Monday, April 30, 2018

It's hard to make me gasp about real estate, but......

The sweet two-bedroom, one-bathroom at 31 Elk St. right across from Glen Park Canyon was listed for $1.295 million on March 23, and sold only five days later for $2.105 million. Source.

810,000 over asking. It makes the days of the housing bubble seem sane. I never saw ANYTHING like this then.

random.





They had already tilled half of this field before I found it. It must have been amazing before that.

Dream Machines 2018 END.



I've gotten the batman car before. It was a show in my town so I was surprised it showed up in Half Moon Bay. They must trailer it there because it sounds like a jet engine.





I always have to get my dog on.





Are we still for lambo doors on things that are not lambo's? There was a time where this all was all the rage. So I was a little bored.





Mr S. was impressed they packed all this crap into the trunk of a corvette.



This car you had to drive from the back seat.



They have these every year. You ride them basically the way that skeleton does.

Sunday, April 29, 2018

Dream Machines 2018 part 1.









Tiny tires are in. So tiny. But they don't make me hard laugh as much as 26's. Now if they went a bit tiny-ier that might be funny.









Uuuuum. You don't see that in California very often.





Somehow the idea of a churchy biker gang make me laugh. But these guys were super nice and started posing for me. They are out of Stockton and somehow they managed to get me to contribute 25 bucks to their churchy biker gang. And I'm the deepest atheist you will ever meet. I'm not one of those "I'm going to convert you" type atheists - but I'm definitely the "you aren't converting me" type.

When I got back to Mr S. he said - man I want to see the pitch they gave you. And he said my heart grew three sizes larger. But mostly he wondered what on earth these people could have said for me to give them any money at all.

Something always brings me back to you.....



I have been aching for a beach day.  Aching. But next month we already have a beach weekend planned - so no sand was touched today.

Friday, April 27, 2018

So shady.

Earlier in the year we took our Solstice into the local dealership to have a bunch of recall stuff done. We also had them do a 60 thousand mile tune up. At the time they told us we had a minor crack in the exhaust manifold. We also had that heating problem I blogged about going on and we felt the deanship was going to rape us on the price. So we didn't get it fixed there.

Fast forward to last week when registration for that car came and we decided we needed to have that thing fixed because it's a smog check year.. We took it to a shop here in town. Guess what he said?

The manifold was fine but "somehow the bolts to the manifold were loose". Because I'm sure that just happens on it's own. I've totally heard of that a million times. Said in the most sarcastic way.

So yeah... that happened and I guess I'm never going back to that dealership. They were going to charge us like 600 bucks. We debated fixing it ourselves because youtube can teach you anything. But ultimately decided we'd already bought enough new tools for projects this month.

That car is kind fun to work on - if you are small like a girl. Otherwise.. I'm not surprised there are things that mechanics don't want to work on with it. To change the battery you have to remove the right front quarter panel. They really packed everything in tight. Man hands no good.

Thursday, April 26, 2018

Apparently the average time houses spend on the market in my town is 6.6 days. It makes the housing bubble days seem completely sane. But for years I talked about how they wren't building enough stuff to keep up with population increases. Now it's completely crazy.

What do you guys think of this air taxi?



I pray once and for all this will make men stop lusting after jetpacks and flying cars. Because this is better! I guess one of the McLaren designers is working on this.

If you have a short attention span like I do - skip to one minute 52.

Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Does THIS make san Fransisco a shithole?

People Hate San Francisco’s Electric Scooters So Much They Are Vandalizing, Smearing Poop On Them.

When I was in downtown San Jose a week or two ago I noticed all of these scooters. They didn't seem to be causing that much of a problem yet. But it was sort of confusing because San Jose already has racks and racks of Lime bikes from Ford that are often just half used.  I've been watching this because I don't understand why Ford is in the business of bike rentals. It's gotta be a sign of desperation. Right?

And Facebook has been getting in a little trouble because their campus bikes were being just thrown in a nearby creek and they had to force facebook to go and fish them out.

So when this whole thing erupted in San Fransisco literally in the last week it made me laugh. Mostly because people can leave these things anywhere they want and don't necessarily have a way to find their way out of obscure areas where there isn't a high amount of traffic.

For instance when  I was in San Mateo last weekend I saw one of those rental bikes parked way back in a residential neighborhood. And my first thought was.... I wonder how long it takes before a rider finds this thing and puts it in a more populated area.

My second thought was - how is this profitable? I'd already seen stories about people in SF throwing these scooters in dumpers and trash cans. And can you believe these people raised 100 million in funding? I'm guessing those people will never get their money back. But at least we aren't China yet. You HAVE to go over and check out the pictures of all the abandoned bikes from similar schemes in China. It's breathtaking without any hyperbole. I don't understand how this can be financially possible in any way.

