Studio711.com – Ben Martens

We live off of I-405 so we have been watching the huge construction project for the last couple years. The project page has all the details, but basically they are adding an HOT lane (carpoolers use it for free, single occupancy cars can pay to use it) and fixing the interchange where we live. Cars going from 405 to 522 had a hard time merging with cars going from 160th to 405.

I had thought that after the change, we wouldn’t be able to get onto 522 from 160th St anymore but it looks like they have accounted for that in the design. That’s great for us because it means we’ll be able to head out that way without driving through the traffic mess in Woodinville.

The people who bought those townhomes right along the new braided exit ramps are going to be treated to an enormous sound blocking wall right outside their balconies. They’re going from having a view that had about 3 or 4 rows of trees between them and 405 to seeing a concrete wall 10-20 feet away. Ouch. At least the real estate market is starting to recover around here so some of the decrease will be masked.

And since I mentioned real estate, here’s a semi-related factoid: the guy who bought our condo from us sold it a few months ago. He sold it for about 20% more than he bought it so he made a little money after all the fees and taxes. Our house has gone up about 3-4 times as much as that condo did though so I still think it was a good financial move. (And it was a great move for many other reasons.)

I’m continually amazed by people merging in front of big trucks and semis, especially as traffic is coming to a stop. I see it every day. Why do you think the truck is leaving that space? It’s so they don’t kill the people in front of them. I wonder if it would help to add a “big rig ride along” day as part of driver’s ed. Students would go ride with a professional driver for an hour or so. Drivers would learn a lot about how long it takes to stop a truck and what cars do that is dangerous around trucks. There are likely a lot of legal and liability issues with that idea, but if implemented correctly, it might improve our overall safety.

I thought a lot about this last weekend while driving around a 5300lb truck pulling 10,000 pounds of trailer and dirt. It’s the truck driver’s responsibility to be safe, but just in the short time I was driving that rig, there were at least a couple people who were saved from a messy death only because I guessed ahead of time that they were going to do something stupid.

When Tyla asked what I wanted to eat for my birthday dinner, I said “BACON LOG!” It’s been a long time since we’ve made one and sitting outside in the sunshine by a smoker for a few hours seemed like a good way to spend the day. Don got in on the action too and decided to smoke a brisket. He really went all out marinating it for two days and then starting the smoker at midnight. He got up every couple hours to check on it. He also chopped up two grill baskets full of veggies. Thanks Don! While we had all that going, we also cooked up a new batch of hot sauce. This time we did it with all mango instead of including some papaya. Logan dubbed this one “Yellow Fever.” It came out delicious though Logan claims the Agent Orange recipe is better.

There was so much delicious food that day. Thank you to everyone for helping to put it together and for letting me fulfill my dream of making another bacon long!

Happy Birthday to me! More and more things make me feel old. The latest one was this video that went around showing teenagers playing the original Nintendo. It’s hilarious, sad and face-palm at the same time.

Having just switched into a new role at work, I’m keenly aware of the various stages of learning that I’m progressing through. I think it can be broken down into three stages:

1. What? I look at this list of things you want me to do and I have no idea what any of them even mean.
2. How? Ok, now I understand what you’re talking about but I don’t know how to make progress on these tasks.
3. Why? I’m a productive member of the team, but I don’t really understand the history and philosophy of why we’re doing these tasks.

I’d say with my job right now I’m generally in stage 3 (though there are some areas where I’m still borderline 1/2.) Jumping into a brand new group is disconcerting, but it sure feels good to learn new stuff!

There is a site for everything on the internet. It’s nearly impossible to come up with an idea that doesn’t exist already. But I’ve got one and I’m giving it away for free. As best I can tell, there is no good website that has downloadable (either free or for purchase) woodworking plans along with user reviews of the quality of each plan. Think about having a shopping experience like Amazon.com except it’s all woodworking plans. You could have customer submitted images of each project, reviews saying how good or bad each plan is and a catalog that is both browsable and searchable. Creators could upload their plans and get money from people who buy the plans.

There are actually some sites out there that attempt to collect plans but they are ancient at best and generally they’re indistinguishable from spam sites. They’re flooded with dead links.

Why doesn’t this exist? Somebody please take the idea and run with it! All I want in return is a link to the finished site so I can use it.

