Your leaking thatched hut during the restoration of a pre-Enlightenment state.

 

Hello, my name is Judas Gutenberg and this is my blaag (pronounced as you would the vomit noise "hyroop-bleuach").



links

decay & ruin
Biosphere II
Chernobyl
dead malls
Detroit
Irving housing

got that wrong
Paleofuture.com

appropriate tech
Arduino μcontrollers
Backwoods Home
Fractal antenna

fun social media stuff


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Like my brownhouse:
   February 2024

01: why I'm bad at technical interviews - My knowledge emphasizes practicality over theory and I can't socialize while writing code.
02: purple pie and truffles - Entertaining our new uphill neighbor and her new boyfriend.
03: at Winter Hoot, 2024 - Introducing friends to friends at a nearby folk festival.
04: more trouble from cheap valve powerheads - I should've just spent the money buying standard Honeywell zone valves.
05: double-salted pasta is even more delicious - The experiment runs itself when Gretchen gets back from work this evening.
06: Ray is more optimistic than Punxsutawney Phil - He doesn't need a groundhog to tell him winter is ending; for him, it ends at the beginning of February.
07: Ashokan Reservoir starting to freeze - It's a little late in the year for this to be happening, but it's not the latest.
08: the forces on a one-arm toilet paper roll holder - They're high, so such devices have to be built more robustly than they usually are. Also, our friend Andrea comes up on the train from Washington, DC.
09: Charlotte races home - What she does when the peanuts I am bribing her with run out.
10: ladder on ladder - A method of easily getting up a roof valley. Also, a discussion of fame over rigatoni.
11: circuit breaker box swap in Old Hurley - Ray and Nancy's old garage subpanel was defective and not expandible, so it had to go.
12: Charlotte's first bath - She has itchy skin so we're trying a new shampoo.
13: big snow that wasn't - Instead of eight inches we get maybe a quarter of an inch.
14: Valentine's Day 2024 - Partially blocked in the parking lot behind Apizza in New Paltz by a Tesla.
15: field work subjects - Gretchen and I are interviewed by some SUNY New Paltz students and I try my hand at cutting out keyboards held by tiny rivets.
16: live music on my birthday - We eat Mexican food and see Squirrel Flower at in Woodstock.
17: four hour film - YouTube has made it difficult to watch films like Killers of the Flower Moon.
18: pieced-together ruin - Fixing a shattered cup while high on kratom.
19: right-ear medication also works in the left ear - So a vet told me at the Ulster County SPCA.
20: Neville vs. Charlotte with respect to Brigitte the Dog - Charlotte easily freaks out, but Neville knows how to handle even the most aggressive dogs.
21: one of the most combustible materials in nature - Preparing the house for Fern while we are off in Mexico City.
22: landing in Mexico City - After yet again not being able to find comfort on a plane.
23: walk to the Zocalo - Also, ordering way more food than we can eat and not always loving it.
24: dreadful restaurant service in Mexico City - At two separate meals, we find the service to be remarkably bad, though we actually leave a tip for one of those.
25: Frida Kahlo Museum - We ride rented bikes down and back. Bikes are, it turns out, a great way to get around Mexico City.
26: why Mexico City doesn't have many rock doves - A hypothesis based on the long period of civilization present prior to the arrival of Europeans.
27: Teotihuacan - Visiting an ancient pre-Aztec site northwest of Mexico City.
28: leaving Mexico City - Xanax takes me all the way to Indiana.
29: impulse romanesco - I drive to Woodstock to pick up dinner and then am tempted by a trippy brassica in the grocery store.