Good morning!!!!

[Bird]

I can just hear the rustle of Bird's old ticket book, as he pulls out the ticket writing pen.
C'mon Boy, light 'er up.
Stand on the brakes, floor the pedal, and do a big burney drift in a full circle for your admiring friends.
And then you are mine... ka ching ka ching

we are never too old to be stupid.
So we need to be careful.

You might not realize that I was also one of those dumb kids in my teenage years. I did a lot of hot rodding without getting caught. And for my last 2 years of high school, I had a 2 year old black and white Mercury convertible on which I put moon hub cabs and twin glass pack mufflers. I'm afraid I had a reputation during my last year of high school for being a hot rodder and stunt driver. And I never got caught hot rodding. But I did get some speeding tickets for doing 10 over in "normal" driving.

I had not gotten a traffic ticket in more than a year when I applied for the police department, but I HAD gotten a total of 6 traffic tickets in my younger days. I still remember in the final interview for the police department, the assistant chief asked me why I had gotten so many tickets, and I told him, "I guess I just learned slow."

But I think I did finally learn . . . I went on to get a 20 consecutive year safe driving award; never crashed a squad car in spite of running some incredibly high speed chases, some of which resulted in other officers involved, and or, the suspect vehicle crashing.

And I guess I can tell now since the other people involved are long gone. But I'll never forget the first time I drove the squad car after I got out of the academy. My older partner/trainer did all the driving the first couple of days and I had no idea if or when he was going to expect me to drive. But we were on the day shift that first month, and shortly after noon one day, he pulled over and said, "It's your turn to drive." So I got behind the wheel and asked, "Where do you want to go?" And he said,"You're driving." So I drove down a freeway at the speed limit, and looking for speeders, and he suddenly flipped on the red lights and siren switches and told me to hit the siren take the next exit and turn right. I was wondering what kind of emergency call I could have missed on the radio, but we went over the Trinity River into West Dallas and he'd tell me, "Get on it." and "Turn right" or "Turn left" with me wondering where we were going, but then when I circled the same block twice I figured out that something wasn't right. But after a bit, he reached over switched off the red lights and said, "That's enough." Now they had told us in the Academy about some possible dire consequences if we should be caught playing with the red lights and siren. So I didn't say anything to him, or intend to say anything to anyone else, but later that afternoon, we met our sergeant for coffee and he told the sergeant what we'd been doing. The sergeant said, "That's a good idea to teach him how to before he has to."

I still wonder what would have happened if I'd crashed that car that day.

 

[RedNeckGeek]

Good Morning!!!! 53F @ 5:45AM. Plentiful sunshine. High 64F. Winds light and variable.
The 10-day is now showing rain showers for next Thursday, and a week from Sunday. And the weather geek on the TV last night thought there'd be more on Monday.

Got the same drip problem on the Ariens splitter, Billy. I get a piece of heavy duty aluminum foil and make a little ramp/funnel shaped thing to put under the drain plug, and it saves most of the mess.

You've definitely got the friendliest and most colorful birds, Doug, but Ron's are bigger.

I did enough stupid stuff with only half the horsepower in that BMW 5 series I had, Drew. You should be able to do twice as much!

You can do 180 miles standing on your head, Bruce. Looking forward to seeing that record broken.

Sorry the Rubbermaid turned into a fiasco, Drew. That Amish shed will be bigger and better build, so I hope you'll be coming out ahead in the end.

Sounds like you might be getting a basket to put your beans in for Christmas, Don. And that the tire's been screwed. Maybe they can use the threads to back it out. Glad they got the snake before anyone got hurt.

Hope the news isn't too bad when you get to the bottom of what's going on with the Kubota, RS.

Sounds like it's still too early to tell much about Omicron, Chris, but is sure sounds scary. I see more hand sanitizing, masking, and distancing in our future, and maybe even another shot or three.

The water tank project is pretty much done, Ken. No hurry on the fire truck, so it might be a while on it.

If you can at least get the nut started, could you use a pair of locking pliers to keep the nut from turning, Paul?

