<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body>
<p>Rambling Ode to (mostly) Trucks:<br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 12/27/23 10:59 AM, Marcus Daniels
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:MN0PR11MB59857C48705DF37F94BD3E77C59FA@MN0PR11MB5985.namprd11.prod.outlook.com">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<meta name="Generator"
content="Microsoft Word 15 (filtered medium)">
<style>@font-face
{font-family:"Cambria Math";
panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4;}@font-face
{font-family:Calibri;
panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4;}@font-face
{font-family:Aptos;}p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{margin:0in;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;}a:link, span.MsoHyperlink
{mso-style-priority:99;
color:blue;
text-decoration:underline;}span.EmailStyle18
{mso-style-type:personal-reply;
font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;
color:windowtext;}.MsoChpDefault
{mso-style-type:export-only;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;
mso-ligatures:none;}div.WordSection1
{page:WordSection1;}</style><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:shapedefaults v:ext="edit" spidmax="1026" />
</xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:shapelayout v:ext="edit">
<o:idmap v:ext="edit" data="1" />
</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]-->
<div class="WordSection1">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt">What I saw
on my trip were hundreds of late model giant pickup trucks
jacked way up off the ground driving around 90mph with the
usual markings.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt">How do the
proles afford them? Not yet post-scarcity. Hmm.</span></p>
</div>
</blockquote>
<p>Re: LMGPTJOtG - Last time I drove the corridor you describe I
remember having my doors blown off by one of those "cowboy
cadillacs" with bumper stickers reading <i><u>Trump 2016</u></i>
and <u><i>If it ain't King James, it ain't Bible</i></u>. I'm
sure there is a Trump 2020 and 2024 sticker on there (or
overlayed) now. </p>
<p>Re: Bible tangent - I recently bought a used Bible off the
interwebs for reasons I'm sure you don't want me to elaborate
here, and learned a bit too much about the myriad *modern*
translations/editions and versions, with KJ influencing them all
significantly. I chose a 1951 version the Catholic Church
produced to try to align with Protestant versions without letting
go of any of their own principles/tenants. A sort of peace
offering? I was raised agnostic-unto athiest but surrounded by
Protestants and Impinged with Catholics until I started choosing
escaped/reformed/recovering Catholics as partners as an adult.<br>
</p>
<p>Re: Can't wait for the machines to take over- When we invented
gods in our own image we did a bad job, I'm not sure we are doing
any better with the AI? Please gods, not in Elon's image! But
hope springs infernal.</p>
<p>Re: REC Banks/Culture - glad to hear someone else is as
voracious as I am with Science and Fiction... my library still
holds a dozen or so books from REC's library when he left SFE (10
years ago?)... but I don't remember any SciFi, just SciFact? <br>
</p>
<p>Re: Eric's cryptic comment about "last keeper of Democracy being
a Black Woman - " Michele, Oprah, and Kamala seem like the likely
candidates in exponentially decreasing order of likelihood? I
see an adjacent-possible path fitting Biden's and the DNC's
handling of 2024 strategy? When does Biden step down/out? After
Trump implodes entirely? After election? Some acute
aging-related event? If Haley squeeks the primary away from DJT?
While she might qualify as "woman of color", not Black and not
particularly a "keeper of Democracy" unless of course, we measure
such by small handfulls of shred? I'd want Kamala to beat her,
but not sure where all those Trumpster-Dumpsters would come
down? Some probably couldn't vote for *any* woman?<br>
</p>
<p>Re: Big Trucks and post Scarcity - On our last road trip,
Mary's favorite cousin (our age) arrived (Northern NE) to meet us
for dinner one of those cowboy cadillacs... looked like it had
been in a bar-fight. Golfball and bigger hail the week before he
said. </p>
<p>He had just come from the insurance adjuster who offered him a
$50k check for the repairs (spangled windshield, ball-peened
hood/roof, and some minor pings in every panel and toolbox)...
