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RTDNTOTO 🐻 Random Thoughts Deserving No Thread Of Their Own 20 (2025)

michaelskis said:
I cut down a crepe myrtle tree over the weekend. Because of the location between the pool and the house, I had to dismantle it bit by bit. Then I rented a stump grinder yesterday and after 3 hours I gave up. The blades on the grinder sucked. It is just about surface level with the exception of where the new tree is going. I made sure to go deep in that area. On, and it was 95 degrees with a heat index of 104.

Sad thing is I am very active and in the gym almost every day. On weekends I am always doing something around the house or building something. But this project beat me down.
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I'm pretty active and think I'm in great shape for my age but a day of yardwork or helping my dad on the farm or something like that just wears me down so much more than I would expect. I think that type of work is just a ton of different movements than what you would do in the gym, no matter how "functional" you think your workout is. There is just no real substitute for actual manual labor.

For the stump... you can do what we always did on the farm: cut some groves or drill some holes into what's left, pour a bit of gasoline in, and light it up! If you don't want to use gasoline (not necessarily the safest method), you can always use some lamp oil. It burns a lot less hot but also nice and slow.
 
ursus said:
If I could get you a coffee, it would be the great privilege of my life, Madam Director. I hope your coffee arrives soon. With a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils to celebrate the equinox!
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Star Wars Fan GIF by BuzzFeed
 
michaelskis said:
I cut down a crepe myrtle tree over the weekend. Because of the location between the pool and the house, I had to dismantle it bit by bit. Then I rented a stump grinder yesterday and after 3 hours I gave up. The blades on the grinder sucked. It is just about surface level with the exception of where the new tree is going. I made sure to go deep in that area. On, and it was 95 degrees with a heat index of 104.

Sad thing is I am very active and in the gym almost every day. On weekends I am always doing something around the house or building something. But this project beat me down.
Click to expand...

Unless it is a huge tree stump, I find that it's best to dismantle but leave significant portion of stump, then rock the main trunk back and forth and the whole stump comes out. It can help to wait weeks/months after the rest of the plant has been removed for rot to start to set in.

That said, not sure if that would work on larger crepe myrtles. They seem to sprout all over the place and don't like to die.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I'm pretty active and think I'm in great shape for my age but a day of yardwork or helping my dad on the farm or something like that just wears me down so much more than I would expect. I think that type of work is just a ton of different movements than what you would do in the gym, no matter how "functional" you think your workout is. There is just no real substitute for actual manual labor.

For the stump... you can do what we always did on the farm: cut some groves or drill some holes into what's left, pour a bit of gasoline in, and light it up! If you don't want to use gasoline (not necessarily the safest method), you can always use some lamp oil. It burns a lot less hot but also nice and slow.
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I already saw the fire chief and asked about dynamite... he said no.

Since it is ground level, I think I am going to drill several holes and plant stuff in it.
Doohickie said:
Unless it is a huge tree stump, I find that it's best to dismantle but leave significant portion of stump, then rock the main trunk back and forth and the whole stump comes out. It can help to wait weeks/months after the rest of the plant has been removed for rot to start to set in.

That said, not sure if that would work on larger crepe myrtles. They seem to sprout all over the place and don't like to die.
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It is about 30 inches in diameter. The amount of brush created a 3-foot wall of green between the sidewalk and the curb for about 50-feet. It wasn't a little tree.

You are correct with the sprouting and that will be a challenge. I cut down some holly shrubs by the front door and am running into the same issue. So this fall I am going to dig them up and transplant them to a location that I want them.
 
My ex had the gift of putting the wrong plant in the wrong place, but had enough of a green thumb that they would thrive. She planted a crepe myrtle in our sideyard, a space of about 10' total between us and our neighbor. I told her it was too narrow of a space and would be a maintenance headache, and probably an express route for squirrels to get in their (and our) attic.

I wasn't wrong about any of it, but was divorced before I had to actually do anything about it.
 
MD Planner said:
Star Wars Fan GIF by BuzzFeed
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I am, in fact, the ORIGINAL fanboy. :)

JNA said:
Back in the day the Census sent out red pencils with their paper maps.
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Didn't they send out purple ones, too? I can't remember what those were for but I remember when they rolled out the LUCA program as part of the census I thought I got a purple pencil, too. Hmmmmmmmmmm. Been too long since I had to worry about it.
 
