On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 03:51:30 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

"mike" wrote in message
...
Jennifer Murphy wrote:

stuff snipped

Any comments or suggestions?

First problem is that you ignored advice and bought an autoranging meter.
TURN OFF THE AUTORANGING.
Dig around in the manual and look for range hold or range lock or
something similar. Set it to the 20V range (maybe 40V depending on the
meter) and leave it there while measuring voltage. You'll have to lock
it again if you change modes.

Considering future uses as well as the current one, I think she did fine
with an autoranger. I think it's far more useful to a novice than a
dedicated range meter and probably less expensive, too. The problem is
obviously getting the probes in place to read the voltage.

You've given few details, but some assumptions can be made.
There are always exceptions, but usually...

Where does the power come from?
If it's a battery, it's DC.
If it's a transformer, it's AC.

What if it's a transformer with a rectifier? (-: (But I don't think so in
this old a device.)

How are they connected?
If you can get one light to work in a socket, it's parallel.

That's been established. They're parallel.

2.5 vac 0.3a #14 flashlight bulbs x 12 = 3.6 amps.

11 ohms cold seems about 5x too high for that bulb. You sure you've
got #14 bulbs?

Damn you Micky, now I have to get up from my nice warm bed to grab some
bulbs and my ohm meter.

[time passes]

I got a reading of 1.1 ohms for my bulbs so you're right. I suspect an
autoranging decimal error of some sort or skin contact interfering with the
reading. Several of my bulbs in storage had substantial corrosion on the
button contact that affected the readings as well.

Short the meter leads and measure resistance of the leads. It's never
zero and sometimes a lot more if the probes are defective or just cheap
or connections are corroded. Subtract that number from your bulb
measurement.

I don't think it matters much as dead bulbs are an "either/or" proposition.
Dead or not. Some small resistance or none at all. If she has an audio
continuity function, a beep is good, none is dead.

#14 MINIATURE BULB E10 BASE - 2.47 Volt 0.30 Amp Miniature Screw (E10)
Base 0.50 MSCP, C-2R Filament Design, 15 Average Rated Hours, 0.94"
Maximum Overall Length #14 Miniature Bulb

NOTE that it's rated for 15 hours average life. Might wanna change
to a different bulb. Then you'll need a different transformer, but
12V bulbs on a 12V surplus laptop power supply works well. Cheap
non-regulated wall warts have small transformers and have serious
regulation problems as noted below.

That is pretty rotten life expectancy but is completely in line with almost
all the bulbs being burned out. Have you come across many 12VDC laptop
supplies? Everything I've got runs from 15 to 18VDC. Maybe times have
changed. The key word in finding a power supply for this app, as you've
noted, is "Regulated." Unfortunately not all regulated power supplies are
marked thusly but a simple check with a voltmeter usually tell you. All the
unregulated power supplies I've tested run several volts above rated voltage
without load. .

And with a bulb in the circuit, there IS a load - and the voltage
drops.

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 09:59:33 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

wrote in message
.. .
On Wed, 21 Dec 2011 19:34:53 -0800 (PST), "hr(bob) "

stuff snipped

You need 12-14 watt LED
60 watt equivalen(7 watt)t is about $20 at american Home Depot stores.
About 50% more in Canada.
Wholesaled.com has 9watt for $32
Or check EBAY and order direct from China.

My problem with these bulbs is that they were likely designed very recently
so lifespan estimates are just pie in the sky. No one will really know how
long ten year LED bulbs bought today will last until ten years from now. (-"

I just found the ideal tester adapter for testing that dollhouse
lighting system. E-Bay # 320766470225
$3.99 including shipping from Hong Kong. Thread it into the E10 socket
and you have an MR16 socket that is a piece of cake to connect to with
the meter probes.

On 12/22/2011 11:38 AM, Robert Green wrote:
wrote in message
...
On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 04:05:23 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

wrote in message
...
On Tue, 20 Dec 2011 21:30:41 -0500, wrote:


Are we having fun yet?
First thing we need to know is what the voltage is at the secondary
of the transformer (which WILL be AC) and if there is anything between
the transformer and the switches (like a rectifier). It is UNLIKELY
there is a rectifier because there is no advantage to using DC on the
bulbs. The #14 bulb is rated at 15 hours at 2.5 volts, and if the
voltage is only 1.5 volts the lights will be dimmer (but the light is
only for "realism" so it does not need to be full brightness)

Dim light is okay if they are dancing or watching tv, but if they are
doing homework or reading, a brighter light is much better.

Anyone ever see one of the few one hour TwiZone eps with Robert Duvall
(with
hair!) called, IIRC, "The Dollhouse?"

Maybe. I think I have a vague recollection.

I might have grown up there.

Memory lapse! It's called "Minature" - searching on Dollhouse got me all
sorts of Russian girlie sites.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miniatu..._Twilight_Zone)

Charley Parkes thinks he sees a figure in a museum dollhouse that comes
alive. Charley returns to the museum
numerous times and gazes into the dollhouse . . . sees the doll in the house
come alive.

Charley falls in love with the figure, a woman, but is institutionalized
because of his belief that the figure of the woman (as well as a housekeeper
and a man) is alive. He eventually is "rehabilitated" and is returned to the
care of his mother.

You'll have to go to the link to read how it ends. You're close.

--
Bobby G.


I liked the TV series "Dollhouse" staring cutie pie Eliza Dushku. ^_^

TDD

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:04:57 -0500, wrote:

I just found the ideal tester adapter for testing that dollhouse
lighting system. E-Bay # 320766470225
$3.99 including shipping from Hong Kong. Thread it into the E10 socket
and you have an MR16 socket that is a piece of cake to connect to with
the meter probes.

Wow, that is good.

The top description says 1 pcs but the other one says 10. Either way
it's cheap enough. It's probably only one?

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:34:13 -0500, micky
wrote:

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:04:57 -0500, wrote:

I just found the ideal tester adapter for testing that dollhouse
lighting system. E-Bay # 320766470225
$3.99 including shipping from Hong Kong. Thread it into the E10 socket
and you have an MR16 socket that is a piece of cake to connect to with
the meter probes.

Wow, that is good.

The top description says 1 pcs but the other one says 10. Either way
it's cheap enough. It's probably only one?
Considering it includes shipping from Hong Kong I'd say it's a safe
bet.

I ordered 10 9 watt MR16 lamps on friday and got them YESTERDAY - less
than a week from China.

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:40:31 -0500, wrote:

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:34:13 -0500, micky
wrote:

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:04:57 -0500, wrote:

I just found the ideal tester adapter for testing that dollhouse
lighting system. E-Bay # 320766470225
$3.99 including shipping from Hong Kong. Thread it into the E10 socket
and you have an MR16 socket that is a piece of cake to connect to with
the meter probes.

Wow, that is good.

The top description says 1 pcs but the other one says 10. Either way
it's cheap enough. It's probably only one?
Considering it includes shipping from Hong Kong I'd say it's a safe
bet.

Yeah, but there's some really cheap stuff online.

