My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on March 14, 2020

It was a tiring week with the drip, drip, drip Coronavirus news and highly-reactive financial markets. Although frightening, investors rightly or wrongly responded with a selloff of historic proportions. The entire meltdown seemed more like hysteria and panic and had me wondering how our country and nation ever faced plagues, a weak economy due to serious financial malpractice, large scale terrorism and a world at war? Perhaps we’ve all become complacent thinking disease or bad things would never happen again?

Health and financial stress aside, I escaped into the workshop and started my long-in-planning Music room / Library remodeling and bookshelves project. Even with the stress, I did smile upon noticing one of my corner-clamping blocks had been tamper with by a little girl (Katelyn) back in the late 1980s (photo-left).

My ambition was less than it should be as we instead decided to watch a couple movies as well as with the distraction of other non-important projects. Bird deterrents and crock lids for the patios were sitting on my workbench so I glued together some scrap wood and used up some old varnish on the walnut one as well as some REALLY old “green”  Petit marine EZ-poxy paint from the 1980s that was still useable, which was shocking (I used it to paint the name Brenich on our first boat – good memories). It was shocking that the paint still mixed, brushed and dried after over 35 years!

The second distraction was the arduous job of moving everything out of the room and then finagling a way to move the piano; it was tedious … especially sensing skeptical Brenda hovering over my shoulder.

All good in the end and I did at get the 4 HEAVY sheets of 7-layer maple plywood rough cut to shelf size … should have put on a mask because of all the dust … but alas there are no more to be had (a semi-attempt at joking about the hoarding and emptying of shelves in stores due to COVID19 now in our area).  

First positive coronavirus cases confirmed in Greater Cincinnati, UC Health officials say

BUTLER COUNTY, Ohio  – Four patients have tested positive for COVID-19, UC Health officials announced on Friday.

LINK

Category: Financial, Health, Medical, Photos, Woodworking | No Comments »
Tags: birds, bookshelf, bookshelves, brenich, coronavirus, covid19, ezpoxy, Financial, library, musicroom, paint, petit, projects, workshop

Posted By RichC on March 13, 2020

Earlier this year in preparation for the Sprint – T-Mobile merger, Sprint ended their business relationship with Virgin Mobile USA; Sprint was the carrier for the Virgin plans which we opted to switch to back in the summer of 2017. Neither Brenda or I have had any problems or complains with our wireless service or pricing for years now and we really hated the idea of being forced to switch. But .. business is what business is … and unfortunately our seemingly attractive deal ended (although the really good $1/month deal was over after the first year).

Perhaps I need to give BoostMobile a chance … even though the switch felt force on us without any other options. I looked into the 55+ and AAA Sprint plans, but even talking to Sprint’s Customer Service to try and get pricing seemed like pulling teeth.

Ting would be my favorite wireless company due to their simplicity and excellent customer service, BUT the tiered billing system always had me pinching pennies and data. The self-imposed “frugalist” in me had me thinking about that next jump in a monthly bill – I might as well have a flat fee unlimited plan (probably the same reason I preferred cruise vacations, before they started to nickel and dime travelers). My personal “monitoring anxiety” reminds me what it would be like if I were driving an EV … can you say range anxiety?

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Category: Business, Cellphone, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: boost, boostmobile, carrier, Cellphone, connectivity, frugal, frugalist, iphone, tech friday, techfriday, virgin, virginmobile, wireless

Posted By RichC on March 12, 2020

Question: How old do you have to be to identify this widely recognized sound from our automotive past?

My first “real job” was as a Shell gas station attendant when I turned 16 years old (although cut lawns, did odd jobs and worked as “boy” labor for a commercial fishing company). Pumping gas, washing windshields and checking oil was a great job … and I even had a uniform to wear. The manager worked around my school schedule and gave me more hours in the summer along with the bonus that came from “selling quarts of oil” and never pumping more gasoline than was paid for. There were always a couple of us on duty at the same time and we enjoyed running out as soon as we heard the sound of the bell (mp3 sound above). That was customer service back in the day.

