The Second, Second Best Blog

With the recent passing of the Bennet family dog, some of Anna’s things were given to us to benefit Yuki when she visits, one of which was the dog door for the patio slider.

Patio sliding doors are pretty much all the same, right? Ought to be able to just take the dog door out of their slider and put into my mine, no problem. Well, not quite. First difference was that their slider was on the right while mine is on the left. That turned out to be easy. The latch is held in place with two screws and is reversible: unscrew it and put it on the other side. The next difference: their door is about an inch and a 1/4 taller than mine. Still not too hard. The dog door frame is aluminum and was fairly easy to cut down to size on a band saw. Sorry Bennets, it will no longer work in your door.
OK, so now the dog door is in place. Let’s see how the slider shuts and locks… It doesn’t. My slider is just a smidge thicker so it will not fit all the way into the channel on the dog door frame, therefore the latch won’t, and the door cannot be locked. This is not as big a deal as it at first seems. We were locking it with a half inch dowel in the lower channel anyway. Just cut it to fit in this position.

That was actually OK…until some winter weather arrived. The wind just blew right through because the sliders only make a (fairly) good seal when the frames of the stationary pane and the slider are aligned. As it is, there is about a half inch gap between the frame and the glass.

I was somewhat at a loss as to how to fix this problem and resorted to Home Depot for ideas. Here is what it took:
Some neoprene rubber, the kind used for garage door top and side seal, some double-stick mounting tape, and some white sheet metal screws, the kind used for aluminum rain gutters. It is rather tricky getting this work. The rubber must be mounted on the frame so that it does not quite touch the glass. Otherwise it binds against the glass and makes the door really hard to open. The double-stick tape is not strong enough by itself and the rubber just peels off after opening and closing the door a few times. The sheet metal screws prevent that. Just be very careful when drilling the pilot holes in the frame that you do not hit the glass.

… Is now available for your viewing pleasure.

What do you say after spotting airborn pigs?
(Remember that you heard it first here!)

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Last weekend my most excellent spouse, Patricia, spent the weekend with her good friend Beth in Torrance. Since watching our usual TV shows together was out, I decided to watch “The French Connection”, which I had recorded on my Media Center when it played on AMC several months ago. I had previously seen only parts it’s famous car chase and was eagerly anticipating a great show, considering that it was a multiple Oscar winner.

After 10 minutes I heard myself thinking, “They sure make movies better now.” I really did not like the music at all and the sound in general is noticeably poorer quality compared to almost any contemporary production.

Further on there were scenes with a detective named Mulderig, who obviously did not like Gene Hackman’s character, Popeye Boyle. After watching him for several minutes, I was thinking, “I’ve seen that face somewhere.” Finally I got it: he was the one driving the Charger in Bullitt!

So at the end of the movie I had two items to check in the credits: music composed and conducted by Don Ellis. Stunt coordinator: Bill Hickman, also played the part of Mulderig.

Don Ellis was a highly respected musician and composer. I still hate the music in this movie. Bill Hickman was indeed the wheel man in the Charger and was also in charge of the stunt driving in that movie. I stand by my first impression: they sure make movies better now.

The Second, Second Best Blog turned two years old on Monday. Back then I called it “The Second Best Blog” but the owner of SecondBestBlog.com, one Sybrand Strauss, discovered it (after some 4 months) and complained. I am happy to report that it has been profitable (though hardly lucrative) almost from the start (with a big assist from pitterpat). Here is my agonizingly complicated balance sheet:

IX Web Hosting -$298.20
Google Adsense $316.51

Just today I discovered Google Adsense’s Category Ad Filters. I was rather dismayed to find that 2.6% of the web sites’ recent earnings were derived from ads in the category of Religion! Being a devout atheist, I have begun filtering those out, even though it potentially reduces my already razor thin profit margin.

Ran across this item when it came up in the news widget on my Windows Sidebar: Milkologists win silly science award. I found it quite entertaining. The bra that can be converted into a pair of gas masks had me literally laughing out loud.

Do you remember what it was like the first day of owning a new car? This was technically my third new car, but it was the first (and only) one that was for me first, the family second. I bought it at Heritage in Huntington Beach through the Costco Auto Program. I was pretty nervous getting on the freeway for the drive home. I had to have the manual transmission, but only automatics were available when I took my test drive. So that was really the first time driving a manual Mazda 6. Geez, what if it was in an accident before I even got home?! After about 4 miles I ventured out of the slow lane.

When I got home I parked in the driveway and spent about an hour and half … reading the manual. (I had to tell you this because one of my official duties at work is writing The manual. I hate it when people don’t read them!) There really are some things you won’t find out any other way. For example, it was easy to figure out how to use the radio controls on the steering wheel. But I doubt I would have ever discovered that the radio can be set to adjust the volume depending on the vehicle speed! For YEARS I had turned the radio up while on the freeway and down again while rolling to a stop on the off ramp. No more! This radio does it automatically. It’s a little disconcerting at first but it is really great after about the third time and you realize that there is nothing wrong when the volume changes by itself. I just left the volume set at 7. Works perfectly!

As you probably know, I was laid off from my 18 years of engineering for Ericsson in 2006. My commute went from 31 miles one way to zero. I have rarely needed to get on the freeway since. When driving around with my most excellent spouse, Patricia, I always turn the radio off.

Last December, I finally had the most expensive service to date: rear brakes, 4 new tires, a new battery, one headlight … Oh yeah, and an oil change, all out of warranty. When I picked the car up, I noticed right away that all the radio presets were gone. That’s what happens when the battery is disconnected. I just quickly found my favorite news station, KFWB, News 980, and went on home.
It was months later before I got around to fixing all the presets again.

For the last several weeks, it has seemed like my hearing has gotten a lot worse or the radio is just not working right. At times it has been necessary to turn the volume up to 12 or 13! It finally made me realize that the volume adjustment with speed was not working. I was almost heartbroken. On the way to work Monday morning I thought I was going to have to take it to the dealer. Where was that setting again? Hmmm. Let’s see push this knob several times until the display shows … what was it again? BASS, TREB, MID, BAL, FADE, ALC OFF. That’s the one! OFF? It should be LEVEL3! It was also reset when the battery was disconnected!My radio works so good again. And the volume is back at 7.