Tag: OCF Update

20JAN2022 – OCF Update – This’N’That

photog Current Events, OCF

Today I intend to mail off my old camera for sale.  I feel a little disloyal for casting it away but I have had it for over four years and the trade up in capability is well justified.  But it’s funny how mechanical devices can become like old friends.  I’ve gotten e-mails from people who, after seeing the classic car photos of the day, wrote about some memories of their favorite old car.  It’s almost like there’s a symbiosis between our machines and us.

But it’s got to go and so that’s that.  The main problem is that it’s snowing again so I’ll first have to clear a path so I can drive to the post office.  This snowing every other day is a royal pain but at least a familiar one.  It gives me an additional reason for hating New England.

Last night I headed out to attend the monthly Dunwich Republican Committee meeting and when I got to the town hall I found out the meeting had been cancelled.  No announcement, no nothing.  And the building custodian shows up at the door wearing a face mask and so now they’ve brought those stupid things back.  When he sees I’m not wearing a mask he hands me a stack of R-95 masks and tells me how great they are.  I thought of saying something sarcastic and then thought, “The poor guy is only doing his job.  It’s not his fault he lives in a mental asylum.”

The battle to repair the heating system is (seemingly) headed for the final chapter.  After the last burst of activity the system worked without failure for a full week.  Then it developed a new failure mode.  This time the system would fail to restart after it cycled off on high loop temperature.  Because no failure code and hard lockout occurred this apparently proved that the problem is indeed in the power venter.  Now a crack team of technicians will descend on the compound in the next day or two and replace the power venter and order will be restored to my heating system.  But somehow it reminds me of that scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey where HAL 9000 declares that a component on the external surface of the spaceship will fail and must be replaced.  I feel like I’m being lured into some horrible conspiracy where I’ll discover that a maniacal mechanical device is attempting to finish me off to further a bureaucratic initiative that is “for my own good.”

After snow removal and mailing off the camera I really have to do some photo work.  I’m out of photos again and must put in the time for the post-processing.

I watched some of Dementia Joe’s press conference yesterday.  After a very few minutes I had to turn it off.  His endless lies and play acting are really hard to stomach.  I read an article that discussed the unlikelihood that after the current Supreme Court session the Dems will try again to get Justice Breyer to retire so they can nominate Kamala Harris to the Court.  Amusingly it would require Harris to vote for herself to get it passed.  Also it would leave the Senate deadlocked until a new Vice President was installed and that might prevent one from being installed at all.  So theoretically, if Dementia Joe dropped dead, the future Republican Speaker of the House would then succeed to the presidency.  So if Harris leaves the VP spot this year maybe Trump will run for congress just to be able to become Republican Speaker of the House just in case Biden drops dead.  How’s that for 4D chess nonsense?  The article was especially amusing because of how openly it disparaged the intelligence of both Harris and Justice Sotomayor.

Well, gotta go make the donuts.  I’ll be back later with more interesting things.

Thanks to the MaddMedic for the Links the Last Few Days

photog Current Events, OCF ,

MaddMedic who runs the “FREEDOM IS JUST ANOTHER WORD…: blog and news aggregation site, linked up a couple of my posts over the last few days.

Thanks Medic for the visibility.  I’m always glad to have more viewers visit the site.

 

And I’ll take the opportunity to ask anyone who likes the content here to pass it along and add us to any blog rolls that might help us get seen by people who would enjoy the content here.

 

 

 

17JAN2022 – OCF Update – Gaia Punishes Me Again

photog Current Events, OCF

So we hit the jackpot today.  Four inches of snow followed by a half inch of rain overnight.  That makes the slop as heavy as possible and plus you’re standing in freezing water.  But I meant every bad thing I said about Gaia and don’t take anything back.  I’ll clean up this slop and be back with my shoulder to the wheel of OCF as soon a possible.

As an aside, I watched Dementia Joe’s speech down in Atlanta.  He really is a lying moron.  But his voters are right there at his level of dishonesty and stupidity.  So his strategy is probably sound such as it is.  Problem for him is the polls show the number of voters on his side has shrunk quite a bit.  Sucks being him.

