Welcome! wxexw - Wired by England by Weird - is the dumping ground for all things Will England - photos, videos, and audio of my family and dog, professional geekery, video and photo tips and my slightly tilted opinions. Enjoy your stay, subscribe to the RSS Feed with your favorite feed reader.
You can always contact me at wengland@gmail.com! - Will England
Wednesday, March 13, 2019
Do Members of the US Congress Get Paid For Life?
A report on "Retirement Benefits for Members of Congress," prepared in November by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, outlines how pension benefits are calculated.
The key provision: no member of Congress is eligible for any pension unless he or she has served in Congress for at least five years. (Senators serve six-year terms; House members must seek reelection every two years.)
To collect, a congressman or senator must be age 62, or be at least age 50 with 20 years of service, or be any age with 25 years of service.
Under the most recent pension program, adopted in 1984, the size of a pension is based on the highest three years of a member's salary, the number of years of service and a multiplier, which is 1.7 percent for the first 20 years of service and 1.0 percent for subsequent years.
Here’s an example, using a typical 25-year rank-and-file member who retired this year. The pension would be the sum of two calculations. First, multiply $172,443 [the average salary over the last three years] times 20 years times 0.017. Then, multiply $172,443 times 5 years times 0.01 and add that number to the first calculation. The total: about $67,250 per year.
A three-term congressman (or one-term senator) who has now reached retirement age would be eligible for an annual pension of $17,588 for six years of work. That's generous, but not close to full pay.
Federal law prevents members of Congress from getting full-pay retirement when they leave office. The report says, "By law, the starting amount of a member's retirement annuity may not exceed 80 percent of his or her final salary."
Under the formula, it would take 67 years of service to hit that limit.
So the email saying that members of Congress can "receive full pay retirement after serving one term" is blatantly bogus. It's never full pay and the only one-term members who would be eligible for any pension would be senators.
https://www.politifact.com/ohio/statements/2013/jan/11/chain-email/can-members-congress-retire-full-pay-after-just-on/
And from the horses mouth:
https://www.senate.gov/CRSpubs/ac0d1dd5-7316-4390-87e6-353589586a89.pdf
https://www.senate.gov/CRSpubs/9c14ec69-c4e4-4bd8-8953-f73daa1640e4.pdf
https://www.gao.gov/assets/230/221239.pdf
https://www.cbo.gov/about/careers/benefits
Tuesday, March 12, 2019
The Three Rules
Rule 1 - the Golden Rule. Do unto others as you would have them do to you; corollary, love they neighbor as you love yourself.
Rule2: The Will Rogers rule: "If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all"
Rule 3: The Junkie rule - "Never trust a junkie." Corollary: Everyone's a junkie for something. Food, attention, games, TV, drugs or alcohol.
Thursday, March 07, 2019
My Certified Ironbutt Rides
So, follows are the rides that I got certificates for from the Iron Butt Association:
Extreme Rides:
William England
Overland Park, KS
08/20/05
Honda ST1100 Not Stock - Russell Day Long Seat, Clearview XL screen, 6" Ron Major Dogbone Bar Risers.
1,551 Miles in 24 Hours; KC to Winnipeg, CA and back.
This one never got a write up, and I can't even find the couple of blurry photos I took of the "Welcome to Winnipeg" sign. Not much to say - sit here, twist that, watch rainbows, run WFO on I29 in the dark of the night, get a half a cup of bad coffee at a gas station in Winnipeg, turn around ride home.
Will England
Overland Park, KS
04/06/13
Stock Honda CBR250R
1,030 Miles in state - Trip Report on the SS1K In-State ride
KS-1000
* * * Combined with Tour of Honor Sites - www.tourofhonor.com * * *
Normal Rides:
William England
Overland Park, KS
06/01/02
Honda VFR750, Stock.
1,078 -- Overland Park to Downtown Chicago and Back.
Had to get a Blues Fest T-Shirt for my wife at the time. :-)
Wednesday, March 06, 2019
Saturday, February 23, 2019
How to reset the Maint Required light on the 2005 Scion xB
https://www.scionlife.com/forums/scion-xb-1st-gen-owners-lounge-1602/2004-scion-xb-maintenance-required-light-21507/
The above forum link describes what is going on with the Maint Required light and the blue / red thermometer looking lights.
Assume that they are just on solid - you're due for the 5k service.
To reset on the 2005 Scion Xb, set the trip odometer to 'odo'. Power off car. Press and hold trip odometer reset stalk. Turn car to 'on'. Continue to hold the button down until both lights turn off.
Thanks to the Scion Life forums for this easy solution!
Will England
Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Video Recording Time for the Samsung Galaxy Note 9
So I'm sitting here testing apps and chatting with the wife, so I put the Note 9 on it's Spigen kickstand and have it record the kitchen floor, with the occasional cat or dog wander by. There is apparently no European limit to the recording -- we're at 39 minutes so far -- and no file size limit. I have 128GB on board, and a 256GB chip installed; I think I have the video set to record to the 256 MicroSD chip.
In a nutshell, I haven't found a hard limit to how long you can record with the Samsung Galaxy Note 9; I got bored and shut it down before I hit a limit.
Monday, February 18, 2019
You don't need the brightest flashlight
When you are out camping, especially in durable high impact campgrounds, you will never need a 200 lumen super flashlight. It just fries your night vision and the vision of everyone else around.
"all you really need is a zipper pull-style pinch LED light."
