Tonight the BSU and I had to go to Wal-Mart for some groceries and I needed to purchase a new fishing license because today was the last day on the old license. While I was paying my fees to the state at the sporting goods counter, I noticed some fishing reels behind the counter. The boxes were kind of dusty and dilapidated so I asked the clerk to let me have a look at them.
There was an Abu Garcia Ambassador reel, marked $60. I asked the clerk if he could do a little better since it was obviously old in the box. The clerk called a manager and he cut the price in half! Thirty bucks! I love deals!
I put 10 pound test Vanish florocarbon line on it already and it is ready for fishing.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Maybe not training wheels...
But instead, a 4-wheeled bike! I mentioned at the end of the last post that the BSU and I are lacking in the beach camping aspect of not having bicycles to ride around the campground. So I've been looking around and I think I found the solution- an American Speedster Sidekick!
This Sidekick would be a perfect winter project for me and it includes my favorite building material- PVC pipe! I'm ordering the plans this week to have a good look over and if they pan out, when winter arrives, I'm going to build us a bike.
The bike doesn't look fast, and it doesn't need to be for our purposes. But it looks like fun and it could travel on top of our camper for trips to the Oregon coast. And it's made of PVC pipe!
How cool is that?
This Sidekick would be a perfect winter project for me and it includes my favorite building material- PVC pipe! I'm ordering the plans this week to have a good look over and if they pan out, when winter arrives, I'm going to build us a bike.
The bike doesn't look fast, and it doesn't need to be for our purposes. But it looks like fun and it could travel on top of our camper for trips to the Oregon coast. And it's made of PVC pipe!
How cool is that?
What I did on my summer vacation-
I drove- a bunch! I've already mentioned the 1800+ mile trip so I won't bore you with that. I did see the bravest, (or dumbest) driver ever while passing through Idaho. I saw a guy driving a mid-70s vintage Fiat X-19, a 1300cc bundle of Italy's finest 2-seater fury across the desert in 100 degree temperatures. He was 30 miles or more from the nearest exit which seemed to me to be a perfect opportunity for breakdown, heatstroke and frustration. But there he went. I wonder if he got where he was headed safely.
Fishing was lousy at Coffenbury Lake in Ft. Stevens State Park where we were camped. I caught just 2 trout that were worthy of killing and cooking for dinner, 1 on 2 different days. Noah and Cecil didn't catch any fish! It really was slow and not really worth the $40+ cost for each of the fishing licenses that I purchased. But it was a fine time killer. The hatchery bred fish weren't as tasty as the ones we have here in Utah but everybody seemed to enjoy a few bites.
Noah and I took the guided tour through the underground portions of Battery Russell, the Columbia River defense fort and that is a very interesting place. I returned later with the BSU to see the memorial rose gardens and we had a nice time and even spotted a mama raccoon and 4 offspring out for a jaunt across the grounds as we were leaving. We also drove down to Seaside to see the aquarium and to laugh at the seal antics as they begged for food from the spectators. That was great fun! We also had a seafood dinner at Norma's before returning to the campground for even more food.
Another day, Noah and a brother-in-law and I drove down to Tillamook to visit the Naval Air Museum. It is housed in a WWII vintage blimp hangar that is worth the trip all by itself. Tillamook was an active coastal defense base with numerous blimps and crews stationed there operating up and down the coast watching for enemy ships so there is plenty to see and we had an informative and interesting afternoon. One of the weird fact about the blimp hangar that we learned was that the roofing contractors, when they placed bids on the roofing job, (galvanized, corrugated steel), bid by the acre! There is 11.5 acres of roof on the hangar! And there would have been twice that amount when they did the work because there were 2 hangars originally, 1 of them burnt down in 1982.
So we visited with family, ate too much, enjoyed the cool temperatures and groused over the lack of cell phone and internet connectivity. I've decided that Ft. Stevens State Park has a distinctive sound- that is the sound of kid's bike training wheels scraping along the camping loop roads from sun up to sunset. One thing you must realize about this very large park- everybody brings their kids and their kid's bikes and the kids circulate around the loop roads non-stop. So the sound of training wheels is everywhere while you are outside. Next year I think I am going to have to have bikes for the BSU and myself so we won't feel so left out. Maybe I can avoid having to install training wheels for either of us.
