mon mar 4
I went for my walk yesterday, and no sooner had I walked down the driveway when a car saw me, did a U-turn in the neighbor’s driveway, and flagged me down. I figured they were lost (on a dead end road!) and offered to help.
Nope. They just wanted to warn me that there might be a rabid raccoon – ‘acting funny’ – next door and I might want to have a big stick handy if I were to look into it. I didn’t tell them that we own ‘next door’, and I didn’t arm myself with a stick, but I went to investigate.
I found tracks and a hole in the snowbank, but no raccoon. I didn’t stick around.
I’ve been working on C3pr’s carbon fiber base for the last 4 days.
I’d tell you all about it, but all you gotta know is: I’m really happy with the way it turned out.
wed mar 6
I went downtown yesterday and, as I drove down the road, a wild turkey wandered into the roadway. He stopped to think about whether he really wanted to get to the other side, then he saw me bearing down on him, and ran for his life.
Next time the turkey crosses the road, he’ll want to talk it over with the raccoon first.
fri mar 8
Today, I gave up on my servo motor’s ProfilePosition mode, but I got CyclicSynchronousPosition mode to work. Whoa! Big time!
tue mar 12
I kind of like the cold season, but this has been a long winter.
This was the scene on tuesday morning.
And this was the scene on Wednesday morning.
They were cutting and catching coconuts so they wouldn’t fall on cars.
Yup. We went to Florida for a little R&R.
A whole week of sitting in the shade,
Laying on the beach,
And fishing.
My fish was bigger than Mary’s fish, but Mary caught a pelican when the pelican caught her fish, and for awhile, it was “Panic at the Disco!”
We had lunch at the No Name Bar in No Name Key, pop 46.
The History of Diving Museum was really, really good.
Wild chickens run rampant in Key West.
I must say that I had mixed feelings about going on vacation at all. I mean …
I’ve got stuff going on! Lots of it! Don’t interrupt me with a vacation!
But all the textbooks tell you that vacations are good for you, so we took one.
And it was fun.
I took a 4 mile walk and my elevation changed by 10 feet.
Fried or blackened. Fries or cole slaw. Fin, fur, or feather. Every single restaurant.
They are really missing the point on draft beer.
I didn’t see a single alligator.
I didn’t get to scuba dive or snorkel.
I didn’t even fully immerse myself in the ocean!
WTF ??
Pest control: 1-800-IGUANAS.
Kelly’s New England Seafood had the liveliest crowd of the whole week, and every single one of them was 80 years old.
In the end, I got back, bronzed and tired, and it seems like the things I had to tear myself away from are still here, waiting for me.
And so was the cat.
fri mar 29
I’m excited about c3pr. It’s gratifying to turn a long list of things that oughtta work into a list of things that actually work. Right now, while I wait for some deliveries, I’ve been working with the servo, putting it through its paces. Nothing ever works right off the bat, and the problem always turns out to be me.
This is the first time I actually ran a motor on one of the main joints. The motion was pretty ugly until I tightened up the pulley bushings, and now it seems to work as planned.
It won’t be long before I move the whole operation downstairs, and I’ve been re-organizing the shop to make space. The space where I worked on motorcycles will be the ping-pong lab, and I set up a new bench over the wood pile to work on ‘dirty’ stuff like engines.
Years ago, I made a platform for a double bed, with storage underneath it, but it’s been gathering dust for years. I raised it by 20″ and called it a work bench.
To christen it, I decided to finally re-furbish a 1940’s era filing machine I bought at an auction a couple years ago.
With all the re-arranging I’ve been doing, it made sense to clean up a little.
I have no idea where most of this paint came from, but I know where most of it is going.
sun mar 31
Did I mention that things occasionally go wrong?
C3pr seems to have a resonance in the shoulder joint but I think gearing it down will fix it.
Queue up another couple hundred bucks and another couple weeks of waiting for the UPS guy. Sigh.
I don’t mind the money, but the waiting gets old.