Raining or not, it’ll be chilly. It was raining when I went to bed. I really hope it dries out today, I’ve got a ton of stuff to move around with the pickup truck. Yesterday stayed grey all nay, with a bit of mist later in the afternoon. It didn’t get much into the 60sF without the sun, and was mid 50sF for most of the day and night.
I did several pickups yesterday, and did a bunch more moving, cleaning, and organizing at home. It’s slow going but it is going. Even something like unboxing the 3d printer and putting it in place doesn’t seem like much, but it means getting the box off the floor, and unlocking the potential of having the dang thing in the first place. No point in spending the money and never using it. Plus, if it was set up, and I was even a little familiar with designing a part and then printing it, I’d have been able to print a mounting plate for the cam I hung last week.
The original metal mounting plate got separated from the cam and disappeared. I ended up drilling holes in the cam body and running screws directly through it and into the house soffit. Not ideal for a couple of reasons. Printing a plate probably wouldn’t have taken as long as figuring out where to drill, getting set up, and actually drilling into the camera. AND it wouldn’t have risked the guts of the camera. Custom one-off manufacturing is the perfect use for a 3d printer.
Anyhow, today I’ll do a couple of pickups, mainly the inverter generator, and at least one run to my shop. You’ll notice I didn’t get the truck to the mechanic yet… that’s still on the list but since it seems to be running and driving fine, it’s farther down.
Work avoidance, I’m a past master.
Stack something, or do something, or learn something. Or embrace the power of ‘and’…
nick
Pathetic fallacy? 😉
Thursday. Good morning again. Toasted crumpets with marmelade and tea for breakfast!
Knocking out little work-related jobs to fill the time until noon. It is amazing how many small tasks accrete while one is busy with important ones.
Nick, do you / did you have some experience with CAD software before getting the 3D printer(s)? I would like to give them a go, but my zero knowledge of CAD looks like a hurdle, and I don’t really have time or energy for a big new learning project… although I was thinking about taking Spanish courses.
You might want to get that checked before too much longer. From what you say, you’re not one to do major auto repairs, which implies that you might not recognizes the importance of a squeak or a shake.
Full novel by David Weber.
The ongoing replacement of cubes with standing desks reached the other side of the building starting at the beginning of November, and I swear people were vaping in their cubes over there prior to renovation.
Some serious company lifers work in that space. The building goes back to the 90s.
34.5 is still a difficult number, and the manufacturers won’t change the pipeline until they are sure that Impeachment 2.0 isn’t going to start in January 2027.
Lower the national speed limit to 55 MPH like the Dems yak about doing and it will be Game Over for the overdrive transmissions. Whether or not the states revolt about the limit, the EPA will revert the testing regimen back to the old procedure, complete with “fudge factor” that allowed Iacocca to advertise a K-car as having 47 MPG highway.
Please.
We get CAFE and the associated bureaucracy because Americans are weenies about gas prices. Other parts of the world let onerous gas taxes provide the incentive for people to buy more fuel efficient vehicles and do not dictate what the manufacturers produce.
Where I am, fuel prices are high (I probably pay more per litre than you do per gallon) and government at several levels dictates emission standards. The city has already forbidden most diesel cars, and they will start forbidding older petrol ones in January.
I paid $2.25 /gallon for normal unleaded gas yesterday at the grocery store. It’s cheaper if you shop around or buy at Costco.
—–
@denis, I was an early adopter of CAD, having it in my grad school lab in 1989. I wasn’t very good with it, there wasn’t any formal training or best practices back then.
I used other drawing packages extensively, mostly 2D, until Sketchup came out. I loved Sketchup. I could bang out concept drawings and 3D renderings in no time. I had engineers for the details and fully realized design drawings. My understanding is that there is a tool chain to get from Sketchup to gcode or a slicer for the printer, but I haven’t got that all set up yet. The kids use TinkerCAD to do their modeling for school and I will probably go that route when I have some time.
Like most things, I learn ‘just enough’ to get the task or job done. There never seems to be time to become expert at it.
————-
54F and not currently raining, but there is still a bit of water on the ground.
n
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15350469/samantha-fulnecky-university-oklahoma-bible-essay-failed.html
– with the weasel word “sincerely” in there, methinks the school isn’t REALLY committed to freedom…
n
The ongoing replacement of cubes with standing desks reached the other side of the building
– so now the cattle don’t even get their own stall? and they have to stand all day while ‘chewing their cud’?
n
I reserve the right to mock individuals’ pronouns and gender identity unless they are sincerely held.