I ordered 10 9 watt MR16 lamps on friday and got them YESTERDAY - less
than a week from China.

Amazing, but no longer surprising.

"micky" wrote in message

stuff snipped

Are you living in Balto now? We've got enough posters in the Baltowash
area
that we should have a get-together.

Yes, I'm in Balltimore. A get-together would be great. I read
another group and we had one and it was a lot of fun.

If we've got enough people, maybe we
can convince HD or Lowe's to cater a lunch where they can make a sales
pitch
while we eat free food. (-: There's one of each in Laurel, which should
be
accessible from DC and Baltimore.

Well, that's two of us. (-: I'll try talking to one of the managers next
time I am in Laurel to see if they're interested in catering a show and
tell. I think one problem the big box stores have is getting eyeballs on
new products. I'll sit and look if they feed me . . . Reminds me of all the
"free" timeshare weekends where if they could, they would waterboard people
to get them to buy.

--
Bobby G.

On Dec 20, 2:42*pm, Jennifer Murphy wrote:
My multimeter arrived today. I cannot get to the wiring underneath the
dollhouse because there is paint and glue drying. ;-)

I tried to get a voltage reading at the light sockets inside the doll
house. I could not get a consistent reading. The space is very cramped
and the sockets very small (3/8"). I seemed to get a better reading on
DC than AC. The DC readings jumped all over the place, but it looked
like between 0.9 and 1.1 v. The AC readings jumped around even more. The
most consistent reading was 6v at one socket.

Is there a way using this meter to tell if the current is AC or DC?

Next, I did a continuity test of the bulbs themselves. Of the 12 bulbs I
removed from the house, only one passed the continuity test.

I then tried a resistance test on the bulbs. The one that passed the
continuity test showed 11 ohms of resistence. The rest showed infinite
resistance.

I then took the good bulb and tried it in several sockets. After
fiddling with the button switches, I was able to get it to light in
several sockets. It was very dim.

When everything dries, I will try to get under the house and see if I
can get better readings.

Any comments or suggestions?

For many years in automotive I used adapters made from burnt out bulbs
with test leads soldered to center post(s) and shell. Compact and easy
to insert and dead accurate. Saved time and made finding dead sockets
a snap.

Joe

"dpb" wrote in message ...
On 12/22/2011 11:32 AM, Robert Green wrote:

You gotta admit it's been weirdly warm for the last couple of months. I
can
remember some God-awful cold at this time of year. We've had major and
serious snowstorms happen on Nov. 11 and killer frosts in October.
When I
first moved in the temp dropped to 6F and the furnace overloaded it
cycled
so fast. It's almost Christmas and it's 61F here. That's not right!
(-:
...

Well, we had a whole bunch of 70F Christmas days/weeks when I was a kid
some 45-55 year ago but I can't recall one out of the 40s at best the
last 10-14 years or so. Right now were 65 on Sat/Sun and snowing and
blizzard conditions Tues and snowing again today lightly.

Things change and there are and have always been short and longer term
cycles and folks remember only a _very_ short time...

I've never experienced a winter like this in the DC area - don't get me
wrong - I like it! Agree about cycles. It's never been as cold as when I
first moved here in the early 80's. Looking over historical temperature
records for the area one thing's clear: the evenings never cool down as
much as they used to. That could just be development, loss of trees, "heat
island" effects and more, but it's still sort of spooky to be working
outside in short sleeves at night a few days before Christmas. Love the low
heating bill, though!

IIRC, you're in the midwest(?) so we'll probably be getting the cold soon.

--
Bobby G.

On 12/23/2011 3:10 PM, Robert Green wrote:
....

IIRC, you're in the midwest(?) so we'll probably be getting the cold soon.

....

Far SW KS, yes. 3F this AM. Not sure whether this front is going E
that far or not at...

--

"micky" wrote in message
...
wrote:

"Stormin Mormon" wrote in message
.. .
Sorry, Mitt, I am not one to gamble. You shouldn't either, being a
Mormon
and all.


http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics...ken-aback-by-m
itt-romneys-10000-bet/

It's true, IMO, that the bet offer tends to make Romney look rich, and
it's probably the result of being rich.

But the comparisons with what the average Iowan makes seem not too
relevant to me. He wasn't offerent to bet an average Iowan**. Romney
should have said, Well, Rick [Perry] has a lot more money than the
average Iowan.

**I don't know how Perry's statement that he lacked indoor plumbing
until he was 6 squares with wikip "His father, a Democrat, was a
long-time Haskell County commissioner and school board member."
Sounds like a guy with indoor plumbing to me.

"A guy with indoor plumbing" is slang for a transsexual man who's had his
faucet removed and replaced with P-trap, if you know what I mean. (-:

And the last person to complain aobut this should have been Newt.
Remember in his first campaign, earlier this year, it turned out he
had a $500,000 line of credit at Tiffany's and his reply was "That's
just the way people do business." as if the reporter and the rest of
us were stupid for not knowing that. I woudl bet that as few
people can afford to be t10,000 dollars, about the same number could
get a 500G line of credit, but a lot fewer think that is "the way
people do business". If I were in that situation, I'd think, That's
the way *rich* people do business, but I woudln't say it.

I think the Republican rank and file is so *not* in love with Mitt that
they'll overlook at lot of things in Newt. The Tiffany LOC, the
"consulting, not lobbying" for Fannie/Freddy totally 1.6M or thereabouts and
conservative family values that include dumping his cancer-ridden wife for a
newer model.

I don't know whether these bets are really the kind of gambling that's
prohibited, but I guess it's gambling. Way back when Atlantic City first
opened its casinos, my magazine sent me to write an article and staked me
$200. It lasted five days doing nothing but playing very conservative
roulette and the poker machines late at night. I even got a royal flush
(on
a 25 cent bet) which paid not very much. But in the end I lost every
cent
of that $200 and all that's left are a couple of souvenir chips from the
Playboy Club. The bottom line is that they grind you down, inexorably.
I've not felt the urge to gamble or buy a lottery ticket (except for a
dream
that had a six-digit number in it - I lost) since. Yes, you can count
cards
and win at blackjack until they take your DNA, your picture, your
fingerprints and ban you for life in all the casinos that cooperate.

In college I knew a guy from San Diego, who said he made money by
using the sytsem in Beat the Dealer, and I still believe he did.
When he drove home in June, I went with him as far as Las Vegas and
tried the system too. I could remember the number of tens dealt, and
the number of non-10's, I could divide them in my head and get an
answer. I could remember the 10x10 array of numbers and look up the
number in the table, in my head, based on the two cards that the
dealer had showing, but I couldnt' do the last step: When I got that
number from the table, and my number from dividing, I couldn't keep
track of which one was higher or what to do based on which was higher,
whether I should draw another card or not.

