Wild Night in Florida
16:22 Wednesday, 19 August 2026
Current Wx: Temp: 76.96°F Pressure: 1013hPa Humidity: 68% Wind: 9.57mph
Words: 236
I keep up a bit with Florida politics because my kids live there, well, two of them anyway, and I spent over half my life in the state. But I was shocked to learn that Angie Nixon won the Democratic nomination for the Senate seat currently held by former State Attorney General Ashley Moody.
I think it's awesome!
Angie Nixon is from Jacksonville, and I'm very familiar with her and even met her once or twice. I don't have any deep insight into how she pulled off this upset, but I'd say it's mostly because she is incredibly driven, very tough and a very hard worker. She may very well lose in the general election because, well, Florida. But I think she's an outstanding nominee in terms of character, willingness to work and profound understanding what's important.
I know some smart-ass is going to think, "Winning elections is what's important." That's the disease of zero-sum thinking. I think Alex Vindman is a fine man who served his country honorably and with distinction. But there are two Floridas.
One is governed by, and for, the privileged.
The other is ignored.
And Angie Nixon is from that Florida. She knows what this race is about, and she's willing to fight for the other half of Florida. She is not privileged and she will not be ignored.
I'm so pleased and proud that she won the nomination.
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08:21 Wednesday, 19 August 2026
Current Wx: Temp: 64°F Pressure: 1013hPa Humidity: 82% Wind: 5.28mphWords: 521
Work continues on the new house. Hopefully, we'll be pouring concrete on Monday. The weather has been fantastic and they're making good progress. This level is more demanding than the basement because there are more window bucks and they all have to be precisely aligned.
I think we finally have the HVAC design nailed down. Now I need to land a contractor. We've decided to use an air handler that can be mounted on the ceiling of the mechanical room. We have 9'-4" of height to work with below the trusses. Even accounting for mounting hardware and ducting, I'm confident we can get the buffer tank below the air handler, which really compresses the footprint, which means the hot water heater will likely fit in the mechanical room. I was considering putting it in the basement laundry, but now I think I'm going to put the water softener in there. I'll have plenty of room for the two tanks and the brine tank, and the filters would easy to change without having to contort myself.
Of course, this is all just hopeful, informed speculation until equipment starts arriving.
But I slept well last night, for the first time in a while.
It's a beautiful day today. The air is crystal clear, and quite cool. I really enjoyed this morning's walk. I skipped yesterday because I hardly slept Monday night.
I figured out how to donate blood around here, so I'm scheduled for a donation at the end of this month at the fire station. I want to get in the groove of doing that again.
The IIc Plus is at my feet here. I'm kind of struggling with figuring out how to get disk images onto the virtual drives built into the MegaFlash. I've ordered some ADTPro cables for the IIc and IIc Plus, and hopefully that'll avoid any conflicts with the number of devices on the SmartPort. I'm also going to take a stab at the TFTP network transfer.
I don't think I'm going to be able to use the database portion of AppleWorks to create an RSS feed, since the maximum field length is 70 characters. But I'll figure something out. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, Christopher Drum just took a long look at AppleWorks in his Stone Tools series. I used AppleWorks very productively for many years, including at sea using an Apple IIc with an ImageWriter printer and the little ET green-screen monitor. I think I had a 4MHz Zip Chip installed in it, but I don't think I ever had any memory expansion.
I have an appointment to get my ears lowered this morning, which means I can stop by Jerlando's on the way home and get a turkey sub.
My GLP-1 prescription has been rejected twice, which is according to plan from what I understand. I've spoken to the pharmacy and messaged my doctor. Hopefully we can get this thing over the finish line and I can start shedding some pounds and stop obsessing over Finger Lakes ice cream. (And cheese, baked goods, cannolis, beer, the list goes on.)
The beat goes on...
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