Stomping in Clown Shoes

Here is a design for an overhead light fixture (see the Creative Commons license notice below).

I’m not really sure I’m going to save any money with this.  I’m spending a lot for a very nice lamp, but economically, I’m not sure the energy and light bulb savings will be worth it.  But then again, that’s not the only reason to do anything.

This lamp will replace the aging standard fixture in the ceiling of my study in a house built in 1965.  This existing fixture is made for two Edison base light bulbs, and switched at the wall near the entry door.  Bo-rrring.

The idea is to stop the 120V wiring at the switch.  There I’ll put in a small DC power supply and a circuit inside the wall box with a special wall plate for the switches mounted on the PC board.  A three wire cable (ground, 24 volts DC, and a 0 – 5 volt square wave) will connect to the overhead fixture.  The lamp will be made of 6 pentagonal printed circuit boards connected together on the edges like the lower half of a dodecahedron (12 sided solid).  Each board will have 5 Cree XLamp MX-6 high-brightness LEDs, 6500 Kelvin (cool white color), for a total of 30 LEDs.

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WARNING
ALL STANDARD DISCLAIMERS APPLY.  THIS DESIGN WILL NOT WORK FOR YOU, DON’T BUILD THIS.  THIS IS NOT FOR BEGINNERS. YOU OR OTHERS CAN BE HURT OR KILLED.  I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING.  EAT YOUR VEGETABLES.  DON’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU READ ON THE INTERNET. TURN OFF THIS COMPUTER NOW.

Problem
I am beginning to have need of additional lighting in my house.  A few years ago, my eyes started to show age, and this is not a trend I expect to reverse itself.  It’s the 21st century, I’m bored with snapping on and off light switches as I move from room to room, so I’m building a few lamps I can use.  These will be especially helpful in stairwells, but also in my basement.

Goals

• Motion activated – this is pretty easy, if nothing in the area is moving, it probably doesn’t need to be illuminated.  This also implies adjustments for sensitivity (will it trigger for me, a cat, or a mosquito) and delay (how long does it stay on after triggering).
• Ambient light sensor – no point turning on a lamp when there’s already enough light
• Energy efficiency – uses pennies worth of juice each year.  Ideally, this works during a grid power outage, and/or is completely self sustaining through auxiliary power generation devices like solar panels, a micro-windmill, or a windbelt humdinger.  It should be bright enough to keep me from tripping over laundry, not for reading.
• Solid state – no maintenance required other than occasional dusting.  Zero recurrent costs.

Vision
Create a device which triggers one or more high-brightness white light LEDs.  Device will use low voltage DC power supply, centrally located to supply multiple devices throughout a house.  Device will be installable using a circular hole saw through existing drywall, power supplied through in-wall wiring.

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How to make pie good enough for cave man.

Fruit pies

This is for a full pie crust, for just the bottom shell, use 1/2 of these amounts:

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons sugar
3/4 cup (a stick and a half) unsalted butter
1/2 cup lard
6 – 8 Tablespoons ice water

Into a large clean bowl completely free of cat hair sift the flour, salt, and sugar.  Cut the butter and lard into the flour mixture with a pastry blender.  Add 6 Tablespoons of ice water, add up to 2 more until the dough comes together.  Use the pasty blender as much as possible, chop the dough… don’t knead it (this is not a pizza, you want it soft and flaky).  When mixed, cut into two lumps and chill.  Then you can make the filling:

Cherry

4 cups (1 quart) fresh pitted cherries
1 3/4 cups sugar
1/4 teaspoon mace
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
2 1/2 Tablespoons quick tapioca
1/3 cup chilled unsalted butter

Blueberry

4 cups (1 quart) fresh blueberries
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon mace
1 Tablespoon lemon juice (half a lemon)
2 1/2 Tablespoons quick tapioca
1/3 cup chilled unsalted butter

Dingleberry
Yes, I’m kidding.

Combine the fruit, sugar, spices and extracts, and tapioca in a bowl, chill and let stand for 20 minutes.

