Sleepy Head, Elaborate Trap

It was a trap.

Amazon let the package with the brake pads i ordered 2 days ago in front of the door sometimes before noon.

Last night i fell asleep late (around 2 and woke up at 6). Then i fell asleep again from 9 to noon. Some noise, maybe the knock on the door that i didn't hear consciously (didn't remember when i awoke) must have awakened me. I was still sleepy when i checked on Angela's computer and saw the order was delivered and opened the door and found the package. Got mad before i was completely awaken after i saw the seal was unglued at one end. Stuck my hand trying to see if i could remove one of the pads. I broke the label a bit in the process.

They were two boxes inside, one with rear brake pads and one with front. I was able to pull a pad (from the front). I am sure a woman or a kid with a small hand could have removed and replaced one or several pads from that box without breaking that label. I don't know if they did it, the pads appear undamaged. It looks like they have a lot of graphite cause my hands got black from handling them and chunks of copper are also visible which means they are the metal type.

At least i saw where the piece of metal that warns you is. At around 2 mm. It is supposed to make a high pitch sound when they worn to that level. Mine have at least 2 more mm above that level. But only two of the four pads (or half of them) have that.

One of the 8 pads on our car, on rear right wheel is metal on metal. Must be one without the the indicator cause i only heard a low freq squeaking sound when it was too late. Which means caliper got stuck on the pins. I also saw some white stains like from drops of something on that caliper. Could that have been since i went to Canyonville and i saw some stains with colored material on the freeway, different colors over several miles. But it would have taken at least 10k or more for that pad to wear that much since the caliper got stuck. Now i remember the brakes were making a low freq noise sometimes when backing from the spot in the parking lot, from since i got the car. Could had been the same stuff that was on the windshield and corroded the paint on the hood probably not long before i got the car. The idea to take first picture came to me after i stuck my hand the first time but before i pulled the pad. The next one after i pulled the pad.
There seems to be a superficial scratch on the upper left pad. Maybe when i puled it from the box.


It is not secret i'm watching the market after i do something. As i said before, i think there is a correlation that is so strong it cannot be a coincidence. Every time i say something right market goes down, every time i get screwed up, the market goes up.

Am i correct if i characterize today's session as choppy? Going up and down 2% within minutes, several times a day that is. Could this have anything to do with economy and coronavirus? Last time it went up at 3:44 eastern time was after i first posted on fb what i thought it happened regarding my Amazon delivery.

Ok i just figured what happened. Last night we ran across some stupid page that shows 40 incredible uses of WD40. One of them was removing labels, other was cleaning the fridge. An idea came to me. I poured a tiny amount of WD40 in the wall that stinks and covered the hole My idea was maybe it would cover the dog stink. Around 2 AM or just before i went to bed i noticed it was smelling inside like WD40 every time the fridge started. So i went and looked an found a place with cracked paint and with a dental probe i discovered a new through hole, on top of the fridge on the left side of the cabinet next to many others i covered in the past. You could not possible use WD40 to remove a seal or label from a cardboard box cause it contains up to 35% heavy penetrant mineral oil which would have irreversibly stained the cardboard. It is true it might help you to remove labels but not from cardboard and you will destroy the label in the process. I think the seal above was removed from cardboard with steam then it was let to dry. Or maybe the glue was softened with a hair drier. The stains seen on the box are parallel glue traces with regular shapes.
.
There is a reason why the're calling it Kabbalah.

70 miles, 3 Useless Hours in Traffic

Winter is over. Hottest day of the year so far. Got to spend two hours of a gorgeous weather in traffic. I would otherwise have stayed at home and didn't see it.

This afternoon i went again to the junkyard to try and get a spare wheel/tire. That is exchange the wrong one i got. Couldn't find the receipt (i keep all receipts for all the years i've been here). In there a bearded guy who look familiar let me in to try and find an different one. But for that i had to sign on a sheet of paper with many other signatures.

Couldn't find one in time. Tried to get back home before Angela got here (got a sign at the door, she ignores it). The guy at the counter dragged me into a long conversation when i left. Asked him if he could give me in store credit for the wheel, he said no without receipt. Got behind a slowing moving vehicle on long Sherwood st and got here right after she came. Could have stayed more at the junkyard and measure wheels. Though only when i left i figured how. Wheel diameter is not the biggest diameter you can measure but one inch smaller. Don't know why.

