Silicon Valley Redneck

Garbage late, rain early

So the garbage didn't get picked up yesterday....

Yeah, we subscribe to a curbside garbage pickup service.  Not so much as a "from the suburbs" thing as a "stay at home during the Pestilence" thing, which we started early last year and will likely discontinue by summer.  Anyway.

Seems there was some manner of equipment malfunction - maybe the truck broke down? - so they're planning to get to us Friday.  Guess I can sneak an extra bag into the bin in the meantime.

And, the midafternoon forecast for today had rain arriving around 1800 or 1900 or thereabouts; it actually started around 1700, as I was starting up the grill.  At least we didn't get much rain while I was cooking outdoors.  Supposed to be enough between now and 0600ish tomorrow to moisten the soil a bit, and probably make the still-swampy lowlands even swampier.  (I think I need to redistribute some soil, to create raised walkways across the lowlands, but that's very much not a this-month project.)

Additional:  Seems hose-end spray nozzles aren't necessarily built for the pressure that comes out of the yard hydrant.  Especially if they're being used downhill of said hydrant.  Guess I need either a heavy-duty nozzle or a pressure regulator that can be put near the business end of the hose.

Of batrachia and tillage

This li'l guy had a harrowing experience:

Wasn't actually a harrow; 'twas a rotary tiller.  Whatever.  I gave the critter a lift to a safe spot.

Later, when cleaning off the tiller, I found fishing line wrapped around the propeller.  Well, mason line wrapped around the tiller shaft.  Same thing, basically.  Seems I hadn't managed to recover all my planting-area markers from last year.  Removing it was a bit of an adventure, but I got it loose eventually.

Kipple, because of course.

Oooh... sore legs.

Picked up a bunch of rocks from the New Victory Garden, and relocated them to the low spot in the driveway.

This involved a lot of reaching down to pick stuff up off the ground.  Also some lugging a bucket around (fill hand-held bucket until it gets too heavy, then dump it into the loader bucket and resume gathering).

After that, hit the Old Victory Garden with the tiller.  Looks like it'll need additional passes, plus some re-arrangement of large mounds with the loader now that the soil is loosened up.

Then another couple of passes over the neighbor's garden patch, then one more over the New Victory Garden... bringing up yet more rocks, including at least one big one.

I'm sure this does wonders for my vitamin D level, but the rock-gathering is hard on the legs and lower back.

Notice how some slogans can cut both ways?

The People United Will Never Be Defeated!

A fine slogan, innit?  Good for rallying the masses to resist oppression and all that.

But...

When we see that a political faction is busily sowing disunity - identity politics, critical race theory, segregated schools, always setting some of the people against the others - we may develop just a teeny little suspicion that the leaders of that faction are in fact planning to defeat the people, and find it expedient to divide them first.

Maybe this is not such a good idea?  Maybe we the people ought to be resisting the divisiveness, and instead fighting those who would divide us?

Pay attention to the messaging.  Mind who's pushing it.  Don't believe propaganda that tells you that the plain-bellied Sneetches consider you inferior and are out to exterminate you; listen to what actual plain-bellied Sneetches themselves are saying - and keep in mind that they're probably being told that you [correction: your kind] plan to exterminate them.

Pay attention to who's trying to build bridges, and who's busily burning them.  Never, ever believe what the talking heads on TV tell you.  And sharpen up those pitchforks.

Breezy early

There was more herbicide/insecticide spraying I was supposed to be doing in the early-morning calm, but by the time the Sun was properly up, the wind was already upwards of 6 MPH, so nope.  Not even for in-tight spraying of the area right around the house; I don't really want stray spray getting on me, never mind on the lawn.

Oh, well.  Plenty more outdoors stuff to be done today.  Tomorrow, more tilling (after which, I expect to take the tiller off the tractor, put the box blade on, and give the driveway a scrape).

We've got a call in to the local roofer, who patched up a spot on our roof a year ago.  Additional shingles have come loose the past few months, and it looks like the strip along the ridge line is coming unstuck (this might be the source of the fragments we've found on the lawn).  Seems there's a considerable backlog, what with people whose roofs are actually leaking.  Got various other work in the queue: fixing up the back deck and the front porch, putting in a feline containment fence around some portion of the back yard, turning the seasonal pond into a permanent one, fixing the driveway properly and extending it to the barn, replacing various trim around the house and barn (in some cases, installing it where it should have been but never was), re-painting the house and barn, ....  Some of this could reasonably be DIY stuff, but some requires heavy equipment, and much of the rest falls under "It's too much work, or involves excessive use of ladders, or I'm too busy with other stuff to get around to it this year."

