Re: Chinese drywall again.

[Warm Worm]

8 pm, "Ken S. Tucker" wrote:

Makes sense and I'm inclined to agree. But again, how would you expect this project to pan out in terms of your involvement? Would it be cash, barter, volunteer in exchange for room and board/or whatever, no charge/strings, or some kind of shared ownership or access to the final product? Would you have me suggest/ offer/negotiate something and see if you like it?

"Vodka is made from a fermented substance of either grain, rye, wheat, potatoes, or sugar beet molasses." "...its popularity, elsewhere, derives from its neutral spirit usefulness in cocktails and mixed drinks, such as the bloody Mary, the screwdriver, the White Russian, the vodka tonic, and the vodka martini."

- Wikipedia

"The full-scale, 14-by-14-foot straw house, complete with gravel foundation and clay plaster walls, the way she builds them in Pakistan, was subjected to 200 percent more acceleration/shaking than was recorded at the 1994 Northridge, Calif. earthquake, the largest measured ground acceleration in the world. After a series of seven increasingly forceful tests, in the final powerful test the house shook and swayed violently, cracked at the seams and sent out a small cloud of dust and straw =85 and remained standing."

--

As a rule, I've never been crazy about stucco, but natural plasters look like exceptions. And if they do crack, they should be a breeze to fix.

House centipedes rule. ;)

[Warm Worm]

One of my ex-girlfriends and I used to eat in the bedroom all the time while we watched tv (she liked the Antiques Roadshow and Charlie Rose). In fact, I recall eating in the kitchen only once. We had a pretty big apartment (long) with many rooms we rarely used: Your 20x20 seems too big. ;)

[creative1986]

Boosting the output of a photovoltaic is easy, place a large fresnel over top of it and surround it with mirrors. However, that creates heat and heat is the killer so it must be avoided or compensated somehow. I have a plan for compensation.

1/8" copper tubing wound in amongst the solar cells to act as a radiator to keep the cells cool and simultaneously provide me with hot water.

Then theres the idea of mounting strips of solar cells on an angle to each other, sort of like a venetian blind, and using prisms to

*bounce* the sunlight off of surrounding mirrors and through fresnels to the surfaces of the cells. Again, heat build up is a concern but easily remedied as I explained above. I believe it is possible to get over 1000 watts out of the same footprint that a standard 200 watt panel produces today, a 500% increase in power, simply by designing and building it differently AND getting beaucoup hot water for free. All of these things have already been done, separately (pool heaters) but I want to put them all together in a unified format.

Why can't the top of a deep cell battery have a removeable cover with a proper compression seal so that the owner can monitor and replace the plates as he sees fit? Currently, when one plate wears, the negative pole, the whole battery must be replaced and they ain't cheap. Further, the electron passage in batteries is pretty much willy nilly, they go wherever they want to, why can't *guide rails* be installed, corridors if you will, so the electrons can go directly to their destinations? I believe batteries have a lot of improving to do in their future as they are and have been very inefficient.

There are no questions, only answers.

[Warm Worm]

Investment in what sense? There are a multitude of ways of going about this-- some perhaps exciting-- but at any rate, yes, I do need an actual ball if we want to get it rolling. So ok, it's up to me to let you know how/if it goes. Ever heard of, thought about, or done home-exchanges, BTW?

Good ideas. Upon arrival, I found a small and surprisingly-cute mouse (with a white belly I think) in my building's hallway this evening and managed to have it catch its breath in a corner long enough to catch it by its tail and let it out. Poor thing must have been terrified. As I was trying to trap it (still wearing my rollerblades), it was trying to vertically scurry up doors and walls.

Especially when they're in your monitor. Having a bug get in my monitor under the layer in front of the pixel-display and somehow get stuck there and die would drive me up the wall, like the mouse. ;)

Bug list in my Ottawa apt so far:

- 1 house centipede (tried to catch it but it got away-- no biggie, since it's a predator of bugs that bug me)

- a few spiders (no problem-- free to roam-- one jumping spider is in the washroom surveying the lamp)

- an assassin bug juvenile (coated with housedust-- killed it as I didn't know what it was at the time-- another predator to my surprise)

- 1 firebrat-- found in the toilet bowl. Slipped in; did my job for me. Flush.