My roulette playing was a lot simpler, betting odd/even or red black and
keeping track of what numbers came up on graph paper pads (which made the
pit bosses nervous but not enough to eject me). My theory was that every
wheel had some sort of small bias to repeat certain numbers over others. I
saved the pad inside my stringbook (a reporter's collection of printed
stories) because I wanted to prove to my editors that I actually did what I
said, and didn't just walk in, lose my $200 stake with one spin and spent
the rest of the time on the beach. When I *really* thought I had a small
set of winning numbers isolated, they came and took the whole damn wheel
away and replaced it with another. It didn't make much sense because I was
never bet more that $10 a roll. They may have been afraid that if I did
find a flaw, I'd suddenly start betting big money. I had a friend come up
for the day who turned out to be a real gambling addict. Back then, casinos
had not yet made it easy to convert your mortage or your kid's college fund
into fast cash. The hallmark of a gambling addict is that they always say
that "just one more spin and I'll get even" and that they can never walk
away from a big win. They almost always give it all back and then some
because they think they're on a hot streak.

I was there a week and lost 40 dollars.

This story has more very interesting twists, if anyone is interested.

Sure. I think the OP has solved her problems and now we're in floating
along in the thread drift.

--
Bobby G.

wrote in message
...
On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 09:59:33 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

wrote in message
.. .
On Wed, 21 Dec 2011 19:34:53 -0800 (PST), "hr(bob) "

stuff snipped

You need 12-14 watt LED
60 watt equivalen(7 watt)t is about $20 at american Home Depot stores.
About 50% more in Canada.
Wholesaled.com has 9watt for $32
Or check EBAY and order direct from China.

My problem with these bulbs is that they were likely designed very
recently
so lifespan estimates are just pie in the sky. No one will really know
how
long ten year LED bulbs bought today will last until ten years from now.
(-"

Break, break. Where's the message? (-:

--
Bobby G.

On Fri, 23 Dec 2011 13:02:53 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

"micky" wrote in message

stuff snipped

Are you living in Balto now? We've got enough posters in the Baltowash
area
that we should have a get-together.

Yes, I'm in Balltimore. A get-together would be great. I read
another group and we had one and it was a lot of fun.

If we've got enough people, maybe we
can convince HD or Lowe's to cater a lunch where they can make a sales
pitch
while we eat free food. (-: There's one of each in Laurel, which should
be
accessible from DC and Baltimore.

Well, that's two of us. (-: I'll try talking to one of the managers next
time I am in Laurel to see if they're interested in catering a show and
tell. I think one problem the big box stores have is getting eyeballs on
new products. I'll sit and look if they feed me . . . Reminds me of all the

P&M

We should have a thread asking who all would be interested. Maybe
even before you bother Lowes.

"free" timeshare weekends where if they could, they would waterboard people
to get them to buy.

I went with a friend who was pestered by land sellers in the Pocono
mountains in eastern Pa. (I was pestered by them too, made an
appointment, rushed home that day, and they never showed up, probably
when they r ealized where in Brooklyn I lived.) Anyhow, t his was
about 1973 and to make things interesting I asked, "How do you feel
about homosexuals?" It was impromptu. I I didnt' ask my friend first
if he minded. but he kept quiet even though we're both straight.

Anyhow, the salesman had just driven us to the sales office,
eventually to be the "clubhouse", and he went inside and came back in
a few mintues and said "This is Maurice. He's homosexual too". I
think if I had said, How do you feel about Serbs" he woudl have
brought out the same guy and introduced him as Slobidan.

I don't know how many lots they sold but I went back 11 years later
and the developer had gone bankrupt, there was no shopping center or
even a grocery at the entrance, so shopping was miles away, and only
10 or 15% of the lots had houses. My friend said they were charging
more per square foot for the land than property on the north shore of
Long Island.

"dpb" wrote in message ...
On 12/23/2011 3:10 PM, Robert Green wrote:
...

IIRC, you're in the midwest(?) so we'll probably be getting the cold
soon.

...

Far SW KS, yes. 3F this AM. Not sure whether this front is going E
that far or not at...

They usually do. )-: It's 36F and dropping here in Christmas Eve.
Sometimes we're saved by a strong enough front from the SW to force bad
weather on New Englanders - that happened with the last three major snow
storms, IIRC. We got a dusting and they got a dumping. Sometimes we're at
the border of warm wet southern air and cold, dry northern air and get close
to 3 feet of snow.

I spent some time in Kansas at Ft. Leavenworth on a number of assignments
(and for the comedians, no, it wasn't the prison). Kansas has the best
steakhouses in the world! I believe that 10,000 years from now archeologists
are going to think Kansans were cow worshippers because there are so many
statutes of bulls everywhere. I took lots of pictures of them but that was
back in the days before digital cameras and my dozens of pictures of "Bulls
of Kansas" await scanning and may await scanning forever. I can hardly
bring myself to scan the important family stuff. Bulls are gonna hafta
wait.

I was just watching a HistCh show about "Jayhawkers" and the religious
strife that existed in pre-Civil War Kansas. Couldn't help thinking of
modern day parallels and wondering how bad things would have been back then
if, like modern religious nutcakes, they had high explosives and AK-47's
(which have killed way more people than any WMD ever did!) . Nation
building is often pretty bloody business. It certainly was for the US.

One of my GF's was from Lawrence, which I learned was populated mostly by
anti-slavers from New England. I remember her dad railing on and on about
the movie "Days of Heaven" (which we had just all seen) because they got the
harvesting schedules all wrong and because the location, while meant to be
Kansas, had rolling hills and flora that was clearly not Kansan. (-: My
wife loved and hates the "Hurt Locker" for the same reasons - too much that
was just not "how its really done."

--
Bobby G.

"micky" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 12:28:23 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

"micky" wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 01:11:18 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:


Bobby G. - It's 58F degrees at night in December in DC. Maybe global
warming theorists are right!

I heard on the radio that it was 55 at 6 in the morning, in Baltimore.
That struck me as strange.

It's been like that for a while. My heating bill is half of what it was
for
the same period last year. I don't mind that. I just hope we don't see
a
string of 100+ F degree days in the summer. I dislike the heat a lot
more
than the cold.

You can always put on more clothes, but there's a limit to how naked
you can get (fully naked is the limit and not even that in public.)

If there's anything I hate it's trying to diagnose a wiring problem in the
attic when it's 100F out. Fortunately I learned a few tricks here in AHR
and one of them was to keep a garden hose aimed at the roof to help remove
some of the heat.

--
Bobby G.

"micky" wrote in message
wrote:

stuff snipped

Memory lapse! It's called "Minature" - searching on Dollhouse got me all
sorts of Russian girlie sites.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miniatu..._Twilight_Zone)

Charley Parkes thinks he sees a figure in a museum dollhouse that comes
alive. Charley returns to the museum
numerous times and gazes into the dollhouse . . . sees the doll in the
house
come alive.

Charley falls in love with the figure, a woman, but is institutionalized
because of his belief that the figure of the woman (as well as a
housekeeper
and a man) is alive. He eventually is "rehabilitated" and is returned to
the
care of his mother.

You'll have to go to the link to read how it ends. You're close.

I'm pretty sure I saw it. All the episodes of that show were good.
Apparently Rod Serling practically worked himself to death to write
and (produce and direct?) so many episodes so quickly.

