Saturday, November 26, 2016

Obligatory, 11.26.16

Given what I said previously, it may be inferred that the blog may be drawing to a close.

Maybe not yet.  I still have to go to that biopsy.  It may not be doomsday, or it may be.  It hasn't happened yet, and maybe it won't. 

It may be premature to bury the blog is what I am saying.  But if it is doomsday, then I may not be up to blogging or much of anything else while this thing is being treated.

Having said all that, let me write just a little about what is going on in the world of politics.  Once again, I have to ask why these people are doing what they are doing.  Do they really think that Hillary Clinton is going to be president?  Do they really think that they can pull this off?  Evidently, the DO think that, or otherwise why do it?  On the other hand, perhaps they think that they can impair Trump so much that he cannot govern.  Who knows?

Trump has been rather generous with them, I'd say.  Maybe it is time to reconsider.


Friday, November 25, 2016

Let me outta here!

You may wonder how I can be so calm.

Maybe it will be a delayed reaction like in this movie.  He told them not to let him out, but he changed his mind...







Obligatory, 11.25.16

A few thoughts this morning...

  • Always the social critic, I suppose.  Just now tried to resolve a problem with a bill, but they want to use computers all the time.  The overreliance upon computers is a feature of corporations, which has become a bugaboo for yours truly.  I see this pattern over and over again.  Corporations are just too darn remote.  The further away you are from a problem, the harder it is to perceive it.  Just sayin'.
  • With my medical issues, big changes are coming soon.  Frankly, I don't know if I can move fast enough to make these decisions.  Besides, that is just the beginning of what they will mean for the future.  One thing I most likely will have to do is give up my property out west.  Yep, that will have to go.  That opportunity isn't viable any longer.  I could wait for the final diagnosis, but I will have to be extremely lucky to avoid having to make this decision.
  • Most likely, I will have to make frequent visits to the doctor.  This may mean I will have to move back to Houston.  There may be a long rehab.  Etc. Etc.
  • It is too early to talk about treatment until final diagnosis.  That is what the doc said, anyway.  However, this could involve some rather radical treatment.  That is why it would be extremely fortunate if the worst case scenario is not the one I have to deal with.  The odds of this kind of luck is rather low, I'd say.
  • What went wrong?  Another question that is too early to answer.  One thing is clear.  This cannot be detected without an MRI.  I could have sought one a lot sooner, but there was the cost issue.  Turns out that this concern may have been unnecessary.  If I had any advice to anyone in a similar situation: get the MRI.  I got one for 750.  That may hurt some budgets, but it is a lot lower than what I thought it would be.  Seems like I remember having one for two grand in 1994, so I was expecting a much higher number.  But that will lead me back to social criticism, don't you know.  There's a lot wrong in our society.  But you probably already knew that.





Thursday, November 24, 2016

Obligatory, 11.24.16

The doctor appointment is now in the can.  It looks as if my worst fears have been realized. 

He laid it on me hard--- it is an aggressive cancer.  I saw the image and it looks like a monster.

I still need to do the biopsy, but I don't anticipate that the news will get any better.

Now I get to think about this from this time to that, which may be about a week.

I probably won't be able to continue the blog much longer.  Or to put it mildly, I will be busy doing something else, if something can be done.

Of course, much has to be decided, and soon.  Not all the info is in yet.


Wednesday, November 23, 2016

Quick post, 11.23.16

There's not much time left before I have to go to my appointment. 