Still trying to get some old database files converted to a spreadsheet, but I'm having trouble getting a compatible combination of the database software and operating system installed onto the same computer. Might be a case of you can't get there from here...

Made good progress on the white bike. Drive line is finished, and shifting the transmission through the gears with the foot shift works just as it should. Now I can roll it off the lift, but before I do, I want to get the intakes installed on the carbs to keep the mice out. Next job is an oil change and valve adjustment on the touring bike, and to make a new set of saddle bag mounts so I can go to larger bags for the New Years run south.

Got a bad news email from Starlink earlier this week telling me that due to supply line shortages, their new installs are falling at least six months behind. Yet they're opening up service in twenty new countries. Seems like they should be taking care of the customers they already have before they try to get more...

TGIF gang!

 

[kenmbz]

Morning all, sunny and 40, was warm last night and sun is coming up.
Got 2 rings for the light sphere welded up last night. Getting used the the FC welding.
Ordered some magnets to help hold the rig as I make the globe shape.

Wngsprd/Thomas - Hope your gout goes away soon.

Don- mini UFO in the tire, not good at keeping air in.

Alien - barn looks great, quite jealous.

Mostly - 6000 miles- Got me topped. Congratulations on the milestone!

Rip- busy day, hope they can get your septic fixed properly, seems like they are training you to trouble shoot.

Stay safe and be well,

 

[Rich B1]

Good morning! 38 and about to drizzle again. Supposed to get to 44 today. Yesterday's low 50's felt good.

Mostly - 6k miles, I am impressed, congratulations.

I have a couple of hard to change things with poor access for changing oil. I use a piece of cardboard to make an improvised ramp to run the oil into the container.

And here is the my tale from one year ago. This is a bit long..sorry.

Last year, this was a pivotal day. Some of it, I know I am not going to really be able to describe. There are a lot of things that went thru my head one year ago that I simply not going to describe in any detail......if at all. See how it goes as I type this.

Another mostly sleepless night, blood draw, my right arm was looking ugly with bruises. I was getting blood drawn 2X/day starting on Thursday. Then my morning quality time with the ****** Youth.

Dr. S, Dr. F, and the urologist came in early. The urologist talked to me about my kidneys, while nothing appeared physically wrong in the sonogram, they were barely functioning. My blood work from that morning was a mess, liver, spleen, and kidney enzymes were all in the danger zone. And my vitals were no better than yesterday, 90% BOL, heart rate - 145 BPM, temperature 102°, blood pressure was running high, but I forget how high. And I felt awful. Worst I had felt yet. They left.

Around 10 AM, Dr. S came in by himself. Told me he had called my wife and talked to her. Then he told me I needed to face reality. He told me that he was looking for a ventilator to put me on as he only felt I had 2 - 3 days to live. He proceeded to show me how they would place my arms as they lowered me on the ventilator and how I would feel on the ventilator until I lost consciousness, slipped into a coma, and died. He actually went through it in detail......

Then he walked out of the room. It was the last time I saw him.

The next hour or so were likely the worst hour or so of my life. Fear, anguish, regret, fear, sorrow, fear, etc. (did I say fear) went through my head. it was horrible. I still hate thinking about it. I know I am going to check out sooner or later, but to get told in detail how I was gonna check out was something I had a really hard time dealing with.

Then the phone rang. It was my wife, she was crying and had been for about 2 hours. Seems that POS Dr. S had really called her (I didn't believe him) and told her to call a funeral home and make arrangements for a funeral since he figured I would be dead by Sunday. We talked for a while, I told her what he told me, and I remember telling her "I am going to prove that POS is wrong".

I got off the phone with her, my throat was hurting from the NG tube irritating it. And I had a rage starting to burn in my brain. Rage at a virus that had me this sick, rage at a POS doctor who had the bedside manner of venomous snake. And I need to be watch what I say in this paragraph as a lot of evil thoughts went through my head. When I get mad enough, I tend to go silent to not say anything I KNOW I will regret. So I went silent with the nurses. And laid there raging in my head. Didn't even speak to the girl drawing my blood right after lunch, and she & I got along fairly well.

