Not exactly daily huh?

Crap, I haven't wrote nuttin' up lately. Here's what I've been up to, I got one of those dump run bikes up and running for my wife. Thought I had it all set yesterday, my test ride goes fine, she takes it for a spin, works fine. I take it for another spin, and the damn rear derailer tries to wrap itself around the wheel. Today I replaced the derailer it went easy peasy, and now it shifts better than my bike.
I have a set of suspension forks I've been hanging on to for a while, so since I was on the bike repair task, I decided to put them on. Those forks were a no go, they are made for a bike with a larger headtube, fortunately the other bike I got from the dump had suspension forks and functional V-brakes. This mucking around with bikes has got me thinking an investment in bicycle consumables (tubes, chains, pads and cables) is in order, even if things don't get as ugly as the prognosticators surmise, bicycle repair is a side business I wouldn't mind getting into. Never a bad idea to have another source of supplemental income.

The weather has been pretty decent last while, wind has been pretty regular, which has me aching to build a windmill. I've spent a good bit of time headscratchin' to figure out if I want to VAWT or HAWT, radial flux or perhaps a induction motor conversion. I have 3 different brushed DC permanent magnet motors that I could use in a pinch, but I'm sure brush replacement would be a thorn in my side. I even played around with my circ saw and some 2x4 scraps to see what cuts would make it easier to carve some plain jane blades out of common spruce lumber. I really just need to jump in with both feet and build something.

I went running the first time in a long time yesterday. I didn't push further than I'd regret and ran 1/4 mile, it took me 1/2 mile of walking afterwards to recover and probably spit half a liter, but no hacking or phlem. Only wound up with slightly sore quads today the only thing I did close to exercise today was leisurely riding my bike.

If SHTF tomorrow, I'm better prepared than yesterday, I hope you are also.

Truck full, including kitchen sink

I made another scrounge run at a local dumps recycle section yesterday. Lets see, I came back with a roll of chicken wire and some fencing for around the garden, two mountain bikes with front suspension, a small wheel barrow, grass rake, pick axe head, a stainless steel double kitchen sink, a suitcase sized tin trunk, 5 unwritten CDRs, and a few other items I'm not remembering right now.

Bicycles are a great item that I figure I can collect now for free, and refurbish as the pile of organ donors builds up. As I see it, bicycles will soon not be tossed aside so freely as they are now. The simple economics of it right now is, why would anyone pay a bike mechanic $50 or more dollars to fix my bike when I can go to any store and buy a happy shiny funtime Lao Tse brand slave labor new one for $100. Of course it rarely works out that way, they plan on buying the $100 bike, but wind up taking home the $200 one that only looks a little beefier and has some sort of "me too" feature.
I might as well go a little further on the bike rant. How bloody crazy is it that we buy a new bike, break a little something on it, or let it rust, throw it in the dump where it gets crushed and then shipped halfway across the damn world to be melted down and turned into another new bike. I could go on but have now reached the point where I'm boring myself with this.

So on to the kitchen sink, I'm not sure how much money I saved myself in the near future by picking this up, but you can bet that a new stainless sink would have cost me a heck of a lot more than the $10 gas it cost me to go to the dump, and there isn't a damn thing wrong with this sink. I can only guess that plain old consumerism landed this sink in the dump, it probably clashed with their new cultured granite countertops that they got a home equity loan to install.
Arrrg, I guess general consumerism is weighing on me today, I should be looking on the bright side, consumerism got me this stuff for nearly free.

I finished boxing in the two garden beds, but have yet to fence the wall for the climbers to hang on to. I'm working tonight on the head scratchin' and costing for building a smallish greenhouse. It's gonna be a simple 'A' frame built primarily with 2x4 by 10'. I'll have to purchase the lumber as I'll need full length uniform pieces, plus I haven't looked much for a good scrounge site for lumber. The father-in-law had a nice pile of scrounged lumber but it's getting eaten up pretty quick.

I guess that is all for the moment.
Don't let the Reptilian Overlords get ya down!