I am not all that sure I am ready for fall/winter this time. In the past, I know I may have said I am fully ready and that fall was potentially my favorite season, but with a new job, and a outlook on life in general, I truly maxed out my summer, and I am sad to see it go. More on that later. I will update you on my Spirit airlines expreience, because I know you are shitting your pants with anticipation.
Spirit airlines was... well.. normal. I did not notice much difference between Spirit and other airlines. If anything, I would state on the record that I think Spirit might be better than any other airlines.
They charge for carry-on bags. At the time of this writing, they have announced that carry-on bags will cost 100$ each way starting in less than 30 days. I say this is great, and a real asset to their business model.
I WOULD LIKE TO CLARIFY RIGHT NOW THAT YOU CAN BRING A "PERSONAL ITEM" WITH YOU for
----> F R E E <---
This includes a backpack. I travel with backpack. So it is free and easy to carry. They WANT you to not bring shit with you, or at the very least, pay for it ahead of time. Their goal being to have a smooth boarding process. My experience? Most people did not fuck around. They brought small shit with them, so no spending 15 minutes standing there waiting for the shithead with 19 large roller suitcases to cram all his shit into the overhead compartment.
People complain about legroom. Folks, this is a myth! The legroom appears to be the same. Again, if anything, I would declare MORE legroom on spirit than other airlines I have flown.
Snack/Drinks? Well, if your stupid fat retarded ass can't sit on a a plane for a couple of hours without stuffing your fucking pie hole full of peanuts or crackers or a Cola of your choice, or whatever, BRING YOUR OWN. But here is the deal. I am in the majority that cannot sit on a plane that long without stuffing my cake portal, so guess what? I brought my own. Also.... guess what? I bought it in the airport terminal. Also, also, guess what? IT FUCKING CSOSTS MORE IN THE TERMINAL THAN IT DOES ON THE PLANE!!!
In summary... Spirit Airlines? It was cheap, it was easy, I was comfortable. I don't see what all the hub-bub is about. There were no problems whatsoever. Bring yer fuckin snacks, bring a fucking drink, and shut the fuck up!
I challenge you to find any other airline, ever, that will take you to boston for 28 bucks. YOU CAN'T!
Friday, October 5, 2012
Thursday, September 13, 2012
I am taking one for the team. I am going to fly the dreaded Spirit Airlines to see if it really is as bad as 'they' say.
I will state for the record ahead of time that I am lean and mean when it comes to travel. I carry one small backpack. I have been doing this for several years now, even when I have visited other states and whatnot for 5+ days at a time. It is amazing how much shit you can cram into a small backpack if you take the time to do it right, and on the way back, who fucking cares, just jam all yer shit in there any which way.
Also, I get the airport with plenty of time to spare. I usually have to sit for one hour. I use the time to play games on my phone or tablet, or perhaps just people watch. You see the strangest shit at the airport afterall.
Another thing that makes me a good traveler is that right before I go into security, I pre-remove all my accoutrements and put them into said backpack. Watch, keys, wallet, lighter, belt, sunglasses, etc... I also remove my shoes as soon as I hand my ID and boarding pass to security. The result uis that when I hit the line, I don't have to do anything at all, just walk through essentially.
Nextly, I have my boarding pas in my hand ready to scan when it is time. When they call my group, I go, no pussyfotting around. All the while, I am being courteous and considerate of all other passengers, because they are really huge assholes, it serves me best to just get out of their way.
Once on the plane, I turn off all my shit, cram my backpack under the seat, NO OVERHEAD COMPARTMENT usage. I am on the plane and in my chair inless than a minute. I also pre-shit or pre-piss if neccessary becasue no one like the fat prick who has to dump off his chicken wings on the airplane. Please shit head, do this BEFORE you get on. Also, if you want a snack or a drink, BRING YER FUCKING OWN! I have found this to be the best policy.
Ok, so back to Spirit Airlines, people always bitch and complain about the seats not reclining, boo fucking hoo. Who do you think you are, the King of Siam? It is a priveledge to fly, so shut your pie hole fatty. They charge you for a drink or food. Again, boo fucking hoo. There are not many places on this planet, where food and drink are FREE. Next up, leg room. Ok shit for brains, the goal here is to get to your destination at 500+ miles an hour. If you don't like the leg room, travel 50 miles an hour on a greyhound, and I'll laugh at your from 35,000 feet on my way back from my luxury vacation. Quit your yapping, and/or if you don't like it, pay the extra fee to sit up front. It's Spirit, it will still be leagues cheaper than the competitor.
So there you have it, I think I am the perfect candidaet for Spirit Airlines. I firmly believe that I am what they had in mind when they deisgned their business model. I don't expect or need anything from them, other than the ability go 500 miles an hour at 35,000 feet. And since that is all the provide, its a match made in heaven. Oh also, they are the only fucking airline that goes directly to Atlantic City.
I'll produce a full report after my return.
I will state for the record ahead of time that I am lean and mean when it comes to travel. I carry one small backpack. I have been doing this for several years now, even when I have visited other states and whatnot for 5+ days at a time. It is amazing how much shit you can cram into a small backpack if you take the time to do it right, and on the way back, who fucking cares, just jam all yer shit in there any which way.
Also, I get the airport with plenty of time to spare. I usually have to sit for one hour. I use the time to play games on my phone or tablet, or perhaps just people watch. You see the strangest shit at the airport afterall.
Another thing that makes me a good traveler is that right before I go into security, I pre-remove all my accoutrements and put them into said backpack. Watch, keys, wallet, lighter, belt, sunglasses, etc... I also remove my shoes as soon as I hand my ID and boarding pass to security. The result uis that when I hit the line, I don't have to do anything at all, just walk through essentially.
Nextly, I have my boarding pas in my hand ready to scan when it is time. When they call my group, I go, no pussyfotting around. All the while, I am being courteous and considerate of all other passengers, because they are really huge assholes, it serves me best to just get out of their way.
Once on the plane, I turn off all my shit, cram my backpack under the seat, NO OVERHEAD COMPARTMENT usage. I am on the plane and in my chair inless than a minute. I also pre-shit or pre-piss if neccessary becasue no one like the fat prick who has to dump off his chicken wings on the airplane. Please shit head, do this BEFORE you get on. Also, if you want a snack or a drink, BRING YER FUCKING OWN! I have found this to be the best policy.
Ok, so back to Spirit Airlines, people always bitch and complain about the seats not reclining, boo fucking hoo. Who do you think you are, the King of Siam? It is a priveledge to fly, so shut your pie hole fatty. They charge you for a drink or food. Again, boo fucking hoo. There are not many places on this planet, where food and drink are FREE. Next up, leg room. Ok shit for brains, the goal here is to get to your destination at 500+ miles an hour. If you don't like the leg room, travel 50 miles an hour on a greyhound, and I'll laugh at your from 35,000 feet on my way back from my luxury vacation. Quit your yapping, and/or if you don't like it, pay the extra fee to sit up front. It's Spirit, it will still be leagues cheaper than the competitor.
So there you have it, I think I am the perfect candidaet for Spirit Airlines. I firmly believe that I am what they had in mind when they deisgned their business model. I don't expect or need anything from them, other than the ability go 500 miles an hour at 35,000 feet. And since that is all the provide, its a match made in heaven. Oh also, they are the only fucking airline that goes directly to Atlantic City.
I'll produce a full report after my return.
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Ya know, most people save money all their lives in the bank, in a 401k, and so on, so that they can afford to retire. So in other words, when I am 67 years old I am supposed to have enough money to relax sit back, and enjoy... uh... wait a minute, honestly, what the FUCK am I going to enjoy at 67 years old? Chances are the things I will enjoy when I am that age will be things that are likely simple and inexpensive, like a quality toilet seat or a real nice water hose. On the flip side, the things I enjoy now are moving really fast, going vertical, hangovers, habaneros, taking chances, unknown spaces, the list is endless.
The average life expectancy in the United States is currently roughly 78 years. I can only imagine in the last 5 years of that span you are not going to be able to get around very well. So let's say your are essentially in twilight at age 73. Now correct me if I am wrong, but that means you have about 6 good years, when you are in your late 60s to early 70s to enjoy yourself! NO THANKS!
Wouldn't a better plan be to save enough throughout life to get by when you need to but can't get around well, and shave enough off now to enjoy things while you can? Do you really want to try and explore the world at an advanced age? I didn't think so.
Now, you may be sitting there thinking it is a risk to do such a thing, but let's analyze. Isn't is more of a risk to collect a million bucks but chance being 70 and not be able to spend it in a proper fashion? Or even worse, save 500,000 bucks by age 59 and be killed buy a wayward dolphin or choke to death on a gummy bear? What is the point of this? Live in the now.