The more insane, the more sincere.
n
Ah, but I’m the judge of sincerity. And I judge harshly.
Most people lower the standing desks and sit. That is still an option … for now.
The chairs are typically leased these days. In the dot com bubble meltdown, Aeron chairs were often the most valuable assets the failed companies owned.
When I took the position at Bigcorp, I had to set up my home office. Bought a like new aeron chair from CORT leasing. They have an ‘outlet’ or off lease store near me.
My wife still uses that chair although I upgraded to a much sturdier chair.
n
We have standing desks at work. I have two in my office. I alternate between siting and standing.
I have a doctor’s note to provide an orthopedic chair. The standard company chairs are crap. They do have “orthopedic” chairs, which I tried, and they are crap too. The company accommodation specialist asked if I had something in mind, and I said an Aeron. She said that wouldn’t be a problem, as they are the same price as the standard orthopedic chairs.
During the pandemic, I purchased a refurbished Aeron for my office. Best $600 I’ve ever spent.
Kevin Loughin, The Old Tech Guy on Youtube, has a series about 3d printing. He makes a lot of small stuff for his working desk and ham radio parts and cases..
He uses only freeware. Linux, FreeCad, stuff like that.
He makes it look, if not easy, at least very achievable.
I have no personal experience with CAD or 3d printing, but I have had 3 different people make me parts on their 3d printers from plans readily available on the internet.
None of them were acceptable, although one came close. I think 3d printing has a learning curve, and parameters that greatly affect the quality of the parts produced.
Wait until your next trip to a theater. Seeing the big screen clear and sharp is amazing.
Bye, bye, bye…
Ouch. SO MUCH Ouch: WATCH Prince Harry’s Face As Stephen Colbert’s Audience BOOS Him for Trump Joke (Vid)
I would pull his visa for mocking the country and tRump. He is a guest here. Get rid of him. He already is under suspicion for lying on his visa application.
And for marrying a 304.
I had to look up what that meant. I’m old.
>>Custom one-off manufacturing is the perfect use for a 3d printer.
Even better when you find plans for the ‘part’ you need available online.
DDG:
Search Assist
Sorry, no relevant information was found in our search
The search results below this were quite clear.
—–
Disintermediation Is a good thing.
I had to look up what that meant. I’m old.
– everything old is new again. The funniest part of the ‘304’ thing is that it uses the old gag of turning a calculator upside down, like we did to spell “hELL” when we were in high school. The kids think they invented something.
———–
Even better when you find plans for the ‘part’ you need available online.
– widely distributed, but produced locally. That’s pretty cool. Also, ‘mass customization.’
Adaptive Curmudgeon invented and is selling a little widget as he learns about 3D printing.
—-
I had a story idea where the main character comes home and flops down on his MS Nano ™ couch, but it’s hard instead of soft because the file glitched. He needs to re-boot his couch to make it soft again. It’s a dystopia where everyone has stuff, but none of it ever works correctly.
n
The larger question is how a graduate student came to believe that his opinion was controlling, and whether the university should graduate this turd (he knew exactly what he was doing, and how devastating a 0-for-25 score would be) and give him a certificate to inflict his opinion on others.
I’d vote no, and give him the boot, then investigate the whole department to determine if a thorough housecleaning is warranted. (Hint: Default position is “definitely”)
I finally bought some fire extinguishers. I have a couple and I know where one is. The one under the sink is missing.
$90 for four. $22.50 each and free shipping. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C634R3WF?tag=ttgnet-20
Quit putting it off until later.
Does anyone remember a SF novella called “The Apocalypse Troll”? Something like that…
Most excellent singleton book by David Weber:
https://www.amazon.com/Apocalypse-Troll-David-Weber/dp/0671578456?tag=ttgnet-20/
“Always be sincere, whether you mean it or not.” – Michael Flanders (among others)
Where can I put my book reviews (about 1,300 to date) on the intertubes where they will outlast me and I do not have to pay $10 / month for the website. I want the reviews to be seeable by anyone so I can point to them.
Kinda like the old myspace or something along those lines.
