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Here we are in the third month. Cool but not bad, little sun. Life good. Fool around with the Arkansaw dictionary occasionally, future arkaeologsts may want to see just how summovus talked.
I's thinking, long time actually, 'bout makin one of these. Dunno if they exist, ain't never seen one. Cordless everthing, specially drills and such, once a particular design or product is out of production good luck findi' batteries. Had a helluva collection of the old Craftsman stuff, Classic Craftsman I call it, the 19.2 stuff. Damn good, was usin' some buildin' the house but the last of the batteries finally went. Dang ole nicads still better than lithium, my head contractor used Ryobi, good stuff, they made some of the old Craftsman stuff I got. Dang good lillo chainsaw, no good now without batteries. Sure, you can find aftermarket stuff on Amazon, got some, wasn't worth a damn. So I got a bunch of good tools can't use. Got a load of the B&D stuff, 20v and 40v and pretty good but what'll happen in a few years when the batteries change? Hell, had old Harbor Freight stuff, 14.4 and 18, pair of each, built a board fence around an acre, that's over eight hunnerd feet and they still had a lot of life in'em. New stuff got different batteries. Of course that the general idea, people could use stuff forever they wouldn't buy as much new stuff. I get it, people suck. Anyway I sez why don't somebody make a variable power supply, six to thirty six or whatever, come to think of it I got a 40 volt post hole digger, and there 48 volt stuff. Anyhow you build this doohickey, put out any voltage at whaver amps you want, make an adapter out of an old battery shell for whatever tool you got, give it ten, twenty foot cords, whatever. Now the tool got a cord and a box you carry around but you don't have to be close to AC power, which is the reason for cordless tools. And it won't electrocute you too bad like 120, I's thinkin about gettin' a cheapo 120 chainsaw and one of them battery packs you can take around where you working, but if'n I got shocked it'd probly be as bad as bein plugged into the wall. Anyhow, there ya'go if somebody want to takle it. Might get rich, and bein' rich comes in mighty handy these days. Just don't keep it all in the bank or someday you wake up and ain't rich no more.
Figured to collect these a while back and never got one of them circular tuit thingies. Got probly three of four from the eighties, decent. Better than you't think in fact, seein's how a lot of movie books are. Dunno who the author is, or are, as Dane Hartman seems to be a pseudoym used by several writers, which would explain how they cranked out a dozen in three years:
This the 40-volt version. Little 20V pretty good, not much I can't do with it, but some of the heavier stuff goes quicker with this. Got a 12 inch bar 'stead of the 10-inch on the 20v. Need a 14" but Black and Decker don't make anything bigger. Need to all use the same batteries, unless I invent that thang up there. If I need to I'll get something, if it the only tool using that battery OK if I really need a bigger one. Anyhow that seems to work pretty good for now. Cleaned up one of the big-ass Juniperus virginiana last year and started on the second so this should make short work of the other. Okey-dokey. Local likker stores seem to be short on Old Charter lately. Forgot to stock up last week and got too busy to go to Jonestown, was lucky enough to score a couple liters locally. Likker stores around here ain't what they used to be. Figure the prices higher than my usual sources, good thing I ain't worried about money. Anyhow, I'm writing an autobio and was thinkin' on some things about my earlier years. Now mom and dad was puritanical as you could 'cept actual Puritans drank alcohol. Way they talked in my house, kinda whisper about someone I hear he drinks or someone or other runs around on their husband/wife and thought everybody about like us, hardly anybody drank or smoked (in our little Baptist church there were some smokers, this being before it was supposed to cause cancer and most of them quit) and in my family anyway you not only didn't drink or smoke or cuss or spit - actually we'd spit outside if nobody looking - or dance, play cards or shoot pool. The gambling association being thing on cards and billiards. But there was a half dozen likker stores, and I didn't think about why. I didn't think about likker. Or adultery. Found out there was dam few in the county what didn't drink, most of them a lot, or adulderate. Lots of adultery. But that was later. One ole feller, Dad knew him, they talked now and them, had the best deal goin. Two railroads crossed at Front and Commercial streets, right there in the corner, old west railroad town style (which Wynne kinda was) was a hotel/restaurant like the old west. Hotel wasn't used by the time I growed up, but the restaurant was open and folks workin' downtown had lunch there some. I went there a time or three with someone or other. Folks owned it, had some other businesses, two kids (of three) were homosexual, pretty rare two in one family. Third one was a macho dude, built hot rods and drag raced at local tracks. The brothers died, typically young, one a murder victim (unsolved) at 27 and the other at 41 (AIDS). Okey-dokey. Knew the younger one, palled around with some of the same kids he did. I was interested in the girls, not sure why he was there, sometimes girls like guys like that to hang with. Nice enough kid, they usually are. Smoked some joints together now and then, drunk some likker too. Anyhow, in the tumescence of time as one of my favorite firearms journalists used to say, the old hotel was closed, just sittin' there on the corner a stone's throw (for Nolan Ryan anyway) from the railroad intersection. Dad said in his day that was a busy place weekend nights, people down there eatin' and drinkin' and bein' merry, that was the 1930s I reckon, but fifty years later it kinda dead. Back side of the hotel was a building with an alley running by it, ole feller (the one Dad knew) had a likker store there, you drive in the alley and get you some likker quick like at the drive-in window, if you didn't want to get out of the car and go in, and that was a right popular place on account of all them people that drunk likker there was more'n a few rather not be seen buying it. I growed up and graduated from high school and didn't go to college, another of Dad's friends suggested I might want to work at the bank, meaning he'd like to have me on account of me (like my older siblings) having a reputation for genius. Honor students and all. So I went through the usual stuff at the bank, in the bookkeeping department filing checks and mailing statements, bein a teller and taking the money the customers brought in, and ole man Dad knew in there early Monday morning with bags of money. Sometimes one teller would close her (most of them was wimmen) window and help another teller count all that money they brought in. And he had some for sure. Likker mostly cash then, probably still a lot of cash. Is for me, likker and smokes I pay cash, no record in the computers. Most people just swipe the card, or poke it or whatever the goverment knows what you bought and how much the likker-seller got, so no dodging taxes like before. Dad said the dude tole him once, I've made a lot of money. Reckon he did. Pretty much guaranteed to. I did know a feller went bust with a Radio Shack (golden goose back in the 70s), and insurance company, and a likker store. But that another story for another time. Anyhow, the old hotel burnt down one night, cold night. Nothing suspicious about that, a useless building with a pretty big theoretical dollar value but in reality near worthless, and the fire department came and put it out, took a while. Water from the fire trucks froze up on the walls of the likker store behind the hotel (like a mini local ice storm) and the wall fell over. The local state alcohol enforcement agency, forget what that was, got a call, said people are over there looting that likker store. Feller was a cousin once removed or some such from me, said call the mayor and tell him. To which the caller replied, No problem, he's got his truck over there. Every place is Peyton Place.
Finished Aztec Blood and taking a break to revisit a favorite extant author. Clayton writes some rough stuff, which is to say he tells it like it is, and sometimes I have to take a break in the middle of one and go outside for an early libation and a smoke. Anyhow Shirley F'n Lyle (introduced in Outlaw Stinky Joe was seriously rough. As in a fat hooker who'll do anything and anything can get near disgusting. Described as 'a hundred pounds north of a big girl' she pretty big. Figger well over two hundred maybe three. Even though there's a nominally hot Ukrainian stripper, got one boob bigger than the other. A little wide in the hips I can live with but asymmetrical boobs, if it's noticeable, dunno. Anyway Shirley got nasty enough in the Stinky Joe adventure it shouldn't get much worse. Be some killin' for sure, but the action is pretty tense a good bit of the time. So we'll see what happens. Still haven't read Tread yet, came in a couple weeks ago and got busy with other stuff. Grass growin' and until June gonna be busy, depending on rain. Like a nice wet and mild summer for the trees but mowing is time-consuming then there ain't much of a surplus of time. Speaking of libations and smokes.... catchyalater.
Bein' the end of March I might as well close this out and start a new one. End-of-quarter too, that used to be important. End of month too but end-of-quarter was busier in a bank. Up all night printin' reports distributing, big piles of greenbar paper. Prez would come by with the operations VP, have to run the general ledger updates a half dozen times sometimes, make some changes, run'em again. He smoked a pipe and him and the VP go over to the boardroom and pour some whiskey in them glasses with the bank logo in gold, whiskey and Coke. Candyasses. Just kiddin', I drink it that way too. Fact is you got a couple of ounces at a time, don't take long to drink it straight. Not that I ever seen that many guys drink it straight anyhow, 'less they trying to show how manly they was. Seen plenty of that. But you get it just right, bout two ounces of Old Charter and six to eight of Coke, plenty of big ice cubes and we good to go. Seegar - City Life mangos and sweets this week - and watch the sunset. At midnight watch the string of Blackhawks crossing north and south. Dunno what they doin' but they been doin' it for a couple years now. Writin' my autobiography, since the fifty year graduation comin' up. Every ten years the poor fellow that gets stuck with trackin' everybody down - the extant ones that is - sends out letters to whatever address they can get for you. With my family bein' so big they generally find me whether I want to be found or now. Guy I graduated with I's talkin' to one day, after the one ten years ago, said ne never went, I said me neither. Mostuv them sunsabitches didn't like me forty years ago I doubt if much changed. I didn't like most of them either, so there you are. Title is Worse Than I Thought, subtitled From Peyton Place to Dilbert World, cause that's what it's been. Only I retired from Dilbert World a while back and don't miss it at all. Not even the money. Seeya next month. Text in images  Sun 31 Mar 2024 08:52:28 PM CDT |
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