Cool and wet to start, maybe clearing up later. Maybe not. The ground is saturated and the ditches around my client’s area were still full yesterday afternoon. I imagine they got even fuller… and the bayous are full too. We really don’t need more rain right now.
I spent yesterday morning getting ready and then on my site visit. No real progress was made but the gear swap should help to narrow down the problem. Having a house full of gear does let them do some cool things, but it takes maintenance.
Then I did my pickup and returned home. Puttered around the house more than working, but did get some small things done.
Today I’m going to have a nice lie in, then eat sugar for breakfast (bacon and bacon waffles are part of the plan.) After that, if I’m not asleep, I’ll see what low effort stuff I can get done. Hopefully it won’t be raining.
Can’t control the weather though, so we’ll see what happens.
My congrats to the other fathers out there. It’s a tough job, but the rewards are great.
Always be working. Stack.
nick
Oh, right. Father’s Day. Forgot, in part because I didn’t realize that today is Sunday (when you freelance and have animals and don’t have regular weekly meetings to anchor that “today is Thursday”, it’s hard to keep track of days), partly because the odds of any of my kids contacting me today are low, and partly because of the national downplaying of this “special” day. I’ll call my dad, but I call him frequently to see if he needs me to help with anything.
I woke today at the usual 0430, just as the sky was thinking of lightening, but before I had convinced myself to get upright there was a clatter from the patio. Got to a window and checked. Yup, fat-butt raccoon had gotten the lid off of the trashcan where I keep the seed for the wild birds. I might look into putting clips or even just bungee cords from the lid to the handles. I don’t particularly dislike raccoons (so long as they stay away from my chickens) but I’m not going to make it easy for the little turds.
BTW, Texans might be interested in this: At 0500 up here on June 21, the air temperature was in the mid-50s. 56, subject to the distortion by the presence of the house.
I don’t think any Linux distribution can be a “Linux For Dummies”.
System76 is trying with Pop! OS, but they’ve wandered down the Rust rabbithole.
I run Mint with the MATE desktop because I’m old and more comfortable with a GNOME2 “feel”.
The Unix philosophy centers around plain text files sliced and diced by small programs doing specific tasks.
I consider myself lucky that one of my undergraduate takeaways was enough vi to be comfortable with using that editor in a time crunch situation. Later on, after working for a couple of years, I went through the O’Reilly Korn Shell book cover-to-cover during “off” time, and I’ve been riding that knowledge ever since.
The Korn Shell book is brilliant. O’Reilly updated it for Bash, but not much changed. The books don’t teach the specific shell environments as much as the Unix philosophy and how it relates to the shell along with the utility programs.
The summary line of my resume should read, “Can use vi and shell in a blind a** panic to solve complex technical problems. Knows enough Python to be dangerous. “
Sunday. Good morning!
Happy Father’s Day to the procreationists among you! I miss my Dada…
Hot. Very hot.
W1 is singing in a midsummer concert around 1pm, when the day will be at its hottest. She is a bit nervous about the performance, so I am going to have to go along and lend moral support.
I would rather stay at home in the cool basement, but needs must. I will try to locate the coolest possible clothing that I can get away with at a church do.
Lidl had ice-cream churns on offer a couple of week ago, and I bought one. It’s a very simple affair, just a metal double-walled bowl filled between its walls with some liquid that chills down in the freezer over a day or two, plus a stirrer on a small motor that fits atop the bowl. Twenty euro bucks, so not a big investment.
The idea is to take the cold bowl out of the freezer, start the stirrer in motion, and pour in cold, pre-prepared, liquid ice cream ingredients. The cold of the special bowl should freeze the liquid, and the agitation ought to keep the water ice crystals small.
There was a simple recipe for strawberry ice cream in the box with the churn, (300g pureed strawberries, 100g icing sugar, 200ml milk and 200ml cream, whipped) so I have just made that up and set it to cool in the fridge.
When W1 and I get back from her concert, we’ll give the churn a go and see what we get. The liquid mix looks and tastes nice, so if the machine works as intended, we should have ice cream!
Time to get cleaned up for my outing. Stay cool, and have a beautiful day!
Have Python, am dangerous!
Today’s Tyler Durden cowardice protecting a mainstream source on the fall of Keir Starmer.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/uk-prime-minister-keir-starmer-expected-resign-monday-report
The first episode of the latest season of “Clarkson’s Farm” ends with Clarkson burning Starmer in effigy.
Well, McCarthy was right, but when you pick a fight with people that buy printers ink by the barrel, and you are an unlikable person, right doesn’t matter.
n
I suspect that the message bearer was a real piece of work. But the message was spot on. Communists and socialists need to summarily executed.
75 F and a steady rainfall. With the five inches we had yesterday, we are soaked. For a while yesterday, we had ponds on all sides of the house.
