Today I am an idiot because...

I can cut it in half and use it to brace the upper and lower brackets of the backboard frame assembly so I can use the pole horizontally as a base. :)
 
Well bad news, I ended up working on the VW with Groo today and we got it all fixed up better and she's back on her feet and running again. Stopping smooth and powerfully, and even though it turned in to a bit of a pain in the ass we managed to replace the emergency brake cables and get it all working great!

Also found a massive vacuum hose leak bleeding the brakes, so next up is a bit of rehosing but she's running better than ever as is. :)

Unfortunately my body hurts all over right now from wiggling under the car and I think I'm gonna go pass out since I forgot to eat or drink while working on it and I think dehydrated meself..
 
Is Groo a mendicant?
I don't know, I don't know what a mendicant is. He's one of the few in a group of friends that I consider my true family before I started my own with my wife, my own family broke up when I was around 15 due to divorce and so I gathered my own of people who loved/trusted/had fun with each other. Groo and me hung out together for years, for a whole year while I worked a midnight shift at a 24/7 shop, like a 7-11 or White Hen but not one of those, although I have worked at both too. This was called "Busy Bee" and was privately owned. Oddly enough my other friend who's nickname was/is "Poof" and got me the job there now runs his own comic shop down in Florida and is exceedingly happy which pleases me to know end. (Double-oddly, his name is "Jeff" in real life too)

Oh that whole year I worked there we tripped almost every night I worked. It was a new place that was VERY slow, I would go some nights without getting any customers at all and a busy night was about 2 dozen in an 8 hour shift and most of those were early morning ones for cigarettes.(They were $0.85us a pack back then, swore I'd quit when they got over a buck. 1985-6?) The owners of the place were a married couple who were "old" hippies. (in retrospect they were in their late 20s-early 30s which seems super young now but I was 19-20 back then) They taught us the ways of the Dead and the proper parking lot etiquette and ways to get the best deals and to tell posers from real heads, and warned me of the harsh realities that my magical happy wonderland still had scam artist running around ripping off tripping rich kids left and right. They saved me from a number of scams, good people!

Groo finally brought me his "dead" computer to fix. It just blinked at him when he turned it on. It's a POS HP, but I made it in to much less of one. He'd never uninstalled any of the pre-installed bloatware and while 6GB sounds like enough for windows 10 you have to realize his PC is basically a laptop in a desktop box and he has no graphics memory so it's shared with the system memory and with all the shite running in the background it had its HDD at 100% usage all the time and had lag in just moving the mouse!

I cleaned out the bloat and malware, (only 38 hits with Malwarbyte, not bad), and updated it from 2016 to the latest 1903 update. It was a legal copy, felt so weird. Then I got it more memory since it's a funky type of DDR3 that's only 1.35v and 2x8GB were only $55us. For some reason I could only get 1 stick working, and I picked up another set just to make sure but out of the 4 sticks only one works in it. So I went ahead with an 4GB & 8GB since it worked and it seems to be enough to make a dramatic difference. The system now has enough memory to operate freely without needing constant virtual ram HDD activity and the graphics are great at playing back videos and web cruising which is all he wants it for. The difference between how he got it originally and what I sent him back should be enough to give him a really good "WOW!" and make me smile.

I also loaded it up with 687GB of various bits of entertainment off our systems so he can have a small library to choose from should his internet go down. (He's got Netflix and Prime, so he's pretty well covered. :) )

Yesterday I refigured out how to do my basketball net and almost punched myself in the face for how simple it is. Instead of any stupid support structure building I'll just use the plastic base it came with and cut a bit of an access hole in to it so I can slide a backing plate on to the three bolts that will protrude through the bottom of the plastic once I cut the holes then the backer plate (probably an old PC side) will go on then I nut it down with washers. Take the first section off the pole and drill some holes in its base to mount it to the original base the same way it was, then add the supports back on to the base and figure out a way to attach them to the pole or backboard.

