Solution implemented!

Solution implemented!  The freezing UPS problem I devised a solution for is now fixed.  Yay!  And I did it exactly the way I had planned.  That hardly ever happens.  :)

The first photo below shows the shelf I installed, with the bottom of it being 10.5 feet above the garage floor.  The hangers that the 2x6s are sitting on were that leftover garage storage kit that I had.  In that first photo, between the two boards and a bit to the left you can see the 4" hole I sawed through the garage ceiling.  There's a matching hole in the second floor's floor.  The second photo shows the UPS all wired up and running.  I'm writing this post on a computer powered by that UPS.  It works!

The primary purpose of this project was to locate the UPS in a space that is temperature controlled – a sort of Goldilocks temperature, neither too hot nor too cold.  The barn's garage suits that bill perfectly.  In the winter it's heated, never getting colder than 65°F.  In the summer the excellent insulation in my barn plus the thermal mass of the 8" thick concrete floor keeps the temperature below 80°F most of the time, and the highest it's ever been is 84°F.  That's well within the UPS's operating temperature range.  My freezing UPS problem should be gone, and hopefully I didn't introduce any new problems while doing that.

There's a secondary benefit though, one that I hadn't even considered.  The UPS has rather loud fans, and now they're running down in the garage where a bit of extra noise will mean nothing (as there are many noisy things down there already).  That means my second floor is now back to it's basically noiseless state: nice and quiet for working, no noise to mess with my music.

Win!

Solution devised...

Solution devised...  A solution for my frozen UPS problem, that is.  Immediately below my UPS's current location is the 12 foot high ceiling in the barn's “garage” (where I keep my tractor, ATV, and some other equipment).  There's no wall anywhere near there.  I remembered that I had one of these ceiling storage kits left over from another project.  After a little investigation, I figured out that this would work very nicely to make a little “under the ceiling” shelf of sorts high above my “garage” floor, well out of the way and safe from anything stupid I might do with the tractor.  Installing that shouldn't be very difficult, other than having to do the work at the top of a tall ladder.  Once that shelf is in place, then all I need is a roughly 4" diameter hole in the ceiling (and floor above) to route the power input and output cables through.  I think the biggest challenge will be simply putting the UPS up there – the thing is a monster; weighs about 60 or 70 pounds.  I have to do some thinking about how to (safely) hoist that thing up there.

So now I have yet another project, this one with a bit of urgency as we have some cold weather in the forecast!

The cat...

The cat ... soon to be formerly known as “Tigger”.  This is the cat we adopted yesterday.  She seems reasonably content with her lot, but definitely not pleased about the presence of all our other cats.  At the moment only two of our other cats can actually come into contact with her, but they can all watch each other ... which they are. :)

Morning, deer...

Morning, deer, and a few other things...  When there was just barely enough light to see this morning, I looked out to our bird feeders to see if they were empty.  I spotted this deer scrounging the seed that birds had kicked off the feeders and not yet cleaned up (eventually they get everything edible).  I couldn't see well enough to tell if it was a buck or a doe – the bucks have lost their antlers by now, so the only way to tell is by getting a good view of their nether regions, or the back of their head (where you can see scars on a buck).  From its behavior (feeding alone), I'd guess this is a buck, but that's just a guess.  This one is being relatively polite and not knocking down my feeder.  Good deer!

The photo looks like broad daylight only because I've manipulated the exposure to make the deer more visible, and corrected the white balance to eliminate the blue twilight cast.  This is actually a good demonstration of the iPhone X's low-light capabilities, stabilizer, and telephoto – this was very low light, long exposure (1/15th), no flash, hand-held, on 2x optical telephoto.  Pretty amazing for something that weighs a few ounces and is the size of a thick postcard...

