Month: September 2024

–Didn’t do much of anything today. Grace is in an extremely foul mood.

–Had a bad night after the flu vaccination. Couldn’t get to sleep, a couple of shivers, minor aches. Went back to bed after breakfast, got up at 1:00, more or less okay.

–Put the Cremina mostly together, waiting for a steam poppet.

–Pizza for dinner.

–Took Grace to Rite-Aid for vaccinations. Turns out she didn’t have an appointment. They recommended no more than two for me, so I got flu and COVID 2024-2025. Spent some time looking at my record on MyChart, gave up and messaged Firoz’ office asking what else I need.

–One of two rat Leitz R4s came in that I ordered on eBay for the red Leitz button. Got it apart by brute force (no youtube disassembly videos), marred the button in the process. It wasn’t very 3D anyway–more than paint, but not much.

–Took the Beemer to El Centro in Natomas to revisit Perry’s farm stand (now Cuevas) and the strawberry lady (still there). Got strawberries, tomatoes, squash, melon–great stuff.

–Scanned some more photos. Assembled the 1965 ACDS graduation photos into a Word doc and uploaded it to vstat.com so the classmates can download it.

–Scanned a bunch of photos.

–Walked to UPS to pick up Cerini Cremina steam assembly, then to Bel Air for anti-perspirant.

–Took Grace shopping at Bel Air.

–Picked up Damasteel Shamwari at FedEx on Sunrise.

–Picked up Cremina rebuild kit at UPS. Seems slender–no steam poppet or boiler cap gasket, for example. Turns out those are only in the $62 “complete” rebuild kit. Oh well…

–Took Grace shopping at Smart & Final. She forgot her list. RedBaron for dinner.

–Did one more showdown between the two SL2-Ss. The Reporter did fine this time. One thing: With the Rikenon lens (with which I am less and less impressed), the Reporter took a horrible double image. Duh! After telling the cameras that I was using a 55mm “other” lens (to turn on image stabilization), all was good. That doesn’t explain the Reporter’s deficiencies when using the coded Summicron, so–still a little mystery. P.S. I finally figured out (last night) how to align the plastic and rubber parts of the eyepiece so it would go on easily the first time. Can’t believe how many times I struggled with those before hitting on this. Oh well. And why did I have them off? The Reporter’s reeked of PJ’s cologne, pretty much obviating the Leica reskin. After swapping them, the Reporter smells…almost not at all. I’m soaking the bad one in alcohol. Probably won’t do anything.

–Played with the Cremina a bit. Buggered the screw trying to get the steam poppet out. Pried it out later with my package-opening knife. Hard to believe I have no spares for steam internals. I ordered a new assembly (stainless, finally) from Cerini. Will look again for spares. I need to find out what the threads are on the trashed screw to see if I can replace it.

–Played a little more with SL2-S and SL2-S Reporter. Sometimes the Reporter seems to have a little more saturation, but other times the standard seems to be a little sharper. May test again tonight. [edit] Tested. like last night (I BELIEVE) the Reporter really suffers in the dark the speed limit sign is foggy, hazy, low contrast. Using the “denoise” feature doesn’t correct it. Both cameras set up as identically as I could do. Very strange how the Reporter is as good when there’s some light, then degrades in the dark. More testing to follow. [edit 2] Tested again with a shot in back. Same results: the Reporter lacks saturation and contrast compared to the standard. I’ll really hate to give that up, given the eye relief and Leica reskin (and identical daytime photos), but there really does seem to be something lacking in the Reporter at night.

–Cleaned up/cut up all boxes so as to reclaim some space in the garage and bedroom.

–Played with the scanner some more. Still learning, but it’s pretty impressive.

–Dinner from Jack’s Urban Eats; Beach Hut Deli closed at 5.

–Dropped off the Rolex 16800 at FedEx.

–Dropped off Noah Cantelon’s birthday package at UPS.

–Picked up Hirame chucks at UPS.

–Picked up a dozen sesame bagels at New York Bagel Cafe.

–Leica SL2-S Reporter came back from being reskinned at Elica. 95% of the smell is gone now. There’s still some there: I swapped the rubber pieces around the viewfinders, which helped. I guess I might still need to add a positive odor to it, since I believe I’ve gone as far as I can in removing the cologne smell.

–Plustek scanner came in. Tried it out on some slides from my 1965 ACDS graduation. Seems to be good. The slides are showing their age (and size), but the scans are certainly good enough to evoke memories. Except Laurel’s eyes were closed.

–Got another free cutting from Kenny; put it in a pot.

