My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on February 2, 2023

EXCERPT => “On November 23, 1942, the Royal Navy destroyer SS Benlomond was torpedoed by a German submarine. Poon Lim, a Chinese civilian seaman aboard the ship, found himself stranded in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Against all odds, Poon Lim survived 133 days at sea before being rescued by Brazilian fishermen.”

This Carl Seaver blog post takes a closer look at Poon Lim’s remarkable life and story.

Read the full post at this LINK is on HistoryDefined.net.

Really … this Throwback Thursday #TBT “repost” was another MarsEdit test. I’m still trying to decide if I can handle shifting from Open Live Writer on Windows to MarsEdit on the Mac?  Unfortunately, unlike copy/paste to a Markdown editor when using my tiny Raspberry Pi HUGO test server, reposting from another website is not so easy using MarsEdit.

Category: Blogs, History, Software, TBT | No Comments »
Tags: markdown, marsedit, poon lin, repost, testing

Posted By RichC on February 1, 2023

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Category: Alexa, Audio, Personal, Photos, Social Media | No Comments »
Tags: Alexa, annalyn, clermont, ellerie, government, message, mp3, taylor

Posted By RichC on January 31, 2023

I would be remise to not mention the the AFC playoff game that left Cincinnati Bengals fans out in the cold, unfortunately the excitement dwindles when your hometeam loses.

In my opinion, the Bengals were healthier and the better team going into the game against the Kansas City Chiefs, but as anyone who has watch Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs play under the coaching of Andy Reid, they are an extremely talented team. Obviously even though they were not 100%, it was enough to push past Joe Burrow and the Bengals this year.

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Category: Sports | No Comments »
Tags: afc, bengals, cincinnati, kansas city chiefs, nfl, superbowl

Posted By RichC on January 30, 2023

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Category: Archive, Health, Medical, Music, Personal, Photos | No Comments »
Tags: barefoot, brenda, excapism, flip-flops, fracture bionic, hip, injury, just keep livin, mishka, mp3, music monday, musicmonday, no shoes radio, radio margaritaville, reggae, shoulder, siriusxm, surgery, xray

Posted By RichC on January 29, 2023

Instead of painting the entire woodworking project that is currently underway in the workshop, I want at least to be able to naturally lacquer finish the frames of the Cornhole game. Partially it is to show off the miters and walnut splines in the frame corners and partially because I didn’t want to use any fasteners that could rust (unfortunately each corner has one brass screw to help with alignment). Still the 1/4” splines will do a great job in adding strength even though I used clear pine to reduce the weight (a couple “little” girls will hopefully be using these)? 

To help with the spline positioning, I made a jig that would clamp to each corner and repeat the exact same cut with my Makita router and 1/4” spiral bit. After a little experimented with scrap, it worked perfect. I cut walnut splines on the bandsaw sled (below) and new 45 degree miter gauge and used my portable belt sander to sand each spline flush. 

I’m so glad to have figured out the hole cutting and was thankful I had waterproof Titebond 3 glue and some stainless steel brads. 

Category: Personal, Photos, Woodworking | No Comments »
Tags: cornhole, granddaughters, jig, miter, project, router, spline, woodworking, workshop

Posted By RichC on January 28, 2023

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Category: Gadget, Memories, Personal, Photos, Video | No Comments »
Tags: Alexa, annalyn, echo, ellerie, family, granddaughters, katelyn, mp4, snow, snowday

Posted By RichC on January 27, 2023

As a boy growing up enamored with the NASA Apollo program and going to the moon in the 1960s, I’m still a little peeved at Pluto’s demotion from planet status. Nevertheless, I’m amazed at the New Horizon spaceship’s video flying over the mountains of Pluto. Amazing and a worthwhile Friday Filler.

Category: Science, Space, Video | No Comments »
Tags: apollo, friday filler, mp4, nasa, new horizons, pluto, probe, spaceship, video

Posted By RichC on January 26, 2023

Besides nursing duties and doctor visits with Brenda this past week, I’ve been working with a customer who would like to deploy a non-CMS website and completely forgot to post something on Thursday — making it up today. Although I’m partial to using an inexpensive Linux server with Apache and MySQL, he would like to use one of the lightweight static site generators. Since I’ve worked a little bit with Hugo in the past as a hobbyist, I demonstrated it and proceeded to head down a rabbit hole in trying to address the many limitations and how to still create a site that accomplished his goals (a learning curve was waste of several hours and an evening). 

Markdown is the preferred way to create content and once learned can be pretty powerful and quick. Unfortunately much of what we want to include nowadays bring in data that is easier to include as html. 

So I put together and reposted page from my WordPress blog on a Raspberry Pi running Linux and Hugo (the prior links may not remain alive all that long). 

Category: Blogs, Health, Medical, Productivity, Raspberry Pi, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: brenda, font, hip replacement, hugo, linux, raspberry pi, rdc personal font, static site, webserver

Posted By RichC on January 25, 2023

Over weekend of snowy Bengal – Bills playoff football, I was able to get down to the workshop and continue working on a joint granddaughters’ birthdays present. The project required larger holes than I have a hole saw for and cutting it with a jigsaw would have left an imperfect hole.

So … I used an odd baseplate from my Makita router and tapped a new “pivot” hole so that I could use my 1/4” spiral bit to gradually cut the circle. Since I only needed two equal holes, I just used the pivot point two times … but if I were going to do this again, I think cutting one in some 1/4” template material and using a bearing shanked bit would be preferred?

Anyway, the holes turned out great and I was even able to use the shopvac attached to the clear plastic chute to clear nearly all the dust and debris … something that never seems to go well for me (I usually make a mess).

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Category: How-To, Personal, Photos, Tools, Woodworking | No Comments »
Tags: cornhole, project, router, safety glasses, tips, woodworking, workshop

Posted By RichC on January 24, 2023

Just as the Cincinnati Bengals did last year in January 2022, they will be facing the Kansas City Chiefs again this year in the AFC Championship game after defeating the Bills in Buffalo on Sunday … impressively I might add.  Even though I was proudly wearing my Joe Burrows #9 jersey, the credit goes to every member of the Bengals. From coaching (Head Coach Zac Taylor above) to every player, they performed like a machine. Let’s just hope the Bengals can do the same as they have dial up a win against KC the last 3 times the teams have gone head to head.

One advantage the Bengals have over the Chiefs this year is that QB Patrick Mahomes suffered a “high ankle sprain” in the playoff game against the Jaguars … this could prevent him from scrambling and being so effective. 

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Category: Sports | No Comments »
Tags: afc, bengals, buffalo bills, chiefs, cincinnati, football, joe burrow, kansas city chiefs, nfl, patrick mahomes, zac taylor