We got an email from an old friend last night, a woman I worked with through the '90s and up to '02.  She's 70, her husband a little older, and they're just now retiring.  They sold their small farm for cash, only to discover that the buyer was a gang-connected drug and gun dealer.  They went through a series of physical and legal adventures, including flying bullets, when finally this bad actor was arrested, arraigned, agreed to a plea deal for 15 years in federal prison.  Her (long) email reads like a précis of a script for a Hollywood production.  Holy cow!  And this sweet lady is someone who, if you were to meet her, you would think was primarily occupied with crafts and homemade shortbread.  I'm going to reply to her shortly, but right at the moment about the only thing I can think to say is “Holy shit, woman!”

Thursday we dropped off our little Munchkin (the male kitten who fell into our casement window a few months ago) and Ipo (the sweet female field spaniel whose owner didn't want her, and we adopted) at the veterinarian's to be neutered.  We picked them up in the afternoon.  Munchkin was back to his normal self within an hour or so of getting home.  One of the vet techs brought Ipo out to us, and while she was waiting for us to finish the paperwork she sat down in the lobby with Ipo – who was wiggling her butt to beat the band, and just loving all the attention from the vet tech.  I'm not sure she really wanted to go back home with us. :)

Yesterday afternoon we were relaxing at our kitchen table after a very filling meal at La Unica.  Debbie was reading about the animals up for adoption at the Cache Valley Humane Society (she does this almost daily).  She spotted a cat named “Tigger” that reminded us both of our beloved Maine coon Halala Pala, who died of cancer a few years ago.  Then we read the description and discovered that Tigger was 12 years old – and we knew that cats of that age are nearly impossible for organizations like the Humane Society to adopt out.  So we talked it over for a minute and then decided to go get her.  Which we did!  The staff at the Humane Society was delighted that someone came in specifically to get Tigger.  They tested her for FeLV (negative!) and in an amazingly short time we walked out with Tigger in a carrier.  She's now ensconced in her own little queendom carved out of our cattery, where she'll get as much time as she needs to get used to us and the other cats.  We found out that she was an indoor-only cat, the only pet of an elderly lady who has become unable to care for Tigger.  I'll post some photos when she's willing to come out of hiding...

A wintry drive...

A wintry drive...  Our neighbors Gary and Elayne S. own a gigantic 4WD pickup, and yesterday after lunch together we went on a drive around the north side of Porcupine reservoir with them.  It was just stunningly beautiful along the whole drive.  The scene at right is looking west over the reservoir, toward the dam.  We saw some deer, rabbit tracks, some chickadees, and an eagle.  Gary did a few Brodies along the way on the icy road, scaring the bejeezus out of Elayne – and I think he was a bit disappointed that he didn't manage to frighten Debbie. :)

Gary and I took note of the water level in the reservoir: it's only about 10' below full.  I don't think we'll have any problem with a water shortage for irrigation this year, which is great news.

They took us to a new (to us) eatery: Sabores.  It's tucked away off the main drag in Logan, behind the Beehive Grill.  We were both astonished to find another great place to eat in this little town.  Debbie and I have been missing good Thai food, and when we spotted Pad Thai on the menu we both ordered it.  It was excellent!  Debbie ordered dessert, and when they brought it out we were a bit shocked.  It was tres leches (three milks) cake (a common South American dessert), and it was a huge chunk.  Also delicious!  Between the four of us we managed to put it all away.  We'll be back to Sabores – that was a real treat, especially with friends for company...

Well, this I didn't expect!

Well, this I didn't expect!  When I went out to my barn office this morning, I was surprised to find that my iMac Pro was powered down.  After I powered it back up, I noticed that the Ubiqiti WiFi node in my office had also powered down over night, though it came back up on its own.  Then I discovered that my little Mac Server (a Mac Mini) also had powered down and come back up – as had all my networking gear.  It looked exactly as though I'd had a power outage – but I have a (really nice) UPS running all of it.  WTF?

My UPS isn't actually in my office – it's just outside my office, in the storage area part of the second floor of my barn.  That part of my barn is unheated.  Looking the the UPS logs, I discovered an event around 3:30 am this morning: temperature too low, at 9°F.  The thing shut down because it got too cold!  This is a new experience for me – all the temperature problems I remember seeing in electronics was because it was too hot, not too cold.