The average life expectancy in the United States is currently roughly 78 years. I can only imagine in the last 5 years of that span you are not going to be able to get around very well. So let's say your are essentially in twilight at age 73. Now correct me if I am wrong, but that means you have about 6 good years, when you are in your late 60s to early 70s to enjoy yourself! NO THANKS!
Wouldn't a better plan be to save enough throughout life to get by when you need to but can't get around well, and shave enough off now to enjoy things while you can? Do you really want to try and explore the world at an advanced age? I didn't think so.
Now, you may be sitting there thinking it is a risk to do such a thing, but let's analyze. Isn't is more of a risk to collect a million bucks but chance being 70 and not be able to spend it in a proper fashion? Or even worse, save 500,000 bucks by age 59 and be killed buy a wayward dolphin or choke to death on a gummy bear? What is the point of this? Live in the now.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
In order to be happy, I believe you must have a complete life balance. You could look at it as a happiness index. I break it down as such:
Health - 25%
Finances - 25%
Social - 25%
Career - 25%
Health - If you are not healthy, things are bad. Self explanatory.
Finances - I separate this from job/career section because you could have a real shitty job, but still be financially secure. On the flip side, you could have a really excellent job that you love and be far from financially secure.
Social - This is the friends and family section. Do you have friends? Do they like you? Do you spend time with them? How's your mom and them? Everything cool?
Career - Do you like what you do, are you content with your current employment scenario?
Using these metrics, you can calculate your own happiness index:
Is your leg broken? Maybe you assign health a 20% instead of the full 25%. Do you have stage 4 terminal lip fungus? Well, then maybe go with a 5% instead of 25%.
Are you flat broke? Do you live paycheck to paycheck? If so, congratulations, assign yourself 10% in the finance category, or maybe 20% if you just don't care. Only you can honestly assign your own percentage.
Did you accidentally run over your grandpa with a lawnmower? Guess what? you should go with a 5%, because you suck. Perhaps your family is all well and good, and on top of that you got a free blow job from your friend's sister, maybe you could go with the full 25. Good for you.
Do you want to take a huge steaming shit on your boss's desk, or maybe something even more sinister? Personally, I say do it, but afterwards you will probably need to assign yourself around a 15% in the career metric.
So, in summary, say you are a dude who has stage 4 terminal lip fungus, you are flat broke, and you hate your job, but you still got the BJ from your friend's sister, you would roughly score a 55%. You are not all that happy. Although, due to the beej from your friend's sister, you may think you are doing better than you really are, so please, be realistic.
Now, you are instructed to not only calculate your own happiness index according to the metrics, but when someone asks you how it's going casually in passing, give them your percentage and watch the look on the face, its priceless. And, should they make the horrible mistake of asking you what it means, waste a good half hour of their precious time that they could be using to get some hot mouth love from your friend's sister.
Health - 25%
Finances - 25%
Social - 25%
Career - 25%
Health - If you are not healthy, things are bad. Self explanatory.
Finances - I separate this from job/career section because you could have a real shitty job, but still be financially secure. On the flip side, you could have a really excellent job that you love and be far from financially secure.
Social - This is the friends and family section. Do you have friends? Do they like you? Do you spend time with them? How's your mom and them? Everything cool?
Career - Do you like what you do, are you content with your current employment scenario?
Using these metrics, you can calculate your own happiness index:
Is your leg broken? Maybe you assign health a 20% instead of the full 25%. Do you have stage 4 terminal lip fungus? Well, then maybe go with a 5% instead of 25%.
Are you flat broke? Do you live paycheck to paycheck? If so, congratulations, assign yourself 10% in the finance category, or maybe 20% if you just don't care. Only you can honestly assign your own percentage.
Did you accidentally run over your grandpa with a lawnmower? Guess what? you should go with a 5%, because you suck. Perhaps your family is all well and good, and on top of that you got a free blow job from your friend's sister, maybe you could go with the full 25. Good for you.
Do you want to take a huge steaming shit on your boss's desk, or maybe something even more sinister? Personally, I say do it, but afterwards you will probably need to assign yourself around a 15% in the career metric.
So, in summary, say you are a dude who has stage 4 terminal lip fungus, you are flat broke, and you hate your job, but you still got the BJ from your friend's sister, you would roughly score a 55%. You are not all that happy. Although, due to the beej from your friend's sister, you may think you are doing better than you really are, so please, be realistic.
Now, you are instructed to not only calculate your own happiness index according to the metrics, but when someone asks you how it's going casually in passing, give them your percentage and watch the look on the face, its priceless. And, should they make the horrible mistake of asking you what it means, waste a good half hour of their precious time that they could be using to get some hot mouth love from your friend's sister.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Sad. My once mighty and bountiful blog has dwindled to virtually nothing. I am still in a creative lull. I think part of it is due to my shitty job. I essentially work alone, and on my days off, I am at home alone. When I am on night shift, I am alone almost all the time. On a lighter note, I have been 'being' and not 'having' for a while now and I am enjoying it. If you don't know what that means, then read a the last few posts and you will understand. I have been collecting a few notes for potential posts, and then not following through on them. So instead of making any sense here, I will just spout out a collection of random thoughts and you can do with them what you will.
I temporarily became a "beardo". I had a lengthy strange beard. People would see me then say oh wow, you have a huge beard. Then one day I shaved it off and went with the clean shaven look for a while. Then people would say oh wow, you are clean shaven. I guess I have the ability to change my look around at will. Some days I get carded for buying beer, other days not, depending on how I look that day.
Taking food from people, particularly at work, is something I practically never do. When someone walks up at work and says, "Hey, my wife made this cake, here have some", I ALWAYS refuse. I am now working on saying yes instead of no. One time at work, dude brought in a cake, everyone (excluding me) ate the cake. Once the cake was gone someone pointed out the 12 inch hair stuck to the top of the cake plate where the cake used to be. They are freaked out, while I just laughed and laughed. It would be virtually impossible for that hair to harm them, particularly since it was still on the plate, but the thought of it grossed them out.
In the same vein as my post on food technology, I started pondering fishing technology. I noticed that fishing technology seems to have advanced, but perhaps not necessarily in a good way. You can spend a lot of money on the brand new doo dads and gizmos. You can buy a super spoonbill chartreuse magic diving battery operated lure featuring 14 treble hooks and a 3-way scatter pattern offset for x amount of dollars. You can buy the latest and greatest rod and reel for XXX amount of dollars. You could even buy a fancy boat for XX,XXX amount of dollars. However, my grandpa could catch the same fish, perhaps even larger in size and more in quantity than you could, by sitting on the bank with the lowest model rod and reel anyone has ever produced, a shitty rusted hook he found stuck in a tree at a fishing spot, and an earth worm he dug out of the ground for free with his bare hands.
I temporarily became a "beardo". I had a lengthy strange beard. People would see me then say oh wow, you have a huge beard. Then one day I shaved it off and went with the clean shaven look for a while. Then people would say oh wow, you are clean shaven. I guess I have the ability to change my look around at will. Some days I get carded for buying beer, other days not, depending on how I look that day.
Taking food from people, particularly at work, is something I practically never do. When someone walks up at work and says, "Hey, my wife made this cake, here have some", I ALWAYS refuse. I am now working on saying yes instead of no. One time at work, dude brought in a cake, everyone (excluding me) ate the cake. Once the cake was gone someone pointed out the 12 inch hair stuck to the top of the cake plate where the cake used to be. They are freaked out, while I just laughed and laughed. It would be virtually impossible for that hair to harm them, particularly since it was still on the plate, but the thought of it grossed them out.
In the same vein as my post on food technology, I started pondering fishing technology. I noticed that fishing technology seems to have advanced, but perhaps not necessarily in a good way. You can spend a lot of money on the brand new doo dads and gizmos. You can buy a super spoonbill chartreuse magic diving battery operated lure featuring 14 treble hooks and a 3-way scatter pattern offset for x amount of dollars. You can buy the latest and greatest rod and reel for XXX amount of dollars. You could even buy a fancy boat for XX,XXX amount of dollars. However, my grandpa could catch the same fish, perhaps even larger in size and more in quantity than you could, by sitting on the bank with the lowest model rod and reel anyone has ever produced, a shitty rusted hook he found stuck in a tree at a fishing spot, and an earth worm he dug out of the ground for free with his bare hands.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Bit of a silly rant here, and I know I have probably posted about this before, but as a friendly reminder I would like every to know that Facebook is stupid. It will be in the history books as one of the causes of global stupidity a la Idiocracy: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387808/. It is like a shortcut to personality. Telling everyone in your friends list something at the same time robs you of the storytelling craft, and the human interaction that makes you who you are. Also, I am sure there are people in your friends list that do not need to know or care what you have done. I would also go a step further and claim that there are people in your friends list that are not even really your friend. There are probably even people who have completely exchanged human interaction and the art of storytelling with simple facebook entries, but hey, at least they have over 200 "friends".
