Random crap with Uno.

[Unorthodox]

Rig the thing to have something pop's up (or something else: special lighting & effects, etc) when a bag gets tossed into the hole.

I know you were being funny, but in all seriousness a old school light gun shooting gallery or even a Buzz Lightyear or Men in Black ride lazer gun walkthrough would be on my bucket list of things to build.  I'm unlikely to ever have that kind of money, but there you go. 

[Unorthodox]

Can I say, I really hate tombstone production. 

Fun factoid.  I never disposed of the tombstones from the original Trevor's display in 2012.   I'm updating them a little bit, and might make a few more things to go along with. 

[Unorthodox]

Corn donation from a neighbor. 



I don't think I've talked much about the garden here this year.

We tried something a bit different.  The idea was to create DIFFERENT pumpkins at our place instead of going for numbers.  It's been a mixed bag. 

Primarily, I planted 4 (only) "Big Moose" pumpkins.  These are the only giant (over 100 lb) pumpkin variety I've seen that advertise they actually keep their shape.  Most Atlantic Giant derivatives turn into shapless blobs.  These promised a good pumpkin shape without needing to purposely place the things. 

On one hand, I've managed to keep them growing and healthy.  On the other, they really didn't care for the summer weather, and I needed to make a shade. 

Of the 4 plants, I think only 2 ever actually set pumpkins, and one of the plants died in August for reasons I can't figure.  I'm probably going to give them a second go with more planning on the shade next year.  We just did a quick Da Vinci Bridge with some shade cloth to cover the actual mounds and it's worked, but some height would be nice for the future. 

This is our biggest of the lot.  This is the largest pumpkin I've seen grown, and that includes my time at the farm and my Uncle growing Atlantic Giants.  I'd guess in the 120+ range if I had to.  I'm starting to wonder how we're going to move it.  It's really hard to get a perspective, but those leaves are more than 1' diameter.  ~ 2-3' tall, 3-4' wide pumpkin 



We have 3 of the big Moose pumpkins for sure set.  The second largest is about half the size.  The third is less than 1/4, and stopped growing in July, and is now turning red, I'm wondering if it'll make it at all.  There's a couple more setting Now that the temps are back to reasonable in the evening/morning. 

For the 4th year in a row, I've gotten a volunteer pumpkin that is what I term 'frankenstein' shaped.  This is largely due to me selecting pumpkins when I pick them up for the party.  I can tell you what a pumpkin is going to clean like just by sight these days, and I like the ones with the soft, pale, almost melon like flesh.  Easy to clean and carve, do not keep well, though.  Normal folks should avoid them, but I only need it to last 2 days.  For whatever reason, they produce these regularly from the seed.   



Our other plant selections had a hell of a time.  The severely wet spring, I'd planted them out in the 'swamp' (my roof drains under the path out to the garden to prevent erosion to the path, it makes a swamp in wet weather), and they did not do well at all.  "Early Giants".  Oblong pumpkins meant to get 30-50 lbs.  The shape is right, but the size is 10-20 lbs. 

[Buster's Uncle]

https://readcomiconline.to/Comic/Megamind-Bad-Blue-Brilliant/Issue-1?id=160784

[Unorthodox]

Fan fic shorts by the looks of it...I hated the first half of the first one...couldn't get much further. 

[Buster's Uncle]

I read the first issue this morning -skimming after the mediocre high school story- and lacked interest to go on...

[Unorthodox]

Hmmm...

Things are going weirdly this year.  The party seems to be gaining a lot more attention than normal...

I've now got vendors and politicians asking to set up booths. 

No, and No. 

[Buster's Uncle]

The Pum'kin carvin'?

[Unorthodox]

The Pum'kin carvin'?

Yeah, I don't know why this year's different, I haven't even started whoring out the link yet. 

[Buster's Uncle]

I wouldn't think there was enough room in your yard, even if you wanted to yes any part of that...

[Unorthodox]

No, there's not.  That's why I'm getting a little worried.  I don't have a TON of space for many more people than we normally get. 