There's a great program, I think on the Biography channel, about all the
problems that management-heavy CBS caused for Serling. He felt they would
frequently butcher his creative vision with idiotic requests to change
everything they could think of, mostly just to prove that they could.
Television suffers from the same problem as the automaking industry. Too
many generals and not enough soldiers.

I thought there was something wrong with me that I didn't ike "The
Outer Limits", which I somehow thought was the sequel to the Twilight
Zone. But now they show Limits on tv every night, and it's not at
all like the Twilight Zone and I see why I didnt' like it.

The Outer Limits (the original version) was often handicapped by the
ponderous moral lessons they tried to teach. They also had some of the
cheesiest special effects this side of the movie "Sharktopus" or "Plan Nine
.. . ."

There are a small number of TOL's that have turned out to classics and
showcased actors like Sally Kellerman and Martin Landau who ended up having
impressive film careers. Landau's potrayal of morphine-addicted horror film
star Bela Lugosi in "Ed Wood" is nothing short of brilliant.

You've got to be a real night owl, Micky, to catch the "Outer Limits" on
TV - around here it's only on at 5AM along with Broderick Crawford's
"Highway Patrol" and "Sea Hunt." If you ever watch "Highway Patrol" look
for how often Crawford appears leaning against something when standing up.
It's reputed he was fall-down drunk for most of the filming. (-:

10-4

--
Bobby G.

"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

I liked the TV series "Dollhouse" staring cutie pie Eliza Dushku. ^_^

Don't tell me you're a closet "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (where Eliza got
her start)!

You're a better man than I am to follow "Dollhouse." I tried but it was
just too odd and complicated for me to follow. Of course, I watched "Lois
and Clark" without paying too much attention to the plot only because it
featured a young Teri Hatcher, who's at least as cute as Ms. Dushku. I
watched "L&O: CI" mostly for Kathryn Erbe - I've got a thing for petite
women with Glocks holstered on their hips.

So I get where you're coming from.

--
Bobby G.

On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 22:37:53 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

"micky" wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 12:28:23 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

"micky" wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 01:11:18 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:


Bobby G. - It's 58F degrees at night in December in DC. Maybe global
warming theorists are right!

I heard on the radio that it was 55 at 6 in the morning, in Baltimore.
That struck me as strange.

It's been like that for a while. My heating bill is half of what it was
for
the same period last year. I don't mind that. I just hope we don't see
a
string of 100+ F degree days in the summer. I dislike the heat a lot
more
than the cold.

You can always put on more clothes, but there's a limit to how naked
you can get (fully naked is the limit and not even that in public.)

If there's anything I hate it's trying to diagnose a wiring problem in the
attic when it's 100F out. Fortunately I learned a few tricks here in AHR
and one of them was to keep a garden hose aimed at the roof to help remove
some of the heat.

I hadn't read that here. Good idea. I guess I coudl do that, but
since I only do my house, I go up around 5 in the morning, after the
roof fan ran until about 10PM .

On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 22:48:46 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:


You've got to be a real night owl, Micky, to catch the "Outer Limits" on
TV - around here it's only on at 5AM along with Broderick Crawford's
"Highway Patrol" and "Sea Hunt."

I go through periods when I am a night owl, but when that stopped I
just recorded those two and Patty Duike. Patty Duke's show is really
great in a lot of ways. It's the most "sophisticated' sitcom I ever
saw, in that they talk about all kinds of topics international travel,
how to form corporations, how to get suppliers, vendors, advertising,
about politics (One episode where her father's boss runs for office,
he makes the same speeches politicians make today, word for word).
They use words even I barely know or don't know. They had an episode
where Patty wants a fancy French dinner for her friends, and her
mother gives her some choices. Patty can pronounce the French well,
but she doesn't know what they mean. One was chicken broth, which she
said sounded a lot better in French.

If you ever watch "Highway Patrol" look

I taped all three but didnt' have time to play back everything I tape
(record) so when I went away for a week, I cut out Sea Hunt and Patty
Duike, all the episodes I had seen already, and kept Highway Patrol.

So far, even when it starts boringly and I know I've seen it, it still
gets very interesting within 10 minutes. A big advantage of
half-hour shows is they are all plot, no sitting around thinking about
what to do next.

for how often Crawford appears leaning against something when standing up.
It's reputed he was fall-down drunk for most of the filming. (-:

I read that once, (here? from you?) and wikip says something
similar, but I don't see it. His body language seems reasonable,
especially for a man his weight, and he doiesn't run fast, but he does
climb hills and move around a lot when the plot calls for it. The
last couple days he's had a dark mark on his lower lip, towards the
side. But the show stopped filming in 1959 and he didn't die until
1986, so maybe it was only a cold sore scab or something.

A lot of interesting things about the show. They rarely rush, and
not because he's too fat, because often they haven't left the station
yet. And they almost never use the radio when the police car is
moving. Instead, even though it's usually an emergency, they call in
before they get into the car. Even when they see a guy turn around at
a road block and in 30 seconds he can be out of sight or turn down a
side road, the cop stands there and calls in.

Or someone's shot, and his wife doesn't ask the operator for an
ambulance, she asks for the highway patrol. I was alive then and at
least in Pennsylvainia, one asked the operator for the police, an
ambulance, or the fire department. A lot quicker.

OTOH, it was what people would, sillily, call modern, in a lot of
ways. Sometimes the women criminals were the dominated female who
did whatever their boyfriend or husband told them, but other times
they were the more crimiinal one, who dragged the guy into crime, and
even the brains. More than half of the criminals wore suits and
ties,. They had people who were extorted into crimes. They had an
episode with a mute girl, who had been kidnapped and released, where
they showed how smart she was when matthews asked the right questions,
and she wrote down enough info to catch the bad guys.

Of course no one on the show was black. Not in Sea Hunt either iirc.

A great movie he stars in was Born Yesterday, with Judy Holliday.
She's great too.

Patty Duike had token blacks, someone dancing at the school dance or
sitting in a class or at the malt shop, but I dont' think they spoke
more than three words total.

BTW, the aparatment building they used to show was actually in
Brooklyn Heights, right at the south end of the Brooklyn Promenade, a
broad sidewwalk facing the river above the Brookly Queens Xway which
was built into the side of the hill, northbound lanes on the bottom I
think, southbound above them, Promenade on top. They have an episode
or two where they walk on the Promenade and look at Manhattan. It's
an apartment building, even though they acted like they lived in a
house. My friend lived a couple doors away, 20 years later. In
later episodes, they lived in a big house with a big yard. No one in
Brooklyn Heights has even a small yard in front. Nor does Brooklyn
Heights High School exist. There is no neighborhood school in
Brooklyn Heights, even elementarry I think, and for high school they'd
have to walk a couple miles to Brooklyn Tech, one of the 4** NYC HS's
that require passing a test to get in, but maybe not such a high score
if it's the only high school near your home.

**Brrooklyn Tech, Bronx High School of Science, Stuyvesant High School
(in Manhattan) and the High School of Performing Arts, portrayed in
the move and tv show Fame. That one requires an audition, not an
academic test.