Oop!  Just after I wrote that, an unmarked white van came up the driveway.  FedEx delivering cat food?  Nope; 'twas the roofer, stopping by for a quick look.  His assistant went up, looked around, and nailed the ends of the ridge cap down with some longer nails - apparently the original installation was done with regular roofing nails, which aren't long enough for the purpose.  Then off to the day's work, and I guess they'll get back to us with a quote for ripping up the ridge cap and replacing it properly; that job won't be happening for a while, but in the meantime we shouldn't have to worry about ongoing damage from ordinary levels of wind.

Oh, and it seems that most of the roofing companies aren't even touching little repair jobs, there being plenty of whole-new-roof business to keep them occupied.  Well, there is a lot of construction going on, so, yeah, I guess everyone in the construction trades must be pretty busy.

Oooh... tired already

Just spent about half an hour shoveling mud around the drain pipe (just the part that crosses the pathway) and then shoveling grassy turf on top of the pipe.

The mud wasn't that much of a problem.  The turf has tough roots, and takes a lot of digging.  (I'd noticed that before, when I tried to use the mini tiller to chew up a section of lawn; the big tiller on the tractor is a tool much better suited to that task.)  This was a hand-shovel job for me; someone with more loader experience might be able to move strips of turf reasonably precisely with the loader bucket, but I don't think I'd make a neat job of it, and this is a spot where appearance kinda counts.

I expect that in another few days the transplanted grass will be growing vigorously.

A little resting time, and then I guess I'll set about tearing up the Old Victory Garden's weed-barrier border (and its staples).  Or maybe try a little hula hooping on the lawn?  Naw, yard work has priority.

Possibly inappropriate warning

I noticed this after unpacking the contents:

Wait... a 4-pack of foam chair pads is a heavy object now?  Just how soy has the world gotten?

Not gonna click this one, sorry

The ad-blocker doesn't block everything, so I see the clickbait ads on some sites.  Here's a line spotted this morning:

Place Rubber Bands over Your Door Knobs at Night, Here's Why

Do your rubber bands lose their flavor on the doorknob overnight?  Are doorknobs the best places to store rubber bands at night, while during the day the bands can be returned to the kitchen junk drawer?  Do rubber bands make a nice warm doorknob cover for cold winter nights?

Or is it some sort of quantum exclusion principle whereby having a known rubber band on the inside knob prevents an unknown rubber band being present on the outside knob for nefarious reasons?

Another day...

So here it is Wednesday.  FedEx delivered 300 feet of garden hose this morning, which (even combined with the existing hoses) doesn't get me anywhere near the back fence, but it's plenty to reach the New Victory Garden and the area where I figure on burning a brush pile or three.

I used the brand-new backpack sprayer (which functions as expected, and has a harness designed by someone clear on the concept of "backpack") to apply brush killer to much of the area above the pond.  I think I should have bought a bottle of marker dye to go with the brush killer.  Oh, well: in a few days, it'll be obvious which vines have been sprayed and which haven't.

First afternoon activity: tilling, both the New Victory Garden and the neighbor's garden patch.  Then, I suppose, shoveling more mud and (if possible) turf over the drain pipe, so as to make the pathway passable for the lawn mower (and the garden cart).

Oh, and I ODed a bit on the transdermal vitamin D yesterday, so I gotta goober myself real good with the protective goop this afternoon.

Update:  Tilling is done.  I'm glad I decided to do the neighbor's patch first; it turned out to be quite muddy (something to do with being a low-lying area), so doing mine afterward helped clean the mud off tiller & tires.  Another pass in a week (assuming not too much rain in the meantime; the forecast is unsettled) might be helpful; maybe the soil will be somewhat drier by then.

Not doing any shovel work this afternoon.  My right hand is cramping for some reason.  Come to think of it, I should stop typing, too.  Ow.

Update 2:  A day later, it's becoming apparent which vines got the herbicide.  Marker dye is on order anyway, because during spraying time it's useful to see what's been hit already.

A day in the countryside

Morning: very little wind.  An opportunity for spraying herbicide!

Apply short-term, broad-spectrum herbicide to the perimeter of the Former Livestock Enclosure, so the grass & weeds don't grow up too badly among the fence wire that I still haven't finished removing.

Refill the sprayer with persistent, broad-spectrum herbicide and spray the perimeter of the barn and the implement storage area, then start on the perimeter of the house.