So now I have a new project: to move my UPS down into the heated part of my barn.  That's just 2 feet below where it is right now. :)  This will mostly involve drilling a couple of holes (for the input and output power) and building a shelf for the UPS, high on the wall of my workshop.  Not a project I was expecting!!

Another titanium artifact...

Another titanium artifact...  This is made by the same folks who made the titanium dice.  This is a key-chain clip, 6 cm (about 2 1/4") long.  It's made from a solid titanium blank, laser-cut.  The jagged-looking cuts form a spring, and it works beautifully.  The angled end prevents the sprung part from moving outward, and the force to move it inward is perfect, a few ounces.  Once again, I marvel that it's possible for an ordinary person to buy something like this...

Scenes from winter in Paradise...

Scenes from winter in Paradise...  By request, at right is my snow plowing rig: my Kubota B26 with a 400 lb. weight on the back and the hydraulic tilt blade in front.  I had it out again this morning, scraping off the two new inches that fell last night.  The forecast for last night? Zero inches.  It's still snowing intermittently this morning; it won't surprise me a bit if I need to go out again later today.

After I get back from my visit to the dentist. :(  Just a routine cleaning, but still ... not my favorite activity.

I took this yesterday to give you an idea just how much snow we got.  That trash can has the salt we use to keep our sidewalk and porch free of ice.  It sits under the stand of pine trees in our front yard – and it still accumulated that much snow!

When I went out this morning to fill our bird feeders, several species went right on feeding despite my presence: chickadees, juncos, house finches, and goldfinches.  I take that as a sign of hunger.  Our nearby honey locust had a swarm of birds perching in it: magpies, pigeons, grackles, and about a dozen red-winged blackbirds.  As soon as I left the area of the feeders, those red-winged blackbirds flew down in a group and started browsing on the cracked corn I'd scattered, as well as picking through the sunflower seeds smaller birds had pulled out of the feeders.  I sure hope they're ok through this snow and cold – they look very much out of place.

Yesterday afternoon we took a drive up Blacksmith Fork Canyon to Hardware Ranch.  For me, the scenes of snow-on-rock were quite beautiful (below).  But darned near everything on that drive was beautiful: the stream, the contrast of red osier dogwood against the snow, the snow in the trees, and the broad vistas of snowy mountains.  Up near Hardware Ranch we saw several groups of deer, including one with about 40 members.  We also saw a few isolated deer, most likely bucks who have lost their antlers.  At Hardware Ranch itself there were hundreds of elk, picking through the night's snowfall to get to the hay beneath...

Red-winged blackbirds are here...

Red-winged blackbirds are here...  This is a couple of months early for them.  It must have been our warm spell that brought them, and they arrived to 18" of snow.  Not exactly blackbird happiness!  They're swarming our feeders; I suspect they'd be starving if not for what we're putting out...

A very German case...

A very German case...  The little aluminum “suitcase” at right holds a pair of binoculars that we just bought.  The case cracked me up – I'd be able to identify it as German even without seeing the logo. :)

We've been looking for stabilized binoculars with high magnification and big objectives, to give our ancient eyeballs the best wildlife viewing we possibly could.  We already own a pair of stabilized Canon 18x50s – great magnification, fairly bright, so-so optics, so-so stabilization.  We also have a pair of stabilized Fujinon 14x40s – so-so magnification, so-so brightness, very good optics, fantastic stabilization.

I finally located something that promised to be a combination of the features we prized the most: these stabilized Zeiss 20x60s.  We've only had them out on one outing so far, but our impression so far is that we have a winner.  The magnification beats the Canon by a little.  The objectives collect 44% more light than the Canon; they are super-bright.  The optics are simply magnificent; the best I've ever looked through.  The stabilization is great, but very, very different than our other stabilized binoculars.  For starters, the Zeiss stabilizer is totally mechanical – no electronics, no battery, and (we quickly noticed) totally silent.  Unlike the electronic stabilizers, the Zeiss stabilizer doesn't seem to interact with panning or tilting the binoculars at all.  In that sense, they act just like unstabilized binoculars.  On the other hand, for the small tremors and vibrations that plague us when using unstabilized binoculars, the Zeiss stabilizer works perfectly.  On the other other than, for large perturbations, the Fujinon's stabilizer works better – which makes perfectly good sense for their target market: mariners.  On the whole I find the Zeiss stabilizer perfectly adequate for our needs – and I really like the absence of batteries and noise.  Zeiss' target market (for these binoculars) seems to be hunters and military, and those with deep pockets – these are damned expensive binoculars.  We had to think long and hard before plunking down our cash, and what tilted us toward it was that wildlife and bird watching is such a big part of our enjoyment of Utah.