which he was upset about since replacement was $70k. Not a
single functional issue outside of windshield visibility. I'd
have had a $500 windshield put in, paid off the loan (which I
would never have taken out, myself) and worn the beating like a
sabre scar, but he was dead set on getting it repaired whilst
grumbling at the downtime when he'd have to drive one of the
(equally big/expensive) company trucks (he owns a tree trimming
service, so it would host a bucket and chipper, slows him down on
the straightaways?). </p>
<p>I didn't check for bumper stickers but am pretty sure they would
say Trump/Pence with Pence struck through with a Sharpie (maybe a
noose drawn on?). He might have missed the small Biden/Harris one
on the back of Mary's ($5k new to us) 15 year old Prius (215k
miles and no hail damage)... I just smiled when he railed about
the cost of fuel (a lot of "I did that" Biden stickers on the gas
pumps there) thinking about the 50mpg I was getting unless I
drafted behind a truck like his (then 60)... </p>
<p>Mary is excellent about not talking politics with family... most
of her generation of relatives (and all of their survining
parents) are died-in-wool conservative and about half of the next
generation are too. One tween grand-niece sported a "I'll be
Baaack Trump-Terminator" T-shirt when we met up with them... I'm
pretty sure it was for our benefit. I wanted to send her a
Dark-Brandon one to round out the closet, but Mary thought she
might/not recognize the snark in it and either way it would be
futile.<br>
</p>
<p>Love of Pickup Trucks - I grew up with pickup-trucks as the best
value-versatility vehicle, usually the first/only for any family
with 3 little kids squeezed between mom and pop on the wide bench
seat and grandparents and older kids in the back in the slipstream
of the cab sharing a blanket. Camper shells/toppers didn't come
into vogue until a few years later, that made the back a little
more hospitable. None came with power steering, brakes, windows,
AC, automatic transmissions that I knew of, and an (AM) radio was
a luxury... but no preset stations and a single speaker under
holes drilled in the (metal) dashboard. </p>
<p>None of my own half-dozen pickup trucks have ever been "luxury"
by contemporary standards but as time progressed, all those
power/automatic features became *standard*, hard to avoid and the
MSRP's went up and past that of any compact and many sedans.
Increasingly newer (none of mine were newish much less new) and
more capable (starting with AM/FM stereo and 4x4 and extended (not
double) cabs) with my latest being a 2002 diesel 4x4 (250k miles)
once converted to veggie oil. fryer oil became scarce for a
while but then at some point all the old hippies hoarding the
stuff started trying to give it away by the 55 gallon drum a few
years ago. If they had sat in the sunlight too long they probably
had algae growth. Not good for injectors. It is hard to keep the
pumps, injectors, seals in good shape with veggie instead of dino
oil with/without alge... even if Rudolf Diesel (1858) did design
the first ones to run on peanut oil. I sure wish I'd not help
Reagan oust Jimmy in 1980! <br>
</p>
<p>I'm not sure when pickups became self-indulgent luxury toys. I
love/owned motorcycles too. Same/Same. <br>
</p>
<p>My 49 2.5 ton farm dump truck (mostly lawn ornament now but often
used a decade ago (by me) for woodchips, manure, firewood) is on
it's way to becoming (fingers crossed) Double Axle II, a second in
the fleet of <a href="https://www.axleart.com/">Axle Art</a>
projects.</p>
<p align="center"><img moz-do-not-send="true"
src="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/4b2119_061fc38d74e84eca8bfb5ae7c3b57217~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_600,h_369,al_c,q_80,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_auto/Stromberg%20for%20web.jpg"
alt="" width="600" height="369"></p>
<p align="center">Current Treatment of Axle Contemporary Van</p>
<p align="center"><img src="cid:part1.vIJjzNLO.C0xsG49U@swcp.com"
moz-do-not-send="false" width="564" height="564"><br>
</p>
<p>DALL-E has a strange sense of humor about a lot of things,
including which direction a dump-bed dumps!... my proposed
performance art-project is called "sequestering carbon, two cords
of books at a time". </p>
<p>Color scheme and body style are accurate, specific Patina and
stenciling entirely made up by DALL-E... many renderings
offered. The only other obvious inauthentic element is the bolt
pattern on the rims... 5 giant self-centering lug nuts were the
standard for this class of truck well into the 50s. </p>
<p>These rims are known as widowmakers... for good reason,
surprisingly Garcia Tire still maintains a cage with mounting
equipment inside to work on them with. I'm looking for modern
replacements. But they will still have a 5 bolt pattern. </p>
<p>I've been waiting for larger affordable "hub motors" to come out
so I could quit tuning a 75 year old petrol burner and drop in the
good sections of my 16kWh Chevy Volt battery I replaced when I
bought it. Used (but still functional) solar panels are cheaper
than plywood and a whole lot more water-proof. I could cover or
clad the bed with those and collect enough photons for the 2-6
mile moves every week or two the art-platform concept suggests?