I had agreed to take my wife and friend shopping yesterday, temporarily forgetting the Commanders game was on at 10.

Luckily, the place they wanted to go was at Reno Public Market, and, since the Commanders were playing the Raiders, I was sure it would be on the big huge-ass TV there above the stage. All else fails, Peppermill sports book is three minutes away.

Wow. Bullet dodged. They still got to go shopping, and I still got to watch the game.
 
jumbach said:
I had agreed to take my wife and friend shopping yesterday, temporarily forgetting the Commanders game was on at 10.

Luckily, the place they wanted to go was at Reno Public Market, and, since the Commanders were playing the Raiders, I was sure it would be on the big huge-ass TV there above the stage. All else fails, Peppermill sports book is three minutes away.

Wow. Bullet dodged. They still got to go shopping, and I still got to watch the game.
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Regarding football... as a Lions fan I sort of miss the days from when they were a laughing stock because I don't really like them getting primetime games like tonight's Monday night game. I like sitting down on the couch to watch them at 1:00 PM on a Sunday in the fall. That's when the Lions games should be!

I have the same complaint with the Big Ten having so many night games now. Michigan football should be Saturdays at noon. Anything else just doesn't feel right.
 
Cancelling a long forgotten digital subscription to a newspaper is like breaking up with a jealous girlfriend.
  • I saw you logged in during June of 2024, what were you reading?
  • Are you still in the area?
  • If you're not in the area, where are you now?
  • Why do you want to leave me?
  • Is there another newspaper you are interested in?
  • What can I do make you stay?
  • I've changed... why did you lose interest?
 
michaelskis said:
So this fall I am going to dig them up and transplant them to a location that I want them.
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We had a lot of nandina (sacred bamboo) in our backyard when we bought this house. I found out it can be poisonous to animals, and my dogs have been known to chew sticks, so I got it all out. I planted some in the front of the house though and it's actually doing pretty good.
 
ursus said:
Didn't they send out purple ones, too? I can't remember what those were for but I remember when they rolled out the LUCA program as part of the census I thought I got a purple pencil, too. Hmmmmmmmmmm. Been too long since I had to worry about it.
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Yes they did.
 
zman said:
Cancelling a long forgotten digital subscription to a newspaper is like breaking up with a jealous girlfriend.
  • I saw you logged in during June of 2024, what were you reading?
  • Are you still in the area?
  • If you're not in the area, where are you now?
  • Why do you want to leave me?
  • Is there another newspaper you are interested in?
  • What can I do make you stay?
  • I've changed... why did you lose interest?
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Please tell me "I wish I could say that it isn't you, that it's me... but no... it's you. I just don't find you all that interesting and I have moved on to newer, hotter, better sources."
 
Every time we turn on our TV for the first time in the day or after it’s been off for several hours, it’s always on “Law & Order.” Doesn’t matter what we had been watching before: turn it on, it’s Law & Order.
 
Let us be lovers,
We'll marry our fortunes together.
I've got some real estate here in my bag....

-

-

-

It took me three days to hitch-hike from Saginaw,
I've come to look for America!

Can't stop singing this these days. It feels right.
 
michaelskis said:
Please tell me "I wish I could say that it isn't you, that it's me... but no... it's you. I just don't find you all that interesting and I have moved on to newer, hotter, better sources."
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We finally dropped our subscription to the Reno paper because, with the price raised to $24 a month for Wednesdays and Sundays only, it's not worth it anymore.
 
ursus said:
Let us be lovers,
We'll marry our fortunes together.
I've got some real estate here in my bag....

-

-

-

It took me three days to hitch-hike from Saginaw,
I've come to look for America!

Can't stop singing this these days. It feels right.
Click to expand...
Love this song!
 
JNA said:
Yes they did.
Click to expand...
I spent two months with those red and purple pencils around 2009 trying to get our boundaries corrected prior to the 2010 Census. The base map they sent us was either in two different scales or two different projects. I spent hours asking if I could just send all of the information in a shapefile or remake their maps from the beginning because they were so bad. The answer was no, so I drew in all the new annexations and I redrew to scale all of the boundaries that were no where near their actual shape.

The next year they sent me the exact same maps with two new pencils and asked me to do it all again without modifying a single boundary.
 