Only slight troublesome bit will be the handle, but I can either cut it short, lock it in position, or set up a pin system to hold in place in case I want to vary it later.

Thought of it all while jury rigging the broken plastic wheels on my grill after straightening its axle. Got a little frustrated last year waiting for my son to help and might have bumped it down some steps a bit roughly then shoved it in to the garage and said "FUCK IT! I'll deal with it next year" and then next year came this morning because my wife decided we should enjoy the day by grilling out and sitting on the porch...just as soon as I get the grill working and all the porch furniture out of the basement and on to the porch and cleaned up, THEN I get to work on the net.

And it's 3:50pm on July 4th... ROFL
 
OH, him! No, no relation in blood or naming.

I think it's actually "Groove" for "Groovy" since he was quite a laid back fellow but up for anything, but I just call him Groo. :)
 
Finally got the water chemically all balanced and beautiful, so today I got to play with the basketball net while my wife ran interference with the puppy. I got to go to the hardware store and EVERYTHING! :D

Got the base mounting bolts/washers, the pole is cut to size and the holes are drilled in the side to connect it to the base by putting it on its wheels with just enough space to put a rubber boot on the bottom. Gotta figure out a way to lock the basketball net in position as it's loose as hell now since it was meant to be adjustable. Almost thinking of NOT cutting off those two extending pipes going back and running a piece of the original pole down from them and bolting them directly to the two bolts in back by including a crossbracket I could cleverly whip up with a bit of angle iron and a pipe clamp from my local Ace. (Got two guys there excited about my project and they've been insanely helpful/friendly. :) )

I was gonna cut the extra bits off the poles and just bolt everything tight and mebbe do a crossbrace, but then all the strain is on the plastic base and the back bolts. If I can tie some of that directly from the dual arms sticking out I have a feeling it'll be much more secure.

Plan to have my son/daughter help me tomorrow and finish it. It's too hard to hold that basketball assembly one-handed while lifting the front end of the base to slide under it without falling in the pool or breaking something. (But I'm damned glad I'm able to lift it and hold it in place one handed, this rebuilt heart is still going strong like ox! :D )

I really want to get this done. My wife wants to shoot baskets and I know I'm looking the answer in the face but not seeing it. Gotta reinforce the back bolts with a crossbracket/backplates and find a way to secure those two poles to better distribute the force.

That's all, pictures so y'all can have fun visualizing it too! :p

finalbits1.jpg finalbits12.jpg finalbits13.jpg finalbits14.jpg finalbits15.jpg finalbits16.jpg finalbits17.jpg
 
The handle! I could use the handle to tie in the two supports to the back two bolts! The shape is right, it's easy to make holes in, and I can then compress the two ends together which will help me with some gapping on the front of it!!!
I think it just might work! Just get a decent grade bit of angle iron to put some holes in to bolt things to and I think it just might bloody work while reinforcing the back hold down!
I KNEW I was looking right at it, I think I even have the gappers and bolts, or at least I can cut 'em up a bit and make them work...  
This is good, this is VERY doable and should be solid. Thank you for being my sounding board yet again.
 
... I just bough 2.0 speakers from BRAND X" that's turns out not the real "BRAND X". It's not even licensed!

It's just the case of two corporation having the same brand in the same product category.

Ugh


Edit: different logo typeface tho
 
My wife needed a new phone so I worked out the best deal for her. It happened to be from a high street store. She went in knowing exactly what to get and not to sign up for insurance. I forgot to say don't get a case or screen protector, we'll sort that out later. She came home with a £30 TPU case and a £20 screen protector. :-?
 
My wife needed a new phone so I worked out the best deal for her. It happened to be from a high street store. She went in knowing exactly what to get and not to sign up for insurance. I forgot to say don't get a case or screen protector, we'll sort that out later. She came home with a £30 TPU case and a £20 screen protector. :-?

Did They gave her §10 extra discount for buying the phone together with tpu case and screen protector?
 