This guy made a website for his reviews but it took too much time to update so he abandoned it.
https://best-sci-fi-books.com/
James Davis Nicoll has a slow website for his reviews:
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
Kevin Loughin, The Old Tech Guy on Youtube, has a series about 3d printing. He makes a lot of small stuff for his working desk and ham radio parts and cases..
The sequel of the Orphan Black series, Orphan Black: Echoes, has a step change in cloning. Instead of using IVF and host mothers for cloning, the daughter of one of the clones invented a human parts (heart, kidney, etc) 3d printer. From that, she jumped to human 3d printing. The brain neurons were the hardest to print. I found it not quite believable but somewhat unnerving.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10016724/?ref_=tt_mlt_t_1
The ongoing replacement of cubes with standing desks reached the other side of the building
– so now the cattle don’t even get their own stall? and they have to stand all day while ‘chewing their cud’?
I bought a standing desk adapter for my office manager. She rarely moves it into the standing position. However, she is 67 now.
When I finally get my 3D printer to Vegas, I want to print some McMaster Carr parts. A lot have a 3D file.
Adam Savage has a video on setting up his new FormLabs Fuse 3D sintering printer. Printing with nylon powder produces strong parts. Sintering is the wave of the future with hard plastics and metals.
Thanks. I am pretty sure I originally got the ebook from the Baen Free Library.
The Plan continues on schedule.
Get Harry thrown out of the country by The Orange King and chances of The Plan being a success increase significantly.
When I took the position at Bigcorp, I had to set up my home office. Bought a like new aeron chair from CORT leasing. They have an ‘outlet’ or off lease store near me.
My wife still uses that chair although I upgraded to a much sturdier chair.
I bought this aeron wannabe chair back in 2017 for $323 for my big ass. My dad had a aeron chair at his home office and I hated it. “Space Seating 75 Series Air Grid Big and Tall Deluxe Ergonomic Office Chair with Thick Padded Seat and 400 lb. Limit, Black”
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000WJVB1Q?th=1&tag=ttgnet-20
Wait until your next trip to a theater. Seeing the big screen clear and sharp is amazing.
I lost my action movie partner, my dad, this summer. I don’t know if I will go to the movies ever again. My wife hates action movies and my son hates movie theatres.
“Not Till We Are Lost: Bobiverse, Book 5” by Dennis E. Taylor
https://www.amazon.com/Not-Till-Are-Lost-Bobiverse/dp/1668223457?tag=ttgnet-20/
Book number five of a five book space opera series. I read the well printed and well bound POD (print on demand) trade paperback published by Ethan Ellenberg Literary Agency in 2025. I will purchase and read any future books in the series. The author states on his website that book six is at the editor and he is writing book number seven now. The author also stated that Universal has optioned the series but no details due to a NDA.
Bob Johansson has just sold his software company and is looking forward to a life of leisure. There are places to go, books to read, and movies to watch. So it’s a little unfair when he gets himself killed crossing the street. His family freezes him for future healing.
Bob wakes up a century later to find that corpsicles have been declared to be without rights, and he is now the property of the State. He has been uploaded into computer hardware and is slated to be the controlling A.I. in an interstellar probe looking for habitable planets. The stakes are high, no less than first claim to entire worlds. If he declines the honor, he’ll be switched off and they’ll try again with someone else. If he accepts, he becomes a prime target for sabotage. There were at least three other countries trying to get their own probes launched first, and they play dirty. Then the nuclear war over Earth threw the planet into a severe ice age and Bob’s space ships moved much of the population to space stations and other star systems.
Bob’s descendants are now over 10,000 with up to 24 generations. They are post the Starfleet war in which a group tried to take over all of the descendants and enforce the Prime Directive. Their physical AIs are up to 100 light years away from Sol. Each of the AI’s is a little different from Bob due to replicative drift. Many of them have formed groups with wildly differing goals. And some of these groups are violent, especially about continued contact with human beings and other intelligent species.
The author has a website at:
http://dennisetaylor.org/
My rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Amazon rating: 4.6 out of 5 stars (6,002 reviews)
Lynn
Try to see “Frankenstein” in a theater.
“US Treasury Market Tops $30 Trillion, Doubling Since 2018”
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-treasury-market-tops-30-201438217.html
“The combined total amount of Treasury bills, notes and bonds increased by about 0.7% in November to $30.2 trillion, according to data released Thursday.”
