claim that CO2 is the controller of global temperature is charitably a mistake or a myth, but more accurately an intentional falsehood designed to increase government control, oppress people, and inhibit the economy of the United States.
Here we are in our 70’s and still having to deal with stuff like this. I wonder if my kids will have the “right stuff” to handle these kinds of affairs. We Boomers were raised right and also raised ourselves right. We have the Right Stuff.
Excerpt from a Mark Childers post on X:
and some commentary on why the U. S. Is not motivated to move quickly reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2026/03/how_math_can_kill_you.html
Missing, at least from a superficial reading, is any mention of the Democrat (don’t argue it was Demented FJB’s idea) r*pe of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in a futile effort to buy votes, and the refusal of Dems to authorize refilling when oil was $30-40 a barrel. Having a full SPR able to release oil to damp the price increase in the U.S. would have been nice for American families, but we know that the Dems have been working to destroy families for decades.
@Ray Thompson
Sounds like your BIL’s wife is a piece of work and possibly a piece of another kind, and your MIL gave you instructions with that well in mind. You already know what to do. Her anger is her own problem. Minimize her ability to act spitefully and harm the well-being of your BIL or the sibling relationship. Best wishes to all.
@ray, I have a vague idea that there are limited use trusts, or accounts, so that you could lock the money to only be used for medical purposes, like the tuition funds. Or, depending on her sophistication, you could just tell her that. Let the son manage her and the money.
There will almost certainly be animosity and outrage and anger. Prepare yourself.
———-
72F currently and the damp breeze has a slight edge to it. 77F in the sun. Clear blue sky, so I’m at least as good a weatherman as the TV guys- I got it wrong but I don’t care.
Eggs and bacon in my belly, coffee in my mug.
Body is stiff and has some tweaked points in my back but it’s not debilitating. I’ll probably head to the shop soonish.
n
I wouldn’t say that the SPR release to buy votes was futile four years ago. Raphael Warnock won a full six year term in Georgia, and, for several years, the Republican majority in the House has been within the four seat pickup DeSantis engineered in Florida with his redistricting plan and beat down of Disney.
Republicans made very little progress in 2022 beyond narrowly winning control of Congress and purging the incumbents who voted for Impeachment in 2021.
Still home. Spent some time researching and ordering stuff for my client. There is a gap in capability and price between “cheap and very optimistically rated” ceiling speakers, and “truly able to handle the power level commercial quality” ceiling speakers.
50w per channel? Lots of cheap choices. 150w per channel? Bose, JBL, and pro level NOT cheap choices.
And if you are ordering out of NYFC, Passover holiday break is a real consideration.
Client went for expensive quality in the room he blew the last set, and cheap name brand for the adjacent bathroom where the installed speakers just don’t sound great anymore. If I’m there, and have the ladder in the room, I might as well swap out the possibly failing speakers, as my day rate is more than the expensive speakers cost.
n
We looked into a trust. There were fees to set it up, yearly fees to manage, and some difficulty in getting access to funds quickly. I am thinking we tell the BIL’s wife about the money, then send the money to the oldest son, with explicit instructions as stated by the MIL, and get the wife and I out of the loop.
The oldest son is a major in the marine reserves, intelligent, and in my opinion can be trusted and would respect the instructions. If he doesn’t that is between him and his respect for his grandmother’s wishes.
As for the BIL’s wife being made at us because we hid the money. Oh well. It would not break my heart to not speak to her again. She was a good thing for the BIL, sort of. She has strange ideas and in my opinion treats her husband poorly. But it is not my marriage or life so not my problem.
John Kass is always worth reading. I think it is time I reread “1984”—I do not remember this passage:
https://johnkassnews.com/the-murder-of-sheridan-gorman-and-the-silencing-of-chicago-media/
The definition of psycopath is based on a study of male examples in prison. It is now being hypothesized that females probably present differently:
https://www.sciencefocus.com/wellbeing/female-psychopaths-difficult-spot
If a gender-dependent definition is developed, will AWFL’s be over-represented?
Jumping ahead, I could formulate inquiries to a LLM that would help me draft the inevitable paper on the LBGT nuances. So little time…
First chapter.