A couple of stories I’ve told to friends and family before has to do with the “rolling” price meter and gallons counter on the 1970s gasoline pumps. As the price would roll to the next cent, there were little 1/3 tick-marks and the objective was to always stop the pump at the “1/3 mark before the next cent.” By doing that, we never over-pumped more fuel than we sold … AND my manager gave the “pump jockeys” the number of cents of gasoline saved in our paychecks. Hey, I was being paid $2.35/hr plus a quarter for every quart of oil sold, so those extra cents were a big deal. It was too bad we didn’t get a bonus for selling packs of cigarettes … I would have made a fortune (cigarettes were about 50 cents a pack I think). I was nice to have a few spending dollars to put gas in “mom’s car” and extra for “money-making” photography business/hobby,  I was also able to save for college since every dollar I put in the bank was one dollar fewer that I didn’t have to borrow.

Ah … student loans .. the bane of today’s millennial generation. I’m not saying that my final student loan debt was painful compared to today, but while working, it was tolerable and could be fit into our budget .. it was still shocking that I took the full 10 years to pay it off and that I even had it when the kids were growing up (we paid off Brenda’s smaller loan much faster .. but even she had a student loan)! Perhaps having them helped us make it a priority as parents to budget for Katelyn and Taylor’s college?  No complaints about having student loans and no regrets for us … but I do understand the struggle for those who dig their holes much deeper.

I still treasure my student loan freedom letter (below).

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Category: Audio, Automotive, Education, Memories, Personal | No Comments »
Tags: attendant, bell, college, degrees, Education, first job, gas station, mp3, payoff, pump, pump jockey, service, shell, sound, sounds, station, student loans

Posted By RichC on March 11, 2020

Although I suspect all the selling on Wall Street has to do with needed cash or the “sell and re-assess later” attitude, I’ve been puzzled that gold (usual safe haven) and utilities have been hit as well. Personally I thought these areas might balance exposure to industrials, tech and energy. Obviously not as Wednesday’s market close was again very ugly.

Still, I do think that if we truly are going to experience a longer term bear market or possible recession that utilities with their fixed cost and attractive dividends based on steadily supplying the electric, gas and water everyone uses should be ok???

What is the utilities sector?

It includes electric, gas and water utilities; independent power producers and energy traders; and companies that produce electricity using renewable sources.

The Utilities sector has tended to perform better when growth and trade concerns resurface, and to underperform when those concerns fade. That’s partly because of the sector’s traditional defensive nature—people need water, gas and electric services during all phases of the business cycle—and these are domestic goods and services, so it has very little international exposure. That suggests that signs of weakness in the global economy amid coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic concerns could relatively support the sector.

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Category: Business, Financial, Health, News | No Comments »
Tags: bear, coronavirus, covid19, djia, energy, gold, nasdaq, recession, schwab, stock market, utilities, wall street

Posted By RichC on March 11, 2020

My friend Jeff gave me a couple “used” books for Christmas this year after we talked last year about our favorite authors and books over the decades. Sloan Wilson, of “Man in the Gray Flannel Suit” fame, also wrote several World War II US Coast Guard and Merchant Marine novels that both of us read and discussed in the 1980s (our mini 2-person book club). I had forgotten the actual story lines so recently am enjoying reading them again, besides I’ve always been a big fan of factual-fiction as it pertains to military and nautical history.

Ice Brothers is the first of the two books … although am currently reading Pacific Interlude … and the story coincided with me reading a question posed about the RMS Titanic and last lifeboat photos. I’m a long time user and occasional reader of Quora.com so in seeing this question, I was off down the rabbit hole reading the interesting answer.

How was it possible for a photograph of the last lifeboat off the Titanic to survive?

Photographs of Titanic’s lifeboats were taken from the rescue ship Carpathia as she picked up survivors and brought the lifeboats aboard the morning after the disaster. They were developed after Carpathia returned to New York and sold to the news media or otherwise preserved.

There are no photographs of either Titanic or her lifeboats taken at the time of the sinking or from the lifeboats themselves. The technology of the day was not capable of it, and none of the survivors would have thought to bring a camera and all its associated apparatus with them, even in the unlikely event that they owned one.

