Month: May 2022

Caveat: Tree #1221

A Daily Tree / Banalities & Journaling / Databases, Smartphones & Computers / My Photos

This tree was befogged.
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I, too, was befogged.

I spent the day doing a very strange thing (for me): I was working in Microsoft Windows on my computer. I always use linux. I’ve been using linux at home quite consistently for 10 years now – I remember when I triumphantly installed it on my posh new home desktop in that old, run-down apartment in Juyeop in Korea in the Spring of 2012. I remember the smell of the street through the open windows and the sound of traffic.

But something prompted me to make sure the old Windows boot on my current desktop computer still worked, to run updates, to make sure I could at least do some basic stuff with it. I think I’ve been feeling that my computer skills have been getting “fragile” – that I depend too much on linux and suffer a lack of “tech resiliency”, or something like that. I want to remain able to adapt.

Windows is pretty sucky, but there have been some improvements. One thing that is to be found in recent windows versions: the so-called “Windows subsystem for linux (WSL)”, which allows a linux hacker like me to use familiar bash commands to do things while working in windows.

One thing that I did get working, somewhat unexpectedly: iTunes. Apple doesn’t make an iTunes version for linux, but it does make one for Windows, and I did get it working. I think this is important because Arthur’s capacity to navigate his quite baroque iTunes arrangement on his macbook sometimes seems dangerously compromised, and we somewhat rely on this for our evening entertainment (the ripped-and-stored TV shows and movies that we watch on his AppleTV).

So it’s good to have the possibility that I could host these TV shows if Arthur ever eventually decides to give up doing so, or simply can’t. I struck another blow against excessive “tech fragility”.

picture[daily log: walking, 4.5km; dogwalking, 3km; c103069069084s]

Caveat: 자빠져도 코가 깨여진다

한국말을 배움 (Failing to Learn Korean) / 한국어 속담 (Aphorisms & Proverbs)

I found this aphorism in my book of Korean aphorisms.

자빠져도                    코가       깨여진다
ja.ppa.jyeo.do            ko.ga     kkae.yeo.jin.da
fall-down-on-back-CONCESS nose-SUBJ break-PRES
Notwithstanding falling on one's back, one's nose is broken.

This means that misfortune follows on misfortune. “It never rains but it pours,” maybe.

I was a bit thrown off by the verb 깨여지다 ([kkaeyeojida] above in present tense with inserted -ㄴ-). The dictionary only lists 깨어지다 [kkaeeojida] (without palatization on the second syllable). I suspect an error in the book of aphorisms, either by the use of some non-standard regionalism or else a simple typo.

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Caveat: Tree #1217

A Daily Tree / My Photos / Treehouse

This tree saw the framing-in of the west wall of the treehouse.
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Now… I still need some more 3/8″ plywood for covering the framed-in walls, and I then need to engineer some doors – the door-openings are of course non-standard sizes (and likely not even square), so the doors will have to be custom-made. This will push my wood-working skills past any previous benchmark, if it proves successful.

picture[daily log: walking, 6.5km; dogwalking, 3km; c113068075084s]

Caveat: Such Choices

Banalities & Journaling / Life in Alaska

I voted today: a vote-by-mail jungle primary, for the at-large Congressional seat vacated by the death of Don Young, Alaska’s Representative since the Early Paleolithic. There are forty-eight candidates. But the choices are best summarized by the names at the top of the two columns on the ballot.
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Apparently Santa Claus is a real guy’s legal name – he lives in North Pole (a suburb of Fairbanks) and serves on the city council there.

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Caveat: Tree #1213

A Daily Tree / Banalities & Journaling / My Photos

This tree saw me making some steps along the path from the driveway down to the treehouse. These are not the only steps necessary – more, other steps are necessary; but these steps seemed the most necessary – there’s been a little mini cliff that I had to navigate along the path until now.
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Here is another angle on those steps.
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picture[daily log: walking, 5.5km; dogwalking, 3km; c108062067084s]

Caveat: 굽은 나무는 길마가지가 된다

한국말을 배움 (Failing to Learn Korean) / 한국어 속담 (Aphorisms & Proverbs)

I found this aphorism in my book of Korean aphorisms.

