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October 21, 2022 – Atlas Shrugged 2:6

October 21, 2022 /

As I said last week, it seems now that we have passed the high tide line for hope. In fact, in this chapter Dabny quits her job as Vice President for the railroad. It isn’t written explicitly, but it has to do with the outcome of a special council of industrialists and government have produced. I am going to talk about that today.

By Executive Order and declaring a State of Emergency, it is officially titled directive 10-289. Below is a synopsis of the contents.

  1. No wage earner is allowed to leave their job nor be terminated under penalty of jail.
  2. No business owner is allowed to fail and cease to exist or to transfer the entity in any means.
  3. All patents, trademarks or intellectual property will be surrendered to the government for the free use by all.
  4. Nothing new is to be invented or marketed or even investigated
  5. All manufacturing is to maintain the exact same output year over year.
  6. Prices will remain the same from this point forward.
  7. Wages will remain the same from this point forward.
  8. Any disputes of edge cases will be overseen by an entity called the Unification Board.

To me, this is clearly a larger than life framing of the transition from free market to communism. Not being a total expert, I assume that all of these things are an exaggeration of state controlled economic system. Will prices never change? I don’t think so, but they wouldn’t change without governmental review. Will nothing ever be invented? I doubt that is even desirable. At the very least, new military technology was invented but I think that science was highly valued in the USSR (granted it was probably state generated).

There is nothing like doubling down on failed policy to make things fail harder. If we look at our current financial system we can see the madness of it all. At a high level, this is how it works.

Banks qualify someone for a loan and they create a ledger entry. That loan then creates money into existence because they don’t actually have the cash liquid in the bank. This is the entire concept of fractional reserve banking. The US government borrows that money from the bank (also creates money), which they are charged a fee. They then raise money to cover the debts by issuing the bonds, which largely the banks purchase. So the banks make money ‘selling’ it to the government and they also make money by buying the debt. This is a Ponzi scheme.

When we have inflation, we have too much money in the system. Interest rates are raised to slow down some of the borrowing and additional creation of money. Inflation devalues the currency and while a small amount of continuous inflation is desirable (from a monetary policy standpoint), a large amount is not.

I suppose that you might be asking what does failure and our current financial system have to do with each other? Well, it hasn’t failed yet, but it will because there is no possible way that it will not. We cannot create money from loaning it to someone else and charge for it both ways as any sort of rational logic. The relative strength of the US Dollar is only backed by force.

What is the Petrodollar? Did you know that all oil transactions from everywhere in the world needs to be done with the US Dollar? This means that every country needs to convert their currency into USD to perform the transaction. That activity keeps the value of the dollar relatively high compared to most. This is the activity that requires force to maintain. Why do you think we are in the middle east in the first place? It is certainly not to promote freedom and liberty.

Bringing this all back around now. The central economic control of communism like the USSR, the move to communism in Atlas Shrugged and the US financial policy are all flavors of the same thing. They are all attempts to manipulate a systems for goals. The goals may not all be the same but the results are. There are too many variables and inputs for this to ever work in perpetuity.

End Your Programming Routine: At this point, I am not sure that there is a perfect economic system. I want to say free market is the best, but that has a lot of issues itself. You cannot predict boom/bust risk free. Who knew that Beanie Babies was going to be a thing? So, when you invest your entire retirement in those things and they become worthless on the whim of a trend, things go south in the entire economy. It is looking like an un-manipulatable currency like Bitcoin is looking like the way to go, but it still wont avoid the Beanie Baby crash. So, emulate the people doing well; make money and build wealth within the framework available but keep your eyes and options open.

October 20, 2022 – ‘Tacticool’ Thursday

October 20, 2022 /

I am going to opine about the past for a minute. There used to to be a local sporting goods chain called G.I. Joes. To me, this was fantasy land. They had auto parts, electronics (including music), Ticketmaster franchise, army surplus, stick and ball gear and a full marine department. In some ways, this is probably why they went out of business. When the children of the founder wanted to retire, the business was sold to an equity group that quickly ran it into the ground (2009). Dick’s bought the name and you probably know how I feel about that.

