Broken Tools, Obsolete Necessities - July 14, 2014

Beekeeping/Fruit/Horticulture

• the late winter, cool temperatures and rain, rain, rain impact
• slow, late bees in the field
• agitated bears finding the beeyard(s)
• broken mowers
• reliable Stihl weed-wacker died from overuse (twelve  years)
• fee apples
• the gooseberries are going crazy
• great red and black currant production
• grapes...another story

Technology

Looking for one thing leads to finding another.  This afternoon I found another box which I must have used fifteen years ago to consolidate computer debris.  There was a nice Multi-tech 28.8 modem with the power
adapter and serial adapters for both sizes of serial ports.  Obviously this was purchased at a point of technology evolution.  Software and hardware alike takes forks in road which can be dead ends, switchbacks, shortcuts and the main road to the future.  Telecommunication speeds continue to increase.  Centurylink will now bring fiber directly to one's home.  Someday we'll be stealing copper telephone cable from our neighbor's homes along with the plumbing.  I'm not sure what I used this modem for and I have no recollection of the computer for which the adapters were purchased.  My first personal computer was purchased in 1980 for about $1500 which was half-price at the time.  Following that most have come from one job or another.  The no-name box in use at the moment was about $300 four or five years ago.  Most other PCs about the workspace are throwaway notebooks re-purposed with Linux or my ever-present Samsung Chromebook.

Half of the cables and adapters were discarded.  I kept a couple of network cables but pondered whether they were CAT3 or CAT5 and all six on the parallel printer cables.  Certainly there are people around today that know nothing other than wireless or bluetooth printing.  That's fine.  Having a box of old computer cables are probably like the brace and bits of our parents and grandparents.  The brace and bits in my tool box are still useable.  The computer cables cannot connect to much of anything.  I shipped the box of cables to some impoverished country in Africa where they can burn off the insulation, polluting their drinking water and air but make a few cents.  It made me feel like a business incubator.

Job(s)

After working a short consulting gig the other day I felt pretty good.  The company were complimentary of
opinions, perspectives and ideas that the 27-year gig rejected for 27 years.

The Twin Cities is full of jobs.  I'm shooting for a fall re-entry but only something less than 8x5.