Facebook is free. What? No, of course it is not really free. There are all types of ads on there, that of course, Facebook gets tons of cash for. Facebook gets it, not you, even though you are the one viewing the ads. Recent articles have shown Facebook to be worth 50 billion dollars. How much of that money do you get for being a member? Exactly none. Seems like a bit of a rip off to me.
They also have awesome games like some kinda farm shit, some kinda vampire shit, and some kinda mafia shit. Games where you have to keep playing to stay ahead of your friends (all the while showing you more ads), and if you ever stop playing, you probably feel bad about it. Great, now Facebook is having a negative impact on you.
Here is a small sample of some things I found on Facebook in less than 10 seconds:
"Jeff is now friends with Alex" - Great, two people I don't know are now fucking friends. Maybe they can queer off together and go ride a merry-go-round.
"thank god it's fridayyy :)" - Clearly the world's next Shakespeare.
"God damn. I LOOOOOVVVVEEEE TO COOK!" - Good, go fucking do it and shut up.
"wishing i was in a dead sleeep." - I wish you were just dead.
But hey, at least you can "poke" your "friends". GREAT! Tell you what, next time you are about to poke someone on Facebook, invite me over and I will poke you right in the eye, and we will both have something interesting to share with our friends.
I do also get the irony of posting this in an article format for the world to read at the same time, but this is not something that I haven't told everyone I know already. Also, I can assure you there was 10 times more thought put into this rant than ANYTHING you have EVER posted on Facebook. I would challenge you to go back to 6 weeks ago and assess maybe three things you posted on Facebook, and see if you feel they have any redeeming value. ...See, now you feel like some kind of asshole.
Facebook is free. What? No, of course it is not really free. There are all types of ads on there, that of course, Facebook gets tons of cash for. Facebook gets it, not you, even though you are the one viewing the ads. Recent articles have shown Facebook to be worth 50 billion dollars. How much of that money do you get for being a member? Exactly none. Seems like a bit of a rip off to me.
They also have awesome games like some kinda farm shit, some kinda vampire shit, and some kinda mafia shit. Games where you have to keep playing to stay ahead of your friends (all the while showing you more ads), and if you ever stop playing, you probably feel bad about it. Great, now Facebook is having a negative impact on you.
Here is a small sample of some things I found on Facebook in less than 10 seconds:
"Jeff is now friends with Alex" - Great, two people I don't know are now fucking friends. Maybe they can queer off together and go ride a merry-go-round.
"thank god it's fridayyy :)" - Clearly the world's next Shakespeare.
"God damn. I LOOOOOVVVVEEEE TO COOK!" - Good, go fucking do it and shut up.
"wishing i was in a dead sleeep." - I wish you were just dead.
But hey, at least you can "poke" your "friends". GREAT! Tell you what, next time you are about to poke someone on Facebook, invite me over and I will poke you right in the eye, and we will both have something interesting to share with our friends.
I do also get the irony of posting this in an article format for the world to read at the same time, but this is not something that I haven't told everyone I know already. Also, I can assure you there was 10 times more thought put into this rant than ANYTHING you have EVER posted on Facebook. I would challenge you to go back to 6 weeks ago and assess maybe three things you posted on Facebook, and see if you feel they have any redeeming value. ...See, now you feel like some kind of asshole.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
The other day I was driving to work and I saw a lady walking down the sidewalk. She had about 4 dogs with her, all on separate leashes. The dogs seemed a little unruly, but nothing she couldn't handle. Then all of a sudden, I see a guy with a single dog, also on a leash going the other direction, towards her. Just about the time I got even with where they were going to cross paths, the man's dog lashed out at the multiple dogs, causing the lady to yank the leashes and leap out into the street. I was going about 45 miles per hour, but I was able to slam on my breaks and swerve to avoid killing her and all her dogs. Not a huge deal, crisis averted, everyone and all animals were OK, and everyone went on their merry way. This could very easily have gone the other way.
It made me think about some of the tragic stories you see on the news almost every day. It was literally a matter of inches, great luck, quality driving, and good timing. If I had left the house maybe 1 second earlier and was 1 second farther down the road, I would wager there is a good chance that lady would be a dead person. Some people aren't so lucky.
This was not a life changing event, but it does make one stop and ponder how close you could be to death each and every day, or perhaps close to being involved in something where someone else gets hurt, or potentially killed. It makes one think about how many times on earth each day something like that happens, and how many of those times, it ends badly. It just takes a single split second in time to be the difference between a miss and a near miss, and there is a good chance you could have no idea this was even happening. My hero George Carlin once said, "...here's one they just made up. "Near miss". When two planes almost collide they call it a near miss. IT'S A NEAR HIT!! A collision... is a near miss. BOOM! "Look, they nearly missed!" "Yeah, but not quite!".
What is my point to all this? What lesson can we learn here? Probably none in terms of avoidance, you don't get to control that type of fate, but you can certainly take stock in what you have and what you do and who you are, and make sure you attempt to live life to the fullest, because some dickweed in a boogie van might run over you tomorrow.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
....and we're back. 2011, Weird. I sort of fell off the grid for a while there. I went to Vegas, then hit Shreveport a couple of weeks later, then there was Christmas and New Years, its all a blur.
So I spent Christmas weekend in Shreveport gambling. Had a free room and free buffets and whatnot, so I said what the heck. I was only 2 weeks back from Vegas, but I figured that didn't matter, a good time is a good time, who says you can't have two good times in any given time frame. Anyway, I noticed something interesting when I was there. In case you don't recall my heartfelt opposition to cell phone companies, and their craft, you can reread the post as a refresher here: CELL PHONE ASS RAPE.
So there I was, in Eastern Louisiana, sitting at a Lord of the Rings slot machine next to a lady who had to be every bit of 75 years old. I heard a strange noise, and this lady proceeded to pull out her iPhone4, and start texting, and using apps and whatnot. Wait a sec. Did I miss something? Has that type of technology reached the elderly at this point? I must say that at first I felt sorta bad. Here I am a thirty-something white guy who has made technology a career. I should have the iPhone, and she should have my shitty low end Motorola RAZRv3. I felt like the old person in the scene. "Why do I need all that fancy new stuff, why would I wanna pay the cell phone company a thousand dollars a year when I don't need to", and so on. Someone could have given her the phone as a gift I suppose, or perhaps someone else could pay her bill for her, or maybe she could be rich beyond her wildest dreams, there could have been lots of variables, but I suspect in this case, things were just as they appeared.
Then the thought mostly faded when I realized that for the amount of money she spent on her phone and her service plan, I could go to that very casino probably 5 or 6 times annually. She is also bound to a 2 year contract, which could quite literally be the rest of her life. She got suckered into their scam, not me. I suppose this falls into my overall plan to balance 'having' and 'being'. She can have her iPhone, and I can be on vacation more. Is she better off than me? I think not. Cosmically, would someone rather listen to her story about her iPhone being awesome, or my story about the old lady with the iPhone, who thought her iPhone was awesome.
I realize this anecdote is weak, but it was one of those sort of whoa moments for me, when I realized a whole bunch of crap at the same time, so I felt the need to document it for posterity.
So I spent Christmas weekend in Shreveport gambling. Had a free room and free buffets and whatnot, so I said what the heck. I was only 2 weeks back from Vegas, but I figured that didn't matter, a good time is a good time, who says you can't have two good times in any given time frame. Anyway, I noticed something interesting when I was there. In case you don't recall my heartfelt opposition to cell phone companies, and their craft, you can reread the post as a refresher here: CELL PHONE ASS RAPE.
So there I was, in Eastern Louisiana, sitting at a Lord of the Rings slot machine next to a lady who had to be every bit of 75 years old. I heard a strange noise, and this lady proceeded to pull out her iPhone4, and start texting, and using apps and whatnot. Wait a sec. Did I miss something? Has that type of technology reached the elderly at this point? I must say that at first I felt sorta bad. Here I am a thirty-something white guy who has made technology a career. I should have the iPhone, and she should have my shitty low end Motorola RAZRv3. I felt like the old person in the scene. "Why do I need all that fancy new stuff, why would I wanna pay the cell phone company a thousand dollars a year when I don't need to", and so on. Someone could have given her the phone as a gift I suppose, or perhaps someone else could pay her bill for her, or maybe she could be rich beyond her wildest dreams, there could have been lots of variables, but I suspect in this case, things were just as they appeared.
Then the thought mostly faded when I realized that for the amount of money she spent on her phone and her service plan, I could go to that very casino probably 5 or 6 times annually. She is also bound to a 2 year contract, which could quite literally be the rest of her life. She got suckered into their scam, not me. I suppose this falls into my overall plan to balance 'having' and 'being'. She can have her iPhone, and I can be on vacation more. Is she better off than me? I think not. Cosmically, would someone rather listen to her story about her iPhone being awesome, or my story about the old lady with the iPhone, who thought her iPhone was awesome.
