Monthly Archives: May 2014

Gardening, Tips

Sprinkler Valve Leaking Water- How I Fixed It

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Since last December I observed my sprinkler valve was leaking water. I went ahead and shut off the isolation valve and kept it off until this weekend to fix it, as we have finally reached the dry season and further procrastination may result in serious plant damages. See the problem video here: (in spoken Chinese)

Thanks to this video below, I was able to clean out the gummy sediment from years of operation: I was glad that valve was still in good shape such that I didn’t have to replace the whole value.

There are different kinds of sprinkler valve, our Lawn Genie closely matches the screw-cap type like the one in this video:

The valve operation among the various vendors are similar. It consists of a diaphragm and a solenoid (the black cylinder that connects to the electrical wire). Without the electricity, the valve is normally shut off. When the electricity is applied, the solenoid pull up the plunger, releasing the water above the diaphragm, allowing the water to go through. Here is a good explanation of how it works.

Lessons learned:
1. Check Youtube/Google the available resources before commencing the repair work. Even if you have done the same repair before, there are always something that can refresh your memory and new tricks others have learned.
2. Keep clear of the work area so that you can place all the parts clearly visible in front of you. I almost lost the tiny plunger rod and had to look for a long time – not cool.

Tips for computer

My Computer Mouse is Possessed (Random Moves and Double Clicks) – How I Fixed It

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For the last two months or so, I experienced a strange phenomenon on my Windows 7 computer. In the middle of my computer session, the computer mouse cursor would randomly move, click and double click as if it’s possessed by ghosts. This happened most often after several sleep/wake-up cycles. It’s normally OK on the first power up.

At first, I thought some malicious Russian Mafia schemes to take over my computer through a virus of sorts. So the first thing I did was to run the anti-virus scan and Microsoft’s Vicious Software Removal Tool. I had no virus.

Then I thought the 7-device powered USB hub may have a data/power initialization issue. So I unplugged the wireless receiver from the USB hub when it happened (I have a Microsoft Arch Touch Mouse). The “possessed” behavior continued. I tried plugging the wireless receiver on a different USB port; it didn’t help. I even unplugged my other tablet mouse. No help.

To make the long story short after trying so many things, I decided there must be mouse driver conflicts among all the USB mouse drivers. I click on the Device Manager (Start -> Computer (Right click and select Property) then click on Device Manager on the left panel. I saw there are 3 “Mice and other pointing devices”: The built-in laptop touch pad (ELAN PS/2 POrt Smart-Pad), Microsoft mouse (Microsoft USB Dual Receiver Wireless Mouse) and the Tablet Mouse (PenPad VisTablet for drawing) (see below).
Mouse devices
I first right click on each of the device driver and click on “Update Driver Software…” and click on “Search automatically for updated driver software”. Windows 7 informed me that all 3 drivers are all up to date. This doesn’t mean that one of the device drivers might have a bug/conflict. So I decided to disable one mouse driver at a time by disabling the “Tablet Mouse” first as it was a recent addition and if I remembered correctly, the problem started when I first got the PenPad VisTablet Mouse.

After disabling the Tablet Mouse, I’m no longer seeing the mouse ghosts. Problem and mystery solved. My computer has been exorcised!

Update: 3/30/15
I recently discovered that the real root cause of the problem is that I kept the laptop cover/screen down while displaying on my 24″ monitor. Somehow, the touch pad is picking up signals from the top of the cover in closed position, as if fingers are touching the touchpad, especially after coming out of “sleep.” All I had to do is the open up the cover/screen and then close it. The touchpad will calibrate itself and no longer pick up the false finger touches from the top of the cover.

Book Reviews

Book Review: “Housing Boom and Bust” by Thomas Sowell

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The housing boom and bust of the last decade was something that I wanted to put behind me. The craziness of the housing boom at the time was unbelievable; anyone could walk in and bid up the house price and walked away with a brand-new mansion without a down payment or employment record. I changed house during that time and was both a victim and beneficiary of that cycle (I sold my old home and bought a home and an overpriced rental property). When this book was introduced to me, I didn’t want to read it or listen to the audiobook until I ran out of audiobooks to listen to. But I thought it would be good to know the diagnosed root causes of the previous housing boom and bust as it appears another housing boom cycle has started in Northern California due to the recent hot high-tech job market in our area.

I did learn something from the book:

I always thought the housing boom was a result of bad banking practice, bad credit rating of the then popular CDS (credit default swap) – a financial derivative. Little did I know that the politicians, in the name of affordable housing “urged” by the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mae lobbyists, contributed to the housing boom and the subsequent bust by forcing banks to loan to high-risk and often minority house buyers. Banks would have survived the crisis by making sound loans without government’s coercive measure to loan to the high-risk house buyers who ended up default on their sub-prime mortgages.

In the name of “slow” development, the communities tend to create a real estate market of increasingly expensive housings. In comparison, cities like Houston, TX, doesn’t have the same issue thanks to the lack of housing restrictions. So it appears the controlled development leads to higher housing prices.

In the last chapter, the author touched on the historical perspectives: it may not be the New Deal that got U.S. out of the depression, rather it’s the World War II that drafted many people out of job market. More mangling by the government may have contributed to more economic shocks. A good example is Canada, which didn’t interfere in the market and escaped from the financial disaster that the U.S. experienced. The author didn’t paint a good picture that history would not repeat itself in the U.S.

This is a good book if you wanted to know about the housing boom and bust cycles and the root causes of the financial melt down of the last decade but be aware of the author’s “right” bias against government regulations and “legal” corruptions.