Author: bhayes952

January 22, 2024 – Small Engine Maintenance

January 22, 2026 /

If you are like me (probably not) then you don’t do your own yard maintenance. I never grew up with a silver spoon and my parents still do all of their own yard work. It was really hard for me to consider paying someone when I had the ability to do the work, and in some cases, desire as well. That being said, I was travelling a lot for work and I simply could not keep up. It was well worth the cost considering how much they can do in the time versus myself.

I have gone through a couple of cycles. I had everything that I needed like lawnmower, trimmer, etc. Then after a couple of years I slowly gave stuff away until I had nothing. But, when I quit my job I needed to take over that task for financial reasons. Fortunately, an uncle gave my son a lawnmower so that he could build his financial empire and he wasn’t using it, so I did. Then, my father-in-law died and I refilled my shed with the things that were missing.

We still have someone doing the yard but at the lake house, not so much. Each trip I have been hauling over yard equipment. I started mowing the grass but I could not get the edges so then I brought over the trimmer. The beach brings a lot of higher wind and now I have a lot of evergreen debris on the driveway and deck so I am bringing over my blower.

If you have ever tried to start a lawnmower after sitting for five years, you might be surprised as how much work is involved. Fortunately for me, I have been in the habit of running gas engines out of fuel when I am uncertain about the future. But, I gassed the mower up and pulled and pulled to no avail. A small engine’s best friend is a can of starter fluid, sometimes called ether. I sprayed a good shot into the carburetor and viola, it started.

Tune up kits can be purchased relatively inexpensively. They typically contain a spark plug, air filter and sometimes a quart of oil or some fuel filters or primer bulbs and tubing depending on what engine it is. What I have heard is that lawnmowers should have the oil changed once a year along with the blade sharpened. Spark plugs and filters are optional if they look plugged or black. You can bet that I haven’t done it in five years, if ever. So, that is on the future agenda for the mower.

I also had to use the starter fluid to get the trimmer going. It had an additional problem that the priming bulb cracked as I was pushing on it. The second picture is the new bulb installed and I also changed the filter and spark plug. I did this because the filter was pretty clogged and those items came with the tune-up kit. Now that is up and going again.

I haven’t been able to get the blower started yet. I think all it probably needs is a shot of starter fluid. However, it seems like my son helped himself to the bottle that I had here and so this will become another unknown project until I get to the beach. Even though it is cheap, I really do not want another thing to move considering I use it very infrequently in the first place. One can will last me for years, two would almost be a lifetime.

Our yard is small. I can mow all the grass in about twenty minutes. I think that when we do move, our days of yard service will be over. That will save a couple of hundred dollars a month. It will be important to get these things going and keep them going. One thing that I do now is only use ethanol free premium. The previous homeowners left a couple of full gas cans for the generator. I suspect that those are not ethanol free. So, it is what I have used for the mower to date but once that is gone, it won’t be.

Side note here. Gasoline should be rotated. So, if we do not run the generator extensively and I have gotten several mows from a partial tank of gas, the gasoline in the the cans will sit for a long time, possibly years. What I do is pour the fuel in my car after a year and then take the can to the filling station for the car and the can. This ensures fresh fuel is always stored.

I learned the ethanol free trick years ago. I had the lower grade gas destroy my gas line in my chain saw. I suspect that it was also the culprit for the primer bulb in the trimmer. Aside from starting the trimmer, I have never used it. Most people won’t go to the cost and effort to get ethanol free gas. It’s not like I can ask my father-in-law. In summary, ethanol damages the rubber or whatever the plastic parts are made of.

Side note two. Ethanol is water soluble. If your gas has ethanol then likely it will also have water if it sits around long enough. Fuel additives called stabilizers help prevent that as well as replace the lightest components that tend to evaporate over time. If you are not going to use ethanol free gas, you should highly consider using a stabilizer product. Regardless of stabilizer, I think the ethanol is going to attack the plastic.

You would think that ethanol is the only problem for small engines but it is not. Sunlight degrades the plastic parts as well. What I mean is that there is no such thing as a small engine that does not require maintenance at some point. This seems like a good opportunity to make some short videos or at least articles so look for more of these as I get things going again.