I always get emails from my employer about various training courses put on by HR available to people in professional and supervisory positions. There is one coming up on how to handle "difficult conversations". The little blurb for the course starts out:

One of the most difficult parts of being in a supervisory or management role is having to deliver feedback – particularly those more difficult conversations...


The course is being held in the Medical Examiner's building. Seems like somewhere that maybe the audience definitely wouldn't be talking back!
 
I ordered a used trunk lock cylinder for my Toyota on eBay for $27 w/ matching key included. The original-to-the-car cylinder seized months ago and I had been just folding the back seats down to access the trunk. This will mean that I will have to carry two keys for the car as if it were a GM vehicle, and it should also fix the trunk release switch too, since the latch locks from the lock cylinder.

I will install myself this weekend, I can still open the latch manually if I crawl in there from the back seats.
 
The Terminator said:
I will install myself this weekend, I can still open the latch manually if I crawl in there from the back seats.
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Be careful: I read this and immediately it felt like the beginning to a really harrowing story...I don't want some vengeful punk-rock hater to lock you in there and drive you somewhere to show you how GM feels about Toyotas, if you catch my drift. So anyways, stay safe, Young Turk.
 
ursus said:
Be careful: I read this and immediately it felt like the beginning to a really harrowing story...I don't want some vengeful punk-rock hater to lock you in there and drive you somewhere to show you how GM feels about Toyotas, if you catch my drift. So anyways, stay safe, Young Turk.
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That's much less of a thing than it used to be in the early 90s. I know folx who show up to work at Tonawanda Powertrain & Lockport Radiator in Fords and Hyundai's. You drive what's cheap and easy, this ain't Michigan. Also my weekend car is GM.

Also half the lot during day shift at Tonawanda GM is full of Mustangs :p, there are a few NFTA Bus routes that pass it.
 
michaelskis said:
I am curious who you are mocking. Is it Joshua Mhlakela who made this prediction, Jewish people who wrote the passages that Mhlakela referenced, or Christians who don't know Revelation 16:15?


I had to look up what you were talking about because this is the first that I heard about it. But then again, I am not a Tiktoker.
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Naw... these people: https://mashable.com/article/christian-rapture-tiktok-tuesday-september-23-2025 (Why are some Christian TikTokkers certain the Rapture is coming this week?)

But this is the best one (from 6 feet under)
 
michaelskis said:
I cut down a crepe myrtle tree over the weekend. Because of the location between the pool and the house, I had to dismantle it bit by bit. Then I rented a stump grinder yesterday and after 3 hours I gave up. The blades on the grinder sucked. It is just about surface level with the exception of where the new tree is going. I made sure to go deep in that area. On, and it was 95 degrees with a heat index of 104.

Sad thing is I am very active and in the gym almost every day. On weekends I am always doing something around the house or building something. But this project beat me down.
Click to expand...
Yard work has a way of reminding you that you are neither young nor fit. You can just drill some holes in the surface of the stump and pour some Stump Out in them. The old fashioned fun way is to put kerosene in the holes and light it on fire 😆
 
The Terminator said:
I ordered a used trunk lock cylinder for my Toyota on eBay for $27 w/ matching key included. The original-to-the-car cylinder seized months ago and I had been just folding the back seats down to access the trunk. This will mean that I will have to carry two keys for the car as if it were a GM vehicle, and it should also fix the trunk release switch too, since the latch locks from the lock cylinder.

I will install myself this weekend, I can still open the latch manually if I crawl in there from the back seats.
Click to expand...

I was out on a walk the other day and walked past the post office and say that somebody had placed a set of two GM keys on top of the little brick wall between the sidewalk and the parking lot and I thought to myself that that is definitely not something you see much anymore.
 
The other day I was going to send a telegram to Uncle Charlie, but on the way to the Western Union office I drove past a television repair shop and realized I forget to get the tv fixed this week like I intended. Hopefully, the repair man can do a house call instead.
 
The other day I was going to drop off three film canisters from our recent trip to the Catskills, but on the way to the camera store, I walked past the jewelry store and realized I forgot to get my watch fixed this week like I intended. Hopefully, their horologist can make a house call instead.
 
Plus ça change plus c'est la même chose.

C'est la vie.

And so it goes.
 
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