The Ultimate Answer to Kings

Well, after all it was a million years ago. Okay – it was three years ago.

It wasn’t a scandal, though. It was Making the World a Better Place.

“The [center-left] bloc has not been able to unify around a common message, a common agenda, or a strong leader. Our aim is to strengthen the bloc, rather than any one party, [and] in tandem weaken Netanyahu and his right wing parties.”

Also – Surprise! The senate was completely powerless to investigate because gosh darn it…

The [State] Department later told the Subcommittee it was unable to find the email chain because it was not retained.

Amazing how often that happens – and how often it works.

But never mind. Russians!

Went out early while it was cool and definitely not going to rain in the next few minutes to finish painting cabin trim. This job sort of went on hold until my back had healed a little more. The back pain still has its moments but it’s not the crippling problem it was a couple of weeks ago. Anyway I got all the Lair’s brown bits – and all the bits that were originally supposed to be brown but I didn’t get around to it the first time – the same reddish-brown color…

…and everything was going fine until I started work on the underside of the addition’s roof overhang… Continue reading →

And we’re back. Actually we seemed to be back last night after the evening storm passed, but that’s life.

Went on a trip over the local “roads” to bounce a draft of my proposal for taking over that brush maintenance job off somebody, which gave me a load of what the normal people around here have to put up with. The clay is saturated, the south wash runs bank to bank daily, the repair that Scott the Road Guy did to this one lethally slippery corner is failing fast, I’m driving diagonally in 4-wheel-drive on a main road, and it’s basically just another day in July. One of our too seasons: Too hot, too cold, too windy, too wet. I love it: It keeps the tourists away. But since it basically hasn’t rained since last summer, I’m having a hard time getting used to the mud again.

Really pretty day for most of yesterday, though. That’s the classic – though by no means invariable – pattern: Nice mornings, stormy afternoons. Yesterday in our immediate area the storms just threatened. we got some rain and thunder, but the big stuff passed us by. You never know. I took the respite as an opportunity to climb up to the top of Ian’s Cave and do something Landlady and I had discussed last weekend…

He keeps getting mice and an occasional rat in there, and we can’t for the life of us figure out how they’re getting in. I mean, the seams are covered in concrete and several feet of dirt, right? If ever there were a house that should be immune from rodents, this would be it. But there they are. Also they have a bad habit of getting in and then just dying – and really stinking the place up – which finally, once I thought about it for a moment, suggested that they weren’t burrowing in – they were falling in.

And if that theory holds, there are a couple of very convenient ways they could do that. I don’t know why so many would keep doing it, it makes no sense to me, but they’re mice. Why do I insist that they make sense? So anyway I’m hoping that’s fixed now.

Pro-tip: Everybody talks about duct tape and tie wire and they do have their charms. But also, for happiness in the redneck life, don’t run out of hardware cloth.

Every time we get weather the connection goes all wonky. That’s always been the case and it was much worse back when I depended on the satellite dish. Back then sometimes I lost connection for days. Now I have this smartphone, which also serves as a hotspot for the laptop – which remains my main blogging ‘pooter because it can receive emails and manipulate graphics – and normally that works great even though I can’t pretend I ever understood how it works. It must all run on the same signal, so you’d think either everything would work or nothing would.

Not so, though. The hotspot hasn’t been able to connect with anything all afternoon, but this smartphone by itself works just fine. Tomorrow it might be the other way around.

Evening storm is coming in now and I might lose it all for a while. Time to unplug things and wait out the lightning.

Getting dressed, and over my second cup I’m getting ready to go out for morning chores. Check to see if my belt knife needs a touch-up, and…

…are you f’ing kidding me? Monsoon’s been on for what? A week? And I’m getting rust.

Time to dig out the Break Free and check the guns over…

It stormed like crazy yesterday afternoon. Storm came out of the north, which I’ve been kind of hoping for because I wanted to see how fixing the north edge of the roof would finally get the front window to stop leaking. For quite some time my assumption has been that the water is exiting through the top of the window but entering up between the roof and the top edge of the siding.