That’s been discussed in the science podcasts I listen to for probably a year. I don’t recall when I first heard “a new study suggests” or when it shifted to “another study confirms the findings”. Also, a number of people or organizations who were looking for content for their daily or weekly podcasts were probably making more of the reported findings than was justified.
I just noticed! That’s supposed to be LGBT! You misacronymed them and that’s hate speech, you hater!
I’m crazy, I know. I have a rug in the living room that is 6×9 feet. It looks nice. Mostly, it makes the stereo sound better. It’s water proof in that Buddy the Beagle pee does not soak through…. actually beads up…. like rain on a freshly waxed car…. to the less than a year old laminate flooring.
Not a fan of his taking a leak or two in the middle of the night. But he almost always goes on the rug. I’ve had puppy pee pads scattered around and well, boy can’t aim and pees on the edge…. so I have a wet pad and a wet floor.
Yeah. I know some folks would say “take him to the pound”. Nope. I like him. He makes me laugh.
Anyway. The rug is supposed to be machine washable. I have no clue if the owner of the laundromat would object to me stuffing this rug into the big German front load washing machine. Mostly, I figure the agitation would break the rug’s backing enough so it leaks pee. Which would be worse than no rug.
I’m going to hang the rug over the bridge railing and hose it down, some morning real soon, on a breezy sunny day. And vacuum the living room and damp mop the flooring.
It cleans and looks nice again? Great. If not, Big River is having a Big Spring Sale. I had a different color of this rug in my wishlist. $89. Then $79. Today “on sale” for $68. Dude!
Current rug cleans up nice, I keep using it. If not, I can roll it up, put it on the side deck and lay down a clean and pretty rug for company.
Plans. I got a few.
LGBT should just be GB. Think about it.
Lesbians are Gay females. Guys are just Gay. That’s the G. B for Bi, ah, whatever. Half Gay.
T for Trans? F*** them weirdos.
Hateful? Oh, perhaps. A bit.
And no. I don’t have a problem if you want to dress up like a woman. Halloween forever! But the whole “I’m a male and think I’m female” is mental illness.
I found an odd behavior of the comment editor. I was going to respond to one of the above comments (maybe later) but !Squirrel!
I highlighted a line of text from an earlier comment and then dragged it to the editor window. I did not see the usual flashing cursor. Hmm. Deleted the line of text. Copy/pasted the line of text; flashing cursor. Deleted the line, drag-n-dropped again, no cursor. Clear the line of text, copy/pasted again, flashing cursor. Obviously the comment editor handles the two methods differently, I’m just obsessed with trivialities today.
NB Firefox 115.33.0esr on Windows 7
My expert opinion is ff is the problem. I’ve had this happen on win7 and 11 and now on Mint.
It’s not just this site.
A lion would never drink and drive. But a Tiger Wood.
(Don’t forget to tip the waiter.)
@ Gavin- I’ll add it to the mental list of comment editor oddities. It’s doing a LOT of parsing and selective replacing and formatting and it’s all pretty opaque to me. I haven’t gone looking for docs on the plug in, because life…
It also interacts with the tool that lets us edit comments after submitting, and with your browser’s “text box” behaviors (one of which is the spell checker).
It used to do something weird with a right click in FFox, but that seems normal now.
It’s a pretty tall house of cards and I don’t want to poke at it too hard as it mostly works.
Especially after I found the list of keywords that automatically sh!tcanned any comment containing them. I think that was the problem with comments that never appeared, as that issue stopped after I cleared the list.
There are a lot of moving parts.
n
That one line sums up so much of my various technical experiences.
Boo! Move fast! Break things!
Haha…
–minimum wage laws. You asked for it, now you’re gonna get it. Good and hard.
n
Thieves with Sweet Tooth Steal 12 Tons of KitKat Bars
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/jeff-charles/2026/03/29/thieves-steal-12-tons-of-kitkat-bars-before-easter-n2673595
I hear Harry Chapin working on a new song…
Break things!
– they seem to break themselves without my input.
n
I’m beat. G’nite all.
n
I want a maximum wage law instead, limiting all executives’ compensation in all forms to no more than 20x the lowest paid employee. Tax everything above that at increasingly punishing rates, ie 20 to 25 times, 25 % more tax, 25 to 50 times, 50 % more tax and so on.