There's no pictures to post as I took only a few and most weren't very good. I'm back to work, got the lawn mowed already and almost everything has been put away until the next time. The BSU wants to get out camping a weekend or two in August so we will see how that goes. The boy scurried off to Logan to see his old friends the same afternoon that we arrived home and we haven't seen him since so I suppose he is having a good time. Maybe he and I will get out fishing again this weekend if he shows up at home before time to return to Colorado.
Fishing was lousy at Coffenbury Lake in Ft. Stevens State Park where we were camped. I caught just 2 trout that were worthy of killing and cooking for dinner, 1 on 2 different days. Noah and Cecil didn't catch any fish! It really was slow and not really worth the $40+ cost for each of the fishing licenses that I purchased. But it was a fine time killer. The hatchery bred fish weren't as tasty as the ones we have here in Utah but everybody seemed to enjoy a few bites.
Noah and I took the guided tour through the underground portions of Battery Russell, the Columbia River defense fort and that is a very interesting place. I returned later with the BSU to see the memorial rose gardens and we had a nice time and even spotted a mama raccoon and 4 offspring out for a jaunt across the grounds as we were leaving. We also drove down to Seaside to see the aquarium and to laugh at the seal antics as they begged for food from the spectators. That was great fun! We also had a seafood dinner at Norma's before returning to the campground for even more food.
Another day, Noah and a brother-in-law and I drove down to Tillamook to visit the Naval Air Museum. It is housed in a WWII vintage blimp hangar that is worth the trip all by itself. Tillamook was an active coastal defense base with numerous blimps and crews stationed there operating up and down the coast watching for enemy ships so there is plenty to see and we had an informative and interesting afternoon. One of the weird fact about the blimp hangar that we learned was that the roofing contractors, when they placed bids on the roofing job, (galvanized, corrugated steel), bid by the acre! There is 11.5 acres of roof on the hangar! And there would have been twice that amount when they did the work because there were 2 hangars originally, 1 of them burnt down in 1982.
So we visited with family, ate too much, enjoyed the cool temperatures and groused over the lack of cell phone and internet connectivity. I've decided that Ft. Stevens State Park has a distinctive sound- that is the sound of kid's bike training wheels scraping along the camping loop roads from sun up to sunset. One thing you must realize about this very large park- everybody brings their kids and their kid's bikes and the kids circulate around the loop roads non-stop. So the sound of training wheels is everywhere while you are outside. Next year I think I am going to have to have bikes for the BSU and myself so we won't feel so left out. Maybe I can avoid having to install training wheels for either of us.
There's no pictures to post as I took only a few and most weren't very good. I'm back to work, got the lawn mowed already and almost everything has been put away until the next time. The BSU wants to get out camping a weekend or two in August so we will see how that goes. The boy scurried off to Logan to see his old friends the same afternoon that we arrived home and we haven't seen him since so I suppose he is having a good time. Maybe he and I will get out fishing again this weekend if he shows up at home before time to return to Colorado.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Home. Safe, tired and I have to go to work tomorrow-
I was supposed to go to work today after a 1 day long haul home yesterday. But we started late and from the coast instead of inland and the Magellan said we wouldn't make it home before 2:30 AM. So we spent the night in Ontario, Oregon, (avoid the Rodeway Inn) and finished the trip today.
Total miles- ~1875. It was 867 from the coast to the house but we also did a bunch of driving up and down the coast while we were out there.
It was a very nice vacation and I'll tell some stories later during the week. But tonight, I'm just chilling and getting ready for bed.
Total miles- ~1875. It was 867 from the coast to the house but we also did a bunch of driving up and down the coast while we were out there.
It was a very nice vacation and I'll tell some stories later during the week. But tonight, I'm just chilling and getting ready for bed.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Not even cell phone connectivety!
I'm blogging now from the Pig and Pancake because I can't even get an
at&t cell phone signal at Fort Stevens State Park! It's horrible! Even
text messages only get through occasionally. If you need to reach me,
smoke signals will probably be more reliable...
In another note, it's just 65 degrees and about 105 percent humidity.
It's not raining but the air is dripping.
at&t cell phone signal at Fort Stevens State Park! It's horrible! Even
text messages only get through occasionally. If you need to reach me,
smoke signals will probably be more reliable...
In another note, it's just 65 degrees and about 105 percent humidity.
It's not raining but the air is dripping.