Lazy Susan shelves...

Lazy Susan shelves...  In our kitchen cabinetry there are two corner cabinets in the same corner: one below the counter-top, the other above.  When we bought the house, there were plastic Lazy Susan rotating shelves in both of them.  These worked, but not all that well.  For starters they weren't quite level.  The white plastic the shelves were made of looked cheesy and were quite flimsy.  Another thing we didn't like is that all the shelves rotated at once (the supporting rod had rotating joints at the top and bottom, and the shelves were all fixed to the rod).  The worst problem, though, was that the lowest shelf scraped against the cabinet bottom as you rotated it.  So one day last week when I looked at them for the umpteenth time, it occurred to me that something better might be available, if the sizes happened to be standardized.  Maybe even something made from wood.

So I did what I always do in such circumstances: I went to Amazon and searched.   In no time at all I found two made from wood, one 30" in diameter and one 18" in diameter.  Could our shelves be that size?  They were!  I ordered them, and a couple days later they were in my hands.  It took just a couple hours to install both of them, including removing the old ones.  The biggest challenge I had was cleaning – because the back corners of those cabinets hadn't been cleaned in probably 15 years.  Maybe even more. :) Much scrubbing was required!

You can see the result in the photo above right.  They're great!  The shelves rotate independently, they're perfectly level, they don't scrape the cabinet, and they're wood.  That was a quick win of a project!

Something probably only an old fart like me would marvel at...

Something probably only an old fart like me would marvel at...  I have no interest in dice or anything generally done with them.  But these dice, which I purchased recently, are absolutely fascinating to me – because of what they're made from and how they were made.  The material is titanium, pure titanium.  They are machined from a rough block – with the machining done on a CNC milling machine with accuracy in the 0.0005" range.

When I was a kid, such an artifact would not have been possible to make at any price, much less the $39 I paid for this pair.  Pure titanium was available, but in a very limited number of shapes, in small quantities, and very expensive.  Machining titanium was just barely possible, with the most expensive of tools, a very high running cost (because of the need to replace bits), and of course it would be done manually.  Titanium parts were used only for the most exotic needs where no other material could possibly do the job.  The intricate engraving on these dice would have challenged the very best machinists – and it would have taken many, many hours.

But today, for the price of a nice meal out, I can hold these in my hand.

These are silly, useless objects – but – I marvel, I do...

Weather forecasters have the best job...

Weather forecasters have the best job...  They never have to be right!  Two days ago, our forecast called for 1 to 3 inches of snow yesterday and last night.  As of this writing, we're at 18 inches – and it's still snowing.

Now mind you, this is actually a good thing – we need the precipitation, especially for snow pack up in the mountains around us.  We're fervently hoping they got a similarly unexpectedly great amount.

Yesterday morning when it started snowing, the temperature was in the high '40s, and the ground hadn't been frozen for a week.  Consequently the first 3 or 4 inches that fell turned into a thick layer of slush, especially on our driveway where it was about 2 inches thick.  The forecast called for a hard freeze last night, around 20°F (which it did) – so I decided to plow the driveway even though it was still snowing hard, in the hopes of getting that layer of slush off before it froze into solid ice.  Checking this morning, it appears that I succeed in that: we've got about 4 inches of powdery snow sitting on the driveway.  That should plow off very nicely.  I'll be out plowing in an hour or so, and tonight the forecast calls for another 1 to 3 inches – so I expect to be out plowing tomorrow as well.  If I'm to believe the forecast, we won't see above-freezing temperatures until next Sunday – a huge change from the warm spell of the past two weeks or so...