They had a going out of business sale. I was in China on business when it started and by the time I got back, most remaining things were 50% off and certainly all of the best stuff was picked over. I did find a Nikon pack that contained a scope, range finder and a coupon for a free fleece jacket, which I bought for $150. I still use all three of those things, so I suppose I did OK.

Enough of that… first I will talk about what is old. My Nikon rangefinder was a pretty simple (to operate) device. Press the button and laser goes out to a pointed distance and measures as long at the distance is less than 1000 yards. You can change between meters and yards and there and the results are displayed on a black LCD readout. It cant be too close either, the distance needs to be longer than 10 yards.

Last week at Trap, we saw a coyote out at some distance. My Nikon is the one I carry in my range bag so I got it out to measure the range. I couldn’t get a distance on it. So, I don’t know if the battery is week, my angle was bad or it is actually farther than 1000 yards. Things have gotten a whole lot more sophisticated in the last 13 years.

My new Leupold rangefinder has a lot going on. First note that it is significantly smaller. The output LED is red instead of black; I assume this is for low light use. It claims that it can read reflective surfaces out to 1400 yards and game out to 1000 yards. But that is not all. This one is also usable for bow hunting, so short range measuring is much improved over my older Nikon.

There are multiple modes: TBR stands for True Ballistic Range. Remember your Pythagorean theorem? On any sort of angle, we are looking at the hypotenuse, not the actual distance. So there is some sort of level sensor inside to compensate for angle (if using that mode). One of the use cases is to take a measurement at the top of a tree to determine the actual height. You can then assess whether it is a risk of the tree damaging something if it were to fall.

And there is more. Using a preset of ballistic groups, the rangefinder will calculate your holdover on targets at distance. Your target is 400 yards, you are sighted in for 200, how many inches do you need to aim higher to make the shot. This also takes the angle into consideration. There is some minimal amount of wind compensation if desired. There is even more, but I worry about needing to read the manual before each use, so I think I will set it up and let it be at least during hunting season.

I have never worried too much about range. The truth is, I have never seen an animal and had my rangefinder handy. I have always figured, if my rangefinder can’t measure it, I am likely way too far away. I mostly use it to gauge distances when I am sitting anyway. I know that if I see something between X and me, then I am good, otherwise I am going to have to get closer.

End Your Programming Routine: This is like having a new car. At first, you think I am going to use this for special occasions. But then, you remember that you like working air conditioning and better fuel mileage plus it is parked in a better spot for that quick run to the store. For now, it is going in my hunting pack but it very well may find my way into my range bag after the season is over.

October 19, 2022 – Electric Yard Tools

October 19, 2022 /

I will be honest, I have had a long held prejudice against yard tools that are powered with a cord. Things I have used would be things like chainsaws, hedge trimmers, string trimmers and leaf blowers. I can now add rototiller to the list.

It’s not that these items don’t work, they do. And quite frankly they are often times significantly, more inexpensive then the cordless relatives. I guess my opinion stems originally from a Black & Decker hedge trimmer that my dad has owned my entire life. This was something we usually had to deal with once a year as kids. And multiple times the cord was cut because you are thrashing around in the brush and the cord gets tangled in the brush and around other plants.

With the advent of battery powered yard tools and my older age, I am starting to change my opinion. For one, I don’t own enough property or do enough work to justify gas powered tools. The truth is, I don’t do enough yard work to replace my gas tools with battery tools (or even own either type of them). My Stihl chainsaw has been really good but other things like lawnmowers and trimmers gum up, crack up or fail due to lack of use.

The nice thing about electric is that there is very little maintenance required, so it is ready to go when you want it. Whereas, I am often wondering if my gas powered equipment will start or run every time I go to use it.

Last year, when I was cleaning out my father-in-laws stuff, I took his electric cultivator. I forgot that I even had it until I was trying to figure out how to get some ground worked up quickly to do some overseeding. I have to say that I was pretty impressed at how it did. My mom has had Mantis tiller for years and I really thought it was worthless from what I have used.

Yes, the cord was in the way but based on my usage pattern, the small inconvenience is worth not trying to do it by hand. This is definitely not something I would have ever purchased, however maybe this is the kick in the ass to get a proper garden in next year. It is getting my juices going.

