Well…damn, just crashed the bike but that’s for the next one…right now, I want to talk about the right’s latest bogeyman, JIT. As you know, there have been some pretty big supply disruptions with lots of container ships stuck outside of the major ports here in the US…and warnings that you should be shopping for christmas now so you will be able to get presents…and, of course, the right wing media is blaming the whole thing on Biden for reasons that make absolutely no sense….but that doesn’t matter to them. What everyone has to understand is that the bottlenecks are caused by a little thing in the supply chains called JIT…or just in time production. Back about 30 years or so, people started to notice that there was lots and lots of inventory and work in progress in their warehouses and factories that was costing them tons of cash to just store….and the production and other processes worked to estimates of what would be needed since that was the only information they had and most businesses and warehouses had months of production and stock just sitting there…but then new ideas started to form about making processes more efficient and only making goods that you have orders for…the idea of just in time started to be adopted across the world to squeeze every penny out of the supply chain. As it became more and more efficient, it also became more and more susceptible to disruption as the chain balanced on a knife edge with no tolerance for problems in any part of it. When the pandemic hit and closed factories accross Asia and everywhere else, and shut down ports and other transport systems necessary to move goods, the finely balanced house of cards fell apart since there were no warehouses full of goods to cushion the shocks, and the result was bare shelves across the country. But what Biden has to do with it, I don’t know…these are private, capitalistic systems that have been built to profit the owners and no one else…so tell me the actions he has taken that disrupted this house of cards? No…yeah, didn’t think there were any….is Biden hiding shipping containers at the WH? Is he telling truck drivers to quit since they are being paid less now than they were 40 years ago? Did he offshore all of American manufacturing so good have to be shipped from Asia? I think the repubs really are too stupid to understand the pitfalls of JIT…as an ME, I built many of these systems at the furniture manufacturer I worked for and lived the chaos when they crashed…this is just on a much bigger scale…geez…
Monthly Archives: October 2021
October 18th
Well…running late today with not getting up til around 7 for the last time…don’t feel as sore as I expected from riding in the wind yesterday but I do feel my legs burning a bit but not much more than normal after a two ride day…I do feel pretty burned out for some reason and it may be that I tossed and turned a lot in bed last night and only had a grilled cheese for dinner to go with the third of a chicken breast and some onion rings for lunch…I do need to run an errand this morning as I wait for the temp to come up before I get on the bike…going to get the new dining room shades and some self tapping screws to try to fix the mower so I can mow the lawn again…the grass is still growing like crazy and I still need to feed it with the fall food I got last week…and I need to do some tree trimming before winter to keep the branches off the power and cable lines….so maybe that today, too, but I’m not sure yet….the coffee hasn’t started to work and I just want to sit here for a while first….need to read some news and think for a while first….and get the cobwebs out of my brain….more later…
Got some work done!
Well…I did get out for two rides today which were almost as brutal as the one that hurt my ribs Saturday….and I know I’m going to hurt like crazy tomorrow…but there is good news…I got some work done today…as I mentioned earlier, I planned to clean the two windows in the dining room and get ready to replace the crappy shades in there with actual white ones…and I got them done! And I’ve figured out a method that appears to be the most efficient way to clean them and the second one took about half the time as the first one…and they look so good finally being clean that I can see through them for the first time…now I can open them for ventilation that I couldn’t before with all of the dirt that was in them and I’ll be able to let some sun in when I get shades that work…will probably do the three in the kitchen tomorrow and then I’ll be down to 6 to go….still can’t believe how much dirt they collect in the bottom of them…but I think with getting grass in all of the bare spots that used to be half the lawn, there will be less loose dirt to blow around and maybe they will stay cleaner longer…hope so…
October 17th
Well…running about on time this morning with getting up at 6:13 and I am sore from riding in the wind yesterday….my ribs on my right side have been sore since I got off the bike and that normally happens in over 20 mph winds…but, I’ll be out this morning with it being almost calm but I will have to wait until the temp comes up some…and it gets light…still not used to it being dark so late in the morning and I get a little antsy waiting to get out…I guess I’ll have to cope with that since it will only get worse…didn’t get much done yesterday and it looks like I’ll be down to one ride again today but I do want to start on the fall cleaning of the windows since I have 11 of them to do and some of them are pretty dirty…the heat has been on since yesterday around noon and that is one thing that was a relief when it came on….I always feel that way in the fall but I have to remember that this one is newer and should start and run all winter with just a little wd on the combustion blower…I am going to tear into it this week to see about the bearings on the blower to see if they need lube or if they are sealed…it does feel good to know that I have enough cash to buy a new one if I need it…not much to do today…just going to get the first ride in as soon as it gets light if it’s over 50 but I haven’t looked at that yet…and I do have to clean the dining room widows today and measure the shades so I can get new ones that work and put them up this week….and there are races on this aft so I want to be done before them….more later…..