End Your Programming Routine: You know what else doesn’t help? My bad neck and shoulder. Pulling on those starters leads to pain. The easier I can start things and the better they run makes life a lot better for me. I want to offer some encouragement, I don’t know a lot about these things either. But, you can try some simple things like starter fluid and tune-up kits and probably get things going again.

January 21, 2026 – Selling Stuff Sucks

January 21, 2026 /

I know that I have threatened to sell things in the past. By all accounts, I should have gotten off the stick and got to work. But, in the process of moving, I came to the realization that there are things that I really don’t need to move, like this stack of canning jars. I don’t need to move them because I don’t really need them. With just two of us in the house, six dozen quart jars is plain overkill.

My wife has also been on me sell my lumber pile. That too I do not want to move, but I also don’t want to get rid of all of it either. Woodworking lumber can be very expensive and I literally have thousands of dollars worth of it that I am selling at 10% of its value. Nevertheless, I set about on my first, recent experience with selling items on-line.

You could probably label me as an old fogey. When I think online classifieds, I think Craigslist. But, all I hear is that Craigslist is dead. I don’t know, not only do I really not sell things, I don’t really buy things either. I set about putting an add in Craigslist, Nextdoor and gasp Facebook. I broke my personal ethos and made my first ever Facebook post (on Marketplace).

I am no rube, I know how to sell things. Marketing, pricing and potentially negotiation are all involved. I took a spin around the market to see what jars are going for. I also looked at new jars and I knew that I wanted to sell all of them as a lot. A dozen jars go for $15 at the store, I thought that I would sell the entire six for $40. That was a even amount that I wouldn’t have to make change for. Don’t even get me started about electronic money.

I could not believe the response that I got. The very first night, someone emailed me, so I assume that must have been a Craigslist hit. We arranged that she would come tomorrow and pick up the jars. Well, I waited and then I waited, no show. Her email actually had her phone number in it but I just stewed.

While I was waiting, I checked Facebook Messenger, I had eight other buyers. I was certain that I was going to complete the transaction that night so I responded to all the potentials that there was a sale in progress. When that person did not show up, I went back to all of those messages in chronological order. The first person only wanted the wide mouth jars, the second person wanted to offer $36, the third person offered $30. I said no to all of those people. The forth person responded immediately when I said I was in talks, they also asked if I had anything else. This was the one.

Not only was I a little overwhelmed by the number of offers and the amount of communication that was required but I was working around two different house showings that weekend. Then I got several offers off of Nextdoor. Now, I had to include that platform in the communication loop. This process spanned from Thursday into mid-Sunday afternoon. I won’t lie, I questioned whether this was actually worth the money. Throwing the jars away would be so much easier and then this would be over.

In the end, the jars went to the right person I feel like. They wanted them, they didn’t hassle me on price, in fact they said this was a good deal and so they recognized the value. They communicated and I am sure that they were going to use them. I think that is why it was worth my effort. It would have been easier and possibly cheaper to throw them away but that would also be wasteful.

I am going to have to go back and revamp my wood listing. I need to get all of the stuff cleared off the pile and take a few more pictures. Because I was under pressure from my wife to get it listed, I did the minimal amount of prep. In all of the house selling and jar selling chaos, I missed out on some timely communication with potential buyers. The wood is also priced to sell but it will be more than pocket money.

I also didn’t realize how much woodworking wood was out there for sale. When I did my initial research, I was seeing prices of $10 a board foot for Douglas Fir from lumber suppliers. But, I see it on Facebook Marketplace at $1 per board food. I priced mine at half of that but I may need to re-evaluate things now that I have a better feel for the market. I am still not giving it away, if I do it will be to my neighbor who will burn it. They have done a lot for me over the years and I don’t feel bad about that.

End Your Programming Routine: I have learned that I don’t get a lot of charge out of selling things online. It is why I have things I would like to get rid of but have not done it. The chairs I talked about a couple of years ago, shotgun barrels, things that all have value. I probably need to focus on one thing at a time and possibly one platform if I am going to be successful at this. I am happy that I am not bombarded with messages at the moment.

January 20, 2026 – There Outta Be a Better Way

January 20, 2026 /

I admit it, I am frugal. That is one way of saying that I really despise waste. A standard construction tube of caulking often contains way more material then a typical home owner project will use at one time. So the remainder of the tube becomes waste if it sits around too long.