I realize this anecdote is weak, but it was one of those sort of whoa moments for me, when I realized a whole bunch of crap at the same time, so I felt the need to document it for posterity.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Awesome, exactly 0 posts in November! It may be a new record. Why you ask? I have no idea. I have plenty of time, so I guess I just have nothing important to transmit? That cannot be right. I have been maintaining a fairly low profile, going to work, going to hockey, and that's about it.
So I was analyzing the old blogarooney here, and saw that there were 92 posts in 2007, that averages out to one every 3.96 days, and it wasn't all fluff, it was not just empty filler, it was quality. Then in 2008 the count dropped down to 49, or average of one post every 7.4 days. Then 2009 brought only 30, or 1 every 12.1 days. Counting this post, only 19 in 2010 thus far. So, every year the count roughly gets halved. Weird.
I read back over tons of posts from the last few years and I think I understand why I started this in the first place, and also why it has dwindled. Does this mean a complete renaissance of the blog? I am not sure yet. Does it mean an increased post count? probably.
I am pretty sure that I don't have less to say than I used to, and I am not completely lazy. I think that I sort of got a form of writer's block. It has not just happened here, I mostly stopped writing pieces for my book, short stories, and all kinds of other things I was working on. I am even having a hard time writing articles for a gaming site that I write articles for sometimes. My biggest issue is that I over analyze and criticize my own work. This applies to almost every aspect of my life. I over analyze every purchase I make, I over analyze every food I cook, I pre and post analyze conversations I have with people. I have done this for most of my life.
I cannot help it, I am a analytical type of dude I guess. Also, I understand that there is not anything wrong with that. It allows me to become better, and make wiser decisions. The downside in my mind is that it may be interfering with my ability to just... be.
I was watching an episode of CSI last night, and Ray Langston was talking to Nick Stokes about Erich Fromm's philosophy on "having" versus "being". It was strangely quite moving. The episode revolved around a hoarder, so Langston was explaining the difference between a having type of personality and a being type personality and the potential pitfalls and that sometimes people go to extremes either way. So the hoarder just took her 'having' personality to a strange level.
A while back I read the book "Yes Man" by Danny Wallace and it changed my entire lifestyle. I realized that I was a having type and not a being type, but I always wanted to be being. After that I strived to at least become half having, half being. Hence, the 'awesome summer' was born, along with many other unscheduled and unplanned outings. I have gotten away from that, and I realize it now, thanks to Ray Langston. I have trained myself not to be 'having' so much. I have paid off credit cards debts, and I really don't buy anything anymore, unless I absolutely need it. I don't buy a fancy new TV just because I can. Some people might stop me there and say part of being is just not worrying about money and buying things as I see fit. True, however, buying useless things, to replace perfectly good things, leans more towards having than being. Being, would be going to the store and looking at the TV's versus buying one. The adventure could be the reward more so than the possession.
So a renewed effort begins to just say "fuck it", and be, and invariably, that will result in more writing.
So I was analyzing the old blogarooney here, and saw that there were 92 posts in 2007, that averages out to one every 3.96 days, and it wasn't all fluff, it was not just empty filler, it was quality. Then in 2008 the count dropped down to 49, or average of one post every 7.4 days. Then 2009 brought only 30, or 1 every 12.1 days. Counting this post, only 19 in 2010 thus far. So, every year the count roughly gets halved. Weird.
I read back over tons of posts from the last few years and I think I understand why I started this in the first place, and also why it has dwindled. Does this mean a complete renaissance of the blog? I am not sure yet. Does it mean an increased post count? probably.
I am pretty sure that I don't have less to say than I used to, and I am not completely lazy. I think that I sort of got a form of writer's block. It has not just happened here, I mostly stopped writing pieces for my book, short stories, and all kinds of other things I was working on. I am even having a hard time writing articles for a gaming site that I write articles for sometimes. My biggest issue is that I over analyze and criticize my own work. This applies to almost every aspect of my life. I over analyze every purchase I make, I over analyze every food I cook, I pre and post analyze conversations I have with people. I have done this for most of my life.
I cannot help it, I am a analytical type of dude I guess. Also, I understand that there is not anything wrong with that. It allows me to become better, and make wiser decisions. The downside in my mind is that it may be interfering with my ability to just... be.
I was watching an episode of CSI last night, and Ray Langston was talking to Nick Stokes about Erich Fromm's philosophy on "having" versus "being". It was strangely quite moving. The episode revolved around a hoarder, so Langston was explaining the difference between a having type of personality and a being type personality and the potential pitfalls and that sometimes people go to extremes either way. So the hoarder just took her 'having' personality to a strange level.
A while back I read the book "Yes Man" by Danny Wallace and it changed my entire lifestyle. I realized that I was a having type and not a being type, but I always wanted to be being. After that I strived to at least become half having, half being. Hence, the 'awesome summer' was born, along with many other unscheduled and unplanned outings. I have gotten away from that, and I realize it now, thanks to Ray Langston. I have trained myself not to be 'having' so much. I have paid off credit cards debts, and I really don't buy anything anymore, unless I absolutely need it. I don't buy a fancy new TV just because I can. Some people might stop me there and say part of being is just not worrying about money and buying things as I see fit. True, however, buying useless things, to replace perfectly good things, leans more towards having than being. Being, would be going to the store and looking at the TV's versus buying one. The adventure could be the reward more so than the possession.
So a renewed effort begins to just say "fuck it", and be, and invariably, that will result in more writing.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
So the other day I was in traffic sitting at a red light. I look to my left and I see a fat white lady, probably 20-25 years old. She was driving a really shitty Sunfire or some other low-rent type car. She had her windows down and was jamming to the sweet tunes coming out of her radio. In the front passenger seat was a small black child, I would estimate to be 3-4 years old. No seat belts in use in the car. The light turns green, and this lady slams on her gas pedal, squealing the tires as much as her puny Sunfire or whatever kind of crappy car it was could muster. Then she pulled into a parking lot like 200 feet past the intersection. Play that through in your head a few times. What the hell?
Shame on you lady. 1. You have a shitty car. 2. You are fat. 3. You have a small unsecured child in your car. 4. You radio is way too loud. 5. You don't need to spin out to go 200 feet to McDonalds.
I should have declared a fuckin' citizen's arrest and had this lady put in the slammer. I also have been around all kinds of people in my life, and I would bet you a month's salary this lady had some form of illegal drugs on her personal self or in her car. What a mess this bitch was. And you know what really bugs me about the whole scenario. That lady was probably as happy as a pig in shit. She appeared to be doing just fine and not have a care in the world. I guess ignorance really is bliss.
So, I am not sure why I made this link in my head, because what I am about to say in completely unrelated, but... In Texas you can make a LEFT on red. Most people are aware you can make a right on red, but in ANY scenario where you can make a right on red, you can also legally make a left on red. When you pull up to a red light in the right lane and you are turning right from a one way street onto another, its all golden, but people listen up, the same shit applies for pulling up to a red light in the left hand lane, turning onto another one way street. I am not talking about crossing traffic lanes or anything, just turning left directly onto another one way road. I am fully aware that this scenario is not possible near as much as it is in the right handed configuration, but it does happen. Do not be afraid. You will make traffic flow smoother. If you have the ability to make a left on red and you do not do so, you, are a complete asshole. The stinky brown part.
If you need proof of this it is Texas Transportation Code Chapter 544, article 007, subsection d.2.
For lazy people like Elixir, here is a handy link:http://law.onecle.com/texas/transportation/544.007.00.html
or you can visit the Texas statutes page here:
http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/
Shame on you lady. 1. You have a shitty car. 2. You are fat. 3. You have a small unsecured child in your car. 4. You radio is way too loud. 5. You don't need to spin out to go 200 feet to McDonalds.
I should have declared a fuckin' citizen's arrest and had this lady put in the slammer. I also have been around all kinds of people in my life, and I would bet you a month's salary this lady had some form of illegal drugs on her personal self or in her car. What a mess this bitch was. And you know what really bugs me about the whole scenario. That lady was probably as happy as a pig in shit. She appeared to be doing just fine and not have a care in the world. I guess ignorance really is bliss.
So, I am not sure why I made this link in my head, because what I am about to say in completely unrelated, but... In Texas you can make a LEFT on red. Most people are aware you can make a right on red, but in ANY scenario where you can make a right on red, you can also legally make a left on red. When you pull up to a red light in the right lane and you are turning right from a one way street onto another, its all golden, but people listen up, the same shit applies for pulling up to a red light in the left hand lane, turning onto another one way street. I am not talking about crossing traffic lanes or anything, just turning left directly onto another one way road. I am fully aware that this scenario is not possible near as much as it is in the right handed configuration, but it does happen. Do not be afraid. You will make traffic flow smoother. If you have the ability to make a left on red and you do not do so, you, are a complete asshole. The stinky brown part.
If you need proof of this it is Texas Transportation Code Chapter 544, article 007, subsection d.2.