10-4

Over and out.

On 12/24/2011 9:57 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"The Daring wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

I liked the TV series "Dollhouse" staring cutie pie Eliza Dushku. ^_^

Don't tell me you're a closet "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (where Eliza got
her start)!

You're a better man than I am to follow "Dollhouse." I tried but it was
just too odd and complicated for me to follow. Of course, I watched "Lois
and Clark" without paying too much attention to the plot only because it
featured a young Teri Hatcher, who's at least as cute as Ms. Dushku. I
watched "L&O: CI" mostly for Kathryn Erbe - I've got a thing for petite
women with Glocks holstered on their hips.

So I get where you're coming from.

--
Bobby G.


Dollhouse was a little more cerebral than Buffy. I watched it more for
the way it made me laugh at their treatment of technology. I get a kick
out of SciFi shows where the space cowboys are running through the
engine room of the Draconian Dreadnaught starship which is full of pipes
and electrical panels that look suspiciously like the chiller plant at
the university hospital complex. At least the set dressers cover up the
part of the machines that reads "Carrier" or "Trane". o_O

P.S., I love old Japanese monster movies, I'm usually laughing so hard I
can't breathe. ROOK! GODZIRA! ^_^

TDD

On Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:04:57 -0500, wrote:

I just found the ideal tester adapter for testing that dollhouse
lighting system. E-Bay # 320766470225
$3.99 including shipping from Hong Kong. Thread it into the E10 socket
and you have an MR16 socket that is a piece of cake to connect to with
the meter probes.

Thanks for that lead. I have one on order.

"micky" wrote in message

stuff snipped

If there's anything I hate it's trying to diagnose a wiring problem in
the
attic when it's 100F out. Fortunately I learned a few tricks here in AHR
and one of them was to keep a garden hose aimed at the roof to help
remove
some of the heat.

I hadn't read that here. Good idea. I guess I coudl do that, but
since I only do my house, I go up around 5 in the morning, after the
roof fan ran until about 10PM .

Yeah, too bad that the CATV equipment in the attic didn't get the memo not
to fail when it's hard to work up there. When any of the cameras wired
through the attic fails, I want to get it back on line right away. Phone
interface block is up there, too, so there are times when I am unplugging
the main house distribution cable to troubleshoot. I've streamlined the
process so everything that can be on quick remove jacks is, but somehow,
something gets me up in the attic once a year when it's God Awful Hot
m). )-;

--
Bobby G.

"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

Dollhouse was a little more cerebral than Buffy. I watched it more for
the way it made me laugh at their treatment of technology. I get a kick
out of SciFi shows where the space cowboys are running through the
engine room of the Draconian Dreadnaught starship which is full of pipes
and electrical panels that look suspiciously like the chiller plant at
the university hospital complex. At least the set dressers cover up the
part of the machines that reads "Carrier" or "Trane". o_O

P.S., I love old Japanese monster movies, I'm usually laughing so hard I
can't breathe. ROOK! GODZIRA! ^_^

I find it similarly amusing to watch how computers and CCTV gear is
portrayed on shows like 24. I've read about some of the serious fights that
break out between agencies about accessing or redirecting spy satellites.
Every second of every orbit has been parceled out long ago. To break in and
change the camera targets gets into the rice bowls of some very important
people. Tapping into satelites, traffic cams, store suveillance cams, cell
phones, etc. in one seamless pass? Arf Arf!

Sometimes location scouts come up with more creative sets like the factory
in Robocop. I imagine with the bad economy there are lots of industrial
sets available. I liked the original "Alien" because they managed to make
the spaceship they find with the huge, dead alien in the control chair look
incredibly realistic.

Nothing like Godzira. I kinda even liked the remake filmed mostly in
Madison Square Garden. When you and I started watch sci fi, FX basically
consisted of models hanging on fishing line. Then, they graduated to "green
screen" where everyone had a jagged halo outline. Now, the sky's the limit.
The funny this is how cheesy the old effects look now, but how much we
*didn't* mind way back then. I noticed Anne Francis, then a 26 year old
sexy star of "Forbidden Planet" died this year (Do you remember "Honey
West?"). Her costar, Canadian Leslie Nielsen, of Saskatchewan, passed about
a year ago. Time's marching on, my friend . . .

--
Bobby G.

I want to thank everyone who offered helpful suggestions and advice. I
got started too late to get the dollhouse lights working so I just
finished fixing up the house itself. It was a big hit on Christmas
morning. When I get some time, I'll finish the lights. My plan is to
replace the transformer with a battery pack and use LED lights. I'll
probably have to replace the four toggle switches.

"micky" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 22:48:46 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:


You've got to be a real night owl, Micky, to catch the "Outer Limits" on
TV - around here it's only on at 5AM along with Broderick Crawford's
"Highway Patrol" and "Sea Hunt."

I go through periods when I am a night owl, but when that stopped I
just recorded those two and Patty Duike. Patty Duke's show is really
great in a lot of ways. It's the most "sophisticated' sitcom I ever
saw, in that they talk about all kinds of topics international travel,
how to form corporations, how to get suppliers, vendors, advertising,
about politics (One episode where her father's boss runs for office,
he makes the same speeches politicians make today, word for word).
They use words even I barely know or don't know. They had an episode
where Patty wants a fancy French dinner for her friends, and her
mother gives her some choices. Patty can pronounce the French well,
but she doesn't know what they mean. One was chicken broth, which she
said sounded a lot better in French.

I've noticed a lot of TV is dumbed down in a peculiar way. The tell the
joke, leave enough time for those who get it to laugh, and then explain the
joke further on in the script. I believe pretty strongly that the major TV
networks of the 50's and 60's, and to a lesser extent later years, really
"synchronized" the cultural patterns of Americans. What we see now is
outlets that cater to laser-narrow special interests. Network TV, for many
people, defined what is was to be American. People would discuss the shows
the next day at work as if they were discussing a large, common extended
family. Remember how obsessed the nation was with "Who shot JR?" TV barely
has enough clout now to pull off anything similar.

If you ever watch "Highway Patrol" look

I taped all three but didnt' have time to play back everything I tape
(record) so when I went away for a week, I cut out Sea Hunt and Patty
Duike, all the episodes I had seen already, and kept Highway Patrol.

So far, even when it starts boringly and I know I've seen it, it still
gets very interesting within 10 minutes. A big advantage of
half-hour shows is they are all plot, no sitting around thinking about
what to do next.

for how often Crawford appears leaning against something when standing
up.
It's reputed he was fall-down drunk for most of the filming. (-:

I read that once, (here? from you?) and wikip says something
similar, but I don't see it.

Yep, it was probably me. I slander the living and the dead, but mostly the
dead because they don't sue with the same vigor as the living. I believe
you'll see it in the episodes towards the end of the series. From what I
read, it was boredom and I remember it because the writer used the word
"ennui" which I did not know at the time. I couldn't quite figure out what
the author meant when he said "He drank from the ennui." Was it a bottle?
A disease? At first I thought it meant "he drank from the toilet" but I've
only heard that happening when people take ketamine (animal tranks) or smoke
Jimson weed (one of the guys who lived in my dorm name Mouse who also took 7
tabs of LSD to prove he was braver than anyone). If you ever seen a human
drink out of toilet, you'll never forget it. Voted mostly likely to be dead
before graduation.

