Still hot and humid, but only got to 101F in the sun yesterday. That’s a couple of days in a row that it didn’t get past that on my weather station. And into the high 70sF at night. That’s an improvement too. Supposed to be clear for a couple more days, so should be nice weather.
Did most of what I wanted to do yesterday, details are in the comments. Didn’t get the computer work done, didn’t get the printer to the shop, but made progress none the less. Today will hopefully continue that momentum.
I’ve got a pickup downtown and can roll three other pickups into a big loop, and stop by my secondary to pickup parts for the big 3d printer. I want to put it all together in one lot and list it for sale. I’ve got more versatile and yet smaller printers and whatever I do with them will be more hobby oriented that using the big printer. And I’ve got too many projects to modify or re-use the printer with different hardware and software. Time is not on my side.
So today will be driving and a big shuffle of stuff around, but hopefully the end result will be progress.
Always be working. And stacking.
nick
Tuesday. Good morning!
Training continues this morning. Yesterday’s session was excellent. My employer uses a particular external trainer who is simply exceptionally good. I sign up for anything she is delivering, as I know I will learn something and not be bored, and that is again the case … I would tune in to her reading the phone book!
Tuesday? Well, at least it’s not Monday. Might get to the range during lunch break and turn some money into noise…
Have a good day!
Mesabi Metallics is an Indian-owned (as in dot) company.
Colonization continues. Americans need not apply for any engineering position.
Or construction.
Still, not just largest but PRIMARY steel. When was the last primary steel mill in the US built?
The unions, politicians, and the fancy lads with their financial games destroyed the US steelmakers. Even with foreign ownership (like most of the steel makers worldwide) at least the facility will be here.
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74F and sun is soon to rise in a very orange sky.
D1 not feeling well, so staying home. I guess W will be taking D2 to school today.
n
US Steel had a plant under construction in Arkansas before the Nippon Steel buyout, but they may have been forced to give up the project to get approval for the acquisition.
Vanguard/Blackrock/State Street wanted to merge their US Steel and Cleveland Cliffs subsidiaries and shutter a lot of the US Steel facilities in order to improve the Cleveland Cliffs numbers. The Japanese wanted to make steel, but that didn’t sit well with the real owners, unions or politicians.
We’ll see what happens with the plant long term. Lots of illegal labor is involved with the vaunted EV production capability the Feds subsidized with billions in Georgia, and I’m sure the H1B system will be abused in Iowa like it is along the I-35 corridor between Austin and the Dallas suburbs here in Texas, with a branch operation in the West Houston suburbs.
The cashier at your local 7-11 may be here on H1B. Who knows. It is one of those “Is Batman a transvestite?” questions.
Fresh territory for Colonization.
Whenever you hear coverage about the massive ICE facility in Social Circle, GA (I’m not kidding about the name), that’s part of enforcement at the new Rivian plant which Corn Pop funded with a $6 billion “loan” on his way out the door of the White House.
It makes sense to move some of the basic production to the colony, close to the raw materials given the increasing transportation costs.
Mesabi Metallics is an Indian-owned (as in dot) company.
Colonization continues. Americans need not apply for any engineering position.
Or construction.
Jodi Ernst is senator until January and the state of Iowa has four engineering schools that I can think of and thousands of alumni.
The CIO has origins in Iowa and anyone who doubts that union influence is still strong should ask John Deere management.
And I doubt Lee County is going to get colonized without a war.
Or how many bullets it takes to kill 25 Indians, on horseback, riding fast, with a pistol?
Or how does The Lone Ranger camp everywhere but always has clean, pressed clothing?
Indian (dot) valet.
My favorite amateur astronomy site, Cloudy Nights, has effed up their user accounts, apparently they tried to purge old accounts … and affected a LOT more. Some people can still apparently login, but I can’t. Which is annoying because of the notifications of PMs to Gmail: I can see some of my online acquaintances are trying to talk to me, but I can’t reply.
