More Training

So I'm back in propane-ville, by which I mean nomad land, except this destination trailer is very stationary and I'm not sure the propane is on. I'm fine though, with full connectivity and a heavy navy pea coat I got at Andy and Bax, the famous Portland army surplus store. Sy is fine too. She turned into a puppy briefly yesterday, cavorting and running full tilt.

They heft the bottle to see if there's propane left, which seems primitive. My evidence is that the burners don't come on, whereas on pervious visits, propane was working fine, but no hot water. The hot water issue turned out to be the in-tank heating element, and is not an issue this time. I showered yesterday after oiling all the wheel line sprinklers in preparation for replacement. Since my last visit, the farm has taken delivery of lots of wheel line segments, but "the movers" (the motors that advance the wheel line periodically) aren't here yet.

There's also a small electrical heating unit in Zone 2. However we're in burgeoning spring and a lot of heat builds up during the day. Oregon's far west climate is rainforest coastal and water intensive agricultural. This farm has water rights up to about two wheel lines at full throttle, which is not a limitation at the pump necessarily. Water is metered (measured, monitored). Not a new idea.

You might think that, as a Truckers for Peace guy (Trucker Exchange program, swap routes around), I'd be working on getting a license to drive an eighteen wheeler. However I dodged that responsibility by making the BizMo (van sized or smaller) a troubleshooting reconnaissance unit, giving real truck drivers a lot of advance notice about this or that situation, meaning opportunities and unexpected benefits, not always dangers (surprises don't have to be nasty).

My training seems more oriented towards remote base testing of stationary tech, not rolling stock. That doesn't mean I'm not on the road, but that I'm more a customer user-base driver than a construction team freeway developer, say working China to Turkey (multiple routes). The yurts I'm studying, SolarPunk projects, are off road and perhaps only reachable by electric ATV, with solar charged batteries.

However in this case I'm very close to Springfield, Oregon, which is happy to be where the Simpsons is happening (the cartoon), you can read about whether why. I'm in a destination trailer adjoining a pole barn, but a luxurious pole barn, a museum of C6XTY and other Flextegrity items (as is my place to some degree).

Original BizMo

General Motors Parade Of Progress Futurliners

Only 12 were made for a traveling science exposition. They were originally built 1939-40 and then remodeled in 1953. More info at: www.futurliner.com/index.html

Civil War (movie review)

I haven't been as conscientious about blogging reviews of all the movies I've seen. Just this week, I took in Dune Part 2 a second time, this time with someone who knows all the books and other movie versions. A librarian in other words. From my Thursday circle. Deke and Dr. D. likewise joined the party.

For Civil War, however, I was by myself way up in the back on the 2nd level in The Bagdad (not a typo) with no food or drink this time (I've partaken self indulgently over the years). The place was crowded and quite a few folks were having their evening meal in the movie theater, a commonplace format in the Pacific Northwest, popularized by destination breweries.

The way the Press hovered closely with the troops, taking close-ups in pitched battle, seemed like a caricature, but I was willing to suspend disbelief given the circumstances. I'm thinking of The Postman here: in an apocalyptic setting, roles from the old days may get distorted and reprojected. Journalists became daredevils on steroids who like to jump back the forth through the windows of speeding vehicles, while the old school journos look on, bemused.

My attitude towards the Jessie character, which some reviewers found "unrealistic" was hey, this is fiction for kids her age i.e. this is a coming of age film and as other reviewers point out, she's our eyes and ears into a violent world to which her elders have become jaded. 

These elders have evolved their psychological defenses, but are still mortals, and still crack and/or die or both. The lead character is coming to the end of her ability to take any more, and she passes the torch. There's a kind of wordless transition, as both know this is where that torch gets passed.

The film is about breaking taboos and exploring the psychology of a true militarized battle for control of the White House, although it's unclear going forward what that icon will mean. The film purposely withholds context, creating distance between ourselves, the viewer-voyeurs, more journos, and the senseless action. The premise, Texas + California united against the rest, more or less, is designed to throw us off balance.

One scene suggests a kind of racism is motivating the soldiers, but again, there's too little context to help us puzzle things out. We've fallen into a world of violence without enough internal coherence to help us find a way out of the quicksand. Sound familiar?

Quadray Deck Ready

Scheduling

At first I imagined turning off the music and heading up to the office, because prompted by an idea. Then I thought: "nah, lets queue it". This is a core movement in consciousness: to put off, to delay. 

We get mixed messages at this point, as "procrastination" is considered a primary obstacle to success in life. On the other hand, "think before you act" reminds us of the common criticism regarding a failure to plan, to think it through, to accurately judge consequences, before acting.

One has to think of circumstances. Chances are, when you have a great idea for something, you have to add it to the queue or stack, because right now you're on the bus or mowing the lawn or... a lifestyle based on "drop everything; I just thought of doing something else" would be interesting to study, from afar. Most of us learn to "delay gratification" except it's not always "gratification" we put off.

The brutal truth is there's no time or space for everything to develop in tandem or all at once. Events need to be queued, sequenced, timelined. That's not really a choice. Why does the hourglass narrow? What does "to bottleneck" mean? 

So here I am, later, implementing my earlier idea: to write about scheduling again. 

We introduce the theory, as from computer science, and the reality, as from getting out of bed in the morning, and combine them in a seamless picture of needing to treat the present like a narrow pipeline, which it is, when we're talking of an individual consciousness.