Always Good News » Interesting bits

Hello, goodbye

David Barwick — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 17:32:19 +0000

This is my tractor, a Kubota L4300 with 45 horsepower and enough torque to tear a house down.

This thing is FUN, and useful too! Of course, few good things come without a price. I sold my bike, which hadn’t seen much use since I moved way out here in the woods.

The Beast graces the driveway of my parents' house

Click the picture to bask in the glory

Farewell, my little black friend. Thank you for making way for the Great Pumpkin.

Tornado humor

David Barwick — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 17:08:40 +0000

There may not be much to laugh about in Joplin right now, but some people retain their sense of humor.

Junk food

David Barwick — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 15:59:16 +0000

Is there anything more American or more wonderful than junk food? I love that greasy stuff. Bad for the body, good for the soul. My current favorite is spaghetti red. Lucky for me, Joplin has several places that make pretty good spaghetti red. If you want the best, go to Norma’s Kitchen on Main street. These particular delectable dishes are from Stogies on 7th.

Aaah, yes…. getting hungry.

Gorilla bars

David Barwick — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 16:57:34 +0000

I think every motorcycle should have ape hangers or drag bars. There’s just no in-between. I decided to (finally) get apes for my bike, and I went with 16″ Burly bars. I think they look great, but of course something had to go wrong. My bars were a little loose, so I tightened them. And I stripped the threads on the riser. Then I had a stroke of genius: just buy a nut and bolt and use those instead of the threads built into the riser. But in the process of tightening the new nut and bolt, I broke the bolt. Whoops, too tight!

Eventually, I got it out. So I bought new nuts and bolts, got them tightened down, and the saga ended. I think it looks pretty cool, and it’s way more comfortable than the stock bars.

That Right Ain’t Shit

David Barwick — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 08:11:18 +0000

About a month ago, I got a cat. His name is Shithead.

One of the good things about naming him Shithead is the opportunity for nicknaming. Basically, any word that uses “shit” becomes a nickname. I’ll just let your imagination run wild on its own.

He’s actually a pretty darn good cat. His personality closely mirrors my own: playful 8 hours a day, sleepy 16 hours a day. He’s pretty big, too. Not in a fat cat kind of way, but just in a big cat kind of way. And he’s only about nine months old, so he could get bigger.

He definitely lives up to his name, but he’s a good little companion.

He looks fat in this photo, but it's just the angle.

This is probably too many pictures of my cat.

Who dey?

David Barwick — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 06:57:18 +0000

Well, it is time to revive the blog! I recently moved and it took a while to get the interwebs hooked up again. And to purchase a new computer after my old one was ripped off. And to try to remember the password to my blog, since it was saved on my old computer. But I’m happy to say that I finally figured it out, and that I love my new place of residence. Since I’ve been here no one has broken into my car or my home.

Most importantly, I only have about four weeks of school left. This is exciting, because it means that I will get to do more of my favorite activity: drink sleep.

Oops, I did it again

David Barwick — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 04:23:19 +0000

Hmmm. This time it’s an ’08 Nightster. More fun to mod. I’m no mechanic, so it’s mostly cosmetic mods, although it already has some light performance mods.

The other one is for sale. I’d love to keep ‘em both, but common sense has to win out on this one.

Summer lovin’

David Barwick — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 06:32:44 +0000

I’ve never been a fan of the heat and humidity that summer brings to our area, but I recently remembered a reason to love summer. After owning a motorcycle for 5 years, I can’t believe I spent the last 2 years without one. Now I’m back on two wheels, and I can’t get over how much it feels like a part of me. I hope that I can always own a motorcycle.

For those interested, it’s a 2005 Harley Sportster 1200 Custom. It sounds quite nasty, in a really good way.

I remember when I first decided I wanted a motorcycle. I was 20 years old and had just begun working at the Sears shoe department. I remember riding in the car with my family in Branson and watching with awe and lust as motorcycles passed all around. I remember telling my dad that I wanted to buy one the next summer. My new job turned out to be good enough that I bought one that fall.

My old bike, the one that started it all… the lowly but stylish Yamaha V-Star 650.

Expensive internetz

David Barwick — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 19:06:49 +0000

It recently occurred to me that I spend an awful lot of money on internet access. It costs $30 every month to have the internet in my home, and another $30 to have it on my phone. That adds up, baby. $720 a year is quite an investment. I’ve lately begun to wonder if it’s worth it.

The problem doesn’t really lie in the money. The problem is in the principle. No matter how much money I make, I believe that if I pay $720 for something, it had better be good. So how good is internet everywhere I go?

Well, half of that money goes to buy internet at my home. I think that is definitely worth it. I use the internet to watch all of my TV and most of my movies. Plus all the other crap like hockey scores, banking, paying bills, facebook, homework, etc, etc. Internet in my home is indispensable.

I’m not so sure that it’s worth doubling the price of the internet just to have it on my phone everywhere I go. Now, anyone who knows me knows that I love my iPhone. But do I really use the data plan that much? I use my iPhone a lot when I’m at home, but at those times I’m always on my wireless network. Same thing at work. The only times I really use the mobile data are in my car or when I’m shopping and want to do some quick last-second research before I buy something.

I decided to test how much I would miss having mobile data. If you jailbreak your phone, you have access to an app that allows you to turn off mobile data. I spent a week without mobile data access on my iPhone — wifi only — and, no big surprise, I found that I hardly missed it. There were only a couple of times I wanted to use the internet and couldn’t, and those times just required me to wait a little bit.

My AT&T contract expires in June. Until now, I’ve taken it for granted that I’ll buy the newest iPhone this summer and renew my two-year contract. Now I have a new plan: keep my iPhone, disable data, and cancel my $30 data plan. That way I still have my iPhone, it would just be limited to wifi networks for internet access.

As a bit of warning, don’t try this unless you jailbreak your iPhone. The iPhone pulls data all the time, and the charges would add up quickly if you don’t have a data plan in place. But if you have an iPhone, you should be jailbreaking it, anyway.

Match candle

David Barwick — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 18:53:10 +0000

Last night I was getting ready for bed and decided to light this candle. I was having trouble because the wick was so short, and wound up dropping the first match inside. I grabbed another match and it slipped from my fingers just after I lit it. It fell down like you see in the picture and continued to burn. Matches usually only burn for 10 or 15 seconds, but this one kept on burning. I figured it was drawing up the wax and burning it, the way a wick does. At that point I was pretty sleepy, but I wanted to see how long it would burn, so I wound up staying awake for another hour waiting for it to burn out until I finally gave up and went to sleep. I didn’t have the heart to blow it out. Today I was able to replicate the feat several times, but none lasted more than a few minutes.