I have tried every trick in the book to preserve the life of caulk tube remnants. I have put electrical tape over the nozzle. I have tried to embed nails and screws so that there is a channel when I come back to it. I have cut the nozzle shorter to pull the plug of dried caulk out. I have used large, screw on electrical connectors to act as a cap. They all suck.

Caulking is a love hate relationship. You want to believe that it is an ideal solution to a less than ideal situation. That being said, I find about a five year or less life with it in an outdoor application. My personal preference is to use as little as possible because if you are at the point where your hopes are on caulk, you are waiting to fail.

Certain projects typically can use quite a bit of caulk. I am thinking back to siding replacement I did a couple of years ago. In those cases, it seemed like I was going through it as fast as I could blink. But, because I despise waste, I want to make sure that I am purchasing the exact amount I need. Caulk will even dry up in an unopened tube and when you only use a squirt at a time, it doesn’t pay to keep it around.

Recently, I was doing a quick cleaning to get ready for a house showing. I hadn’t really spent any time in the apartment since the tenant moved out. It looked like it was in the need of TLC and when I looked at the vanity, I could see a gap between the top and the tile backsplash. I can’t remember if I ever mentioned this but we had to replace the entire floor a couple of years ago. The shower had leaked and it had rotted the structure. So, the vanity had to be removed and I suspect it shrank.

I thought that I would just quickly put a bead down. The more I can spruce up, the better the chances the buyer will be wowed, or at least not turned off. I had an open tube of kitchen/bath caulk. The best application for this is 100% silicone, that is not wholly important other than to say it is not water based. It requires mineral spirits to clean up.

In fact, I had two tubes. One was clear and the other is white, see picture above. The clear one had clearly given up the ghost. I determine that by forcing a nail into the small opening at the nozzle. If and when I pull the nail out and I get some still wet material, then I consider the tube viable. I would then set about trying to get at the good material.

The clear was clearly dried out, but the white was not. So, I set about poking and squeezing until it was flowing. If I can get away with it, I will cut half the nozzle off but that amount of opening causes a very wide bead. That tactic is not really suitable for a for a bath job unless you are OK with it all over the place. I was not.

Twenty minutes of poking and cleaning my hands and tools off with mineral spirits, I finally got it to flow at an adequate rate. Believe me, more than once I had this thought that I am spending way more money in time than just going to purchase a replacement tube. The nagging problem in my head is that this perpetuates the cycle all over again. I had to get it done quickly because I had 30 minutes before the showing so I persisted. Fortunately, I felt like the smell of bleach that I poured around the shower to try and subdue the mildew significantly overwhelmed the pungent, vinegary smell of silicone caulk or the petroleum smell of ‘Odorless’ Mineral Spirits.

The job got done and I screwed the electrical wire nut back on the nozzle. I know full well that the next time I want to do something like this again that this tube is likely shot at 3/4 full. I was lucky to get a second project out of this one as it is.

End Your Programming Routine: I used to keep a small tube of hand squeezable caulk. However, it also dried up. Just like we are buying half gallons of milk now, these things can almost cost as much as a standard tube. But, at least there is not so much waste. Now that we are moving to a newer house, I am expecting less home improvement projects. Maybe it is time to go back to the smaller tube?

January 19, 2026 – The Truth is In the Middle

January 19, 2026 /

You might have been wondering where I am at such a polarizing time. That time has come. I comment on the Minneapolis, ICE shooting that occurred a couple of weeks ago. I also talk about history and how events of the Boston Massacre relate to this and what I think you should do about it, if anything. Remember, we should be doing what matters. Consider my words but keep on doing things that matter for the proper perspective.

January 16, 2026 – Mere Christianity, Conclusion

January 16, 2026 /

We have made it to the end once again. I have to apologize that my focus has not been nearly as good as it should have been. This is only a 220 page book that took me over four months to read. On one hand, when something is dense and thought provoking, speed is not a good metric. But, my plan was not to read and ponder each word but to read a reasonable length block a week. This should have been approximately one short chapter a day.

I think what is pretty telling is that I read about a third of the book before I even started writing. I had a huge jump start at the beginning of fall which lagged and lagged. On both fronts it is telling about how I approached things. One being how late I am and the other about what I thought about the book.

I started out with pretty high hopes. Not only did Lewis attempt to do something nobody else has ever done, but he went about it in a way that was disciplined and secularly approachable. After a quick and spectacular start, the book and the argument got bogged down. That is as good a place to start as any.