[creative1986]

Warm Worm> wrote:

There is an old shed down on the far end of our property that has misc stuff in it left by the 3 sets of previous owners of our house and some storage boxes we put in it. The shed was very poorly constructed, in fact anyone that knows which end of the hammer to hold onto would marvel at how this thing was put together. Talk about a Rube! Anyway, when I fling the doors open there is a flurry of activity as hundreds of woods mice go flying ever which direction. I let em alone. They serve a purpose in the bigger picture. Besides, they swing a pointy stick. When I was 9 I was at a cub scout meeting in one of the old WWII barracks at the Carlisle War College (yes, that place) and I caught a mouse and I took it out on the front porch. This was winter, at night time. I stood there in the cold illuminance 18th century cast iron wall sconce conversions petting the thing and it decided to sink a tooth in one of my delicate phlanges. OUCH! I threw the little devil in the snow and went inside. The scout master panicked, called my dad who laid rubber, took me to the hospital and all of this was a mystery as to why it was going on. After the smoke settled and we were back home my dad laid it on the line. We couldn't find the mouse and there is no way to know if it had rabies so you have to get 14 shots in the belly, 1 everyday for 14 days in a row at Dr Thompsons office. Say what? So there it was. My dad told me if I get rabies it will make me go insane so I have to get the shots. There ought to be a law about lying to little kids. LOL The

1st shot, no problem, the 2nd shot, problem. I got sick, instantly. Shots 3-14, no problem. End of story.

Almost.

My first published online writing back in 1994 at a now defunct site called the Tiki Hut was titled, "Big and Small" and it was a short story based on this very principle, that even small entities can be very dangerous.

[creative1986]

We did a home exchange 3 years ago. We exchanged our home for 1/3 of a mil fiat dollars. :-)

[creative1986]

I actually saw a human being do that with dog shit one time at a park in FL. So I stood right there and openly marveled at that spectacle. Look at how people have allowed themselves to be contorted.

I went to the restroom in walmart to wash my hands and while doing so a f***ss came in and propped himself up on one of the thrones and commenced to blatting and fizzing knowing full well I was standing a few feet away.

What does it say about a person that will expose himself in such an intimate hygenic moment in a public facility? That sort of thing should obviously be taken care of before you leave the house and most definitely before you take your daily shower.

But then, just about all of society is shitty now so it is probably me that is out of sync and the above scenarios are considered normal.

[Warm Worm]

It's the law in most urban parks up here. I seem to recall mentioning that on here some time ago and wanting to do some kind of photography that layers/superimposes them picking it up with their dog crapping a few seconds before so that it looks like they're picking it up while the dog is still crapping. If done well, (and my Photoshop skills are pretty good ;) it might look like the dog's crapping on the owner and/or that the owner's really getting in there-- down and dirty-like. It wouldn't take much; just an unsuspecting victim, a full dog, my still camera on its tripod and a couple of before and after shots.

Well what was he supposed to do? Wait until you left while his colon progressively filled up yet some more?

Nature doesn't always make convenient calls. You could have just left briefly. I've always liked the hotels that have toilet stalls whose walls (and ideally doors) reach the floor so that there's some sonic and olfactory privacy. My blame goes to Walmart-- was just in there today. FU Walmart.

at is out of sync and the above scenarios are considered normal.

It's a money thing that Walmart's a near-epic bowel movement of.

[Warm Worm]

True. The way things are going, Russia might bite off chunks of me. They already have in terms of my website. I'll admit to a growing fetish for its women/people, language-phonetics and free electronica. But the problem is it's too Canada, climate-wise... But perhaps I could run an import business on the side and have a best-of scenario. I wish I could pause the clock of time. Make my own deal with God, as Kate Bush sang.

As much of my own labour as possible. It would be cool if I could get you to work in some capacity for free.

Why not?

Maybe not as far as the last bit, but the mouse as domesticated pet did cross my mind after the fact, and it's indeed quite possible that I threw a pet mouse out.

[RicodJour]

I had an albino girlfriend. =3D:O

R

[RicodJour]

R

[Warm Worm]

Maybe when I get back into music composing, I'll find my soulmate. Well, it might be a good idea. I mean, if I post my songs here and there and get fans, I could see if one of them might be the one. Either that or hire a detective for the real Jennifer, only to find she's happily married with kids.

[Warm Worm]

Very funny. ;)

Seriously, though, it's competition for hotels and even hostels. I think it started in the 50's and thanks to the net, it's still going strong.

[Warm Worm]

Good.

I've been leaning toward a straw-bale post-and-beam timberframe, but might consider cob and that reciprocal roof, but maybe only as a proof of concept, such as for a "guest" cabin. We'll see.

I was thinking of the reason behind it, but then I noticed the 'consider' qualification.

It was gray on top and whitish underneath.

[Warm Worm]

Sounds lovely, Ken, thank you. Speaking of posting pics, I'll have to do one of myself so at least you have some kind of warning of what you're dragging in. ;)

[Warm Worm]

Good idea. While I'd have the 3D model on my laptop, I think a tangible "social-project-piece" would work rather well.

[creative1986]

Drag that 70's belt out to the dumpster. heh

[creative1986]

e:

Its very probable that kicking an idea around long enough will boot it right out of tangibility.

[RicodJour]

e:

Post the SketchUp model in the 3DWarehouse.

R

[Warm Worm]

I'm wearing it as I type. :) Much of my shirts are outside of the pants and so the belt is unseen. Where I have dress-shirts that I have to tuck in, I use another belt. In any case, these days, everything's in fashion.