Josh's Not-a-Blog

S-H-O-W-E-R

2009-07-05T23:05:00.008-04:00

Today was car cleaning day. Nancy and I vacuumed, washed, and waxed her car and the Neon. Scout was outside "helping" too, but soon decided she wanted to nap under the Neon. It's oily under there, so she ended up with oil in her fur. Time for her first ever B-A-T-H. Or in this case, a S-H-O-W-E-R.

Scout did really well. She squirms and makes unhappy noises when I trim her claws, but through the whole process of having a shower, she didn't claw, bite, hiss, or growl.

After her fur was mostly dry, she sat down and licked herself dry, purring all the while.

Video Player 12

She got a bowl of her favorite food as a reward.

Neon instrument panel

2009-06-28T14:38:00.004-04:00

Since the Neon was handed down to me, I've had trouble with the instrument panel not working. For the last three years I've been driving around with a ScanGauge II instead of gauges.

Today I finally got around to doing the fix described on the neons.org forum. I pulled the PC board, and found the problem right away.

Notice the cracked solder joints around most of the pins on the instrument panel power/data connectors.

The fix is easy. I re-flowed the solder on all of the pins, adding solder where necessary. All my gauges are back and should work fine for another 265,000 miles.

Bikes, new bikes!

2009-06-26T20:01:00.002-04:00

Nancy and I bought a pair of Trek cruisers.

Mine is, of course, the purple one.

Oops

2009-06-10T13:00:00.003-04:00

I'm guessing this wasn't a part of the plan.

This wrong turn was taken in the 300 block of Shelden Ave.

By way of TJ, found at http://twitpic.com/71cxp.

Edit: More pictures, submitted anonymously. I hope nobody was hurt.

Nancy and Spencer

2009-06-07T13:46:00.004-04:00

Spencer loves Nancy. Specifically, her hair. Or her head. Or something.

This is pretty common. He'll just doze off, his head resting against Nancy's.

Sometimes he'll make himself even more comfortable, which is endearing.

But sometimes he goes too far.

Beware the thumb

2009-06-01T11:47:00.001-04:00

Tom added a "thumb" to his backhoe, so he can more easily pick up things like trees and rocks. It can be pinned at 90 degrees, or folded up against the boom when it's not in use.

And a short video of picking up a tree for bucking.

Video Player 11

Why Ultra 10s Suck More

2009-05-22T13:01:00.008-04:00

Here's a blast from the past: A rant from 2000 on crappy old Sun workstations.

Yep, you can tell I've worked on one too many Ultra 10s in the past few years.

Why PCs Suck	Why Ultra 10s Suck More
one-piece sheet metal cover that is difficult to work with	one-piece sheet metal cover that is difficult to work with and is also installed upside-down
IDE	IDE with no DMA
PCI slots that don't line up	PCI slots that don't line up on an upside-down riser, working against gravity
unreliable floppy drive	unreliable floppy drive with the activity LED covered
low-quality cooling fan	low-quality cooling fan with proprietary connector that can only be purchased as a part of a larger assembly
PC RAM sucks	Ultra 10 RAM sucks, but costs more

Lest we look back and remember Sun workstations fondly...

Power outage

2009-05-14T13:30:00.002-04:00

Whoa:

05/14/2009 0756 am

Laurium, Houghton County.

Non-thunderstorm wind damage, reported by co-op observer.

Observer reported extended power failure affecting the
Laurium/Calumet area. Observer reported a transformer on
fire with a pole burning after checking with Michigan
State Police.

The power went out at my house at about 4:25 this morning, came back on, and then went out again at 5:00 or so. It stayed out until 11:30. I was happy to be on city water this morning, so I could still take a hot shower.

See Nancy Run. Run Nancy Run.

2009-05-14T09:10:00.006-04:00

On Saturday, Nancy ran the 2009 Journeys Half Marathon in 2:19:12, continuing her streak of ever-better times. It was a cold and windy day in Eagle River, but it was still fun to be at the race, and to celebrate afterwards.

Nancy at the start, smiling despite a few flakes of snow.

They're off!

Video Player 9

I navigate a back road to my spectating point about 4.5 miles in.

Video Player 10

At the finish, free food in hand, moments before a quick dash to the hot tub.

Goodbye, old road

2009-05-06T19:50:00.004-04:00

I, for one, am happy to see the old road go. It's time.

