Christmas Eve is finally here and we opened our bottle of Bailys Irish Cream and enjoyed some on the rocks. Jaidan is looking forward to opening presents tomorrow morning, as is Thavorn.
I have devoured the turles that my sister Elaine bought for me. They never last very long and Thavorn helped a little.
Ontario enters into a 28 day lockdown on boxing day, mainly because the GTA area (Toronto) can't seem to control themselves or just don't give a shit. They are the same fools that keep electing Trudope.
Here in Ottawa it is 8 degrees with rain tomorrow so it appears we will not be getting a white Christmas.
That's it for now, it is zoom for Christmas tomorrow, and I wish a Merry Christmas to all. Ho, ho, ho :-)
Todays' song is: Bang ... AJR .. I love this song :-)
It is the 23rd of December and I am happy and upbeat getting ready to enjoy Christmas in Canada with my Thavorn and Jaidan. The presents were bough, wrapped, and placed around the tree 2 weeks ago. Ready set go :-)
My friends still in Thailand are enjoying the weather and the night life and beach life. I will get back their eventually, but on my own terms, no some terms that the Thai government comes up with.
Jaidan's major Christmas present is a Nintendo Switch which I will probably enjoy as much as he will.
Jaime will drop up some presents on Christmas eve and pick up some presents. Her last present arrived via Canada Post on Monday so everything is good to go. Ann and Bill will visit Elaine on Christmas day which should be enjoyable for the 3 of them.
We have been babysitting Kali, Jordan's dog over the past 24 hours and Jaidan has enjoyed being kali's shadow rather than mine. The only down side is Kali likes to crap on the floor :-(
Shaun is keeping me entertained with his travel to Pattaya. I do miss Pattaya and its nightlife.
At the start of the pandemic Thavorn and I were building Lego cars and I was motorizing them with controllers bought from Hungary. These controllers were a crowd funding project and they work quite well, but by the time they arrive in Canada they are $150!
These controllers, Buwizz and sBrick communcate with the lego car via bluetooth. Time for some research.
I studied electronics in High School as part of a 5 year science and tech stream that is unfortunately no longer offered. Too bad, it was a great program. My interest in electronics and single board computers and lately, microcontrollers has continued.
The good news is there are lots of inexpensive options for hardware and there are lots of videos and blogs on the net to help you. Of particular interest is Adafruit a company started by Ada, a grad of MIT. She is really interesting and her company makes quality components backed by great learning docs.
I decided to buy their circuitplay ground that is used by many schools for STEM education. My second choice would have been the the BBC Microbit. The cdn cost was about $35. I added the circuit crickit at about another $35 but it is really not needed but seeing schools were pairing them with the playground to build robots I thought I would look at it.
Here is the crickit with the playground bolted on top.
To show the size, compared to an American quarater.
The cricket can be bought with a BBC micobit slot or an Adafruit feather slot for more experienced builder. But as mentionned before the playground and many other lower cost boards will work as well.
Most electronic cicuits utilize 3.7 to 5 volts DC power, but Lego used 9 volts for their motors and cicuits. You can always run the motors on 5 volts but that is about.6 of their capacity (speed).
So the hunt began for something that could be used to run my leo motors at full (or perhaps more) power. The legacy and populat moule selling for about $6 Canadian is the L298n module.
The big problem with this module is there is a 2 volt loss in the cicuitry so the 9 volts you feed it to power the motors gets cut back to 7 volts so that sucks. The other downside is that heat sink is there for a reason as it gets hot. BTW, according to the law of conservation of energy, that is where your 2 volts disappears to. There has to be a better circuit. More research!
The solution I found was the Maker drive by Cytron (a Malysian componay) that sells for $5.99 CDN. BTW I buy most of my stuff from https://elmwoodelectronics.ca/ out of Toronto and they are fantastic, with four day shipping. I also buy from Amazon.ca.
The Maker Drive is excellent, smaller, test buttons, led indicator, and best of all, very little voltage drop. Note the absence of a heat sink.
I have always advocated that a day that goes by without learning something new is a wasted day and when playing around with microcontrollers there is always lots of learning.