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I was thinking about what Paul and others mentioned about smaller properties that are easier for those of a certain age to maintain. I am in that bracket and it is slowly dawning on me that the stuff I was looking at out of state won’t work, even as a BOL. I can barely keep up with a 2 1/2 acre property near to town, so 20 acres that are 20 miles from anyone is probably not a viable purchase…
We’ve had an awful lot of rain over the past several days. The ground in the house where I live is very squelchy because clay doesn’t drain well. The part of the chicken run which isn’t covered by tarp is mud with no grass visible. The covered part is much better but by no means great. I’d move the run to a patch of fresh grass but it would be very difficult because of the mud and I might not be able to do it at all.
Let the hens out for a half hour when the rain had briefly declined to misting. They had a good ol’ time scratching in the mulch and gobbling worms. Not happy about going back to the run but were mollified by the treat in the dish. Plus, the rain was picking up again.
I need to mow the yard at each house but, again, rain. Maybe in a couple days; the forecast says the next few days should be mostly dry. On the other hand, yesterday the forecast said that today would be completely cloudy (true) but little to no rain (false).
Spent several hours in the past few days helping The Child with physics homework. Some of the trouble was just not understanding what the problem was getting at, some was having forgotten some trigonometry or whatever which was necessary for the solution, some was the tail end of a cold gumming up her brain. One would think that the necessary math was addressed in the lecture or in the textbook but maybe she missed it. (Note to self: before helping next time, go over her notes and text with her.) Regardless, she’s at or near the top of the class (as of three weeks into the semester). I suggested that if she comes across one of her math or physics classmates having trouble with homework, she ought to do a mocking dance and say “Nanny-nanny-poo-poo! My dad’s an engineer and tutors me whenever I need it.” Or she could offer to help, but where’s the fun in that?
Remember, before making major changes, DO NOT make a backup of the database or settings. We have standards to uphold.
It’s why no one ever culls bad/inactive names.
n
My hobby group sends out over 250 emails about activities and member stuff, but we have only 55 dues paying members.
n
You would think that they’d at least send a message to ‘inactive’ members to check beforehand, but apparently they messed that up as well.
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Our club has about 40 to 50 members that show up at least semi-regularly, and about another hundred that never show to star parties or the club meetings, but continue to happily pay their dues.
When the vice president announced that they are going to have elections for a new president to replace our deceased and will be accepting nominations – several people turned around and looked at me.
I really don’t want the job, but I can see that the same half dozen people that have been doing everything for years are getting kind of burned out.
I really don’t want the job, but I can see that the same half dozen people that have been doing everything for years are getting kind of burned out.
– and that is how I found myself webmaster, and might be in line for VP.
n
A word of caution. Volunteering when and if you want to is different than being an officer. That’s a commitment, and as president, everything that happens, or more specifically doesn’t happen, is your fault.
My club president is a high-IQ idiot with focus issues. It’s as if the club doesn’t exist except for the monthly board meetings, monthly general meetings, and our few big scheduled events.
It doesn’t help that he still has a day job.
I’m off to an undisclosed location tomorrow to prepare our AI Barackylpse bunker. I’ll probably have to order the iPhone Duo from the bunker; I’ll be gone that long. Contact here will be via carrier pigeon.
Make sure you have a large supply of Cheese and Vegetable Omelet MREs to carry you through the crisis.
“Old Man’s War” by John Scalzi
https://www.amazon.com/Old-Mans-War/dp/1250359732?tag=ttgnet-20
Book number one of a seven book space opera military science fiction series plus a couple of short stories. I reread the well printed and well bound trade paperback published by Tor back in 2005 that I bought from Amazon in 2010. I own all of the succeeding books and plan to reread them also plus the new book in the series. BTW, this series was just awarded the 2026 Hugo Award for Best Series, a very legitimate award in my opinion. The book was nominated for the Best Novel in the 2006 Hugo Awards also. And the book won the 2006 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.