Sent from my iPhone
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Pulling out tomorrow!
And except that I have to go pick up the firewood tomorrow morning, we are just about ready to start our vacation. And I'm ready!
Son Noah and I went to East Canyon this morning fishing and we even managed to catch 3 nice trout, securing our supper plans with fresh grilled fish. Once we got home, the dog needed her nails trimmed- a trip across town, I had to fix two more sprinkler heads, move the boat, pack a tool bag and some emergency items- guns, if you can't guess, and start loading up the truck bed.
There's laundry still turning in the machines and camp boxes upstairs to go into the truck in the morning. But we'll be pulling out for Oregon tomorrow morning and it should be a great trip.
But now, I'm really tired!
Son Noah and I went to East Canyon this morning fishing and we even managed to catch 3 nice trout, securing our supper plans with fresh grilled fish. Once we got home, the dog needed her nails trimmed- a trip across town, I had to fix two more sprinkler heads, move the boat, pack a tool bag and some emergency items- guns, if you can't guess, and start loading up the truck bed.
There's laundry still turning in the machines and camp boxes upstairs to go into the truck in the morning. But we'll be pulling out for Oregon tomorrow morning and it should be a great trip.
But now, I'm really tired!
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Man with gun takes wife and son out to dinner-
at Red Robin. Nothing tragic happened.
The Burnin Love Burger is not as good as a Carl's Jr. Jalepeno Burger.
The Burnin Love Burger is not as good as a Carl's Jr. Jalepeno Burger.
Busy, busy busy
Yardwork today- I mowed, dug up and replaced 3 sprinkler heads, replaced a riser on a broken sprinkler head and discoverd yet another head broke off its riser and I'm out of spare parts. I tried to replace the 3 manual valves with electric valves and a timer so the lawn could stay green during our vacation but my ancient valves are incompatible with the current big box store offerings.
So I had to put the manual valve heads back on and return the parts I purchased to the big box store that starts with an L.
Son Noah arrived home yesterday for the first time since last October for a couple weeks vacation. So I put him to work! He changed out the furl filter and spark plugs on the truck today. He foolishly took off his shirt and ended up with some sunburn but otherwise he is fine.
Tomorrow he and I are going fishing in the morning. The only question- East Canyon for trout or Willard Bay for Wipers? Decisions, decisions!
So I had to put the manual valve heads back on and return the parts I purchased to the big box store that starts with an L.
Son Noah arrived home yesterday for the first time since last October for a couple weeks vacation. So I put him to work! He changed out the furl filter and spark plugs on the truck today. He foolishly took off his shirt and ended up with some sunburn but otherwise he is fine.
Tomorrow he and I are going fishing in the morning. The only question- East Canyon for trout or Willard Bay for Wipers? Decisions, decisions!
Thursday, July 16, 2009
540,000 miles, 1 owner Mercury Comet
Check out this 89 year old woman and her Chariot. It's a 64 Mercury Comet Caliente and she's driven it over 540,000 miles on the original engine. And she just came back from a 3200 mile solo trip to her 70th high school reunion!
Quite the old lady!
Quite the old lady!
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Sears sold houses?
Complete houses? Why did I never know about this before now? One of my cubicle mates mentioned yesterday that Sears Robuck once sold complete houses as kits. Turns out he was right-
Here is original Sears catalog descriptions of all the designs from 1908 to 1940. Pretty neat!
Between 1908 and 1940, Sears sold about 70,000 homes in 48 states through their mail-order Modern Homes program, with 370 designs that you might not readily recognize as a kit home. Sears kit homes were shipped via boxcar and came with a 75-page instruction book. Each kit contained 10,000 - 30,000 pieces and the framing members were marked to facilitate construction.Pretty interesting! Can you imagine having a train box car with every part needed to build your house show up, ready for you to crack open the 75 page instruction manual and get to work?
Here is original Sears catalog descriptions of all the designs from 1908 to 1940. Pretty neat!
Sunday, July 12, 2009
A Sunday evening update post
How long has it been since I last did that? A few weeks now, I'm certain. Tonight's the first night I've actually sat down and ran through my bloglist in a caouple weeks! But I did sit down tonight bout an hour ago and it's been a pleasure to relax and read through my list to see what my friends on the internet have been doing while I've been busy.