@Denis
Sounds like a motorized version of this
https://www.amazon.com/Donvier-837450-Manual-Cream-1-Quart/dp/B00CFIKO3S/ref=asc_df_B00CFIKO3S?tag=ttgnet-20
I think mine is tucked away in a corner cupboard.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2026/06/how_bulletproof_are_joe_biden_s_pardons.html
Start with Fauci. My bet is that there is not only no paper trail, no one will admit to using the autopen to sign his pardon.
Is Richardson’s place if burial known? People should be pissing on his grave for opening that can of worms without putting a strong verification procedure in place for legal documents and including a flat prohibition on use when POTUS is in DC and a witnessed physical order directing use when he is not.
The people who buy printers ink by the barrel have all gone broke after going woke.
The Rodent’s blind date with Bankruptcy continues this weekend with “Toy Story 5”.
She’ll have “that pudding made with a blowtorch” … in France.
Gas up the jet, Josh.
The Unix philosophy centers around plain text files sliced and diced by small programs doing specific tasks.
Unix was originally designed to build, edit, and print phone books for Ma Bell. Everything else was secondary.
The Vibe Shift at the World Cup Has Been Insane
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/josephchalfant/2026/06/20/the-vibe-shift-at-the-world-cup-has-been-insane-n2678049
The NFL is probably sh*tting bricks.
This may be the real thing–a tipping point. The year that a lot of ordinary Americans embraced soccer–yeah, we’re always going to call it soccer–and the popularity curve accelerated.
Second most boring sport behind basketball.
IMHO
My son played soccer for several years, so I developed a slight interest in the sport. I watch an occasional Premier League match if I catch it on, but I don’t seek it out.
I’ve been watching quite a bit of the World cup and have enjoyed it so far.
Up! 79F and overcast. Dripping wet.
Made and started drinking my coffee. Bacon waffle is in ma belly. I did a big pile of bacon for the kids but they’re still in bed.
—
The people who buy printers ink by the barrel have all gone broke after going woke.
— not dead yet. They’re whores and they are taking the chinese money until that runs out. Doesn’t matter for my point though, they had an iron grip when the unlikable Senator was trying to root them out.
n
I played a bit of soccer on a mildly successful coed intramural team in college. I never developed a taste for the game and find it boring to watch. But they’ve been building soccer fields all over middle America for more than twenty years and have thousands of leagues with kids starting under five. Those kids don’t grow up playing baseball or football, and it takes less equipment to practice soccer solo than basketball.
About ten years ago I started using the basketball hoops at a local school playground. Much of the asphalt was in bad condition and there were no nets. I made multiple calls and finally got the blessing of the guy that could give the okay, and bought good chain nets and installed them on the least bad court. I’d go up to shoot solo every night and finish with 100 free throws. Got my percentage back up to 70. Some kids started to show up on their bikes and I taught some of them a few fundamentals.
It was decent yesterday in the high desert, 85F, but windy, 35mph. The weather folk say it should be about the same today, maybe a bit warmer. We are supposed to be up in the low 100s again by midweek.
I was picking up weeds and debris all over the yard Saturday morning, trying to make it safe before the Fourth of July and all the accursed 4th of July bottle rockets. But by 11am stuff was blowing away out of my little wagon faster than I could put it in, even with planks and bricks on top to hold it down.
—
Looked at the news briefly this morning, SpaceX scored as low as possible on ESG … I do like the cut of that man Musk’s jib!
—
Well, best get out and do some more wind-limited tasks whilst I can. Then I have to go into town and check on my friends house and cat. And their mail – they stopped it with the USPS but it seems to have started again. And they do have mail thieves in their area.
WRT soccer in the US, someone has turned the ‘cultural weapons of mass destruction’ on us. Still, my kids had no interest after they played, but they’re not very sporty anyway.
n
FIFY.
In a democracy, right doesn’t matter. And after direct election of senators and women’s suffrage and universal suffrage, only nice, polite losers succeed. Thus ends the nation.
Marketing beats truth. Every time.
“SpaceX scored as low as possible on ESG … I do like the cut of that man Musk’s jib!”
He probably has av aversion to DIE hires doing orbital calculations.
I bet he has a low tolerance for any kind of incompetence.
n
Indeed. I am very glad mine is motorised, though. It took over thirty-five minutes to turn the liquid mixture into soft-scoop ice cream. That would have been a long time to churn manually.
This is the Lidl machine:
https://www.lidl.co.uk/p/silvercrest-ice-cream-maker/p10049438
The simple strawberry recipe in the box was delicious, by the way. Certainly nicer than store-bought. W1 and I made waffles after her concert (which went fine) and had them with coffee and the fresh strawberry ice cream. Sublime. We ate about two thirds of the litre of ice cream, and the remainder has gone in the freezer for another day.