Neighbor to the South drops by to inquire as to whether I have some sort of equipment for plowing a garden patch.  Maybe thinking of a borrowable rototiller.  (I'm certain he wouldn't want to borrow the mini-tiller for a first pass; it's not up to such a job.)  I tell him I have a bloody great tiller that hangs off the back of the tractor.  He tells of earlier times (apparently the lowlands used to be a pumpkin farm), and says that now that he's back from various travels he'd like to revive the garden he used to have, where he'd had great success growing large watermelons.  After some discussion, he goes off and plants stakes at the corners of the area he has in mind, and sometime soon (most likely tomorrow), when I head down to the Annex to give the New Victory Garden its final-before-planting tilling, I'll take a little detour and go over his marked area too.

After lunch, more brush-pile moving.  Make a decent amount of progress on the piles on the back lawn.  Meanwhile, deliveries arrive, including the new backpack sprayer and three 25-foot lengths of pleated drain pipe.

Taking a break from the brush-pile thing, I see how the drain pipe is going to work.  Turns out it needs the drainage channel dug a few inches deeper and also extended a few feet on the downslope end.  After much shoveling of mud, I get the pipe in place, mud piled around the upstream end, and water running through it as planned.  Sometime soon, I need to pack more mud around it, pile some approximation of turf on top (more or less level with the surrounding ground), and consider burying more of the downslope extension.

Then it's time to assemble and test the backpack sprayer (seems to work just fine), fire up the grill, cook and consume burgers, catch up on word on the 'Net, then take a book out to the back deck for a while.

While digging, I finally got a look at what I presume to be one of the noisy little frogs.  Didn't manage to get a good photo, though, using my cellphone at an awkward angle.

Snake!

Now there's a silly app concept

From today's Brewster Rockit:  a phone-locator app!

The obvious implementation simply displays "It's in your hand, stupid!" or a great big "X" and "Your phone is here."

Or, more usefully... and without actually looking for a phone-locator app to see if they exist and what they might do... I suppose if all the phones in the household are introduced to each other via Bluetooth, an app could display the Bluetooth signal strength for a selected phone, which could assist in a hunt.  Only works if the target phone is nearby and turned on, but, unlike simply calling the misplaced phone, it doesn't require that ringing be enabled.

Gender-confused garden accessories?

So I've been using plastic quick-connect couplers on the downstream ends of my garden hoses, for easy connection of nozzles and such.  I need a few more.

I thought I'd bought the original ones from Amazon, but can't seem to find them in my order history.  Maybe using the wrong keywords?  So, search for hose couplers.

I note that there are shiny brass ones available, and figure those might be a better deal in the long run.  Hm.  The first model I look at (sold under various brand names) doesn't appear to be compatible with the plastic ones (said plastic couplers being some sort of industry standard, conveniently matching the pre-installed washout plug on the lawnmower).

There's another model (again, from multiple vendors) that does look like the plastic ones.  As I'm getting ready to order some, I notice that something doesn't look right.

Ah.  The female coupler, as would be expected to contain an automatic shutoff valve, has male hose threads; the male plug has female hose threads.

This must be for the Australian market.  Things are backward there, right?  Like hose bibs have female threads, so the male end of the hose is upstream?  And nozzles and sprinklers accordingly have male threads?  'Cause that's the only way this makes sense.

Unless this is yet another product designed by someone who wasn't going to use it himself and was unclear on the concept.

Li'l project

So there I was...

Wasn't much wind yesterday, so it seemed a good time to spray some brush killer around the recently-cleared area along the back fence, to discourage regrowth of vines.  Time to use that old 4-gallon backpack sprayer that the previous owners left behind, and that I'd cleaned out and slightly tested a few weeks back!

Well, it worked OK for a while.  Then, with the tank still nearly half full, it started making sucking-air noises, and I kept having to work the pump.  Eventually, the pump ceased to function, the handle taking no effort to move.  I transferred the remaining gallon-ish of brush killer to a lesser sprayer and finished the area.

This morning, I had a look at the old sprayer, with an eye to reviving it.  It's not really meant to be disassembled, and I can't tell why it would have been sucking air, but I did eventually get it torn down enough to see that the piston head had parted company from the piston.

So, can I fix it?  Well... I can breathe on the embers, as it were, but it's not gonna be like new.  It'll maybe work again, for a time, and I doubt it'll be 20 years.

Got a replacement on order, for the long term.  Might be able to put this'n to some use tomorrow morning, if my attempt at sticking the piston head in place is somewhat successful.  Methinks I should also goober a bit of grease around the cylinder wall before reassembling.

Update:  The pump is revived, but whatever is causing the output tube to suck air while there's still plenty of liquid in the tank remains a mystery, and I don't really feel like disassembling the thing again for another look just now.  Maybe another time.