End Your Programming Routine: For homeowners or occasional users that are close to a power source, having a corded tool is highly preferential to not having anything at all. For this category of user, I think the battery powered tool is probably the best compromise on most yard tools. Only serious, frequent users would benefit from gas tools. If that is you, then you probably already know all of this. But, reconsider the stigma corded tools, I know that I am.

October 18, 2022 – Will it Juice?

October 18, 2022 /

For a while, there was an schtick about ‘Will it Blend?‘. It was a marketing campaign for Blendtec, blending all kinds of things in there product. Some of it was pretty impressive. I set out to find out if my new to me apple press would press grapes to make grape juice.

I do have a device that is marketed as a ‘juicer’ and it does work. However, with grapes that have skins on them, this device plugs quickly and hard. The last time I made grape juice, I spent several hours cleaning it. I also had to disassemble frequently just to keep it going. I know traditionally, grape juice could be made by stepping on the grapes, I don’t see why an apple press wont do the same thing. So this is what I set out to do, plus, I want to use it.

Because I have been both lazy and busy, I haven’t done as much preserving as I should. Admittedly, a lot of blueberries and raspberries went to waste while I was focused on the siding repair. We are nearly out of jam as we haven’t done any in several years, this year I think I will make grape. I do know that this is one of the least popular choices in my house but we have it, so lets use it.

It’s hard to compare yields and efficiencies because I don’t have a lot of baseline to compare but I got about a quart of juice from roughly 3 gallons of grapes. Looking at the jelly recipe, only 2 3/4 cup of juice is required to make a batch, which is 7 cups yield. I will probably at least double it.

As coincidence would have it, the guy I bought the press from stopped by the day I was trying this. He said absolutely they have used it for juicing. Now, I had no fears, I just needed to figure out how it worked.

The truth is, it was a lot of work for a little yield. That being said, I am happy that my grapes didn’t go to waste. I got enough juice to make some jelly so that is something. I am planning to get going with apple pressing soon. I am running out of time to do this as well.

End Your Programming Routine: It has been a long held dream to have an apple press. Now, I need to get some use out of it. This may not be the best ‘production model’, but just like I keep talking about, I cant get caught up in the ‘toolbox fallacy’. Let me get some use out of it and figure out what I like and don’t like, then I can upgrade.

October 17, 2022 – Revisiting Hardware and Software

October 17, 2022 /

I knew that I wrote about this once. I looked it up and it was April 13, 2020. In that context, I was talking about spending money on things that accessorize my shop equipment rather than another tool. Today, I am taking about having experiences versus stuff primarily. I some ways, the two are closely related.

End Your Programming Routine: This is something that I battle with. I am stuck in the ‘how can I use this’ mentality of what would make this experience better the next time I do it. The challenge is tempering the exuberance of getting better with the reality of investing for future experiences.

October 13, 2022 – ‘Tacticool’ Thursday

October 13, 2022 /

Have you ever heard the history of the metallurgy of the penny? I am not going to cover that specifically you can look it up but in 1982 the penny was changed from 95% copper to 5% zinc to 97.5% zinc and 2.5% copper. The entire purpose was that the cost of copper was worth more than a penny. I will join this to the rest of the topic later.

One of the things I typically do at the range is pick-up what is called range brass. This is brass that other people have left of the ground. Technically, we are all supposed to do our best to clean-up after ourselves. Some people do not. I usually take a look around and if there is something useable, I pick it up. I always pick-up more than I take and the rest goes into the recycling bin. More on this later too.

A word of warning, ultra cautious shooters warn that this is a potentially dangerous activity. We do not know the history of the brass and it could be ‘wild catted’ or out of specification in some manner. My take on it is that these are shooters that are just lazy. They shoot and then they leave. If you are not willing to pick up your brass, I highly doubt that you are going to reload, let alone wildcat. I suppose that you can tell I feel like the risk is very minimal.

Some people take this pursuit to a different level. They pick up and take all brass, whereas I only take brass for calibers that I own. They will clean and resell brass at places like gun shows. Sometimes, they do some sort of hobby reloading business and reload the brass. The fact of the matter is that the gun club does the exact same thing. They sort through the recycling bin by caliber and resell in the pro-shop at a good rate.

