It Has Gotten Quiet . . .

Chris left last night after dining with us at Sushi Tao restaurant.  We ate well, stuff must of you would not touch and some would gobble up.  To us it is great stuff at a great place to eat.

Judie made a cookie tray and took to them.  She had earlier brought some frozen quail as they expressed never have tasting quail.  They really take care of us now days.

We often go and have Chirachi, which is dish of flavored rice and Shashimi which is raw fish.  Well most of it is raw fish, some is egg cooked of course, and sometimes a few pickled items I think most for décor but tasty none-the-less.  Then we say bring us something else, a surprise.  We have had spider rolls, and of late the broiled neck of cod fish.  There are morsels of fish all around the neck or the bony piece of fish aft of the head but before the body.  You have to pick out the morsels, very tasty.

The surprise is often not found on the menu.  So like I said, we get special care.  We like it and they like it.

The house is especially quite, not kids, not adult kids, just us again.  Almost eerie feeling.  Refrigerator is down loaded, stuff is either frozen or fed to the deer or in the garbage can.  Cleaned out and ready for our peculiar diet, mostly we eat out.

Happy New year to all and Geaux Tigers.

Post Christmas . . .

December 27, quite, no kiddlings running around, trash picked up and cleaned out.  The silence is over powering.  Back to listening to TV in the back ground while workingon the computer. 

Fortunately, the stock market went up on December 26.  Today the stock market is poking long, down a few points, like maybe 10 points.  I can remember when 10 points was a big day but that was back in the early sixties and the market was around 300 or so points, not today's 16,000 points.  Big difference.  So 10 points is not a show stopper. just a short pause the trek of the Dow Jones Index.

Still trying to get the malware out of the table top computer and I am using the laptop for this blog.  Closer in that I have removed most of the blocks but apparently not all of them.  Checked out a forum on the topic and will follow the instructions.  Not a new problem for malware.  But beware of programs saying they will speed up your computer.  They want to hold on to you forever and embed all kinds of hooks to hold you.  In my case the new 2014 virus checker introduced some malware and now I am deep into fighting it.

So the quite helps.  Happy New Year to all.  And Geaux Tigers!

Meeting Miss Jane . . .

Yes, I met Miss Jane for the first time.  I was told by her grandmother that she was shy and aloof, not friendly at all. 

Wrong, Miss Jane was out going and friendly.  Not to me so much but to her grandmother and others.  While on 16 months, she is walking all over the place and evidencing her personality.  She is quite intelligent.  She has learned a lot of sign language, and can express herself to eat, etc.  She is quite precocious, very intelligent.  Not just because she is my grand child, but because she is just that.

So I have vastly enjoyed Miss Jane,  she is a pleasant child.  Rarely a tear usually only when she and hard object meet.  And that is not often either, so few tears.

She is going to be a pistol.

Christmas Day Is Closing In On Us . . .

Jacob and Anne will arrive tomorrow with their two children.  From there in we expect bedlam will befall us with loving (and crying children).  Maybe the weather is trying to tell us something, it started raining last night at about 4 AM with thunder and lightening.  It has finally let up at 10:30.

Local weather station says we have had over 1.25 inches of rain so far and to expect more.  Temperature holding steady at 40 degrees F.  Tomorrow to be dryer but a little cooler too.  No matter we will be nice and warm in the car going to and from the airport to collect Jake, etal. 

They will be here through Christmas and return home to Madison the day after Christmas.  The schedule is driven by the cost and availability of the airplane tickets.  Fortunately there is an American Eagle flight direct from Madison to DFW and back daily.  Used to be two flights a day but I think it is down to one flight per day now.  The alternate route is out of O'Hare to DFW, about a 100 mile trip for Jake and company, thus not desired route.  The flight in and out of Madison is well populated and that drives the dates for them to travel.

Chris will be here for Christmas as well as James, etal.  We also expect to see Katy and Cavin show up too.  James and family just got back from a trip to NYC seeing Manhattan and all the bells and whistles that go with it.  James has racked tons of frequent flyer miles and they used that for their trip.   NYC is Joan's old stomping grounds, she was raised just outside of New York City and went to school near by before she ended up in Texas.  So she was the willing and able tour leader for the trip.