Maybe this isn't a viable business model after all.

WeWork documents reveal it owes $18 billion in rent and is burning through cash as it seeks more funding.

I've been completely fascinated by these "incubators". They don't seem to be producing much. Yet I see one site in Fremont that is basically vacant and just storing cars in the parking lot. I've been meaning to go and check it out more closely. They seem to be a direct to customer used car company that I haven't heard of before and forget the name of. But every time I drive by there - there seems to be more and more cars. I just don't get it.

All I know if that if something happens to Softbank the Valley is going to be a little screwed. They own a little of everything around here.

Tuesday, April 24, 2018

The great monster update.

We were sitting in the living room and we heard that rustling sound under the house. Then we hear a cat growling. So we turn off the TV.

Me - is that a cat? We don't have a cat under the house do we? So we wait to hear it again thinking it must be outside. Then the cat does it again and we rush outside to look in one of those weep vents to see if there is a cat in there.

If it was a cat it would howl to try to get out... right? It's been like three days. And clearly it's nighttime here. That is exactly how all horror films go. It's dark outside so of course you need to go investigate. NOT. Mr. Say's that eventually it will start to sound like a baby. Which actually gives me a vague memory of the last time we were under the house and we were having these same discussions. We started talking about the creepiest thing you'd find under a house. And I think we decided on a baby doll would freak people the eff out. Mr S. suggested those roadside candles would be super creepy.

I wasn't planning on going in until the weekend and if it's a cat I'm gonna have to do a rescue mission. Gawd I hate the underside of houses. I don't know if I need to just throw a cat some food and hope it survives until the weekend.

I guess I'm giving you cars and more cars.



A Masi is always good for a smile. But it almost made me miss this R8 further out in the parking lot.

Monday, April 23, 2018

McLaren in the wild.



It was probably coming back from Santana Row, and if I'd seem it there I wouldn't have even given it a second look. They are at every car show. I see them ~all~ the time. But seeing it in the wild made it better.

There's something living under my house....

And hopefully it's only a mouse. I'm not very happy about the whole thing because I've watched too many horror films and now Mr S. and I have to crawl under there. This is how every horror movie starts!

We've been under there twice. Once to lay cable and I forget why we were under there the second time. But it's a totally normal under the house kinda thing. But because I've watched so many horror movies I think it might be zombie rabid raccoons.

I mean it can only be like three things right? Mice/rats (most likely), opossums, raccoons? But it makes enough noise that I can hear it from inside.  So it must be big. It seems to be somewhere along my flexible heating hose. Because it sounds like really loud cellophane rustling around.

Man do I hate the underside of houses.

50's vet.

Tesla's demise may have been greatly overrated.



I was having ramen down by the Tesla plant this weekend so I had to do a drive by. Their overflow parking lot looked WAY better. Maybe that production stop helped them clear the backlog. Or they are hiding them somewhere else. But I didn't even stop because that lot is now a non event.

Progress is progress.



The BBQ bench got wheels this weekend. Now all we have to do is attach the melamine to the frame.

This whole project started because the stand that came with the BBQ was 400 bucks and it was super flimsy. When the grill lid was open I wasn't sure the whole thing wasn't going to topple backwards. Other BBQ stands were even more spendy than that.

This stand came in well under 200 bucks, although we did buy a few new tools. If you ever have to work on melamine I highly recommend iron on melamine tape to create a manufacture looking edge. That crap really works as advertised.

Saturday, April 21, 2018

You have to try it once.



Since I was in San Mateo today we wound up at the burger place call Apple Fitter. They make donuts and burgers. And Mr S. and I had to try one of those donut burgers. We decided to do half and half because I thought that would be way too much and I wouldn't like it. That way we both got to try it without committing to a whole burger and we'd have a different burger half chaser.

But...... it was better than the other burger we ordered. And I'd go back. You almost can't even taste the donut. It just sort of gives it a sweet finish. Plus they put glazed side down so you don't get all sticky. It was really much better than I expected. Now I guess I have to order some insulin in bulk. And no I don't use insulin now.. but give it time. Donut burgers. They could be crave worthy.

When I'm bored....



I might wind up at a cat show even though I don't really like cats. Not to mention, Mr S is super allergic to cats. I do sort of have a kink for breeders though. They are a really quirky set and they create some pretty interesting stuff sometimes. Like for a few years it seems like they are trying to get cats to look more like lions and tigers. The hairless ones don't seem to be as trendy now.

I think the real reason I keep going to these things is one time I went to one and they had a serval there. Which wasn't the interesting part. LOL. The interesting part was the giant billboard next to the serval that told you in big letters how bad of a pet they are. You can never leave home. They are needy. They will destroy all your stuff. Which honestly made us feel better about owning bunnies. At least she isn't a serval. Things could be worse.

