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two…
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Plants →
Plants →
Plants, one…
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Atmos →
My father and his father were both members of the International Union of Elevator Constructors. From 1940 thru 2001 they worked on literally every elevator and escalator in and around the Lehigh Valley.
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The Freecycle Network: Don’t throw usable stuff away →
The Freecycle Network™ is made up of thousands of groups with millions of members around the world. It’s a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (and getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Each local group is moderated by local volunteers. Membership is free.
To sign up, find your community freecycle list by searching on the Freecycle web site.
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Imanishi →
Brown Santa just brought me an Imanishi 8k ceramic waterstone from Lee Valley… “scary sharp”, coming up!
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Oak →
100 year old Oak, cut down by my father in 2009. Let’s see what was going on in 1909?
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Portnoy →
Retiring server after 9 years of flawless operation. RIP “Portnoy”!
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Tree →
Storm damage and dead wood trimmed; Tree’s in decline, but looking good for Spring.
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BookMooch: free, used-book swapping →
BookMooch.com is a huge (as in: 100,000’s of books), free, book swapping site. Why buy a new book when you can save one from the landfill?
It’s free to join and create your account. You start out by posting up some books which you are willing to give away. If someone would like one of your books, they request to “mooch” it from you. If you accept the mooch, you simply ship it to them paying the postage. In return you get a bookmooch “point”.
If you see a book you want, you can request to mooch it. (If the owner accepts, they ship it to you and they pay the postage.) Each mooch costs you one point. You earn points when someone mooches a book from you; you get 1 point for within-the-U.S. mooches, and 3 points if you’re willing to ship internationally. You also get 1/10 of a point for each book you list in your moochable inventory.
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Pardon me? →
I lobbied for a new idea: Let’s stop talking to each other from different rooms. Let’s take the time to find the other person, and to wait until they are ready to listen before we begin speaking. I hoped this would eliminate the hearing-related false starts. But to be fair, we agreed this should be a two-way street; We would both work to try this new idea.
Everyone who knows me, knows my hearing is failing. Recently, I realized just how much of the communication at our house was frought with false starts. If my attention wasn’t focused on the speaker, we started most conversations with, “Mumble mumble mumble?” “Pardon me?” “I said, …”
I lobbied for a new idea: Let’s stop talking to each other from different rooms. Let’s take the time to find the other person, and to wait until they are ready to listen before we begin speaking. I hoped this would eliminate the hearing-related false starts. But to be fair, we agreed this should be a two-way street; We would both work to try this new idea.
It turns out, that it’s amazing how much this changes. As the listener, you have time to finish your thoughts. Instead of the speaker demanding your instant attention, you shift your attention when you are ready to listen. As the speaker, you place increased value on the other’s time. You have to invest your time to locate them, and then you have to wait for them to be ready to listen.
People are dubious when I explain this idea. It sounds exactly like the sort of hair-brained, overly pedantic, arrangement people expect me to invent. After all, it is hair-brained and pedantic. And it is life-changing. Try it. Go ahead, I’ll wait.
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