Friday
- after a days work, home to Lancaster. I've only been home a single
night in about three weeks, it is time.
On the drive home I finished Book #8, Simple Courage*, by Frank Delaney. As I mentioned last week, this is the story of the SS Flying Enterprise
and Captain Henrik Kurt Karlsen. It's well done, concentrating on the
last voyage and Karlssn's motives for staying aboard. Recommended, even
if Delaney gets a bit overblown at times, and rather unnecessarily
brings his personal issues into the book - while only mentioning in
passing Karlsen's WWII convoy service.
A minor nitpick: Delaney repeatedly refers to the Flying Enterprise
as 'the old ship'. On the day of her sinking, January 10, 1952 she was
only eight years and three days old, having been launched in January 7,
1944! She was old tech, certainly, and was built in a wartime
hurry, but she wasn't 'old' by maritime standards.
Interesting factoid: as a 'tramp steamer' she could (and did) carry up
to 10 passengers, any more and she would have been classified a
passenger ship with attendant (and more stringent) regulation.
Riley inspecting the TIVO usb to ethernet adapter.
Thursday 26 February
2009
Thursday
- it was hot out. Short sleeve weather, with sunscreen lotion on! Then,
after a full day of inspecting there were several hours of a meeting on
database design in the evening. Complaints were raised when I took my
boots off, but too bad: it wasn't my idea to work so late.
There was an email in the inbox, stating that my EVDO router had
shipped earlier in the week, so it's probably waiting at the house. I'm
curious to see how well it works. My boss already
wants to borrow it, as they are turning off the internet at the office
this weekend (March 1st is Sunday) preparatory to the big move.
The Kyocera KR2
has the PCMCIA card slot I need for my old tech PC5750, but also has an
Express Card slot that should fit his data card, and even the newer USB
inputs. It has, as well, a number of other nifty features, none of
which I actually need. VPN throughput might be nice.
Wednesday 25 February 2009
Wednesday
- another day in the field. The weather has been nice, long-sleeved
shirt work, just about the best. A bit unusual for February, but no
complaints here!
I was reading that the stimulus/bailout/whatever was now up to nearly
10 trillion dollars.
Ten...trillion. This is unimaginable. It's $1500
to (from?) every person alive on the planet
- not just
the USA, the planet. If we use just the 100 million employed population
of the USA it comes to $100,000, each. I suspect this is simply the
up-front cost, that the interest and fee's on this kind of debt will be
even higher. And of course the net effect is as if the gov't was
printing money, inflation is certain, which will trash the savings of
the thrifty and responsible.
Smart people bought bullion last year. I'm not that smart. But I am
beginning to think about defensible arable land, with a good well. If
there is a run on the dollar, who knows what will happen?
Tuesday 24 February 2009
Tuesday
- Still not back to inspecting. I did send the county a list of what
the remaining inventory looks like, just a few more weeks worth, and
they are checking that it's complete. Heh. I hope so. It was their inventory,
after all.
