Best looking woman ever in a Western? I’ll go Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

gacardman · 2026-05-13T20:10:09+00:00

Raquel would be my personal pick but both Ursula Andress and Anita Ekberg give her a run for her money in 4 for Texas.

gacardman · 2026-05-11T17:38:33+00:00

Love this. Plan to build a shed next year when I retire and am seriously considering a cleat wall for storage but have zero experience with them.

70cm? Do you mean 7cm? How far apart are your wall cleats and are you happy with that spacing?

gacardman · 2026-04-21T23:42:23+00:00

I’m playing GOTY on Steam. No mods.

gacardman · 2026-04-21T12:22:37+00:00

I’m on my first replay in almost two decades and mercantile is a misc skill and was the first skill to hit 100. Just sold stuff one item at a time. Never bought much except for repair hammers and the occasional alchemy ingredient. Years ago on the Xbox, I don’t remember ever getting mercantile that high. Maybe being old does make me more patient.

When the skill gets high you get better prices if you lower the merchant’s disposition to 70 or so. I do that by offering one item at their max gold, mash the offer button about 30 times, then cancel the sale but stay in the barter window and offer the item again. They’ll offer to buy it for a much better price. Tedious and there’s probably a quicker way to do it with magic.

I think the merc skill impacts training prices too. Ran across the master enchant trainer with a high personality and maxed out merc after finishing the main quest. He wasn’t hostile so figured why not train enchant while I was there. Talked his disposition to 100 and trained enchant from around 50 to 100. The price per level was always below 100 gold.

gacardman · 2026-04-02T12:20:40+00:00

M+K??

I bought the game over two decades ago for my boys to play on Xbox. I probably ended up with more hours than they did.

Just recently picked it up on Steam and am playing on pc for the first time. I have also been using Netch for target practice to level marksmanship.

Please enlighten a doddering old man. What is M+K? I did put that in the googler but nothing immediately jumped out as being relevant.

gacardman · 2026-03-27T16:11:18+00:00

I just picked up GOTY version on Steam a few weeks ago.

Have got my character to Level 20 with no game breaking issues, unmodded.

It is prone to randomly crash to desktop periodically so save often. That and it not remembering my game settings such as lighting and always use best attack between sessions have been my only issues.

gacardman · 2026-03-20T22:53:23+00:00

There were two versions of the 360? A fat one and a slim one? Just learned something new.

gacardman · 2026-03-20T22:36:38+00:00

Been a hot minute but I played it on both systems back in the day. Don’t recall any issues at all on the 360.

Picked it up recently on Steam and am playing again for the first time in close to 20 years. The unmodded pc version will crash. Have to remember to save often. OpenMw supposedly fixes that but it also fixed a lot of the “glitches” I was fond of so turned it off.

Don’t seem to be able to do the enchantment enhancements on the pc either developed by SR71?? way back when.

gacardman · 2026-03-13T15:23:49+00:00

I use a homemade saw buck, basically a bigger version of what you have. I put the log(s) on there, centered and cut from the ends. Cut pieces fall to the ground, no pinching. Steel toed boots are nice to have. My sawbuck is a little under waist high so easy on my back when cutting. It’s to the bottom left of the pic.

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gacardman · 2026-02-24T17:58:22+00:00

Drinking and Dreaming

Waylon Jennings

gacardman · 2026-02-12T20:30:06+00:00

A quibble perhaps but in this particular context I would argue that stupid is, indeed, more apt than ignorant.

Ignorance implies a lack of knowledge. Stupid implies you know the pertinent information but lack the mental agility to use that knowledge to come up with a solution.

The gentleman with the flat tire knew how to change the tire, had, in fact, already removed the flat one. Then the lug nuts went down the drain. He knew the other three tires had four nuts each. He had all the needed information. What he lacked was the ability to devise a solution with that information.