Video Player 7

Video Player 8

April showers bring hang on what the hell

2009-04-21T23:12:00.001-04:00

Spring in the Keweenaw. We are not amused.

There was well over a foot of snow on my roof tonight.

Well, I'm just peeved enough to take two crummy videos with my phone.

Video Player 5

Video Player 6

Keweenaweeweeweeaweweawewesomefest (Friday)

2009-04-10T10:11:00.009-04:00

Some links to music from tonight's artists. Please comment.

ONE FOR THE TEAM (minneapolis, mn)

http://www.onefortheteammusic.com/

Comment: Meh.

BEEP BEEP (omaha, ne)

Comment: Would like to see.

DRUNKEN BARN DANCE (ann arbor, mi)

http://www.myspace.com/drunkendance

Comment: Meh, might be annoying live.

LIGHTNING LOVE (ypsilanti, mi)

Comment: They sound hot.

THE SHOW IS THE RAINBOW (omaha, ne)

Comment: Woo! Crazy ugly guy techno! I only want to see this band.

GREG McINTOSH (ypsilanti, mi)

http://www.myspace.com/theowlmcintosh

Comment: James says he's a dude from Great Lakes Myth Society.

BVH LIVE (marquette, mi)

Comment: Proto-Da-Yoopers. Meh.

I've been mapped, and I feel dirty

2009-03-24T22:51:00.002-04:00

Our crappy little corner of the world now has Google Street View. It looks like the Googlemobile came through last summer, though I haven't been able to figure out exactly when. The imagery covers at least Houghton and the villages of Laurium and Calumet, but fortunately not all the way out to those of us who live even further in the sticks.

I thought Street View was kind of neat when it was other people's houses I could drive by, but now it just has me feeling...uneasy.

Ice Ice Baby

2009-03-24T09:48:00.003-04:00

Calumet had a heck of an ice storm last night. The giant pine next to my house thwapped against the roof all night under the weight of the ice. All the windows on the east side of my house were converted to a perfect wavy shower door finish. CLK schools were canceled.

I came out to start my car this morning, and noticed my neighbor's flag thumping against his roof, also heavy with ice. I turned around and noticed that one of the power lines in front of my house had come unwrapped, and was sagging below its support cable. There were no power interruptions during the night, but UPPCO was glad to be notified of the problem.

Then I got to Houghton. Dry as a bone. Meh.

In memoriam Josh's office

2009-03-19T21:15:00.004-04:00

Goodbye, my old office. For the last seven years, you've been a very important part of my life.

A cozy place for a nap.

A quiet place for staring out the window.

A private place for reading web comics.

A carefree refuge from the rigors of organization and cleanliness.

You were always so strong: holding up the crap I hung on your walls; supporting the inordinately large piles of leaking UPS batteries on your floor. You were always so accommodating: welcoming myriad flies into your fluorescent light fixtures; your door closer never quite pulling the door fully closed.

Just remember that you will always be with me in spirit, old office. And a part of me will always be with you. At least until they clean behind the file cabinet.

2002-2009

Tom the Snowblowing Yooper

2009-03-13T09:38:00.005-04:00

By popular demand, here's a compilation of the photos and video of Tom moving snow.

Prior to using this snowthrower (a 30" Poulan Pro), Tom had been snowshoeing to the barn to avoid disturbing the insulating layer of snow over his water line. Here he uses the snowthrower to go around the back of the house, and create a walking path to the barn.

Tom pauses for a quick break. The snow is just as deep as the auger housing is high.

The path is nearly complete. This was snow that hadn't been touched until this point.

He nears the barn. After this run, he went back and doubled the width of the path.

I walked up the path behind Tom to take this short video.

Video Player 4

Now I know from whence I came

2009-03-09T08:40:00.002-04:00

My folks are up visiting for the week. They made it up to my house at around 9:00 PM, and I gave them the $0.05 tour (fee waived). I thought for sure they'd echo the common sentiment: "Holy crap, this is a lot of work." Instead, they got really excited, and saw a lot of the same potential I do. I'm fairly confident this means they're nuts, and that I inherited fully this characteristic.

Dad told me a story about our first motorhome. In the early '80s, my folks wanted to move up from a pick-up camper to a Class C motorhome. Dad found a good deal on an almost-new Starcraft that needed some work. Specifically, it had been in a fire and was gutted.

My Grandpa Vernon (my mom's dad) came along to look at the motorhome. When he saw it, and saw how much work it meant, he just shook his head. Dad said, "I think I'm going to get it."

