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Fixing Potholes

I read a great Milwaukee Record article titled Mandatory Milwaukee: Potholes! and learned about the MKE Mobile Action app which allows you to submit a pothole to the city! So of course that’s what I did…

I walked down to Lisbon Avenue which is about a block from my house, and a road I drive on every day, and snapped a photo of the first pothole I came across. Tap, Tap, Tap… Submitted!

And hey, I can use the app to check the status of the submission, or this URL to publicstuff.com. I submitted it this morning and when I checked on it this afternoon it was marked as received.

According to Milwaukee Record this is what the Department of Public Works (DPW) has to say:

“We currently have four crews city-wide working on potholes. That number will increase to six in March. That is the time of year we see the most potholes because of thawing. Yesterday [Monday, January 29], we received 48 pothole requests and we are basically caught up with requests. Our current response time is 1-3 days. In the cold months we use cold patch. Once about April hits, we have hot mix available which is more flexible and stronger.”

I’m excited to see when it gets resolved, which is why I am posting this now. There’s this thing where it’s really easy to complain about something, but it might take actual work to do something about it. This seems like a pretty easy thing to do to improve the city… if it works.

Check this out… you can view the map and see other issues submitted. I feel like if you got your neighbors together and all submitted the same issue (like potholes on your street) they might even get dealt with quicker… who knows?

The mobile app (and web site) does have all sorts of other city services you can request or check on, so if you live in Milwaukee (or a city that has this app) install it and give it a try. I figure the worse thing is you might waste a bit of time setting up an account and submitting an issue, but hey… I still have some hope left in this world!

Update: Holy Wow it’s fixed! On the same day… But wait!

I drove home around 5:15pm and noticed the street, and it looked like it was filled in. It was. I walked over to get a photo of it and on the way home ran into some neighbors. I told them I submitted it this morning and my neighbor said she saw a crew out there around 10am. That is 3 hours after I submitted it. Yeah, this works. Go at it, people!

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Printmaking Registration Pins

Here are my pins and tabs used for registration of multi-color relief prints. They are heavily inspired by the Ternes Burton system, and I’ve found a similar design on Thingiverse but as usual, these are mine.

Print at least two pins and then as many tabs as you need to do a print run.

When printed the tabs should fit tight into the pins. This is by design. Depending on your printer the tolerance may or may not make a good fit. I print the tabs and then if they are too tight I just give them a very small swipe inside the hole with an X-ACTO blade.

Once shaved down the tab should fit the pins slightly tightly but not too tightly, and not too loosely obviously. Welcome to 3D Printing!

If you need a quick tutorial on how to use these check out How to get perfect registration with Ternes Burton pins.

With my latest batch of handmade paper the blue painters tape I use tends to pull up a lot of the paper when removing it, but the typical printmaking paper you can buy (this is some Strathmore paper) holds up just fine.

You can get the STL and .scad files from Printables.com – Printmaking Registration Pins. Note: These are very thin prints! I printed mine at 0.1 layer height. But hey, print them if you need them!

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Pizza Steel – First Attempt

I got a pizza steel. It’s a 16″ x 16″ x 1/4″ thick piece of steel for baking pizzas on. I thought about getting one nearly a year ago. put it off, told Dana it would be a good Xmas gift, then told her not to get one, then thought about it again, then got convinced by a friend to get one, and here we are.

I was originally turned off by the thought of having to heat it in the kitchen oven for 45 to 60 minutes, but damn… I just made some pizzas and yes, yes, it was totally worth it!

I ended up getting a Thermichef 1/4″ Deluxe Version, 16″x16″. (Okay, I actually got a Factory 2nd item, which was $10 cheaper, but same thing. Supposedly it has some blemishes but I didn’t notice.) The one mistake I made was that I should have maybe got a 16″ x 14″ because the 16″ depth sort of makes it ride up on the angled back part of the oven rack. Not a huge deal I guess. And damn, that things is heavy!

I had planned on screwing around with it over the weekend but honestly I could not wait. I had dough I put in the freezer about two weeks ago, and I put it in the fridge before I went to work, then put it on the counter when I got home for about 45 minutes while the oven heated up. I had grabbed some cornmeal at The Outpost (as I could not find semolina flour) but didn’t use it because someone recommended parchment paper. I should also note I don’t have a pizza peel. The parchment paper worked well. I just made the pizza on the paper then slid it (from a cutting board) onto the steel.

