Very Important Subjects

[rosarugosa]

Also--I'm goona repaint my hillbilly shack. The color scheme has already been decided--a drab, two-tone brown. Yup. End of story, except I've got lots of scraping to do. Plus, enclose the front stoop, and also repair the wooden garage door I installed 34 years ago. Also, I'm putting up a totally refurbished portable car port. Plus, I'm thinking about putting some awnings on it. These are the kind with aluminum frames, and plastic tinted shades. Yup. Just hope they are wind-resistant. Not getting bids for any of this stuff. In preparation for this I bought a damaged-salvage 16-foot Aluminum stepladder from a guy on craigslist from whom have purchased other very useful items, before. Isn't that an amazing coincidence? Anyway, the ladder was damaged and twisted, but the seller said "you can fix that", and by gum, he was right! He was asking $80, firm. So, yeah--I spent a week fixing it. But, I also improved it with material I picked up from the curb of a nearby home. It is a stigmatized property, by the way. The house & vacant lot next to him is also stigmatized! The vacant lot across from those two places is also stigmatized! What do you think of THAT? Should I discuss it here, sometime? Or does it creep you out?

I am eagerly awaiting details on the stigmatized properties. Do tell!

[boss mare]

Okay--here's another Household Hint RE: Pets. I've been doing research and experimenting with using wood pellets for pellet stoves as cat litter, during the heating season. At first the test subjects(random cats) were skeptical & wary. But, they caught on. Wood Pellets and unscented cat litter are priced about the same--not quite the same, but close. What I do is dispose of the used pellets in the wood heating stove, droppings and all. Heating season is 5 months m/l, so this should result in a saving$. Plus, no need to dispose of used litter, other than dumping the ashes on the compost heap with leaves and stuff. Hope thatt helps you kids some. Thankk Mee.

I have been using wood pellets for bedding in my horse stalls for over 20 years. When I was at my highest horse population. I was going through a pallet (one ton) about 1 and 1/2 months. Now I am down to three horses and only two of them are home now. I have a manure spreader that does not require a PTO. I just load it all up and spread it on my back field with my ATV pulling it.

[littlebittybobby]

That's a whole lot of pellets, Boss! But, yeah--they do absorb the pee & keep odor down, and last longer than clay litter for catts. Plus the used litter can be composted or burned in a heat stove, if its dry. So, that's good. I would have to DRIVE aways to find them in stock, year around. So, I'm stocking up while the supply at the nearby big-box lasts. I have plastic food storage barrels, to keep the pellet fuel in, and dry. Yup.

[littlebittybobby]

R/R--yes, I've got a history on the 'hood, though it's not complete. Many people don't keep track o' that kinda thing. But as Church Guy said--I'm the neighborhood historian. I just happened to think of a couple more stigmatized properties, in the immediate vicinity. So yeah---I'll have to write up a little something, about it. Maybe, I could get one o' those surplus short buses from the school district on the auction site, repaint it with spooky graphics, and set up a tour of places around here that are stigmatized. There are plenty of them. Like--the India Gas Station up on the corner. There have been two murders in the parking lot, in the last 18 months. So, it's stigmatized. Right now, I've got to tidy up around here, even though I'm not Dutch. Ha. But, it is close to Spring. Yup. But, here's a preview o' one o' the stigmatized properties. Very tragic situation. 2022-03-16 (5).jpg2022-03-16 (5).jpg2022-03-16 (5).jpg

[littlebittybobby]

Okay---over at Aldi's, they've got these choc-lit bars w/almonds. They're much better than brand H bars! So good I don't share them with anybody. I spose that makes me selfish. Ha.

[littlebittybobby]