Something funny happened while I was burning with rage. I urinated. It shocked me. Felt like I was peeing the bed. Then I did it again. When the nurses were in checking on me, they were surprised I needed my bag emptied, it was all but full.

Around 3 PM, Dr. F & the urologist came in my room. Urologist went to the bag attached to the catheter and asked when it had been emptied last. I had calmed down and was providing minimal conversation at this point, told him about the same time they had drawn blood (about 1 PM). It was over half full again. They told me they came to see me since there was a dramatic change in my blood work from early morning to early afternoon, plus the report I was urinating. My vitals had improved. BOL 92%-93%, Heart rate 130 BPM (not good but better), temperature 99°, and my blood pressure was a little high, but near normal. And I actually felt better, vastly better than I had earlier in the morning.

But I was still furious with Dr. S...and enough in control of my anger I could vent, so I did. The look on the 2 doctor's faces told me I wasn't out of line. And I still remember the conversation.

Urologist - "You are sick, but aren't a candidate for the ventilator, you likely need to be in step down for more attention and monitoring, that is it. But there are no beds available"

Dr. F- "Write the order & I will make it happen"

Ur. - "We were told at the staff meeting, there are no beds available in step down"

Dr. F - "Write the order, I will make it happen"

The urologist left the room and went to the nurse’s station (right outside of my room door). Did something on a computer, came back in, said "the order is in"

Dr. F walked out and got on the phone. He came back in and told me I would be in step down by dark. He also said " I will be in tomorrow to check on you". It was supposed to be his day off.

45 minutes later, I was in step down. It was still daylight, I had a room with a view. A view of the roof of the emergency department and the wall of the old section of the hospital. And a couple of trees. That would remain my room with a view for the next 17 days.

Everyone stay safe out there!.

 

[PJSprog]

39°F and clear-ish skies this morning, going up to 72° today.

Wife has finished her dog training schedule for the year. She doesn't bother scheduling anything from late November through December, as most people have so much going on this time of year that they start cancelling and wanting to postpone lessons. So, she just takes the time off and picks up again in January. At least for this month, we're not ships passing in the night ... or, evening, more accurately stated.

Loved the angel story, Roy.

Paul, I worked for about five years for Wicks Organ Company, building and servicing pipe organs. After they closed up shop and moved across the street to a much smaller location, they sold the old buildings. The people who bought the property turned the whole place into a giant event center (there is also a small music school there) called The Olde Wicks Factory. The put some serious time and money into that place, and it looks fantastic now, a far cry from the dingy old factory is used to be. The picture of the room at the top of their website home page used to be the mill room. I can tell you it didn't look anything like it does now. So, yes, there appears to be some profit in the events industry.

You've reminded me that I need to take a look at Starlink again, RNG. They were supposed to be coming online in our area in "late 2021."

6k is incredible, Mostly_. Quite impressive.

 

[sodamo]

66°F and no rain, but big storm forecast including snow on Mauna Kea.

A good day of progress with my greenhouse even though 5 of the fittings required time consuming cleanup. All main frame prices dry fitting. Today hope to attach the poly panels and lift into place before the rain.

Sophie got to try out her new battery chainsaw, Ryobi 8 inch, on palm fronds. Said it worked very well.

Hand & Foot this afternoon

Prayers for all
Be safe
Have a great day

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Wngsprd hope the gout goes away soon like giving birth out of your foot. Prayers it gets better soon

Toppop hope surgery went well prayers for a quick recovery

I wonder if it is like the pain I’ve been having in my feet?

Found out yesterday my new Dr already left the practice, so gotta hunt for another new Dr.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Mostly only 6000 miles? Slacker

Congratulations!!!

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Jim was a good friend. He passed from Cancer. Mike was the one who had the tragic accident. May they both RIP.

I remember the elevator project you all did.

 

[sodamo]

Congrats on your milage, Mostly, very impressive.