The two photos below are from yesterday afternoon, about halfway through the snowfall.  We have quite a few branches so heavily loaded now that they're at risk of breaking...

Blogiversary today...

Blogiversary today...  On this day thirteen years ago I made the first post on this blog.  I haven't posted every single day, but I'm close to that.  This post will be the 13,914th post since I started this thing.  When I started, way back in 2005, blogs were “the next big thing.” That hasn't worked out quite as many people thought it would, but it's worked fine for me.

If you're a regular reader (as about five of you are! :) then you already know this blog is mainly aimed at friends and family.  But, you might say, that's what Facebook is for!  And I say: a pox on Facebook!  I can't stand the damned thing.  I have an account there, but it is almost completely unused.  These days all I use it for is to see posts that people ask me to look at (generally by sending me an email link).

Nevertheless, it's hard for me to accept that I've been doing this for thirteen years, and that I've written almost 14 thousand posts.  Crazy!

Not all news is bad...

Not all news is bad...  This is the name of a daily email newsletter that I signed up for a year ago.  I look forward to getting it every day – it never fails to cheer me up after reading the news each morning.  It's free, and I've never been spammed from the site.  You can sign up here...

Sisyphus tracks...

Sisyphus tracks ... a couple new ones:

Mystery solved...

Mystery solved...  For a couple of years now, we've had a problem with three different digital clocks.  All of them mysteriously ran too fast, but intermittently.  Over the course of a month, they might gain a half hour or so.  The thing that's really weird about this is that three completely different digital clocks – different brands, different circuitry, different chips at the core – all did the same thing.  Also, the problem happened whether the clock was in our house or in my barn office – and those two places have different electrical supplies (even different transformers!).  I still suspected something amiss with our AC power supply, but then when I ran one from my UPS (a model that is continuously supplying inverted power) it still had the same behavior.  I gave up, and started to think of explanations that included Harry Potter and divine intervention.

But then a few weeks ago, the problem suddenly stopped.  WTF?  Three separate clocks having a problem, and all of a sudden they all work?  How could this be??

A few days ago I had the first thought of a possible explanation.  The clocks all started working about the same time that the power company fixed the top part of our power pole (blogged here) – could that be what fixed my clocks?  I didn't know exactly what they did beyond replacing the top crossbar.  So I called the power company, hoping I might get some answers.  And I did!  Turns out they keep good records of what was found and what was done – and one of the notes they'd made on that day said “heavily corroded HV connection”.  The “HV” means “high voltage”, the input into the transformers for my house and my barn – and those two transformers shared that same HV connection.  Ah ha!  Now there was a possibility!  A heavily corroded connection might exhibit intermittent connections when, for example, the wind shook the power pole a bit. 

So I rigged up a bit of an experiment with one of the clocks.  I wired up an outlet whose power came through a wire that I cut, stripped, and then bound together with a rubber band.  Then I tried wiggling that joint.  Lo and behold, I was able to replicate the peculiar behavior.  The clock didn't lose power, but it did pick up the intermittent connection as though it was additional cycles to be counted – and the result was the clock gained time, just as we used to observe.

I'm left with the mystery of why the problem still happened with a clock connected to my UPS.  I think the most likely explanation is that the intermittent connection issue was transmitted through the UPS as coupled noise – which is certainly disappointing.  The UPS works fine if I switch off its primary power, so I know the inverter it contains is working properly.  I see no glitches on its output (using a 'scope) if I flip its primary power on and off.  Nonetheless, the clocks malfunctioned when running on it prior to January 11. 

I have to conclude that for our entire time in this house, up until the repairs on January 11, we've had flaky power and didn't even know it!  The clocks have been rock-solid now for over a month.  I'm very glad to have the problem fixed, but I'm still amazed that we didn't even know we had a problem!

Pies...

Pies...  A few days ago Debbie made these two (delicious) coconut custard pies.  With just a little help from her, I'm halfway through one of these. :)  The other went to our neighbors and friends Tim and Jeannie...

