There's a homeless guy where I run up in Seattle. He says hi and eggs me on. About a year back I was running through the park and I saw him getting the absolute living shit beaten out of him. I called the cops. They came a'runnin'. He was pretty fucked up for a while but he's always got a smile.

About two weeks back I saw him. I always urge him to come with me and this time he did. We traded names. He'd found Jesus, had been two days sober (but was not giving up weed), had gotten all of his "misdemeanor trespass" (IE, homelessness) charges dropped and had gotten slotted into a halfway house. He ran a mile with me. It was dope.

I went running this afternoon (amazing how arduous it is when your body has switched over to "we bike 150 miles a week" mode). He was there, and he went running with me again. He's 17 days sober now, still in the halfway house and had been offered a job by the parks department - "after all, they know me pretty well." And the dude was tan. It's like he'd been out during the daylight and shit.

NOW LOOK AT THIS FUCKING THING

It could be mine for a mere $15k. It will make pens a dozen at a time. It has a PLC and pneumatic control to apply a 300-year-old technology to fine writing instruments. It is quite possibly the most ridiculous mechanical device ever made. And oh, the Dieselpunk absurdity of it. The lust I feel. It hisses and whirrs and clanks as it works. It is truly an amazing thing.

I made the mistake of meeting with a machining tools rep a couple days ago. He supports what he calls "CNC art" and pointed out that he sold my school a 7-axis turning-machining center at cost. It's the thing in the corner that everyone's afraid of. It could make fancy-ass pens out of flippin' bar stock if I program it right. And it could do them at high speed, three phase, carbide cut and fog cooled.

My wife pointed out that the ridiculous pen machine is a third of the way to a used 7-axis mill-turn.

So I didn't spend used-car money on machine tools this week. I guess that's something. But I can tell this particular piece of wierdness is going to haunt me for a while.

Here's a video of a machine that makes chicken wire.