Lately I’ve been hearing everyone at work say, “It is what it is.” These people are not more insightful all of a sudden, they’re just quoting the cleaning guy at work known as “Muffin”. Why, I don’t know. I didn’t ask “Muffin” why he goes by “Muffin”. I assume it must have something to do with the, “It is what it is.” Maybe?

So in the spirit of, “It is what it is”, I am trying to make a post. It’s not that I don’t want to, I just find myself doing “other things” and the Internet site is always a distant 3rd place on the priorities. Though it makes a good journal to keep me motivated. I need to motivation most of the time, otherwise it will just been beer, sleep, video games. We can’t live like that all the time. I don’t mind trying, it’s just not healthy.

I have several things to post, I’ve just not got my photos together. Enough of my mind dribble and lets get to it.

MP3 docking station for my car. I figured since the US Transportation Administration will be doing way with devices in cars soon, I might as well get this out there. I HATE all thing APPLE. I really do. You can believe what ever you want about APPLE you crazy ass hipsters with your tight black jeans and fat black rimmed glasses. APPLE products are for dicking around. Very few, and I mean few people use them for real work. I know, there will be be a ton of you silly asses telling me that you really are more creative and get SOOOO MUCH ACCOMPLISHED on your Mac. I am sure you do in your own mind. Now why do I have so much hate for them?

• I don’t need to feel like I fit in when I use my computer. It didn’t work when I was nerd in school, and it sure the hell isn’t going to work now.
• My PC ROCKS. It’s cheaper than you Mac, It’s more secure, it easier to get parts, add-ons and upgrades. Also, I don’t run Windows OS, so all my software is free.
• I don’t have to put my credit card into my MP3 player the first time just to use it.
• My software is opensource.
• No one controls my applications or my OS. My computer and my MP3 player are truly free of other companies control.
• My OS doesn’t spy.
• No DRM on my laptop or MP3 player.
• Steve Jobs was a smarmy pompous ass-hole. You can say that is an opinion, but to me it’s a fact.
• APPLE isn’t innovative, they’re just better at stealing other peoples ideas.

So when it came to looking for a new MP3 player, I went with a COWON S9. I have no DRM on it, and no company that has access to my MP3 player. I control what goes on it. The only issue, no good docking cradle in my car. SHAPELOCK to the rescue!

My design was to have a ridged yet flexible docking unit. I decided to use 3 pieces of romex 20 amp cable with a spine like support for the arm.

This is what I came up with.

The holding base is looped in order to permit that audio cable an easy connection. I used an old power outlet converter so that it plugs into any aux power port in the car. Here is a view from mein auto.

Here is a photo I took at 5am. So the focus is my fault for not being awake.

Lastly I have a photo of it without the MP3 in it. The back of the housing sits off of the MP3 play by about 12% angle. This makes the release of the MP3 player from the dock easy. I just push on the back and it expands off of the player.

Ok maybe one more photo. I am a sucker for Curtis Mayfield. Especially Superfly.

Ok, one word of warning for those that want to make such a thing. If you live in a place where summer can get warm, don’t leave your shapelock devices in the sun. It will get to over 140 deg in your car and your shapelock will melt. Keep it out of the sun and you might be ok.

Since then, I have melted this down. Not that I didn’t like it, I just needed more shapelock for my Halloween mask and didn’t have the time to wait for more to come by mail. I can always make another one. That is the beauty of prototyping.

Surviving a cold winter without losing ones mind is easy for some, but not for me. I used to love the winter and the actives that comes with it. I can say that I’ve given that up with the costs of a single day lift ticket at any ski resort. The costs costs of the equipment and up keep, the time off needed and the hassle of the lines, I’m done with it. Back in high school it was nice to skip school and go skiing. It was much better than taking tests. Now the reasons for my grammar mistakes are known.

This winter I’ve been occupying my time with fungi. No, I am not spending time picking my toes. It’s discussing that you would think of such a thing. I was referring to mushrooms.

Granted the title of this post can sounds a bit homosexual if you just heard someone say it, but that’s where the mushroom graphic removes any thoughts of the pornographic. If you’re still having those thoughts, than your a sicko and shame on you. Mushrooms should be eaten and not molested.

In this particular case Agrocybe Aegerita. The common name is Pioppino. I am also growing  Pleurotus Ostreatus; common name is the Pearl Oyster.

I was able to get several harvests so far, but with the dryer air in the winter, I had to change the way I kept them humid. So I built a humidity tent for them.

Whomever said that duct tape has 1000 uses, more then just under estimated their count. As I like to call it miracle tape.

One of the requirements is to never use water from the tap. This has chlorine in it and can cause some damage to the mycelium. The mistake that many make. So I’ve saved a barrel of rain water to use as the humidifying source.

Here are my pioppino mushrooms growing.

Here are my pioppino mushrooms a day later in the humidifying ten.

So the ten obviously kicked them into gear a bit.

Here is a snapshot of an oyster mushroom starting to emerge.

It is a blurry shot, but none the less you can see the cute little baby shroom emerging. Mmmm I’m eating babies tonight.

If you haven’t already notice the stacks of sticks under the blooming mushrooms, they’re there to catch the spores that the mushrooms drop. I save these spores and use them else where.