The answer above that Woody Hancock gave was no doubt complete, but the later post by Dave Nitzer was the more interesting read .. and it had photos.

His Answer:

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Category: Books, Friends, History, Human Interest, Idioms, Photography, Photos | No Comments »
Tags: answers, Books, factual fiction, gray flannel suit, History, ice brothers, idiom, idioms, jeff pitts, military, pacific interlude, questions, quora.com, rabbit hole, reading, sloan wilson, titatic

Posted By RichC on March 10, 2020

The “old school” razor sharpening animated GIF below has NOTHING to do with my emotional state after stomaching Monday’s stock market crash and “oil war” between Russia and Saudi Arabia … so don’t read anything into my poor attempt at humor.

After watching the DOW drop over 2158 points and seeing the index close just a tad better has kept me from seeing any light at the end of the tunnel. Have the coronavirus and this oil dispute really as bad as the market perceives them?  Anyway, I thought this razor blade sharpening illustration was pretty neat, not that I’m getting ready for anything! 

Category: Financial, Humor, Misc | No Comments »
Tags: ani gif, anigif, chart, coronavirus, economy, finviz, graph, investing, markets, oil, razor, sharpening, stocks, trading, wsj

Posted By RichC on March 9, 2020

This content is restricted.

Category: Financial, Idioms, Music, News, Photos, Space | No Comments »
Tags: alison krauss, catfish john, idiom, idioms, moon, mp3, Music, music monday, musicmonday, nitty gritty dirt band, Photos, supermoon, worm

Posted By RichC on March 8, 2020

While planning a long overdue bookcase woodworking project, I needed to learn a little more about edge banding. Previous bookcases that I’ve made have all been solid wood and either painted (in our first and second homes) or stained and poly finished oak (several book, CD, video and DVD case). This planned project is a bit larger and requires edge banding of birch plywood on 30+ shelves and likely support pieces. I contemplated cutting my own wood, but using a quality birch and hot melt edge banding makes more sense.

I stumbled on an excellent YouTube content provider Matt Jackson and Next Level Carpentry who offered up some excellent time saving “production” tips that might make my project easier. I was hoping to get started on our Library/Music room in February, but now that it is already March … who knows? Perhaps I’ll end up just archiving the idea and will find the time next winter?

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Category: Ideas, Tidbits, Video, Woodworking | No Comments »
Tags: advice, edgebanding, matt jackson, technic, video next level carpentry, woodworking, youtube

Posted By RichC on March 7, 2020

I’ve purposely put off posting anything to MyDesultoryBlog as the worldwide spread of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (#COVID19) began. Partially since it is challenging to separate the unfounded fears and panic from the real threat since the reporting varies based on news sources (Information from China is particularly questionable but western media sources aren’t all that stellar either). On one hand, we want to take the health risk seriously, on the other, we have infectious diseases that we live with all the time – the common cold and influenza which spreads every year without panic and are the cause for 1000s of deaths, even in 1st world countries. I also think it is wrong to transpose mortality rates for COVID19 from one part of the world to countries who are better prepared for health emergencies. There is also such a thing as “viral seasonality” (debated) that we generally associate with the common cold and flu season, as well as those we have hampered with vaccines.  So, I’m not sure how to appropriately react …besides falling back on what we learned in Boy Scouts – Be Prepared?

As for “being prepared,” that means best practices for protecting yourself and decreasing the spread. First , “wash you hands” … and second, “wash your hands, again.” Most health organization stress that over and over. Use soap and water and consider even using a 60% alcohol-based hand rub (usually mixed with a skin moisturizer – was thinking about mixing up a home-brew since I have a couple gallons of 99% isopropyl alcohol from my printing company days). Step two which is just as important, is to prevent coughing or sneezing openly … do it into your sleeve/elbow. Then “wash your hands again,” just as you should do after using the bathroom.

