@mikesusz social feed.

today was the annual* cleaning of the circulator fan for the pellet stove, detaching it and taking it outside to blow it out with the air compressor. i wish i had recorded the plume… cloud of dust that came off of it. usually after doing this, the stove gets much much quieter. we never really noticed it getting slightly louder and louder over a long period of time.

*not really every year. whenever i remember to do it.

yep. we all know that Amazon’s operations are centered in … Morocco.

@mathowie my absolute favorite. thank you.

@mathowie cool! is the first one Multnomah? i haven’t been there in 20 years.

(also stop at Vista House if you get a chance)

but trying to stay positive, keeping up the search. augmenting my workflow so i can search on niche and (difficult to scrape) job sites while i wait in the parking lot of my kid’s school. using @appendx to file interesting links to research more deeply when i get home.

woke up from a panic dream where I had a terrible contract job and then started another terrible contract job at night that lasted through till the next morning so I had no time to sleep. for some reason in both jobs, I was forced to use flaky CRT monitors and was given very little direction on what needed to be done only that it needed to be done immediately.

@hotdogsladies sometimes when i pay for something with my Alaska card, the clerk will ask me if that’s Jimmy Hendrix.

this is why i enjoy getting daily Cars & Bids emails about new auctions. (scrolling…)
- rare, classic alfa romeo
- handbuilt british supercar
- lamborghini gallardo
- geo metro with a v8 stuffed in it

last week: awe
this week: oww

one of my kids needed a light that produced heat for a school experiment. i found an incadescent bulb in the basement and put it into one of my worklights.

“this is how much heat that lightbulbs used to make???”

yep. that’s why that mom on Schoolhouse Rock was yelling at you.

three of these bulbs use as much electricity as your gaming PC does now.

@marcamos it’s amazing to watch them play Minecraft and close every door, every time.

@jerzone when i went down this rabbit hole i found there are many, many children of musicians who became musicians themselves :) i had to just pick a few.

idea for a new supergroup.
vocals: Violet Grohl
guitar: Roman Morello
bass: Tye Trujillo
drums: Nic Collins

they could tour with The Offspring

@mathowie i have a theory, let’s see what you think: Jeep should stop making anything except Jeep-shaped Jeeps. in recent years they’ve been adding new vehicles that are just big crummy Dodges with weird grilles and bumpers tacked on.

@jensimmons surely you will get few quality replies to this. but - with 30 years of experience, i’d like to be working.

when is the last time you checked the air pressure in your spare tire? read the sticker inside your driver door to get the proper level.

tomorrow is going to be an interesting day for me, milestone-wise. please forgive me self-reflection, and self-promotion.

this morning my son is taking the PSAT so i’m driving around a bit and wow, new england, this is off the hook.

this is a first.

i got the rejection BEFORE the submission confirmation.

“After a lot of thought and tough discussions, we’ve decided to move forward with other candidates whose experience aligns a bit more closely with what we need right now.”

indeed. a lot of thought and tough discussions.

@jerzone are you doing the erie canal ride?

you* probably don’t want to hear this, but if you clean your pans right after you’re done cooking - before everything dries up - it’s a lot easier.

* it me. i don’t want to hear this.

today was a day.

@annika they have IT people answering the phones at the IRS, so i dunno maybe your passport application is being reviewed by a janitor

@cabel we used to rent 3d animation demos on VHS from Tower Records.

@hotdogsladies Merlin! maybe Grady can explain The Contraption™️ https://youtube.com/watch?v=5_B1Mq02wcI

@beep @jessamyn and the cooking percentages. ask @hotdogsladies

@mathowie this is so awesome for me. i probably won’t get the opportunity to do this kind of trip myself. i really appreciate you sharing it with us.

i need a weekend to recover from my weekend.

i started to put this into a reply, but then i thought the folks who follow me might enjoy following along. @mathowie just got back from a trip to japan where he posted a lot of great photos. thank you, matt, for sharing this with us. traveling with you vicariously has been great. edit: matt replied there will be a mega blog post monday!

@annika you remind me that i have a vimrc in my dot repo https://github.com/mikesusz/dotrepo and i mostly stole bits and pieces from random friends and old-school twitter folks and i’m not even sure what half of this does. :) i should figure it out.

in searching for a pride/ally flag sticker, i found progress pride stickers inscribed into state shapes.

@hotdogsladies Coo coo coo

@m750 thanks. shop confirmed alternator seized, quoted me a price for that and a belt. they can get it done a lot quicker than i could.

when i realized the alternator was seized up, i had a follow-up thought: what if that’s not the only problem? and so.

today my car was in the shop and my dog was in the shop. the dog is home, the car is still away.

in case you’re wondering why i’m putting so much effort into keeping my 13 year old janky car running by myself, hi!

check out my site at https://mikesusz.dev

i’m looking for remote senior front-end dev opportunities, help me support local automotive repair businesses by hiring me so i can use that income to pay a mechanic.

the next challenge - car still won’t start. cranks really slowly and dies out. i’m wondering what the heck.
after i try to start it i go poke around and find the serpentine belt is warm. hmm.

so i have one of my kids crank the starter and i watch everything on the serpentine belt. i see the alternator turn about 5% then stop, and the starter slowly drags the belt
over the alternator pulley until it runs out of battery.

so, alternator now. whee.

@jerzone heh yeah, Genesee County and Wyoming County in NY

@jerzone yep, orange with black stripes. yellow on bottom most of the time.

@jerzone wild to see Genesee & Wyoming, i didn’t realize they became a huge short-line conglomerate (i remember seeing G&W back in western New York State where i grew up)

@overholt i guess those are ‘inspirational’ posters, kinda like an angry dad is ‘inspirational’

@jerzone when we moved back to NH from Seattle we did a long road trip, partly through southern Wyoming. we saw those and thought “what the heck?” but then we saw the gates that could be swung to block off the highway, and we put 2 + 2 together.

New England seems well-prepared for this nor’easter storm weekend.

teaching my kids how to drive means teaching them … situational pessimism.

very different from everything else i’ve had to impart upon them. but this is like, the first clear and present danger, where consequences are enormous and you can only control a fraction of the inputs.

@jerzone drill/driver

@5t3ph Grid it!
into shape

@marcamos “hey guys, don’t make dad decrement again.”

Jack Stands.

...

“He sure does!”

don’t worry - i used a delicate blend of science and engineering to fix it.

welp. when i followed ford’s instructions to “yank wildly upwards on the airbox to remove” i did indeed dislodge the hood latch release cable. and broke it.