You’re halfway done.  Go pee.  Have a cigarette.  Wash your hands again, with soap this time.  Take a break before flouring up the counter and a rolling pin.

Roll out the crust and line a 9 – 10 inch deep pan, fill with the uh… filling… stuff.  Dot the top with the butter, you don’t have to use up all of it.  Add top crust, crimp the edges very high, cut steam vent holes (carve “HARE” on top  Get it?  Hare Pie.  Nyuk nyuk nyuk).

For top crust pies, bake on top of a cookie sheet covered with metal foil in a hot oven at 425 degrees Fahrenheit for 1 hour.  Allow to cool completely before serving.  Fruit pies will keep pretty well out of the refrigerator for a week or more if covered with foil and you washed your hands well enough while making it.

Meat Pies (WARNING!  EXPERIMENT IN PROGRESS!)

1 pound of meat (bison, lamb, turkey, beef, camel, wildebeest, kangaroo)
1 small or 1/2 large yellow onion, chopped
2 large cloves of garlic, chopped
1 Tablespoon oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon rosemary
1/4 teaspoon sage
1/4 teaspoon powdered mustard

a few small red or gold potatoes
1/2 rutabaga
1/2 parsnip
1 cup milk (or 1/2 cup cream and 1/2 cup water)
2 Tablespoons cornstarch

Brown meat in a large skillet with the onion, garlic, oil and spices.  Dice the vegetables and add to skillet, add milk and cornstarch.  Stir while cooking for 10 – 15 minutes while the hard tubers soften some, you don’t want to cook them completely.  Turn off heat, let sit while rolling out a top crust (note: you may wish to use salted butter in this crust… just for meat pies).  Bake at 425 degrees Fahrenheit for 1 hour (until it’s bubbling through the vents).  Serve with homemade tomato ketchup, horseradish, and premium soy sauce.

Cream Pies

NOTE: if you found this recipe because you were looking for porn, sorry!

Cream pies are a little different, you only make half the crust (there’s no top) and bake the crust before filling (425 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 – 20 minutes).  There’s some tricks to this… since there’s no filling, the crust will tend to shrink and bubble up in the middle, so pie weights will be useful.  The order of operation is very different from that of a fruit pie… you need the baked pie crust complete and ready to go before you start on the pudding mixture.  This is when it might be tempting to get a store-bought pie crust.  Don’t DO it, MAN!! You can make this.

Select zero or more of the following base ingredients:
3 bananas
1 cup shredded coconut
3 – 5 oz sweet or semi-sweet chocolate (or Nutella)
1/2 cup citrus fruit juice and zest from the rind

and…
2 cups whole milk
1 cup cream
1/4 cup flour
2 Tablespoons corn starch
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 egg yolks (bruised and beaten)
1 tsp vanilla

In a medium saucepan, bring the milk and cream to almost a boil (’scald’ it), stir constantly to avoid skimming.  Don’t use a double boiler here, it won’t quite get hot enough to scald the milk, and so the filling won’t thicken properly.

• If you’re making a citrus pie, add the zest to the milk before scalding, and then afterward let it steep for a few minutes before straining out the zest bits.
• If you are using chocolate, melt it first, then slowly add the milk and cream.

Sift the flour, cornstarch, sugar, and salt, add to the milk while stirring constantly.

• Extra salt is optional for a citrus pie.
• If you want to use coconut or Nutella, add that to the mixture now as well.

Whisk the egg yolks.

• If you’re making  citrus pie, add the juice to the egg yolks.

Spoon some of the hot milk pudding mixture into the egg yolks and stir, then add the yolks to the mixture (don’t just dump the egg yolks into the hot pudding) and cook a few more minutes.  It should be getting really thick and smell really good.  Taste it (don’t burn your mouth) and add more sugar if needed, especially with semi-sweet chocolate.

• Add the vanilla last if used.  Skip the vanilla for  a citrus pie.\
• Use a pinch of chili powder instead of vanilla for a chocolate pie.
• If you use bananas, spoon a little of the pudding into the bottom of the pie crust, then add bananas slices, and then spoon on more pudding.
• Otherwise, use a spatula and pour the pudding mixture into the crust.