We have been steadily purchasing food stuffs for the big day.  A ham here and a turkey there, crab meat for the gumbo, garlic bread, plus lots of other thises and that's.  We will have Ernestine's (she was my mothers cook for years) green beans and mashed potatoes to go with it all.

Then us fellows will sit back and watch some football -Not.  We will all be worn out by after dinner time.  Well, I'll qualify that, I and Judie will be worn out by then.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.

Can You Believe It . . .

Well after the great ice storm of December 2013, we still have unmelted ice on the ground.  It hit a little above 60 degrees yesterday and we still have globs of ice.  The globs are the result of a drifts and are found in corners where the wind whipped around and pour in more than usual precipitation.

And what ever it was, sleet, frozen rain and snow, it all turned to solid ice.  So some of those chunks so to speak were a foot and half deep.  Thus they are still there, especially if they are on the shady side of things.  We have a couple out front, one hidden under the Crepe Myrtle tree, and yet another on the back exposed part of the patio up next to the garage by the Bar-B-Q pit.  Not that we are doing any Bar-B-Qing, but at least it has give up its hold on the lawn chair that was there.  The legs were encased and frozen in place for week.  The chair is free, the ice is still there.  At least we do have access to the Bar-B-Q pit should we need it.

It is supposed to hit the mid sixties today and hopefully we will see the last of the ice in our yards.  Even a bit of the frozen remains in the valleys of the roofs, especially in houses that have good insulation (like ours).

At least the FedEx and Brown trucks can get around and deliver the Xmas gifts. The roads are free and clear.

So we will sojourn out to do a bit more Xmas shopping for the grandkids.  Got to get the right toy for them, ya know.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.

Melting . . .

The ice is slowly melting since the temperatures have soared to 40 degrees.  But it is a slow process.

So far I have scraped off the ice for a path to the street via the front side walk and via the side walk that goes to the drive way.  Parts of the driveway are cleared, others are cover with two or more inches of ice (note, not snow, ice).  I had to use a pick ax to break up some of it.

The highways are clear.  Texas DOT said they came in prepared to clear off a couple of inches of snow and we got a couple of inches of ice instead.  We did have a dusting of snow, not much.  We got freezing rain (that is rain that falls normally and turns to ice on contact with the cold ground and other surfaces like roofs and streets especially over passes and bridges) followed by sleet.  Sleet you well know is frozen pellets in the air and stays that way when it hits the ground.  So basically we had an ice storm and it left more than an inch of ice, closer to two inches of ice on everything.

Ice takes a long time to melt down.  Only now after two days of bright sun shine is the grass showing in places.  The drifts are as much as a foot thick.  And that too is mostly ice.

I scraped off the paths a with a spade, flat front vice a shovel that is pointed, the paths.  Now no danger of slipping and falling, well mostly no danger.  You still have to be alert as it goes below freezing a night and forms black ice on roadways and slick spots on the paths.  Just got to be careful.

Our German and Ohio experience has help us be more cautious yet venturesome.  So we went out in the weather when others watched.  But we were careful and drove slowly.  I got passed a lot and hope those fools made it home safely.

So we are gradually recovering.  I am sure the merchants got hurt severely by the lack of customers in this region.  They were off to a good start and came to a crashing halt.

Four Days . . .

Four days of ice.  The weather moved in Thursday night with freezing rain and sleet, later some snow.  Basically we got almost two inches of frozen stuff on the ground.  It is not quite two inches but it is more than an inch and in some places has drifted into deeper piles.

Now it is all ice.  At least an inch of ice.  The asphalt streets got some thaw yesterday with bright sun and temperatures greater than freezing.  Not a whole lot above freezing, about 36 or 37 degrees.  So we had lots of spots in the streets that melted and the water ran off.  Not so in the driveway and yard.  And what softened up from the 'high' temperature froze again last night.

We are predicted to get above freezing again today, to maybe 37 degrees again.  And I think that will clear up most of the streets but not the stuff in the yards and drive ways.

We have had our experience in the northern climes so we ventured out Saturday and Sunday.  But we found McDonald's closed.  And Judie's favorite spot in Willow Park, Sonic, was closed.  We did find Walmart open as we also found Sonic in Hudson Oaks open (and we got cokes and eats there).  We found Walmart quite pleasant since it was near empty, just us folks who went out to challenge the elements.