His body language seems reasonable,
especially for a man his weight, and he doiesn't run fast, but he does
climb hills and move around a lot when the plot calls for it. The
last couple days he's had a dark mark on his lower lip, towards the
side. But the show stopped filming in 1959 and he didn't die until
1986, so maybe it was only a cold sore scab or something.

Are you sure you're not looking at his stunt double? (-:

A lot of interesting things about the show. They rarely rush, and
not because he's too fat, because often they haven't left the station
yet. And they almost never use the radio when the police car is
moving. Instead, even though it's usually an emergency, they call in
before they get into the car. Even when they see a guy turn around at
a road block and in 30 seconds he can be out of sight or turn down a
side road, the cop stands there and calls in.

Maybe some ham reading this will tell us why. Could be that the radios
didn't work so well on the move or that a moving car complicated the filming
and sound recording. I remember an interview with the director of the
enormously entertaining film "Gun Crazy" (written by blacklisted commie
Dalton Trumbo):

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042530/

who talked about how difficult it was to film scenes in a moving car back
then if only because of the size of movie making equipment at the time. He
talked about how "button" mikes were brand new and so enabled him to place
them throught the car to capture each actors' voice accurately.

Or someone's shot, and his wife doesn't ask the operator for an
ambulance, she asks for the highway patrol. I was alive then and at
least in Pennsylvainia, one asked the operator for the police, an
ambulance, or the fire department. A lot quicker.

These were all filmed in California, which at some point in time has stood
in for every place on earth and quite a few places not of this earth. I'm
stumped on this, but I haven't watched Highway Patrol in years. There are
plenty of shows I'd love to see again from the 50's. What's mostly left is
Perry Mason and I Love Lucy. A staggering number of old shows were recorded
on tape that was erased when the shows left the air. A lot of TV history
was simply demagnetized out of existence.

OTOH, it was what people would, sillily, call modern, in a lot of
ways. Sometimes the women criminals were the dominated female who
did whatever their boyfriend or husband told them, but other times
they were the more crimiinal one, who dragged the guy into crime, and
even the brains. More than half of the criminals wore suits and
ties,. They had people who were extorted into crimes. They had an
episode with a mute girl, who had been kidnapped and released, where
they showed how smart she was when matthews asked the right questions,
and she wrote down enough info to catch the bad guys.

HP was made toward the end of Hollywood's film noir period and when there
was no film work for them, a lot of directors and craftsmen ended up doing
TV series, which many felt was beneath them. But they had to eat.

Of course no one on the show was black. Not in Sea Hunt either iirc.

That's one reason why it's sad to have lost so much of even "junk" TV from
the 50's. It captured so much of the essence of that society. No book, to
my mind, can ever express the same sentiment as a scene from Leave it to
Beaver, showing what houses looked like, what people wore, how they talked,
etc. I get TCM now, and get a real hoot out of seeing movies from the 30's
with wind-up telephones, furniture cabinet radios, cars without any safety
features whatsoever(!), men all wearing hats. The people all have the same
sorts of problems we have now, though. They just had to be circumspect in
showing things like violence. In the original "Scarface" when someone is
killed, they show a bowling bowl making a strike, the pins go flying and you
see an X being marked on a scoresheet. Now you get to see slow motion
images of pieces of brain matter spattering on the lens.

A great movie he stars in was Born Yesterday, with Judy Holliday.
She's great too.

Gangster and his moll? Seen it a long, long time ago. Just watched "White
Heat" again and noticed that they made their radio calls stopped, too. They
had radio transponders they used to track the gangsters that were the size
of vacuum cleaners!

Patty Duike had token blacks, someone dancing at the school dance or
sitting in a class or at the malt shop, but I dont' think they spoke
more than three words total.

You see some of that going with Hispanics, Koreans and Chinese nowadays. I
guess if I were black I'd be happy that other minorities are lower on the
totem pole.

BTW, the aparatment building they used to show was actually in
Brooklyn Heights, right at the south end of the Brooklyn Promenade, a
broad sidewwalk facing the river above the Brookly Queens Xway which
was built into the side of the hill, northbound lanes on the bottom I
think, southbound above them, Promenade on top. They have an episode
or two where they walk on the Promenade and look at Manhattan. It's
an apartment building, even though they acted like they lived in a
house. My friend lived a couple doors away, 20 years later. In
later episodes, they lived in a big house with a big yard. No one in
Brooklyn Heights has even a small yard in front. Nor does Brooklyn
Heights High School exist.

The show "Homicide:Life on the Street" was filmed in Baltimore and every
year the H:LotS group on the Internet had a drinking tour of all the
buildings that were used as sets or backdrops. I went one year. It was a
lot of fun. Seeing something you've seen on TV is always a weird feeling.

There is no neighborhood school in
Brooklyn Heights, even elementarry I think, and for high school they'd
have to walk a couple miles to Brooklyn Tech, one of the 4** NYC HS's
that require passing a test to get in, but maybe not such a high score
if it's the only high school near your home.

Careful, friend. I graduated from Brooklyn Tech!

**Brrooklyn Tech, Bronx High School of Science, Stuyvesant High School
(in Manhattan) and the High School of Performing Arts, portrayed in
the move and tv show Fame. That one requires an audition, not an
academic test.

HSPA wasn't usually considered one of the "three" special entrance NYC high
schools. Once, during a transit strike, I got to attend our sister school,
the all-girls Bay Ridge High School. I still have dreams about being the
only teenage boy in a building full of teenage girls. Good dreams. (-:

10-4

Over and out.

"Whenever the laws of any state are broken, a duly authorized organization
swings into action. It may be called the State Police, State Troopers,
Militia, the Rangers... or the Highway Patrol. These are the stories of the
men whose training, skill and courage have enforced and preserved our state
laws."

Well, that's about as OT as you can get. (-: Has the OP returned to tell
us how the bulbs have worked out? My newserver occasionally drops posts.

--
Bobby G.

On 12/26/2011 8:47 AM, Robert Green wrote:
"The Daring wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

Dollhouse was a little more cerebral than Buffy. I watched it more for
the way it made me laugh at their treatment of technology. I get a kick
out of SciFi shows where the space cowboys are running through the
engine room of the Draconian Dreadnaught starship which is full of pipes
and electrical panels that look suspiciously like the chiller plant at
the university hospital complex. At least the set dressers cover up the
part of the machines that reads "Carrier" or "Trane". o_O

P.S., I love old Japanese monster movies, I'm usually laughing so hard I
can't breathe. ROOK! GODZIRA! ^_^

I find it similarly amusing to watch how computers and CCTV gear is
portrayed on shows like 24. I've read about some of the serious fights that
break out between agencies about accessing or redirecting spy satellites.
Every second of every orbit has been parceled out long ago. To break in and
change the camera targets gets into the rice bowls of some very important
people. Tapping into satelites, traffic cams, store suveillance cams, cell
phones, etc. in one seamless pass? Arf Arf!