15JAN2022 – OCF Update – Deep Freeze

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Camera Girl announced to me this morning that the outside thermometer registered an impressive 2° Fahrenheit.  I went to the kitchen porch and duly ventilated my lungs with this arctic air.  When the coughing fit subsided, I made a mental note not to do that anymore.

I went through the news today and I didn’t see anything new of value.  I guess I will have to wait until something comes along to bloviate about.

Today is a good day for writing and doing some research on local events that might have value as photographic subjects.  Yesterday I got out and did some photography in a colonial era cemetery here in Dunwich.  Some of the dearly departed were bound to be warlocks and witches and other friends and family of Selectman Cthulhu so I was very conscious of any sounds or vibrations emanating from the ground.  I’ve seen enough movies to know that being dragged down into a graveyard is your own fault.  Sidestepping that sort of thing is trivially easy.  Luckily no such trouble occurred.  The dead were slumbering under a layer of fresh snow and the only noises I heard were Camera Girl grumbling under her breath about wasting her time.  It was a relatively short outing but it awoke my COVID drugged reflexes to seek out interesting images in the wide wonderful world.  However, 2° Fahrenheit is a powerful deterrent to wanderlust.  I’m staying put today and planning future treks.

Having finished the Star Trek episodes is a great milestone and a highly encouraging event.  Without the horrors of Season 3 shadowing my heart my spirit is buoyant and I can look forward to new projects with renewed zest.  I do plan to do some follow up work on the Star Trek project.  Some quantitative analysis of my ratings of the episodes might provide insights.  But that is for the future.  Right now, the attitude is, “Free at last, free at last.”

I’ve been disappointed by the fact that the last few Galaxy’s Edge novels have not been published in paperback.  I guess I’ll be forced to get kindle to read them.  I sent an e-mail to one of the authors to question if this is a permanent situation but he never got back to me.  I also have to catch up on the most recent Monster Hunter book too.  And eventually I have some movies to see also.

January 15th!  Time is whizzing by and they haven’t quite broken us yet.  I’m looking forward to more bright (but warmer) days like this and to getting out and about in the short winter days.  If anything interesting catches my eye I’ll be sure to pass it along but for now enjoy your day and stay warm if you’re living in the arctic waste like me.

04JAN2022 – OCF Update – Life Resumes

photog Current Events, OCF

So the guy showed up yesterday and after several hours of fiddling around he got the heater going again.  It still sounded terrible but it slowly heated the house up so that when it failed again today at 11 am my teeth weren’t chattering.  I pushed the reset button then calmly called up the “Company.”  And, wonder of wonders, they finally agree with me.  The fan they installed a month ago needs to be replaced.

So we’ve gathered our wits and gotten an electric space heater to keep us alive while they replace the fan this afternoon and life has resumed!

Although it’s pretty cold today, the sun is out and I hope to get Camera Girl to unleash the hounds and allow me to try and get tracking autofocus shots of them running with the A7 IV.

And I intend to continue to press on to the end of Star Trek Season 3 no matter the damage to my body, mind and soul.

Fiction writing will have to wait until I can get a block of time that isn’t submerged in contractor management grief.

The news is sort of slow.  I read that the Senate is putting aside work on BBB and will attempt to enshrine voter fraud into law.  If they fail they intend to try and eliminate the filibuster.  We’ll see if Manchin and Sistema are still holding them off.

So things are getting back to normal and I hope to have something a little less nonsensical to read soon.

31DEC2021 – OCF Update – New Year’s Eve Message

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After my very depressing non-predictions post I thought it was a good idea to post something a little bit more positive.to balance out the end of the year.

Camera Girl went out and got chicken chop suey from our favorite local Chinese restaurant and we’ll watch some fun movies and celebrate the New Year on a good note.  We’ve managed to eat or give away most of the Christmas leftovers and even most of the Christmas cookies which is quite an accomplishment.  Everyone in the family is doing pretty well and even this state hasn’t resorted to masking in grocery stores or other establishments.  I heard a local health care authority admit on television that the omicron “plague” while causing tremendous numbers of infected is failing to cause many serious cases and even fewer deaths.  It looks like the COVID panic will be allowed to evaporate.  So things are looking up even here in the Evil Empire.

