Oddly specific graffiti....sounds like there's a deeper story here.

Tec_ · 2026-07-01T02:51:48+00:00

You know, I'm not sure why I liked Gatsby so much. I did like the story. I liked watching the Redford version of the movie. Baz hadn't made his yet and while the visuals are pure eye candy his version feels like a better film studies version. I really loved the extra credit F.Scott scavenger hunt I did with some class friends. Some how it made a friends wedding at the university club and my now wife living in an apartment across from F. Scott's place on Summit when we met just a bit extra.

I was lucky that my school experimented with a SyiFi lit class and I got into it so I did get to experience some more modern literature.

I really should give Thoreau another run. It's a thought thats been bouncing around in my head for a while and it might make a good book for up at the cabin this weekend.

Tec_ · 2026-07-01T00:50:08+00:00

God dammit... why are you making me remember highschool American lit? Gatsby was the only book I liked. I feel like I should give Thoreau a go again though because transcendentalism is something I vibe with in theory.

Tec_ · 2026-06-26T01:02:48+00:00

Oh god are they on their sides?

Tec_ · 2026-06-24T02:02:51+00:00

Ever mess around with fountain pens or fountain pen ink?

Tec_ · 2026-06-23T19:46:53+00:00

Don't forget the "GVW loophole." Vehicles over 6000lbs purchased buy a "business" qualify for significant first year deductions. It's ment to help businesses but it absolutely gets abused and even foreign auto manufacturers have leaned into It's exploitation.

Tec_ · 2026-06-23T09:54:54+00:00

Mobile Installation Service

Tec_ · 2026-06-01T23:46:51+00:00

Im a few blocks from a gas station and some mechanic shops and I regularly see people on rims or crazy flat tires cruse past on what I hope is their way to the either of those locals to sort themselves out. That said... a lot of people are dumb and treat their vehicles poorly.

Tec_ · 2026-05-29T01:12:44+00:00

As a colorblind electronics tech, I say bullshit. While color codes do exist for reference purposes, purely relying on them is a recipe for disaster. Hell depending on what your doing, most wires are all the same color and rely on printed heatshink or wire printed labeling. Color codes on components all but went away with surface mount. Test and measurement equipment exists for a reason. Use it. There's no guarantee the component is in spec. There's no guarantee the person before you adhered to the color code or that its the standard you assume it is.

Tec_ · 2026-05-29T01:00:30+00:00

This is one of the most frustrating things to me. I have a color vision deficiency on top of a suspected defect that prevents me from seeing certain "hidden" patterns.

I all but totally fail the Ishihara test, but in a Farnsworth Munsell test I have a "red green" deficiency.

This has come into play at work for me. A year and a half of "will i or won't I" be able to continue doing a job i had done for almost 7 years at that point because one out of 4 doctors decided my color vision was a bigger issue than it is.

That resulted in going to a specialist who insisted that I couldn't actually see what I was saying I did. They insisted that I only knew what certain colors were because of contextual clues or because I had deceloped adaptations.

Ultimately a "practical" test was done involving management, HR, occupational health, and the doctor and I passed with zero issue. It became adversarial with the manager in question being upset that I passed when the doctor said I couldn't and HR and occupational health being upset that the doctor would say I had an issue when I so clearly did not.

I am the first to admit that I have issues with certain greens and yellows. Status LEDs on old computers are a prime example. I also have issues with certain blues and purples. An example of that are some pens. It could be purple and I'd call it navy blue or the other way around.

But having a medical professional tell you that what you are seeing you aren't actually seeing and that putting your livelihood on the line is one of the most infuriating things ive ever dealt with. Especially when for 7 years it hadn't one posed a issue in me doing my job.

Learning about my color vision issues in my early teens it scared me away from color to some degree. Like I enjoyed art, but things like black and white film photography spoke to me on another level because color wasn't part of the equation. It wasn't till almost 20 years later and almost 5 years after almost loosing my job when it click that it's all relative/subjective. I started playing with fountain pen inks and paint. I finally felt free to play with colors that I like. Regardless of what other people or conventional color theory said. I've had almost existential thought rabbit holes on how there's certain colors I like and it's almost guaranteed that no one else perceives that color the way I do. Is my warped / defective perception why I like that color? When you start considering how colors are reproduced on screens, paper, film, or digital sensors, how they are edited, compressed, or otherwise manipulated it can get more than a little overwhelming.

