Week #17 -- Housing Doubts and Rust

Hello once more my friends. Another week has gone by, so now we only have about 2 weeks of school days left. Jeez, time does indeed go by fast. As such, this week has been rather busy for me. I kept working on my Fallout symbol, as pictured above. As you can tell the rust is coming along nicely. It isn't as dispersed on the other side, nor is it to where I want, but it is coming along. Since the process takes extended periods to work, I decided to occupy the rest of my time by making some more metal art. I'm doing another Eagle, Globe, and Anchor piece, but I am going to turn it into something creative. I learned you can buy a small set at Home Depot, Lowes, etc that can be used to make a custom clock. I was pretty joyed about this, as it means I can make a homecoming present for my dad when he comes back from the hospital.

Anyway, moving on to the essential question. It's a big one this week, which I don't look forward to typing about since I have a headache a mile long. As it is, the question is: "what is the housing market like in California?"

As it stands currently, it costs about $440,000 to buy a home in California. I doubt many people, as most are low-to-mid class, can afford such steep prices. Home prices have gone up about 6% in the last year and are expected to go up about another 3-4% in the next year alone. This seems really worrisome, and it is. However, unemployment rate has gone down to about 6.6% from last year's 7.5%. That's .9%. Doesn't seem like much compared to the housing cost, but more people working and more jobs opening means more money going into the economy. And since other sources seem to calculate home prices to drop about 2%, against the rising 4%, that means home prices will be a slight more affordable.

Regardless, though, these are all very small changes and it will likely take many more years for things to get better, if at all. So that means I probably won't get a house unless it is BAH or some shite since I'm going in the military.

Meh. Oh well. Have a nice weekend, friendos. Stay safe.

Week #16 -- Funtime Friday

Hello again my friends. Dr Nebula here with another update for the troops. Kidding. Week sixteen is now behind us, with only about 28 days or so until another year passes. So, while we wait, why not recap on last week's events? This week I worked on my fallout symbol. Monday was scraping off the rest of the rust with steel wool. Tuesday was a lethargic day for me, so I mostly researched the essential question on that day. Wednesday was spraying one side with some black-ish grey primer to keep out rust and keep the final paint on. Thursday was spraying the other side, which is above. Gonna have to tilt your head to the side because the phone is a bad medium to upload photos with.

The essential question of this week was: "how do you get electricity from rotating shaft? How is this movement so important?"

The most basic and efficient way to make electricity in the modern day is to use fossil fuels or coal power. The coal is used to evaporate liquid water to steam. The steam then goes through to a generator. There are rotating blades in this generator in which the steam spins the blades. The blades then spin a shaft, which creates power for a turbine. The turbine moves a magnet inside a coil of copper, in which electric power is produced on a massive scale. This electricity then goes out to power lines, transformers, etc. 

Week #7 -- Sergeant Metal Promoted

It is now the end of week number seven. This week I continued work on the present for my dad. Monday there was no school as it was President's Day. On Tuesday, I continued to grind off the little metal boogers on my art. It took a little while to get it how I wanted. On Wednesday, I put my art in the eighty ton press to flatten it out and make it straight. Beforehand I had to heat it up with a small, propane-fueled blow torch. That was quite fun. After I was done there, I started rubbing off rust with some steel wool. On Thursday, February 19th (my birthday), I continued to use steel wool and re-press the piece. The first time did not do so. Next, I went over one last time with the wool and then sprayed primer on it, pictured above.

The essential question for the week is "Are you well rounded? Should this be a goal?"

About 3 years ago, I wouldn't have been able to answer this question, really. I was not that well rounded. A know-it-all, yes, but not well rounded. Today, I am a much more developed individual. I can do a lot more, fix a lot more, reason a lot better, and so on. I've gotten smarter and a little wiser. I can act, I can draw, I can write, I have mechanical aptitude, I can do math at my level, I'm active, I can read much higher than the designated area, and a few other things of less notable mention. Do I think I am well rounded? No. There is still a lot more I have to learn, much more I have to do, and infinitely more I have to see. I need to keep pressing and keep developing. I must get better. That IS a worthy goal for not just me, but everyone. I will continue.

Side note: I apologise for the sideways image. I could not rectify it. 

Week #15 -- I got nothing for a title.