Scalzi is the master of the opening statement for his books. This one is excellent. “John Perry did two things on his 75th birthday. First he visited his wife’s grave. Then he joined the army.”
From my 2010 review, “Heinlein would be proud”.
“If you like Starship Troopers, A Matter for Men, and books about the Honorverse (you know who you are), you will love this. Another book that I had to read at a single sitting until 4 in the morning.”
“Although this is another “war amongst the stars” book, the ideas here are fresh. I mean, what former peacenik joins the the Colonial Defense Forces at the age of 75 ? The results and scenarios were a breath of fresh air.”
The author has incredibly busy website at
https://whatever.scalzi.com/
And he has a mallet if you annoy him. In fact, he has malleted me a few times. His website, his rules.
My rating: 6 out of 5 stars
Amazon rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars (32,420 reviews)
Lynn
Barstow it is. The armpit of the southwest.
Mesabi Metallics is an Indian-owned (as in dot) company.
Colonization continues. Americans need not apply for any engineering position.
Or construction.
I guarantee in case of war, a company of USA Army regulars will show up and take over the place, deciding where the steel will go. Should any one object, they will be arrested and thrown into a federal jail to be released at the end of the war to face trial for treason.
My brother’s brother in law got this explained to him when the USA Army really, really, really, liked his 2,500 ft-lb hydraulic wrenches during the Iraq occupation. In his case, only an Army Lt showed up but he had MPs on call for any problems. They seized his next two years of production and made him hire two more shifts of assemblers for his production line so they could ship a thousand or two of hydraulic wrenches to Iraq to install the armour kits on the 5,000+ humvees in Iraq.
Only violate the Defense Production Act at your own risk. This law has serious teeth in it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Production_Act_of_1950
Things are very slowly returning to the new normal. I took four stool softeners today and finally had my first bowel movement since last Thursday. Probably way too much TMI there.
The surgical process fills your abdomen up with air and you have to fart it out. That is why they won’t let you leave until you can fart.
I got stories from the nurses. Cautions that any fatty food will make it through you in 30 minutes or less. Recommendations to stay away from fried food for a month.
I’m sure the facility will produce steel, but I doubt a lot of local residents will be involved in operations at the site once the construction jobs go away.
President Trump Is Considering a Diesel Export Ban — and Conservatives Should Oppose It
https://townhall.com/news/dmitri-bolt/2026/09/28/diesel-export-ban-n2683716
Diesel Drivers Paying Price For [UK] Govt Neglect
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/09/29/diesel-drivers-paying-price-for-govt-neglect/
Checked just now: national average gasoline $4.48 vs diesel at $6.38
The UK pays a premium of roughly 13% for diesel over gasoline. The US consumer is paying +42%.
Yeah, aples to oranges and all that, but the UK position is largely due to the same bad government policy and refinery destruction that Cali is experiencing–their premium should not be less than our national average.
The high price of diesel in the U.S. has a number of factors, but the primary cause is the U.S. refiners seeking profits from serving a market that they do not normally serve. They are selling diesel overseas to compensate for loss of crude oil shipments to other countries. When oil supplies return to normal, U.S. refineies won’t be selling most of that diesel.
“Cheaper diesel would encourage more consumption during the ban”
Compared to what? Highest diesel average in the U.S. last year was $3.87. It’s up 64%. It’s not a matter of encouraging more consumption, it’s a matter of keeping costs down for our own transportation fleet, which directly impacts the prices of every good that moves on U.S. highways and rails. Sell diesel overseas most of it goes to cushion somebody else’s economy, not ours.
“Then, when exports resumed, the accumulated demand and constrained supply could collide, driving prices back up, potentially above where they started. ”
I call b.s. on that argument, too. Not only as it stands, but because it again ignores the source of the problem in the reduction of oil supply. And if you want to talk about driving prices up, let’s look at the fast rise and slow fall excuses and the
tradersshylocks driving that truck.Thing 1: Trump doesn’t need to ban diesel exports. He needs to explain to the U.S. refiners that their market is primarily for the benefit of the U.S., not their overseas customers. They need to limit the effect of their exports on U.S. prices, and he will help them do it if they can’t–them give them five minutes, call time up, and tell them their cap this month is 75% of what they shipped last month.