Getting Fish Slayer ready for fishing really was a slog and I'm not done yet. But the boat's working very well and the trailer is safe to haul the boat to the lake. I replaced the entire axle under the trailer and added a new winch and safety chains. I've moved part of the windshield and removed the other portion until I can get some new windshield braces to finish the job.
In the future I'll be replacing the lounge seats with fishing seats and building a fishing deck in the front portion of the boat. I want a livewell up there and an electric trolling motor so I can do some bass fishing and control the boat from the front. I also want a gas trolling motor for the back of the boat- there's already a kicker motor mount back there and a couple downriggers for trolling for kokanee salmon and trout when I go to the deeper lakes.
But all that will have to wait- send money! and in the mean time, I'm going fishing! Kenny and I went to East Canyon reservoir yesterday for a day's fishing. Kenny caught 2 rainbows while we still fished for a bit and later I caught 4 trolling about 30 feet deep. The boat worked better than a 30 year old deserves to and we had a great time. Sunday and I even had 2 of my fish for dinner tonight!
No fishing today but chores instead. I spent most of the afternoon digging up and repairing a busted sprinkler line in the front yard. With the temmperatures reaching into the 90s, the grass needs watered diligently and the sprinkler I was trying to use just couldn't deliver enough to keep the grass green. So the built in sprinklers are fixed and working and I just have to turn them on and off every night.
My new router seems to be working fine but the signal strength isn't very good in my shop so I intend to relocate the router upsstairs from its current location underneath the stairs. Maybe that will get done one night this week...
Vacation starts next Monday with our annual trip to the Oregon coast, camping with the BSU's family. Son Noah is due home from Colorado and is going with us on the trip. He's planning to ride his motorcycle to the coast and back and I suppose he will unless his mom can talk him out of it. We'll see. But he hasn't been home since October so it will be good to see him.
So that's it. Summer is here and I'm keeping busy. I'm loving my new, old boat and look forward to lots of fishinig trips with my buddies. I'm looking forward to getting fixed up just the way I want it over the winter and as funds allow.
Getting Fish Slayer ready for fishing really was a slog and I'm not done yet. But the boat's working very well and the trailer is safe to haul the boat to the lake. I replaced the entire axle under the trailer and added a new winch and safety chains. I've moved part of the windshield and removed the other portion until I can get some new windshield braces to finish the job.
In the future I'll be replacing the lounge seats with fishing seats and building a fishing deck in the front portion of the boat. I want a livewell up there and an electric trolling motor so I can do some bass fishing and control the boat from the front. I also want a gas trolling motor for the back of the boat- there's already a kicker motor mount back there and a couple downriggers for trolling for kokanee salmon and trout when I go to the deeper lakes.
But all that will have to wait- send money! and in the mean time, I'm going fishing! Kenny and I went to East Canyon reservoir yesterday for a day's fishing. Kenny caught 2 rainbows while we still fished for a bit and later I caught 4 trolling about 30 feet deep. The boat worked better than a 30 year old deserves to and we had a great time. Sunday and I even had 2 of my fish for dinner tonight!
No fishing today but chores instead. I spent most of the afternoon digging up and repairing a busted sprinkler line in the front yard. With the temmperatures reaching into the 90s, the grass needs watered diligently and the sprinkler I was trying to use just couldn't deliver enough to keep the grass green. So the built in sprinklers are fixed and working and I just have to turn them on and off every night.
My new router seems to be working fine but the signal strength isn't very good in my shop so I intend to relocate the router upsstairs from its current location underneath the stairs. Maybe that will get done one night this week...
Vacation starts next Monday with our annual trip to the Oregon coast, camping with the BSU's family. Son Noah is due home from Colorado and is going with us on the trip. He's planning to ride his motorcycle to the coast and back and I suppose he will unless his mom can talk him out of it. We'll see. But he hasn't been home since October so it will be good to see him.
So that's it. Summer is here and I'm keeping busy. I'm loving my new, old boat and look forward to lots of fishinig trips with my buddies. I'm looking forward to getting fixed up just the way I want it over the winter and as funds allow.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Hurray! It's working!
My new D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N wireless router is connected and working! Now, now I can go have a shower so I can get the fish smell off of me from a successful day of fishing!
Friday, July 10, 2009
Blogging will resume
Tomorrow, after my newly purchased router arrives from Amazon.com. Yesterday I had a paid proffesional, IT guy come to the house and his opinion, after an hour's troubleshooting, is that my router was is bad. Even the house pc didn't work correctly all the time while passing through the router but it did work correctly with the router removed from the system.
