Modern Vespa

Well done. Proud of you.

All of my crazy driving events have been snow-related. None of them resulted in damage to people or property.

Happened to call my brother in Madison yesterday. He and his wife had just voted, and were about to head back home. He cut the call short, because he wanted to get home before too much snow had fallen. He said they'd had 4" in just a few hours, and more was falling as we spoke.

Bittersweet as one of my bestest friends from this current unit has left.

But couldn't me more proud because she left to get a commission in the Coast Guard.

Now that's a noble cause.

I found a solution for my PDF resizing issue!

The way I have always done it is to "print" the PDF to a new PDF with the needed page dimensions. There was a virtual Adobe PDF printer option that I'd use. That went away, so I started using the Microsoft print to PDF virtual printer instead. But that didn't help with the Mac.

I did some research today and discovered that Acrobat has a Preflight function that has an option to automatically resize the pages.

After digging around in it I figured it out (it's not very intuitive, and the default units are mm).

It works with both PC and Mac. Although each platform accesses it differently. Mac has it in the Edit menu, while PC has it as an option in the Print Production Tool. But once accessed, the interface & functionality is identical.

My supervisor also found an InDesign plugin that will place multiple page PDFs into a document, and automatically resize them. I tested both the plugin and the preflight method, and compared the results.

Preflight will resize based on Long Side and Short Side, while the plugin will resize to fit either portrait or landscape. So if the document has a mix of portrait and landscape, they will not be resized correctly.

Out of curiosity, I checked the resulting file sizes of the three methods.

The original file was 741kb
Microsoft print to PDF resulted in a 1908kb file.
Preflight resulted in a 731kb file
Resizing via InDesign and exporting to PDF resulted in a 730kb file.

I'll probably use Preflight resizing going forward, because it is so much faster than the InDesign method.

A few weeks ago our forum friend caschnd1 told us about his Panhead being featured in an early issue of Greasy Kulture. I went ahead and ordered the back issue and it arrived today.

Please enjoy a few photographs of the magazine and spread.

My Gaziano & Girling bespoke shoes arrive tomorrow.

Looking forward to seeing what I'm missing out on! Someday😌. Flying airplanes ain't cheap, got to sacrifice something. 😆

dad left behind a gift far more sizeable than we anticipated; some was absolutely invested for retirement but i have a pension for life in the neighborhood of 70-80k a year most of it tax-free....so a lot of it became "experiences and fun stuff" and i can't begin to tell you how unbelievable a pair of bespoke footwear is. i've been lucky to have some fantastic pairs of shoes in my closet but when it's made specifically for your foot and nobody else's....man it's otherworldly.

and that's just going off the trial-fitting pair they cut apart.

i'll throw a photo of the final product in here tomorrow i'm sure. assuming this stupid rain stops long enough for me to go out and get a shot in some proper light.

So true. I still have my custom made leathers from my sportbike days and a custom made leather jacket I wear now. Nothing off the shelf comes close! Looking forward to the pic.

And it arrived a couple of days ago. Now installed outside, 240V wiring moved, new 33ft pipework hidden away, just turned it on and it all works so much better than the old unit did.

Pic of the indoor unit - a bit like a large fridge on the wall... You can see where I took out the old wall furnace, as the plaster hasn't quite dried yet.

Hah. I've lived in California long enough that I can picture exactly what that wall furnace looked like. Classic.

Can we talk about the Michael Jackson dog pillow, which I can also see?

I believe it was branded 'Cozy' in my Oakland apartment. Ironically it was incapable of making the apartment cozy. It did clank a lot though.

After 20 years married we still have a morning routine. I get up around 4:00am, tend to the pets and bring coffee up to the bedroom. We spend time with the pets, checking the news and just talking. As I back out of the driveway on my way to work, my wife stands in the kitchen window, dog in arms, and they wave and blow puppy kisses.

I may have never seen Rome. I may have never jumped out of an airplane. I may have never been scuba diving in Bermuda. But I get puppy kisses when I leave for work in the morning, and that's ok.

Stupid dog.

My Ford F-150 King Ranch cheers me today. The fact that there are haters out there just makes it better.

Oh, I dunno - looks like he's got it made

My neighbour was given too much beer so gave me some 🍻

Yumm.

Too ... much ... beer?

I'm concerned about "contains love" and the fact that it was free. You should be too. Wilhelm IV didn't think love was a legitimate ingredient in 1516 when Reinheitsgebot was decreed and I'd imagine there was good reason for that.

Oh, we are SO far from that now. Walk through any of the bigger beer stores in town and look at what they make beer out of. Aisles and aisles of craft "brews" that claim everything from Craisins and coriander to Bigfoot hair and unicorn poop.

This was a recent purchase. Bought for the label, but not bad overall.

Yeah then that other dude a few hundred years later proclaimed more german purity and things took a turn.

Experimentation is how we advance. Live a little.

Oh and in making me happy news, wearing the new ones today. They're magnificent.

Fancy!

I have to say they are in a different league.

Those Northampton chaps can make a bit of footwear.

Also i went ahead and reserved our Valentine's Day table for next year.

Ristorante ai Barbicani, just east of Rialto bridge.

I'm sorry but that's not romantic enough. Step it up a bit.

Workin on it. Still an enlisted man for 179 days. Not that anyone's counting.

Where did you go to learn this kind of shit ?

You sound like a keeper.

Mostly weaponized ADHD. Plus i've been hunting people for a living the last 15 years or so. Those skills come in handy.

This place though, genuinely came across it getting lost in Venice (a wholly enjoyable experience) back in February. Walked that bridge and saw people eating a very lovely romantic dinner and immediately realized it was a spot to look out for.

Starred it on my googly maps for later, found em on IG, found out when the window opened for reservations, set a calendar reminder for yesterday and emailed them immediately.

Can't fxxing remember where I put my keys 5 minutes ago, but i can remember to do all that

Sir I salute you.

You operate on a different level to me.

Cancels Bargin Bucket.

I was going to say, how the f do you find a spot like that?! That's fairytale stuff for sure. My wife would probably trip somehow and fall in the water bringing the table with her.🙄 Love her dearly though. We'd have a good laugh about it when we got home.

My local Bike Dealer.

They are making up a Kymco order with only one item so to save postage costs he calls me up and asks me if I needed anything and in a bizarre coincidence I did.

He's good.

😀 Great memories from 2008. I just love Greasy Kulture Magazine (published in the UK). I read every issue cover to cover when it arrives.

I understand what each of these words mean individualy, but when they're combined the way you have them they make no sense.

They look like they were made with love.

Not directly scooter related, but today I took Trixie's Triumph Speedmaster up to Deadwood for a coffee clache with the other regular bums who congregate there at about noon every day.

The Triumph hadn't been ridden at all for the past month, and I decided to blow some of the cobwebs out of it for her.

I had forgotten what a very, very, nice bike this thing is, and every time I ride it I'm reminded of that fact.

It's a wonderfully smooth and refined 77 hp vertical twin of 1200cc's, mellow in temperament but strong, matched up with one of the slickest six-speed transmissions I've ever had the pleasure to experience. A two-finger-light clutch
and equally light throttle springs. Cruise control and heated grips.

Unfortunately, the seat hurts my butt after only about twenty five miles, and for some reason, it makes some very personal parts go numb as well, but a minute or two off the bike now and then gets 'things' back up to running condition quickly.

It's also a beauty to look at (IMO), and riding it today had me quite 'cheery', thus this post.

Today's destination on the Speedmaster...

We've recently had a cold snap here. Going out this morning, I found this huddled up against my Vespa for warmth.
I guess I'm going to take care of it for a while and see how it goes.