In the introduction to this book, it was stated that this was originally a radio broadcast to the British people during World War II. The stated purpose of the broadcast was to provide hope to a nation under a looming cloud of war, specifically the early German bombing London. I think that it is a pretty good strategy to reassure everyone that there is something better than this life if things don’t go well.

I think where I got stuck on a hump is after book one, it is pretty much assumed that the point was sufficiently made. From Book 2 forward, it is all about doctrine. I suppose that if you were a brand new convert you might be at that point of tell me more, tell me more. It is probably a pretty good bet that this radio broadcast landed best with the non-believers followed by the conservative Protestant denominations. That more than likely is the majority of the British citizenry.

I definitely don’t want to argue theology. One, I could get my behind whipped by someone educated and prepared. And two, I don’t really care. I might not agree with doctrine such as the trinity but you can be darn sure that I am open to it and I respect your right to believe differently. I also strongly agree with the better good position rather than pick at nuance.

Despite what I said above, the rest of the book didn’t do that much for me. I am aware of biblical virtues and the supposed way to eternal salvation. I am aware of theology and beliefs and where they differ from mine. I think also that we have to look at mindset. Because I am already a believer and this does not reinforce my beliefs already, the whole things kind of fall flat.

The way that Lewis presented his case, he of course took from his own line of belief as defacto truth. Sitting from where I am, I would have been more interested in going deeper into the justification for those items. I am not opposed to challenging my own beliefs, in fact I would welcome that. But, then again I guess this is not the intent of the work in the first place.

OK then, who is this book for? I would say that it would appeal to Lewis fans, historical fans and people questioning the existence of God but are open for the possibility. I am not going to say that I didn’t get anything out of it but where it started and where it ended were disappointing for me. In that vein, I am glad to say I read it and I can recommend it circumstantially.

End Your Programming Routine: This is one of those books that I should come back to in a couple of years. Now that I know what to expect, it is likely that I will come back to a different opinion. It is short enough to read pretty quickly and I wouldn’t be surprised to have a more favorable outcome or at least new perspective. When something is labeled one of the greatest at anything, it is only an opinion. Just like this.

January 15, 2026 – Good Things

January 15, 2026 /

Good Things by Samin Nosrat is the January selection of the Left Coast Culinary Book Club. I have to admit that I groaned slightly on the inside when it was decided that this was the book that we were going to pursue. I guess for me I much more enjoy culinary fiction more so than another cookbook. I also kind of get a little of worn out of celebrity cooking personalities that put out cookbooks frequently

Several years ago, we covered Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. In fact, we did a month on each subject. I have to say that if there was one thing I took away from that was to salt beef early. But, I really did not put too much stock in the book. We also watched the Netflix series. But, after reading this book, I wonder if I got it all wrong.

Yes, I would call Nosrat a celebrity chef. I have seen her on Anthony Bordain’s No Reservations as well as well as other places. That being said, I do not see her putting out content like The Pioneer Woman, Bobby Flay or Emeril. This is her first book that she has published since Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. When starting this book, she admits that this is a very different book in that her first one was all about how to create something using what she calls the key elements with no recipes. Now that you have all of the tools you should need to be successful, this seems counterintuitive.

This one starts off with building some fundamental sauces or condiments or what have you. It then moves into techniques for cooking ingredients and then you would layer those sauces into the recipes. This book builds on dishes using a matrix. So, you can pick one or two or three vegetables that you have and then the sauce and a few sprinkles or spritzes and you have a finished product.

It is kind of a ground up approach or a reverse recipe. While most recipes show a picture and then a list of ingredients to make it, this book starts with an ingredient and then it provides three to ten recipes that can be made with that ingredient. Typically, you kind of look a category and then try to pick something that is appealing or read to see if you have everything. Whereas this book, you pick a vegetable and see what options you have to make something appealing.

This is the way that I cook and I suspect that this is the way many of us approach meals, especially for people with gardens or deep pantries. “I have a lot of such and such, what can I do with it”? It is so revolutionary, that it made me consider going back to Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat because I suspect that I missed the significance of it.

If there is one knock on the book to me, it is that I feel like the book uses a lot of semi-exotic ingredients. Nosrat is middle eastern born and it highly influenced her cooking. As an example I don’t know where I would find a Persian cucumber or labna. I would say that if you are going to use this book then it behooves you to do some research on sourcing middle eastern ingredients. The beauty of Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat would be using whatever cucumber you can find.

