Random Stuff

Sorry, Ain’t Gonna Happen Department

I’m sure that you were just as excited as I was to learn that two of the richest and most hated men on the planet were going to beat the crap out of each other on live TV. Come on, admit it, you’d have even paid money to watch that.

Alas, it isn’t going to happen. After Zuckerberg accepted Musk’s ill advised challenge, Musk, who is in even worse physical shape than I am judging from some of the photos I’ve seen of him without a shirt on in the Daily Mail, must have realized that challenging someone who is actually physically fit, trained in martial arts and is reportedly very, very good at it, wasn’t such a good idea and suddenly came down with “neck problems” that would require surgery. After numerous jokes and comments about alleged cowardice on the part of the head Twit, he said he would livestream himself driving to Zuck’s house and fight him in Zuck’s backyard. When Zuckerberg wasn’t actually home, I should point out.

Sheesh. With Zuckerberg’s “metaverse” concept being pretty much a total failure so far, and Musk’s issues with Tesla’s that allegedly stop steering and allegedly lying about battery capacities, exploding spaceships and the collapse of the social media service formerly known as Twitter turning into another Myspace you’d think these guys would have something better to do.

Ooo, Brussel Sprouts!

We got Sprouts!

When MrsGF suggested we grow brussel sprouts I said sure, why not? We’d never grown them before. And they are one of the weirdest looking things we’ve ever had growing back there. They look like some kind of mutant cabbage plant that was grown too close to the Kewaunee nuke plant. But MrsGF assures me that this is indeed what they look like and I’ll take her word for it.

How About A Flower?

There you go.

What? You want another one? Oh, why not…

The New Solar Panels

As I said before I replaced the 8, HQST solar panels with 4 Newpowa 220W panels a week ago so I have 10 of them out there now. And well, damn, they work good. Whenever you see the power ratings of a solar panel you need to remember that those numbers are produced with the panels in laboratory conditions that you will rarely see out in the real world. Especially up here in Wisconsin. So if I get anything even remotely close to the rated output wattage out of a panel it’s doing pretty darned good. And these have been doing better than good. By about 9 AM with some of the panels still getting some shade they’re putting out about 400W. By 10 AM when they’re in full sun they’re putting out about 1,000W or more. And at midday, under near ideal conditions they’re pumping out close to a full 2 KW. Let me run down in the basement and check some numbers quick. Don’t go away, this will only take a minute…

Okay, yesterday the inverters tell me the PV system pulled in 8.1 kWh, and the panels were switched on for about 6 hours. So the average per hour would be 8,100 divided by 6 = 1,350 per hour over those six hours? Egads, that’s not bad at all.

Still More Smoke

Once again we’re under an air quality warning here in Wisconsin because of the out of control wildfires in Canada. I feel so sorry for those people up here. These fires have burned something like 34 million acres so far and it it doesn’t look like they’re going to end anytime soon.

DC Tries Again

Supposedly there is a new Superman movie in the works. Even though I’m a sucker for superhero movies because I’ve been a comic book fan since i was like 5 years old, I’m not exactly thrilled with the idea of them taking another run at a Superman flick. Let’s face it, DC hasn’t exactly hit a lot of home runs with its attempts to adapt their characters to the big screen. The Justice League movie wasn’t horrible but it wasn’t very good either. And Black Adam… Oh dear. I felt sorry for the Rock because he really wanted to make this work and he ended up with a script that was, frankly, pure crap. I haven’t seen The Flash yet. What it all amounts to is that nothing that’s come out of the DC franchise in decades has done anything to excite me. Marvel has put out its share of stinkers but at least it has also put out a few gems that have kept people excited. At best what DC has been putting out has been mediocre at best.

Supposedly the whole DC multiverse is being “rebooted” yet again. The Batgirl movie, already completed and ready to roll, has been flushed down the toilet and will never be seen. I have to wonder just how bad it was that the company didn’t dare to even release it. New people have been brought in and there is a whole new “vision” for the Superman movie.

Hmm, I distinctly remember writing a Black Adam review but I can’t find it in the archives here. Did WordPress flush it? Did I delete it and I don’t remember? Sheesh…

David and Goliath

How about some peppers?

The bell peppers are doing crazy good this year for some reason. We’re getting massive bell peppers bigger than my hand. MrsGF had to stake some of them up because the weight of the fruit was making the plants fall over.

Anyway that’s about it for now. We’re bracing for heat right now. The latest weather reports are telling us that we’re going to be getting up to around 101F tomorrow, the hottest it’s been up here in ages. We are not looking forward to it.

House Insanity

Okay, so the house just around the corner from our place just went up for sale. It’s small, about 1,200 sq ft, 3 bedrooms, 2 of which aren’t much bigger than my walk in closet, just extensively remodeled. Virtually no yard at all. And they’re asking $350K for the thing. $350,000 for what is, I’m sorry to say, a 100 year old polished turd.

That got me and MrsGF talking about how utterly insane house prices have become in the last few years and speculating about what our place might be worth. We paid $85K for it about 25 years ago. The town appraises it now at $180K for tax purposes. Our insurance company claims it’s worth $500K. And if we look at real estate ads for houses with similar amenities, size and size lot in a nice neighborhood we’re seeing prices pushing up over $750K.

WTF is wrong with people? Seriously.