I don’t remember where I heard it, but somebody once said: “If you lined up all the cars in the world end to end, it would probably be Labor Day.” Technically I guess this holiday is about celebrating unions and the labor movement, but I’ll just enjoy a beer and some meat on the grill.

A while back somebody commented that the emailed receipts from various physical stores feels like a privacy concern because they know your email. Umm… let’s take a step back and think about all the ways that you are being tracked today:

• Do you have a credit/debit card? Each individual store you shop at is able to track all of your purchases through that card. And then on top of that, your credit card company knows a LOT about your personality, your purchasing habits, where you shop, what time of day you’re shopping, and much more. That data all gets aggregated up and most likely is sold off to advertisers etc.
• Do you have a frequent shopper card? Why do you think that the grocery store gives you discounts if you use their frequent shopper card? It’s because they are able to make more money off of you if you know your buying habits. If everyone used their credit card every time they shopped, they wouldn’t need these cards.
• Do you use the internet? Your internet service provider knows everything you do online unless you’ve taken steps to use encrypted sites or a VPN. But even then, almost every website you visit is dropping a tracking cookie onto your computer so they can understand your browsing habits. And have you seen things like the Facebook Like button showing up all over the web? Anytime you even view a page with a Like button, the fact that you saw it is getting sent back to Facebook. Facebook and ad networks have huge amounts of data about what sites you visit.
• Do you walk around? That cell phone in your pocket is a huge tracking beacon. The cell phone company knows where you are at all times because they can tell which cell phone towers you’re connecting to. And when you walk through stores, they can watch for the completely unique WiFi signals that your phone is putting out and then track your path through not just that store but other stores that they are affiliated with.

The list goes on and on and on. You are the product. Companies are buying and selling your information, and thankfully, it’s almost always a benefit to us. We get discounts at stores, cash back on our credit cards, better store layouts, coupons targeted at our interests, and free websites. But if the fact that a company knows your email address creeps you out or you’re paranoid about why ads show up on one site for something you searched for on another site, then you better take a huge step back, educate yoursef and rethink your approach to all aspects of your life. Stop carrying a cell phone. Pay cash for everything. Never sign up for a frequent shopper card. Don’t use the internet. Do those four things and you’re off to a good start (but you’re not even close to done.) You might want to add a tinfoil hat to the list too.

We moved into our neighborhood about three years ago. The neighborhood was built in the 90s, a bunch of families moved in and raised their kids together, and apparently now they are all moving out. Since we moved in, a huge number of our immediate neighbors have sold their houses. Thankfully it wasn’t because of foreclosures or anything like that. I think it’s just a combination of their point in life and the fact that the market in our neighborhood is really hot.

Take a look at this map. The black circle is our house. Red ones have changed hands since we moved in and blue is either up for sale now or will be in the next month.

If you want to be our neighbor, you better be on your game. Almost all of these houses have sold within a few days of being listed and are going for ~10% over the asking price.

I’m thankful that we got in when we did because it looks like a pretty good point in the market history. Our sale price is roughly what it was worth back in the middle of 2005 and now the value is up ~25% back to almost the last peak. It does us very little good since we have no intention of selling, but it’s nice to be on the good end of a real estate investment for once. It gives me hope that down the road when we decide to sell, our good location will continue to make our house an easy sell.

P.S. I’ve been intentionally vague about some of these numbers because it feels a little weird to write about money. But everything here (and more) is public data that you can easily find if you know my address.

I love the idea of solar, but I don’t live in a great part of the country for it. We are one of the sunniest places in the US for 3-4 months of the year and then we switch to one of the most overcast places. A couple years ago, a guy at work did a big solar installation on his house. His monitoring website doesn’t have a password on it, so I check in every once in a while to check out how much money he is saving. Over the two years since he installed it, he has generated 7.51MWh while using 21.9MWh. So he has knocked about a third off his electricity bill saving him roughly $750. I bet he has a LONG way to go to recoup his investment.

I love the idea of solar power, but the technology just isn’t quite there yet if you want to have a quick return on investment. Yes, I know there are other reasons that people do it, and yes I know there are ways you can use it to generate a bigger portion of your usage, but for me, it’s going to be a while before I head that direction. If Tyla and I ever decide to buy some vacation property east of the mountains, I will be revisiting this topic. They get a LOT of sun over there and I could see it being a very useful way to power a vacation home.