I will also admit that I haven’t done much cooking from the book either. Part of it is because I have not finished reading it as of the time of writing. I have gotten through 75% which I feel qualifies me to be able to comment at this point. I am also somewhat dubious of grocery store produce and so things like eggplant need to wait until a better time of the year. I did broil some cauliflower the other night because I was feeling the pull of Nosrat.

In my opinion, this isn’t the first cookbook you should buy. I feel like this cookbook is for someone that already has some skills and desires to learn more. From there, you can really elevate things with the knowledge that Nosrat can impart. But, it is not too bad either. I suspect that if you knew nothing, you might come away wondering why they all are not organized this way.

End Your Programming Routine: Before Christmas, my son sent me a picture from Barnes and Noble. Good Things was the 2025 gift book of the year. He knew that it was on my bookshelf to read. It very well could be, it is that good.

January 14, 2026 – One For the Road

January 14, 2026 /

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me. The original plan in mid-December was to go to the Portland Boat Show with an eye toward trying to find a boat for my birthday. But, due to things changing with our real estate transaction, things are pretty tight financially right now. As much as I would like to go to the boat show, I didn’t think that made a lot of sense for the cost and use of time.

My wife said, what do you want to do instead? I thought about it and I said, I want to go to the range one more time. I had already squirreled away one more range trip’s worth of ammunition for a December visit that I never got to. My annual renewal is due already and I am in the 30 day grace period. So, I am planning on not renewing my membership due to the distance of my potential new home and my current range.

Looking at the activity calendar, I almost panicked. Nearly half of the range was booked for events. Usually that is bad news for the guy that wants to pull up and get a space. I almost cancelled but then I remembered that almost nobody shoots at the shotgun range and we were arriving after the scheduled 4H practice. One of the things on my agenda was to shoot 410 bore out of the new 20 gauge chamber adapter. And, I had a box of targets that I had stacked up to move. If we shoot them all, I wont have to worry about moving them.

I probably should do an after action report now that I have shot all the chamber adapters I talked about in the early Fall time. But, I can say that they do make things go bang. I had zero failures when I pulled the trigger. Whether you can hit anything is another question. From an accuracy standpoint, they all resulted in less than ideal results. Thinking about things, probably a lot of it is that a shotgun is a poor rifle, due to the sights. I tried to use Kentucky windage as my aiming method and was semi successful.

First, we went to the shotgun range. My son is a much better shooter than I am due to his significant more time behind the trigger doing trap for years. He was the first to hit a target albeit it took us probably twenty attempts in order to do it. We found that you really had to jump the target or you had no chance.

My ‘expert’ analysis is that a chamber adapter has no choke on it. For that reason it is considered a ‘cylinder bore’ or no choke whatsoever. This means that the only real shot pattern is what the wad is providing. The closer the shot, the more likely of a hit because once the shot leaves the wad, it is going to spread out tremendously.

Another thing that makes a difference is that in trap, my son was shooting 1 1/8 oz of #8 shot. In this 410 shell, there is only 1/2 oz of #8. This means that there is less than half of the shot then he is used to. A poor pattern with half as much shot means that chances of target breakage is significantly reduced.

Despite all of that, we had fun. I had 50 rounds if 410 and half was 2 1/2″ shells and the other were 3″ shells. We both shot about half of each. I missed every single shot until the very last two. He hit three of them toward the end. Like I said, he is typically an 80% shooter with 12 gauge whereas I am more like a 40-50% shooter. My analysis of the situation is that if you really ‘needed’ a 410 like this, it might cost much more than it was worth to get that rabbit or quail. When you only have one shot, it is low odds that this will be it.

I suspect that if this were a proper 410 shotgun, things would be different. I don’t know if we would have been in the 80% success range but I bet we would have hit more than 10%. Regardless, I enjoyed the time, there was very little recoil so if you could afford to shoot all day, you could do it without bruising. It definitely got me thinking that maybe I should add a 410 to the fleet.

After we got done at the shotgun range, most of the open bays were open. I find that later in the day it is always easier to get a space regardless of the day. People want to be home and winding down at 4pm rather than dealing with the elements. We switched over to shooting pistol rounds rather than shotgun shells and we lucked out that the bay we were in had lights. I didn’t even know that they had them other than one bay.