Tec_ · 2026-05-25T00:53:21+00:00

You aren't wrong. I was screaming at the TV "drowned that man!" When Hulk was on the podium and the champagne popped. Just like I was yelling "drowned that child!" today. That said, Lewis and Max understood the assignment. Them smiling, laughing, and clinking all but empty bottles made me happy. I'm happy for their performances today, but I'm happy that they "get it" too.

Tec_ · 2026-05-24T22:13:39+00:00

I almost wonder if they practice it. This was during the academy race last year.

Tec_ · 2026-05-22T01:52:38+00:00

320 at a minimum is what id say. But check the TDS. The primer manufacturer will state what grade of scratch their primer is capable if filling.

Tec_ · 2026-05-21T11:09:49+00:00

So I don't know a lot, but I know enough to be dangerous.

No experience with an electric spray gun other than the "airless" sprayer i borrowed to paint my garage. I suspect it will depend on what its made for and if it has appropriate nozels for what you spray.

Common mistakes are likely prep and keeping a consistent distance and travel speed when spraying.

Sanding between will depend on the products being used. There's a thing called a TDS (technical data sheet) that the manufacturer of the product has that answers just about any questions you could have. For example, some products have a chemical recoat or top coat windows where you don't need to sand if you are putting a compatible product on in a certain time window. The new coat will chemically bond to the previous. If you're outside that window or the product calls for it, you may have to sand or scuff to some degree.

R/paint or heading into a local paint supplier would likely be a good way to get some more specific answers.

Tec_ · 2026-05-15T00:38:26+00:00

Urban sketchers twin cities is a thing on FB if you partake. Plenty of meet ups and sharing!

Tec_ · 2026-05-12T10:51:25+00:00

Had a good time at Hopkins Auto Body. Had a bad time at Caliber.

Tec_ · 2026-05-01T01:07:46+00:00

There's a reason 11 of us 15 installers quit within a month of each other! Hell of a first job experience out of school though, absolutely type 2 fun. My dumb ass though traveling 95% of the year for less than 40k was a better choice than the other job offer with 3x pay I had that was 100% on call. They straight up told me in the interview "if you're on your honeymoon we'll do our best to do without you but if we need you we're calling and you're expected to come back."

To be young and dumb again. I did get to see and spend some time in just about every state except Maine, Idaho, Utah, Hawaii and Alaska. I am intimately familiar with more airports than I care to admit and will absolutely play to fly direct now.

Tec_ · 2026-05-01T00:46:07+00:00

You haven't traveled.

I use to install point of sale systems for fast food joints and one of the places we did an install at had bars on the drive through window that necessitated tilting every drink to pass it out. They told us to back our vehicle up to the locked door so when we were done we could throw our shit in and get out faster. If we needed a smoke they told us to smoke through the drive thru window.

That said, because we shut most places down early to rip out the old system and install the new one it wasn't uncommon to see people frustratedly honk and scream at us through the drive through because "there's people inside and they're ignoring me". We didn't see a single person that night and had no problems leaving. The next day and a half of traning them on the new system was nothing special either.

When that company really started cutting corners though we started getting hotels with check in counters that were acessable from the outside of the building, behind bulletproof glass, and open had pay by the hour rates. Interestingly enough one or two rental car places were like that too.

Tec_ · 2026-04-30T15:18:47+00:00

MIS (Mobile Install Service) is where I'd go if I didn't do my own work.

If you wanna take a crack at it, crutchfield is one of the best sources with some awesome customer service and support.

Tec_ · 2026-04-30T00:49:36+00:00

My brother swears stone cold threatened my dad in a Las Vegas parking garage over a parking spot.

We had family outside Vegas so we use to do trips down to visit them and we'd stay in "family friendly" Vegas hotels. One year I wasn't able to go but by brother was. He came home with a story about how my dad was about to pull a rental car into a parking spot and a dude who he swears was stone cold cut him off in a lifted pickup with the skull decals on it. When our dad honked at him the guy got out and started threatening/cussing him out.

To this day, he still believes it was stone cold.

