My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on August 20, 2026

Back in July, I considered selling our 1982 Mercedes-Benz 300D Turbodiesel since it wasn’t being driven as much as in the past … and even transferred my amateur radio vanity plates to the Tesla (stay tuned for a story). I also need to start consolidating my garage space and lifetime accumulation of stuff. Part of me wants to sell my dad’s Packard too, but it still has a little sentimental value left (but I’m getting in the mood). 

The other point is that I would mind haven’t a little more garage room to actually work on projects without having to shuffle everything around. If I want to work an hour or two on a car, it will be there … if not, it will be ready when I feel like it (the MGB could use some tinkering).  So … it is listed on Classic.com.

The third, and less relevant  point, yet another neighbor (this one on the west side of us) has just sold his house ( 1, 2 ). I talked with him last week, and as he had before, commented that he was thinking about selling. I always made perfect sense to me since he is single and a few years older than me … and never work out in his yard. So when someone approached him and made an offer and said he didn’t need to improve, update or paint anything … and that the buyer would cover all the closing costs etc, it was the push he needed.

Hm … I wonder what kind of push I would need … or more importantly, Brenda. 😉 

Category: Automotive, Diesel, For Sale, Mercedes | No Comments »
Tags: 300d, classic, for sale, k4rdc, listing, mercedes benz, turbodiesel

Posted By RichC on August 19, 2026

Have you seen this map of the 10 rivers in Asia and Africa that are responsible for 95% of the plastic polluting the world’s oceans … and is it true?

The claim comes from a real 2017 study (Schmidt et al.). Researchers estimated that rivers carry 0.4–4 million tons of plastic to the sea each year … and that the top 10 rivers accounted for 88–95% of plastic pollution. The rivers were mainly large Asian systems plus the Nile and Niger.

Here is what might be missing:
The study measured plastic moving through rivers, not all plastic entering the oceans. Other sources such as coastal dumping, litter near shorelines, etc are also contributing. There was also an earlier estimate that put the total land-based plastic entering the ocean at roughly 5–13 million tons per year. In 2021 (Meijer et al.) further revised the picture. Emissions appear more widely distributed – more than 1,000 rivers account for about 80% of river plastic, with many smaller urban and coastal rivers ranking high, especially in the Philippines, India, and Malaysia.

Bottom line: (more…)

Category: Environment | No Comments »
Tags: africa, asia, plastic, plastic bags, polution, rivers, water bottles

Posted By RichC on August 18, 2026

The summer storms keep coming again and again!

One hundred dollar hamburger lunches are done in small planes (a “staying current” aviation tease), but Brenda and I sort of did the same this past weekend. Instead of hamburgers at airports, we drove “her” 2019 Tesla Model 3 to Fazoli’s and back on Sunday afternoon … leftover from her pick for a birthday lunch (and thanks for the gift card, Gigi).😉  

It wasn’t all that exciting of a drive, but we did enjoy the pasta and breadsticks reflecting on our very early years of marriage and going to the inexpensive $1.99 meal at the Red Barn in Streetsboro, Ohio  … and then years of going out to Spinning Fork with and without our kids in Fairfield, Ohio (so sad closed and the new one is no longer there or the same). 

Anyway, after checking out a range test between a couple of EVs by a YouTuber OutOfSpecReviews primarily comparing the real world 70 mph range test between a 2026 Rivian R2 and a 2026 Tesla Model Y, I thought it would be interesting to know what my “real driving” (more than 70 mph) was on the recent 58 mile round trip.

The battery is now 7 years old and on the smaller 54 kWh (gross) with about 50 kWh (usable) “when new” so we’re at least 15% degraded from the quoted 240 mile range BUT in real world situations can’t plan for even 200 miles from a full charge (I still need to “push” test this). 

Using this past weekend as a test though, the efficiency during a 58 mile round trip drive and stop to eat was 4.14 miles/kWh or 241.4 Wh/mi. 

And since I snipped the “back of the napkin” comparison that was quickly written down by the guys running the Rivian R2 vs Model Y test from the video by the @Out_of_Spec guys, I’ll include it below:

(more…)

Category: Archive, Automotive, Aviation, Tesla, Travel | No Comments »
Tags: driving, fazolis, outofspecreviews, range, spinning fork, storms, tesla model 3

Posted By RichC on August 17, 2026

I can’t believe it … I didn’t realize that Seals and Crofts and ”Get Closer” was mentioned on Music Monday before 7 years ago. Nevertheless, they were one of my favorites harmony groups back on the 1970s … but yes I did include their 1973 Summer Breeze Live version and 1972 Summer Breeze recorded version pre-Music Monday though.

After hearing Get Closer from 1976 on SiriusXm “The Bridge” … I decided it was time to mention them again.
 

Category: Music | No Comments »
Tags: mp3 get closer, music monday, musicmonday, seals and croft, siriusxm, thebridge

Posted By RichC on August 16, 2026

Anthropic recently confirmed that Claude AI will now embed invisible watermarks into AI-generated text, in order to comply with the EU AI Act’s transparency rules that took effect August 2. The watermark travels with the text even after copying and light editing, and doesn’t affect readability — you’d never spot it by eye.