Here is a pic of my Lego leaning platform. The wiring will be cleaned up in the near future but it is fully functioning. The playground and crickit have much more capability, including many sensors and the ability to play wav or mp3 files.
Crickit
Playground
The Mule
The Lego motors are a L-motor (drive) and a servo motor (steering).
In the near future I will change the electronics substituting one of these for the playground and crickit to make everything smaller. I almost forgot, I program the modules in python, but there are visual ides such at Microsoft MakeCode thay are extremely easy to program with.
It is almost a month since my last post and it is about time to report in. Covid is still with us but the vaccines have started to arrive in Canada and though it will take months to get around to everybody, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
In the meantime, Thavorn and I have walked in the woods on a snowy day and I have started a new hobby, learning about microcontrollers and teaming them up with some of my Logo cars. Learning is fun.
Christmas is just 9 sleeps away and the presents are bought and under the tree. Jaidan is getting a Nintendo switch and some games. Thavorn is getting a couple of Coach purses and a new Hua Wei watch. Jaidan will inherit her older Hua Wei watch as he is enjoying learning to tell time. Papa does not need any presents except for his new microcontrollers which he is already playing with. It is Thavorn's and Jaidan's first Christmas and they enjoyed decorating the tree and our looking forward to Santa arriving.
Meanwhile, in Thailand Santa has already arrived :-)
Today's song is: 6 Pack workout, similar to Thavorn's, but her's hers is 30 mins long:
Thavorn is still working hard during Covid to realize a 6 pack. She is very close:
Myself, I am just working on getting rid of my covid 10 (pounds) that I put on since arriving back in Canada. The new treadmill is helping immensely!
Meanwhile, back in isolation I am thinking about things like Christmas, teaching Thavorn and Jaidan how to skate, etc. As always, you can't do it all, so I will have to prioritize. We never really celebrated Christmas in Bangkok, because it was simply a change of decorations for the commercial interests. There is not a large Christian population in Thailand. IMHO, Thais are better off with their Buddhist 'do overs'.
Snow is drifting down in large snowflakes as I write this blog. It won't stay but I would not be surprised to see it stay later on in the week. Tomorrow, the high is -5, down from today's high of +4.
I am anticipating another lockdown as covid infections are spiking again in Ontario and most doctor's are calling for it. It is only a matter of time. To prepare, Thavorn and I bought a month's worth of staples at Costco early yesterday morning. The store was mostly empty at 8:45, unlike the weekend when it was packed.
Speaking of Costco, they opened a store in China this week as as Chinese are want to do, they went nuts and overran the store.
This is why you don't ever want to be in an ambulance in China! And, no I am not racist, having coached many Chinese student, just not the mainstream Chinese who never step foot out China. I can't imagine what would happen if 'Bat Soup, was on special in the cafeteria.
I continue to code for my 18 year old software application as covid makes weekly changes necessary. But, then again, what else if there to do during covid? Time for a good book, Kindle edition :-)
My last post talked about my methods for coping with Covid, which included exercising and purchasing a treadmill to enable wintertime runs. The tread ill arrives today so I am anxiously awaiting it.
I have been a long time motorcyclist having purchased my first bike in 1969 which was a Triumph T120R Bonneville. I enjoyed that motorcycle immensely (despite crashing it) and it was stolen in the Fall of 69. All that remains is a Franklin Mint model:
My next bike was a Norton 750 that I bought about the early 70's. I kept it for a few years and then sold it.
Next up was a mid 70's Norton 850 that I kept during my university years. I ended up making a custom out it after disassembling it and then rebuilding it. I sold it in the early 80's.
Next up was a Honda NT 650 hawk that I bought in the early 90's when my kids were young. I sold it in the late 90's.
Next up was Yamaha FZ1, 1,000 CC rocket that I bought in 2006 and sold around 2013 as I was spending most of my time in Thailand. Top speed was 275 kph.
Now with Covid looking like it is sticking around for at least a couple of years I ordered the new Triumph Trident for delivery around Feb 1st 2021.
Apparently many people are ordering and becoming bikers as it is something that melds nicely with Covid and self isolating.
I don't think I would be remiss in saying that Covid-19 has degraded the quantity of life for most of us. I would also argue the impact has been greater in some age groups than others. Obviously young people graduating form high school and going off to University have been robbed of some of life's best rituals.