Sometimes location scouts come up with more creative sets like the factory
in Robocop. I imagine with the bad economy there are lots of industrial
sets available. I liked the original "Alien" because they managed to make
the spaceship they find with the huge, dead alien in the control chair look
incredibly realistic.

Nothing like Godzira. I kinda even liked the remake filmed mostly in
Madison Square Garden. When you and I started watch sci fi, FX basically
consisted of models hanging on fishing line. Then, they graduated to "green
screen" where everyone had a jagged halo outline. Now, the sky's the limit.
The funny this is how cheesy the old effects look now, but how much we
*didn't* mind way back then. I noticed Anne Francis, then a 26 year old
sexy star of "Forbidden Planet" died this year (Do you remember "Honey
West?"). Her costar, Canadian Leslie Nielsen, of Saskatchewan, passed about
a year ago. Time's marching on, my friend . . .

--
Bobby G.


Honey West was a real TV hottie back then. The special effects for
"Forbidden Planet" are actually very good for the time the movie was
made. I worked in Californiastan back in the late 80's and some of the
jobs were in "The City of Industry" one of the many small cities that
makeup Los Angeles. The City of Industry is a location for many of the
industrial shots you see in Hollywood productions. When I was there, I
saw a film crew just about every day on the street or down some alley. ^_^

TDD

"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

Honey West was a real TV hottie back then. The special effects for
"Forbidden Planet" are actually very good for the time the movie was
made. I worked in Californiastan back in the late 80's and some of the
jobs were in "The City of Industry" one of the many small cities that
makeup Los Angeles. The City of Industry is a location for many of the
industrial shots you see in Hollywood productions. When I was there, I
saw a film crew just about every day on the street or down some alley.
^_^

Agree about FX for FP. They let you into Calfornia? Must have been before
your reptutation became nationwide. (-: I worked on two films as a still
photographer that filmed in the DC area. "The Amateur" and "Raise the
Titanic." I often thought that locations crews should share their knowledge
with the Pentagon because if anyone knows how to take over an urban area
with few casualities, it's a location film crew.

I'll always remember the "starter" check I got as a down payment from the
RTT location crew's accountant that had no name, address or phone number on
it. I got worried so I took it to.the bank where I was friendly with the
teller (she eventually died from AIDs because she had sex with a bisexual
male model ONCE but that's another sad, sad story). Anyway, I handed her
the check for $200 and asked "is this check any good?" After punching in
the check's numbers, her eyes widened and she said "It's *plenty* good!"

Ironically, there's a crime movie called "City of Industry" starring Harvey
Keitel and the woman who was in Star Trek. She was meant as a bride/gift
for some alien wedding and is supposed to fall madly in love with the first
person she sees. Due to some mechanical error, she falls in love with
Captain Picard. (A similar plot was used in the original series with the
woman who wore the raw dilithium crystal necklace that saves the day). I
guess I have to turn in my trekkie badge - can't remember the name of either
one although I think the ST:TOS woman was Frances Nguyen. Crap, now I gotta
go look it up.

Before I do, I've got one more complaint that should really resonate with
the ex-Navy guys here. On way more than one occasion, huge shipping barrels
and crates tumble from high storage racks in STNG. One nearly kills Worf.
I've been on a number of subs (mostly old diesel boats) and there isn't a
THING that's capable of flying around and killing someone that isn't secured
in some way. Two hundred years from now, they've forgotten all about
cargo's tendency to fly around the holds if not strapped down.

Back to the irresistible ladies from space:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_Nuyen

Star Trek (1968) "Elaan of Troyius"

The other one was:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Industry_(film) *

starring Famke Janssen as Rachel Montana

a starring role in the 1992 Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The
Perfect Mate"

* The picture at this site

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fa...nssenOct08.jpg

makes her look like Mariska Hargitay's twin sister although I never thought
the two looked that much alike.

Who's Mariska Hargitay, aside from being a running gag in Mike Meyer's "The
Love Guru" she's the daughter of the late Jayne Mansfield and now the head
detective on L&O:SVU.

The closest I can get to bringing this back on topic is that Famke's married
to the son of architect Tod Williams. (-:

--
Bobby G.

"Jennifer Murphy" wrote in message
...
I want to thank everyone who offered helpful suggestions and advice. I
got started too late to get the dollhouse lights working so I just
finished fixing up the house itself. It was a big hit on Christmas
morning. When I get some time, I'll finish the lights. My plan is to
replace the transformer with a battery pack and use LED lights. I'll
probably have to replace the four toggle switches.

Thanks for the follow up. Too bad you couldn't get the rehab done in time.
(-:

A DC wall-wart power supply would be cheaper in the long run and just as
safe. Only low voltage DC goes beyond the sealed unit that plugs into the
wall. I use units I get from AllElectronics and have been very happy with
them.

http://www.allelectronics.com/

You can get the power supply, sockets, LEDs, switched and anything else you
might need from them.

http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a...upplies/1.html

If you switch to LEDs you can use a supply of 1.5A at 12VDC. You can by
LED's that run off 12VDC that have the required current-limiting resistors
built in. I bought a bagful from Ebay to use to light areas in my van. You
can also use Christmas light strings of LEDs for the inside lighting.

http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a...-T1-3/4/1.html


--
Bobby G.

"micky" wrote in message
On Fri, 23 Dec 2011 13:02:53 -0500, "Robert Green"

stuff snipped

"free" timeshare weekends where if they could, they would waterboard
people
to get them to buy.

I went with a friend who was pestered by land sellers in the Pocono
mountains in eastern Pa. (I was pestered by them too, made an
appointment, rushed home that day, and they never showed up, probably
when they r ealized where in Brooklyn I lived.) Anyhow, t his was
about 1973 and to make things interesting I asked, "How do you feel
about homosexuals?" It was impromptu. I I didnt' ask my friend first
if he minded. but he kept quiet even though we're both straight.

Anyhow, the salesman had just driven us to the sales office,
eventually to be the "clubhouse", and he went inside and came back in
a few mintues and said "This is Maurice. He's homosexual too". I
think if I had said, How do you feel about Serbs" he woudl have
brought out the same guy and introduced him as Slobidan.

(-: They are the masters of the hard sell. When I was writing an article
about them for the National Observer there was one seller who took me aside
after I peppered him with a list of prepared questions about all the
downsides of the timeshare arrangement. He didn't figure out I was a
reporter, but he did say "You don't have to stay for the presentation - I
get the feeling no matter what we say, you're not going to buy." He got
that right.

I don't know how many lots they sold but I went back 11 years later
and the developer had gone bankrupt, there was no shopping center or
even a grocery at the entrance, so shopping was miles away, and only
10 or 15% of the lots had houses. My friend said they were charging
more per square foot for the land than property on the north shore of
Long Island.