I’m still in the very early stages of learning how to use the new camera (Sony A7 IV).  But so far it checks all the boxes I needed.  Tomorrow, if weather permits, I’ll have Camera Girl unleash the hounds and do a tracking autofocus test on them.  So expect some info soon.  I want to see what the larger file size allows me in cropping my macro shots.

Like everyone else, I’ll be counting my pennies from now on.  Food and everything else is becoming horribly expensive so avoiding waste will have to become a priority.  Luckily Camera girl is very frugal.  I’ll unleash this super power of hers by not calling her cheap anymore.

And finally in the New Year I resolve to spend more of my day writing my fiction.  It will probably cut into my blogging time but I see now it’s unavoidable.  Those morning hours are the only time when creativity exists.

So Happy New Year everyone out there in the big, wide wonderful world that doesn’t believe what Dementia Joe says.  We’ll make progress in 2022 and we’ll figure out a way to prosper despite the awful people who make it their business to torture us.  In fact I predict they will be the ones suffering this year.

Happy New Year.

23DEC2021 – OCF Update – Pre-Holiday Catastrophes

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Here at the Compound we have threats and invasions on all sides.  A critter has gotten into the basement and the heating system is staging a revolt.  I woke up this morning to Camera Girl informing me with wide-eyed terror that she could hear footsteps in the basement.  There’s a dropped ceiling down there and a lurker in the darkness was making its presence felt.  I went downstairs with a flashlight, a rickety ladder, a two handed ax handle and steely determination but the invader escaped my every attempt.  I’m glad I watched Alien a few weeks ago.  I knew not to enter the air ducts without at least a flamethrower.  I have contracted with big game hunter Frank Buck to “bring ’em back alive.”  Actually I would prefer if he brings it back dead but whatever the prevailing animal ethics are I just want to restore Camera Girl’s joie de vivre.  I will confess that I hope it’s at least a racoon.  If somehow it could be a fisher cat that would provide me with some kind of rollicking adventure story for Christmas but the space is kind of limited.  More likely it’s a chipmunk.

The heating problem has been an ongoing saga.  On December 7th (a day that now does live in infamy) we had the power venter replaced.  This is a fan that exhausts the high temperature exhaust gases from a house without a chimney.  The unfortunate tech who performed this waged an unholy war against cramped space and dimensional constraints of the new unit.  But since the replacement it’s been one problem after another.  Yesterday we had an emergency visit at 9pm to correct a number of heating outages.  Today they continued and I exhorted the service provider that I needed his “top man.”  I envision a sort of Indiana Jones of HVAC technicians coming on the job and battling the forces of entropy to restore my heating system to alignment with Truth, Justice, the American Way and the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

So while I hold down the fort in anticipation of these rescue missions I look out on the wreckage that is Dementia Joe’s America.  Harpies threaten to have Joe Manchin burned at the stake for refusing to cough up some multi-trillions of dollars of spoils from our great grandchildren and bureaucrats threaten to fire anyone who refuses to capitulate to weekly vaccine injections.  These truly are the days of miracles and wonder.  One day soon we will look back on this period and wonder how in the world we allowed ourselves to be abused so badly by such evil men for so long for no good reason.

Well, I’ll have more interesting things to yammer about later but Indiana has arrived and the battle for combustion supremacy must be fought and lost before sundown.

Merry Christmas.

 

19DEC2021 – OCF Update – This’N’That

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You may have noticed a definite lull in posting yesterday.  I had my two older grandsons over for a Marvel Universe Marathon.  We had copious desserts and Camera Girl’s best spaghetti and meatballs and sausage dinner.  I voted for the original Iron Man movie and they added Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Endgame.  Now, considering that “Endgame” clocks in at three hours long, that’s a lot of movies for one day.  But we filled in the time with much witty banter at the expense of the on-screen “heroes.”  The most egregious of the diversity and equity “improvements” was Girl Captain Marvel.  Basically she is Superman with estrogen.  But in addition, the whole girl power agenda was on open display.  And I railed against it most vocally.