Some thoughts to share before I go.
  • Being a thinking man may be a blessing or a curse.  I don't know which, but I do know that I like to think.
  • That said, I note that Trump is said to be reversing himself.  It seems likely that this will happen, but if it is happening, it is still a disappointment.   That allows me to segue into another thought.
  • Politics is that way.  It is the art of making people feel things so as to get them to do things.  The trouble is that this can lead to some bad outcomes.  In my opinion, most of the troubles in the world can probably be traced to that.  That said, the thought is that anger is the fuel of politics.  Anger is to politics what gasoline is to the internal combustion engine.  Without anger, politics can go nowhere, which is analogous to running out of gas.
  • An example is racial politics.  The legacy of slavery begat Jim Crow.  Which in turn begat the Civil Rights Movement.  Which in turn begat the things that we see today.  None of these things are actually solving any of the problems associated with racial problems.  Instead, they are fueling the racial animosity that in turn fuels politics of race.  It's the anger that comes with these acts that fuels the politics.   If the politicians actually solved the problems, the anger would disappear.  It could no longer be politicized.  Therefore, politics isn't about solving problems.



Aren't you glad I am around to explain these things?  But I jest.  A little.



Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Counting Cars TV show

I'm doing what I don't normally do, and that is watch TV.  Maybe I didn't know what I wuz missing.

Actually, something like this may have been more up my alley at one time.  It would definitely be up somebody's alley, whose name I know, but won't mention.



Monday, November 21, 2016

More complaints

Let's see.  I have this doctor's appointment for Wednesday.  This is less than 48 hours.  They are asking me to provide stuff that takes longer than 48 hours to get.  Or maybe it does.

Just wondering why, because doctors aren't cheap.  If I don't have this info, then my visit may be more social than medical.  Nice to meetcha, doc!  Now why am I here??

I figured that he should have had this info already.  If he needed it, I should have gotten an advisory to provide it much sooner than this.  Now I don't know if I can get it in time.

Just saying, folks.  Things are screwed up, but you knew that already.  But some of you want Hillary, anyway.

Go figure.

Seems like something high value like this should have more customer service.  You can get better customer service at Mickey D's.  This isn't an isolated case.  Indeed, this is the rule, not the exception.


Another example of what has gone wrong

I was viewing the NextBigFuture site when the webpage crashed.

Hello!  No way shit like that should be happening.  This stuff should have been corrected years ago.

We might as well be back in the nineties when the web was new and full of bugs.

People can't manage their way out of a wet paper bag.  Give me a freaking break.


An example of what has gone wrong

Here's an article about the new 'stealth' bomber.

The problem is the expense and the time lag between concept and delivery.  By the time the thing gets ready for combat, it may well be obsolete.

We need new leadership, and hopefully we will get it.  Trump criticized the F35, which is another prime example of this kind of numbskullery.  Perhaps this one can get junked as well.

Trump says he can cut taxes and build new infrastructure.  All of this without adding to debt.  According to conventional thinking, this is impossible.  But the problem is with the conventional thinking.  Trump went outside the box to get elected.  If we are fortunate, he will govern outside the box, and we will be better off for it.


Doctor's appointment

On Wednesday.  It's the Big One, I suspect.  What I mean is that when I walk out of there, I am going to know what my future is, and that is what is worrying me a bit.

It could well be worrying over nothing, but it may be something.  Not knowing which is which is a bitch.  But knowing which is which can also be a bitch.  You can't win sometimes.

One thing I think I will know is what this surgeon wants to do.  When a surgeon wants to do something to you, it tends to concentrate your attention.

Know what I mean?


Thoughts about climate change and whatnot

Time after time, I have come up with arguments against this claim.  But, even so, I am willing to consider the possibility that I am wrong.   After all, one theme of this blog has always been that there are solutions to the problems, including this one, provided that it is really a problem.

It is also been one of my observations that these people really don't want the solutions, even though they claim they do.  That's because every time somebody comes up with an idea to solve this "problem", these people show little interest, or outright hostility to the idea.

So, what is going on here?  Again, I have noted that this is rent seeking behavior, as opposed to problem solving behavior.  For, if the "problem" were to be solved, the rents would no longer be collectible.  The rents can only be collected while the "problem" exists.  Therefore, climate change can never be solved, because solutions are not being sought.  No, it is the rents that are being sought.

