Broken Lawnmower

Spring has finally arrived here in the Great White North. Time to give the lawn a trim (it’s looking pretty bad because it was getting kind of long last fall and then, all of a sudden, it was covered by snow). My wife pulled out the lawn mower and tried to start it. After sitting all winter, it didn’t want to start. I thought that it was about time it had some TLC. I’m not the most mechanical of people, but I can pull spark plugs and check filters. Working on the lawn mower on the garage floor wasn’t something my aching back and knees really wanted to do, but there wasn’t anywhere else to work on it (perhaps the kitchen table? No, I don’t think my wife would be too happy about that). A workbench in the garage! That’s what I need. I had some particle board and 2×4’s left over from a shelving project I did last fall, so I had most of what I needed. A few hours with a saw and drill, and I had a perfectly workable workbench. Well, now I was inspired. A quick trip to the hardware store, and I put up some pegboard behind the bench. Finally, a place to organize all of those ‘big’ tools that don’t fit in my electronic toolbox. I knew it was time to stop when I was seriously contemplating tracing out the tool outlines on the pegboard.

Contesting

It’s time once again for the CQ WW WPX ham radio contest. I like to participate in contests just to get a few more callsigns in my logbook. However, this time, I’m not sure I’m going to get much chance. We’re picking up a new puppy tonight, and I think spare time is going to be a rare commodity over the next little while. I’ll have to squeeze a few contacts in just so I can say I participated. I’ll post some puppy pictures in my moblog tonight.

Google Pays For Settlement With Adsense?

Google has announced a proposed settlement to settle claims of click-fraud. The part of the settlement that concerns me is that the $90 million isn’t to be paid out in cash – it’s to be paid out in advertizing credits. I haven’t seen any online commentary about the impact to Adsense subscribers. Imagine if Google decides to provide the $90 million in advertizing using their Adsense program. What if they decide to pay out to the Adsense subscribers (the people who actually display those context-sensitive ads) much lower than the going rate for theat ad? They could even pay zero (like a Public Service Ad), and the Adsense subscriber couldn’t do anything about it. They probably wouldn’t even know!