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Timbo

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You are screwed Paul. Say good bye.
 

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Paul B

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They are most likely killies as they are the most common fish here. And if they are they get too big for my tank so it is going to be a problem catching them. But that is what makes this hobby fun. If there was nothing to do I would take up a hobby like trying to guess the cell phone numbers of Supermodels. :shocked1:
 

Paul B

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I was looking for Patriotic songs to play today at our Fourth of July party with the neighbors in front of my house and I came across this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msYPbjFC50w

It is not really a Fourth of July song but I keep watching it and I can't stop crying. Mostly Veterans will get this. Millennials may not get it as much. But I hope they do.
Happy Fourth of July and Happy Birthday America.
 

Paul B

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My wife is always nagging me to trim my eyebrows. When you get to a certain age, I guess gravity prevents your hair from growing on the top of your head. It can't quite make it there so it grows out of your nose, ears and your eyebrows. So I have this thing that I use to buzz my hair (it doesn't have to work very hard) and there is an attachment for leaving the hair longer. I was to lazy to change the attachment on it so I used it on my eyebrow.
Big mistake. It's a good thing I only trimmed half of one eyebrow because I buzzed it right off and now I could audition for the Twilight Zone as I look like a big Jiboni.

Anyway, that reminds me of a story.
I used to work with a guy named Mike. Wait a minute, that's his real name so I will call him Guy to protect his identity.
He looked just like this old time comedian named Jerry Colona.

I mean exactly like him. So I told him and he said he never heard of him.
The next day he comes in with a picture of Jerry Colona with his arm around his "Mother".

He said, what a coincidence, my Mother told me she was "good" friends with Jerry Colona.

I said, And you brought in a picture to show me! He said, yeah, whats wrong.
I said oh Nothing.

You can't make this stuff up, but he doesn't look anything like his "Father". Just saying

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Colonna_(entertainer)
 

Paul B

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I am almost finished building this Fireplace/TV steel plate wall. I just need to get the hearth stone up here. I need to carry it or hoist it about 12'
Unfortunately me and most of my friends are Geezers and we can't carry the thing.
I may try to hoist it up which will be a little dangerous because like most structures today my front deck is made of plastic as is the floor which I think is recycled bottles of prune juice.

I estimate the slab to be about 350lbs which 2 people can handle, but it is 9' long and the stairway has a 180 degree turn where the thing needs to stand straight up. Not something a couple of 70 year olds can do safely. We can, but the hospital is about 2 miles away.

10 or 15 years ago I could easily do it as I specialized in moving very heavy objects up to ridiculous heights like a 37,000lb generator up 200'.
The hearth stone goes on the bottom of this and will be opened and closed with hydrallics.
So if any one reading this is a Moose catcher and can carry something heavy. Call me. I have Beer. (not you Andy, you are a Moose Catcher but I need a strong one. :bigeyes2:)
 

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I acquired this Steamer trunk from the 1890s (about the same year I was born) ans I am restoring it. I completely took it apart and it has over 400 nails in it. The nails are to long and in these trunks they hammered in the nails with a steel weight on the other side so the nails would get bent inside the wood. It is very strong in spite of the thin pine it is built out of.
I ordered new canvas from the period as well as the handles but I will use all the existing steel, and there is a lot of it.

I will also line the inside with cedar but I am not sure what my wife wants to put in there. Probably me. :eek:
These trunks held everything people owned when they came here from Europe and were quite common.

 

Paul B

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I just got back from bike riding and have to say, the roads here in farm/sea/ wine country are loaded with wildlife. About a mile or less away we have a horse rescue farm that takes horses that were either abused or are sick or near the end of their life and allows them to live out their days in relative "Horse Paradise". As I approach them the first thing you smell is "wet horse". I was born in Brooklyn, grew up in Queens and didn't get much of that aroma.
There is also a Miniature rescue horse farm where the horses were either pets or in petting zoos.
We also have a Buffalo "ranch". No, really, this guy keeps a few hundred head of buffalo, the rest of the buffalo are attached to the heads.
http://eastridinginc.com/Buffalo.aspx

There is a some kind of farm I pass right near my house and the amount of life in there boggles my mind and there isn't a lot of space to boggle. We have deer up the Kazoo, all the way up. Birds, forgetaboutit. Bluejays, red wing blackbirds, ospreys, swans, geese, egrets, Quail, ducks, chickens, turkeys (which are as big as Emu's) Humming birds and birds that know the words, Cardinals and I think I saw a Pope.