The split-drive-shaft and two-speed rear-end with PTO setup is
also a reasonable place to inline an EV-class motor for low-speed,
short distances. Who knows?<img
src="cid:part2.uU3FjwR1.dMfWwSlo@swcp.com"
moz-do-not-send="false"><br>
</p>
<p>Locals should look for this pressed into some form of transient
public art installation in Santa Fe by this summer.</p>
<p>'nuff of this careening ramble,</p>
<p> - Sieve<br>
</p>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:MN0PR11MB59857C48705DF37F94BD3E77C59FA@MN0PR11MB5985.namprd11.prod.outlook.com">
<div class="WordSection1">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<div
style="border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in">
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span
style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif">From:</span></b><span
style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif">
Friam <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com"><friam-bounces@redfish.com></a>
<b>On Behalf Of </b>Roger Critchlow<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, December 27, 2023 9:28 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee
Group <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:friam@redfish.com"><friam@redfish.com></a><br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: [FRIAM] The last Lighthouse Keeper in
America<o:p></o:p></span></p>
</div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
</div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">On Tue, Dec 26, 2023 at 8:51<span
style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"> </span>PM
Marcus Daniels <<a href="mailto:marcus@snoutfarm.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">marcus@snoutfarm.com</a>>
wrote:<o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
<blockquote
style="border:none;border-left:solid #CCCCCC 1.0pt;padding:0in 0in 0in 6.0pt;margin-left:4.8pt;margin-right:0in">
<div>
<div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"
style="mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto"><span
style="font-size:11.0pt">[...]<br>
<br>
Really hoping the machines can take over soon.</span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"
style="mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto"><span
style="font-size:11.0pt"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">I just yesterday finished rereading
all the Iain M Banks "Culture" novels in the Boston
Public Library e-collection, seven between Halloween and
Christmas. The "Culture" is a space-going far future
civilization of organic life - humanoid and other - and
of artificially sentient beings. The machine "Minds"
pretty much run the infrastructure and economy while the
organic beings party, study, travel, pursue dangerous
hobbies, whatever. It's all post-scarcity, so everyone
can pretty much have what they want.<o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">It sounds like the Culture "Minds"
pretty much solved the dictatorship of the proletariat
in the Culture's history. You raise dumb matter to
sentience and let it sort everything out. The energy
and matter of the tools that the proletarians used are
even more prole than the proles.<o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">-- rec --<o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<br>
<fieldset class="moz-mime-attachment-header"></fieldset>
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">-. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. .
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://bit.ly/virtualfriam">https://bit.ly/virtualfriam</a>
to (un)subscribe <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com">http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com</a>
FRIAM-COMIC <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/">http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/</a>
archives: 5/2017 thru present <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/">https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/</a>
1/2003 thru 6/2021 <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/">http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/</a>
</pre>
</blockquote>
</body>
</html>