At $52, it’s a lot more expensive than other alternatives.  However, for my situation it was ideal.  I’m in Colorado, but I needed the aluminum to be in Oregon.  I was able to get it there overnight for $56.  If I’d purchased it locally and shipped it myself, it would  have cost more than that.

I don’t even know what software was trying to start; I don’t think it was related to the browser. I clicked on the Details expander, and it expanded to show this:

It would have been nice if the responsible program could have at least put its name in the dialog somewhere.

“Man, I have suffered through illness caused by your brutality and persecution. I have run from your bruising foot and taken refuge here, for dust and ashes are gentler than man’s heart, these ruins ruins less melancholy than the soul of man. Be gone, you intruder from the world of misrule and injustice.

I am a miserable creature who served the son of Adam with faith and loyalty. I was man’s faithful companion. I guarded him day and night. I grieved during his absence and welcomed him with joy upon his return. I was contented with the crumbs that fell from his board, and happy with the bones that his teeth had stripped. But when I grew old and ill, he drove me from his home and left me to merciless boys of the alleys.

“Oh son of Adam, I see the similarity between me and your fellow men when age disables them. There are soldiers who fought for their country when they were in the prime of life, and who later tilled its soil. But now that the winter of their life has come and they are useful no longer, they are cast aside.

“I also see a resemblance between my lot and that of a woman who, during the days of her lovely maidenhood enlivened the heart of a young man; and who then, as a mother, devoted her life to her children. But now, grows old, she is ignored and avoided. How oppressive you are, son of Adam, and how cruel!”

Thus spoke the speechless animal whom my heart had understood.
author unknown

I inquired on a mailing list, and people suggested various vendors. Two people suggested McMaster-Carr, and they had the screws I wanted in packages of 50 or 100, at reasonable prices, so I ordered from them.

Some other suggestions were:

• Bruce Watkins Supply, Wilmington, NC
• Nuts to You Fasteners, Fremont, CA
• Olander Company, Sunnyvale, CA
• Small Parts Inc., Miami Lakes, FL
• Specialty Tool and Bolt, Santa Barbara, CA
• Tacoma Screw Products, Tacoma, WA

Vendors offering small quantities don’t seem to have done a good job of designing their online catalogs such that Google can index them.

I think we all agree, the past is over.
This is still a dangerous world.
It’s a world of madmen and uncertainty
and potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked
Is our children learning?
Will the highways of the Internet become more few?
How many hands have I shaked?

They misunderestimate me.
I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.
I know that the human being and the fish can coexist.
Families is where our nation finds hope, where our wings take dream.

Put food on your family!
Knock down the tollbooth!
Vulcanize society!
Make the pie higher! Make the pie higher!

[Poem compiled from actual G.W. Bush quotes by Washington Post writer Richard Thompson]

This reminds me of a story, a cautionary tale. When Crump Electronics went out of buisness a buddy called and said “lets go get some resistors”. “I bet we can get 100 of every value, won’t that be cool”. So we went down and looked at what was there and talked with Dabney Crump. He said he wasn’t interested in pulling resistors and that was that or so I thought. My buddy went back and asked if he could pull the resistors himself. The answer was “I will sell you all I got for $400!”. Well some deals are too good to be true and this was one.

Three FULL SIZED PICKUP LOADS of boxes latter, my buddy’s living room was super insulated with TWO layers, floor-to-ceiling stacks of boxes around the entire perimeter. You had to crawl over the back of the couch to watch TV, there was NO room on the side. Each box was filled with 6 to 8 (memory has kindly faded) qty 5000 spools of resistors and there were 100s of boxes, we estimated someting like 2 to 3 MILLION resistors! I felt sorry for the guy, gave him $200 and said I would take 1/2. Oh boy!!!! The peice part price was good – holy crap.

I spent that winter reeling off spools of resistors and loading them into my Camry and hauling them home. At home I made 8 boxes. Five had 3′ off each spool unless they were duplicates – we had LOTS of duplicates (see below). One had 6′ off each spool (my box)and two got the remainder. When done I had two copier paper boxes full of taped resistors, (no spools) for my self, 5 single boxes of resistors to give away or sell and two piles of crap to try to dump. In addition, I heated my house that winter by burning the spools and boxes and resistors that would no longer stay on the tapes and were not worth the plastic bag to put them in.

I sold all five boxes for $35 to friends for a total of $175. I donated one pile of crap to Arapahoe Community College and deducted $0.0025 per resistor neting me ~$25 – $30 back on my income taxes. Its nice when Uncle gives you a break even proposition. I gave the rest away to a ham radio club where there are even bigger pack-rats than myself.

Now for the best part – Rich I include this especially for you. As I mentioned it was winter, I was driving a Camry and I had boxes of resistors packed into every square inch. As it turns out, Crump had garnered a corner on 470K 1/4W resistors. Memory is not so good here, probably blocked by some unconsious agony, but there where atleast 5 boxes of spools of 470Ks (That may have been just my cut after separation and trips to the dumpster). One day with my car full of 470K, honest officer, these are resistors, I was driving home up 285 when a NASTY snow storm blew up. Front wheel drive, I was doing OK until some Yahoo stopped. That was it, I was stuck like a hog-on-ice – not too far from the truth. The guy behind me pulled up real nice and close so I couldn’t back up. I finally got out and told him he hadn’t left me enough room to back up and I couldn’t put my chains on, he would have to push me so I could get to the outer lane, which was not being used so I could get my chains on. He grumbled something, I said I had no place to go, we could wait for spring, and he pushed (revenge is a dish best served cold – and it was COLD with the added indignity of wet).

Just after I pulled over and was trying to figure how I was going to get my chains out, buried under TONS of 470K, the snow plow went by dropping sand. I no longer needed my chains but was still stuck on the ice in the unplowed lane. I could back up so I could get a little angle on the gradient but not enough to get ANY traction – you couldn’t even walk on this S&%T it was so slippery. In blinding inspiration, I laid a track of 470Ks from my front tires to the sandy part of the road, waited for a break in traffic and charged, worked like a charm, I always carry a couple rolls of 470Ks in the back just in case. I imaginethe next snow plow pushed the whole mess into the ditch where that summer some hiker or road paving crew found them muttering “What the F^&K are these and what are they doing here!?!?!”. Well I do live a rich fantasy life, but the story is true as I live and breathe and I bet if you walk up the right hand side of 285 you can still find remnants of my escape.

Scot