For lazy people like Elixir, here is a handy link:http://law.onecle.com/texas/transportation/544.007.00.html
or you can visit the Texas statutes page here:
http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
I did not do the full water boil test on the Brutus 10 clone. I did begin my research for creating two new beer recipes though, so at least I achieved something. My shitty job has got me back into zombie mode, where I live a nocturnal existence and sleep all day. This makes doing anything sorta difficult. I have paid off my credit card debt though, and I have been studying up for a technical interview. The credit card thing is an important milestone, because without the load of having to make huge monthly payments to get out of debt, I can consider some short contract type employment if necessary. Studying for a tech interview is handy as well, because in my line of work, the behavioral and psychological questions are the easy part. At any rate, today's post is not about any of that. So to change the subject completely...
When I was in Las Vegas a few weeks ago, I heard some rednecks talking about Terry Fator, who is a ventriloquist who won a million dollars winning the America's Got Talent TV show. He later signed a whopping 200 million dollar Vegas deal. They did not believe that the guy really got a million dollars, much less the 200 million dollar deal at the Mirage, and they also did not believe that he was doing all the voices himself. They thought that the voices were basically on tape, and he was just acting like a ventriloquist. Then I started thinking... hey, these dumb shits have a conspiracy theory about a fucking ventriloquist. They cannot believe some guy puts his hand in a puppet and throws his voice.
It made me wonder if, or by how much, conspiracy theorists' theories vary by race, class, age, and so on. The thought that a ventriloquist could be faking has never, ever, not a single time, leapt into my brain. I wonder what made these people think that? It seemed sort of below me to wonder or worry about something as irrelevant as that. It isn't, it just seemed like it at the time.
Do black people have conspiracy theories that white people do not take into consideration? I am sure there are some related to Hurricane Katrina, particularly if you ask Kanye West. I am sure white people are more prone to consider 9-11 a conspiracy than black people. Old people probably have theories about Pearl Harbor or JFK that young people never think about, and young people probably think Biggie and Tupac were both slain at the command of Suge Knight, which I am sure old people have never heard of at all.
I have always been intrigued by conspiracy theory/ists. I don't have any particular ones that I subscribe to, and any time I hear one, I can usually discount it fairly quickly, so I am more focused on the theorist, rather than the theory.
It would be interesting to do a study on conspiracy theories, and categorize which various groups believe in which theories, and lay it our in some kind of chart. Am I going to do it? Hell no, that sounds like an awful lot of work to me.
But I bet that's what you want to happen. You want me to do the study and make the chart, because the more time I spend on it, the more you keep me locked up and working, and the more time I work, the less time I go to K-mart and buy water hoses. And the less time I spend buying water hoses, the less time I spend watering the yard, which means it doesn't grow as much, which means I am trying to put illegal immigrant out of work, which means I must be pro border fence, because the government needs to build a border fence to keep Americans employed. They need Americans employed to pay into the ponzi scheme that is social security, so those government fat cats can retire on our money, and then not care if it goes away later, because they will all be dead. Dead and buried taking up valuable real estate, taking up more and more land, and eventually forcing the Native Americans to seek shelter on the moon, which means they will advance in space travel, which will anger the North Koreans, which will then incite a new world war. So you hate Mexicans and want to see Indians on the moon, but I am not falling for it, do your own study.
When I was in Las Vegas a few weeks ago, I heard some rednecks talking about Terry Fator, who is a ventriloquist who won a million dollars winning the America's Got Talent TV show. He later signed a whopping 200 million dollar Vegas deal. They did not believe that the guy really got a million dollars, much less the 200 million dollar deal at the Mirage, and they also did not believe that he was doing all the voices himself. They thought that the voices were basically on tape, and he was just acting like a ventriloquist. Then I started thinking... hey, these dumb shits have a conspiracy theory about a fucking ventriloquist. They cannot believe some guy puts his hand in a puppet and throws his voice.
It made me wonder if, or by how much, conspiracy theorists' theories vary by race, class, age, and so on. The thought that a ventriloquist could be faking has never, ever, not a single time, leapt into my brain. I wonder what made these people think that? It seemed sort of below me to wonder or worry about something as irrelevant as that. It isn't, it just seemed like it at the time.
Do black people have conspiracy theories that white people do not take into consideration? I am sure there are some related to Hurricane Katrina, particularly if you ask Kanye West. I am sure white people are more prone to consider 9-11 a conspiracy than black people. Old people probably have theories about Pearl Harbor or JFK that young people never think about, and young people probably think Biggie and Tupac were both slain at the command of Suge Knight, which I am sure old people have never heard of at all.
I have always been intrigued by conspiracy theory/ists. I don't have any particular ones that I subscribe to, and any time I hear one, I can usually discount it fairly quickly, so I am more focused on the theorist, rather than the theory.
It would be interesting to do a study on conspiracy theories, and categorize which various groups believe in which theories, and lay it our in some kind of chart. Am I going to do it? Hell no, that sounds like an awful lot of work to me.
But I bet that's what you want to happen. You want me to do the study and make the chart, because the more time I spend on it, the more you keep me locked up and working, and the more time I work, the less time I go to K-mart and buy water hoses. And the less time I spend buying water hoses, the less time I spend watering the yard, which means it doesn't grow as much, which means I am trying to put illegal immigrant out of work, which means I must be pro border fence, because the government needs to build a border fence to keep Americans employed. They need Americans employed to pay into the ponzi scheme that is social security, so those government fat cats can retire on our money, and then not care if it goes away later, because they will all be dead. Dead and buried taking up valuable real estate, taking up more and more land, and eventually forcing the Native Americans to seek shelter on the moon, which means they will advance in space travel, which will anger the North Koreans, which will then incite a new world war. So you hate Mexicans and want to see Indians on the moon, but I am not falling for it, do your own study.
Friday, September 17, 2010
I am going to do the full water test on the Brutus 10 clone on Monday! Yay. If all goes well, I will make a few beer recipes, buy the ingredients, and kick Fall off right.
I am not sure why I feel the way I do about the next subject, but here goes. Last night, I was getting my equipments together to go play hockey. I hear some chiming type polution outside. It kept growing louder and louder, and then I heard some people chattering. Once the racket was loud enough and close enough to be clear, it was unmistakable.
An ice cream truck!
Now... it is two thousand fucking ten. We do not need ice cream trucks anymore. The first thing that pops into my head is wow, some guy wants to rape children. What kind of person chooses voluntarily, to purchase an entire ice cream truck, then go on to purchase an inventory of said ice cream, with the intention of driving around neighborhoods peddling it to children? How does that thought even go into your head? Perhaps if you had just listened to Van Halen's "Ice Cream Man" you might ponder what would be involved with becoming an ice cream man, but you certainly don't act on it. Even then, the ice cream man in David Lee Roth's lyrics was a perv.
Ok, so rape and murder is a little harsh, I guess the guy is only selling top quality drugs... Hashish, ludes, reds, uppers, downers, booger sugar, angel dust, cheese, the dreaded lysergic, horse tranquilizers, dyno-pure, chucks, and so on. All the fun stuff you want your kids around. Great. I'll take two please.
Ok ok ok, I should give the guy a little credit. Maybe he doesn't really want to hurt anyone. He just wants to shit and piss and fart and sneeze and god knows what all over the ice cream, and get his jollies off knowing that people are going to eat it. There ya go, one hell of a guy.
Can you really justify in your brain someone being an ice cream man in 2010? Good I can't either. Just the though of an ice cream truck, creeps me out.
I am not sure why I feel the way I do about the next subject, but here goes. Last night, I was getting my equipments together to go play hockey. I hear some chiming type polution outside. It kept growing louder and louder, and then I heard some people chattering. Once the racket was loud enough and close enough to be clear, it was unmistakable.
An ice cream truck!
Now... it is two thousand fucking ten. We do not need ice cream trucks anymore. The first thing that pops into my head is wow, some guy wants to rape children. What kind of person chooses voluntarily, to purchase an entire ice cream truck, then go on to purchase an inventory of said ice cream, with the intention of driving around neighborhoods peddling it to children? How does that thought even go into your head? Perhaps if you had just listened to Van Halen's "Ice Cream Man" you might ponder what would be involved with becoming an ice cream man, but you certainly don't act on it. Even then, the ice cream man in David Lee Roth's lyrics was a perv.
Ok, so rape and murder is a little harsh, I guess the guy is only selling top quality drugs... Hashish, ludes, reds, uppers, downers, booger sugar, angel dust, cheese, the dreaded lysergic, horse tranquilizers, dyno-pure, chucks, and so on. All the fun stuff you want your kids around. Great. I'll take two please.
Ok ok ok, I should give the guy a little credit. Maybe he doesn't really want to hurt anyone. He just wants to shit and piss and fart and sneeze and god knows what all over the ice cream, and get his jollies off knowing that people are going to eat it. There ya go, one hell of a guy.