Okay--here is a couple things, all in one. One, is a project I started Xmas Eve, 2011. It didn't get to the state you see it in the photo until 2021. See---it was a used frame I bought on EBAY. No one else bid on it, so I got it for the reserve of $99,plus $25 shipping. A bare used. 20+ year old bike frame--no wheels, no seat, no handlebars, no pedals, no "sprockets"no chain, no nothing. For $124. Ha. I know you kids are sitting there, thinking: "ONLY somebody like Packy/littlebittybobby would do something THAT dumb!; Yup. I know you're also thinking: lbb, why didn't you just look in a dumpster at an apartment house, near the college campus, and find a bike? ; There's LOTS of old bikes, for way less, at yard sales, ya know. Right? ; Anyway, I figure I got a good deal on this frame, and I initually put it together with stuff I rounded up, plus a set of wheels---with no tires---that I also bought from a guy who took them off his brand-new Cervelo, and put them on EBay. $140 was the price, but since he was local(20 miles away) I met him at a gas station to take delivery & save shipping. Aren't I smart?; He drove up in a brand-new Subbaroo, that was bigger than a 70's Caddallac!; I think he works in the lucrative health care industry, so he obviously can afford it, plus a new Cervelo AND to upgrade his weelz, asap. Ha. Anyway, them weelz were just the ticket, for my project. That bike is a test bed, for trying out stuff. See?; Anyway--as you see it, it is a 2 x 11 speed.; At one point, I told the guy at the bike shop I was making my 1988 bike into an 11-speed, and he expressed doubt. It did take some trial and error. I had spent several hundred $$(which is really not much for bikers in health care, but is a LOT for littlebittymee)and it sat up for over a year, until late one night in the laboratory, I was web surfing, and found a company that makes oddball, aftermarket parts, that has the solution. It was an ingenious little gizmo that cost under $50! So, I put that thing on, and my 11-speed conversion works! But, I wasn't done. See, years before, I had put a used road-bike crank on it, with 52-39 t chainrings. Well, with my 11-speed rear, it sorta worked, but had a bad habit of dropping the chain, when you least expected it. Not a good thing. After much analysis and trial and error, I bought a 49t- new old stock chainring for $40 or so, and guess what? It works fine. See, what you have here is rolling terrain, especially the back roads. It's not like climbing mountain passes in Co.(where the cool people allegedly live), it's these short, sharp 6% grades, one after another, sometimes. Then, level stretches. But, they tend to break your momentum. I see some people out riding up these rollers, young, supposedly-fit people, and they stand up to pedal up these little grades at a slow pace. And here's the deal---I am an old,fat,out-of-shape rider, but this setup lets me go up and down rollers, no problem. Why? Well, and 11-speed rear had a wide range of gear teeth(ratios), but with a closer range, between gears. Plus, using an integrated brake/shift lever, allows for very fast gear changes. This way, you don't break your momentum, going up and down hills. Best way I can explain it. Plus, having an 11-49 top ration gives you a decent gear for level terrain. Okay: I know a lot of crowd-followers have those dorky bikes with fat tires and loud graphics, so they can be faux "mountain bikers", and ride local public bike trails that offer no challlenge, whatever. Ha. Forget following the crowd. To be continued.....

[littlebittybobby]

As you can see, this bike has a VERY compfterble seat. See, one of the bike shops that sells consumer bikes that are better than department store bikes, but are affordable, has a line of bikes called "Liv" which are really Giant-brand, marketed toward wimmin. See? Well, some of these wimmin buy a new Giant "LIV", but immediately want an even MORE compfterble seat(based upon their perceptions & preferences) and so the bike shop obliges them and sells them a really compfterble seat for $100, and because the customer doesn't want an old(but still new)seat cluttering up their place, the bike shop throws the take-off nearly-new seat in a cardboard box off to the side, so that I can go in and rummage around and get an almost NEW take-off seat for $15. Ha. Pretty good deal. I've got one of this same model on several of my bikes, and I take a marking pen and ink out the "LIV" logo. They are VERY compfterble seats! The guy at the bike shop told me that Giant stopped using that model of seat, so I've picked up some spares. Yup. Let's take a break, and I'll tell you about my monster pickup--shown in the background. 102_1422.jpg102_1422.jpg

[littlebittybobby]

And now--a word from our sponsor. Yup. The Meat Locker & CustomAttachment 4277 Abbatoir in Dust Bin, I-Wah. Also, the Clarion Locker is having a special--your pig, plus $400, and looky what you get! Real Food, for REAL I-Wans. Yup. Awesome & Amazing Which reminds me--an I-wah couple I know---good, solid I-wans, have each had their gall bladders removed, in the last year or so! Congratulations, to them! Yup.
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[littlebittybobby]

Jeopardy answer: Expensive toy for consumeristic Dorks. No way would I ride this thing. Hope that helps you some. Thank Mee.2022-03-18 (1).jpg

[rosarugosa]

Well it sounds like you have a unique bike, not another one like it on the planet! Probably not on any of the other planets either.