For rimfire cartridges and damaged casings, these can be sold for scrap. The going rate is $1.75/lb. It doesn’t take long for this to really add up to some real money. The gun club donates all of that money to youth shooting sports that use the facility for practice and events. The truth is anyone can do this too.

This was my haul last trip. There are almost 400 rounds of .223 Remington/5.56 NATO in there. I am seeing $5/lb for straight off the ground brass to $50/250 for cleaned and prepped brass. I guess what I am saying is that it is worth the effort to pick it up. Within the mix I have crushed cases, crushed necks and some really difficult primers to remove. So not every case is usable, but that is OK because I don’t have anything invested into them anyway.

The US military picks up range brass too. Some of that is sold back into the marketplace as ‘once fired’ brass. This is a lot of what you find if you are looking for anything that is not new. People buy it off of surplus sites and then count it, rebrand it, etc. A lot of it is also shredded and sold for scrap. But you can see how much more valuable the cartridge cases are based on the paragraph above.

I think is worth mentioning that not all cartridge cases are brass. They can also be made of steel or aluminum and now plastic has just been introduced into the market. None of those can be reloaded, so I just throw those into the recycle bin. All metals have a scrap price, so they are still worth money.

End Your Programming Routine: I am waiting for my replacement rods to come from Lyman. I have bent several of them messing with .223. I also broke one pin and bent the heck out of another on my Lee Universal depriming die. I am hoping that this is just me learning to feel how to do it, but if I can get powder and primers, I can make ammunition much cheaper than I can purchase it retail. But, since I don’t have a load worked up yet, I will just do the case prep waiting for the consumer market to catch up with inventory.

October 12, 2022 – Installing a Replacement Window

October 12, 2022 /

Do you wonder why I talk about flashing so much? I mean, who doesn’t like to see a good, quality flash? I know what you are thinking and yes I am trying to joke around a little bit. But, seriously, flashing is the key to a quality job. There are tons of videos out there to show how to do this properly. Just remember, think like a raindrop.

There are three ways to go about this job. The first is to order replacement windows. This is essentially a widow without a nailing flange and the idea is that you remove the old window the one pops into the hole. This does not disturb the existing siding and trim assuming the window you are replacing does not have a nailing flange already and all of those details are in good condition

The second way to do it is to buy a new window and cut the nailing flange off with something like a reciprocating saw. This simulates a replacement window at usually significantly less cost. Then there is the right way. That is to cut off the siding and trim so that the window and opening can be flashed appropriately.

The window that I was actually replacing was used when I purchased it. Someone had already cut the flange off. I bought it second hand for $40 and I tried to make it water tight. It was a fine window, but my wife wanted a window that actually opened so that we could install a portable air conditioner in the future (actually this year, but it is already October so we won’t see those kind of temperatures again until next summer).

Out went the window. The next thing you want to do is prep the opening. I really like this self sealing membrane product. It is sold in the area of windows, it is really sticky and it seals around nails and punctures. You want to flash around the window opening to protect the framing from getting wet. If this is a replacement, you want your flashing to hang over the house wrap so that any water that might get behind the window stays on the outside of the wood.

Start at the bottom and work around the opening. Here is a link from someone doing it right. Note, there are some slightly different techniques but they all are a variation of the same thing. After the flashing, set the window into the hole as centered as possible. Just like doors, do everything you can so that the window is square and plumb.

If that is true, nail in the window. I like a 2″ roofing nail, nailed every other hole on the flange. The point is to get the window nailed into the structure and two inches is enough to get through the window and the sheathing and get enough grab into the structure. Now, you want to flash over the flange to keep all water on the outside of the house wrap.

Believe it or not, when siding the very next thing you would do is the window trim before the siding. This is because the trim and the siding mate with a caulk bead. I have come to the conclusion that these should also be flashed with metal or membrane but I didn’t do it here because I would have to pry all the siding loose so that I could slide flashing underneath. I reused and installed the trim in the reverse order I took it off.

The takeaways here are 1) order an appropriate window 2) install it plumb and square 3) flash the opening properly before and after. If you do these three things, then you will have a successful replacement. Obviously I didn’t cover everything, you may have to remove the interior trim for instance. I also typically use a 6″ tape. Mostly, I split it in half because this is some expensive stuff.