Apparently not. The siding and roofing are now very well sealed but the front window still leaks like a sieve. More than that, the front bedroom window leaks just as badly. This is completely confusing. They’re metal flange windows: They screw to the underlayment and then the siding goes over the metal, there’s lots of caulk at every step, and I simply can’t see any physical way either window could leak. But they both do, about equally badly, implying that I’ve done something wrong in their installation but I can’t imagine what. No way the bedroom addition is leaking from the top of the frame – there’s overlapping metal roofing and a good drip edge. It’s annoying – that window has leaked since I moved in every time the storm comes from the north, which happens twice or three times in a typical monsoon season. I really truly thought I had it fixed. Instead now I have two leakers.

The wash ran a little overnight…

Just a very little, giving me a notion of where the new channel is after last year’s floods changed everything around. We used to have a nice raised island for the 100-yard shooting station but it’s just plain gone now – along with the iron shooting bench which I never did find. I’ve borrowed Ian’s laser rangefinder so in the next few days as the mud settles down I’ll be pounding in new range markers. The 200, 300 and 400-yard markers are still there, of course, but no longer accurate since I set all the target stands back closer to the cliff in May. I’m hoping to find places for the 25 and 100-yard markers that won’t be right in the path of the water every time the wash runs. When there’s a real flood, of course, there’s every chance of losing them. But if I pound rebar a couple of feet deep and then slide PVC over it as the actual marker, that usually survives. Those two big floods last July that tore everything up were really unusual.

Until recently I’ve had a long and relatively happy relationship with Amazon*. Then I got a smartphone and it all went to hell.

Naive and unknowing, I made the mistake of logging on to Amazon with a second device, which triggered some security bot. Now I can’t use either my laptop OR my smartphone on Amazon without inputting a second security code emailed by Amazon’s bot – except the emails the bot sends me are invariably BLANK. Which is not a big help.

Maybe – probably – it’s just my comically outdated software. Maybe … I don’t know. I’m sure an eleven-year-old would sort this out without breaking stride. I have officially reached fogeydom. It’s all downhill from here.

Curiously Amazon has no problem whatsoever with the tablet computer Big Brother gave me in April. So now I do the small amount of online shopping I do using the tablet. But I invariably forget about that and get frustrated when Amazon won’t let me shop on my laptop.

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*Yes, yes, I know they’re evil privacynappers intent on world domination. True. But you deal with the despot you’ve got.

And she assumes she’ll be getting all this largess from…who? Slaves?

Or maybe I’m misreading her, and she thinks she’ll marry some sugar daddy then spend her life eating bon-bons because she carries paradise in her crotch? That’s not the way that works, either. Maybe once, but not any more. Between taxes and inflation everybody’s on the clock now. Oh, maybe an outlier like Melania Trump can pull it off, but dear Avery can’t.

Nope. Sorry, hun. Get used to it…

…and twice on Sunday, if you get your wish and the socialists start winning elections.

Thanks to a cash infusion from Big Brother I was able to fill all the gasoline cans.

Next Monday if all goes well I’ll fill my two empty propane bottles. then I’ll be stylin’.

Had a bit of an unexpected shot to the kidneys on the way to D&L’s this morning… Continue reading →

I have grown dependent on Former Weekender Neighbor L in the past two years because she has a washing machine and (especially) a water softener. I can wash my own clothes – actually find it kind of relaxing – but what our famously hard water does to stumpsocks and underwear shouldn’t happen to an enemy. I have fewer skin problems now, let’s just leave it at that.

Anyway, I got a text from her this morning saying that laundry is off this week because their generator crapped out*. Since we’re well into Monsoon now that would have been a real problem for me due to the time it takes stumpsocks and gelsocks to dry after hand washing but…

…day before yesterday I scored three more socks which puts me just barely over the “enough for two weeks” goalpost. Which is one of the two reasons I wanted at least that many, along with spreading out the wear so they all last longer.

