Building the Shack, Part 12

Ended up spending most of the winter on the walls, working on warm days. Started by cutting and stapling sheet plastic over the frame where the walls would go.

Collected usable scrap lumber from around the property. Angle cut boards on the table saw to 30°. Made perpendicular cuts in the workshop with hand-held circular saw.

Started on the west wall. Didn’t beat the snow. Got most of the west wall nailed into place standing on saw horses. Finished on the extension ladder.

East wall was the most complicated. Hung the entension ladder on the roof peak from the foot of the banking, being careful of the picture window.

Made a platform with the ladder, to get the board above the window nailed into place. Steadied the ladder by running ratcheting straps out from the side windows, and finished the roof peak late one night in February under freezing drizzle.

South wall easier. Stood on the block of styrofoam from the picture window installation to get the top board in place. Worked up from the bottom. Recut the final board a few times.

North wall finished last. Cut the final board trapezoidally by hand.

Finished this afternoon, in sunny 45° spring weather.

Caulking needed in places, but walls are in place.

YouTube Captioning: Duck and Cover

So many more captioned YouTube videos at YouTubeCapper.Blogspot.com. Create your own embeddable captioned YouTube videos here.

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You need Flash player 8+ and JavaScript enabled to view this video.
And to the sound of the Dumb Dumb song, we welcome you to a classic piece of WTF.
The Allegory of Bertrand Russell
Clearly.
Wh-? Where did-?!

Oh god, the monkey was a suicide bomber!

He didn’t speak unless spoken to…
“FOR THE CAUSE -!”
*bits of dead monkey begin to fall*
“Plod along mindlessly, and withdraw within yourself when there’s unrest.”
*instinctively mashes the Top Menu button*
“…any unathorized rebroadcast, retransmission, or relocation without the express written consent of the Civil Defense Administration is prohibited.”
I think Bert’s pretty much “out” already.
“You’re a puss.”
Scenes from “Burt the Turtle Fights VD”
Emotionally?
Sometimes monkeys just blow themselves up.
“Under my hairpiece, children.”
But do we understand its needs?
“Such as school desegregation.”
Alert the FBI if you see anyone talking to unknown fires in your neighborhood.
Hitler!
“If you ever need to drill a fire.”
“Herbie: Fully Loaded” should be avoided at all costs.
“Our ragamuffins shall protect us from the cars.”
Or risk suburban ostracism.
Pre-Tweens
Chances are you won’t.
If you’re not lucky enough to be vaporized instantly.
Or will again.
Miss Rumphius: Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
“Burn your shadow into the pavement…”
“It can menace people near drugstores, and smoke marijuana.”
Please. Bert is boiled like a sweet in there.
“Oh yeah. Oh god yeah.”
Did you know your homeowner policy doesn’t cover atomic brinksmanship?
Shame-wise
With your face?
Cover your back with your septum.
“Isn’t this f*cking bullsh*t? Wouldn’t we f*cking die anyway?”
“Shut the f*ck up, Betty.”
Sometimes you will see the monkey, sometimes you will not.
“Permission to go faster, sir.”
“PBS. No, the Mrs. Slocum’s Pussy tote bag is at the $200 level.”
“Does that look like an atomic bomb to you?”
You may be playing with yourself when the signal comes.
FASTER! TRAMPLE EACH OTHER, YOU F*CKERS! THE WEAK WILL NOT REPRODUCE UNDER THE NEW ORDER!
“Galactus!”
In your perfectly pressed suit.
Near the liqueur cabinet.
If you’re in Chinatown…
“It’s in my soundproofed apartment, right up there…”
“Let go of my elbow.”

“Forget it, baby. It’s… Chinatown.”

“…you may encounter a Beatnik.”

“Me?”

Unless you’re The Flash.
“When they dump your books, dive into a fetal position, screaming like a little girl. Watch…”
“Ugod! Wah! Stopit! Stopit! Aaugh!”
“See how he’s wet himself?”
“That’ll keep them from stuffing you in the janitor’s cart.”
“Expect them to spit on you. Fortunately, no one can jack off fast enough to soil you in that manner.”
I’ll take my chances with the bomb, thank you.
Except the room itself.
“IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD, KIDS! INCEST! DRUGS! WAAAH! HA HA HA HA!”
“…they’ll never live down the shame.”
“Out of my way, b*tch!”
“Too bad they won’t be around to enjoy it.”
“A feeble attempt, really.”
“Future civilizations will be amused by the shapes they leave in the half-molten topsoil.”
GAH! They are!
Did she put her head through the cladding?
Or her head will be preserved, anyway.
“Tony regularly wets the bed as a result. Tony’s dad beats him.”
Tony, can I recommend the other side of the wall?
Tony thinks that if he can’t see the shockwave, it can’t see him.
“Notice how he weeps, and curses Oppenheimer.”
Any unnecessary rubbing or thrusting he does is condoned by the United States Government.
“He’s armed, so be careful of him in the ensuing anarchy.”
“No matter how mad his demands.”
The armored schoolbus
“Has it ever been cleaned down here?!”
“The glass may melt and splash across your body, casting your final scream in a hideous crystalline death mask.”
“Stop eating the cooking fuel!”
If they know what’s good for them.
Or they believe it, and that’s the important bit for civil control.
As long as it’s made of 3″ thick lead.
“Which shouldn’t be much of anywhere, or you’ll just be getting what’s coming to you, you slut.”
That could have gone so many kinds of wrong.
“In all likelihood, falling structures will do this for you.”
“Seriously, what the f*ck?”
“Review the life flashing before your eyes, as the air fills with a sound and smell of sizzling bacon.”
“…lose that virginity fast.”
Kill every monkey you see.
Don’t call him Barry Allen?
Next from Astoria Public Schools, don’t miss “It’s a M.A.D., M.A.D., M.A.D., M.A.D. Cold War.”
Capped by Space Toast
YouTubeCapper.blogspot.com