Once that’s done, chill and chill out.  You can’t just pop the hot shell and filling in the fridge, but from here on out, COOL is what you need.  When it’s not quite so hot, then put it in the refrigerator.

If you add a lot of base ingredients, you might need to reduce the amounts, it will make a lot, but you can always just pour the remainder into pudding cups.  Cream pies have milk and egg and so they won’t keep out of the refrigerator, they have to be chilled.  Some recipes call for additional baking, I don’t recommend this.

You can leave the pie unadorned, top with whipped cream, or…  did you save the egg whites?  Good!  Make meringue:

4 egg whites
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar (optional)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup powdered sugar

Adding the sugar slowly, beat with a high-speed electric mixer until you get soft peaks, this can take 20 – 30 minutes.  When the pie is cool, plop gobs of foam onto the top of the pie with a big spoon and broil (on high) in an oven 5 minutes until the meringue is golden brown… don’t walk away from this, or you’ll burn the meringue and the pie will get all runny.

It’s done.  Let it cool.  Don’t put it in the refrigerator while still warm, or it will get runny.  When it’s no longer warm (call it an hour), THEN put it in the refrigerator and chill out for at least 2 more hours, and while waiting don’t get any Soupy Sales ideas.

General tips for making PIE:

• Don’t use any ingredients that aren’t at least 100 years old.  Not the actual item (ewww!), the invention of the ingredient… people have been eating pie for a very very long time, you don’t need anything exotic or new to make any of these.  Pie good for cave man!
• Heart Smart warning: This will kill you.  Do not serve this to people without notifying them that this is real pie, and therefore crammed, jammed, and packed with real fat.
• This is not a beginner course on cooking and baking, but it’s not difficult.  If you’ve ever put together a piece of tube frame recreational equipment for your kids in the back yard on Christmas Eve, you have the skills necessary to make a pie.
• Use organic ingredients whenever possible.  Butter, milk, sugar, eggs, flour, and fruit can all be bought organic.  Your body will thank you for it.  Don’t be fooled by the word ‘natural’, natural is not organic.  The word ‘natural’ (as applied to food in the USA) has come to be meaningless at the consumer level through lobbying by the food industry.  Arsenic is ‘natural’.  Read the labels on the ingredients you use.  If there’s anything in them that you can’t pronounce without a chemistry reference, buy something else.
• Cheap fruit makes experimentation more fun.  When you see a quart of blueberries for $4 at the farmer’s market, think PIE.
• You can use white granulated table sugar, but exotic premium sugar at the ethnic grocery store will definitely make a difference.  I wish there were a standardized sweetness scale, but until that science is up another tech level, I prefer to use organic powdered sugar.  If you’re looking to reduce the sugar, you might try substituting about half the amount needed with a commercial sweetener substitute.  I haven’t done this, but there is diabetic friendly sugar substitute available.  Somebody also try a tablespoon of light unsulfured molasses and tell me how that goes.
• In fruit pies, you can use cornstarch instead of instant (or flaked) tapioca, but the texture is boring.  The idea here is to thicken the filling so it will look good on your fork and cut in a nicer triangle.  In the cream pies, tapioca can probably be substituted for the corn starch, but the texture won’t be smooth.
• Use real unsalted butter and actual lard for shortening.  Using these and cutting it into the flour with a pastry blender keeps the gluten fibers short, and not like pizza.  Use some muscle on this, when properly mixed you should not be able to distinguish any individual lumps of butter or lard.  Yes, you can buy lard in the store, it’s usually near the baking supplies, I usually see it in bricks or small white plastic tubs.  Lard does not contain trans fats, because trans fats were invented when people stopped using real animal fat.  If you’re worried about cholesterol, stop eating pie.  On the other hand, if you would rather sacrifice some taste, green mersh label zero trans-fat shortening bricks will work just fine.
• Take your time rolling out the crust.  If you goof it, pick it up and do it again.  Roll it out, fold it over a few times, this makes it flaky.  If the bottom crust has a hole or seam, it will leak.  On top crust pies, seal and crimp the edges very high, it will spill, and make sure the steam vents in the top are big enough that they don’t seal up while cooking.
• If you make a few pies and the next one suddenly seems… not difficult… you’re getting it.  There’s a reason they say ‘easy as pie’.  There’s definitely some arm work in blending and rolling the crust, but nothing else in these recipes is particularly difficult.  Maybe chocolate, chocolate is almost always difficult.

