Grab-bag

I fiddled around with the Made-in-China canning lids.

I took a micrometer to the lids and found the M-i-C lid was 0.008" thick and the name-brand lids were 0.006" thick, so the buckling had nothing to do with the thickness of the material. More likely, it had to do with the name-brand rubber coating having a stippled coating while the M-i-C lid had a smooth surface. I contributed to the problem by over-tightening the lids

I thought I would be able to "paint" them with food-grade linseed oil and it would polymerize to form a layer of varnish over the bare metal.

Imagine my surprise when the oil beaded up on the painted surface. I assume the lids are powder-coated and the coating is highly polar. Closely inspecting the surface, it looks like the oil did have an affinity for the bare metal but it definitely did not like the painted surface.

Pear Chutney

 My sister wanted to try a recipe for pear chutney. I was able to accommodate with some hard, cooking pears.

The general consensus is that in antiquity, pears were very hard and could only be rendered edible by cooking them, much like quinces. Over the generations, softer, earlier ripening pears were selected and now dominate the market.

One can still find "hard" pears: Kieffer, Duchess 'd Angouleme, Pound and various seedlings will fit the bill. I took over some Kieffer pears for her to play with.

My sister promised me several jars of Chutney. I did not have the heart to tell her that I don't need condiments to make food delicious. I get hungry. I eat.

Ok, I lied

I brought in the herbs for our winter window-sill.

Rosemary! If I could only have one herb growing on the window-sill it would be rosemary.

And oregano, thyme, sage, chives....

Mint...gotta have mint... 

Back to sis

My sister is also a new grandparent.

I signed on to make applesauce (without sugar or cinnamon) for the little nipper.

Early tomorrow morning, Mrs ERJ and I will be spreading tarps and shaking the apple trees. My goal is to put up 35 quarts of applesauce which is roughly the yield of 100 pounds of apples (30 liters, 45kg for Simon and Glen).

Wish me luck.

Value

From the standpoint of economics, "Value" is intimately related to the availability of acceptable alternatives.

If food is readily available in grocery stores than there is marginal value in growing your own. If there is NO food available in grocery stores then growing your own food approaches infinite value.

If "sperm donors" are fungible and willingly provide their services free-of-charge, then "sperm donors" have little value.

If "Dads" are uniquely and deeply invested in seeing their offspring succeed then they have value beyond measure.

The very, very sad thing about inner-city culture is that government successfully sold the idea that they were a viable substitute for "Dads". With "Dad" out of the picture, gangs fill the emotional void in young men and mayhem results.

This is not a racial thing. Whites are chasing after Blacks and might catch them for out-of-wedlock births.

St Michael's Episcopal Church, 6500 Amwood Dr, Lansing

St Michael's will be hosting a gun buy-back drive on October 1, 2022.

They are coy about telling folks how much they will be offering for each firearm but I doubt that it will be more than $150 per boom-stick.

Police will be on the premises to ensure order, so if enterprising individuals wanted to park on the street and offer a little-bit-more to take the guns off the street, well, isn't that what they want to achieve?

If it saves one life...

The  most common means of committing suicide in New York City is "strangulation, suffocation and hanging".  Suicide is usually a phenomena of impulse and means, often abetted by substance abuse impairing judgement. 

Undoubtedly, lives would be saved if there was a two-week waiting period for buying rope, wire and plastic bags. Furthermore, there should be a tribunal that evaluates whether the person who wants to buy a coat-hanger or clothes line NEEDS that device before a permit is issued.

The second most common way of committing suicide in New York City is to jump off of tall structures. Needless-to-say, eliminating tall buildings and placing energy-absorbing structures around the shorter structures would eliminate this modality for ending one's life.

Physical therapy

I am definitely on the glide-path to be booted-out of physical therapy.

This was my last session with Jeremy who is heading to a new job in Antarctica. Great guy.

Jeremy put me on a BOSU ball and threw medicine balls at me to catch. We were both surprised when I managed to catch all but one of them and did not fall off of the BOSU ball.

I will say that 45 minutes of physical therapy and a three-mile walk can be a bit stout. Especially when Zeus and a neighbor dog decide to sort-out dominance issues while I was holding Zeus's leash.

Nothing bad happened. Mrs ERJ took notes on the creative ways the leash arranged itself and intertwined with my anatomy in case she takes an interest in BDSM. The neighbors came out and eventually corralled their pooch.

Just another day in paradise.