So I think a good deal of it will be abated.  The streets will be open, the main arteries will be sanded and so on.  Still a great deal of traffic accidents, people are not repeat not cautious and have little patience with the conditions.  We saw folks driving to fast, some with four wheelers thinking that such a drive system exempts them from having to worry about the ice and slush.  Not gonna happen, and they are careening off the roads.

So we have electricity and gas and are nice and cozy inside.  The garage with one oil bath heater is kinda holding its on between 55 and 60 degrees.  I go out there and fire up some more heaters for awhile and it gets reasonable, maybe all the way to 65 degrees.  The heaters are in my work area and it gets a little warmer there.

Gotta New Plane . . .

Well the plane is new to me, it is used.  It was gathering dust of which I had to clean off.  It is a Stik model designed for a .60 cubic inch two cycle alcohol engine.  I happen to use a .91 cubic inch four cycle engine, roughly the same amount of power, maybe a little more.

The person that had the plane had a .91 Magnum four cycle engine on it, so it was sort of setup for my engine.  I had to mount the engine on the engine mount rails but since they were already drilled and properly spaced it was a no brainer.  I did have to reverse the carburetor and that was a matter of removing two screws, turning the carburetor 180 degrees and reinstalling the screws.  So the engine is  done and hooked up to the throttle servo which was already installed in the fuselage.

Next I had to install a main landing gear with tires.  The owner had cannibalized the main landing gear for another model.  Fortunately, I had exactly the same landing gear in my spare parts box.  I keep all the landing gears from airplanes past and there it was all read to install.  I had to poke around for a hour in my hard sources to get four screws to mount it with.  Finally found four that will do the job and the landing gear is installed.

Next it had some checkerboard markings on the sides and top of the fuselage.  They were ugly in my estimation.  I used the heating iron to soften the stickum that holds the decals in place and peal them off.  Not to hard to do.  So that is removed and it looks more realistic now.

It had a small tear in the wing and I had to patch that up.  There is another patch that does not match on one of the Maltese Crosses on the wing.  I will have to heat that up and remove the old dark blue patch and install a black patch that will match the Maltese Cross material.  I have plenty of MonoKote to do the repairs. 

MonoKote is a plastic covering that has stikum on one side to adhere to the airplane surface.  The outside is the finish.    It takes a small sealing iron to make it stick to the balsa surfaces.  Then one uses a heat gun to stretch it.  So it is heat sensitive.  Wrinkles can be removed with the heat gun.

The control surfaces had a lot of wrinkles.  Nothing impacting performance but not good looking.  I removed some of the wrinkles and will work on the rest of them. 

Any way a couple of hours work and she is ready to go.  I had to replace a fuel line too.  It is all done now.

Next is to tune up the receiver and set up the controls.  That is an easy task.

A White Day . . .

Woke up about 7 AM to a white world.  We got the brunt of the winter storm last night.  The present temperature is just above 22 degrees with 8 to 10 mile an hour winds.  So if is both cold and slick out side this AM

We started with freezing rain.  That is regular rain that falls and freezes on contact with the earth.  Then we had sleet, which is of course rain that has already been frozen and falls.  Sleet makes a noise of hitting the leaves on the trees and so on.  Freezing rain loads up the trees and bends the limbs to the ground, it can even topple trees.  Then it all turned to snow. 

So the icy surface is cleverly disguised with snow.  You step on and slip and fall  We have a few small drifts up against the houses.  Snow and ice in the roof valleys and along the eaves where heat does not reach and it freezes quickly and stays cold and will not defrost.

It is still falling, an extra fine snow.  It is called corn snow by the folks in the mountains.  Great stuff to ski on but otherwise just winter moisture to us.

I have not seen any birds so they are all hunkered down trying to stay alive.

TV and radio are full of accidents and slick road warnings.  Schools closed.  Doctor's offices closed.  DFW and Love airports are shut down.  Son James is trapped out in Boston waiting to get back home.

Nothing is moving.  The garage is toasty warm at 60 degrees.  I will have to go out and warm the garage up so I can do some model stuff.  I bought a used airplane and have to refit it.  It needs a battery, radio receiver, install an engine, re-inforce the center wing splice (a thing I do not found in the model plans).  It has a funky pilot mounted on it and I will remove that, kind of offensive to me.  Then I will wax it to protect it.

Something to do while shut in.