So yummy they are!

Trailer trials and tribulations...

Trailer trials and tribulations...  Yesterday I visited a local trailer dealer to look at aluminum utility trailers, similar to the one at right.  I was surprised at how reasonable the price was, and how nicely the trailer was made – so we quickly came to agreement and I decided to buy it.  I want a trailer for towing behind our Model X – something big enough to carry 12' long lumber and 8x4 sheets of plywood, and this one is just about perfect for that sort of use.  It weighs just 420 pounds, a spec with more impact than just being good for towing behind an electric car: at that weight, this trailer doesn't require registration or licensing in Utah.  Hooray!

The towing capability was one of the things that attracted me to the Model X in the first place, but we have never tried to tow before.  The hitch receiver in the Model X is removable, and I've been carrying it in the car's “frunk” ever since I bought it, over a year ago.  Yesterday the trailer folks helped me install it – except that we couldn't!  We thought at first that we were doing something wrong, but then we found a YouTube video demonstrating how to do it – and it became clear that there was something wrong with my hitch receiver.  Dang it!  So I ended up just putting a deposit on the trailer to secure it, then I contacted Tesla with a request for assistance.  A few minutes later, I had a service appointment for the next day (this morning) – both for the hitch issue and for my annual maintenance.

So this morning Debbie and I headed down to SLC and the service center.  We got there in plenty of time.  We were given a loaner car, but sadly it wasn't a Tesla – it was a Cadillac SUV and since I can't say anything good about it, I won't say anything at all.  We were given an estimate of half a day for the service, so we went to lunch at the Red Iguana (spectacular, as usual), and then spent three hours at the Loveland Living Planet Aquarium, 15 miles south of SLC in Draper.  This turned out to be a lovely surprise – it's an incredibly great aquarium, though I think that name is a misnomer.  It's more like a zoo with an aquarium attached.  In addition to all the things you'd expect an aquarium to have, they also had two otter exhibits (with different species), a clouded leopard exhibit (with a breeding pair), great bird exhibits, and even some plants (palms, mostly).  There's lots more there, too.  We thoroughly enjoyed our time there, and we'll be back for sure.

Then we headed back to the Tesla Service Center, where we got some good news and some bad news.   The good news: they found the problem with the hitch receiver - some welding flashing that was preventing the receiver from fully inserting into its socket.  A bit of careful grinding and that was fixed.  The bad news: the estimate we'd been given for the routine service was badly off.  Instead of a half day, it would take a day and a half.  That meant we had to drive the Cadillac back home tonight, and we'll have to drive it back down to SLC tomorrow.  Driving that conventional car 70 miles back home was ... a really downer experience.  I am so completely spoiled by my wonderful Model X!  The Cadillac's two-chipmunk engine got the car to 80MPH, but it took a couple miles to get there, instead of the 200' or so that the Model X takes.  The ride was so mushy that I was afraid there was something badly wrong with the suspension – but apparently that's intentional.  Going uphill in Sardine Canyon required keeping the accelerator to the floor to stay at 65 MPH – and all the while the engine is making alarming noises.  Then the Cadillac's “auto-stop” feature was constantly making me think the car had died.  That feature is intended to save gas – a laudable goal – but it does it by shutting off the engine whenever the car stops moving.  Even at a red light!  The engine automatically restarts when you take your foot off the break, but of course there's a brief hesitation before it can actually apply power to the wheels.  It's such an awful driving experience after being used to the Model X!

Los Primos...

Los Primos ... is the name of a local restaurant that we enjoy.  They also call themselves the El Salvador, which is sometimes confusing.  We always thought that the name meant (in Spanish) “The Best”, or something along those lines, because “primos” sounds to us like “prime” or something closely akin.  As they serve the best Mexican food in town, this seemed completely appropriate.

But recently we discovered that “los primos” actually means “the cousins”.  It seems that three cousins started both the restaurant and the related grocery.  Nothing wrong with “the cousins” as a name, but it doesn't have quite the same cachet for us as “the best”!  :)