I am quite impressed with the little churning machine, although its motor is a wee bit anaemic – it had trouble turning once the mixture got firm-ish. The ice cream was spoon-ready and delicious at that point, but certainly not hard.
I suppose, if we had been patient enough, we could have put the churn of soft-serve in the freezer for a while to firm up more, but as we were anyway ready to enjoy it, that wasn’t necessary.
Next, I am going to try making vanilla, which will be the acid test…
The ice cream was a welcome cooling off. It is still really hot, though.
We used our ice cream maker a lot when we first got it, mainly because we were doing low carb and could control the ingredients. Sometimes it would make very hard ice cream, but usually not. Depends on the recipe. Fun to try different things.
We took it to the BOL, because unless we have the little 12v freezer in the car, ice cream will melt before you can get it home from the store. We haven’t made any up there yet because we’re usually doing something else.
Maybe the July 4th weekend…
n
Alton Brown posted a new video on YouTube about ice cream. He uses a Cuisinart freezer, a bigger version of the one we have.
It has a stationary dasher and a rotating coldbucket from the freezer.
We have 2 buckets, so we can make up to 4 quarts between cleaning.
An excellent use of time is making Affagato with homemade gelato. I’m undecided whether to add Cognac or drink it on the side. More experimentation is indicated.
Golf has to be number 1 most boring sport. Stand in one spot, watch someone hit a ball, wait for the next person. Those stationed around the greens are 50-100 yards away, watch a guy tap a ball into hole, cheer if it is a birdy, scream if it is an eagle, jump and hug a stranger if it is a hole in one. Do that for 7 or 8 hours. Yeh, real exciting.
Then go and spend a few hundred dollars to buy the same putter your favorite player is using hoping to take a stroke off your game.
Although bass fishing is a real close second. Stand in an arena, watch some guy pull up in a boat covered in sponsorship stickers, watch him pull a couple of fish out of a tank on the boat, scream and yell because one of those fishes is bigger than the other.
Then go spend a few hundred dollars on lure, reels and hats because your favorite fisherman uses them and it will make you a better fisherman. Or go buy a new boat and spend $50K on that 350HP outboard so you can get across the lake faster to arrive where the fish were yesterday.
Happy Fathers Day!
And
Happy Summer Solstice!
Mom just reminded me about the summer solstice.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2026/06/20/longest-brightest-day-year-happens-this-weekend/
I bet he has a low tolerance for any kind of incompetence.
A very low tolerance for incompetence and a high tolerance for failure.
You have obviously never attended a cricket test match. They take about a week. Even a one-day cricket match takes a whole day. The boredom is best alleviated with extensive picnic baskets, copious champagne, strawberries and ice-cream.
Golf is simply a criminal waste of what would otherwise be an excellent shooting range.
Fishing is not so bad. It is an excuse to sit around all day, drink beer and talk nonsense, with messing around in boats for good measure. Bait and hooks are completely optional. That is all fine, but it’s the lying about the “one that got away” that irks me.
Yes and no. Golf’s rules need to be changed. Each player’s bag will have woods, irons, and shooting irons. Participants will try to blast the other player’s drives out of the air. We shall rechristen the sport Skeet Golf.
Golf: a good walk spoiled.
I don’t have any problem with someone engaging in those activities, but I am mystified by someone WATCHING them, especially if they are emotionally involved…
n
If I could get my golf score on the bowling alley, and my bowling score on the golf course, I’d be an expert in both sports!
When it comes to golf ….. If you wanted that little ball, why did you hit it away with a big stick? And if you DIDN’T want it, why go fetch it?
Buc-ee’s is quickly becoming the Mother of All Cultural Weapons of Mass Destruction this Summer.
I saw so many Tom Brady jerseys on fans heading into Raymond James for World Cup two weeks ago that I thought the Yucs were holding a season ticket seat selection event.
No word on whether the pirate ship cannons were firing, but the Yucs gear shop was open.
Watching golf on TV seems amazing to me. How does the camera track the ball? And show it rolling almost to the hole?
I guess it’s like nature shows with lions chasing a zebra.
Bowling. I actually kind of like watching bowling. I can bowl. I do ok. Never a perfect score but I almost got there a few times. Have not gone bowling for many years, there’s no bowling alleys around here. But it was fun. Except for the shoes.
Its been tried with other sports. Cue Val Kilmer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJOS7dKuwcQ
The r/o system has been noisy. I looked in the directions and a cause of noise is a need to change filters.
I changed filters. Not near as noisy. Still plenty of annoying gurgling draining noise.
One more filter to change. The r/o membrane. I bought a two pack from eBay. USPS says delivery is tomorrow, Monday.
Yeah. Two membrane filters. So I have a spare to install when I’m pushing 80.
