kaizen
what's been floating my boat lately:
  • hiking

  • "How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don't think."
    -Hitler-
    "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
    -Albert Einstein-


    11/5/23 (15:41)

  • Haven't had a day off in the last couple weeks. Trying to get as much done with the new house as possible, especially before Thanksgiving vacation and the rains start.
  • The most difficult beams in the building have been replaced so it's relatively easy carpentry from here on. Still a lot of work, but it's not as difficult.
  • Evidentally I didn't upload the page at all last month even though there were a few updates.

  • 10/31/23 (15:08)

  • CTC was pretty much what I expected. Very steep in portions. Relentless and punishing, but doable. Took us 15 hours total including several stops to check the route, eat, drink, rest, admire the view, etc. 21+ miles and almost 11,000 feet in elevation gained. Backpacker Magazine has it as the 5th hardest day hike in the country so there's that. Knee was sore the next day and my traps were sore from wearing a heavy backpack all day. Other than that, no lasting damage. Actually had an easier time that night and the next day than when we did Grand Canyon. Something about that one was really tough for me. I think it was the stopping for an hour at the bottom and having so much downhill to start. Happy to have done it. Happy to be done with it.
  • If everyone buys index funds what are the downsides of that? I don't know enough to say, but it seems like everyone knows by now that index funds are the best strategy for long term growth (at least they have been looking backwards). But what if everyone dumps their money into them? Does that make them better, worse, or the same? Seems like dangerous groupthink, but I have no evidence or theory about why this wouldn't be a good macro level strategy in the long term. We'll see.
  • Been working at the new house a bit lately. Working on framing and structural work. Engineer made assumptions about the shape of the existing foundation that don't make any sense. Unfortunately it looks like we'll need to underpin the existing foundation. This will require a lot of difficult work. Not a simple fix and outside of what I'm comfortable doing so I'm currenly looking for help on this.
  • Currently the entire structure is being help up by steel beams and temporary shoring so we can do our structural work. Had a few union guys out over the weekend and I worked with them on replacing the two main beams in the front of the building. Hopefully we can finish that this weekend. Since they are union guys who work during the week they will only help us out on the weekend, but it's better than nothing and they are better carpenters than me or any of my guys so it's good to have the skilled help. My guys and I will do all the easier stuff.
  • Since 2020 social welfare spending is up, prison population is down, money supply is up, inflation is up, crime is up, drug overdose deaths are up.
  • Liberals my entire life have complained about military spending and remarked on the opportunity cost of spending all that on the military when we could (supposedly) spend small % of it on some pet program that would lift millions out of poverty. That's the narrative. Meanwhile we are now spending more on debt payments than on the military. Media seems silent on this. Liberals are silent on this. I think it's a moral wrong to put our kids and grandkids into debt at this level for the long term just so we can have nice stuff today. Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine. COVID payouts due to government shut downs. Trump tax cuts. Not going after big corporations to pay their taxes. Social security and other welfare spending which mostly goes to old people who have had their entire lives to get their shit together. It's morally reprehensible.
  • We whould invert our spending. Instead of giving 20%+ of our federal outlays to old people, we should be giving it to babies and kids to make sure they have a better start in life. SS payments to grandma would be better spent on a newborn's family that needs childcare, early education, a birth savings account, etc. I've heard Democrats ask for spending on some of this stuff, but with them it's always "yes and..." And now that we have high interest rates, our debt payments are ridiculous because no one is willing to balance the budget.

  • 10/18/23 (14:42)

  • I fucking hate my job sometimes. It seems cool to fix things and make cool stuff, but half of it is setting up meetings with city inspectors, emailing engineers and architects and homeowners about shit that doesn't matter or is only required because of government bureaucrats. An endless loop of questions and answers that yield more questions. Here's an idea - let's just fucking build things and move on. Insurance and bonding and replacing stolen tools and dealing with employees who can't get their pants on in the morning. People and society have a way of sucking the pleasure out of everything.
  • 10 months into the year and the city still refuses to do anything of substance with the homeless encampment in front of our warehouse. They are going to have a meeting about it soon (supposedly). What a joke.
  • What it comes down to is that I like to get things done and other people like to talk. Talking is nice because it makes people feel heard and validated and they get things off their chest and all that touchy feely girl shit. Not for me. Sorry.
  • This weekend we're going to Palm Springs for CTC. 21 miles, 10,800' gained. Nervous about it. Going to be hot, but we'll be climbing fast so we should get ahead of the heat. Not in the best shape right now and wish I had trained more, but I hate training and really don't have a lot of spare time. Which brings me to...
  • Work at the new house is underway. Contractors were there last week and this week lifting the structure so we can do our work of replacing it piece by piece (not quite, but kinda).
  • Why is every crappy software company constantly "upgrading" their software? Seems like they are just justifying their jobs at this point. It's not all bug fixes and security updates. It's minor graphics changes and crap. Most of the time I get Android updated it actually introduces new bugs into the phone. Often with Bluetooth. It's just amazing that all these people do this shit and software still has problems constantly. I've said it for 25+ years - just make the shit work and stop tinkering with it.

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    10/11/23 (13:51)

  • When the Golden Gate Bridge was built less than 100 years ago it cost about $600 million (adjusted for inflation). Today it will cost about $400 million to install nets to prevent people jumping to their death from the bridge. This says a lot about modern society. The costs are out of control. But also the fact that we're building nets under a bridge so people don't jump off says a lot as well. Maybe it's good or maybe not. But that's our society today vs. 1937.

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