However, they have many years left to regain some of life's experiences. Older folks (older 70) lose out in more ways than one as they only have a few years of life remaining. A year of Covid to an older person could represent 10-20% of their remaining years. Ouch!
Realizing you may have only 10 winters remaining means that you look forward to winter and embracing all that it has to offer.
Perhaps more important than the years an older person has remaining is the quality of life in those remaining years. I have argued before, the most important aspect in your life is your health! If you don't have good health all else is moot.
So, I would argue, eat well, exercise well, and play well. They are all important and remember, 'We are here for a good time, not a long time!' Embrace whatever life you have and run with it. If you are not happy, change it! And, if you can, take a walk on the wild side now and again :-)
I have been known to say that, 'I don't regret anything I have done, just the things that I have not done.'
As winter has started to approach, it has been chilly going for my run. I am now doing interval training, running 500 metres, walking 500 metres, times 4 which translates into running 2 kms and walking 2 kms, whereas in the past I ran 3 kms straight at 10kph. My new training regime is easier on the joints and I believe better for cardio.
However it is time to extend it my intervals to six sets regaining my 3kms of running and adding 3 kms of walking. I have been debating whether or not to buy a treadmill and a Costco promotion i coming up tomorrow so I think I will jump on it.
I am anticipating a price of $2000 but as I mentioned, health is important.
I do enjoying running and listening to music and watching the news at the same time.
Thavorn is uing her covid time to get in great shape. She sometimes exercises twice a day.
Life is boring these days. The highlight of the past few weeks is that Jaidan is adapting very well to school life despite missing out on JK4 and JK5. Today his teacher informed me he was awarded 2 owl awards, each from a different teacher. Apparently he will be mentioned on the school morning announcements!
The Owl is the school's mascot and school teams are the Owls.
Our days starts at 6:30 am when Alexa announces it is time to get up. I am usually awake 30 minutes earlier as I like to enjoy my coffee and peanut butter toast and contemplate the day's activities. I have already made the coffee and a piece of peanut butter toast for Thavorn. I then cook some bacon and rice for Jaidan which he usually starts to eat at 7 am. I then head off to the shower and Thavorn makes sure Jaidan eats well and gets him ready for school. We usually bot drive Jaidan to school and then head off to Timmy's in Kemptville for a medium dark roast double double.
I follow us the morning by checking my eMail and start programming any issued that have arisen with my software. Thavorn prefers a hearty lunch and we have a lighter supper. After supper it is a bath for Jaidan and asleep by 8pm on school nights.
Wednesday is the mid week treat for Jaidan and we take him for KFC chicken tenders. We celebrate Friday after school with chicken nuggets at McD's.
Next week we repeat. We don't have visitors and we don't visit and we only go to food stores and occasional the Beer Store. Thavorn loves Cracked Canoe light beer from Moosehead Breweries in the Atlantic provinces.
I have written about my friend Jimmy, a Singaporean who has made Bangkok his home for 40 years. He is affectionately known as 'Poppa' to the Girls of Cowboy. When you walk into a Cowboy bar with Jimmy, you will quickly hear the girls shout 'Poppa' to greet him. He is an icon on Cowboy.
I just got news from Cowboy that Jimmy is very sick. He had a stroke or aneurism and is unable to walk or talk. Jimmy speaks 7 languages and was a font of knowledge, having lived through the best times of Bangkok, before the advent of social media and too much tourism.
I know I will miss Jimmy but so will the girls of Cowboy. He was not a customer but a friend to all who knew him.
I will share some pics. Some of Jimmy and a bunch from the past couple of years chosen at random to illustrate why I miss my expat life in Thailand.
Poppa on the left
Margaret and the boys
Brigit and the gals
Quiet before the storm
Harvey
Ronald
Jaidan going for a ride
Harvey and Jim out for a beer with Jaidan
Jimmy and Mimo
Marriage
Best friends
Phai and Harvey
The boys and Phai
Thavorn and Tacky
Thavorn and friends
Thavorn in a wrap
3 Kings in Cambodia
Ting Tong
Bad boy Tum on the right
One day I will post the best pics over the past 10 years
