Ordinary

Scott sent me a link to a page of photos of high-wheelers. There were some new photos of a restored bike there, but the backgrounds were too busy. I like this one better. Even though it is over a hundred years old it is clear enough to show that makers of weirdo handlebars were there from the beginning. Then I open Roberta's page and she's talking about buying one. Seem to be running into more than my share of coincidences lately.

The invention of the safety bicycle had to wait for the development of roller chain, or maybe roller chain was invented to enable the creation of the safety bicycle. It's a little hard to tell which came first, but it was when Dunlap added the pneumatic tire that it finally made a big impact.

The bicycle was what made the Gay Ninties gay. It was a practical investment for the working man as transportation, and gave him a much greater flexibility for leisure. Ladies, heretofore consigned to riding the heavy adult size tricycles that were only practical for taking a turn around the park, now could ride a much more versatile machine and still keep their legs covered with long skirts. The bicycle craze killed the bustle and the corset, instituted "common-sense dressing" for women and increased their mobility considerably. In 1896 Susan B. Anthony said that "the bicycle has done more for the emancipation of women than anything else in the world."

Gnome of the Day

They just keep coming! This one showed up in an email from Bergen this morning. Or maybe it's a troll. How do you tell?

Cable TV

I canceled our cable service a year or two ago in order to cut expenses. I just re-upped. I'm not real happy about it, but there are some shows you just can't get any other way. Verizon sold off their fiber optic business to Frontier (whoever they are) so that's who we had to talk to. They offered us a choice of fiber-optic service, or for about half the money, a satellite dish from one of them thar miniature satellite dish companies. This strikes me as a conflict of interest. Now the miniature satellite dish is quite the slick little piece of technology, but I don't like the companies. There are two reasons for that. One is because of their relentless advertising and the other is their habit of sticking their ugly stinking satellite dishes on the front of houses where they are most obnoxious. So I went with the fiber optic connection.

There's another reason to prefer the ground based delivery and that is the signal quality. These satellite systems use such a high frequency it is subject to degradation by just about anything including leaves and rain. I don't know whether it is a real issue or whether it just something overwrought nerds worry about, but I suspect it is one of those things that won't be a problem until the day of the big game when Jim Bob tosses that Hail Mary and zizzzit! Hey! What happened to the picture? Of course that could be the time that Joe Bob accidentally cuts the cable in downtown Peoria with his backhow and disrupts fiber-optic service to the entire West Coast. What? You didn't know that West Coast TV service ran through Peoria? Well, I don't know that it does, but I don't know that it doesn't either.

Then there a couple of other minor issues, that could end up being long term problems:

• there's the whole deal of having another piece of equipment (the dish), 
• having it mounted on the roof where you have to deal with all the roof related issues, 
• having cables running all over the outside of the house. Installer's do what they can, but threading cables inside of walls isn't something they do. 
• the location of the dish. Can it be mounted on the back of the house where it is out of sight, or will it be out of sight of the satellite as well? And who decides whether it can see the satellite or not? And would it be okay if it's just peaking over the ridge line?

Lastly, there is their pricing strategy. First off they want a contract. It's for two years. First year is really cheap. The second year is almost double. Now the two years are up and you've gotten used to having this whiz bang gadget beaming a thousand channels of crap into your house. I wonder what the new rates are going to be? 

I think what it comes down to is we had the fiber-optic service before and it worked well enough and we were happy with it. I don't know how well the satellite stuff will work, and I don't want to spend the time or money to find out.

Update April 2016 replaced missing picture.

Pill Me

Eight days worth of magic.

I have an irregular heart beat. I think they used to call it a heart murmur. A few years ago (ten?) it got out of control and put me in the hospital. I sat there for a couple of days with an IV plugged into my arm until things calmed down and they let me go. So now I take a handful of pills every day. My cardiologist prescribed them, I take them, and I haven't been back to the hospital so I guess they work.

I've got a pill dispenser, a box with seven compartments, one for every day of the week. Once a week I set down and load the seven slots in my magazine with my daily dose of pills. It doesn't take long, five or ten minutes, but it is tedious, and I believe I need to be careful so I get the right number of magic potions in the right slots. So I was thinking, wouldn't it be nice if the pharmacy could load up a month's worth at one time so I wouldn't have to perform this little chore every week? I realize it's not much individually, but with the number of old people taking a handful of pills every day, this business of counting out pills is putting a serious crimp in America's TV watching. How can we be number one in TV watching if people have to count all their own pills? Vote for me, I'll put a stop to it.

RYNO Motors Full Story

Crazy man from Portland. Via Scott.

Gnomiculture

Flame Thrower Gnome

I hope this is not going to turn into a all gnome, all the time blog, but it seems that lately every time I turn around I trip over one. This one is from sumdood in California, via a comment on Roberta's previously noted post.

Update: this gnome maker has more energy than I can imagine.

Garden Gnome Liberation Front

Roberta reports that somedood stole Tam's Rocketeer garden gnome. If you absolutely must have one you can buy your own from Amazon, you don't have to liberate one.