This time though, the situation was apparently quite disturbing to my delicate male ego as is evidenced by my shouting in a bad-fake Scottish accent at the voice-mail of a very nice lady that was just trying to give me some money…yeah…well…not my finest hour, and another story, that. (at this link)

Here is the offending repair…duct-tape holding the blinker together while parts are ordered, forms are filled out, pictures are taken, and other “not-riding” stuff has to occur:

The emercency repair...duct tape holding the blinker together,

Now, apparently the reason this was such an issue is that it was a “bad” repair…as was pointed out by a good friend (Hi Wizard!).

He indicated that had I made a “proper repair” that I would not have experienced the cold-sweats, shakes, assorted hauntings, and other things commonly experienced while riding about with duct-tape on one’s faithful Dragon.

He pointed out that a repair of this nature was all about proper selection of materials. See, I simply had the wrong duct-tape.

He went to the trouble to procure me some (Thanks Wizard!) and had it delivered (Thanks Phyllis!).

The proper material:

The proper material. Real man's duct-tape!

A closer look at the proper repair material..

The repair, completed properly.

I must say, even picking up the fender with the offending “improper” repair on it caused some emotional distress…and it was immediately soothed by the application of the supplied material. Truly, the right material makes the right repair.

Fortunately, the machine has been further repaired with undamaged parts, but I am confident that had I repaired it with this material, and maybe slapped a couple strips over the crunched spots in the fender, that I would have been good to go for a long time.

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer (now nigh unstoppable because I have the “proper” duct-tape!)

A duffel because they are cheap and flexible and packs nicely on the motorcycle.

All the essentials…

When I arrived at work today I discovered “all the essentials” covers a little more than I expected…see the pic:

Three Mice, two balls, and a feather. Everything I could possibly need today.

Some of my friends will know exactly what this means…but for the rest of you, it seems Pierre, the Polydactyl Maine Coon Hemingway cat, worries about me leaving for the day. He used to try to come with me, but I can usually figure out the 17 pound fluff-ball is in my bag and remove him before leaving.

Recently, since he can’t come along, he has taken to packing stuff for me to take with me.

Obviously, to a cat anyway, today I needed three mice, two balls, and a feather.

It’s nice to have the essentials.

Pierre…the Polydactyl, Maine Coon, Hemingway cat…

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

Y’all know I had to ride, right? While waiting for the insurance company to assign an adjuster, I grabbed a crowbar and some duct tape and rendered The Dragon ridable. Mainly just had to get the fender away from the tire and hold some discomboobulated (technical term) lights in place.

I had several meetings yesterday and was away from my desk at odd times. This caused me and the insurance adjuster to play phone tag as we kept missing each others’ calls.

She works normal hours, so my last call back was after her working hours and she had gone home.

Gone home? Gone home! Bu…but…but…doesn’t she realize the situation is critical?

“Dammit woman! There is duct-tape on my motorcycle!”

Ooops…I guess I should have hung up first. I was talking to her voice mail.

Dammit woman! There is Duct tape on my motorcycle!

(no flames for the insurance guys yet please, so far they are doing their job)

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

My Dad had lost his bullet level and wanted a new one…my brother likes interesting wines, and the kids love just about anything so the shopping was over in record time.

A bullet level for Dad, some cheap LED flashlights for the kids, and a bottle of Texas wine (Llano Sweet Red if you must know) for my brother.

The Bullet Level

No problem, right?

Unfortunately my wife left it up to me to wrap the presents.

Ladies, advice here. Never let a man that owns tools wrap the presents.

Anyway, the kids like cool stuff…and I had some scrap PVC pipe and fittings, so I created a screw-top water-proof, food-safe, indistructo flashlight wrapper. I figured they could use them for pencil holders, playing in the bathtub, whatever. It’s cool. Kids will figure out what to do with it.

The Flashlights and wrappings

I took the scrap PVC, glued a cap on one end, and a female adapter/screw top on the other, and presto! Easy open close…about the right size for kids hands, and containing two (each) cool LED flashlights!

The Kids Ready to Go

Dad, being somewhat older and having access to power tools…well, his could be harder to open.

About that size

Since I had no screw-top ends for this size pipe, I just glued caps on both ends. Anybody that has ever worked with schedule 40 pvc knows there is no getting into that without tools.

Dad's Package

Just about done

As for my brother? He lucked out. We just packed the bottle of wine in a bag. Seems I was out of 4″ PVC pipe and fittings.

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

Somebody ordered this. Somebody paid for this. Somebody produced this. Somebody stuck it on the truck. Somebody looked at it and said, “That’s great! Thanks!”

I find this funny…or sad…I’m not currently sure which.

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

From one of my favorite webcomics.

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

Editor Matthew Cardinale says Springston was asked to leave APN last week “because he held on to the notion that there was an objective reality that could be reported objectively, despite the fact that that was not our editorial policy at Atlanta Progressive News.”

Source.

I’m just…boggled…

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

Pretsels! Lots of them! Now!

Y’all (technical Texas term) may be familiar with that guy in the UK that says weird stuff in his sleep? He and his wife record what he says and sell t-shirts.

Apparently there is some skepticism that he’s really saying such things.

I don’t doubt it at all. I know I talk in my sleep…but my wife does too and when she does…it is inevitably interesting.

Case in point:
A few nights ago I woke up for no apparent reason (I often do). My wife was warm beside me.

I adjusted the covers and then reached over and rubbed her back.

“Hmmmmmmm.” she moaned in obvious pleasure.

So I rubbed it some more.

“HHMMMMMMM.” she moaned even louder.

So I rubbed her on the butt (Yeah, I’m a guy, get over it.)

Without hesitation she said in a sharp, clear voice, “Not unless you bring the pretzels.”

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

For some reason the wife always blushes…

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer

(NASA artist’s rendering)

Cool stuff huh? Apparently it went off without a hitch!

But you know you’re a sci-fi geek if the first thing that comes to mind is physics and the relativistic bomb…essentially, in space, you accelerate a large mass to as close to the speed of light as you can, and aim it at a planet. Boom! Gone. I think it was a Heinlein or Niven invention, but it could have been AC Clark or a number of others. I’m over exposed to the old masters.

So, anyway, I’m picturing some alien space force…an advance contact scout unit or something overtly friendly…but prepared…sets up on the moon in a remote and difficult place…like the dark recesses of a crater…so they can check us out for a bit. You know…get the feel of the place.

First contact is a cautious thing, yes?

Alien 1:
“Hey, the bottom of this deep, dark crater looks good. The humans won’t spot us here.”

Alien 2:
“Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a …”

And we find trace elements of water and other very interesting stuff in the debris plume…mainly because we nailed the alien base with (our very slow) relativistic bomb.

Ooops.

“Hey look! Water!” turns out to be the phrase that declares war on an entire alien species.

Yeah…you know you’re a sci-fi geek if that’s what you think.

But…You know you’re a complete :uber, lost cause sci-fi geek if, after you think up the above scenero…you then think, “…Annnd that would be SO cool!”

CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer (off to buy some ammo and a pirate hat for the impending alien invasion)