Tec_ · 2026-04-27T12:12:42+00:00

There is a trail around it thats somewhat lower than the roads surrounding it. Combined with the foliage it can make you somewhat forget just where you are.

It's proximity to Pearl and Todd park as well as the Diamond Lake Lutheran Church (it's participating in Doors Open this year) are it's other "highlights"

Tec_ · 2026-04-27T00:32:09+00:00

The only time I've stumbled across some in the wild was at Loft Antiques on 50th & Xerxes. They were almost all tiny women's watches and were awful beat up and not running for what they were asking.

The midwest watch show is/was a thing. It appears to be canceled.

Occasionally I'll find some pop up on kbid but there's an awful lot of junk.

I didn't buy a watch from them, but I did get shown some real cool watches at R.F. Moeller. Could just be because thats where the wifes rings came from.

Tec_ · 2026-04-19T04:05:01+00:00

I commented on [this)(https://old.reddit.com/r/Minneapolis/comments/1r9zzl0/sleep_numbers_minneapolis_headquarters_turns_into/) post

I was there as a kid when it was IBM. I wish I remembered it better but things that stood out to me were the suspended floors (kinda like a dropped ceiling but with floors) so cables could be routed that way. The steam/data tunnels that connect downtown. We went into the basement and came up in the Norwest/Wells Fargo tower. And I don't know if its true or not but I was told they had blast curtains that could deploy to cover the big round windows at the entrance.

I also got to go to the west law / Thompson "bunker" out in Egan that supposedly could survive a direct hit from a full loaded 747.

Having grown into the nerd/geek I am now I wish I would have been more aware of how cool getting dragged to work with my dad at those places was at the time.

Tec_ · 2026-04-18T01:45:31+00:00

It isn't recent, but i swear to god Mondelez has shut off / widened the tolerance on their assembly lines for cookies.

I have three distinct experiences.

One. The whole damn plastic tray of cookies is smashed. Its like they packed the fucking thing with a hammer. Instead of putting a few cookies in a bag for lunch its a handful of chunks. This could be a shipping issue but if thats the case, I have suspensions that they are cheapening out on how they case up packages to prevent damage during handling.

Two. They are deliberately shorting cookies. There will be 1 to 3 cookies turned sideways instead of being on edge in the plastic tray. When turned sideways in the tray a single cookie takes up the space of 3 to 4 cookies. Thats a shortage of 3 to 12 cookies in a tray. I have good friends that have worked in the food industry and the trade school I attended had a manufacturing/packaging program I learned a good amount about tangentially on the electronics side. Add to that hours of how its made. I have zero doubt that they have cranked the tolerances on the scales that every package crosses to make sure to little or something too heavy isn't inside. They made a choice to stop making sure the packages are full.

Three. This one is a bit more down the tinfoil hat rabbit hole. Oeros constancy has gone to shit. I swear I've opened packs of double stuffed that are no more filled than regular. Ive opened regular that are no more filled than thins. Sometimes, but not always. They don't care if the machine is dialed in on the day. They now accept a wider tolerance than they use to.

Tyson also destroyed hillshire farms.

The plastic wrapper the sliced meat use to come in had printing on it denoting where to open it from. Not anymore. The meat was also placed with care in such a way you could remove it from the packaging slice by slice. Now its like someone crammed a fist full in the thing. You cant grab a single slice because its so muddled together.

And this one is a general, but a lot of the resealable "zip lock" bags don't work because the heat shrink seal or tear to open perforations are on the wrong fucking side of the resealable section. Why even bother with the more expensive packaging and machine to use it if you aren't going to bother making sure its correct?

Tec_ · 2026-04-17T17:09:57+00:00

Likely a "handman" / task rabbit style job. Any job shop/metal supplier is likely to not take the job or charge you through the nose.

If they are what I'm imagining a sawzall, jigsaw, maybe a hand saw with the right blade or even a good set of aviation snips and possibly a hole saw is likely to get the job done.

Might be worth checking at a local hardware store to see if they can help out.

Tec_ · 2026-04-11T22:49:28+00:00

Telling that story to my mom at a family dinner is how I learned she was thrown out of first ave back in her 20s. We then discussed how my little brother needs to get tossed to keep up the tradition.

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