–Got the propane tank filled at U-Haul. The guy didn’t seem to look for an inspection date/tag. I’ll have to check and see how obvious it is.

–Red Baron pizza for dinner.

–Leica CL came back from repair. Works.

–Cremina came in. Looks good.

–Decided to return the Rolex 16800. Emailed Jacek; Kirill replied that he would handle everything. Jacek later replied that “for sure it’s been polished.” Wish he had said that in the listing.

–Sea Dweller case came back from Rolliworks. It’s shiny all right, with relatively broad chamfers. It doesn’t look bad; it’ll likely come down to a choice between it and the 1680 Rolliworks is working on.

–Got corn at Bel Air; barbecued it with Jenny-O turkey burgers (yum) and Claire’s potato salad (not yum).

–Took a shower and shave.

–Rolex 16800 came in. Runs perfect on the Timegrapher. Lume seems much whiter than the tan shown on Jacek’s pics. Had to add a link to the 11-link bracelet. Close scrutiny does make it look like it’s been refinished–except the caseback has the worst pitting I’ve ever seen, while the case underneath is clean. I don’t know.

–Took Grace to Hallmark at Sunrise Mall for cards and wrapping paper. Discovered there’s a Red Robin at the edge of the mall. Had I known…

–Played with Westclox Moonbeams. Decided to keep the original: light alarm works (sound alarm is weak), it has lume on hands (new one doesn’t seem to) and a better case.

–Grace still sick. Sicker, maybe.

–Leather glue came. Used it on my belt; will see. Just noticed for the first time today (after 40 years or so) (a) that the belt has a script signature “John W. Nordstrom,” and (b) it consists of a 2″ wide piece of leather folded over and glued to…a form of some sort to make a 1″ belt. Could be a thicker stiffer piece of leather, could possibly be something else. How it held up this long without noticeable wear is astonishing–the one hole I’ve used isn’t even elongated. Reversing it every time I wear it has helped, I’m sure.

–Third (or fifth) Westclox Moonbeam came in. This one is nice: dead silent, has the “power loss” indicator, and both light and buzzer work at the appropriate time.

–Got a pizza at Blaze for dinner. Pretty tasty.

–Lunch at McDonald’s on Sunrise, then shopping at Smart & Final for milk, Pellegrino, pizza, tangerines, apples.

–Played with cameras. Dug out the Canon R5 again to test the Zeiss Pancolar against the Rikenon. Can’t tell. [edit] Tested Canon and SL2-S with Summicron 50 with night shots. Canon held its own, but the SL2-S sensor continues to astound.

–Took the Helios 44-2 apart (via youtube video) and fixed the ultra-stiff aperture ring. Wasn’t obvious how to do it (not covered in video), but I figured it out. Smooth as silk now.

–Fixed (apparently) the steam lever on the ECM. It wouldn’t stay down, now it does. I didn’t do anything except take it apart and put it back together. Beats me.

–Kind of a nothing day. Much cooler.

–Took the BMW to McDonald’s for lunch, then Bel Air for bulk water, banana cream pie, and a couple of frozen dinners.

–Played with Helios-type lenses. Decided to drop the Biotar and 81H, keep the MMZ Belomo Helios 44-2 (58/2).

–Grace still sick.

–Picked up another Lumitime clock at UPS. Nice. Got pizza, cream cream cheese at Bel Air.

–Got a haircut at Great Clips. Cutter was tattooed, but had good energy and an unbelievable body.

–Took the Beemer out for a ride. Started towards Ione, turned back before reaching (eyes mostly). Car has a buzz/rattle in the dashboard that sounds just like the one in the 330i. Keerap!

Red Baron 4-cheese pizza with our own pepperoni for dinner.

–Played with bike pumps all day. Got all but one working nicely–i.e., gauge needle goes up on the downstroke and stays there until the upstroke. Web solved one issue: When I push super hard but can’t get the handle down, it’s likely because the Presta valve is blocked shut by my poor fitting of the chuck. Could also be that the “drops to zero” problem is related to poor fitting of the chuck–though I tried different ones and  (sort of) tried to keep them straight. Will try again. I may also want to have the tubes replaced, as I’ve done a lot of pushing and pulling on the valve stems. I was going to buy a bunch of Hiro chucks but then noticed (and read) that they let a lot of air out unless you remove them really fast after opening the lever. Will practice.

–Weather is much milder. Took a 10.5 mile bike ride around 2 PM. The first two bike pumps I tried didn’t really work. I think the issue is that when I test them there’s about 5 pounds of air in the tire. Today there was > 50 pounds, and, I believe, the weaknesses of the Silca pump heads are showing up. The gauges would go up (but not to 50) then quickly down, as air leaked (I surmise) around the chuck seal. We’ll see.