Drilling some holes in some oak logs to make a new home for the dial rods that the spores collected on.

Insert the dial rods into the log holes.

It’s official that summer is over and this one went quick. In June we a beloved friend from Germany come and visit. Only one week though. :’(
We were hoping on doing more, but time limits us all. Then we had another dear German visit us in July. Not the same German, but apparently we’ve made rounds and met people in Germany. Then came August where we had childhood friend from Seattle come visit. That was a good time too. Let’s just say people from Seattle don’t hold their beer as well as a German. So now that our hostel is closed for the fall, we move on to new things.

Also as a side note, the blog updates of 2011 have been few and far apart. Not for the lack of trying, but for the busy schedule. It’s some what depressing when I think of how busy I’ve been, but I don’t have much to show in accomplishment.

Storms in the spring resulted in some hail damage on our roof. After dealing with insurance companies and quotes from roofers, we’ve got new roofs. The roofs were covered, but there were some additional changes that we had done that created out of pocket expense.  We had solar attic fans put in for our solarium room and our attic.

Yeah, it looks small in the picture, but it moves a lot of air. On a sunny day as high as 1550 CFM. It will even run a bit on a cloudy day. It just depends on how bright it is outside. It’s also very silent. It makes about as much sound as our DVR player. So that’s not bad. It has a thermostat that turns on around 60 deg. I am planning on modifying that when I have a chance so that I can turn it off or set my own thermostat to adjust the temperature I want it to turn on at. At least in the sun room. So far I am happy with it. It also has a tax rebate up to 30% so that is nice.

So the Halloween time has come and passed. I tried to get this post in before that time period, but I am having issues with centralizing my photos. I have them, just on different memory cards and devices. It’s making thing a bit more difficult. Not to mention the latest bugs with bluetooth in Ubuntu 11.10 make it difficult to get photos off my phone.

Here is my costume construction.

It took about 4 hours to mold the mask using shape lock plastic. It took 4 hours to shape the mold, another 1 1/2 hours to paint.  The fabric is from “Joanne Fabrics”, three yards for $18.18.

Here is some side shots of the mask close up.

The hat took another 3 hours. What can I say, I’ve never stitched a hat before. I also created a coif to attach to the mask and cover the face and head completely. That entailed cutting three separate pieces of two dimensional fabric and fabric in the correct patterns to fit my 3D head. This took me another 2 hours to make. Again, I’ve never sewn a coif before.

The finished product.

Here is a close up from the side.

The robe I made four hours before heading out to the bars for a Halloween drink. I sewed the arms to fit first, then attached them to the torso of the costume. The seams were all folded in on the stitch and double stitched. I was going out drinking in this puppy and I was worried about snagging it on something. I had to make it heavy duty to survive the beer-a-thon that was coming. Mmmmm Czechvar!

Addition to this I also sewed two more costumes for my wife and daughter. They were Heat Miser and Snow Miser from “The year without a Santa Claus”. I have photos of that, but I don’t know if they want them on the “Internets” so I will leave them out for now. I totaled the time for my costume and it was around 22 hours in the making. My wife’s and daughter’s costume, I don’t know, but I’m sure it took longer then mine.

Then came Halloween which means having to decorate for the trick or treaters. This typically takes 3 hours to get everything setup, but this year we did it in two. Here is one side of the drive way.

It looks better at night with the lights. I don’t have a tripod so it’s almost impossible to get a good shot of this at night.

Other happenings as of recent. I had to travel to Boston for work. I got some nice photos of the occupy Boston.

I saw many, many tents, but not a lot of people. Either they were hanging out in the tents or most of them were on a pee break when I happen to walk by. Happy Camping.

Working in Boston is ok. This last trip was some what of a break since there were less then 10 people in an office. It was nice to still do work and take a break from the daily chaos. The last day must have been a dog day. I say this because I was being following around the office all day.

This is a 3 year old bulldog named Tyson. I was listening to my MP3 player and I keep smelling something stinky. I looked under my desk and there was a very panting bulldog slobbering on my shoe. I made the mistake of scratching the puppy behind the ears. This guaranteed me an escort everywhere I walked in the office.

This bulldog charms you with its pathetic look on it’s face. I am not a dog person and I can go as far as to say that I can’t stand dogs, but this dog definitely had me laughing with it’s breathing noise and waddling.

Another favorite of mine while in Boston is Jacob Wirth and Company. The German food is not exactly German, but the beer can be. It’s the only place other than NYC where I can find Radeberger on draft. Mmmmm Lecker!

I was in Boston till last Friday. I got most of my work done, but found that I still need to fix a few more issues. So I will probably have to head back in February. Brrrrrrrrrr! We shall see how occupy Boston is holding together by then.

Upon my return, a wonderful German delivered me a bottle of something special from the Czech Republic.

This is the 1 liter bottle from the Czech republic too. Not the .75 liter. Needless to say I’ve had it 4 days and I am half way through the bottle. WHY DO THEY HAVE TO MAKE IT SOOO TASTY?
UPDATE: After a 2 year email and phone call campaign to the state of Pennsylvannia, I can now get Becherovka here as well. Ohh happy days.