In old age I am learning how to plan. 🙂

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*Dig this: They got 22 years out of a 2-cylinder Briggs & Stratton generator engine. There ought to be some sort of international prize for that.

Most people, upon first moving to the desert, are in for a lot of unpleasant surprises. Even I, who had been in a desert or two before moving to the high desert permanently, had quite a learning curve at first and still find things to learn. One of the more delightful positive surprises is how full of hummingbirds the desert is.

Hummingbirds have roughly the same aerodynamics, ecological niche and brain power as bumblebees. They’re attracted to anything red. For example… Continue reading →

Which Handgun Is Right for Your Wife Based on Her Favorite Store?

If you’re anything like me, you’re tired of reading handgun recommendations that can be summed up as “small and pink.” After all, smaller handguns are harder to control, not easier, as many handgun neophytes seem to assume. Pink can be liberating, and no one should be stopped from buying a pink handgun based on someone else’s opinion of the color, but recommending a gun on color alone doesn’t pay due respect to other important factors.

How, then, is one to pick out a handgun for their wife or girlfriend? Easy – by looking at her shopping receipts and figuring out where she shops most. We’ve used a highly scientific formula to match guns to shopping habits, making your task easy and fun. Ready? Let’s go!

Yeah, it’s a clickbait nonsense listicle. But it’s unusually funny, and I can’t actually disagree with most of those few elements about which I have some knowledge. Except: Matching Wal-Mart and S&W? Naw. Where’s the Hi-Point? Also I admired the way the website squeezed in a little of its own product placement, which is probably what the listicle is really for in the first place.

Courtesy of Landlady, who claims every word in it is true.

Landlady came up this weekend with a pile of swag for Uncle Joel…

Get a load of this! I’m a member of the Claire Cabal, and out of the blue a few weeks ago a member there said he was sending me a set of the BWH Whole Sheebang, basically everything BWH ever published in print, which is more than a winter’s reading for sure.

Two whole cases of books and bound magazine anthologies, designed to be useful to a homestead. Landlady was so impressed she immediately cleared out bookshelf space in Ian’s Cave, which is sort of centrally located in the Gulch.

A number of people took pity on my recent (and ongoing) back pain travails… Continue reading →

The few people who visit the Secret Lair immediately notice a major difference between the two rooms: The main room looks improvised and utilitarian, because it is. It was made from salvaged and often unconventional materials by someone who barely knew what he was doing and didn’t really care what it looked like. The kitchen cabinets were built until they were functional and never finished. Nothing is painted. There’s no corner trim anywhere. But the bedroom addition was constructed of new and more conventional materials: Sticks and drywall. It has trim, and everything is painted.

So unlike the cabin, which I found visually interesting from the start and never gave much thought to decorating – though some decoration did sort of evolve over the years…

…the bedroom is just a plain drywall box. It needed style to be consciously added, and I don’t really do that. So from the time I called it done to this, it remained a drywall box.

Finally decided the quickest way to decorate it in a way that wouldn’t grate on my nerves was to do what teenagers do to their bedrooms*: Posters.

So a couple of months ago I sent away for the first of a planned collection of posters from Forgotten Weapons swag. There’s a “1919 Secret Weapons” series I have coming, but I started with this one because I think it’s funny. The world doesn’t have enough rifle-related humor…

I actually got the poster three weeks ago, the last time Landlady was up. But the frame I ordered from Amazon didn’t make the deadline date, so it only came yesterday. Not exactly what I was going for, but it works fine and came with hanging hardware so I didn’t have to make a big production of getting it on the wall.

“Neato, huh?” he said, munching on a Tide pod.

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*Or did when I was a teenager. For all I know, these days they use flamethrowers or paint sprayers.

On the first of June I put up the new Lair porch’s structure. Having tired of getting hit in the head with things, I followed through on something that had been on my mind lately and borrowed a hard hat from Landlady’s barn. It was returned…not entirely undamaged.