I know I make owning bunnies sound like hell, but the baby years can be challenging. That's why so many of them wind up in shelters after a few months.





This one was new in the cellophane.



I'm the cat.

Thursday, April 19, 2018

Maybe she will get more freedom.



Normally when bunnies are babies there are a lot more photos around here, but Lacy turned out to be a stealth pee-er. And I wasn't sure I was going to be able to break her of that. So, her outside time has been pretty restrictive. But she's coming up on two years old now and she's started showing signs of being a mature girl.

Like - she understands when I am going to take her litterbox and clean it so she goes in and pees pretty consistently so she doesn't have to hold it or just pee anywhere. And that is a huge sign of progress.  Maybe someday I will get to let her back on the furniture.

And yes - I recycled this photo.

Wednesday, April 18, 2018

Since I'm about the only Californian who will admit to voting for Trump I find it fascinating how attitudes are starting to change.  For a while there it was pretty tense and even I regretted being so open about it. But, Obama people are finally starting to talk to me and it seems that whole China thing left an impression on them.

I'm honestly not sure what all the fuss is about. The only thing I know about men is they will beat each others asses and then be like ARE WE COOL? And then they are friends!

I'm totally confused. I thought Solar power was going to save them.

Puerto Rico Hit With Island-Wide Blackout.

Said in the most sarcastic way. I've only been keeping a slight eye on this because I can't wait to see what happens to solar panels in the next hurricane. But what do I know?

I'm really loath to give Tesla too much shit right now. Cnbc came out with this article this morning. "Tesla could be 'too big to fail' like GM, Chrysler were during crisis, Morgan Stanley says" .

Remember I talked about this a few weeks ago. But honestly, Elon is the billionaire you want to be. He changed the Valley in ways I could have never imagined. I want him to stop using our money - but I don't want him to stop. Elon is one of the most scrappy guys. He will die trying to  save that company. He might just not have enough runway.

I honestly think a Tesla default will ripple through the Valley in a much larger way then CNBC thinks. In a normal business cycle 1 auto job supports 7 other jobs, but I think that ratio is higher because of all the sensors and map applications. I'm not sure what the ratio is... but I think way higher than that.

Hurricanes blew away Puerto Rico's power grid. Now solar power is rising to fill the void.

.Gov job openings have gotten interesting lately.

Boeing is hiring for this:

"Developing system and subsystem performance models for airborne and space radar applications Documenting technical analysis to support requirement derivation, allocation and verification efforts with respect to Electronic Attack (EA) and Electronic "Protection (EP) and related signal processing algorithms .

And Torch is hiring for this:

Exciting opportunity for a Sr. State Estimation Engineer to join the "Cruise Missile Navigation for A2AD, Long Range, Over-Water Ingress" program team within the Integrated Sensing and Processing Sciences Branch of the AFRL Munitions Directorate. The qualified candidate will have experience in guidance filtering, state estimation, and optimization; expertise in computational engineering, algorithm development, Kalman filtering, object-oriented programming, and data analysis.

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Imagine if the website to pay your taxes was down and all the Starbucks were closed for sensitivity training. Then we would see what kind of society we all live in is truly like.

Monday, April 16, 2018

Even I think real estate is gasp worthy now.

This week the whole nation freaked out about a burned out house in San Jose selling for 800k. In my head I thought - these people don't even know the half of it. People are telling me that to buy a house these days - you have to waive ~all~ contingencies. Including inspections.

Since I don't like to extrapolate my area to other areas, I like to get lots of data points before freaking out about stuff. But today I talked to my childhood friend who has decided to become an agent in the Seattle market and she said the same thing is happening up there. You even waive title insurance! Everybody says it's been going on for a couple of years.

That right there is a whole nuther level of crazy. I've gutted a house before and even I wouldn't waive inspections or title.

Sunday, April 15, 2018

I don't understand the demo who comments on youtube videos.



I put this video up on youtube ~seven years ago~. No fucks given for six years. Basically all through the whole Obama administration. Then all of a sudden about 6 months ago,  people became interested in it and almost every day now I get a comment on it. The only reason I even know is because I get an email sent to me.

The question is --------- who comments on seven year old videos! And why do you care now and not then?

Saturday, April 14, 2018

Friday, April 13, 2018

I found my husbands kryptonite today.

I asked him to put my hair in a pony tail. Oh - he can do complex math but ask him to put your hair in a pony tail and I've never seen him so confused.

I was trying to get a sand job in on my BBQ stand before it rains. And since it's stained black the sanding dust made me look like a walking minstrel so I couldn't touch anything including my hair.