Here’s how it works according to ClaudeAI:

Anthropic is now embedding invisible, machine-readable watermarks into text (and signed provenance metadata into files) generated by Claude, in order to comply with the EU AI Act’s Transparency Code, which took effect on August 2, 2026 and requires AI companies to mark AI-generated or edited content in a way other systems can identify. 

When a supported Claude model generates text, it weaves an imperceptible watermark directly into the text itself — invisible to readers, and it will survive copying and pasting, even light editing.

For images and other files, Claude uses signed provenance metadata based on the open C2PA standard (Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity) for JPG, PNG, and SVG files.

The watermark applies to essentially all text Claude outputs — even assistive edits like translation, summarizing, or proofreading — not just fully AI-authored content, which goes beyond what the EU Code technically requires (the Code has an exception for “standard editing” that doesn’t substantially alter meaning). Anthropic chose to apply it broadly anyway, erring on the side of caution.

Rollout

• Claude models launched on or after August 2, 2026 support this marking at launch, and it applies across Claude Platform (API), Claude.ai, Claude Code, Claude Cowork, and Claude Tag, worldwide. 
• Anthropic is still working on adding marking support to older models, with a transition period built in for models launched before August 2. 

Reaction

It’s gotten a notably mixed/negative response. Backlash intensified as users pushed back against the idea that AI use would now be detectable in their own work, sparking debate over who deserves credit for AI-assisted writing — the tool or the person who directed it. Critics also note the flat “AI-generated” label doesn’t distinguish between someone mass-producing fake content and someone just using Claude to polish a paragraph or translate a transcript. 

Category: AI, Human Interest, News, Productivity, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: anthropic, artificial intelligence, claude.ai, invisible, watermark, watermarking

Posted By RichC on August 15, 2026

Ever since the women’s basketball phenom Caitlin Clark entered the WNBA, there has been increasing attention to a sport that has gone unnoticed by much of America. Now the talk on sports radio, social media and conservative television isn’t about Clark’s dominating performance, but more about her being targeted (above – some think jealousy and other think race) … but she has quietly played her game choosing not to get overly political.

On the other hand, her teammate Sophie Cunningham (the enforcer), a great basketball player in her own right, hasn’t shied way from away from physical play and standing up for a teammate or “biological women” playing in sports (not transgender women — actually biological men). She also happens to be white, attractive and straight in a sport where being black or a lesbian is common.

This in turn has made her both a target and lightning rod for those who see things differently and have elevated the entire WNBA into the political realm. Sides are drawn and advocates for left-leaning ideology, open to transgender athletes playing in women’s sports (ie. biological men in women’s sports). The more traditional conservative political side has taken to Sophie Cunningham’s position (and other women) and appreciate her speaking out for all girls and advocate that the WNBA side with them.

As it was for female college athletes losing spots to biological men for scholarships and podium spots a few years ago … it has become just another divisive political issue.

Unfortunately as sports get overly physical, athletes get injured, insults fly and tempers take to social media … as it did with Chicago Sky guard DiJonai Carrington after being ejected  for a flagrant foul in a block against Indiana Fever player Sophie Cunningham … and locker room post claiming “White Privilege” (she claimed it was misconstrued).

Who knows where this will end … but a couple of NBA stars have signaled they are willing to take this to the next level and have declared themselves “women” and eligible for the WNBA next season (an Enes Freedom meme quickly made its way around social media … and I could resist including) .

It is disappointing that the hard won Title IX sex-based discrimination treatment for women and girls in sports are being squandered away in the name of inclusion or inability to define what a women or girl is these days. It is a ridiculous argument in my book … but on the other hand, generates a lot more attention for the WNBA. 

Category: News, Politics, Sports | No Comments »
Tags: basketball, Caitlin Clark, racism, sophie cunningham, title ix, transgender, wikipedia, wnba, women

Posted By RichC on August 14, 2026

Nothing really earth shattering regarding a WordPress plug-in glitch requiring a PHP update earlier this week, but it did force me to tweak my “smallish” Digital Ocean server that really is in need of more RAM. But, since I offload image serving for the most part to a separate server and audio/video streaming to AWS for the most part, the WordPress demand and “bots from China, etc” hammering the server are the most pressing issues.

Every process seems to wants more memory and even a quick chat with Claude AI is encouraging me to increase my droplet to 2 GB of RAM (currently 1GB). I’ve tried to improve efficiency by using SWAP and upgraded to a Premium AMD CPU and NVMe SSD which is better for SWAP, but a Wordfence process scanning will no longer complete the task under PHP 8.3 … even giving it more time. I’m going to set up a “pm = ondemand” to see what happens as things settle down … rather than doubling my monthly server costs.

Category: Advice, AI, Blogs, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: blog, digital ocean, linux, mdb, php, tech friday, techfriday, wordfence, wordpress