How to Block Telemarketers

...the goes between your phone and the wall jack. It sells for around $40 on Amazon and has no monthly charges. The way it works is that you manually enter a list of approved callers. Unknown numbers get forwarded to a recorded message (oddly, a man with a British accent–an out of work Shakespearean actor, perhaps?). You can also scroll through a list of previous incoming calls and either put them on the approved list or block them. It did a great j...

Read…

Why Architectural Graphics Standards Should Be On Your Bookshelf

...course. Should you want to build split ring wooden trusses, a greenhouse, or spend an evening pondering the arcana of wood joist connections, it’s got you covered. And, naturally, I want my own fencing piste. A new copy of Architectural Graphics Standards is available but a bit pricey on Amazon. There’s also an abridged and less expensive student edition. If you fish around the nether regions of the interwebs you can find free pdf versions of dubi...

Read…

Saturday Linkages on Sunday

...: Educational resources that are likely free from your public library’s website: Lydia.com and The Great Courses (you can also watch the Great Courses if you have an Amazon Prime subscription) Quarantine viewing suggestions: The Set-Up (1949) and the series Silicon Valley...

Read…

The Wondrous 1-2-3 Block

...if a tool is square. To clamp pieces of wood together to guarantee squareness when gluing. To attach a machinist’s dial (a another inexpensive tool that will get its own post). For woodworking, a cheap set from Amazon will work fine. I assume machinists will want to seek out higher quality 1-2-3 blocks. They make a great, if heavy, stocking stuffer for the precision impaired members of your household . . ....

Read…