The financial apocalypse of the USA continues to follow the Mandibles book. 2029 will be here in fairly short order.
https://www.amazon.com/Mandibles-Family-2029-2047-Lionel-Shriver/dp/006232828X?tag=ttgnet-20
I handed a 50 on a midterm project to a girl who is now a full tenured PhD professor in an engineering department in the UC system. That is what the rubric demanded after I ticked all of the boxes which applied. Ultimately, the code didn’t work.
Of course, since the girl had a large grant supporting her due to some kind of learning disability, the professor changed the grade and didn’t let me touch the final project grading for anyone.
How much did the Fed buy?
I have a short term bond fund as an experiment, and the yield went above 5% annually in the last few weeks. The fund is a mix of US Government and commercial debt.
The estimated infrastructure costs for the sex robots keep raising the numbers for the currency debasement which will be required.
“A new battlefield problem: Drone fiber pollution”
https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2025/12/a-new-battlefield-problem-drone-fiber.html
“Business Insider reports that drone guidance and signal cables are being strewn so thickly over the Ukrainian countryside that they’re becoming a major hazard in themselves. I’ve included some photographs from social media to illustrate the problem.”
I prefer drone fiber to land mines. I suspect that unexploded land mines are all over the place too.
Time to invest in a laser projector and a 120+” screen as I did.
I would guess that Eastern Ukraine will be almost unusable for decades, no matter who wins. To a lesser extent the same for the provinces bordering on the Black Sea and Crimea.
The sheer amount of mines and unexploded ordnance is off the charts.
Perhaps we will have AI farmers before AI sex workers?
Or both?
“Redneck Robots have their name on the back of their shells,
they’ve a kiss on thie lips for their owners and nobody else.‘
Flat screens are up to 85 inches diagonal the last I looked. Might be simpler that a projector.
@lynn, I’ve got an 86″ I’ll sell you cheap. I’ll even deliver and help you set it up. It’s not technically a tv, so no built in apps or tuner. That also means no built in spying. Works with any other source like roku, appletv, directv, etc.
Another link, it was available at Office Depot 6 months ago.
It’s too big to fit on the wall between the bookcases where my current tv hangs.
n
added- plenty of spying from the other connected sources. And I might move the bookcases and hang the dang thing anyway. If I don’t, I need to hang one of the two 76″ sony tvs…
I swear Sam’s had 100″ on Sunday.
The price was below $1000. I didn’t go over and get a good look, but, remember, if the monetary price is low or zero, the product is you.
I have a Grand Wega Trinitron in our living room that refuses to die and a 24″ flatscreen in my home office for video games.
Which reminds me – my kickstarter for the Analogue 3D Nintendo 64 emulator finally shipped and arrived at my house last week. Only a year!
@Nick – If you are dealing Nintendo 64 cartridges as of late, the Analogue plays everything in my collection except “NFL Blitz”.
I really only wanted to play “Perfect Dark” in HD. Everything else is a bonus.
All the N64 classics — “Goldeneye”, “Banjo Kazooie”, “Donkey Kong 64”, “Starfox”, and “Star Wars: Rogue Squadron”.
Lucasarts!
@paul
A fire blanket is a good thing to have in the kitchen. Very effective for grease fires.
@denis
Baen was at the cutting edge of digital books when cd’s dominated, and The Apocalyse Troll was on several IIRC.
Producing a score based on objective goals is quite another thing, and defensible in a mature iteration that has been successfully used before. I’ve seen schemes that didn’t work as planned on the first outing, and had to be duct-taped on the fly, which is also defensible. Custom tailoring to get a desired result for a special one or a group is not defensible.
Breaking: Supreme Court Allows Texas Redistricting Plan to Stand
https://redstate.com/smoosieq/2025/12/04/breaking-supreme-court-allows-texas-redistricting-plan-to-stand-n2196824
Still need to tell the RINO’s in Indiana to get with the program.
Well…..we came close to being scammed. More tomorrow after I calm down, and sleep.
Scammers are particularly active this time of year. Not sure about @Ray’s problem, but Brian Krebs reported today that there’s a big increase in Chinese-based scammers using SMS texts as the starting point for scamming:
(link)
“Let’s be careful out there…” You might want to alert family and friends to be on their guard…
BTW, my brother just told me to go buy brump stocks for my AR gubs. He thinks that if things go wrong, you need a spray machine.