[E_T]

spilling out into the right of way??

[Unorthodox]

We usually have 75ish people at a time for the party, 150-200 over the course of the night.  It's the at a time that needs to be kept low to avoid potential license and legal...things. 

[Unorthodox]

So...

I know I've talked about the monkeys plenty in the past, and for the large part, they moved off to a different building and I don't have to deal with them much.  However, in the last year they were supplied with an entire new jungle to play in.  Part of that included several stages, and their toys had to play nicely with my stuff behind the curtain.  No problems there.

However, they started throwing their crap around and moaning and whining that some of their toys just plain wont work with some of their older toys.  They were supplied with multiple versions and configurations, but they wanted a specific shiny fancy toy and insisted nothing else would work. 

None of this was my business, and I stayed the hell out of the poo flinging. 

Again, I'm a clown, not a monkey.  I might be the only clown left here, but I get the clowning done well enough, and have largely avoided the barking under our new management (though I have to do an entire show next month which might end up changing that).  Over the last few years, I've gotten to work with a magician who makes sure all the effects are working properly behind the curtain.

Now, the Monkeys have changed the #2 Monkey several times, and the audience has not been too awful impressed with the poo flinging.  In fact, some of them started asking for refunds.  So, the circus owners sent in an animal trainer to the monkeys. 

This trainer has worked with several groups here, and she usually cleans up the acts in a hurry.  It's kinda what she does, goes in and whips acts into shape. 

Just prior to her officially stepping into the Monkey cage, Monkey #2 immediately changes department.  Monkey #3 resigns.  Monkey 1 blames the issues on 2 and 3, insists that the toys wont work, and says if they cant have the fancy one, they need this other item which costs a ton.  The audience refuses to entertain a higher ticket price. 

Thus, I'm in a budget meeting (which is hilarious in and of itself and would have never happened under former management) with the circus owner and most the trainers when this gets brought up.  The monkeys have to have these new pieces because the toys are le crap. 

"Wait a minute.  I haven't had any issues with the toys behind the curtain.  All three stages are running the toys just fine.  What's the problem?" 

This caught all the trainers' attention. 

Head monkey gives this complicated problem why they wont work  Circus owner asks me to take a look.  Now, this is NOT anywhere NEAR my job description, and will be stepping all over Monkey toes. 

"I don't know enough about the special effects to do diagnostics.  Let me bring in my Magician friend."

Magician:  "oh, yeah, the monkeys don't have the right wiring, you just need this $10 fix per toy" 

So we get a couple test wires. 

Monkeys insist the new fix isn't working any better.  Circus owner asks me to look into it. 

Now, I come from a quality department background, and I just go about step by step trying to target what the actual problem is instead of a "this don't work".  I talk with the magician and consistently his theory that the part they are complaining about isn't the problem, it's actually ANOTHER part, but we can work around that with his $10 fix. 

Monkey story changes 5 times over the next week, and when I test each of their claims I can't find it being an issue, and write up my findings each and every time, like you would for any quality issue.  I posit there may be people reporting issues specifically to discredit the toy and get shiny new things.     

Ringmaster steps in and takes the things from the monkeys, installing them directly with some of the freaks.  The freaks have no problems. 

We increase the test sample size, ordering more from the magician.  No freaks report any issues. 

Monkey #1 is caught ordering some of the monkeys to 'make sure these things stop working because we can't look this bad'. 

The bouncers just escorted out Monkey #1. 

Monkeys 4-6 have been demoted, one of the Freaks is interim Monkey 1.  Trainer is still sorting through the rest of the monkeys.  They get on board or get out. 


Now I'm getting asked to move into the monkeys as I've "clearly demonstrated knowledge on the subject". 

I don't know a thing about the monkey's job.  Really.  I'm just really detail oriented, capable of critical thinking, root cause analysis, and very good at googling. 

[E_T]

As well as mainly keeping out of the monkey poo...

Ah, Gov contract political BS...