I’m currently experimenting with savory recipes… buffalo with potato, carrots, parsnips, rutabaga, basil, oregeno…. sausage with cheese, onions, green pepper, cayenne… beef with cream and rosemary.   I know the cherry and blueberry recipes work well (don’t skip the mace!).  I’m still perfecting the ‘citrus’ cream pies.

Whaddaya gonna do with those pies, boys?

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I have another admission to make.  I sew.  It started a long long time ago… I used to watch my mother sew when I was very young, but a year or so ago the realization that I actually know how to sew hit me.  It rekindled with just not wanting to pay $50 for shirts made overseas that didn’t fit, but my newfound stitching bug now has me making more diabolical plans.

I have in my possession four (4) red patent leather pig hides, which is enough to make a rather large coat, one my size.  As I live in Michigan, I’ll be insulating it, and of course it will need a proper liner.

The leather is pretty lightweight, the thinsulate is really thick, and the innermost liner is paper thin and slippery. I’m also using some red velvet for some of the facings.  This is definitely going to be harder than polyester-cotton work shirts. (Burda pattern 7767 rocks!)

This all adds up to a lot of planning on how to sew the liner to the coat, which seems pretty mysterious to me.  Why does it hold together?  Why would it fit?  How many needles am I going to break doing this?  The only way to find out is to do it, but there’s no material I’d bother to use to make a coat that is cheap… so do or die, this is going to have to happen and mistakes may be costly.  The leather is slightly more expensive than some Cashmere wool, so one way or another.

Here’s the pattern, can you say pimp coat?  Yeah, well, I could have gotten shiny metallic gold leather as well, but then I’d feel obligated to get the cane with the jewel in the top, the heavy gold-rim sunglasses, a leopard skin print top hat, and goldfish disco shoes (hint: they don’t come in size 12).  Being as tall as I am and living in an internationally savvy area, I’m pretty sure I can get away with wearing this coat.  Anytime around Christmas, anyway.

I spent a few days making a custom embroidery tag for it.  This is the funny part.  The “image to embroidery” programming in the world today leaves a lot to be desired. This is a joke, I’m not sewing children’s clothes, I’ll be wearing this coat in only the finest bowling alleys, biker bars…

I found a very nice blog post on interlining the insulation, previously I was considering copping out totally and sewing in the thinsulate by underlining it.  I’m no longer afraid of using the thinsulate, but I had to make some mistakes to figure it out.  I’m making a lot of mistakes.  However, I’m learning from them, and this is also important.  This is not going to be a fantastic work of art.   It’s going to be a coat, and a weird one, but it will be functional.

Findings:
* Leather is a little hard to use
* Velvet is a little hard to use
* Thinsulate is not too bad to use
* Leather coats with thinsulate and velvet linings are hard to make.  Use of a walking foot is highly recommended.
* There’s no way to press open leather seams.  When this is necessary, the seam must be top-stitched open.
* It is actually easy to make simple seams with patent leather, when doing right-side to right-side stitching, it sticks to itself pretty well, and you don’t have to use pins or tape.  It’s harder when you have to sew with the right side down on the foot plate, it won’t move and you have to use tissue paper as a cover.

Picture updates:

Thanksgiving weekend: The shell is stitched, I managed to work on it all day on Saturday.  Welt pockets are a BITCH very difficult.

December 3rd, 2009: Thinsulate must be *fully* attached to the liner before even thinking about attaching it to the coat.  I’ve had to go back and add stitching while doing the front velvet facings, and with the leather and tight corners, the collar and lapels have been degraded to “good” condition.  Oh well, if I don’t want to discuss where I got it, I can say I got it on EBay from a first year Textiles major.  It’s not unusable, but obviously not the work of an expert tailor.