But there was still a lot of fun in the movies.  And it was really great to have the kids over for dinner.  We talked about their school situations.  The older fellow is preparing for college and the younger is in high school too.  They have two weeks off for Christmas which is pretty good.  But they were good company for their old grandad and I felt like one of the kids myself.

Omicron continues to look like the variant that couldn’t.  South Africa is a month into the spike and the deaths just haven’t happened.  Based on the new cases data the spike may already be past.  If that is so then I’d say by New Year we will be able to infer that omicron is the endemic benign end state of the COVID-19 virus.  Of course Dementia Joe is desperate to keep this thing going.  And unfortunately, the Sixth Circuit Court just gave him the green light to force large companies to implement the vaccine mandate.  Ah, the horrors of the administrative state.

The train wreck that is the American economy continues to struggle along with “supply chain” holes and rampant inflation punishing the public in a way that is sure to make outrage the dominant emotion in 2022.  And the breakdown in law and order completes the dysfunctional reality of the Biden regime’s profile in a way that is sure to make the midterms truly awful for the Democrats.  Whether the Republicans will be smart enough to use this to their benefit remains to be seen.

Christmas is upon us.  I’ve so far indulged in three of my various versions of the “Christmas Carol” movies.  Highly satisfying.  Camera Girl is serving roast beast this Christmas, her butcher describes the cut as a “spoon roast.”  This is some cut of sirloin beef.  Last time she made one it was very, very good, so I am anticipating “another triumph.”

So have a good day.

Christmas Cooking, Sony A7 III, Sony 90mm f\2.8 macro lens

 

17DEC2021 – OCF Update – The Joys of Home Repair

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Today I went out armed with enthusiasm and determination.  Also with bespoke fence supports, rebar, sledge hammers, levels, shovels and stainless steel screws.  And after several hours I came back a broken man.  My only solace is that I learned a valuable lesson, namely whatever you assume the worst case is, quadruple it.

My predecessor at the Compound was an inveterate do-it-yourselfer.  Which I’m sure saved him scads of money on contractors.  However, it meant that orthodoxy was not something he was held to.  When putting in a wooden fence it is best practice to set the posts in concrete.  Apparently Mr. DIY decided that was way too belts and suspenders for him.  So bye bye to bespoke supports.  Hello to hammering in any wooden or metal stakes I could get my hands on and nailing them to the posts.  Even aside from the unpleasing aesthetics of this makeshift solution, my confidence in the dependability of these repairs is very low.

I guess this spring, I will get to experiment with installing concrete footings.  But as a very lazy man my soul rebels at the enormous effort I’ll be expending.  Oh, the pain, the pain.

Well now by comparison writing a post or two seems like a walk in the park.  I’ll be doing a review of another of the last of the Star Trek season three episodes.  It was terrible but now I have something worse to compare it to, home improvement catastrophe.

16DEC2021 – OCF Update – A Quiet Day

photog Current Events, OCF

Good morning, good morning.  Less than ten days to Christmas and the grandkids are buzzing with anticipation.  Camera Girl is like some kind of kitchen prisoner slaving away at cookie dough and stockpiling the gravies and other ingredients she’ll need for the roast beast that will be served for Christmas dinner.  And I, even I, am experiencing the pre-Christmas rebirth that makes this such a great time.  I can watch one of the Christmas Carol versions and still get the thrill of seeing Scrooge repent his inhumanity.  I can still see him marvel at Fezziwig’s kindness and get a kind of sympathetic response when I look back on my own life and remember when I was the beneficiary of an act of true kindness from a family member or a friend, or even better, from a total stranger.  And maybe a lot of other people have this sort of feeling at this time of the year too.

As for the site, I will have a lot of chores in the next week or so.  This may cut into my posting a bit but I’m sure everyone else is also busy.  A few less outrages to read about won’t harm any of us, even the most bloody minded.  I’ll try to include all the positive things I can find or think of but since traffic goes down quite a bit at this time of year I’m sure I’ll be forgiven for any lapses.  So enjoy the 16th of December and we’ll see what emerges today.