Inside the junkyard. Sexy models walking on alleys while guys where showing in the same ling of sight. I heard a woman yelling in a conversation on the phone or with someone else. "Money first!".

Earlier i spoke with a guy at Les Schwab i knew since 97. He was ambiguous about possibility of swapping the one i got, he said i got to talk to the supervisor, put me through but nobody came at the phone for several minutes so i just hanged up.

So after coming from junkyard i took Angela's car and just went there. Don't know, 20 miles or so. Took the long way on 26. Right when i wanted to get out of the complex, a young woman with a tan Volvo coming from right entered the alley unexpectedly, haven't seen her due to a complex traffic situation. Had to hit brakes to avoid her. Again the extra wide and long windshield pillar played a role. (Not my car in the picture, but similar).

Got there only to see he went home early. Talked to a young guy who ran to my trunk and grabbed one my grocery cardboard boxes (got two to avoid groceries rolling around the trunk) before i had a chance to pull myself the spare wheel to show it to him.

Said they cannot accept those, only if i wanted to buy a full size wheel which would cost me more than on Amazon.

Asked him if they where any red light cameras on 185 where i came from, he said probably not. Got into a long conversation with him about legality of red light cameras. BTW i think they are not legal since only cops can issue tickets, not out of state contractors. I noticed he was talking faster and faster until i could not catch up with him in conversation.

Came back home, i knew at that hour 217 was very slow and i tried 26 and I5. Haven't seen a map of the area in while, have never been on that route at rush hour in the last 10 years maybe, now i realize it was stupid, especially that it was so slow. The only place where it got faster was at the Terwilliger curves, most dangerous curves on I5, and after.

Last night i figured there might be too much oil in the catch can and at bumps and sudden maneuvers it can just splash in the intake pipe. I pulled 2 ounces of oil or more with a 5 dollar garden pump i got from Walmart for this purpose.

Car never drove this smoothly, either because of that or because i torqued the wheels correctly yesterday after the guys at Les Schwab in 217 and 99 missed to torque one nut per each wheel two days ago.

https://goo.gl/maps/dQz3zNKZ9fXWHiiUA

Cadet Heaters and the Mystery of the Howling Dog

I don't believe it exists a company with more health damaging power per size than Cadet Heating Company of Vancouver, WA.

They manufacture heaters mainly for apartments.


Small, cheap, they are great for landlords. Here are some of the health hazards that those heaters pose.

The ones with forced heat, have a hot resistor and a fan. The resistor's temperature is close to red hot. If the fan would stop, the resistor will glow. Made of high chromium and nickel alloys, they in time evaporate (resistor gets visible thinner in areas blown by fan before finally breaking). As a result, you get to breath heavy metals, a situation very similar with when vaping (the resistor, made of a similar alloy, is a consumable). Besides they burn whatever dust gets sucked in by the fan.

Easily installable inside the wall, that is you cut with a box cutter a rectangle in the inner wall  (usually 3/8-1/2 inch soft drywall) next to a stud and nail the d... thing on the stud with a couple of nails using one of the pre existing holes in the thin sheet metal. However the box have like maybe 20 holes for different installation position that remain open. Thus the fan also sucks "air" from inside wall and blow it inside. Could it be mineral insulation breakage or simply dust fallen from the apartment above from the space between wall and floor. Vibration from high rpm unbalanced fan helps shake and brake the insulation inside the wall.


In my case, litter dust.

I was intrigued yesterday by a howling dog in the neighborhood.

I don't use those. I covered the grills with tape. Instead i got some even cheaper heaters from Fry's. Of Italian design, they are the best. Low temperature convection heaters with oil inside and covered with ceramic. I move them around in places where the floor bulges to help dry it faster.

The neighbor upstairs use them. Actually only one. The one in the kitchen. Because of that it runs almost all the time, per thermostat.

Two days ago i saw some imperfection in the way i taped the grill for the heater in the same position or below hers. Small gaps, etc.. I removed the tape to put some new. Done something else in the meantime, forgot about, i re-taped it several hours later.

