Storm Report

We got hit pretty well from the storm. I woke up Monday morning to the grid being down. Rain and wind were heavy. My house battery bank was topped off so it wasn’t too big a deal. Surprisingly, the grid was back up by noon. I was impressed. 

Our regular internet service was also down. However, we still had a cell phone signal so the phone became a hotspot for the computer. That came back around the same time as the grid. 

The rain, and snow melt from 50+ temperatures caused significant flooding. While our house was fine, we gave up on going anywhere. Roads were flooded or washed out in all directions. 

It’s good to have a well stocked pantry and my own backup power. 

-Sixbears

Time off

I'm fine. Just taking some time off from blogging for a bit.

-Sixbears 

Exploding Totem Poles

Space X just blew up another Starship. That’s par for the course. The company is a great  believer in destructive testing. While that’s a common enough engineering procedure we don’t often see it on this scale. Maybe never. 

As far as failures go this last attempt appears to be a more successful kaboom. Right off the bat the first improvement was the launch pad success. It didn’t mimic a gigantic volcanic eruption like the previous attempt. Turn around time is so much better when you don’t have to rebuild your launch site from scratch. 

The next improvement was booster separation. It actually took place this time. However, the booster was not supposed to then explode in a spectacular manner. Ops. Stuff happens. Going to space is hard. 

The rest of the rocket appeared to be doing well. It went quite a distance before it too turned into a fireworks display. Let’s just say it’ll be a while before the vehicle is man rated. One problematic issue appears to be the shedding of heat tiles. You need those to be intact to come back safely. 

Of course the general public doesn’t have access to all the data. Hopefully Space X learned enough to keep these issues from happening again. There’s no sense in doing destructive testing if you can’t learn from your mistakes. 

For now, the Starship is on par with Musk’s other current projects, like the cybertruck and the acquisition of Twitter. 

-Sixbears

Tests and Parts

My lovely wife just had some rather invasion medical tests done. It’s for a cancer than runs in the family. We are very relieved that the test results were good. Life goes on pause while that sort of thing hangs over your head. Sleep hasn’t been that great lately either. 

Looks like the infection in my leg is finally gone. It’s healing nicely. Getting back in condition will take some time and effort but I’m doing it. 

In other news I finally got the parts needed to fix my washing machine. There’s a load of laundry going through its cycles right now. It’s a relief that a $25 part was all it needed. Thanks to YouTube university the installation went fairly well. Of course the instruction video didn’t have the installer drop a screw into a pile of dirty laundry but that’s how those projects go in real life. 

-Sixbears

Woodstove Chore

Woodstoves are great, but they need a certain amount of maintenance. My wood cookstove has a lot of nooks and crannies that collect soot. Unlike a regular woodstove, cookstoves have circuitous smoke channels around the oven. That’s great for extracting more heat from every bit of firewood. The downside is that as the smoke cools it deposits soot in those channels. 

Once in a while everything has to be taken apart and cleaned out. Yesterday was one of those days. It’s a messy job. To make matters worse I also take apart the stove pipe and clean that out too. At least the stovepipe can be cleaned outside. 

On the bright side very little soot makes it to the chimney. Cleaning the chimney is even more of a chore. Not having to do that so often is a huge plus. 

-Sixbears

About those digitals

There’s a push to eliminate cash and go to a completely digital society. Your money would be a digital account in a central bank somewhere. China is far down that road. It’s so bad that if your social score is not high enough you can’t even shop in some stores. Europe isn’t far behind. 

In England there are grocery stores with gates as you come in. To enter you need to scan a QR code with your phone and show you have the right account. Europe in general is pushing full ahead with digital money. Their excuse is that it’ll be more convenient for the citizens.

They don’t mention how it will provide more control over the citizens. That’s very convenient for totalitarian dictators. 

While this is all going on there’s something else happening in the wider universe that’s more powerful than any government. The sun’s been cranking out CMEs. Nothing like huge burst of solar energy to take down power and digital systems. The more civilization relies on electronics the easier it becomes for even moderate CMEs to take down the system. 

-Sixbears

The Check’s in the Mail

Okay, I admit it. I liked paying my heating oil bill with paper checks. Writing checks is a pretty Boomer thing to do. However, I didn’t just write a check out of habit. It was a hostile act. While the oil company accepts checks they have a hard time processing them. That was fun. 

They’d have a paper check sitting in their office for almost a month before they would manage to cash it. I’ve gotten up to two late notices even though they had the check. In the end they’d cash it and I wouldn’t have any penalties for late payment. 

Then those bastards upped the game. There’s a discount for early payment. Even though cashing checks took a long time they’d have to honor the date on the check. Good fun. This last time they didn’t even send my the paper bill until the discount period had passed. I suppose I could have fought them on it but this game has pretty much run its course. 

I probably shouldn’t be messing with the company that keeps my house warm while it’s snowing outside. 

I need a new hobby.

-Sixbears