In the run-up to the 2012 presidential elections, my dad sent this “journal” entry to me in the form of a Word doc on November 1, 2012. Here’s his preface:
In the meantime between waiting for elections and storms of the century to pass by, we entertain ourselves and others the best we can with the limited resources we have at our disposal. To that end I am attaching the initial rough draft, first chapter for a loosely connected, somewhat deranged, writings called ‘Dan’s Jobs’. It was somewhat inspired by a picture I happened to notice illustrating the Steve Jobs monolithic and minimalistic, ship he had made for himself (Venus). It seemed like the standard, over-the-top kind of thing that wealth often leads to at first. Upon closer scrutiny it was all about ‘aluminum overcasting’. The technique is used to make something from aluminum (cast the metal larger than it needs to be) that eventually machined down to the proper specifcications but maintains the stronger than necessary nature of the design. All I can say is enjoy life and ‘overcast’ when ever and where ever poissible.
Below is the Journal, titled “Dan’s Jobs”
Dan’s Jobs
Inspired by Steve Jobs and the giant yacht he built name ‘Venus’, I have decided to begin another chapter in my own life. These pages of future life that I will fill in the blanks and holes with will be born and raised between the Microsoft Word software and the ‘Angry Whooper’ ads displayed by one of the more ‘meaty’ fast-food places in Amerika.
My new journal (working title – Dan’s Jobs) will be filled with humor and wry anecdotes. There will be clever combinations of historical irony and future predictions. It will be a warm, sometimes critical, but always entertaining monologue about the world around myself and others that are found clamoring, clinging, gyrating uselessly in the flotsam of cosmic hilarity.
Below is a picture of Steve Job’s yacht named ‘Venus’ and a child’s, vintage, all-aluminum tricycle. Steve paid vast sums of money to have Venus built from pure Aluminum and Plexiglas(unfortunately, Steve did not live long enough to see the christening of his gleaming white princess of the seas – an irony in the author’s mind and a prime candidate to be one of the very first ironies to be recorded here in Dan’s Jobs).
100% Aluminum (Overcast) tricycle (early Steve Job’s knock-off)
Steve Jobs All-Aluminum Motor Yacht (Venus)
Two pictures of very different results of the manufacturing technique of ‘aluminum over-casting’. In this first of many somewhat humorous and ironic comparisons to be found here in the Dan’s Jobs Journal, one can see a markedly dissimilar result of engineering disparity. For the reader’s convenience I have arranged the images in chronological order. The all-aluminum tricycle was invented first, then the 256 foot long, all-aluminum Steve Jobs yacht – Venus.
One might ask…”so Dan, what’s the big deal? I mean, the man with more money than god builds a god-awful, big white floating thing out of pure aluminum and Plexiglas. So what. And what’s the comparison between that and the dinky, little child’s all-aluminum tricycle? Well, I was going to make that leap in logic right now. The whole point of this comparison and why, in fact, I am even putting crap like this in my Dan’s Jobs journal is simply this – ” technique “. The methodology employed to create both of these man-made objects can be stated in one or two words, depending on how you spell it –
Aluminum-Overcast
Below is the artist’s depiction of what the aluminum-overcast method is really all about – Big Tits!
Aluminum Overcast – the Tools, the Technology, and the Trivia
This concludes the first chapter of Dan’ Jobs. The story continues tomorrow and the next day ‘ad infinitum rectus’ (forever-up-your-ass). So, until we meet again – as they say in Bengazi, Switzerland, “Don’t forget to tie up that ass, take the money, and RUN!”.