So after the big brown truck arrives and after I get home from a fishing trip with Kenny, I'll go to work re-establishing a new wireless network in the palatial Wasted Electrons World Hearquarters!
So after the big brown truck arrives and after I get home from a fishing trip with Kenny, I'll go to work re-establishing a new wireless network in the palatial Wasted Electrons World Hearquarters!
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
This is a test
This is only a test of the workaround for blog posting and my Gmail account. Do not be alarmed by any odd noises or sirens for the next hour.
Sent from my iPhone
Sent from my iPhone
Why aren't I blogging?
It’s summertime. And if you have been coming around to this humble blog for any length of time, you already know that my blogging falls off as the temperature goes up and I get busy outside. So that’s reason #1, I’m busy outside. I’ve been working on Fish Slayer, my new, old boat every evening and the hours I’m working, (and the money I’ve spent) have been incurring the frustration of the BSU.
Fish Slayer is lake ready and worthy and even catches fish! I’ve had it out twice, once last Saturday evening for a trial run to make sure everything works as intended and then again on Sunday with my buddy Loc. We trolled for Wipers unsuccessfully for a bit then anchored up next to some stickups and I ended up catching 4 nice catfish, which I gave to Loc because he was willing to clean them and I wasn’t. The boat seems to work very well. The engine idles along nicely while trolling, starts easily and pushes the boat to 43 MPH when the water is smooth enough. The used depth finder I purchased works just fine.
So far, to make the boat safe and user friendly, I have installed an entirely new axle under the trailer and replaced the winch and transom tie-downs with new items. I’ve cleaned up the wiring, installed a new fire extinguisher, depth finder and 2 rod holders on the boat. I’ve gotten the boat lights working, scrubbed it inside and out and installed a battery box and boat paddle. I’ve also partially relocated the windshield to sit further forward on the consoles though only the driver side portion is currently installed. I need to purchase 80 bucks worth of new windshield support braces before I can finish the windshield relocation job and the spousal unit has really been giving me the evil eye over the amount of cash that I have spent so far. We are going to Oregon later this month and I’ll need plenty of spare cash for that vacation and the windshield project will have to wait.
Reason B for my lack of blogging is directly related to my continued inability to connect to Blogger. I narrowed the problem down to my laptop or the wireless router because I can reach Blogger through the house PC. I just really hate sitting in the closet where that computer lives so I haven’t been blogging even when I do finally sit down. Last night I discovered that I can’t connect to any Google site, not my mail account or my account settings page. I can’t even log out of my Gmail account. I’ve tried turning off my firewall to see if maybe that is blocking my access, unsuccessfully. I’m stumped and I’m not even certain how to proceed or how to find an expert that can dig into my settings to get this fixed. I don’t think there is any way to contact Google to get user support so I’m pretty stuck right now. I will get it fixed but my time has been pretty well taken up with boat work so I haven’t been able to focus on this problem.
I’m going to stay busy for the immediate future as well with a fishing trip planned for Thursday evening, another trip planned for Saturday and maybe a 3rd trip on Sunday afternoon. After that, I need to start preparing for the camping trip in Oregon…
Pictures and a video of Fish Slayer as soon as I can spend a few more minutes taking them off 2 cameras and getting them uploaded. But it won’t be tonight because we are going to see the grandbaby!
UPDATE: Hey, it's working! For now I guess. I just sat down, (it's 10:05 PM) and somehow, Blogger is working without me even logging in. Great- I have a $50 service visit planned for tomorrow after work!
Saturday, July 04, 2009
WTF us up with my system?
I've been too busy to really troubleshoot my connections here at Wasted Electrons World Headquarters and Boat Maintenance Barn but I'm still not able to post to Blogger through my laptop. Resetting the modem and router didn't do the trick like it did last week. I guess I should try the downstairs pc since it isn't wireless and maybe I can narrow the problem search.
Let me go try that before I head out to the carport and Fish Slayer.
Let me go try that before I head out to the carport and Fish Slayer.
Sent from my iPhone
UPDATE: From the dark and dusty basement lair where the eMachine pc lives- Blogger lives! So that narrows my connectivity search to the laptop and the router, neither of which I am inclined to replace right now!
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