That was brutal…
Well…that was brutal…after the temp came up around 8, I went out to get on the bike since it was 52 and the weather channel said the wind was blowing around 10 and I’ve dealt with that plenty of times out here…but, they were wrong, oh so wrong….when I made the turn across the flats next to the lake, I knew it had to be blowing more than that since I could barely move even with being all the way down to 3rd on the back sprockets when I normally go through there in 7th….but the wind was coming from the NW so I decided to carry on and struggled all the way out to the lake…by then, the wind was blowing so hard I had to pedal down the steep downhill to the beach when I can normally coast down it at 20mph or so….on the way back, I used my patented way to measure the true wind speed and got about 22 and I never go out in winds that high…and it’s supposed to blow harder later in the day so it looks like a one ride day but we’ll see…my legs already hurt like crazy and the ride took almost an hour and a half and it normally takes about an hour and change….soccer time…
October 16th
Well…darn, I wonder if my wake up times are going to cycle all the way through to the times I go to bed? This morning I went from 5 yesterday back to 4 but I was able to get back to sleep and didn’t get out of bed til almost 7 so I guess that better than yesterday…feel pretty beat up today and that is with just one ride yesterday and I won’t be able to get out this morning since it is only 45 out here and that is too cold to go out in shorts…and Man U plays at 10 so that means the earliest I could get out is around noon unless Man U stinks up the place against the Foxes and I just give up on them for the day….Michigan doesn’t play today so that will help me get on the bike twice so I can get to 4K miles this weekend and then keep racking up the miles to see where I end up this year…I am losing my motivation to ride…well, and to do almost anything and I wonder why that would be? Just tired, I think and that may need a couple of rest days to get over that…and just get the fall cleaning started…need to do all of the windows to get the dirt out of them that blows around everywhere up here…but I think I’ve helped that by growing grass in the half of the back yard that was bare when I moved in here….not much to do today….yeah, that’s not true…have so much to do that it is depressing…but I don’t want to do any of it right now…just want coffee and to read some news with soccer on in the background….damn, I’m getting old….
I’m tired of working all the time…
Well…I think I hit the wall today and I am just so damn tired of working all the time….got on the bike for the first ride a little after 9:30 and then back here to mow the lawn…the fix on the mower crapped out after almost all the mowing and that was disappointing…so, right after lunch, I waded back into trying to fix it again….used JB again but filled the stripped out screw hole with it and then screwed the screw into the hole to get it as tight as I could and I hope the JB will hold it in there…and I made a clip out of some extra siding and glued that over a flange on the part of the actuator that has a broken screw in it and I hope that will relieve the pressure on the JB and hold it in place…an that took an hour and a half and I am just getting done and it’s almost 2:30….may have to buy a new mower if this doesn’t work since I need one to pick up the leaves and I can’t get a new transmission….and that sucks since I really do like this one…oh, well…and I feel guilty that I only did one ride today…but it is going to rain here in a few minutes so that is my excuse…..maybe more later…
October 15th
Well…that kinda sucked…woke up at 5 this morning and tried to go back to sleep for a while but that didn’t work…I feel okay so I guess I can live with it…it is pretty darn cold out there right now at 47 degrees so it looks like I won’t be on the bike until around 10 so I have to find something to do until then…I am going to mow the lawn this morning and I am a little curious how my repairs to the mower will hold up…still don’t have a lot of leaves down so I think I’ll just mulch today instead of bagging but there is some trimming I need to do so I may start a bag for branches and the trims….it’s not supposed to rain again for a week or so and I hope the new grass will survive…at least it’s not hot so the ground won’t dry up as fast…not going to water it since I don’t want to pay the big dollars for the water…had a funny thing happen when I was out putting in grass seed yesterday…the chickens that have been roaming the neighborhood came running toward me in a group while I was holding the bag of seed and I think they thought I had food for them…so, if they’re here again today, I think I’m going to feed them some stale bread I have since that is a food they like….that may be fun….didn’t get much done yesterday but the seeding and errands but I think I want to clean my fridge today since I haven’t done that in a while….and I need to measure the dining room shades so I can get new ones and clean those windows…so, I’ll be puttering around here this morning getting a few things done while I wait for the lawn to dry out and the temp to come up…need to adjust my days to allow for the cold and accept that I may have to ride later in the day if I want to get two rides in…only have about 50 more miles to do to get to 4K for the year and that will probably happen over the weekend….more later….
Got a second ride in…finally…
Well…I think I’ve been running late all day today and I really didn’t think I was going to be able to ride at all with how much rain was forecast…and with it raining this morning, I decided to get a couple of errands run so I don’t have to do them tomorrow…had to hit Menards where I spent another 40 bucks on lawn stuff…fall food, more seed, and some weed killer…I did get the food for about half price so that was cool…and I think this may be the last bag of seed I’ll need for this year since I still have half of it left and have filled in almost all of the bare spots…I even have grass coming in on an area that I call the sandbox since that’s what it is…pure sand and I never thought grass would grow there…after getting the seeding done, I had resigned myself to the fact that I was only going to get one ride in but then the sun came out about 4:15 and I couldn’t pass that up…so, back on the bike later than I ever go out and I’m just now getting the rest of the stuff done I needed to before I can relax for the night….The Wings season starts tonight and I do need to take a look at that until they start losing but then back to Justified and Deadwood….re-watching both of them at once so it gives me something to see and I don’t get bored…oh, and the chickens were back today…I think they are free range now and that makes me laugh…
Still looking for a topic…
Well…as I sit here waiting for the rain to stop so I can get on the bike, I thought I’d come here and do one of these…but a good topic escapes me…oh, here’s one…do all repubs not pay their debts? We all know that the idiot trump stiffs everyone that works for him…and after one time, I wonder why anyone would work for him…he still owes money on his casinos that have been torn down and people continue to give him more money for some reason…but, he’s not the only repub that doesn’t pay his bills…just today it was reported that ole Newt still owes almost 5 million bucks from his failed run for president in 2012…and he has no intent to pay any of it back…even though he could afford it with the millions he makes from fox news…this is the rot that has infected the modern repub party…I remember when they were fiscally responsible folks…but maybe they never were…I mean I’m an old guy and maybe my memory is crappy….don’t think so, though….geez…