End Your Programming Routine: I bought this window on the same day as I bought the front door. So, it has been in the queue for a little bit. The weather has really cooperated so that I could do all the things I have wanted to finish before fall/winter set in. Once the trim is in, it is time for the fussy part of caulking and painting. but that is it, Take you time, have a stable work area, watch some videos and think before you act, you can do it.

October 11, 2022 – The Kitchen Counter Cooking School

October 11, 2022 /

The Kitchen Counter Cooking School: How a Few Simple Lessons Transformed Nine Culinary Novices into Fearless Home Cooks by Kathleen Flinn is the Left Coast Culinary Book Club selection for September 2022. In many ways, this is a follow up to The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry. It picks up where that book left off in Kathleen Flinn’s timeline.

I have found this book very interesting because I identify very much with Kathleen’s psyche. Here she goes to Le Cordon Bleu kind of on a whim, gets her credentials and then immediately writes a book. She is interested in food and cooking but really doesn’t want to put those skills to work traditionally. She even says it herself that she doesn’t know what she want’s to do. Sounds like someone I know.

I don’t want to spoil the book, but Kathleen has an epiphany while grocery shopping. She observes how much junk people are loading into their carts and begins asking the question of why. The most pervasive answer is that people don’t know how to cook. This book describes a social experiment, bringing in nine people that had little to no skills to see what happens. I will let you read the book to find out the methods and how it went.

This made me think about our current society. We live in a world that is surrounded by information. We take in the information as entertainment and so my analysis here is that whatever happens on the screen is not reality. Therefore, we have programmed our brains to say ‘that all happened in fantasy land, I will now operate in the real world’. What I am trying to say is that we cannot make the link between what I can do and what I see. Channels such as Food Channel, HGTV and MotorTrend can be entertaining and informative. But, I feel like their best disposition is really as inspiration.

Couple that with product marketing and misinformation. Unless people really study the information and use critical thinking, of course they are misguided. I hate to take this back to the tired old Covid analogy, but here we go. We are entering the ‘flu season’ of 2022. Pretty much what I see now is that everything is back to the way things were pre-Covid with the exception that masks are now permitted in banks, schools, etc. I just heard the commercial to get your fourth booster.

How do we rectify the crisis that was with the ambivalence of today? In my opinion, what we thought we knew in 2020 was wrong. Notice, no one is talking about why we are behaving differently today then we were two years ago. This is what brings us back to food. Even the supposed experts on health were wrong with Covid. What make us think that they are right about die?

Kathleen Flinn is not getting her due from my side trip. But, she did inspire it and she is right that the vast majority of people don’t know how to cook. Some of it is their fault and some of it is not. For instance, even I have heard numerous chefs recommend soup base as a starter. To me, that is fine for a restaurant because their number one priority is profit whereas a home cook’s number one priority is nourishment; and that ain’t in soup base.

I want to be careful, I am not denigrating anyone’s choices. I sometimes use shortcuts too. But, I know how to cook and my choices are made by circumstances like I don’t have time to defrost stock so I use soup base, not by lack of skills. It’s like I wrote about salad dressing in the past. Back when I was a child, buying salad dressing was a convenience but now it is a lost skill.

This is a book that is an easy read. To get the full impact, you have to be ready for it. It’s like watering dry ground, it is just going to run off. But, if your soil is a little bit moist, then it is going to soak that water deep to the roots.

End Your Programming Routine: This is the last scheduled book of the year. I have to say that I was really not excited about any of the selections, surprisingly I have warmed up to all of them. I am really glad that this was how we finished the year because this is the kind of stuff that I am really into. I love a good dinner, but I really enjoy changing the status quo, even if it is for nine people.

October 10, 2022 – Table Topics and Misadventure

October 10, 2022 /

Ever do something that you know that you shouldn’t do but do it anyway? I did and I talk about it today. I also talk about what I do differently and how it has changed my life since. All the while, I continue to practice my delivery. If you are like me, there is help for us in terms of a support group.

End Your Programming Routine: I know that I am weak speaking impromptu. I think that I am pretty good when I am prepared. At least when it comes to structure and content but I also know that my delivery could certainly improve. I am going to do more ‘Table Topics’ in the future because I don’t ever want this forum to fall into a rut. That falls part and parcel with my initial vision of ‘polymath daily’.