Author: Alan
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Me, in Your Inbox
I finally implemented one of those email newsletters every other site seems to have these days. This is for the benefit of those who just can’t get into RSS readers, but still want to keep up with all the stuff I put online. You can go and subscribe to it here. Or not. The newsletter…
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Printing Minifigures the Wrong Way
As I said in the previous post, I’ve finally jumped down the 3D printing rabbit hole, and it’s turning out to be both useful and fun. It’s also a gateway drug to other nerdy projects. While tuning the settings, I got interested in figuring out how high I could crank the printer’s resolution. After some…
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I Can Now Summon Objects into Existence
It won’t surprise readers of this blog to learn that, to the extent that I have friends at all, they’re a nerdy bunch. As a result, I’ve become accustomed to hearing them talk about 3D printing. After years of waiting for the technology to mature, I’ve now bought myself one of these magical object-summoning boxes…
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Winlink and VARA on Linux: Surprisingly Straightforward
For years, I’ve been hearing about Winlink, an amateur radio system for sending email over shortwave frequencies. It’s become a standard tool for ham radio emergency communications, as it enables a properly equipped station to connect an emergency shelter, command post, or staging area to email even if the internet is completely wiped out in…
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Welcome to the FPLV Step-Down Facility
A couple of years ago, my daughter was looking for local volunteer opportunities when she hit on the idea of helping at our local animal shelter. We have a history with the place, having adopted a few cats there, and it sounded like a great idea. So great, in fact, that I suggested she and…
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The Best iMac Cat Bed
If you have an old G3 iMac, the original version with the CRT, and you start looking for ways to reuse it, you’ll soon come across the idea of turning it into a cat bed. Because this is the internet. Having found myself in exactly that position recently, I realized I could create not only…
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A Saturday Morning Fox Hunt
One Friday night in early December, Larry Krainson, W1AST, forwarded an email to the WMAFoxHunters email reflector, announcing that a hidden amateur radio transmitter, or “fox box,” was now active somewhere in the area, waiting for people to find it. The game was afoot. Having put together a tape-measure beam antenna and offset attenuator for…
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New Game: The Mission
I’ve added a new subsection to my main site. If you click the “Adventure” tab at the top of that site, or just follow this direct link, you’ll find yourself drifting through an immense void in a tiny escape pod. Figure out your mission, and your true identity, as you play through this short narrative…