–Took a shower and shave.

–Went to UPS to pick up Paradigm Titanium razor. Very nice; turns out I have the steel version of this and the ti version is much preferred. Also got the Carbonio front license plate holder. Installed it without too much trouble; seems good.

–Went to Bel Air for dessert, corn, turkey burgers, potato salad. Barbecued for dinner: fabulous stuff.

–Compared Leica Q-P and Q2 (Hodinkee). It seems to come up repeatedly that 24 megapixels is just fine, showing no real deficits compared to 46. Last night’s night shot with the Q-P, which came out fine, was done at 1/6 second and 400 ISO (I neglected to set it to auto ISO). Pretty amazing. Will try again tonight with higher ISOs.

–Took the BMW to New York Bagel Cafe for bagels. Took Grace to Target, where she didn’t get much. I got protein bars and toothpaste.

–One red squirrel (child) came for peanuts. Yay!

–Compared Leica M10-P Safari to SL2-S, Summicron 50/2, 24 MP each. M was fine, but doesn’t really offer anything over the SL2-S, and was actually a little fuzzier here and there, which surprised me given the identical setups. That SL2-S sensor is pretty amazing.

–Played with small cameras. Was shocked to see that the the tiny Leica C beat out the C-Lux, which in turn outperformed the D-Lux 7 and 007. The C has the only Summicron lens among those cameras–though it’s from 2013 with only 12 megapixels. The single best performance was the C-Lux zoomed, but for point-and-shoot I seem to go with unzoomed then cropped. Wish I’d had the C in Bellevue. Also thinking of dropping the Qs and just going with C and SL2-S. It would be nice to find a wide L-mount auto-focus lens for the SL2-S that weighs less than 3 pounds.

–Put gas in the BMW. That car is fun to drive.

–Cleaned and set up the Plomb 1943 “War Finish” 3/8″ ratchet. Very sweet tool.

–Muffins in the hotel room; gas at a nearby Chevron; then to the airport. Siri crapped out for some reason and wouldn’t connect with Carplay. Dropped the car off at National: a really good experience overall. Then trudged through Security to the gate. Another full plane, with lots of cheaters trying to board early, screaming babies, dogs, etc. A totally not fun experience.

–Got back to Sac, made our way to the Daily lot (we were the only ones on the shuttle), and eventually found the Honda. Home at last, said hi to Kenny, got pizza for dinner at Bel Air.

–Really exhausting experience all around; I think we’ll drive the next time(s).

–Breakfast at the hotel–good.

–Went with Jan and Chuck to Crossroads. Lunch at some forgettable Vietnamese sandwich place, then Barnes and Noble.

–Then to Kathy’s. We all went to dinner at Tokyo Japanese Restaurant. Good stuff. Then back to Kathy’s for opening presents and birthday cake on her 80th. Then back to the hotel and sleep.

–Breakfast at the hotel–very good. Off to Jan and Chuck’s for family to chat.

–Got sandwiches at Potbelly (very good) and took them to Kathy’s. Family chatted some more. Jan and Chuck went to Safeway and Costco for rotisserie chicken and mashed potatoes. Very good. Kathy isn’t drinking. Hard to tell with David: he seems chipper, but as I recall Kelly moved out in part because of his drunken abuse. Noah seems fine.

–Back to the hotel for muffins and sleep.

–Took the Honda to the airport. Parking wasn’t bad, but getting to the terminal, security, etc. was pretty tedious. Plane was chilly, but that was expected. Sparkling water and chips were provided.

–Getting to the National Car Rental area was also tedious–up and down escalators, a shuttle, etc. Once there: pick a car, any car. chose a Kia Kona (eventually) and–bless the saints–it started Apple Carplay automatically.

–Checked in at Eastgate BW Signature, got top (6th) floor. Not bad.

–We all went out to dinner at Las Margaritas in Issaquah–pretty good.

–Then to bed.

–Drove the BMW to Sacramento Airport just to get a feel for it–it’s been many many years. In fact, I can’t remember the last trip I took. Oh wait: early 2008, Minneapolis, for the SPSS weekend seminar. And…

–Picked up 3 Apple charging cables at UPS (all work); the Armstrong ratchet wrench (bad mechanism, very hard to switch off/on, tossed; and the replacement solar fountain pump–piece of crap, barely works, ordered another from Amazon, will toss.

–Red Baron for dinner.

–Skipped Chalk It Up this year. Heat, travel prep, laziness…

–Took a shower and shave.

–A nothing day, pretty much.