Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

All-Haiku Bowl Predictions, 2023

Based on the popularity existence of last year’s article predicting bowl games in haiku form, I present to you this year’s all-haiku bowl game predictions. Still America’s only all-haiku college football bowl game predictions.

These are listed in order of date (earliest first). Some picks are whom I think will win, and some picks are whom I want to win. I’ll leave it to you, the reader, to decide which is which.
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First Big Snow

At the very end of Thanksgiving break, we got our first real snow of this winter. To celebrate that (or commiserate, your choice), here are some photos.

snow covering a fir tree

snow covering a Japanese maple tree

snow covering some trees

snow covering a driveway

snow covering a bottlebrush plant

He showers snow like wool; He scatters the frost like ashes.

Psalm 147:16

Two-Factor Authentication

A number of sites and services are switching to 2-factor authentication, rather than just a simple username and password. So you’d login, but then have to enter a code sent to you by email or text before it will finish the login.

So far many of the places I use have that as an option, not mandatory. And I don’t opt in, but for a lot of the places I end up having to do the same steps anyway.

The reason: I forget passwords.

Here’s a typical login scenario from me. I enter my username and password, the site rejects it. I then enter my username and another password, and the site rejects it. At this point, I don’t want to enter a third bad password, in case they’re strict with their lockout protocol, so I select the forgot password link.

The site then sends me a reset link, I follow that and select a new password (usually the first password I tried), and then I’m good.

It’s about the same steps as standard 2-factor stuff, but in an unofficial manner.

then they would say to him, “Just say, ‘Shibboleth.'” But he said, “Sibboleth,” for he was not prepared to pronounce it correctly. Then they seized him and slaughtered him at the crossing places of the Jordan. So at that time forty-two thousand from Ephraim fell.

Judges 12:6

All-Haiku Bowl Results, 2022

Okay, okay, it is 2023 at this point, but the results are headlines as 2022 because they match with the 2022 predictions made in 2022 for the 2022 season. Also, the results are not all-haiku, just the predictions were. A more accurate title would be “Results for the All-Haiku Predictions made in 2022”.

Before the bowl games commenced for this past college football season, I made some predictions. Here, for your reading enjoyment, is the tally of those predictions. Note that the results are not in haiku form, in contrast to the predictions.
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Christmas Break 2022

I’m on holiday this week, so no real blog post.

I will take this time to mention that around here, we don’t put the wise men at the Nativity, because they didn’t arrive until a couple years after Jesus was born. But I think you should be allowed to have the wise men at your Christmas display if you note they are the wise men from two years ago. Then you get into all sorts of time travel logistical problems, such as shouldn’t the baby Jesus then be the toddler Jesus, and how can you have the baby Jesus and the toddler Jesus in the same place? Maybe it’s best just to keep the Wise Men apart from the manger to show the time distance that way.

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem

Matthew 2:1

Sky Tubes

Some Wife and I have different philosophies on some things, one of which is turning on lights in hallways.

I prefer to have light so I can see to not step on whatever things the kids have strewn about the hallway.

She thinks its a waste of electricity for such a short distance, especially during the daytime when there’s enough residual light.

We went back and forth for a while. Years, in fact. I leave the room and turn on the light; she follows and turns it off. Or vice-versa. Not that she was following me just to turn off the light – it’s just that if we are going somewhere that’s how it usually works out.

I got tired of flipping the light switch, especially as there is plenty of light available, just not in the interior hallway. If only there were a way to get outside light inside the house.

Behold, the magic of skylight tubes! They are perfect for a situation such as our upstairs hallway, where there is no place for a window to the outside, and the ceiling has an attic above it.

So I bought one to install. That took me a couple of weekends working on it part time, and had a bit of a learning curve. Plus the attic was tall enough that I had to buy some extension tubes.

But I got it in, and it worked. But the light wasn’t impressive. A number of reviews had said that one skylight tube looks bleak, but add a second one and it is much better. The sum is greater than the parts, or something like that.

So I bought another one and installed it. Installation was about 4 hours one Saturday this time – much quicker the second time around.

Here are the main steps, in case you’re interested.

  • Cut a hole in the ceiling drywall
  • install the interior diffuser
  • go into the attic, find the interior diffuser, and mark a spot on the south-facing roof that lines up with the diffuser.
  • cut a hole in the roof
  • go on the roof and install the exterior dome and flashing
  • go back in the attic and connect the diffuser and dome via shiny tubes
  • clean up

I must agree with the other reviewers – having two skytubes is more than twice as good as one skytube.

Here are the before and after pictures, although I don’t have any with just the one skytube.

Before, with the bedroom door fully shut.

image of a hallway that is dark because doors are closed

Before, with the bedroom door mostly shut. This is how it usually was.

image of a hallway that is dark because doors are mostly closed or slightly open

After, with the door fully closed.

image of a hallway that is bright because of skylight tubes

After, looking from the bedroom doorway.

image of a hallway that is bright because of skylight tubes

End result: I’m pleased with them. They do what they’re supposed to do, and now Some Wife and I don’t disagree on the hallway light switch. The skytubes were more expensive than the electricity we’re saving, but overall it was worth it.

Your life would be brighter than noonday; Darkness would be like the morning.

Job 11:17

No Blog Post This Week

Rough week over here. Tune in next time.