And then there’s Thing 2: U.S refineries are operating at 98%. Tell them any capacity reduction due to “breakdowns”–funny how we always have breakdowns despite 50 years of preaching “preventative maintenance”–and the difference comes off their exports.
After decades of letting the pot simmer the Iranian snake is about throttled. The bill is huge. We didn’t do it so the oil companies could post record profits.
“In his case, only an Army Lt showed up but he had MPs on call for any problems. They seized his next two years of production and made him hire two more shifts of assemblers for his production line so they could ship a thousand or two of hydraulic wrenches to Iraq to install the armour kits on the 5,000+ humvees in Iraq. ”
I cannot imagine that I would have a temperate response to a shavetail louie trying the Big Swinging Richard routine.
Particularly inasmuch as at the time my advice was to have a car bomb go off in the streets of Tehran every time we lost a vehicle to an “improvised” explosive device that originated in a workshop in Iran.
The Left’s Fear-Mongering Over AI Was Inevitable
https://hotair.com/john-s-2/2026/09/29/the-lefts-fear-mongering-over-ai-was-inevitable-n3819448
And perfectly predictable given that the Democrat party is a front for the Chicoms.
That just means you can eat more sooner. It’s a feature!
We were about to lose the special capability based in Tonopah as the clock ticked towards 50 years since the aircraft first flew.
The capability was buit for two missions, but Hillary took out Khadafy with a red hot poker shoved straight up his a**.
In comparison, the Ayatollahs got off easy.
Trump pushed things too far, believing that he woud prevail like he did in Venezuela.
Venezuelans are not Iranians … or Cubans.
Tonight’s movie was How to Train Your Dragon. It’s a DreamWorks movie. Not new, the ChuckECheese coupons expired in 2011.
I liked it. It’s a simple movie. Not a lot of screaming voice actors. But Vikings and Dragons and flying around, what’s to not like?
And hell yeah, who would not want a pet dragon to fly around on?
I watched Over the Hedge a while back and it was good enough to keep. I tried to watch Madagascar the other day and onto the the discard stack after 20 minutes…. too much screaming.
I’ve mentioned it here before, but trying to get my Canadian colleagues at BigCorp to understand why projects with “National Defense Priority” should be viewed like a rattlesnake on the bedspread was a losing battle.
We can always nationalize a working asset here in the US, not some much one in Yugoslavia.
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Lots of rain in various parts of Houston today, so I didn’t get the big printer out of the house. I did get my pickups for today done.
Now it’s child taxi duties.
n
I had this with Buddy the Beagle for his first month here. Feed supper and take him outside as soon as he finished eating. Within 10 minutes. Because real food was pushing out the very smelly acorns and leaves and whatever else his guts were full of.
All ok now. I have about half an hour, no walk involved, just take him out to pee. Attach leash and he waters the grass a couple of times and comes right back in the house. He just has to go.
Bedtime walk with all features is later.
My Mom had her gallbladder removed while she lived here. I don’t recall anything happening other than she wasn’t sick anymore.
https://hotair.com/tree-hugging-sister/2026/09/29/rise-of-the-habu-nasa-to-resurrect-the-last-sr-71-n3819447
Please.
https://hotair.com/john-s-2/2026/09/29/supreme-court-allows-third-country-deportations-n3819449
You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here.
The penguins antics are the entertaining parts of “Madagascar”. I can only tollerate Ben Stiller and David Schwimmer in small doses.
Sacha Baron Cohen? Um. Yeah.
Schwimmer does rock as the Kardashian patriarch in “The People vs. OJ Simpson”, which should be on your list if you ever see a copy in the discount bins.
“OJ? Please don’t kill yourself in Kimmy’s bedroom.”
