Month: May 2015

More pickling

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I love doing lactobacillus pickling to make sour dill pickles. Did three quart size jars this time. And instead of just a little black tea, I put who black tea bags in each jar. We’ll see how it goes.

A second batch of dill sour pickles. Better in quart jars. And this time instead of a little bit of black tea, a whole tea bag to each jar.

So far I’ve done cucumbers, bell peppers, and jalapeno peppers. The jalapeno – left the seeds in place on some, remove on others. Oh the flavor of those was awesome.

It’s pretty easy to do. Sterilize jars and lids. Then make a brine – 2 tbsp salt to a quart of water bring it to about 180F.  I cut these mini cukes in halves and through in 3 or 4 cloves of garlic, along with a big dose of fresh dill and a tea bag filled with black tea. Then pour in the brine – leave about 1/4 to 1/2″ of head space. Drop the sealing plates on and loosely tighten the rings.

Let them ferment for about two weeks or so. They’ll be sour, crunchy, and delicious. Just enough salt in the brine too.

More things coming in

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So today I ordered a case for the Rigol scope. It hit me that the Tek has the cover that goes over everything to keep it nice and safe. And I want the same for my Rigol scope.

Also ordered a function generator kit. That way I can set the scope up properly.

I note it has bnc connectors on the kit – I’ll just tap a wire in and clamp the probe to that. Problem solved.

Then I can use it once I finally build my Pixie QRP 40m kit. Let me translate:

Pixie is the product name.

QRP is a Q-Code for low power operation.

40m is forty meters. The wavelength for the band that runs about 7.0MHz to 7.3MHz. Yes, three tenths of a Megahertz of space. But we hams get through.

Plus the Pixie is a CW radio. CW stands for Continuous Wave where you use a key to turn the signal on and off in the form of Morse Code. Yes – I hold an Extra class amateur radio license and I got my extra when you had to know 20WPM code. Now of course there is no code requirement even for the extra. Ut si!

And I’m pleased to report

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The UPS actually delivered the package. It was shipped UPS Ground out of a community just outside Red Bank, NJ to me in Providence, RI. About 228 miles between us.

But according to this map:

That yellow area – all one day if shipped within it. Pretty good.

As you probably well know I’ve had some major problems with UPS in the past. From them not being able to find the address, to doing tag and runs, etc. But this time they actually delivered. The box for my new Rigol DS1054Z was sitting on the porch when I got home.

Which says – no signature required was honored. I’m fucking amazed.

The new Rigol DS104Z arrived today

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I’ve got it all unpacked and plugged in. Here’s first boot:

And the photo below shows all features Official. I love it. If you have a DS1052, DS1054Z or any DS1000 series Rigol digital oscilloscope go here to get the unlock code.  You’ll need the serial number from your scope. That’s all that’s required.

Then to enter the code:

Once it’s done you should see something like this:

20150527_181344[1]

Maybe with UPS, just maybe

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So I ordered a Rigol DS1054Z oscilloscope on Amazon of all places. The price is pretty sticky on it, $399. And I searched around.

But to my dismay the vendor shipped it via UPS. You know, Shit Wrapped in Chiffon.

Now I ordered the scope on the 22nd of May. It didn’t ship until yesterday – holiday weekend and all. So I can forgive that plus I didn’t pay extra for expedited shipping.

But Amazon says it’ll arrive on the 3rd of June. But when I take the UPS tracking number and plug it into UPS’s tracking web site it says it’s out for delivery today.

When I first saw that yesterday I theorized that either Amazon or UPS was telling a lie. Quelle surprise – it was Amazon. However I don’t have the item in my hands at this time, and UPS still has plenty of time to fuck it up. Now it shipped no signature required. If I have to go down to UPS and pick it up again I’m going to definitely tear them a new asshole.

Though I will admit, since I put up the sign in the street facing windows that it was in fact my address, the UPS driver now delivers the package no questions asked. So i’m hopeful. It’s all of a ten pound package. That might be too heavy for the driver to heft off the truck and all.

Uh oh – the Federal Government is getting Swatted

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In the gaming community there is a practice called Swatting. Basically you find a VOIP service that lets you play fast and loose with the rules for Caller ID and BTN data and you call the police department in your victim’s community. Because the gaming platforms today include cameras you get to watch your victim as his house is invaded by police SWAT teams, hence the name Swatting

In the past couple days airports and now even the U.S. Capitol have been swatted. Best of luck finding the perps if they don’t get stupid and brag about it.

It’s a flaw in telecom systems that is at the root of it all. Because it all originated with the old Bell System. There was no need to authenticate Caller ID data or even BTN data because you were doing business with other Bell companies. The assumption was it was all authenticated. But even since the mid 1990’s when alternative carriers got in on the game – and exposed a fair amount of their networks, well people learned how to spoof their caller information.

What concerns me about this isn’t so much the practice, but what the practice could be adapted to do if you think it out. Criminals for instance could tie up police at opportune sites while they commit their crimes. That’s the generic of course, the specific acts I leave to your imagination.

It’s the same thing with the communication bus on all cars since the late 1990’s. It’s called a CAN bus. It runs EVERYTHING on the car, or lets it communicate with everything. One of the proposals the federal government has is to get cars to be able to talk to each other. And you just KNOW it’s going to hang off the unsecured CAN bus. A rogue actor could have a lot of fun with that, particularly since braking, acceleration, and steering in many cars is on the CAN bus.

Well – Memorial Day is almost over

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We didn’t do a damned thing. I just recovered from work. I did do something though – I took an inspection look at the air conditioner lurking in the basement. It’s a window mount type.

Plugged it in to see if maybe the GFCI outlet had quit – nope – it lit up and turned on.

And I believe I had posted how I ordered a new deep fryer. One with about six times the capacity of the older Rival unit we had. Got that and a good Spyder for fishing chips out, but realized the basket comes out of this new deep fryer. But it’s good for delicate items. So all good there.

Well I also want to do my own potato chips so I also ordered a Mandolin. It’ll be here tomorrow.

Also made a realization – someone forwarded me a  recipe for a lemon based cake. And I was looking at the ingredients and it hit me, had all of them in the house. This is me who has at last count Unbleached All Purpose Flour, Wheat Flour, Bread Flour, Cake Flour, and regular bleached All Purpose Flour. And then oils  which include canola, corn, peanut, and olive. Vinegars include white, cider, balsamic, and one strawberry vinegar.

And in the technical – my new oscilloscope will ship tomorrow. It’s through a company on Amazon called Tequipment. Apparently they aren’t THAT hungry as the order went in on Friday. But at least they take their holidays seriously.

Indiscriminate ads on Hulu

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Just a sampling of the ads thus far:

Botox – which I find highly abhorrent.

State Farm – an Insurance company I have no reason to trust or deal with.

LG Flex – if I wanted a curved cell phone I’d take a torch to my Samsung phone.

Hulu just doesn’t get it.

Congratulations to Ireland’s Gay Community

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I find it remarkable – in a country upon one half of which is Catholic that this actually passed a public referendum. My congratulations are in order.

And having a bit of Irish ancestry myself I’m glad it happened. Things are getting better at a remarkable rate all around the world for we gay people.