December 8th, 2009: I’ve slowed down, but trying to get back onto it.  The lapel stitching is awful.  Functional, yes, but… well, that’s all I’ll say.  Last night I pinned the sleeves.  Sewing them into place is going to be slightly like sewing a collar onto a rabid weasel from the inside.  While it’s the hardest part, it’s not likely to make things look much worse, so onward I go.  The liner is starting to look easy in comparison, just a lot of cutting and trimming.  I’m hoping the liner material itself won’t be too terribly awful, but it’s really thin and slippery.  Once I get it cut, thinsulate attached, connected together, and the seams overlocked, hooking it into the coat seems reasonable enough… up to the cuff seams, not sure how those will work out.  Velcro?  It’s getting COLD here, need to get this wearable!  I must find a long thin zipper, so I can make the liner removable and then washable.

December 9th, 2009: Sleeves are attached, and I did a good job.  Now to cut the liner and thinsulate.  We’re getting SNOW, and it’s imparting a sense of urgency… it’s COLD here.

December 13th, 2009: the lining is almost done.  I’m having trouble deciding the correct way to finish the lining seams, so I might have to wear it a couple of times and see if the wind blows through them.  I’m thinking that it will, but I’m too uptight sometimes, so we will see.  I’ve got the main lining sewn to the leather at the collar and halfway up the front facings, I have to finish the sleeve insulation/lining and prep that for going into the armpits before I can finish hooking in the main lining.  All that would be left would be hemming and putting in the label, so almost there.  Arm movement isn’t terrific, but I’m not quite ready to sew in a gusset just yet.  With the collar sewn down, it’s really taking shape, and the shape it’s taking I like, even with the lapels a little goofed.  I’ll take lots more pictures of the insides soon, it’s in a wearable state.  It needs work, but the way might be more clear if I got some wear into it.  It’s squeaky.  I think I’d have to oil it to drive if I didn’t have power steering.

December 25th, 2009: The bottom liner was hard to do, I cobbled it a bit and it’s not too bad.  Next one will definitely be better.  Slowed down, need to finish the sleeves, but playing new computer game is obsessive.

After some testing, here are statistics for gaming purposes:
+2 Charisma
-1 Wisdom
-1 Dexterity
+20% versus Cold

also known as

the Stir-fry recipe (with pictures)

1 jar of “Thai Kitchen” green curry paste
1 can coconut milk
1 – 1 1/4 lbs of cheap chicken meat, white or dark
1 – 2 cups of rice
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 – 2 teaspoons turmeric

2 or more of the following:

a cup green beans, snow peas, or snap peas
a cup of green peas (give peas a chance)
a small yellow onion (or half of a large one)
a cup bamboo shoots (or a small can)
a cup water chestnuts (or a small can)
a cup of sliced eggplant (use small ones)
a bell pepper (any colour you like)
4 – 6 jalapeño or serrano peppers
3 – 4 large or 5 – 7 small carrots
a small rutabaga or potato
a large parsnip
a can of store-bought “stir fry vegetables”
a cup of broccoli or cauliflower
a cup of asparagus
a cup of any other vegetable (bokchoy, radicchio, parsley, broccoflower)
fresh or canned mushrooms

“Miller Farms” boneless skinless chicken thighs (still frozen), turmeric spice, red bell pepper, “Thai Kitchen” green curry paste, “Thai Kitchen” organic coconut milk, “La Choy” fancy mixed stir-fry vegetables, “Reese” bamboo shoots, “Reese” water chestnuts, a “Texas New” yellow onion, jalapeño peppers, green beans.  For these pictures, I used half of the onion, half of the jalapeños, and everything else except the three cans on the right.

