Author Archives: frank

Today I learned a little bit about clothes dryers

Posted on 2011-12-24 by frank

The bad news came this morning as we were cleaning the house in preparation for Christmas: the dryer wouldn’t start. Andrea and I both assumed that the belt must have worn out, and I made another assumption that cost me … Continue reading →

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How a tweak becomes a full-blown upgrade

Posted on 2011-11-21 by frank

The pre-built DIY brewery I bought earlier this year is now sitting in pieces on our garage floor. I realized something about DIY projects after getting it home and wired up for use — when the works of a thing … Continue reading →

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Nest costs WHAT?

Posted on 2011-11-20 by frank

The Nest Learning Thermostat sounds neat, which is what I accidentally keep calling it when I forget its forgettable name. Even the nicer thermostats I use have room for improvement, but $250, excluding installation, smelled more than a little bit … Continue reading →

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Steampunk Homebrewery

Posted on 2011-07-24 by frank

Thanks to a DIY home-brewing engineer known as Sizz building a pretty cool electric all-grain brewing system and then deciding he wanted to play golf instead, our garage is now stuffed with a recirculating infusion mash system (RIMS)-based all-grain brew … Continue reading →

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Skype, Cause, Effect, and Overkill

Posted on 2011-04-22 by frank

My loathing of Skype’s new UI and horrible group conferencing performance at work has led me to implement a PBX at home. When I stop to think about it, it must be overkill, but once I got started, it was … Continue reading →

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