I can’t fault his thinking, but if you are doing that, you have BIG problems. No QRF and no medivac either. I think people will need to think more like criminals, gangs, and insurgents and not like soldiers.
Silencers, ordinary clothes, armor, and mobility … anyone got some enduro bikes they’re looking to sell cheap?
n
(I’ve watched a lot of interviews with a guy called Shrek who did a bunch of solo missions in the Sandbox. He dressed “like the savages” and only had a pistol, or no gun at all”. He says that when he was briefing his teams for the kind of missions they sent him and the other team guys out on, he pointed out that if they had to start shooting they’d be F’d most of the time. He said guys get “Blackhawk Down Syndrome” and wanted to carry thousands of rounds, but you can’t move quickly with all the weight. He’d call guys out for carrying too much. That said, there were plenty of times when they just killed everyone.
We won’t have the choice of picking and planning our missions if we’re in a place we need machine guns and the ammo to feed them.)
and xtra mags
I had a chilly hour outside with my tiny little fire and a book. I refilled a couple of 1# bottles from the BBQ bottle so I could run my MrHeaters. Bundled up and with both heaters running it was not too bad. Still, 45F is cold, I don’t care who you are.
Time for a warm shower and bed.
n
(I’ve watched a lot of interviews with a guy called Shrek who did a bunch of solo missions in the Sandbox. He dressed “like the savages” and only had a pistol, or no gun at all”. He says that when he was briefing his teams for the kind of missions they sent him and the other team guys out on, he pointed out that if they had to start shooting they’d be F’d most of the time. He said guys get “Blackhawk Down Syndrome” and wanted to carry thousands of rounds, but you can’t move quickly with all the weight. He’d call guys out for carrying too much. That said, there were plenty of times when they just killed everyone.
My son carried all seven drums (one in his M249) on the first foot patrol in Iraq (USMC has a vest that carries 6 drums). He only carried a spare drum after that. Each drum is 200 rounds of 5.56 and weighed 3 lbs IIRC.
His body armor weighed 65 lbs, his camel canteen had one ??? gallon of water at 8 lbs, his M9 was 4 lbs plus a spare 10 round mag, and his M249 weighed 18 lbs without the spare barrel. Plus his Kabar and a few other things in his backpack. Over 100 lbs of stuff before the other five drums.
They got to Iraq in May 2006. In August the peak temperature hit 136 F. They had armor kits on their humvees (no opening windows then) and no a/c. Nobody was moving fast.
BTW, I was telling my brother that I feel very uncomfortable in Fort Bend County now due to the 40% immigrant population here. Buying brumps was his suggestion. He suggested silencers also.
“Rep. Ilhan Omar’s Links to Massive $1 Billion Somali Fraud Scheme Revealed”
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/12/rep-ilhan-omars-links-massive-1-billion-somali/
“As The Gateway Pundit reported, 70 members of the Somali community in Minnesota were involved in stealing $250 million in COVID funds that were intended to feed children. Millions of dollars were stolen from American taxpayers and sent overseas to Somalia, and 80% of the money has not been recovered.”
“Seven defendants were tried in connection with the scheme on charges related to stealing more than $40 million in taxpayer funds, and five were found guilty. However, the FBI is still investigating an attempt by a Somali woman to bribe one of the jurors with $120,000 in cash.”
“However, the fraud extends deeper, with multiple schemes of this nature occurring over the last five years.”
“On Monday, employees from the Minnesota Department of Human Services accused far-left Governor Tim Walz of orchestrating a sweeping cover-up to shield the massive fraud ring from detection.”
Lovely, just lovely.
> Things I Wish I’d Known When Starting a Book Collection
>
> Handy advice for overly enthusiastic bookworms (you know who you are)
>
> https://reactormag.com/things-i-wish-id-known-when-starting-a-book-collection/
I only have 4,000 books at the moment. Plus 500 books in my SBR (strategic book reserve). I keep them in seven 6 ft tall by 3 ft wide bookcases, triple stacked, in my bedroom. Triple stacked is a front row, a back row, and a top stuffing of books on each shelf.
I have asked my wife if I can install an eighth bookcase in our bedroom. She said no. And then she said I should get rid of one of the bookcases.
I am getting rid of the 8,000+ books from my parents. Half were hardbacks. It has been difficult. The local library has taken over a thousand books so far.
What do you do with a 60+ year old complete set of the Hardy Boy books ?