The YouTube Captioning Thing Upgraded

I’ve added a second mode to the YouTube Captioning Thing. The original version allowed you to create a running commentary beneath any embeddable YouTube video. The new version has a second mode where the captions appear directly on top of the video. Here’s a demo:

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You need Flash player 8+ and JavaScript enabled to view this video.
The original Lloyd Thaxton was a retired Grand Rapids machinist who would stand in a long raincoat and leer at the camera for an hour a day. His program ran from 1952-1960.
Back when you had to be drunk to work as a television announcer.
“With a sound as gay as their sportcoats!”

*crowd cheers*

The escalation in Vietnam?
“And other pop culture cliche crap! DAMMIT, JACK, WHERE’D YOU-? Oh, it’s in my hand…”
Thank god we invented teen sex.
What’s Dorothy doing back there? The Funky Mashed Chicken Potato?
This is what the hep crowd would be doing on a Friday night if Strom Thurmond had won the Presidency.
Where?
That’s Lake Michigan.
Well, there are a few.
I thought you said there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.
.
o
O
(Two more verses! I can make it!)

*puff puff*

The abandoned mortuary?
Maybe the old vomit factory?
Oh! The weird church on the dump road, in that trailer.
Over… over here now, dude.
Hello?
.
o
O
(It can’t be my healthy 3-pack-a-day habit, why am I so beat?)
Gomez Adams: Bandleader
The grand tradition of American songs that use up their material in 90 seconds but just keep f*cking going.
Thinking about Rayon dress pants on a bicycle seat, I hope this guy didn’t have balls when he started doing this.
Dorothy, what are you doing?
Wait, he’s not really singing!
“WE’RE EASILY ENTERTAINED!”
“Anyone got some Gold Bond?”
“…he’ll never work in this business again.”
That’s the choke.
Christian Bale, Nixon Youth
“Ixnay on your ex-life-say.”
“David, I understand you’re warehoused at the vocational school…”
“Michelle, you’re not any part negro are you? It doesn’t work on negros.”
“The same.”
*jing jing!*
Do the faggoty little ribbons come with it?
“–and fight.”
Wait, what?
Is this Britain during the rationing?
“But none for you, Dorothy — I said ‘dancers.'”
“CANNED GOODS!”
And the teenagers rebel by going away.
Capped by Space Toast
YouTubeCapper.Blogspot.com

Korean Hangul Cheat Sheet

This is a cheat sheet for cramming the basic phonemes of Korean. It’s a printable PDF, and a first draft. I’ve noted the approximate sounds in English and Hindi, because Hindi has a better phonetic alphabet. It’s mostly based on this guy’s YouTube video. (He doesn’t give his name, and I’m not going to look for it.) I number the order of the phonemes in the syllable blocks, rather than using his LRB/TMB system. Corrections welcome.

The Fiddlers of Rome

Sneering, populist climate science denialism from a self-described Libertarian is nothing shocking, but it should be a bit beneath the New York Times science page. I’m beginning to think the best thing to do is just to sneer back, and keep asking questions about those lovely secondhand robes they’ve bought from the Emperor.

Leaving aside the question of whether libertarian philosophy is even flexible enough to mount a response to a problem with personalized rewards but socialized consequences, let’s make sure we understand why this is denialism, and not skepticism. Climate change “denialism” relies not on a single set of arguments, but on several tiers, whose only commonality is a defense of inaction on the issue:

  1. I don’t “believe” in climate change, because of X,Y, Z
  2. If you show that X,Y,Z are invalid, I will find new arguments U,V,W
  3. If you demolish U,V,W, I will say that even if climate change is happening, there is no evidence that it is anthropogenic because of A,B,C
  4. A,B,C become D,E,F through the same process that produced U,V,W
  5. When D,E,F fall, I will argue that there’s no evidence that it will be harmful
  6. When harm is shown, I will pass the buck to the next generation, assuming they will invent some whiz-bang technology to reverse the damage
  7. Why, under libertarian philosophy, anyone in the future would undertake a massive program whose only benefits are social will remain unasked; presumably in the future Libertarians will remain a fringe minority

The scientific consensus on plate tectonics is about as old as I am. It’s been around much longer than that, much like our understanding of the greenhouse effect. To certain generations of Americans, though, the Earth never moved. The geological revolution was a boon to oil and gas exploration, and the free market as a whole. If modern climate science had such a rosy picture to offer, would such an unfortunate gap have ever been opened in the last ten years between scientific consensus and public perception?