Rabbits are like, well, rabbits, foxes (no, I am not talking about the Lady's, they don't get up at that time).
And bugs, I have never seen this many types of bugs since I was in Viet Nam. Of course in Viet Nam the bugs were bigger and would carry you home to feed their nephews.

I know a lot of people on here live in farm country and this is normal to you. It is relatively new to me.

On the way to my Grand Daughters we encountered this little Fella walking across the road.


I love turtles and stopped to make sure he wouldn't become turtle sushi. He wasn't walking fast enough for me so I helped him across the street.
I have been encountering a lot of turtles lately and some people here call me "Turtle Man" which I kind of like.

I am taking out the "Girls" today for Girls Night out and have to get to the boat to make sure it is in great shape and light all the girly smelling candles.
Still cleaning up from the Fourth of July, but almost done.
My Main Squeeze looks good.

 

Paul B

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The girls had a great time on the boat and didn't want to come home.
My wife had an accident though getting off the boat at the restaurant. We docked at the gas dock but it wasn't a floating dock so my wife had to step up about 2' from the boat to the dock. Her leg didn't make it and good thing I was holding her. She almost went into the water but I had a grip on her and managed to hoist her up to the dock. Her shin was all cut up and she bled all over her shoes. I had a first aid kit on the boat and patched her up with a 6' gauze bandage. It didn't ruin her night, just her shoes. :(

I have the entire steamer trunk taken apart and I removed all the hardware along with hundreds of nails and metal. I sanded the entire thing smooth which was easier than scraping to remove the old canvas.

I ordered new canvas, leather handles and hand made nails. Today I also found a source right near my home for cedar which I will line the thing with as the paper in the inside is all rotted off. I will use all of the existing metal and I won't re-finish it too much as I want the age to show. I still have to sand all the oak slats that were all over the top and sides.

 
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Paul B

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The inside of the chest smelled like "Old people." :shocked1:
I sprayed it a few times with bleach and water, now it smells like Lotus Blossoms in the wind, with bleach.

That belt sander is very old. It died last week and I had to re-condition it and solder a wire on to the brushes. I would never throw out an old American tool as I would have to replace it with something from China and that can't happen. It is as good as new now but I have to get the belts on line as they don't make that size any more. It's a Craftsman but Sears is going out of business and now just sells snowflake clothes and maybe toothbrushes for red necks :tongue1:




The sander does have a vacuum built in to catch the dust but sanding the old canvas off just made too much dust. The canvas turned into cement and they used flour and water for glue so I can collect the dust from that and bake a cake with it if I like. Maybe I will invite you guys over to sample that.
I held my Re-designed vacuum next to the sander to take off the excess dust.
I bought nails, canvas and handles for that trunk and I got them yesterday. The "hand made" nails come from an ancient machine that used to make the nails when that trunk was made. It makes one at a time.

They are special nails that are very soft and designed to be bent over inside the wood. I don't have to do that as I am putting 5/8ths cedar inside the trunk so the nails can go into that. Bending each of about 400 nails over is too time consuming at my age. :agree:
I also have stuff to "age" the shiny nails.
The sheet metal that goes on the sides, corners, bottom and a lot of other places is rusty. I will reuse it and just blacken some of the rust as I don't want the thing looking brand new.

If I get time today, I will work on it. I still have to sand the wood slats. I thought they were oak but I think they are maple.

My restored drill.



My vacuum is very cool. Virtually all the dust gets collected in that top bucket and none of it goes into the lower vacuum container where the filter is so the filter "never" gets clogged. Nothing goes on to the filter so I never have to clean it and it never loses suction.
The top part of the bucket with that vortex thing on it just twists off and I lift out the bucket to empty.
I connect it to my radial arm saw when I use it .




I know I posted a lot of this stuff before, just get over it as I posted this in Other places too.

That inflatable boat is in the back of my garage (above picture) because it has a slow leak that I will fix tomorrow. I also wanted to clean it.
 

Paul B

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Today we went to Nikola Tesla's birthday party. Right near my house. No Really! they still have his workshop/laboratory and the pad where he had his huge Tesla coil that was supposed to give everyone in the world free electricity.
Of course thats why they stopped funding him. Free is not a great thing for businessmen.
Anyway he is the reason we have AC electricity today as well as Radio, TV, cell phones, dosers, electric eels, Facebook, controllers, etc.