Can you really justify in your brain someone being an ice cream man in 2010? Good I can't either. Just the though of an ice cream truck, creeps me out.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Brutus 10 clone progress report: I am at the point where I need to do a full boil water test, to make sure the burners and pump are all working and up to par for brewing beer. Unfortunately the excesses of the Texas daytime summer heat have stifled my motivation for performing such a test. Heat indices reaching ~120 make is miserable outside during the day.
So, instead, I will present to you a loose string of random thoughts.
The other day I had mowed the yard and become parched. It was shortly after that that I enjoyed one of life's little gifts that people take for granted: A nice tall cold glass of ice water is nearly impossible to beat. A glass of water so cold that beads of sweat glisten off its surface, eventually growing so large that gravity wins, resulting in a small puddle of condensation on your coaster. The kind of refreshment that you feel all the way to your core, and instantly you know that water, as slang would deem, is the shit.
When you are a small child, perhaps sometimes even into middle school years, you really are blissfully unaware of the behind the scenes magic that happens to produce an end result. I remember when I was very small and travelling with my dad and we arrived at stop light, he would say "Hey, watch this", and then he would snap his fingers and make the light change to green. I was always blown away by it. It was the late 70s, and I was 4 or 5 years old, I didn't really understand how he did it. This thought crossed my mind the other day when I cooked some pork shoulder. I smoked the meat all night and the next day. Between the prep the day before and the cooking process, I spent a solid 17 hours on it. That seems excessive when you consider it only takes maybe 20 minutes to eat it. When I go to a restaurant and eat a pulled pork sandwich, that means that someone spent in the neighborhood of 17 hours making it, and I suppose I have never thought about that while eating such an item, but I plan to. I may even go out of my way to do it, just so I can have those thoughts.
I was applying my deodorant this morning and noticed that is was called Right Guard 3D. THREE FUCKING D! It seems that 3D is the new thing the kids are into these days, why not spray it into your armpit as well. All I can say is I'm damn happy thing the latest fad aint peanut butter.
So, instead, I will present to you a loose string of random thoughts.
The other day I had mowed the yard and become parched. It was shortly after that that I enjoyed one of life's little gifts that people take for granted: A nice tall cold glass of ice water is nearly impossible to beat. A glass of water so cold that beads of sweat glisten off its surface, eventually growing so large that gravity wins, resulting in a small puddle of condensation on your coaster. The kind of refreshment that you feel all the way to your core, and instantly you know that water, as slang would deem, is the shit.
When you are a small child, perhaps sometimes even into middle school years, you really are blissfully unaware of the behind the scenes magic that happens to produce an end result. I remember when I was very small and travelling with my dad and we arrived at stop light, he would say "Hey, watch this", and then he would snap his fingers and make the light change to green. I was always blown away by it. It was the late 70s, and I was 4 or 5 years old, I didn't really understand how he did it. This thought crossed my mind the other day when I cooked some pork shoulder. I smoked the meat all night and the next day. Between the prep the day before and the cooking process, I spent a solid 17 hours on it. That seems excessive when you consider it only takes maybe 20 minutes to eat it. When I go to a restaurant and eat a pulled pork sandwich, that means that someone spent in the neighborhood of 17 hours making it, and I suppose I have never thought about that while eating such an item, but I plan to. I may even go out of my way to do it, just so I can have those thoughts.
I was applying my deodorant this morning and noticed that is was called Right Guard 3D. THREE FUCKING D! It seems that 3D is the new thing the kids are into these days, why not spray it into your armpit as well. All I can say is I'm damn happy thing the latest fad aint peanut butter.
Monday, August 2, 2010
I know I have said this over and over again, but it is hard to beat going to Vegas. First off, I get reward points on my credit card which I use to buy gas, pay my cable bill, pay for my truck insurance, general day to day stuff that everyone has to have. I also use this card when I am going to buy things that I have cash for already. I use the card, get the points, and then pay the bill each month, so there is no interest. So I then use the points to buy airplane tickets. Generally each time I go to Vegas, I can afford either one or two tickets, one way. If I buy two tickets out there, I only have to buy tickets on the way back. For this, I have a vacation fund which my best gal and I each dump $25 per paycheck into. I don't miss the 25$ at all, and then when it is vacation time, boom, I have a nice booty from which to loot. So that pays for return tickets.
Since I go somewhat frequently, I also get free rooms at most of the hotels out there. I can stay for free practically anywhere on the strip. So I can stay a few days at an MGM property, then a few days at a Harrah's property, and it costs me virtually nothing... room service and the like comes from the previously mentioned vacation fund. Since we have been to Vegas so many times, we also know how to get around cheaply, and where to eat cheaply, and we would have to eat if we were at home, so this is not necessarily an added expense, but again, vacation fund provides.
So that only leaves gambling money which comes out of pocket, and if you win, you leave more than you came with. It seems like a lot of times we break even on gambling, or close to it, so going there for a few days and even up to a week really is incredibly inexpensive. Also, I know preach this every time I bring up Vegas, but public intoxication is legal there, so you can drink all the free drinks you want, and then go roam the streets for hours, which I find rather amusing. Anyway, I bring this up because I will be going again soon, if I cannot locate an alternative vacation in a certain price range, and I want everyone to know how awesome it is. It is awesome.
One of the last things on the brutus clone build prior to a full water test is the counterflow chiller. A counterflow chiller (or CFC) is a contraption consisting of a long copper tube inside a larger rubber tube. As water cool or ambient temperatue water flows up the rubber house surrounding the copper tube, the freshly brewed beer flows the opposite direction down the copper tube in the center, then creating a pretty massive heat exchange. The water leaves the top of the contraption having stolen the heat from the beer, and the beer flows out the bottom of the copper tube having had the heat stolen.
I decided to build my own to save on costs, and to learn another valuable skill in copper soldering (or sweating, as it is known). so I went to home depot and bought all the parts and began the build.
Sweating copper parts is rather easy as I discovered, but making it pretty can be a challenge to a newcomer. Essentially, you heat up the two copper parts you will be joining, and then lay a piece of solder on it, and the solder get sucked into the jont, thus sealing it up.
After the final testing of the chiller, I was able to insert near boiling water in one end, and have it come out the other end at around 80 degrees, and this is outside in the Texas heat, so imagine what it could do during the dead of winter, when the tap water is quite cold.
At this point, I think I am ready for a full water test, which involves going through the entire beer making process using only water, so as not to waste ingredients if something goes wrong.
Since I go somewhat frequently, I also get free rooms at most of the hotels out there. I can stay for free practically anywhere on the strip. So I can stay a few days at an MGM property, then a few days at a Harrah's property, and it costs me virtually nothing... room service and the like comes from the previously mentioned vacation fund. Since we have been to Vegas so many times, we also know how to get around cheaply, and where to eat cheaply, and we would have to eat if we were at home, so this is not necessarily an added expense, but again, vacation fund provides.
So that only leaves gambling money which comes out of pocket, and if you win, you leave more than you came with. It seems like a lot of times we break even on gambling, or close to it, so going there for a few days and even up to a week really is incredibly inexpensive. Also, I know preach this every time I bring up Vegas, but public intoxication is legal there, so you can drink all the free drinks you want, and then go roam the streets for hours, which I find rather amusing. Anyway, I bring this up because I will be going again soon, if I cannot locate an alternative vacation in a certain price range, and I want everyone to know how awesome it is. It is awesome.
One of the last things on the brutus clone build prior to a full water test is the counterflow chiller. A counterflow chiller (or CFC) is a contraption consisting of a long copper tube inside a larger rubber tube. As water cool or ambient temperatue water flows up the rubber house surrounding the copper tube, the freshly brewed beer flows the opposite direction down the copper tube in the center, then creating a pretty massive heat exchange. The water leaves the top of the contraption having stolen the heat from the beer, and the beer flows out the bottom of the copper tube having had the heat stolen.
I decided to build my own to save on costs, and to learn another valuable skill in copper soldering (or sweating, as it is known). so I went to home depot and bought all the parts and began the build.
Sweating copper parts is rather easy as I discovered, but making it pretty can be a challenge to a newcomer. Essentially, you heat up the two copper parts you will be joining, and then lay a piece of solder on it, and the solder get sucked into the jont, thus sealing it up.
You can find plans all over the interclouds for building one of these things, so I will not bore you with the ins and outs of the design, and get straight to the pictures of the build.
After my initial test, one of my soldered joints was a leaky, which is no bueno, so I tried to fix it, but soon found that unsoldering or unsweating a joint seems very difficult, so instead I opted to go with my good old pal JB Weld. A little JB Weld on the joint, and all was well.
After the final testing of the chiller, I was able to insert near boiling water in one end, and have it come out the other end at around 80 degrees, and this is outside in the Texas heat, so imagine what it could do during the dead of winter, when the tap water is quite cold.
