The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning

Ed Nisley's Blog: Shop notes, electronics, firmware, machinery, 3D printing, laser cuttery, and curiosities. Contents: 100% human thinking, 0% AI slop.

Category: Oddities

Who’d’a thunk it?

  • Forsythia Clearing

    It was decided, in that place where what is decided must be, that the time had come to hack back the giant forsythia stand encroaching from the neighbor’s yard. The stuff tip-roots, so anything that stands in its way gets assimilated, and the only way to make headway is to tear it out by the roots.

    We eventually clearcut a section about 15 feet wide and 40 feet long by the simple expedient of lopping off everything that stuck up:

    Cleared Forsythia
    Cleared Forsythia

    Removing the roots required prying with a 7 foot length of 1.5 inch octagonal steel bar braced on a chunk of 4×4 inch lumber rammed up against the roots. With my full weight on a 6 foot lever arm, the roots would just barely break free.

    A dozen wheelbarrow loads like this went atop the branches on the heap:

    Forsythia root balls
    Forsythia root balls

    That’s my kind of outdoor work: kill them all…

    Mary raked and seeded the debris field just before the next rainfall. It ought to be good for another few years.

  • Gas Flareoff

    While I was on that ride, I found this at the bottom of a smoky pillar rising along the Hudson River:

    Turns out Central Hudson Gas & Electric has a pipeline under the Hudson at that point and I’d admired their spherical storage tank from ground level some years back:

    Gas Storage Tank
    Gas Storage Tank

    I don’t know what they’re flaring off, but it looks messier than, say, propane. There’s another flare nozzle just out of the picture on the lower left, both along the edge of the circular concrete pad left over from a cylindrical storage tank, so they do this often enough to have some permanent infrastructure.

  • Dropbox vs. Little Bobby Tables

    The Android version of the Dropbox interface (on the Kindle, anyway) lets you create a password like this:

    ab&CDef{gHi

    Come to find out that, although the web-based Dropbox interface doesn’t reject that password, it kvetches that your userid and password don’t match. Yes, even if you cut-and-paste from a text file copied through the USB link.

    Fortunately, the web interface has a password reset mechanism that’s missing from the Kindle app.

    Little Bobby Tables rides again!

  • Credit Card Services: A Tinge Of Doubt Crosses His Mind

    This call from Credit Card Services lasted about a minute, but was highly informative. I pressed 1 to lower my interest rates, then …

    CCS: This call is regarding an issue with your Visa and Mastercard credit card accounts. Based on changes in your credit score and repayment history over the last twelve months, you may be eligible for a lower interest rate. In order to qualify, you must have a balance on at least one card of at least $4000. Is that the case?

    Me: Sure.

    CCS: The interest rate on that account must average more than 12 percent. Is that the case?

    Me: Sure.

    CCS: I must verify your phone number. Our records show that it is [reads off number].

    Me: Sure.

    CCS: And your name is [reads off my formal name, which shows he doesn’t know me from Adam Smith].

    Me: Sure.

    CCS: What is the total balance on all your credit cards?

    Me: Well, that’s hard to say.

    CCS: All we need is an estimate.

    Me: Let’s call it ten grand. [This is a lie. Next time, I’ll say twenty grand.]

    CCS: And how many credit cards do you have?

    Me: Four. [Also a lie. Next time, I’ll say eight.]

    CCS: [background chatter, loud crash, call disconnects.]

    Previous Credit Card Services contestants have sworn that they do not know what number they dialed. After you pass a minimum qualification, well, suddenly they do know your number and your name. Huh. Who’d’a thunk it?

    This contestant did not pass me to the CCS Level 2 Closer, the guy who attempts to tongue-wrestle victims into divulging a credit card number that he will instantly siphon money out of. We recently burned the balance in a gift card obtained for test-driving a Toyota (hey, I won’t pass up free money), so maybe I’ll feed those digits into the next call.

    If I sounded more enthusiastic, I’m sure I could reach the Closer!

    I used to think that a sensible person running a scam like CCS would make it a point to not re-call smartasses who jerk my reps around. Now, I’m sure the reps run on pure commission and the marginal cost of making a phone call sits right around zero, so the sensible person running CCS has nothing to lose.

    Search herein for Credit Card Services (or just CCS) to find previous installments of this continuing adventure.

    The title is a tip o’ the cycling helmet to Zappa:

    Motorcycle Man: Well, let’s make a deal if you think that’s true
    I mean, you’re the devil, so whatcha gonna do?

    Devil: Wait a minute. A tinge of doubt crosses my mind
    When you say that you want to make a deal with me.

    You find the rest on your own, OK?

  • Blog Hits: Dirac Delta

    The admin pages for this blog have a “sparkle bar” along the top that shows the hourly hit rate, which is usually a simple diurnal cycle: most activity happens during the Western Hemisphere daylight hours.

    Yesterday was different:

    Blog Hourly Hits - 2012-05-19
    Blog Hourly Hits – 2012-05-19

    In the space of about 10 minutes, my sleepy post about a bicycle saddle advertisement received 207 hits from “bike riding” at Yahoo! image search. For the last two and a half years, it’s been ticking along at about 1 hit/day, so I think that spike represents a nice example of a Dirac Delta Function in action.

    I no longer even pretend to know what’s going on…

     

  • Ladybugs!

    These freshly hatched alligator-oid critters:

    Ladybug larvae
    Ladybug larvae

    …. quickly become something even more fearsome, at least to aphids smaller than they are:

    Ladybug Larva Eating Aphid
    Ladybug Larva Eating Aphid (by Cheryl Hearty – CCE/DC)

    Eventually they turn into Ladybugs who relentlessly stalk larger aphids on garden plants:

    Ladybug with aphids
    Ladybug with aphids

    And then they do this and the wheel goes around:

    Ladybugs mating
    Ladybugs mating

    Gardeners love them ever so much…

  • Outdated First Aid Instructions

    The Plumbing Treasure Chest started life as a first-aid box designed to hang on a  wall. Inside the drop-down lid appears this list of Instructions For First Aid:

    Instructions For First Aid
    Instructions For First Aid

    You can’t even buy some of that stuff these days…