Category Archives: Beware of Leopard

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22 Octogre 2018

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Mondays

It was Thursdays that Arthur Dent could never get the hang of. For me? Mondays. We slept in Sunday morning, a bit, and it pushed the whole day. Oh, well.

Got lots done over the weekend. The last of the parts arrived Friday, and I repaired my snow blower, thus staving of the return of Snowmageddon this winter. While I roasted some SO coffee beans from Burundi, I cleaned up the workshop and gave myself a haircut. I also made a delicious batch of chili with hot italian sausage, ground turkey, fire roasted tomatoes, kidney and black beans, and the very last of the bedraggled peppers from the garden. Yummy, and enough for an army (or us for a week).

Channeling Ed Sullivan

I’ve got my bit to do for a presentation this week, we’ve been in prep for the last week or so, and it’s coming down to suit and tie time. So of course I’ve lost track of the one proper tie tack I have, and while I can cope, I’d like a fall back for the next time I can’t find it. But I’ve searched, and no one is selling Weeping Angel tie tacks. I wonder why?

Winding Down

No other news of note, and thankfully, DoD has no new casualties to report. Be good to each other, and make sure to vote!

9 September 2018

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We’ve been home from Maine for about 30 hours. It’s been raining for approximately 36 of those hours. And I’m having fun with the french drains leading to the sump pump. I think one is mostly blocked … AND I’ve got some grading issues along that side of the house. Sigh. Today I back-filled and improved some of the grading. I also extended a couple of gutter drains a lot further away from the house. Hope it helps while I figure out what the next move is. After all, there’s rain in the forecast here for each of the next eight days. Sigh.

Maine. We did another week up at Cobbosseeconte Lake, and got some fishing in each day. I caught a few undersized, malnourished specimens, but Marcia had a spectacular week:

Tuesday: 19.5", 3.5# Large mouth bass caught by Marcia

Tuesday: 19.5″, 3.5# Large mouth bass

Thursday: 19", 3# Large mouth bass caught by Marcia

Thursday: 19″, 3# Large mouth bass

Both of those went right back into the water and swam off after their photo opp. No matter that bass is tasty, regulations for the lake require bass between 16 and 20 inches to go back in the water. One presumes that this is to protect some of the trophy-size fish for the regular tournaments that grace those Maine waters. It was a good week, very quiet and lovely once the holiday weekend folks were gone.

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For the upcoming week, Lexi is getting surgery to deal with some gum issues, and a tooth cleaning as long as they’re putting her out. I’ve got a large backlog of work to deal with. And maybe continuing water problems. We’ll see what’s next.

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DoD announced no new casualties in the last few days.

19 August 2018

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I spent a couple of days in Columbus, Ohio, and all I got was this crummy head cold. Yay? It was a really successful trip, though. But the cold means I didn’t get jack done this weekend. By the time next weekend rolls around, the weeds that overtook the lawn will be sentient. I did get some shopping done, and the coffee roasting. But that’s about it. Most of the rest was watching DVR’d food network shows from a prone position, and blasting my way through facial tissues like there’s no tomorrow. The real question is: Can I hold out and watch the Hugo Awards live stream tonight. I fear not.

DoD announced no new casualties in the last few days.

8 July 2018

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Well, that was a busy week. And although we had a lovely weekend, weather-wise, it was mostly downtime for me. I wasn’t feeling very chipper yesterday. Today, I got the bare minimum done – shopping and coffee roasting. I did spend some time playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution, though. I play these shooters in story mode, and they’re fun for me that way. I’m not fond of the die-every-minute mode they’ve put in for the fun kids with extreme fast twitch reflexes.

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Our condolences to the family and friends of Cpl. Joseph Maciel of South Gate, California, who died on July 7, 2018, in Tarin Kowt District, Uruzgan Province, Afghanistan, from wounds sustained during an apparent insider attack.

20 May 2018

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Howdy. A full work week, followed by chores and theatre on Saturday, and mowing a wet, wet, tall set of lawns today. We had just one rainy stretch – it lasted from Saturday the 12th until this morning. All in, according to my still-poorly-sited rain gauge, we got just under 5″ of rain in that period of time. Not too shabby.  The abbreviated garden hasn’t drowned or died from lack of direct sunlight, either … yet.

I’ve been working my way through some Python (programming language) training, and I’ve reached once again the point where I spend more time fighting to understand how to solve the problem as poorly-posed, than I do on solving the problem. The underlying issue is that the specification and sample code in the exercises end up displaying only a passing resemblance to the solution code. If I make my best guess about just what the author of the tutorial wants, I end up with either slightly or dramatically different code, sometimes solving problems that clearly aren’t as described in the text. Maybe that’s part of the lesson – do the best you can with incomplete specifications and remember that it’s not permissible to kill the stakeholders. Harumph!

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DoD reported no new casualties in the last week. US school districts did, sadly. Our elected representatives should be doing more to address that than their corporate donors would prefer.

14 May 2018

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A day late, and a bit more than a dollar short. We missed the storms this evening by attending the ASC Cabaret – lovely. Weekend: yardwork, getting a bunch of stuff done, but just one bed fully prepared, planted, and protected from the wrascally wrabbits.

2018 garden - one bed planted so far.

2018 garden – one bed planted so far.

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DoD reports no casualties in the last week. Ciao!

26 March 2018

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Busy week and weekend past. The week brought us our heaviest snow of the season, on the first day of Spring. Here’s a shot from my drive home last Wednesday, midday:

First day of Spring: Snow

First day of Spring: Snow

Much of the weekend went to house cleaning and associated chores – we have a house guest arriving shortly. I also roasted some more of the Guatemala Pico Mayor Gesha from Sweet Maria’s. Lovely stuff, and it wouldn’t do to run out because I’ll be brewing more than usual, perhaps. I also did some more glue-ups on the new jig I built last weekend:

New glue-up jig in woodshop

New glue-up jig in woodshop

 

We march in spirit with students from across the Union, in search of leadership that can do better at many things, including championing and passing sane laws regarding guns.

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DoD announced no new casualties in the last week. Ciao!

22 October 2017

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Work. Chores. A bit of Barrett-Jackson from Las Vegas. And there goes the week and the weekend. Seriously. The cars are clean, the lawn is mowed, the coffee is roasted, the roaster is clean, now, too, and most of the work has gone well. But with patching, there was a lot of that to go around.

There are only four more chances for you to see Much Ado About Nothing at the Annapolis Shakespeare Company, though, so get your ass over there and show them some love.

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DoD reported no new casualties in the last week. Ciao!

4 September 2017

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Hullo. Happity Labor Day, for US visitors. Happy first post in the final one third (not “two thirds”… sigh) of the year, for everyone else. Hurray for a three day weekend. I’ve celebrated by not checking email at all (for work), which means several hundred emails, mostly system generated, tomorrow. Oh, well.

Not much else to report – we went out fishing for a bit, but catching wasn’t on the menu. Otherwise a lovely weekend.

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Our condolences to the family and friends of Staff Sgt. Emil Rivera-Lopez, who was declared deceased on Aug. 31 as a result of a training incident on Aug. 25, off the coast of Yemen, where he was supporting U.S. Central Command operations.