I was totally disgusted with the event. The guy was one of the greatest minds in the history of the world right behind Justin Beaber and in almost 80 years since he died they did absolutely nothing with his workshop. It is still boarded up and no one is allowed in. Next month they said they were going to do a little work on the chimney. The Chimney! after 80 years thats all they are getting to repair.
Supposedly under the shop there is tunnels and a shaft that goes down 120' so he could anchor the tower so it could "shake the earth".
But all you can see is the outside.

The entire event was a big waste of money and they could have done so much better. Near the gate where you pay $25.00 they were selling half wraps with a small container of potato salad which we bought for ten bucks, But they had no napkins or forks to eat the potato salad so I assumed you were supposed to eat it like an Aardvark and suck it out with your tongue. Luckily we are smart enough to cut a piece of the container off and make forks but people who don't know how to do that had to use a stick or credit card I guess. :eek:

Then they had this big truck selling cookies and grilled cheese sandwiches, which is an odd combination. Now we were like the fifth people in there as we got there when it opened and I went to buy a cookie.
The guy tells me they ran out. I said, how many did you bring? Six!

They they had Port O Sans and next to them they had a portable sink which I thought was nice. There was a paper towel holder next to the sink to dry your hands but no garbage cans in the event so I assumed they wanted you to put the wet paper in your pocket and take it home. :confused:

I don't know what people think when they put on these events. They could make so much more money and have more people come back the next year but they just don't get it.
It was like 90 degrees and they had lots of chairs out in the sun for the "Scientific Presentation" about Tesla that I wanted to hear. It's the only reason I went, but the entire thing was to thank the volunteers who put the thing together. No science, nothing about grilled cheese, no discussion about ich, nothing.

There was a 40' replica of Tesla's tower that was supposed to make a display, which was a spark. But after that titillating speech in the sun we forgoed that and went home. Total waste of time.

The best thing there was a Lady selling tick repellent which didn't have much to do with Tesla. But she had some ticks stuck to Scotch tape and she was a tick expert.

She also told us that they were not allowed to spray to kill ticks any longer on Long Island where ticks are very prevalent. We asked why and she said the jewelers complained and sued the state. I said "The Jewelers".
Why would Jewelers care if they kill ticks. She said because if they eliminate the ticks, clocks would just go "Tock, Tock, Tock. :rolleyes:
 

Paul B

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Yesterday I looked at my tank, I have been so busy that I rarely look at the thing unless I hear the crabs banging on the glass to get my attention. One "arm" on one of my SPS bleached. I figured I would test the water. The Alk was like 4 and the calcium was so low I couldn't make an Alka Seltzer tablet out of the entire tank. So I dumped a load of alk in until it went up to 7.
Don't worry, I did it over about 5 minutes. :eek:
I don't believe in Old Wives tales unless it is my wife about doing this stuff slowly.

If you were dying because you had no food, water, or internet, would you rather take a small sip and maybe an M&M, or would you want a full Gourmet meal right away?
Thats the way corals think about it. If you don't agree. Write me a letter and send it snail mail with a self addressed envelope. I won't read it but I could use the scrap paper. :cool:

Anyway, I looked at the tank today and all seems well. That piece of coral didn't miraculously re grow but nothing else bleached. :)
I really need to change some water, but it is not in the cards for a while. My workshop is so full of projects that I have no room for water buckets. :cool:

But besides that, today I am very happy. After living here a year I found a fish market, (not a LFS) that is supposed to be the best on Long Island. It's right on the docks and you buy the fish still jumping, you can't get fresher than that. They have every kind of fish caught in the North Atlantic and the prices are pretty good. My wife and I are "foodies" and we need good food.

The stuff you get in a supermarket marked "Fresh Fish" is code for Cat food.
Fresh fish is so much better, it's like comparing a gold fish to a moorish Idol.
My Dad had a fish market and I grew up in it so I know what fresh fish is supposed to smell like. The aroma brought back so many memories.

We got some fresh tuna and scrod that they were cleaning when we got there. They even fill the bag with ice for you.
But they had squid, octopus, MahiMahi, porgies, fluke, flounder, striped bass, and almost every fish and crustacean that I can name including soft shell blue claw crabs which is amazing now because they are not even in season.

I can't wait to go back.
I made the scrod tonight and was in Heaven. What a difference. Fish after it is a day or two old, is not the same animal. As I said, it turns into cat food. :D

Is this thing On?
 

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