Directions:

Thaw the chicken if frozen.  Put the jar of curry paste in a wok or large saucepan, add the coconut milk.  Stir with spoon until mixed.  Chop chicken into bite sized pieces and add to the curry sauce in the wok.

left: a package of chicken, thawed in the microwave and sliced; right: chicken added to the curry and coconut milk, still pink and not yet cooked

Right now, before you do anything else, wash and scrub the cutting board and anything else that touched raw chicken.  The cutting board needs to be scrubbed with soap, rinsed, and then final rinsed with the hottest water that can come out of your tap.  No, I’m not kidding, get to it.

Start the rice.

Cook the chicken over medium heat stirring occasionally from the bottom to avoid burning.  Cover when not stirring to hold in the heat and ensure the chicken cooks properly.

the chicken is cooked, no pink left in it.  Don’t add the vegetables until it’s like this or you’ll have to overcook the veggies to finish cooking the chicken.  Undercooked chicken is a total bummer.

While the chicken is cooking, start chopping the vegetables.  The tougher veggies need a little longer to cook than the others, so if using carrots, parsnips, or rutabaga, chop them first.   Onions and eggplant cook pretty fast, add them last.

cutting up green beans, these are really healthy and cheap

When the chicken is obviously cooked, and the rice water is boiling, add the vegetables.  The vegetables will also give up some water when cooking, so it may look like it needs extra fluid at this point, but don’t add any.  Stir occasionally and cover in between.  Near the end of the cooking, add a tablespoon of brown sugar (optional).

left above: vegetables added; right: veggies cooking nicely

When the onions have become translucent, reduce or turn off heat until rice is finished.

left: stir fry is ready; right: rice is ready, this is a brown organic long grain American rice with a teaspoon of turmeric spice per cup of rice added for health properties, but also has a nice color

To serve, make a bed of rice on a large plate and add a large ladle or two of stir fry and sauce.  Makes 3 – 4 large plates.

Eat me.

Notes:

• I recommend Zojirushi rice cookers.
  
  I’ve seen comments on forums saying something like “Why would you spend that much when you can get brand X for less?”.  This is like comparing a Mercedes automobile to a rusty Datsun.  A Zojirushi Neuro-fuzzy will cook any rice absolutely perfectly every time and last for years, the model above is at least ten years old.  If you ever hesitated in making slow-cooked long grain rice because it was difficult in any way, you’ll need to see a Zojirushi work to believe it can be that easy.
• The green curry paste is already pretty spicy, but adding a few jalapeno peppers will really put some heat in this recipe.  This usually cures my sinus headaches.
• My favorite combination is chicken with onion, bell pepper, eggplant, brocoli or green beans, and white long grain rice with tumeric.
• Other meats can be used.  Pork butt, shrimp (prawns), squid, and beef stew meat all work just fine.
• I use a regional brand of chicken in a pack of 6 boneless chicken thighs.  It’s cheap and delicious.  Hint: After thawing it from frozen in the microwave, it will still be slightly frozen in a block.  It’s very easy to cut up when it’s like this.
• I use a stainless steel wok that my wife got me for Christmas one year.  It sits on a small stand above a gas burner and works very well for me.
• The vegetables can be pretty bland looking if they’re all green, use a red bell pepper to add some color if you’re serving this to others.

Everything is done better with Cat Supervision.

I actually did this about 7 years ago, and I have completely forgotten why.  That’s probably a good thing.  I have a few more hobbies now to soak up time I would normally spend thinking up this kind of deviltry.