This got me to thinking maybe I needed a hard hat or helmet of my own. I’m out in the boondocks alone, sometimes working with heavy things, and the older I get the smarter it seems to take steps to avoid easily-avoidable injury. Thorough Joel wants to go full hockey helmet, but Sensible Joel says I’d never use the thing.

While surfing what’s available I came upon a concept I had actually thought of but didn’t know was available – a bump cap. It’s just a plastic skullcap that fits under a baseball cap. Even if that might not be a complete replacement for a hardhat, it sounded like it might be the solution to my chronic “hit your head on a branch while watching the ground at your feet” problem. Plus it was really cheap, so I decided to try one and it came today.

As advertised, it’s just a plastic skullcap that fits under a baseball cap. It has some very thin padding at the crown.

Didn’t exactly come with instructions, but it looks as though you’re supposed to put it inside the hatband – which does just barely fit.

And there you go. I did wear this around for an hour this morning, when it was humid but not very hot. Early impression: It’s sweaty but not otherwise uncomfortable. Stays on my head fine. I’m going to try it with a bandanna lining.

I don’t know how people who live in places where there’s actual rain put up with it. I really don’t.

Water that falls out of the sky and makes everything…wet! Over and over! I’m sorry, that’s just bad design.

I mean, what if you’re an old one-legged dude, and every single joint in your body right down to the thumbs has been stressed at some point? You know how much fun you’re gonna have getting out of bed in the morning when the humidity level is … whatever it is? (I have no notion that this dumb little gauge is anything like accurate, but I know it rarely cranks itself this far to the right.)

I did get a little work done yesterday. Between rain showers. Continue reading →

I haven’t made rosemary bread since March, when I was concerned about the woody winter leaves. I was afraid it would be like eating shards of treebark, and that the taste of the herb wouldn’t come through. Now I’m a little concerned I took it too far in the other direction.

Former Weekender Neighbor L (I really need a better blog name than that) is having a neighborhood get-together Saturday, and since it dawned rainy and cool and not at all suitable for doing anything but baking I decided to do a double baking day. Actually I started yesterday evening by going out and cutting a bunch of new-growth rosemary and getting the leaves ready for baking.

And here’s where I fear I may have gone too far because if I’d re-read March’s blog post I’d have seen that this time around there’s four or five times as much rosemary. And then I took it to eleven…

One thing I did remember from March is that somebody suggested I sauté the herb before mixing it in the dough. So I did that this time.

And then I put it all in the dough. And now I’m a bit concerned, since last time it actually came out pretty good and this time I fear it may be overwhelming.

One reason I decided to do it a day early is I was concerned about the yeast. I just opened a new 2-pound package of yeast, one I think a blog reader sent me – only to see that the use-by date was in 2005. Yeast doesn’t have a great shelf life, and I wasn’t confident that this batch would rise. But in fact it worked fine, so no worries.

Then since it really was baking day I went ahead and did it again, this time with plain bread for my own consumption.

Think I’m going to suggest that L try some of the rosemary bread before putting it out for the party, just to avoid any unpleasant surprises.

Rummaging around in my junk drawer last evening I found a gadget I completely forgot I owned!

That’s a cute little pen-like digital Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) meter sold by the company owned by the father of my old neighbor Geiger Counter Guy. I forget if he gave it to me or if I “inherited” it while cleaning out their house after they fled the scene. Either way, I had it and I must have used it once just for play, and then I tossed it in a drawer and forgot all about it. But apropos our recent conversations about drinking water, these results: (Several pics and a wall of words below the fold) Continue reading →

…and then I’ll study how to clean bird shit off a newly-painted wall.

She has been a very busy and diligent mom but she did not like me standing there fiddling with the camera for so long. I’m surprised she’s in the photo because even as I lowered the camera she flew to a nearby bush.

Sigh – it rained hard in the early afternoon and then just dripped for the rest of the day.

Monsoon is not my favorite season. I don’t dislike it as much as winter, though. For the record.