And we did. Now I know.

Epilogue: Dad and Grandpa rebuilt the motorhome to better than brand-new. And I helped, mostly by playing in the bunk, I think. Pictures to follow.

Unix in 1985

2009-03-04T13:09:00.003-05:00

A (now) humorous and actually pretty interesting Computer Chronicle episode on Unix from 1985.

Comments

2009-03-02T16:36:00.002-05:00

I'm turning on comments for new posts. I just can't keep ignoring my fans.

Kidding.

In other news

2009-03-02T11:06:00.006-05:00

(Brr, it's cold out today. At 8:00, the National Weather Service said it was -16° F in Calumet.)

Here in Houghton and Keweenaw counties, we have approximately two official local news sources. One is the Daily Mining Gazette. They're typically pretty slow, and their choices in which stories do and don't get printed are traditionally pretty bizarre.

The other one is WLUC TV6. They're a TV station, not a newspaper, and you can tell. News is published quickly on their website, which is welcome, but sometimes their haste is obvious. It's mostly forgiveable, though, since most of us are grateful for an alternative to the DMG.

James pointed out a good example of this today. An article about a snow plow collision on US-41 had all of the relevant information, but was a little choppy. The best part, however, was the first comment left on the story, which I thought was a good mix of good-natured ribbing and relevance to the story. The good-natured ribbing part must've caught the eye of someone at WLUC, though, since they quickly reformatted the story.

I don't think that's meant to happen

2009-02-09T13:52:00.004-05:00

The steam humidifier in the Dow building went nuts today. I got a high-temperature alarm from our Dow server room and went up to look.

Video Player 3

Hmm, I'm pretty sure there's not normally steam coming out of the ceiling. There was a similar layer of fog at the top of the two computer labs under building A/C.

Despite the steam, the relative humidity in the server room stayed below 25%, and there was no condensation that I could see. The dedicated A/C unit in that room had shut down with high head pressure, but that's not uncommon, and it's reset and running again. The building manager shut down the humidifier and the blowers until the problem could be diagnosed, and we're back to normal temperatures.

Think you want to live in the UP?

2009-02-02T17:18:00.002-05:00

Today, we got well over a foot of snow, most of it while we were at work. Here's Nancy's car in the parking lot at around 4:00 PM. There was no snow on it at 8:00 AM.

Sure comes in handy for winning "we got so much snow" arguments with folks from more southern climes.

Oh, if that doesn't convince you, check the historic snowfall totals, or maybe today's weather.

Webcams

2009-01-28T09:12:00.002-05:00

I've added a couple of webcam thumbnails to the right column of this weblog's main page. One is a view of the end of my driveway, and is there mainly so I can see how much snow I'm required to move before I can get my little car up the driveway. There's no bigger version of that one right now, as the camera's not the greatest quality.

The other thumbnail is of a webcam in downtown Calumet on the northeast corner of Portland and 5th Streets. It's an outdoor PTZ camera, mounted on top of the first-floor canopy of the Miners & Merchants building. Here's a spy photo through my sunroof.

Snow moving action on my street

2009-01-27T13:24:00.013-05:00

I was home this morning and caught the SnoGo, a heavy truck with an independently-driven front snowblower.

Video Player 1

The SnoGo took the snow from the banks and put it in the street. Then the grader scooped the snow to the end of the street, where it was picked up with a loader and dump truck.

Video Player 2

Oh, and my neighbor getting stuck in the SnoGo's leavings. The SnoGo driver was nice enough to dig the car out, and the neighbor returned a few minutes later with a plate of cookies.

Winter. Meh.

2009-01-05T08:12:00.004-05:00

The Village of Laurium has excellent snow removal. I don't live in the Village of Laurium. On my block, I have to wait for the county grader to come by.

There was about a foot and a half of snow on my street this morning, with drifts higher. I got to the end of my block and saw a car stuck in the berm left by the Village plow. It was a Subaru. AWD. Uh-oh.

I thought the other side of the lane looked passable, but it wasn't. I got stuck and ended up walking back to my house for a shovel, and just as I had my car almost dug out, the grader pulled up. Um, sir, you appear to be inching up on my car. Please don't scratch my pristine paint job. It turns out he saw the rear hitch on my car with the ball mount in it, moved his blade up to push me through the berm with it.

So, if you can't be early, at least you can be helpful. Thanks, grader guy.