Wednesday, April 11, 2018

It's funny how of all the things people are mad at....... no one seems to be concerned with interest rates. I haven't talked to one person who has mentioned them at all.

Purple Haze.



The hills are starting to look like bruised NBA wives with the purple flowers. Lighting today was not great.

Tomorrow I will be in an A.I. conference all day so you will have to entertain yourselves.

Tuesday, April 10, 2018

Maybe he's going to store cars there.

Tesla Interested In Purchasing Massive Plot Of Land In Oakland.

"Tesla CEO Elon Musk sent a letter of interest to Oakland city officials saying that the automaker is interested in the 130-acre site. Oakland City Hall also received a request from real estate investor Mark Hall, who hopes to use the property in part of a United Soccer League expansion project."

"Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf plans to work a deal with the Oakland A’s to build a new ballpark in the area. This could mean that neither of the above would be able to partake. However, Hall’s plan would use a portion of the property and leave the rest for the A’s new ballpark. We’re not entirely sure if Tesla would also agree to such a plan.

Hall has already offered $85 million for a portion of the land. Additionally, the city and county are $136 million in debt on the current Coliseum and Oracle Arena. To make his offer even more appealing, Hall has committed to matching the team’s offer to pay off the debt in the event that the A’s choose to move their new stadium elsewhere."

The articles goes on to say....

"He’s pitching a plan for a 44-acre mega-sports and recreation center on the Coliseum site that would include a stadium for his team and sports fields. He would use Oracle Arena, which the Warriors are about to vacate, for concerts, pro lacrosse games and foosball competitions. (Yes, foosball, the arcade game when little players on hand-manipulated metal rods kick a ball up and down the table.) The rest of the property would go to the A’s for their new ballpark."

I guess everyone is wrong about his demise. He's got baller stadium money. Because those always make money.

Monday, April 09, 2018

Getting your picture taken at the facebook thumb doesn't seem to be getting any shorter.

That makes complete sense. NOT.

San Diego pays $7 million for former indoor skydiving center to be repurposed for homeless services.

This article caught my eye because two years ago Mr S. and I went to the iFly indoor skydiving in San Diego and I can't imagine a more awkward piece of real estate to repurpose. This sale is NOT iFly, but look at this building they are putting homeless services in. Seriously!

Some days I don't know what the hell is happening in California. It's like insanity wrapped in an enigma.

Mr S. found a way to make ironing fun again.



When you are a weekend warrior lots of things get in the way of your projects. We had a few weeks of rain that slowed things down. Taxes. Normal life and finding content for this blog all sort of get in the way. But we are back at the BBQ project where we needed to measure out the middle shelf where the BBQ will rest on. My job was to apply iron on melamine tape to the edges.

First order of business was to find an iron which meant going out to a goodwill store. I didn't want to buy a new one and who irons anymore? Mr S. was rifling through the goodwill store while I was completely transfixed with how so much glue ended up in this isle. It's the kind of stuff that you'd find at Weird Stuff which sadly I learned closed down this weekend after 30 something years. I was in there once (weird stuff) and they had a giant bin full of imperfect prisms. Which I always regret never having bought. I don't know why. They were prisms! Do you need a reason?



Anyway...Mr S. found this stuff and I was sure it was pretty much bullshit. But we watched a few youtube videos on how to apply it and off we set. To my complete enjoyment - this stuff actually works and makes the edge look like a manufactured edge. It's actually shocking how good it works. It didn't get to the middle circle yet and that could be challenging.



Sadly I learned how to property cut melamine after I'd already had this piece cut. I thought you just had to learn to live with the one side being a little "chippy." Otherwise my top would look super amazing. This was suppose to be a throwaway project after all.



For the middle shelf we subsetted the melamine and Mr S. was busy working on applying triangles to the frame so we could attach said melamine.





The funny thing about this project is that Mr S. and I have probably had more disagreements on it than any other. And we've done some pretty crazy house stuff.

We bought this BBQ over the holidays and Mr S. was like - lets slam a stand together in a day. But being a woman - I didn't want to work on a project that I was just going to have to throw away in a few months. Plus I was dying to get rid of some wood from my woodpile and I didn't want to buy a bunch of wood that I was just going to have to throw away. I already had a precut piece of melamine in the garage and I was aiming to get rid of more stuff than I acquired. A goal that I ultimately lost. But not by much. We did have to buy a second sheet of melamine because there are two levels. So,  I now have a larger remnant of melamine in the garage for some far off project.

So, this went from quick and dirty to actually kinda high end. I have a granite remnant we were going to use in place of melamine. Then Mr S. got all despondent because as I said - things get in the way of projects a lot of times and he thought this would never get done. So we ratcheted back and we are getting close to having it done. Depending on the rain this week I hope to get a final stain coat on.