Wrapping up the day, we chatted in the truck on the way home about his carburetor problems and tools that he was looking to buy. It was the father/son time that I never really experienced. Maybe I was too busy to take notice or maybe we are both changing. But, despite the fact that it was kind of a risky, make-shift plan it turned out perfectly.

End Your Programming Routine: I shed a silent tear as we drove away. I guess that if there was a way to go out, this should be the way. It’s not like I couldn’t become a member again if for some reason we move back but time also has a way of moving on. It is just going to cost double to start over again. Maybe even bigger, we have turned the corner on something my son and I have never had, an admirable relationship rather than an hierarchical one. That is worth the price.

January 13, 2026 – How Wearables Have Changed My Life

January 13, 2026 /

I am not a fan boy or gym rat or even a fitness fanatic. I am just a guy that looks at data and makes observations. I got this GPS watch to help with my training for my PCT hike and it has slowly made an impression on me. It is the kind of impression that puts conscious decisions to the forefront. Before I knew it, I was making health improving decisions that I didn’t even know were issues.

Years ago when I was leading a 24×7 tech support group, I found out about this feature that buzzed your wrist when the phone rang. As a pretty heavy sleeper, I was curious how that might affect my ability to catch some of the calls that I missed because I was sleeping and the ringer was not waking me up. Some of the guys in my group were wearing them and swearing that this was the difference maker when they were on call.

I shared this with my wife and she was interested too for different reasons. For her, my excuse of not hearing or feeling the phone ring while I was working around the house was coming to an end. She seems to have this incessant need to feel like she can get ahold of me at any moment. It is a feeling driven out of fear that I have fallen off the roof or something.

I downplayed the risks but when it came to tracking my training, I changed my tune. I looked at the top of the line and double the price watches but I decided that it wasn’t worth the price. I was not planning on using my watch to navigate and I didn’t need a color screen. I picked the Garmin Instinct Solar Tactical II. I am not sure what makes it tactical other than it is brown. It was the watch that fit the price and had the features that I wanted, particularly the run time.

This is actually my second Garmin watch. My first one was a much simpler watch called the Forerunner. I used it when I was training for my half marathon. I became battery sensitive because after two years, it wouldn’t run long enough to complete at two plus hour run. But, it was pretty cool because I could see a map of what I did plus pace. Battery life became the reason I quickly ruled out the Apple watch nearly immediately. I don’t want another thing that I have to charge everyday.

Yes, I do use it to track my hikes and walking. I look at steps and time for pace as well as distance. But what I really found is valuable is the other data it provides. When I sync my watch on the Garmin Connect application, the very first graphic it provides is a ‘body battery’ image. It takes the activity and rest for the day and comes up with some sort of point in time calculation of what my body battery value is. I have to say that when I feel run down, the body battery validates that either I did not get enough rest or I have been busier than I realized.

Another thing I look at is my sleep score. I typically only look at it when I feel like I slept poorly. But I have to say that I feel pretty validated about how I am feeling and the relative score that is presented. A general trend is that I start the week high and my battery declines as the week moves on. On some Fridays, my battery is a quarter of what it was Sunday morning.

A lot of the day is out of my control. But, there are occasions when it is a Wednesday and I am feeling low energy and I make the conscious decision to go to bet at 8:30 rather that trying to make it to 10pm. This is particularly true when it has been a hard weekend without a lot of rest. Looking at the data is changing my behaviors. I am making decisions to act on the data in the interest of feeling better tomorrow.

I have had a scientific interest in the data as well. I have observed that on days where there is a fair amount of drinking that my sleep is garbage. It didn’t matter if I slept 10 hours on New Years Eve, the result was that it was of poor quality and my body battery started off significantly lower than where it should have been. I have used the data to decline that second drink.

I have to say that the solar component does almost nothing that I can see. I have yet to see an increase in the battery life on a sunny day. But, supposedly after a full charge, there is 40 days of GPS free operation. I have yet to see the battery get low because I charge it when I take a shower. The watch will gain four days in thirty minutes.

I can also say that I only feel the ringer function about 2/3 of the time. I often find when I am being very active, it is very noisy or some amount of vibration I often do not feel the ring. Maybe it is just my choice in wearable, I don’t know but I thought that I would share that this may not be a panacea if you are looking for that function specifically.

