ShopTalk Sunday: Summer Safety Issue – Papa’s Day!

9:45 AM Update – Father’s Day New panels are in place – done before breakfast as implied: They should make 240W each – which means the only action points (into hour-long blocks) will be removing the old wiring, measure and premake the extensions, mount junction boxes, complete wiring, taping. Memo to DIY home solar builders: … Read More

Market Mystery, Data and FedSpeak Warmup

Personal Income is our first fairytale today.  Theory is we’re all making more money, but what’s the old saying?  “The harder I work the behinder I get.” Unless you’re the gubmint.  Because the more you make, they bigger the tax bite.  That is to say, when it comes to real disposable income, we haven’t seen … Read More

Avoiding a “Solar Fleece”

A number of readers have asked me how to judge an investment in solar power.  Today we will take a deep look at solarnomics.  However, as you’ll discover, there’s a legal cloud – not so much an accounting  issue – that lurks as great peril to solar investors. Yeah, including us.  I got “bit” too. … Read More

ShopTalk Sunday: Buggy 3D Prints at Invention Alley

A short rap on Mental Topologies is a useful (Big Brain People) prequel today. “Regular” understanding of IQ as a semi-Gaussian normal distribution” among humans is oh so terribly flawed I could just wet myself. See, dimensioning humans (rendering concepts down to 2D) is hopeless Reductionism for the mentally short-changed. Multispectral Humanity becomes apparent as a … Read More

Market’s Inflation-Driven Rally – PPI Figures

My consigliere – a wizened tax attorney – is more than slightly savvy on Money.  He was projecting an “economic showdown with China” as early as 1979. And here we are… So, when he called to talk about the “hollow money” problem – we both (being students of Long Wave Economics – knew exactly what … Read More

ShoptTalk Sunday: The Marquis de Yard and Mow

Our usual Sunday commentary on the non-news, non-financial aspects of Life nearly didn’t happen this morning.  Due to a chance encounter with the Marquis de Yard. Unlike the Marquis de Sade, whose works are horny, sketchy, and mean at some levels, the Marquis de Yard was supposed to provide a good time.  A few hours with … Read More

ShopTalk Sunday: On Your Mower? Get Set…

Although I got a lot done this week, including some long-winded columns both here and on the Peoplenomics site, the two greatest accomplishments in making for a better spring were getting our income taxes done and repairing the lawnmower. “Wait?  The NEW Mower?“ Yeah, buddy.  The NEW mower.  Which we bought from Lowes, and which … Read More

ShopTalk Sunday: Garden Prepping, Eats & Treats

Someone stole an hour of our lives overnight.  Running the clock forward with Daylight time which is so scammy… We don’t have a “measure, cut, join, finish” project to revel in today.  Because the weather was perfect Saturday to take on the greenhouse rework.  See, over the winter it grew and grew and turned into … Read More

Football Does Our Work

Since the world is freakin’ crazy, it’s easy to find ways to entertain the herd of sheeple.  Pro sports is one such tool. I mean, when you think about it, Sports is a HUGE made-up monetization.  While there are some values (*teamwork, practice, striving for excellence) most of it can be learned from watching a … Read More

ShopTalk Sunday: Ice Storm Aftermath/Radio

Sheesh.  Not a fun week for Ure. Turning 74 this month, I thought the Sun was supposed to come out, not go falling apart on us.  And golden years?  Pah-leeze! Got up at 3 AM (*brain on fire, couldn’t sleep) Friday morning.  Wrote column, futzed around, ate and then my neighbor showed up and in … Read More

PDN: President’s Day Nightmare? GRRP Rising

On the surface, this promises to be a fairly quiet week, data-wise. The news flow is less than inspiring, because the “shoot down” of the Chinese weather or surveillance balloon has turned everyone in Washington into even bigger Buffoons than before.  Sounds impossible, we’ll admit. Tomorrow we’ll get a taste of international goods pricing, but remembering … Read More

ShopTalk Sunday: Ice? Solar Vs. Genset

Ok, sitting down after a day of working on post-storm chores. As you will remember, the ice storm took us almost offline, except that now I understand why a tablet and Starlink are so crucial to people in Ukraine.  They work great.  Able to look over comments and approve things along with the odd post even … Read More

Ice: After Action Report

Fine tuning of prepping is in the works following the major ice storm in East Texas this past week. Today, a discussion of what we got right and what we got wrong.  Very interesting “school” the universe provides! Plus, in our ChartPack, that alternate count of the (Elliott) wave structure from a few weeks back … Read More