Anyway, I spent a very warm afternoon moving little brush piles around.  Time to rest now.

And speaking of Wagner

There's an ETLA* that's been making the rounds lately... no, not PUBG, but ASMR.  I've never been quite clear on this one (nor, to be honest, on most of the others.)

There's a vid here.  Seems ASMR is something to do with thrills or tingles brought on by various stimuli: touch, a whisper, the sight of a politician's impeccably-creased trouser leg, music, etc.

Wait, music.  Ah.  Yes, now I kinda-sorta get it.  There's this one brief passage in Act I of Die Walküre that always makes my hair stand on end.  Tingles indeed.

Afterthought:  I keep seeing "ASMR" and getting it confused with "ASLR" - Address Space Mapping Randomization, maybe?  Or does ASLR refer to an old-timey not-digital camera?

* Footgripe:  It seems to be commonly accepted nowadays that the "A" in TLA and ETLA stands for Acronym.  Wrong!  Mighty few of them are ACRONYMs (Abbreviated Condensed Rendition Of Name Yielding Meaning).  They're merely Abbrevs.  And why does the spelling checker think "Abbrevs" is a word, when it rejects so many actual words?

Yard foods

Just had a couple of venisons wander across the front yard.

Huckleberry got very excited, and wanted to go out and chase them.  (I'm not sure he quite grasps the concept of things that are far away looking smaller than they actually are.)

Southmoon the fun-size mountain lion missed the excitement, coming in as the critters were leaving the yard and while her brother was still hogging the window.

Oop!  There goes another one!

, Batman!

I guess tomorrow is Easter (which would explain the presence of bunnies rehearsing on the back lawn early this morning), which makes today Holy Saturday, which traditionally means turning on Live From the Met and getting Parsifal.

Is Live From the Met even a thing anymore?  Lemme DuckDuckGo that... ah, the Met is having various nightly streams!  No Parsifal?  But they do have Tristan und Isolde for Easter night.  Not exactly the same thing.

It's not like I really have a block of time for sitting around listening to an opera, anyway, though I suppose I could listen while doing yard work or something.  (Straps gramophone to hood of tractor.)

Nothing about this makes sense.

Couple accidentally paints over $500,000 artwork

Not accidentally.  Mistakenly.  Not the same thing.  Anyway...

A South Korean couple mistakenly tarnished a half-million dollar American artwork when they painted over it, as seen in a cringeworthy clip.

Ah, now you use the right word.

Arranged in front of the abstract opus were the paint cans and brushes used in its creation. They’re considered part of the piece, which may have given the aforementioned pair the wrong impression.

Wait, there was usable paint lying around?  It hadn't been allowed to dry out before being put there for people to misunderstand and/or trip over?

And, well.  Look at that paint-bespattered piece of wall, and tell me with a straight face that it's a work of art, let alone one worth half a megabuck.  Wait, does that "value" include the price of the building it's painted on?  That might be plausible.

Easter egg hunt, sort of

I've set about decommissioning last year's victory garden.  Pulled up various stakes, moved the anti-bunny cage to the back deck for now, and...

... Started looking at the weed-barrier border.  I hadn't figured on trying to re-use the weed barrier, but it needs to be pulled up and the staples removed before I go over the area with the tiller.

Pulling up the staples is going to require a tool, such as fence pliers.  Fine.  But just finding them turns out to be a mite trickier than I'd anticipated.

Sounds like a job for an ACME^® Giant Magnet.  In fact, I have a bloody great magnet in the barn.  Know exactly where it is at this very moment.  See, just this morning I dug it out and lugged it all the way over to the house, to pick up cut-off nail ends after I went around the front porch with the angle grinder.  It's heavy.  Maybe something a little less giant?

So I ordered a 3" diameter fishing magnet from Amazon, to be delivered by the Easter Bunny.

Well, sometimes photographs do lie, but...

Is it just me, or do all the photos of Matt Gaetz make him look like a televangelist bobblehead?  I mean, the face, hair style, and suit all say televangelist, and in several photos, the proportions say bobblehead.

Yeah, I've known some people who didn't look anything like their photos.  And maybe the photos that crop up in the news are carefully selected.  But you'd think that with that face, he'd rethink his hair and attire.

Another point in favor of 3D printers

When you want some fiddly jig or storage fixture that ordinarily you'd carve from a scrap of wood?

But you haven't been in the new place long enough to accumulate such scraps?

Sometimes it's best to print it, even if that means using up a bunch of brand new filament.  The job gets done, and you don't waste a bunch of time rummaging around for materials that you probably don't have in suitable dimensions.