* The basic parts are water blocks, reservoir, pump, tubing, radiator, and the coolant itself.
* Don’t buy kits.  Just like building your own system, you can get the best equipment if you get the parts individually.  When you buy a kit, the manufacturer invariably must include something they’ve done on the cheap, through materials, manufacturing, or engineering.  Example: the Zalman Reserator 1 (blue) I have is terrific and includes a first class Eheim aquarium pump internally, but the acrylic ‘flow indicator’ that came with it started leaking a few weeks after it was installed.  A second one did exactly the same thing (acrylic is NOT good with glycol).
* Don’t bother with the extra expense of silver over copper, the difference isn’t that much.  Be aware that different metals in your system can have a slow electrochemical effect.  Stick with copper and aluminum.  Don’t use anything acrylic, it will slowly crack during exposure to the glycol.  Polyethylene, polypropylene, and Lucite work great.  The only time I’ve ever had a problem with a leak was due to use of acrylic plastic.
* A high flow rate is not important.  Sure, some flow is necessary, but high pressure pumps will only encourage your system to leak.  You don’t see people putting massively high flow rate antifreeze pumps on their cars because it’s not necessary.  Don’t pay extra for larger jets on the blocks or radiators.  Water cooling is much more efficient than air cooling, no need to waste money on hype.
* Rig your water blocks in parallel, not in series.  This way all the parts get fresh coolant rather than daisy chaining the heat from one component to the next.  This also reduces flow rate, but flow rate is not important!
* Rig the pump to pull coolant from the blocks and push it into the reservoir.  The pressure difference between the coolant and the outside should be a vacuum where it’s most dangerous to leak.  In this way, if there’s a break in the tubing, the pump will pull air into the system at the break rather than spray mildly toxic coolant all over your live hot running computer, carpet, walls, ceiling, face, and pets.
* Use of a rheostat to adjust the fan in front of the radiator will help reduce noise.
* Assemble and test (with water) the whole system before trying to install it.
* Mix 16 ounces of premium automotive grade ethylene glycol antifreeze with 8 ounces of “Redline Water Wetter” and top off to a gallon with distilled water.  A plastic windshield washer gallon jug works well.  You will need to replace the coolant every couple of years or you might get algae.  I’m currently using “Zerex”, but if your system is in an area with poor ventilation or in a house with children, you might consider using propylene glycol based “green” (green as in environment, not the color) antifreeze instead, it’s less toxic.

My own system is about 4 1/2 years old now, and has been used on two different motherboards/CPU sets:

Zalman Reserator 1 (blue) with integrated Eheim 300 pump, comes with very nice blue silicone tubing, but I didn’t use the Zalman water block
2 Danger Den “Maze 4″ copper water blocks with Lucite tops and 3/8″ outlets, custom mounted to two Slot ‘F’ AMD Opterons with strips of brass sheet metal
ThermalTake “Aquarius” A1983 VGA water block, nickel plated with 1/4″ side outlets, this is very thin and fits between PCI cards
Black Ice Xtreme II radiator with 3/8″ outlets (the Zalman Reserator passive cooling isn’t enough for two CPUs and a GPU)
2 ball-bearing fans for the radiator (120mm), and additional chassis fans for motherboard passive components (definitely needed for a Tyan S2927)
A 4-circuit fan speed controller.  This is an unintelligent device, merely a set of 12 volt rheostats.
A “Digital Doc 5” fan speed controller and temperature sensor, this needs no interface to the computer (translation: works with Linux)
A few polypropylene T’s and L’s in the tubing.
“Arctic Silver 5” heat compound

Needless to say, my system is less than easily portable.  I consider this an “anti-theft” feature.

The two separate fan speed controllers require a bit of explanation.  I made a custom cable for the radiator fans, with two separate voltage feeds and diodes to keep the two units from parasitically vampiring power from each other.  The rheostat lets me set a minimum fan speed, which is basically enough to keep the fans running at a minimum of noise.  However the “Digital Doc 5″ unit monitors the temperature of various parts of the system, including the double radiator.  If that temperature goes over 96 degrees Fahrenheit, it kicks in it’s voltage, boosting the fan to full speed.  The system runs pretty quietly, but if it gets a little warm, the fans automatically spin up to higher speed.  I run the BOINC application, and so 4 cores of 2 Opteron 2218’s are going 100% all the time, and I’ve never had a problem.

I put another quart of Slick 50 in my car’s engine.  It’s a brand of motor oil that is saturated with polytetrafluoroethylene.  I did it when I got the car at 10K miles, and here I’ve done it again at 67K miles, which is about right.  I’ve always reapplied it at 50K mile intervals, and I think that’s what is recommended.  I drive a vanilla 2001 Volvo S60, no turbo.  It is blue.  No, it didn’t come with an “Abba” CD.