At this point, I think I am ready for a full water test, which involves going through the entire beer making process using only water, so as not to waste ingredients if something goes wrong.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
So your mash tun is responsible for holding your grains and your water at a certain temperature for a proper conversion, where the fermentable sugars are extracted from the grains. If you were to just leave it all in a pot, the temperature would drop too much rendering the conversion useless. There are two methodologies to address this in a Brutus 10 clone. The first would be to add a burner under your mash tun, and then simply heat the vessel when it drops below a certain temperature. The other is to insulate your mash tun. I decided to go with option B and insulate.
I did this for a few reasons. For one, I didn't want to use any more propane than I need to. Additionally, that would require another burner, more gas piping, another igniter, more burner mounts, another wind deflector/heat shield and so on, not to mention the pain the ass of having to have precise temperature control to turn the burner on and off automatically, or even worse, manually. Lastly, heating the bottom of a vessel means unequal heat distribution, which brings up another whole can of worms. Insulation on the other hand, is rather simple, just... add insulation to your vessel.
It seem like half the world heats their mash tun, and the other half insulates theirs, so there is endless information on the interwebs regarding insulation types, and what people have had success with. I chose to go with foam rubber insulation, 3/4" inch thick. It is closed cell so it is basically waterproof, and it is soft and flexible which means it would be easy to attach to my mash tun. It has a heat flow rate (or K factor) of 0.27 Btu/hr. Without getting too scientific on you, this just means that you will lose .27 BTU per hour at 1 inch of thickness. Mine is only 3/4" thick so I will lose slightly more. Needless to say, I think the temperature will only drop a negligible amount over the amount of time my grains are in it.
The foam came in 3 foot by 4 foot sheets, so I picked up three sheets. I then just cut them to the sizes I needed and applied them to the vessel using some real nasty glue. Amraflex contact adhesive looks like snot, and has the properties of snot, so getting it on there was a bit of a challenge. Also, the adhesive is very unforgiving, so you have exactly one chance to get it on there correctly. I did not. My pieces went on crooked, so it was a challenge to make it look 'right'.
Here are some photos of the process and the final result.
It aint the prettiest mash tun in the world, but I have seen far worse. In the long run, I am not sure how well the insulation will stand up to the elements, being handled, and moved around, but worst case scenario, I can just redo it later.
I can practically smell the beer breweing already
I did this for a few reasons. For one, I didn't want to use any more propane than I need to. Additionally, that would require another burner, more gas piping, another igniter, more burner mounts, another wind deflector/heat shield and so on, not to mention the pain the ass of having to have precise temperature control to turn the burner on and off automatically, or even worse, manually. Lastly, heating the bottom of a vessel means unequal heat distribution, which brings up another whole can of worms. Insulation on the other hand, is rather simple, just... add insulation to your vessel.
It seem like half the world heats their mash tun, and the other half insulates theirs, so there is endless information on the interwebs regarding insulation types, and what people have had success with. I chose to go with foam rubber insulation, 3/4" inch thick. It is closed cell so it is basically waterproof, and it is soft and flexible which means it would be easy to attach to my mash tun. It has a heat flow rate (or K factor) of 0.27 Btu/hr. Without getting too scientific on you, this just means that you will lose .27 BTU per hour at 1 inch of thickness. Mine is only 3/4" thick so I will lose slightly more. Needless to say, I think the temperature will only drop a negligible amount over the amount of time my grains are in it.
The foam came in 3 foot by 4 foot sheets, so I picked up three sheets. I then just cut them to the sizes I needed and applied them to the vessel using some real nasty glue. Amraflex contact adhesive looks like snot, and has the properties of snot, so getting it on there was a bit of a challenge. Also, the adhesive is very unforgiving, so you have exactly one chance to get it on there correctly. I did not. My pieces went on crooked, so it was a challenge to make it look 'right'.
Here are some photos of the process and the final result.
It aint the prettiest mash tun in the world, but I have seen far worse. In the long run, I am not sure how well the insulation will stand up to the elements, being handled, and moved around, but worst case scenario, I can just redo it later.
I can practically smell the beer breweing already
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
A couple of quick pointless anecdotes before I get on to the Brutus 10 clone update...
On my 16th birthday, I got my driver's license. I begged my mom to let me take the car for a spin, as I am sure a lot of teenagers do when they get their license. She reluctantly said yes. I went out to my friend's farm to meet up and look at horses and various farm things. Later, we left the farm and headed back to my place. I was following my friend, and of course, we were both mostly driving like jackasses. My friend, who had a relatively large lead, took a quick right down a dirt/rock road, and unbeknownst to me, immediately stopped and turned off his lights. So then I come barreling around the same corner as quickly as he did, and BAM, there he was. I slammed on my breaks, but alas, it was too late, and I slid right into the back of his truck with my mom's car. Needless to say she was unhappy. I did not drive her car again for quite some time, when ironically, the same car became mine. I later totaled the car 600 miles from home in St. Louis.
When I chew small pieces of gum, I usually chew two at a time, but rather than mix the two pieces together to create a larger piece, I keep them separated in my mouth, never allowing them to touch. I am not sure why I do this, it is subconscious. I tend to chew gum all the time, so sometimes these two separate pieces will be in my mouth for many hours, then moments before I am ready to part ways with the gum, I will smash them together to form a single piece, and then deposit them.
So back to the Brutus clone build. I have made two upgrades to the system. First I added some flame shields around the burners. I found this necessary because during recent testing, I found that the wind was causing inefficiencies. Additionally, I am hoping that the rings will direct the heat directly towards the bottom of the kegs, and deflect heat away from the frame, because I found that the frame of the contraption gets extraordinarily hot after the burners have been going for a while. I am sure this is just part of the process, but I don't like it, and if I can defeat it, its a win.
So I considered building the rings out of steel, but the size pieces I was going to need was going to be less than cost effective. Plus, I really have no way of making a perfectly round piece of steel. After scouring the interwebness for a while, I came across someone else facing the same challenge, so I decided to employ their method for achieving the same goal. The answer? Cake rings! They make cake rings out of relatively thin gauge stainless steel, and, they are adjustable. Awesome! The only issue was that I had to cut a notch in them to allow my igniters to still be in place. A few minutes with my trusty roto-tool and that issue was a thing of the past. Here are a few pics.
The next upgrade was not necessary, but I nice thing to have at a very low price point. How do you know how much liquid is in your vessels? Well, you really don't, so to solve this, I added vinyl numbering decals to my sight glasses. Here is how that looks.
Also, I scored some cheapo stainless steel lids for like 12 bucks each off amazon.com.
I am so close to being done now I can taste it.
On my 16th birthday, I got my driver's license. I begged my mom to let me take the car for a spin, as I am sure a lot of teenagers do when they get their license. She reluctantly said yes. I went out to my friend's farm to meet up and look at horses and various farm things. Later, we left the farm and headed back to my place. I was following my friend, and of course, we were both mostly driving like jackasses. My friend, who had a relatively large lead, took a quick right down a dirt/rock road, and unbeknownst to me, immediately stopped and turned off his lights. So then I come barreling around the same corner as quickly as he did, and BAM, there he was. I slammed on my breaks, but alas, it was too late, and I slid right into the back of his truck with my mom's car. Needless to say she was unhappy. I did not drive her car again for quite some time, when ironically, the same car became mine. I later totaled the car 600 miles from home in St. Louis.
When I chew small pieces of gum, I usually chew two at a time, but rather than mix the two pieces together to create a larger piece, I keep them separated in my mouth, never allowing them to touch. I am not sure why I do this, it is subconscious. I tend to chew gum all the time, so sometimes these two separate pieces will be in my mouth for many hours, then moments before I am ready to part ways with the gum, I will smash them together to form a single piece, and then deposit them.
So back to the Brutus clone build. I have made two upgrades to the system. First I added some flame shields around the burners. I found this necessary because during recent testing, I found that the wind was causing inefficiencies. Additionally, I am hoping that the rings will direct the heat directly towards the bottom of the kegs, and deflect heat away from the frame, because I found that the frame of the contraption gets extraordinarily hot after the burners have been going for a while. I am sure this is just part of the process, but I don't like it, and if I can defeat it, its a win.
So I considered building the rings out of steel, but the size pieces I was going to need was going to be less than cost effective. Plus, I really have no way of making a perfectly round piece of steel. After scouring the interwebness for a while, I came across someone else facing the same challenge, so I decided to employ their method for achieving the same goal. The answer? Cake rings! They make cake rings out of relatively thin gauge stainless steel, and, they are adjustable. Awesome! The only issue was that I had to cut a notch in them to allow my igniters to still be in place. A few minutes with my trusty roto-tool and that issue was a thing of the past. Here are a few pics.
The next upgrade was not necessary, but I nice thing to have at a very low price point. How do you know how much liquid is in your vessels? Well, you really don't, so to solve this, I added vinyl numbering decals to my sight glasses. Here is how that looks.