Jeez. My uncle, who designed jet fighters for Republic and Grumman, ended
up buying a lot in Florida that turned out to be mostly swampland. A
friend's father, a police sergeant in Chicago ended up buying a lot
consisting of mostly ancient volcanic rock smack dab in the middle of
Nowheresville, Arizona. All te same promises were made accompanied by an
"artist's impression" of what the completed development looked like. My
friend even wasted money checking it out. It's still an old lava plain with
not a house in sight.

I experience buyer's remorse at a very early age, spending my allowance on a
deck of magic playing cards that weren't so magic one you knew the secret.
Since then, I've bought very little that's left me thinking "why on earth
did I buy that?" (-:

--
Bobby G.

On 12/27/2011 12:47 AM, Robert Green wrote:
"The Daring wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

Honey West was a real TV hottie back then. The special effects for
"Forbidden Planet" are actually very good for the time the movie was
made. I worked in Californiastan back in the late 80's and some of the
jobs were in "The City of Industry" one of the many small cities that
makeup Los Angeles. The City of Industry is a location for many of the
industrial shots you see in Hollywood productions. When I was there, I
saw a film crew just about every day on the street or down some alley.
^_^

Agree about FX for FP. They let you into Calfornia? Must have been before
your reptutation became nationwide. (-: I worked on two films as a still
photographer that filmed in the DC area. "The Amateur" and "Raise the
Titanic." I often thought that locations crews should share their knowledge
with the Pentagon because if anyone knows how to take over an urban area
with few casualities, it's a location film crew.

I'll always remember the "starter" check I got as a down payment from the
RTT location crew's accountant that had no name, address or phone number on
it. I got worried so I took it to.the bank where I was friendly with the
teller (she eventually died from AIDs because she had sex with a bisexual
male model ONCE but that's another sad, sad story). Anyway, I handed her
the check for $200 and asked "is this check any good?" After punching in
the check's numbers, her eyes widened and she said "It's *plenty* good!"

Ironically, there's a crime movie called "City of Industry" starring Harvey
Keitel and the woman who was in Star Trek. She was meant as a bride/gift
for some alien wedding and is supposed to fall madly in love with the first
person she sees. Due to some mechanical error, she falls in love with
Captain Picard. (A similar plot was used in the original series with the
woman who wore the raw dilithium crystal necklace that saves the day). I
guess I have to turn in my trekkie badge - can't remember the name of either
one although I think the ST:TOS woman was Frances Nguyen. Crap, now I gotta
go look it up.

Before I do, I've got one more complaint that should really resonate with
the ex-Navy guys here. On way more than one occasion, huge shipping barrels
and crates tumble from high storage racks in STNG. One nearly kills Worf.
I've been on a number of subs (mostly old diesel boats) and there isn't a
THING that's capable of flying around and killing someone that isn't secured
in some way. Two hundred years from now, they've forgotten all about
cargo's tendency to fly around the holds if not strapped down.

Back to the irresistible ladies from space:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_Nuyen

Star Trek (1968) "Elaan of Troyius"

The other one was:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Industry_(film) *

starring Famke Janssen as Rachel Montana

a starring role in the 1992 Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The
Perfect Mate"

* The picture at this site

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fa...nssenOct08.jpg

makes her look like Mariska Hargitay's twin sister although I never thought
the two looked that much alike.

Who's Mariska Hargitay, aside from being a running gag in Mike Meyer's "The
Love Guru" she's the daughter of the late Jayne Mansfield and now the head
detective on L&O:SVU.

The closest I can get to bringing this back on topic is that Famke's married
to the son of architect Tod Williams. (-:

--
Bobby G.


What has always completely cracked me up about the future and space
cowboys is the distinct lack of dentists. Dentists must have been
outlawed by future Democrats for wrecking the self esteem of the poor
who couldn't afford tooth whitening and braces. o_O

TDD

"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

What has always completely cracked me up about the future and space
cowboys is the distinct lack of dentists. Dentists must have been
outlawed by future Democrats for wrecking the self esteem of the poor
who couldn't afford tooth whitening and braces. o_O

[Kicks away flame bait]

I always wondered why Picard was bald. Warp drive but no cure for baldness?

--
Bobby G.

On 12/30/2011 8:02 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"The Daring wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

What has always completely cracked me up about the future and space
cowboys is the distinct lack of dentists. Dentists must have been
outlawed by future Democrats for wrecking the self esteem of the poor
who couldn't afford tooth whitening and braces. o_O

[Kicks away flame bait]

I always wondered why Picard was bald. Warp drive but no cure for baldness?

--
Bobby G.


Look at a closeup of Mr. Spock from the original series, his teeth are
the envy of any British actor. ^_^

TDD

"Whitest teeth I ever came across." -- James T. Kirk


"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message
...



[Kicks away flame bait]

I always wondered why Picard was bald. Warp drive but no cure for
baldness?

--
Bobby G.


Look at a closeup of Mr. Spock from the original series, his teeth are
the envy of any British actor. ^_^

TDD

On Tue, 27 Dec 2011 07:49:40 -0500, "Robert Green"
wrote:

"Jennifer Murphy" wrote in message
.. .
I want to thank everyone who offered helpful suggestions and advice. I
got started too late to get the dollhouse lights working so I just
finished fixing up the house itself. It was a big hit on Christmas
morning. When I get some time, I'll finish the lights. My plan is to
replace the transformer with a battery pack and use LED lights. I'll
probably have to replace the four toggle switches.

Thanks for the follow up. Too bad you couldn't get the rehab done in time.
(-:

We got it all fixed up except for the lights. She absolutely loved it.
Once she saw it, she lost interest in opening up any other presents. It
really is a cool dollhouse. It has a very realistic brick chimney on the
side, windows that actually slide, and all kinds of little accessories.

A DC wall-wart power supply would be cheaper in the long run and just as
safe. Only low voltage DC goes beyond the sealed unit that plugs into the
wall. I use units I get from AllElectronics and have been very happy with
them.

http://www.allelectronics.com/

Thanks for the pointer. I don't completely agree with you about a
transformer being as safe as a battery pack, but it woulod be a biug
improvement over what's there now. The other advantage to batteries is
no cord to trip over. Everything is inside the house.

You can get the power supply, sockets, LEDs, switched and anything else you
might need from them.

http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a...upplies/1.html

Those power supplies look like they have a round plug like for cameras
and computers. Would I get a compatible plug to mount on the side of the
dollhouse? I didn't see anything on the website.

If you switch to LEDs you can use a supply of 1.5A at 12VDC. You can buy
LED's that run off 12VDC that have the required current-limiting resistors
built in. I bought a bagful from Ebay to use to light areas in my van. You
can also use Christmas light strings of LEDs for the inside lighting.

http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a...-T1-3/4/1.html

I'm not sure how I'd use that type of LED. I don't want to remove the
E10 base sockets. I couldn't find any E10 base bulbs on their website.

They are available other places:

This place has several types for 12vdc and they come in colors:

http://www.ledlight.com/e10-screw-ba...led-light.aspx

Here's another, but a lot more expensive:

http://www.bulbtown.com/LM1012MS_W_L...lm1012ms-w.htm