End Your Programming Routine: This body battery function is one of the unknown gems of a wearable. I always knew that I felt run down as the week moves on but now I have proof. And because I can conduct empirical experiments, I can actively do things so that I feel better tomorrow. I don’t believe that it is all mental, because I usually check to validate my feeling and not look before I decide.

January 12, 2025 – A Starter Mechanic’s Tool Set

January 12, 2026 /

Today’s podcast was born out of some question my son was asking me. Today I talk about things to consider when starting out buying tools. It is really hard to recommend brands especially when things change over the years so I focus more on the what to do versus what not to do. Hopefully, I impart some wisdom so that you can do your own analysis and make your own decisions. There probably are some buy or do not buy recommendations but it all depends on what you are doing and want to do in the future.

January 9, 2026 – Mere Christianity, Book Four: Chapters 7-11

January 9, 2026 /

Read along: http://www.ntslibrary.com/PDF%20Books/Mere%20Christianity%20-%20Lewis.pdf

This section concludes “Mere Christianity” by C.S. Lewis. Next week I will do a complete review of the book per my usual methodologies. I also want to introduce that the next book is going to be “Then Talent Code” by Daniel Coyle if you want to get a jump start on reading that book. I am doing my best to keep up considering all of my free time is directed toward packing and moving.

In case you weren’t reading along, below is a one bullet summary of each chapter.

  • The Lords Prayer is to be spoken by the son of god.
  • Following Christian rules is not good enough because we will never be able to execute perfectly. Only once we accept that will Christianity work and we will be on our way to perfection.
  • People would prefer to be good enough rather than perfect. Perfect is only achieved through strict adherence to Christianity, see above.
  • If Christians are supposed to be nice than why aren’t all equally perceived as that? Think of where they would be without Christianity. All traits are gifts regardless of believer status or not.
  • Evolution can only take us so far and it is God’s plan to evolve us into better humans

The thing that I found interesting in this week’s reading was Lewis’ argument using evolution. In fact, I find Christianity’s general stance on evolution just plain wrong. It seems like it has been positioned so that you can only be on one side or the other. While I absolutely do not believe that humanity came from an amoeba or something, I see no reason why all life has not adapted to the environment. We even apply the same principles to livestock, pets and food with selective breeding. We even see the results in our lifetime.

The fact that Lewis acknowledges evolution at all seems novel. Not only that, by his writing he has accepted evolution as scientifically viable and uses it in a debate about Christianity is certainly unique. The idea that if we pick a point in time and think about evolution was an astute point. His point was that if we were guessing what evolution would lead to in dinosaur times is bigger, stronger and better dinosaurs. Nobody saw that the brain would be the better weapon then claws and spikes.

Lewis is a proponent of humanity evolving more toward godliness. I think my view is a little myopic but it seems like it is a hard stretch to say the Hitler is an evolution of Ceaser. I am more than sure that Ceaser was racist as he was brutal, making him and Hitler pretty much on par, just with different body counts and abilities to execute their vision at scale. The difference I see is that Ceaser was a product of his culture which was universally racist and brutal where as Hitler rose to that position.

I think that if we buy the evolution argument, it didn’t start at the birth of Christ. It should have started with creation. As a matter of fact, we started with near perfect beings that were of God. All the Moses, Solomon, David or pick your old testament hero had some character faults as we all do. But my point is that we should be much closer to the evolvement into Godly beings and I just don’t see it.

Another point that I mostly agree with was Lewis’ evolution of species argument. I think where this works is the time frame of the human life. He states that no matter low long we wait, a field of grass will not evolve into a field of wheat. The only way to get wheat is to plow up the field to start over. The point being is that we need to make drastic changes when we want drastic results.

My problem with that argument is the actual comparison. I think a more effective argument would have been you can’t get wheat from an apple orchard. Because both grass and wheat are grasses and I suspect that they diverged from one another at some long, distant point. But, the message is still clear and said by Einstein in a little more effective way. “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result.”

End Your Programming Routine: Many of those other points I didn’t talk about today are standard Christian doctrine. Maybe if you are Atheist or Agnostic then discussing those items might do more than the impact on me. However, subverting a dyed in the wool non-Christian argument to support your argument is brilliant. Finding common ground is a surefire way to persuade someone to your argument.