Also, I scored some cheapo stainless steel lids for like 12 bucks each off amazon.com.
I am so close to being done now I can taste it.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
A few quick updates with pictures.
1. I lowered the pump to under the cross member. This generates more drop between the liquid level in the keg and the bottom of the pump. I also added a dump valve on the output side. Between these two improvements, I should be able to prime the pump easier because of the increased pressure from the bigger drop, and being able to allow air to escape from the dump valve. I left the former mounting plate in place, because A. I didn't want to booger up the frame by chopping a part of it off, and B. I figure it is a good mount for potential future additions 8-)
1. I lowered the pump to under the cross member. This generates more drop between the liquid level in the keg and the bottom of the pump. I also added a dump valve on the output side. Between these two improvements, I should be able to prime the pump easier because of the increased pressure from the bigger drop, and being able to allow air to escape from the dump valve. I left the former mounting plate in place, because A. I didn't want to booger up the frame by chopping a part of it off, and B. I figure it is a good mount for potential future additions 8-)
2. Next I added a set of igniters to the system, for automated lighting of the burners. This way, I don't need to mess with flame lighters, I can just turn on the gas, push a button and go. This was the mystery button from the last post. Not installing an automagical lighting system is pussy.
I ran the wires for the igniters through this stuff I picked up at McMaster-Carr. It is made of fiberglass and able to withstand 1000 degrees of heat. It may be overkill, but I didn't want my wires to melt. Also, I failed to mention that the igniters are from a kit from Wal-Mart made as a replacement for grill igniters. Cheap and easy!
3. I finally painted the system. This is another stumbling block for many brutus 10 clone builders. The high heat from the burners typically will burn off normal, and even high temperature stove/grill paint. I didn't want to powder coat it, which would probably be for the best, because of the high cost involved. A lot of people go the paint route, and then just repaint as the paint burns off to avoid rusting. I have another plan to combat this, which I will address in a near future post.
It is Texas and it is summer, so the heat is around 100 and the humidity is ridiculous, so painting proved to be a challenge, but nonetheless after 5 days of sitting by a fan, the paint finally appears to have dried well enough for a test run. I think I should be able to do a full on test of the entire system using water inside of a week.
4. I built a "hop hopper" for lack of a better term. I did not invent this, I duplicated this from someone else's brilliant design. It is simply a 5 gallon paint strainer bag clamped onto a chunk of PVC pipe, with long threaded rods bolted to it. It allows the unit to sit on top of the brew kettle while the beer is brewing, with an open hole in the top, so that you can toss in whatever little tidbits you might need, such as hops, any extra grains, twigs, berries, fruit, nuts, coffee, gum, cereal, tacos, bacon, a hamburger, whatever you like. When you are done, you can simply remove it from the top, and all your junk remains in the strainer, and not in your beer.
So as you can see, once again, the system is looking nearly completed. I am stoked, and starting to plan out what style of beer to make on my maiden voyage.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
**** I just realized I had a post on weldless fittings already, so I am cutting this post down to just my March pump switch****
The next challenge was to figure out a good way to wire my March 809 pump to some sort of switch or button. I went with a cool lighted blue button. Push the button, pump comes on, light comes on. Push button again and both go off. This very easily could have been a simple light switch from home depot instead, but hey, that's just not cool enough. Plus, this way I learned more stuff.
Wait a sec broham, what is that other mystery button?
Worry not old chum, we will cover that later.
I had bear of a time getting the button configured, and had to resort to asking for help on the dreaded interweb. It could have been my lack of electrical knowledge, or it could have been the plethora of pints I drank in the process of trying to figure it all out. In the end, I did get it all working properly, and I am quite pleased with the results.
So here is the progress so far. It is starting to look more like a Brutus 10, and less like a pile of random parts, every day.
It is funny how some projects start off as really kick ass, and then eventually they sort of get annoying. I wouldn't necessarily label the Brutus 10 clone build as annoying per se, but I do wish that it was completed already. I am WAY behind schedule, and it is right around 100 degrees in the garage during the day now, which makes working on it a real scorcher. I had a few personal setbacks which threw the schedule off, but I am back on track now, and hopefully I will be cranking out sweet golden nectar within a month.
Hooray beer!
Thursday, June 17, 2010
I took a break from the Brutus 10 clone build, through no fault of my own. I am back on track now though, and should have an update or two in the coming days. In the meantime...
I was at the store the other day purchasing some lovely alcoholic libations. There were two old people in front of me. They were REALLY slow, and they were really old. They were also pushing the limits of the "15 items or less" rule as stated by the sign. Listen Mortimer and Helen, if you have 14 tubs of denture cleaner, that does not count as one item, unless perhaps they are contained within some sort of jump pack, and are sold with one price. [This applies to everyone by the way] There were also several patrons in line behind me, and they were quite impatient. They were making snide remarks under their breath, and sighing heavily to display their discontent with the situation.
I started to think that perhaps as I have gotten older that I am just more tolerant to these kinds of predicaments. I did not care in the least bit that these elderly folk were jamming up the works at the local Kroger. I didn't care that they were probably buying more than 15 items in the clearly marked 15 items or less lane. Awesome, I am getting older, and therefore more mature, I am beginning to understand more and more how the world functions, and how humans grow and learn and adapt.
But then something else occurred to me. The impatient people behind me were older than I am, so rather than reveling in my new found skill of tolerance to meaningless situations that do not merit ill will, I came to realize that in general, people are just assholes, and that I had basically stayed the same. I am not an asshole. I suppose I could portray an asshole as a character if I chose, but I would be basing the character on people in line at the grocery store, and nothing inside my self. I suppose that, in and of itself, is a self realization, so it was not a total loss.
Completely different subject....
On the way home from work the other day at 6:30am [YEAH, AM], I saw a lady walking down the street. I mean she was IN the street, walking against the oncoming traffic. On the other side of the road, lay a perfect quality, recently renovated, nice, smooth sidewalk. This is rush hour traffic sweetheart. Well, as much as rush hour can be in a relatively residential part of a small Dallas suburb. Why would she do that?
I looked at her face as I drove by, and she appeared to be a sane, lucid, normal lady, approximately in her mid 50s. She did have a big ass, but her perhaps that was why she was walking in the first place. I could not associate the size of her ass to why she was walking in this fashion. I was, and still am, baffled by this. The only theory I could muster was that she was a crazy. A bona fide street walkin' crazy, and that her disguise was that of a "normie".
Whenever I see things like that, I always daydream that later, on the evening news, I will see a report of that same lady having been run over and killed. This rarely happens though. Or does it? What if my daydreams killed people? Hmmmm....
I was at the store the other day purchasing some lovely alcoholic libations. There were two old people in front of me. They were REALLY slow, and they were really old. They were also pushing the limits of the "15 items or less" rule as stated by the sign. Listen Mortimer and Helen, if you have 14 tubs of denture cleaner, that does not count as one item, unless perhaps they are contained within some sort of jump pack, and are sold with one price. [This applies to everyone by the way] There were also several patrons in line behind me, and they were quite impatient. They were making snide remarks under their breath, and sighing heavily to display their discontent with the situation.
I started to think that perhaps as I have gotten older that I am just more tolerant to these kinds of predicaments. I did not care in the least bit that these elderly folk were jamming up the works at the local Kroger. I didn't care that they were probably buying more than 15 items in the clearly marked 15 items or less lane. Awesome, I am getting older, and therefore more mature, I am beginning to understand more and more how the world functions, and how humans grow and learn and adapt.
But then something else occurred to me. The impatient people behind me were older than I am, so rather than reveling in my new found skill of tolerance to meaningless situations that do not merit ill will, I came to realize that in general, people are just assholes, and that I had basically stayed the same. I am not an asshole. I suppose I could portray an asshole as a character if I chose, but I would be basing the character on people in line at the grocery store, and nothing inside my self. I suppose that, in and of itself, is a self realization, so it was not a total loss.
Completely different subject....
On the way home from work the other day at 6:30am [YEAH, AM], I saw a lady walking down the street. I mean she was IN the street, walking against the oncoming traffic. On the other side of the road, lay a perfect quality, recently renovated, nice, smooth sidewalk. This is rush hour traffic sweetheart. Well, as much as rush hour can be in a relatively residential part of a small Dallas suburb. Why would she do that?
I looked at her face as I drove by, and she appeared to be a sane, lucid, normal lady, approximately in her mid 50s. She did have a big ass, but her perhaps that was why she was walking in the first place. I could not associate the size of her ass to why she was walking in this fashion. I was, and still am, baffled by this. The only theory I could muster was that she was a crazy. A bona fide street walkin' crazy, and that her disguise was that of a "normie".
Whenever I see things like that, I always daydream that later, on the evening news, I will see a report of that same lady having been run over and killed. This rarely happens though. Or does it? What if my daydreams killed people? Hmmmm....
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