It was only last night, after more that 24 hours that i realized what happened. Though i covered most virtual nail holes inside the black box, there must be gaps cause without tape the whole place started to stink again like the litter dust that is still abundant in the wall since last summer's neighbors.

Face burning, dog stinking, it must have triggered the senses of the dog in the apartment at the other entrance.

Today i opened the back sliding door again and the dog started to howl again. Tilted the fridge, washed it under, mopped the floor, yada yada.

Modern Interpretation of Wadjet

REX NON POTEST PECCARE

Re-edited April 08 2020.

«In the linear, global, historiographical approach, modern history (the "modern period," the "modern era," "modern times") is the history of the period following post-classical history (in Europe known as the "Middle Ages"), spanning from about 1500 to the present.»

According to the site oldest.org, The United States is the first democracy of the modern world, because it started in 1788.

Many of the principles of the previous oldest democracy according to the same site linked above have been simply transferred. One of them was the principle of sovereign immunity.

As a result some of the attributes and privileges of the King from British Constitution have been transferred to the president. One of them is the power of pardon.

However, presidential elections had to be invented. Due to vastness of country, the great distances and lack of means of communication at the time when they where first held campaigns still last 384 days and they still do so. A very complicated process that few understand. With existent "modern" communications, US election system is now outdated. Nominations are mixed with elections. «The presidential primary elections and caucuses held in the various states, the District of Columbia, and territories of the United States form part of the nominating process of candidates for United States presidential elections.»

Some of the issues with elections being such a lengthy process is... well, people can change their mind. After one year, people who voted for one candidate in one of the first states during primaries may wish to have voted with another! Some die, some come to voting age. Primaries not being held simultaneously in different states, results in the one state voting may influence the next one.

But in the end the weirdest part is people who are not registered with the only two parties get to choose from only the two "remaining" candidates after primaries.

In most modern European countries campaigns length varies but do not have an official time frame, state does not get involved in nominations and elections themselves last at most a couple of weeks, in one or two rounds. In the first round participate all candidates that have gathered a number of signatures and if none obtained 50% of the votes the first two go in the second round.

In France by example, primaries are still held within the big parties (to avoid of course having more than one candidate) while anybody can candidate if they can gather more than 500 signatures.

But there are other aspects regarding this lengthy process that imitates... a sports championship? Candidates during debates eliminate each other in debates from state to state. The rise of a new occupations.

The professional candidate. Today's drop of Bernie Sanders reminded of this. He was a candidate for many years. With him, there go away some of the best ideas i ever hard of which some maybe would have been survived in other forms with other candidates. I call him "an issue killer". Here is another example:

"Harold Stassen is perhaps the most famous and distinguished perennial presidential candidate in U.S. history, along with Ralph Nader. A one-time governor of Minnesota and former president of the University of Pennsylvania, he ran for the Republican nomination for president nine times between 1944 and 1992."

The protesting candidate.

"Pat Paulsen, a comedian best known for his appearances on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, first ran for president in 1968 as both a joke and a protest. He ran again in 1972 and in succeeding elections until 1996, one year prior to his death."

Another consequence is US cannot hold what is called in other states "snap elections". Something that by example in the UK has happened 3 times within last 5 years.

The age old questions about American elections. Can a (still sponsored) "independent" candidate win against one backed by one of the two major parties? I don't think it ever happened. The reason. The same one year long campaign. Only those having a big party to back them up can afford the costs to the end. Traveling campaign tradition these days implies huge campaign teams with big expenses. I think, if we say there are 20 candidates with 500 staff on average, there are  up to a total of 100.000 people employed by the elections. To those we need to add local organizers and why not, people employed by media to cover each event.

Writers (not mentioned in the article), communication director. Speeches are read by candidates from prompters. The issue of how their donors and volunteers are going to be of course repaid, if.

"A communications director who oversees the entirety of the campaign's messaging, message planning, media relations, and the whole communications staff."

The alternative, a one month long campaign with debates, with two election rounds within 2 weeks would allow way more candidates to participate in the first round, less one year long distraction and fewer illusions because anybody knew from a long time ago Sanders will not going to go into the finals.

And the issue of the campaigning president. Isn't 384 days campaign too big of a distraction for the current president.