A Geek Goes Flying

The sport in the living room where I’d setup the String Swing was somewhat protected from rampaging puppies, but I wanted to relocate the guitars to a more protected corner of my bedroom, which was occupied with some wire shelves holding a couple of old PowerMac machines I haven’t turned on in years, some stereo equipment from the late 1980s / early 1990s, an Ultra 5 project I haven’t even started on yet, some old media gathering dust, and some droids . Sigh. That corner needed attention. Also, I’d displaced my reading/listening nook and wanted to restore it in its new, simplified configuration  with spiffy new light . I used this  WORKPRO 5-Tier Storage Shelf, 72" H Heavy Duty Adjustable Garage Shelving Unit 2180LBS Capacity, for Basement, Kitchen, Pantry, 27.6”Wx11.8”Dx60”H, Black  unit (it’s not  72" high, sigh), with just two of the shelves installed. It wedged into the corner I had available nicely, and seems sturdy enough as I have it assembled. I have the Stri...

Another Facebook Marketplace bargain, though this one was in rougher shape than I realized initially. A 2001–2002(ish) ESP Ltd EC-300, in See Thru Black Cherry. Made in Korea. This one had been modified with Seymour Duncan 59 and JB-1 pickups, and was missing the pickup switch top . The EC-300 was the top-of-the-line non-Deluxe Ltd when new, and had an MSRP of $699 (about $1,300 in Spring 2026 dollars). Original specs: EC-300 Set neck, 24.75" scale Mahogany body Maple neck, rosewood fretboard Flag inlays Black hardware Tune-o-Matic bridge with stop tailpiece White binding on the neck 24 XJ frets EMG-HZ H-1 pickup set (passive) 2 volume, 1 tone knob, toggle on upper horn “STBC” color way (See Thru Black Cherry) It came to me mostly stock. The seller represented on Facebook Marketplace that it had been “modded with real verified Seymour Duncan 59 and JB-1,” but when I had everything apart I saw the pickups are the  Seymour Duncan Hot Rodded Humbucker set  with a JB (SH4)¹ a...

Transferring files to a system using Apache's mod_dav to export its filesystem via WebDAV , any time I tried to transfer a file over 1GB my local client ( Cyberduck ) would fail with the error: Unexpected response ( 413 Request Entity Too Large). The fix was simple, once I sat down to actually implement it; I just added a LimitRequestBody entry into httpd.conf and restarted the server : [root@server ~]# vi /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf   ... EnableSendfile   on LimitRequestBody  0 [root@server ~]# systemctl restart httpd

I don’t have time to do a deep dive on this, but this LA Times article struck me:  Gas prices are widening the wealth gap between wealthy and poor Americans  (May 7, 2026). Key take-away: “Lower-income Americans sharply reduced their gas consumption in the month following the Iran war, yet spiking prices still forced them to spend more at the pump, worsening the economy’s economic disparities...” This is likely especially true in California, as I ruminated on yesterday . But it doesn’t have to be that way. The price for electricity hasn’t really moved, even with everything going on. I mean, yeah, it’s trending upwards, nationally it’s gone up (for residential customers) about 38% in the last ~10 years , from $.1255 to $.1730 per kilowatt hour. But, e.g., for the Solterra, that’s a difference of about $3.09 to “fill up” from 10% SOC to 90% SOC. That is a far cry from the leap in gas prices we’ve seen just from the Iran conflict, which shot up ~50% in just two months², and ...

Pulled in at 56% SOC at 09:37. My 7%/hr guesstimate said recharging to 100% would take about 6.3 hours. The car predicted 5:50 to full. I got the notification from the Subaru app at 16:08 that the car was done charging; ~6.5 hours later. At 240V 24A (5.76 kW), 37.44 kWh transferred, the actual SOC increase approximately 31.9 kWh (44% of the 72.6 kWh battery pack), makes for about 85% efficiency, which is more or less spot on for what I’ve read I should see L2 charging. Everything seems to be working as expected. I seem to be stuck at 205 miles predicted range, though, which is more a function of my driving than anything else (I’ve had 222 miles range predicted as recently as October 14, 2025, at 11,998 miles on the odometer, so I don’t think battery degradation is at play here - especially since  Electric Vehicle Range Doesn’t Degrade Much Over Time Now (MotorTrend, Apr 27, 2026). (This Solterra has been in service about 1 year 9 months, and has logged 16,457 miles, comfortab...

Discussion I had with a friend recently... California gas prices have hit $7/gallon in some places , even as high as almost $8 at at least one station . Growing up in the 90s, gas in the midwest was generally under $1.00/gallon, often as low as $.79/gallon. Pretty much the only way I was able to stay flush delivering Chinese food, when a $5 tip was memorable. But I digress. Even in SoCal, gas dipped below $1.00/gallon as recently as as 1998 , only to surge to around $2.00/gallon by spr surge to around $2.00/gallon by spring of 2000 . Outside of like a global pandemic, they’ve never gone back down, really, though they’ve occasionally shot up much higher. June 2008 or so, adjusted for inflation , gas prices were in the $6-7 range in California . But why? I find this interesting; how little things have changed, despite multiple governors (including – ostensibly – a Republican, Arnold Schwarzenegger, from 2003–2011): California Attorney General Bill Lockyear investigated accusations of pri...

Things I’ve picked up to augment the used non-Mk II, non-Turbo Fractal FM3 I found on Facebook Marketplace for a very good price: Screen protectors from ChadBoston.com ($34.99 as of this writing; $44 shipped). This FM3 came with Mooer foot switch toppers , which I noted in the Notes section when I ordered the screen protector. The Humbuster™ cable from Fractal ($19.99, $42 shipped) (I got this as I was experiencing hum running into the FX Return input on my cheap Facebook Marketplace Marshall G50RCD , but this cable didn’t fix that) Headrush FRFR-112 Mk2  and a  CableCreation XLR Cable to connect it to the FM3 A Harbor Freight Apache 3800 case to protect it from the dogs, when traveling with it, etc. The Apache case is roughly equivalent to a Pelican 1450 if you want to go “pro,” but for my modest needs, the $39.99 Apache does the trick. I cut the foam to allow transporting the FM3 along with a USB A-B cable and the power cord, which you may or may not want to do (realisti...