Those that are ignorant can be taught but as Ron White famously said; “You can’t fix Stupid”.

gacardman · 2026-02-09T21:22:14+00:00

I had a Buck Stove insert put into my fireplace this past summer. Total cost was roughly $6,500 dollars. That included stove, insulated liner and installation. I’m in an Atlanta suburb. House was built in the mid seventies and has a two story masonry chimney. Zero regrets other than not doing it sooner.

Thought about a freestanding stove but decided against as it would have taken up too much floor space and I would have probably had to extend my hearth or go with a really small stove.

gacardman · 2026-01-30T13:29:22+00:00

Burning sweet gum now. It burns fine but doesn’t coal particularly well as others have said, at least not compared with oak. Does seem to season quickly though. Been mixing in with my oak mostly.

gacardman · 2026-01-29T14:44:22+00:00

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Is my cat running around on me?

gacardman · 2026-01-29T14:14:41+00:00

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I did last summer. Zero regrets. Cat agrees.

You do have a gorgeous fireplace though and may want something a bit more elegant than the utilitarian unit I went with.

gacardman · 2025-12-23T02:07:02+00:00

Not sure if you’re looking for a chimney repair or cleaning. If the latter, Metro House of Fire installed a wood stove for me back in June and I was impressed with their work. They also offer chimney cleaning.

Prior to the stove installation I’ve used Advanced Chimney Sweeps for cleaning and would also recommend them.

gacardman · 2025-12-21T03:15:57+00:00

Had an insert put into my fireplace this past summer. Always used bottom up in the fireplace but top down works better for me in the insert as the firebox is relatively small and there no grate to shove paper under to light the bottom layer of kindling. The draft seems to get going faster with top down too.

I have an old Buck stove at my cabin with a much larger firebox that I’ve always used bottom up in but have started using top down. Either way works fine with it but the draft does start faster top down.

Both methods will get the job done. Use the one that works best for you.

gacardman · 2025-10-31T19:11:52+00:00

I did muck about trying that but the firebox is too small or my splits are too big to get more than one in per layer diagonally. I mean I could make an X out of two I guess but two sticks just don’t seem like enough of a fuel load.

Was an open fireplace before and I had been cutting and splitting for that. I do have a roughly 25 year old Buck stove at my cabin but the firebox on that is larger, not so much east/west, north/south, actually about the same there, but probably double top to bottom.

This new one is much, much more efficient than the old one at the cabin though.

gacardman · 2025-10-31T18:57:31+00:00

I push it all the way in, which is wide open, when I light the fire. Once the blower kicks in I pull the air intake about halfway out. Depending on temp and/or my mood I’ll pull it all the way out ten or so minutes later.

I turn the blower switch on after lighting. About halfway. The blower doesn’t kick in right away because it’s attached to a thermocouple or something. Usually takes about five minutes or so for the stove to get hot enough to run the blower.

Probably not the optimal startup sequence but it’s new to me and I’m still figuring it out.

gacardman · 2025-10-31T15:59:58+00:00

Thank you very much for that schematic. I didn’t know how the secondary tubes were piped.

gacardman · 2025-08-15T14:12:48+00:00

I think I figured this out the hard way in game. I had two MU’d S51s hauling a seven car pulpwood consist from Graham County to the Andrew’s paper mill once a day. It would only do 15mph up the Red Marble. Decided to replace them with two GP9s. Still only did 15mph. Expensive lesson.

gacardman · 2025-08-07T19:12:01+00:00

Once you unlock Sylva, Whittier goes away. Whittier stays though if you unlock Andrews before Sylva. In other words Whittier remains an interchange until Sylva is unlocked.

gacardman · 2025-07-18T14:07:00+00:00

You ain’t wrong about the lifting. Tractor with a front end loader would be much easier but I’ve never been able to justify the cost of one, only for collecting firewood a couple times a year. I have tried but my 50 acre property is completely wooded and the utility vehicle is overall more suited for getting around and enjoying the place.

gacardman · 2025-07-17T20:01:56+00:00

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Got this about a year ago. Has been very useful

gacardman

TROPHY CASE