Fun and Games Dept

Sometimes I take a photo to remind myself of what I want to write in my blog. Apparently I didn’t do that today, so here’s a selfie from a local restaurant called “Serial Grillers”.

Monsoon season is winding down in these parts. The weather forecast talks about dry weather and seasonal temperatures for the foreseeable future. I enjoy the rains of the Monsoon and the ferocity of Mother Nature, except when it penetrates the wall and roof of the house.

Here, sniff this and tell me if it smells like pumpkin.

My husband and I were first in Tubac, Arizona in 2003. In that blog entry, written 20 years ago, I mentioned the quaint little town in passing as we were on our way to Tucmacacori and Nogales. That’s also one of the first time I mentioned our plan of moving to Arizona for our retirement. I love it when a plan comes together.

We headed specifically to Tubac today for a nice ride on this Labor Day and to get some decorating ideas for the house. The little village is charming. I get the feeling that like the rest of the world, businesses were impacted by the pandemic, but many of the quaint little shops seem to be holding their own.

We strolled through many displays and have plenty of ideas for adding to the vibe of our home. Since it’s only an hour away, we’ll head back down and pick up things as the budget allows and the family agrees.

We had a nice lunch outside at Shelby’s Bistro. The table was a little wobbly but it was still an enjoyable experience.

I will admit, I miss my family and friends back East and in the Midwest. Historically Labor Day has always made me a little anxious because it meant cold weather wasn’t that far away and there’d be snow and the like soon enough. I don’t miss that. Living in the desert just doesn’t work that way. And that makes me very happy.

As a full fledged geek I have full fledged geek dreams. It’s not unheard of me for me to remember dreams about school clocks once or twice a month. I’ve fixed clocks for my hometown schools in the past and once in a while I’ll dream about being back in the school and getting the old clocks running again. These dreams are obviously prevalent because of my keen interest in all things connected, including these early and mid 20th century clock systems.

The Historical Society in my hometown set up residence in one of the school buildings closed in the early 1970s. A former classmate has led the effort in restoring the building to its former glory, and the cafe-gyma-auditorium is now a popular spot for banquets, wedding receptions, and other community events. The building has clocks from other schools in the district, including the last wooden cases clock left intact from my elementary school. I’m hoping to get their clock system working again the next time we go back East.

The clock pictured above is a gift from another clock system enthusiast in Central Ohio. Beautifully restored, I am planning on installing it in my office here at home. I’m debating whether to cut a hole in the wall to mount it properly or ask Chris and Mike to build a frame for it. Either way I hope to have it up soon. It’s a touch of class my office needs.

The clock can’t really keep time, it advances once a minute by a 24VDC impulse from a master clock originally located in the principal’s office or something. Originally pendulum based clocks, motorized clocks replaced the function in the mid 20th century and then electronic clocks took over the duty in the late 1980s. My clocks run off a Raspberry Pi switching a simple relay to replicate the impulses needed to keep the clocks on time. Surprisingly, this clocks is not particularly loud.

I look forward to getting this on the wall. I’ll probably dream about these clocks in the next couple of days.

Such a happy geek.

I will never tire of desert sunsets.

I’ve mentioned before that I’m a little bit of a storm chaser. When we moved to Tucson from the Midwest I was concerned that I would miss out on excellent storms, but the monsoon has not disappointed.

I snapped this photo while out for a walk yesterday afternoon. I was talking to my mom on the phone at the time; I love the way the rain showers are isolated and easy to spot. A couple of hours after this photo was taken we had a spectacular lightning show that kind of hovered over the neighborhood for an hour before it got bored and dissipated.

As I continue to groove on this old films on YouTube, here’s “A Young Man’s Fancy”, a 1952 infomercial from the Edison Electric Company. Mr. Alexander Phipps loves his friend’s mother’s all-electric kitchen. I’ve seen this one plenty of times; the mother in this movie reminds me of Grandma Country.

I sometimes wonder if the homosexual subtext between Bob and his friend Alexander was on purpose. Of course, it can be attributed to the innocence of the early 1950s, but looking back from a 21st century point of view can make one lift an eyebrow.

And notice young Judy’s flair for language, calling her mother “sweetie”. She was ahead of her time.

I guess I never anticipated this hot, new trend sweeping the nation. Not only are entertainment outlets no longer pretending to strive for accuracy when portraying period pieces, there’s this new fad of the GOP doing everything they can to never teach accurate historical facts again.

I can guarantee the writers of “I Love Lucy” never used the word ‘literally’ in a 21st century way when discussing an episode script with Lucille Ball, but there it was, peppered all over that recent Amazon Prime movie. “Bridgerton” takes wild liberties with language and activities, and now this new “A League of Their Own” series has women dropping f-bombs in public every ten second and lesbians making out in the streets of Rockford.

Look, I know the f-bonb and lesbians existed in the 1940s. But I’m also pretty sure neither were celebrated with this wild “queer rage” being shoved into this period piece. Heck, I don’t even remember these things being shared with such wild abandonment in the mid 1980s.

I guess I have a certain expectation that if I’m watching a television show set in the 1940s I’m not going to hear Janis Joplin singing a track while same sex couples dance.

And as far a the GOP and their idiocy, it does have to make one wonder, if they’re so eager to rewrite history to make the United States all white and perfect, what makes them think the Bible is completely accurate in its storytelling?

Maybe Jesus was a woman or something.