... I just bough 2.0 speakers from BRAND X" that's turns out not the real "BRAND X". It's not even licensed!

It's just the case of two corporation having the same brand in the same product category.

Ugh


Edit: different logo typeface tho

The fact that BRAND X makes the best speakers while BRAND X makes pretty mediocre ones just adds more insult to injury.
 
This picture first as it helps explain it:

finalbits12-jpg.3193


Got a bolt to go through the holes at the back of those two overhanging bits that used to have the handle connected to it. Gonna rehook up the handle, but after I cut it about 13" shorter. Then if I bore out the bracket that held it to the pole I can put it on the forward bolt in the concrete to add some serious reinforcement, and cut a few more holes in that 13" shorter bit and use it as a cross brace across the back two bolts to distribute the load better.

Add a 3" U-bolt to the front to make sure the pole doesn't wiggle, a boot to the bottom, and then figure out a way to reinforce the upper support if needed to keep it all solid.

Yup, that should do it. If I measured right I should even have a bit of room for adjustment and different settings..but I REALLY doubt I'll get that lucky. LOL

Just gotta have it all done by tomorrow at 4:30. Chrissy gets off/home then and it's supposed to be nice and I want the pool clean and her hoop up for her to lounge around and shoot at. It's her favorite past time and even I'm starting to like it. (I SUCK at sportsball in any form, my sport is frisbee with Calvinball rules)


finalbits1-jpg.3192


Only picture of the hardware bits. That's the bar I'm going to attach to the back of those extended rods, it has a hole through it and mounting hardware on the non-handle side.

I took the handle off and mocked it up as best I could to get an accurate measure, and the little black bracket above it with the piece of blue plastic on it is the bracket I'm going to use to attach it directly to one of those bolts.

Don't worry, the only part of the plastic bit I'm using is the screw going trough it holding it on. I'll drill some holes in the sides of the handle and that will give me my height adjustment leeway.

Again, SHOULD work and I think I'm starting to err a little on the side of overkill...but after all this effort I don't want a wobbly basket. I want it rock hard and feeling like a real backboard.

Oh and I just got back from Ace with the new boot that will fit, (but it's white so I might throw some paint on it just to match and it's only PVC, but better than metal on concrete for now), and the biggest U-bolt they had which is a rectangular one but is wide enough for the pipe and has about an extra 4" of threaded bits with a backer plate so I have lots of mounting options.

Damn it, now I've invested MONEY in this! It hast to work, just HAS to! Well, if you count the step-bit I spent almost $16us...you can see the pressure I'm under! This was supposed to be ZERO budget!!!
 
Oh, got the whole thing up but I'm not happy with it. I don't like the way the pole is still on the wheels/bar on front, gonna take it apart and take that off, the big u-bolt I got holds it in place just fine and it'll be straighter and more solid if it just rests on the ground.

On to the OT, today I'm an idiot because it's 1:35pm and I just figured out that it's not Sunday and it honestly came as a shock to me. :|
 
ARGH

Today i am an idiot!

  1. speaker return has been accepted by an online shop
  2. they gave me "voucher" as refund (same money value)
  3. i buy 3.2m USB cable and a set of speakers
  4. got a shipping discount
  5. applied the refund voucher
  6. paid the bill
  7. checked the invoice in my email. BLOODY HELL
  8. the shipping discount is GONE.
  9. contact support, yes there's no shipping discount because the total i paid was lower than the required amount for shipping discount promo, due to the price cut from the refund voucher.
  10. i want to grumble and say harsh thing... but the customer support is just a person too.
  11. i give him/her a bunch of UX feedback (and thank him/her for his/her politeness)

so basically today i pay around 5 dollars to give a bunch of UX feedback :( :( :( :( :runaway::runaway::runaway::runaway::runaway::oops::oops::D:D:LOL::LOL::LOL::mad::mad::mad::mad:
 
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