From what I read the “valve shut-off” can go bad. It seems to be a generic part. It doesn’t matter if your r/o system is rated for 18 gallons per day or a hundred gallons.
I found a listing on Big River with two for $9. It’s an interesting thing. It somehow knows when the pressure in the holding tank pressure is about 63% of the water line pressure. Nope, can’t find the link now. I just thought that was an odd number.
I think my valve is fine. When it seems the the system will never stop gurgling water, tapping in the valve with the handle end of a table knife has no effect.
So. Ok. While the system is drained to replace the membrane filter I’ll check the air pressure in the storage tank. It has an air bladder. Five to seven PSI.
Why five to seven? No idea.
The tank on my well says to air the bladder to the pump’s shut off pressure. I have checked it a few times. Over 30 years I’ve added air twice. The second time was because the tire gauge I used had unnoticed to me lost the little rubber gasket that seals to the valve stem.. I said a lot of bad words that day.
This is all boring. But interesting, too. Like watching golf on the TV.
Go figure.
I can remember my father watching on a 480p television in the 1980’s … sometimes the ball would be visible.
The actual answer is very skilled camera operators with really good lenses.
n
Tech is probably good enough now to let a computer track the ball and feed distance, pitch and yaw to motors aiming cameras.
The cameras are only going to be able to follow a subset of the infinite possible parabolas off the tee so the system quickly picks which one to apply to the cameras downrange.
Picking the right one in a hurry is the key.
A cricket match is a sure sign of Colonist infestation in any given area of Texas, best to be avoided.
“SpaceX & the Sentient Sun” by Marc Andreessen and Michael McGuiness
https://www.a16z.news/p/spacex-and-the-sentient-sun
“Earth is the cradle of humanity, and you cannot stay in the cradle forever.”
“Elon Musk’s compensation package at SpaceX is structured around two targets. The first award vests if the company reaches a valuation of $7.5 trillion and establishes a permanent human colony on Mars of at least one million people. The second vests if SpaceX operates data centers in space that draw at least 100 terawatts of power, more than 1,000x the consumption of every data center on Earth combined. Miss both, and Musk earns nothing but the $54,080 salary he has been paid since 2019.”
“The board members who signed this package spent two decades watching Musk make predictions about SpaceX that sounded impossible before they came true. He said SpaceX would put humans in orbit when no private company ever had; it now flies NASA’s astronauts routinely. He said it would land and reuse an orbital rocket when the entire industry treated boosters as disposable; SpaceX has since done it hundreds of times. He said a satellite internet business could be worth tens of billions when satellite internet was a graveyard of bankruptcies; Starlink’s revenue has climbed from zero to $11.4 billion in a few years. The predictions were often aggressive on timing but almost never wrong on direction. And the original direction, written down in 2002 as the company’s mission, was to make humanity multiplanetary. So the board tied his pay to the mission itself.”
“If that mission sounds like something from a science fiction novel, that might be because it is.”
“Iain M. Banks spent twenty-five years writing about a civilization called the Culture. It is, by most reasonable measures, the best utopian society ever imagined. Humans live alongside Minds, the superintelligent AIs that run orbital habitats the size of small worlds, in a relationship that is neither servitude nor rivalry but partnership. Nobody works who doesn’t want to. Nobody starves. The Minds handle the staggering computational load of running cities in space. Humans handle being human, which turns out to be a full-time job.”
“SpaceX’s three autonomous drone ships, the floating platforms in the oceans where Falcon 9 boosters land, are named after sentient starships in Banks’s novels: Of Course I Still Love You, Just Read the Instructions, and A Shortfall of Gravitas. In a 2023 interview at the UK AI Safety Summit, Musk was asked what a good AI future looks like. “The Banks Culture books are by far the best envisioning of an AI future,” he answered. “There’s nothing even close that’ll give you a sense of what is a fairly utopian or protopian future with AI.” He has been telling us, on the sides of his landing pads, exactly what he is trying to build.”
Ah, the Legend of Marc, whose mother answered phones at Lands End to support her son through school so he could one day join the “Tres Commas” club.
Before the web, I once ordered pants from Lands End at 2 AM from my desk at GTE. Maybe Andreessen’s mother took the call.
We’re all about to have stakes in Tony’s rocket and AI grifts as Andreessen & Horowitz and other major private equity players unload their stock into the 401(k) and penson plans everyone is depending on for their retirement.
Well, we all should have a stake in the future of mankind…
——-
Elon has also said that AI is the biggest danger humans face.
n
Went out for greek for dinner. Had a gyro sandwich, which I love, and which brings back memories of eating with my own father…
Then a tiny little fire, only one black cat that moved like a mini panther, and some street racers in the distance.
Time for a shower and bed. I’m hoping to be busy tomorrow.
n
That was hilarious. I hadn’t seen it before.
Skeet golf? That might catch on!