굽은             나무는       길마가지가               된다
gup.eun         na.mu.neun gil.ma.ga.ji.ga        doen.da
be-crooked-PART tree-TOPIC packsaddle-branch-SUBJ become-PRES
A crooked tree [can still] become a tree-swing.

This is to say, something that seems useless can still prove useful, when seen in the right light. The word 길마 [gilma] gave me some difficulty – I can’t actually find any online result to match the idea that it means “swing” – but I found that it can mean “packsaddle” (as on a donkey, ox, or horse), and that seems close enough semantically that I think that’s how this works. A “branch-packsaddle” seems a plausible idiom to express the idea of an a treeswing.

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Caveat: Tree #1212

A Daily Tree / Banalities & Journaling / My Photos

This tree saw the former storage tent (“studio”) finally rest in peace. I have completely cleared the original location of the storage tent.
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It involved a lot of walking back and forth, carrying stuff – I made a new “under tarp” storage facility in a different location.
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picture[daily log: walking, 11.5km; dogwalking, 3km; c102062072084s]

Caveat: Tree #1211

A Daily Tree / My Photos

This tree saw the fog dissipate.
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I was walking down the road to fetch the dog and looked down and saw this. Random detritus of an optimistic civilization.
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picture[daily log: walking, 10km; dogwalking, 3km c108063064084s]

Caveat: Tree #1209

A Daily Tree / Banalities & Journaling / My Photos

This tree saw the return of the GDC (RV camper) to Lot 73.
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I had loaned the GDC to some neighbors-down-the-road. Brad is energetically building a house at 12 mile, and wanted a place for one of the workers he had to stay in. So in exchange for some much-needed maintenance work, I loaned him the RV.

It’s been a whole string of frustrations and disappointments, these last few days. I finally got Alaska Power & Telephone (the local utility) to come out and hook up the new meter-base for electricity for Lot 73. I learned there was an unexpected, quite high charge associated with this hook-up. Essentially, it’s a bureaucratic “reactivation fee” because I took so long in the time between when I first had the utility pole and power drop set up and when I got the meter base installed. It’s a kind of “procrastination fee.” I’m disappointed because I specifically asked, at the time the pole was put in 3 years ago, if there would be other charges if I delayed putting it in, and the people at that time said something to the effect of: “nothing major, a small fee.” $700 doesn’t seem small, to me.

Then today, I was planning to drive into town to JS Hardware (the one and only hardware store on the island), with the cargo trailer. I wanted to buy some more plywood and longer pieces of lumber, to best continue my treehouse project as well as to construct a small shed to replace the weather-destroyed storage tent.

I had the trailer all hooked up to the Blueberry (the Chevy Tahoe), and the brake lights were even working, and I realized the trailer’s registration was expired. Although evidence is thin on the ground, I suspect Arthur simply forgot – despite surely having received some kind of reminder in mail form and probably email form as well. And I blame myself, because at this point in things, it’s really my job to keep track of Arthur’s multitude of bureaucratic obligations. I simply didn’t think about it. But my luck being the way it is, I’m not going to drive to town with expired tags – that’s inviting a revenue-raising stop by the Craig Police.

So the trailer was re-parked, and we’ll have to sort out the expired trailer registration. Because the DMV in Craig is only open 4 hours a week, by appointment only, that is not something resolved promptly – it’s on “their schedule.”

These experiences just reinforce my feelings of general incompetence, lately.

picture[daily log: walking, 5km; c101062062084s]

Caveat: Tree #1208

A Daily Tree / My Photos / Working at the Gift Shop

This tree is growing next to a big ol’ rock.
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The store is beginning its move into the new location (across the shopping plaza, about 40 meters). I spent a lot of time carrying very heavy and awkward boxes of our stock of spare picture glass. I became tired.

picture[daily log: walking, 8km; retailing, 6hr; c117064061084s]

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