Basically, you change your oil… drain the old oil, replace the filter cartridge, and put in the right amount of new oil minus one quart.  Then with the engine running, you pour in the quart of Slick 50 oil, put on the oil cap, close the hood, hop in, and drive for about 30 minutes.  This shears the Teflon and the rest of the oil together, and the Teflon gets burnished into the metal of the inside of the engine.  I’ll let it ride for a regular oil change interval (which in my case is like 6K miles), then replace the filter and oil again.

I’ve been using the stuff for 30 years.  I’ve never not been impressed.  Back when I had a pretty old car (in the 80’s I had a 1968 Ford Mustang with a 289 cid V8), the effect was just shy of miraculous, and I’ve got friends who also have seen pretty amazing results.  The internet is full of claims and counterclaims on Teflon motor oil, I’ve always only used the original Slick 50.  I also looked up the quoted magazine article by ‘Consumers Digest’, using a microfilm reader as this was before the invention of the World Wide Web.

I did the research, I gave it a try, and it’s terrific.

I do believe in the engine additive self-fulfilling prophecy… when you put some snake oil product into your car, you unconsciously alter your driving habits in tiny ways which make the claims of the product come true.  Get some macho guy pouring a pint of DDT Carburetor Ointment in your gas tank and hell… it’ll even make your girlfriend’s tits seem bigger.  I don’t use a lot of that junk, all I’ve ever seen any of it do is glop up my spark plugs, and I don’t need a pseudo-sexy sports car to get happy.  (Wait, maybe I do.  I saw a ‘68 Jaguar on the road recently.)

Okay, so it seems to me that on my 30 mile 75MPH drive I didn’t have to push down the gas pedal quite as far as I previously had to push it to go the same speed.  Nothing definite, nothing scientifically provable, no… I didn’t measure the amount of travel with a micrometer… it just didn’t seem like it needed as much gas to go.  Improved gas mileage has been the most noticeable effect for me, the Mustang got 21 MPG before and more like 25 MPG after I used it (yes, back in the early 80’s I got better mileage than I do now).

I’m not selling the stuff.  I don’t care if there are tons of articles on the ‘net that say it can’t possibly work.  I’ve used it, I know it does, so there, neener neener nyeah.  I’m saving my gas receipts and writing down the mileage, so I’ll have some hard data on the gas mileage.  There won’t be any way to prove that the oil is what caused it, but *I* will know.  I’ll post the results here when I do the math.

Drawbacks?  I sometimes wonder if my engine will ever wear out so I have an excuse to buy a new car.

To the makers… Gentlemen, thank you for this wonderful product, once again, it’s paying for itself.  For me.

Squinky.

Today is just too adjective-challenged for a previously existing word, we need a new one… and the word for today is squinky.  It replaces smarmy.  All forms are currently available (squinkfulness, squinkitude, squinkalicious, et cetera).

Does it matter that this waste of time is what makes a LIFE for you? Hmmmmm?  Wouldn’t you really rather be involved in a series of colorful time-wasting trends?

I highly recommend Air France and the Hôtel Au Manoir St Germain des Près in the 6th arrondissement of Paris.   I also recommend French Coca-Cola, it’s made with real sugar, not high fructose corn syrup.   What else…?  Oh, nutella crepes… I must learn to make nutella crepes.  Here are a few pics.

The Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris, photograph taken from the south

Close-up of the north rose window of Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris

A statue in Pére-Lachaise

In the Ossuary of the Catacombs of Paris

A view of the Tour Eiffel

A view at night from the Tour Eiffel of the Trocadéro.
This photograph is interesting in that the top of the Eiffel is so high, you can plainly see the curvature of the earth at the horizon (no, it’s not just the camera lens)

A view from the Arc de Triomphe with the Tour Eiffel visible.

I took about 700 pictures, so these are just a very few. We were blessed with wonderful weather, a little cool… but no rain during the short, short time we had. The hotel room was state of the art and not small, I never met a rude person (even the beggars were polite), the security at Charle-De-Galle airport was slow (but polite and efficient), and we had a marvellous time. Quite frankly, the flights on Air France were the best I have ever flown. We will be returning soon.