Also use a little commonsense and wash up before preparing foods or eating and when around babies. Do the same around those with depressed immune systems and the elderly who the the most susceptible to illness. This is all World Health Organization advice and a good practice all the time.

Now if you are traveling and in an area where there “might” be someone who is sick, then go the next step. Take along disinfectant wipes to wipe down surfaces and “consider” traveling with a face mask (click image above for demonstration as to how to use them). The best option is also to use the single-use blue and white mask; the blue side is waterproof and to the outside, and the white side is absorbent and it is worn on the inside. Be sure it pinches around your nose and is fitted under your chin. When you reach your destination, dispose of properly … and again “wash your hands.”

And now for the advice that is not necessarily from the WHO or CDC: (more…)

Category: Business, Financial, Health, Medical, News, Weather | No Comments »
Tags: 401k, be prepared, boy scouts, bsa, cdc, coronavirus, covid19, disease, flu, Health, idiom, idioms, infection, influenza, investing, ira, mortality, opinion, pandemic, precautions, retirement, savings, seasonality, trading, virus, who

Posted By RichC on March 6, 2020

My buddy Jeff Pitts, who has recently moved from IT to  a job focused exclusively on cybersecurity for a worldwide company, tends to error on the side of caution when it comes to privacy practices. He has moved entirely to the Mac (we used to have a  fun debate when he was a 100% PC guy) and switches web browsers more often than I change underwear (but at least my underwear is clean and I’m not still using Netscape). Currently he has settled on the Chromium-based Brave Browser, so I decided to follow his lead since he studies this in far more detail than me. So, I’ve shifted from my usual mix of Chrome, Safari, Firefox and Waterfox browsers depending on OS (and am still on the list for BETA Firefox VPN approval).

You deserve a better internet – click here! 

I’m now building out my daily web surfing and Internet habits using Brave and although there was some initial difficulty with the built in Shields and having to limit my bulky extensions (add-ons for Firefox), I finally have everything clicking the way it should be. For context, my initial problem was due mostly due to Cross-site trackers and Cookies since for some of the WordPress installs I manage use “protected” content served from Amazon AWS servers. This is done for a variety of reasons – number one being that I’m not fond of “hotlinking” or direct linking to images, audio or video that steals bandwidth or protected digital content. I noticed that particularly in the early days of web that several Wikipedia pages were linking to data from my servers (see the myarchive.us link #15 on Wikipedia page –  “1.9 litre TDI engine with Pump Düse”). Of course it is easy enough to just clip the content and use it elsewhere … but at least that doesn’t stealing bandwidth from my servers.

Back to using a browser that intentionally blocks “ads and trackers” and pushes for HTTPS upgrades:

Brave smartly notes and markets the “estimated time” saved when using a browser that respects the user rather than those that see Internet users as customers to be exploited for profit (example above). By now everyone knows that Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc sees users as “the product” and both harvests your data and markets to you.  Personally I understand the in-your-face advertising just as I do on TV … especially since we are getting something free … but I do have a big problem with their semi-secretly collecting our browsing history, sifting through our emails and archiving our personal information with the incentive to sell it to whomever is willing to pay for this data.

If you are not paying for it, you’re not the customer;
you’re the product being sold.

— Quote Investigator

All in all, once the bookmarks and my habits adjusted, I’m somewhat happy with the new Brave browser … at least on the Mac, since I haven’t fully switched on the PC, iPad or iPhone yet. I’ve even opted to give up some privacy and am willing to partner with the Brave Rewards for Creators program – BAT – which offers a way to support those who add content to the Internet (maybe even me?)  Most content creators need advertising and and a way to finance their endeavors, and this may may give them a way to bypass the behemoth “gatekeepers.” So far so good. I’ve linked my Uphold  Cryptocurrency account and am set up to both support and receive support from others who participate … although I’m giving up a little privacy. Stay tuned.

Category: Advice, Computer, Friends, Software, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: apple, bandwidth, brave, browser, chrome, chromium, cookies, cross-site, cyber, cybersecurity, firefox, internet, jeff pitts, mac, netscape, privacy, safari, security, vpn, waterfox, web, wordpress