I’ve since read a tip that you can bake on parchment paper for a few minutes then pull it out so the pizza is directly on the steel. I may try that next time. The parchment paper makes “Launching” the pizza onto the steel easy, especially if you don’t have a peel.

Oh, I divided the dough into three small crusts, one Dana and I ate, one I ate, and one I packed for my lunch the next day. I should also note that Dana declared it the best crust made in this house that she ever tasted. (And she can be pretty particular about her crusts!) And yes I threw these together quick and haphazardly so they are not beautiful looking.

I was able to grab the parchment paper to pull the pizza out when done as well, so that was all good. I still need to figure out exact baking times. I did about 4 minutes, then turned the oven to broil on high for another few minutes.

And the results? Damn, that crust was the best I’ve ever made, and I’ve been making pizza crust at home for nearly 20 years. Seriously, it was good. Why the hell did I put this off for so long!? I’ve been reading The Elements of Pizza: Unlocking the Secrets to World-Class Pies at Home and there are a ton of tips and tricks for better dough/crust, but my regular old recipe on a pizza steel turned out amazing.

And I mean, I’m not done… I still have a lot to learn, and a lot more experiments, but I had no idea my first attempt would turn out so well. Cheers!

Just one more note about the photo above. The cutting board was a gift from my dear friend Maks and the pizza cutter was given to Dana from the husband of a colleague who turned the handle on his lathe. Neat!

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Pen Holder Assembly Jig

I designed a Pen Holder for Brown Dog Gadgets Rover project. When we were prototyping it was easy to make one. I would just 3D print the part and then carefully hold a 3mm hex nut in place with some small forceps and tighten the 3mm bolt until it drew the nut up into the hex-shaped cavity…

When it was decided we needed to print and assemble a lot of them I had to find a better/faster way to do it. Obviously the answer was a jig. So here’s what I came up with.

The jig is basically a little stand with an arm going straight out at 90 degrees. This is the sort of thing where it’s silly to print it all in one piece and mess around with supports when a single screw will do the job.

With the jig assembled we are ready to put together a Pen Holder. You also need a 3mm bolt, and a 3mm hex nut…

You place the hex nut into the hex-shaped pocket on the arm of the jig…

And then you slide the Pen Holder into the base all the way. It will be aligned wit the hex nut and ready for the next step…

Add the screw and turn it a bit with your fingers to get it started…

Then grab a screwdriver and start screwing around… and around…

The hex nut will lift up and insert into the hex-shaped cavity on the Pen Holder…

You then lift the Pen Holder (which now has a screw sticking into the hole in the center) straight up and pull it out of the jig. So far it’s the best solution we’ve come up with for quickly (and easily) assembling these Pen Holders.

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The Clash of the Hats

Once I was driving around Milwaukee with Aaron Cometbus and Richie Bucher (Buggerall, Jüke, Soup, The Wynona Riders, etc.), and we were talking about The Clash, and one of them mentioned how the band had sort of a “style guide” as it were, and there was a point when they decided they would not be photographed wearing hats.

It’s one of those things that stuck with me all these years. I don’t know why. Maybe because it sounded sort of ridiculous, but also potentially true. (If you’ve been in a band, or worked with other people in a creative endeavor, maybe it makes more sense?)

I guess I never really noticed any members of The Clash wearing a hat in any photos, but since it’s 2024 and it has been nearly 30 years, I thought I should do some research. I ended up reading about Pen­nie Smith, the photographer who traveled with The Clash and took the iconic photo of Paul Simonon seen on the cover of London Calling.

Besides finding a photo of Joe Strummer wearing a hat, there’s a mention of the band going to thrift stores and buying hats! This doesn’t completely discount the idea that the band (at some point) was completely against wearing hats, so I’m still going to remember this story fondly.

Pennie Smith also took photos of the band wearing hats…

Also, if you were not aware, Richie was here in Milwaukee because he received a basketball scholarship to UMW. [sic]

Cut me a fat slice, sir!