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Mar.10,2010Brian's Morning Newsletter
Wednesday, March 10th 2010
Fire Poi Dancing
Fire dancing, also known as fire spinning, involves twirling or spinning an object that is on fire in time to music or in elaborate patterns. The practice is common in many cultures throughout the world. Fire dancers us many different objects in their performances. Staves, batons, whips, even chains with balls attached, are all common tools used in the performance.
Good Morning
Pretty exciting headlines this morning, huh? Well, first off, let me do some explainin'
Yesterday as I mentioned in the BMN we were going to, for the first time attempt to employ the energy from our wind turbine to power our big Crockpot and cook a small beef roast. I crossed my fingers as I plugged the Crockpot in. Sorry if I disappointed those of you waiting for the scientific method; no I never put the Crockpot on the Killawatt meter 
for the practical excuse that the outlet on the kitchen counter is upside-down. We would have had to stand on our heads to read the display. You don't want us to hurt ourselves practicing our alternative energy research do you? Let this be a lesson for all the aspiring young electricians out there, make sure the third pin on the power outlet is on the bottom.
Seriously though, unsure how much wind we had up here in the mountains, hoping enough energy was stored in the batteries to run the Crockpot long enough to cook our dinner I plunged forward and plugged it in. Curiously, the ammeter on the inverter jumped to 12 amps for ten seconds, then dropped back to 5 amps. At first I was confused, but then I realized the Crockpot electronics employed something called duty-cycle which the relationship of an "on" time to "off" time. 
For the three temperature settings on the Crockpot, low, medium and high, the duty-cycle is simply modified, from "off" more than "on", up to "on" nearly constantly.
This power strategy seemed all right to me, as long as the heater element did not jump up much past the 12 amps while it was heating, a little math says: 12amps times 120 volts equals 1440 watts, which is a tad over what our crappy little UPS inverter can handle at a steady rate, but intermittently it should be fine. Anyway, we don't know if the inverter survived, probably, since the meat was fully cooked and still hot when we arrived home 8 or 9 hours later, although the inverter was off.
The inverter shuts off all the time, so that is not really of concern. You see, as the energy generated and stored in the batteries is used, battery voltage drops, and the inverter shuts itself off before the batteries get down to 20 volts from the fully charged voltage of 25 volts. I was hoping that the wind was going to blow like it did the day before, and keep the Crockpot running all day, but when it comes to nature, we happily take what we get. A grand success, that wind turbine powered Crockpot experiment. The meat tastes oh-so-fine knowing it didn't cost a dime to cook it all day long. Nell cooked carrots from our garden as well as potatoes to go along with the roast, mmmm-good.
So, whats with the other part of this morning headlines, I mean besides the awesome images of fire dancers? Well, we are thinking about entertainment for the Tusas Campo this Spring. I don't know if we will have the diesel generator ready to go by then, or for that matter whether Nell will see her way clear to let me make payments to Slim for it. You know me, I'm ever hopeful, and touch on the stubborn side; when I get my heart set on something, I rarely think of much else, and work doggedly trying to make it happen. If we can buy the diesel generator, and make it work again, we can run it on WVO (Waste vegetable oil) homemade biodiesel or dino-diesel super powering the stage this year which means we might want to hire and promote a band of musicians to entertain us.
Oh, for sure I have no problem coming up with a million reasons why we here at Las Tusas Ranch need this generator, but alas this isn't the problem, bills and taxes are constant reminders that our government is a blood sucking black hole into which every dime plus a hundred we haven't earned yet must flow. Add to that medical bills from before Nell worked at the hospital and bought health insurance, retarded dental insurance plans that pay for only half of the largest bills from another outrageously overpriced medical field, dentistry, and let's see who else is constantly fleecing us, oh yeah who can forget the county, city and state taxes, and dear Jesus protect the smokers from government. One pack of drugstore "nickel cigars" now costs nearly $30, where the hell does all that money go? We should have the best lubricated government tax money can buy, yet we hear with fright and horror that New Mexico still doesn't have enough money, the governor as I write this is considering taxing the food we buy.
They are stealing from us people.
But what we gunna do?
Anyway, it is snowing again. Now that the dawn approaches, looks to be an inch or so of white stuff on the ground, and it is coming down hard and in little balls.
And I'm supposed to work outside again today
Brian Rodgers
Letters
I know, I haven't called you in so long I can't remember your number, bad dad, bad!
Yeah rope lights are neat looking, I want lots of rope lights, wrapped around vigas and posts on the stage, lots and lots, I want the stage to glow brilliantly. I also like the Fire dancers, this doesn't cost much of anything energy-wise, I would like to buy a few sets of what are they called? "Poi?" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poi_(juggling)
Really looking forward to adding a big-ol thick layer of adobe to the horno, really make that oven hold the heat. Thinking of how to get the bus you guys lived in back there and putting it somewhere near the horno.
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Yours in artistic struggles.
MB
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Thanks Mary-Beth
Indeed, the standing back and staring works well, I will try the squinting too. While driving home last evening, the sun was setting behind Hermits Peak, my god it was beautiful. I have to wonder if this painting hobby isn't causing a whole new appreciation of natural beauty around us. I wanted to stop at the scenic outlook just north of Nine Mile Hill and soak up the sunset for a later attempt at painting what I saw. Now I look at the sky and the way sunlight interacts with clouds, I think about every painting I've seen and the way each artist painted clouds, and how I would do them. Yes, I think the next canvas will be a landscape.
Brian
-- Visit the forum at: http://outfitnm.com/forum/ Read the BMN online at: http://outfitnm.com/category/brians-morning-newsletter Oh yeah, I turned the comments back on at http://outfitnm.com
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