This week has been a fond one for me, no matter how difficult it was to get out of bed. I finally got to cut out my nuclear fallout metal art piece. I did that on Wednesday, which took nearly all period due to machine complications. On Thursday I began to file off the little metal boogers and grind them down. I'm gonna do the same to the triangles. Make some cool throwables. The picture above is from right after cutting the bloody thing. As you can see, there's rust on it so I'll have to take steel wool to it and use some primer.

This week's essential question asks where do plastics come from and how are they formed.

Based on research from le Google, I discovered that cellulose (a sugar), natural gas, salt, coal, and crude oil such as petroleum. All the ingredients are distilled in a factory and broken down. The two types of production that branch from this are thermoplastics (soften on heating, then harden on cooling) and thermosets (must be molded and stay hard). 

Week #14 -- Cutting Blues and Rancho's Poo

I'll admit, that title is tasteless and not funny. However, my mood is one of that who does not care. Ha! Anyway, so flies by another week of work, boredom, fun, surprise, and the mundane. What I did this week was pretty much the same. I spent some time on MyMiniFactory and Thingiverse, but found little to interest me other than Destiny weapons. At about Wednesday I decided to cut my Fallout symbol, yet forgot to bring my USB to school and apparently the file was not on Google Drive anymore. Thus, I had to start over. Took the whole period. I was ready to cut it yesterday (Thursday), but another classmate took the whole period printing his stuff. I did a little cleaning and watched science tricks on Youtube. Bleh.

Essential Question: Where does your waste go when you flush at Rancho?


Well, since Rancho Cotate High is in Rohnert Park, we have made a pact of sorts with Santa Rosa and Cotati. As such, all of our waste goes to the Laguna Treatment Plant in Santa Rosa on Llano Road. There, they clean and reuse waste water every day. As much as 21 million gallons can come into the plant on a busy day, making its work and impact highly important.

Week #13 -- Back in the Shop

Credit: Kirby Downey for the image and creation/design of the weapon.

Spring Break is over! Which means this past week has been spent at school and in the shop. Monday was a religious day type deal, so school was not in session then. For the past 4 days, I have been unable to cut out my metal Fallout symbol. The plasma cutter blew a fuse or a wire or something else of that nature. As such, it was out of commission. In the absence of that, I spent my time doing odd jobs around the shop, I helped carry windows for the tear drop trailers from the office (quite a distance). I also made divet holes in the edges of the trailer walls so they could rest in the trailer fittings. It required a chisel and hammer, which was fun. Bashing stuff sure is exciting! In and around those jobs, I looked at cool 3D printed stuff from MyMiniFactory. One of the things I found that I loved was a 3D printed, 1:1 scale weapon from one of my favorite video games: Destiny. I wish I could print something like that, but the cost would be ridiculous.

The essential question of the week is: how has the water crisis affected you?

To put this question into context, I reside in Northern California, on the Western coast of the United States. Right now we are in year four of a major drought. As such, water rationing and not being able to grow crops has been quite an issue. And since Cali is responsible for 1/3rd of the produce in the country, the effect is felt nationwide. As for me personally, I have to take shorter showers and monitor myself when brushing my teeth and doing dishes. I always get water when I turn on the faucet, but I am a huge environmental kind of guy, so I try to conserve when possible. Next, the prices of both meats and produce will go up in price by next year. These prices are already high, but they can go nowhere but up at this point. I love meat and nuts, so those are two things in particular I'll have trouble enjoying.

Week #12 -- Falling Out to Spring

Salutations once more, people. This week has been quite draining on my mental health. However, I shall persevere. For the most part, this whole week has been mostly computer work. I found a new piece of metal art to work on. As I mentioned in my last post, it is a Fallout insignia, denoting a building as being a nuclear shelter. First, I took the image and put it on Inkscape, traced a bitmap, then saved it as a .dxf file. Next, I set the image in AutoCAD and cleaned it up. This was easy as cutting a cake. Lastly, I scaled it down to my desired dimensions, then saved it again as a .dxf file. Now it is ready to cut, as I hoped to do this period. I would have been able to do this on Wednesday or Thursday, but I had a family emergency those two days. 

As I said, this week was rather draining and I am quite happy that next week is spring break.

There is no essential question for this week.

Anyway, peace fools. Kill!