Why don’t we use the Defense Production Act to order a few closed or closing refineries in Cacafornia to re-open? And to restart several/many shuttered oil wells? The diesel problem, if I understand this correctly, is that CA is closing a number of refineries at the same time that Ukraine has been DRONING 30+ Russian refineries. Crude oil isn’t all that expensive, but it is USELESS until it’s refined.
I also understand that constructing NEW refineries is a multi-year process. Could that be accelerated?
https://thefederalist.com/2026/09/29/jack-smith-seized-nearly-5000-checks-written-by-trump-donors/
Jack Smith should to be tied to a stake, doused with coal oil, and burned.
Followed by his entire staff, Merrick Garland, Chris Wray, and all of their lackeys.
Biden can be given a lawn chair and supplied with popcorn while he watches, then flipped into the dying embers with Jill and Hunter.
What was possible 25 years ago in Texas, before voters caught on that George W. Bush was an a**hat who was in over his head and beholden to his family Cabal, is not the same as what is possible today in California, where the Governor’s family money and connections both come from his father being consigliere to the Getty family as in Getty Oil.
Here in Texas, we still have faithful who will line up to vote for P. Diddly Bush in primaries and the general election in four years should Abbott lose in November.
“In his case, only an Army Lt showed up but he had MPs on call for any problems. They seized his next two years of production and made him hire two more shifts of assemblers for his production line so they could ship a thousand or two of hydraulic wrenches to Iraq to install the armour kits on the 5,000+ humvees in Iraq. ”
I cannot imagine that I would have a temperate response to a shavetail louie trying the Big Swinging Richard routine.
After my brother’s brother in law blew up about their production getting seized and the two more shifts being hired, the Lt and the company lawyer threw him out of the company for three months. The company lawyer actually kept him from getting arrested which the Lt was getting ready to do so. His paychecks were delivered to his house. When he came back, the Lt had the place running like a clock with two more shifts hired and working.
Did I mention that the first shift was the Austin Lighthouse for the Blind? He had actually built the assembly warehouse for blind people. A couple of vans would show up every day full of blind people. They did a great job.
Of course, lots of tax credits and payments by the city of Austin which were allowing him to sell the electric hydraulic wrenches at under market pricing. The second and third shifts were not able to to meet that pricing which caused a lot of financial problems down the road. The feddies eventually made them whole but it took a while.
And during the three months off, he started drinking a couple of six packs every day. Thanksgiving at my brothers house was fun that year as K was fully under the table by 3 pm.
My Mom had her gallbladder removed while she lived here. I don’t recall anything happening other than she wasn’t sick anymore.
My gall bladder pain for the last 2 or 3 years was Level 1 on a Level 10 scale. Just mild discomfort for an hour or two.
Then last Thursday night it was a solid Level 6. I was firmly in the rip it out camp.
The check washers have hit me again. Twice at the office and now at home on one of my personal checking accounts. It was my mortgage payment check of course. The bank changed my account number and closed my old account. What the heck is going on?
I wrote a new mortgage check using bill pay.
Do I need to switch to bill pay for everything? Is bill pay more secure than just putting a check in the mail?
Where do you drop the outgoing mail?
I always take checks to the drop at our US Post Office or the box at HEB.
Where do you drop the outgoing mail?
My mailbox of course.
It is a federal felony to mess with a mailbox. Surely no one would mess with my mail.
We had one stolen out of our mailbox on the street. Bank made us whole but that was the last time we put a check in the mailbox waiting for pickup. I miss living in civilization.
n
@paul, any of the “Penguins of Madagascar” shorts, movies, or collections are worth the time. My wife and I still trade quotes, shouted across the house, or just slyly dropped when needed…
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Trump was talking about forcing refineries to reopen but that made him Hittler so I haven’t heard anything in weeks.
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Finally got some cool breezes during my very early tiny little fire tonight. Still 81F though.
n
I’m headed to bed.
Long and busy day tomorrow.
n
I am going to go to work tomorrow. Probably.
I made all of my pot surgical goals today.