May I mention once more, that one of my goals here was to think in terms of principles.  The principle here is that entire lines of rent seeking behaviors could be invented that supposedly handled "problems", but don't really.  Furthermore, we could have an entire economy built on the proposition of solving problems that do not even exist.  Therefore, values are not being created, but destroyed!

Finally, may I add that this blog was created to explore what has gone wrong in our civilization. 

The election of Trump may be a solution to the problem, because the problem is a social one, which is caused by our politicians, who do nothing but create problems so that they can have a reason for their own existence.  These people are called liberals.  They do not create values, but the opposite.  They pretend to solve problems that do not exist, and while doing so, collect rents from us all, which feed them.  Well, it is high time to stop feeding these parasites.

I know that this may sound harsh to some folks.  However, if it is true, it is true.  Note however, that truth is suddenly unacceptable in this society.  You can't tell the truth anymore.  This lies at the heart of the phenomenon which has become known as political correctness.

Truth itself is attacked as a relative thing, as there can be no truths.  This has become known as post modernism.

Language has been attacked.  "Gay" has become to mean homosexual.  Indeed, if one calls another a homosexual, one may get punished for it, if these people were to get their way.  Once again, thinking in terms of principles, the entire language can be turned upside down in order to accommodate these people in getting what they want.  What they want is not to solve a problem, but to manage to seek some advantage, which may be monetary as in a rent, or a social advantage.

Anyway, this was to be a lead into another proposal to solve a problem related to global warming.

Why do it?  Nobody is really interested anyway.

One could do it as a mental exercise.  Somehow, that is not satisfying.  This is why I sought a lab of my own.  I bought some land in order to have my own "moonshot".  This means it is a way of testing my own theories, and then writing about them.  Not that anybody would actually be interested.

I have written about the Apollo company.  They make fuel cells that could power automobiles.  The claim is that these can be produced at a competitive price.  If this is true, which I can neither confirm nor deny, then it would be a prime example of the phenomenon I have just mentioned.  There's a solution, but nobody's interested.

I contacted this company and spoke with a fellow on the phone.  Nothing came of this.  I got the impression that the guy wanted to make a fortune off his product.  This may be unjust of me to say, but I could swear that this fellow was seeing "stars".

Does it mean his product is no good?  I don't know.  But it seems to me in order to make it more real to people, you need to have real live installations in place.  The Wright Brothers were considered phonies until they flew their heavier than air contraption around the Eiffel Tower.  Once they did that, it could no longer be denied.

Anyway, an idea occurred to me to make this work in order to make energy and water.  You see, a hydrogen fuel cell makes water while making energy.  What a concept!

On my little ranch out west, I could certainly use water and energy.

How to get my "fuel"?  The idea isn't new.  I would use smelling salts.  Smelling salts release ammonia, which can be collected.  The ammonia could be cracked to produce hydrogen, which goes into the fuel cell and makes energy and water.

The logistical problem is to get the smelling salts into the place.  Then a way has to be made to process it into hydrogen.

For every ton of smelling salts, I could get 640 lbs of water, plus enough electricity to drive a fuel cell car nearly 2,000 miles!  That might translate into about 500 kwh of electricity.  That's a lot of water and a lot of electricity for my little cabin!

If I could prove that, what would it mean?  Maybe the world would yawn.  But they could not deny the truth of its existence.  But would the truth matter anymore in this society?



Sunday, November 20, 2016

Could it be true?

  Sometimes, a little detective work can lead you to a question.

So, what is the answer?

I suspect that a connection has been made, but getting the answer would be like pulling teeth.

Just for the record, I do not like to guess.  So, we are not getting anywhere like that.



Homemade water distiller

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Another post in the water sub series in the main off the grid series of posts.

There is another post in this series just like this one.  This may give another perspective.




dog gone it



Good enough to tickle your funny bone





From movie "Patton": All Glory is fleeting

It may be well for the Trumpsters to keep this quote in mind.  Sure, this victory is glorious, but things can go wrong, and often do.