Front page today.

Summary: Late April 2025 to Now Summary: Late April 2025 to Now What I’ve actually built, explored, debugged, or re-architected since April 18th. Apologies for no updates. It’s been a dense stretch of weeks with lots of hands-on …

Dropped a new summary on Gadgets.Life. Lots of Pi cluster work, radio/SDR experiments, network upgrades, automation projects, and general homestead tinkering. Good chaos.

gadgetsdotlife.wordpress.com/2025/11/14/s...

At just over a mile from 21D here in the Twin Cities metro area I can tell when Airventure is close as the warbirds stop in for fuel or just to do some practice - radials and Allisons and Merlins making pleasant noises overhead.

#AirVenture #Warbirds #airshow

A bar graph. On the left side is a bar showing that Republicans are cutting $930 billion from Medicaid. On the right side is a bar showing that Republicans are giving $910 billion in tax breaks to corporations under their budget bill, paid for by gutting Medicaid.

Republicans may lie about what's in their budget bill but the numbers sure don't.

Massive Creator Platform Fansly Bans Furries Blaming payment processor restrictions, Fansly—a platform creators flocked to after OnlyFans announced it'd ban sex—announced it's changing the rules for multiple types of content.

Fansly Just Banned Furries

🔗 www.404media.co/fansly-ban-f...

This is your reminder to sign up for @racketmn.com. You want an independent outlet that's skeptical of power and highlights under-covered stories around the city? You got one! Support it!

You'll be surprised at how central it becomes to planning your social calendar.

GitHub - netbymatt/ws4kp: A web-based WeatherStar 4000 A web-based WeatherStar 4000. Contribute to netbymatt/ws4kp development by creating an account on GitHub.

Make your own weather channel and relive the 90s github.com/netbymatt/ws...

Another alternative is to look for a nearby CoCORaHS observation station www.cocorahs.org

Happy Birthday to my pal, John Cena, one of the primary reasons why making Peacemaker is more fun than anything in the world.
Love you, my friend.

This week was one of those mashups where half my brain was buried in Python scripts, while the other half was dragging to-do lists out of dusty bins. From container tech and chainsaws to contact cleanup and shallow wells, I had my hands in just about everything. gadgets.life Friday April 18th.

Rigged up a thing so my kid can change the color of her bedroom using her marker set!

Busy week at the bench: Zigbee relays, 3D plaques, squawk bots, USB-C deep dives, image classification, and vintage XT networking. Full Friday roundup now live on the blog → gadgets.life #makerlife #homeautomation #retrocomputing

I post a weekly blog about the stuff I did. I'm going to expand on various topics as well since I have lots of content behind each of the entries. gadgets.life

We're bringing Pebble back! Eight years later, you still can't beat a Pebble

Neat, you can get a Pebble watch again! repebble.com

Planning a 70' Rohn 25G tower with the house having a 6" wall wood foundation. Even when guyed, can tower's sway still impact the foundation, like causing bulges as the concrete shifts? Safe distance tips? Base would be 2x2 x 4' deep concrete with rebar, 24 inches from the foundation wall. Advice?

Grading sheet for Conrad's mother Mary with a score of 97 out of 100. Comments include "nice gradient effects" and "love the abstracted natural shapes". The art was a screen printing of flowers.

My mother got 97 percent on one of her first printing assignments now for college credit. If you know a senior 62 or wiser, encourage them to either audit classes at the University of Minnesota for free or take credit for $20 a credit hour.

A snow-covered field leads to a large barn with a solar panel array to the left. Two RVs are parked in front of the barn, one larger motorhome and a smaller travel trailer. A few structures, including a house with a red truck parked nearby, are visible in the background among leafless trees. The sky is clear and blue, with long shadows cast on the snow from the trees

Had a fair bit here just two weeks ago. But yeah, an unsatisfactory winter so far.

A wide-angle view of a rural property in late winter or false spring, featuring a large open grassy area with patches of dormant grass. On the left, a beige metal barn with a brown roof has solar panels on top. Next to the barn, there is a small wooden greenhouse, and a white travel trailer with an "r•pod" logo. A white motorhome is parked further left. In the background, a house is partially visible behind leafless trees, with a red vehicle parked near it. A dense tree line with mostly bare branches extends across the right side of the image, with a few evergreen trees scattered among them. The late afternoon sun casts long shadows across the field, and the sky is clear blue with a few small clouds.

False Spring in Minnesota. The ground is squishy and the grass slides over a still-frozen layer of ground as you walk on it.

NTSB investigators reviewing cockpit voice recordings in a room.

NTSB investigators retrieving a flight recorder from a box of ionized water

An NTSB investigator examining a flight recorder

Recent events have been a tragic reminder of the importance of a fair and thorough investigation when things go wrong. We sat down with the NTSB's Sean Payne to find out how the board conducts air crash investigations from start to finish. www.flightradar24.com/blog/how-to-...

Early '80s, I was a FL airport ticket agent. One plane blew a tire on landing; no spares in-state. 6hr delay. Elderly passenger scolded (complete with finger-wagging): "Who goes 2000 miles without a spare tire?"

They weren't wrong.

Are you a bit teed off there?

I made a placeholder to avoid the name being reused for crypto scams or such. I waited until the "you can still restore" period expired and created it again.

Cold & clear skies mean some great solar generation today - consuming 4,100W and generating 20,420W at -6F today about 45 minutes before peak sun. The system production for the day was 108.92 kWh.

I think this is from interior during a Christmas shopping trip prior to 2011, after winding thru the aisles in line for an hour or so.

Deer visitors in the fresh snow.

Airport dogs rule

I started using mini-computers at the community college while still in high school. The only home PCs were S-100 bus like the Altair or IMSAI. When the Apple ][ came out it was enticing but my first home computer was a TRS-80 model III; I sold my only car to get it. Helped with homework!

Senate Democrats Are Running Out of Time to Pass a Shield Law to Protect Journalism The PRESS Act, which would protect journalists from government spying, enjoys broad bipartisan support and has passed the House—but it’s unclear whether the Senate will take it up.

NEW: Legislation that would bar the United States government from spying on journalists—except under rare, specific circumstances—is currently stalled in Congress.

Now, with only weeks left to legislate, press advocates are urging Senate Democrats to pass the bill, known as the PRESS Act.