Read more - https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2018/07/26/lets-shine-some-light-on-flashlight-etiquette/
Thanks all,
Will England
Sunday, February 17, 2019
Conecting Windows 10 Laptop to USB connected network drive on an Apple Airport Extreme
Speaking of kids, I rebuilt and lit up a refurbished Windows 10 laptop for my Dear Daughter to use going back and forth to college. We keep all our backups, music, movies etc on a pair of drives connected to the USB port on the Apple Airport Extreme base station.
So, I tried to map the base station shared drives using the typical UNC network protocol (\\10.0.1.1\) in the Explorer bar. No dice. Tried the 'Map Network Drive' button in Explorer. No dice.
Then I got around to searching and found a post in a long-dead thread that mentioned you should install the Airport Utility for Windows . So I did. And while it was installing, I noticed it was also installing Bonjour drivers. Once it completed, I still couldn't connect.
Mapping a drive from the file explorer finally threw a useful error message - the Airport Extreme uses old SMB1 protocol, and that's blocked by default due to old insecure protocols. Well, this is a home network and has nothing sensitive on the shared drives. So, I found that you can enable SMB1 Sharing Protocol in Windows 10 by running '
optionalfeatures.exe'.Hit Windows Key and R for 'Run Program' and run
optionalfeatures.exe.From there you get a nice dialog box with everything you can, and cannot enable. SMB1 is disabled. Enable it. Restart the PC.
Now, from Explorer, you can connect to a Network Share or Map a Network Drive. Easy, eh?
-- Will England
Friday, February 15, 2019
Will England on Tumblr
Now I'm back with Analytics stuff going out there. You can find me at Will England on Tumblr
and everywhere else to find Will England too!
Enjoy, be excellent to each other and be present!
-- Will England
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Snow, Ice anda dopey dog
During the summer, his favorite treat wa an ice cube fresh from the tray. Kerrunch, nom-nom-nom! I doubt it was good for his teeth, but he certainly enjoyed them!
Surprisingly I captured a few on video with the cell phones:
Thursday, January 10, 2019
Buttons and turning on the AKG Y50BT
| AKG Y50BT Headphones |
On the Left earpiece is a MicroUSB B port to charge the phones.That's it.
On the Right earpiece are all the buttons. Starting from the top:
- Button labeled '+' - increase volume
- Black button with a dot - One press for pause, / play two presses for track forward, three presses for track backward. And they mean *quick* taps.
- 3.5mm hole - to plug in the headphones for a non-bluetooth experience.
- Black unlabeled button - power on, power off, pair.
- To power on the headphones rapidly tap one time the unlabeled button.
- Fast flashing blue light indicates it's on, and unpaired
- Slow flashing blue light indicates it's on and paired.
- Slow flashing red light indicates low battery.
- Black button looking thing - not a button but the microphone!
Saturday, January 05, 2019
Netflix not working with OpenDNS / Cicso Umbrella?
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| Blocked Netflix Content Domains by OpenDNS |
It's quite simple to resolve when Netflix won't play because of OpenDNS filtering - go into your Umbrella control panel and whitelist:
- services.wmdrm.windowsmedia.com (the Silverlight player)
- netflix.com (just in case)
- nflxvideo.net (their content distribution network)
- nflximg.net (more of their content network)
Friday, December 21, 2018
Lg’s Flagship Phone Is A Media Forward Device - Sprint Product Ambassadors
Saturday, November 17, 2018
LG V40 ThinQ Triple Shot Demonstration - Sprint Product Ambassadors

Wednesday, October 17, 2018
Mac OS X 10.14 Mojave Problems and Solutions
First, what to look for - MacWorld.co.uk has a great overview of Mojave.
SoftwareHow.com has some solid tips on the most common problems and resolutions for them in Mojave.
Ensure your Mac is backed up, and you have updated all your applications. Also, after the update, update your apps again, as there may be new versions just for Mojave.
Fortunately, there doesn't seem to be as many issues as previous updates. Once the backup is done I'll be installing the 10.14 Mojave update.
Sunday, October 07, 2018
On Riding
Stolen from so many sources I can't even give proper attribution -
"Riding a motorcycle doesen't call to everyone. It carries a level of risk that is an anathema to most. It demands a level of competence, a degree of engagement that is unusual in today's society. Like an old craft, the skills and the wisdom necessary to be successful at it don't come quickly, but emerge slowly, over time. Most people today simply don't have the patience or the inclination to deal with that sort of thing.
But for those of us who do, to that tiny minority who are drawn to it, the rewards are immeasureable. For us, riding imbues life itself with color, tinges it with adventure. It connects us to a time when people weren't perhaps quite so shy about how they lived. A time when everything wasn't a careful, exacting calculus of risk and reward. A bolder time when a fear of getting hurt didn't stand as an impenetrable shield to the simple enjoyment of life.
So, yeah, those of us who ride are deffinitely different. But it's a good difference. We carry something that once was common but now is rare. Something of the distilled essence of what got us all here.
We're the last wolves, in a land of sheep." — with Will Rutland.
Friday, September 28, 2018
My favorite GPS error, Somewhere in the Texas Hill Country
Where? There may have been a road there 10, 20 50 years ago but there sure isn't one there now!
-- Will England
Tuesday, September 04, 2018
LG G7 ThinQ Concert Recording - Fantastic -- Sprint Product Ambassadors
Saturday, September 01, 2018
2011 Ducati Diavel Key Fob Battery
Battery died in the proximity sensor key fob for the wife's Ducati Diavel. We (I) being cheap, order some generic batteries. Never worked. Used the PIN code to ride it around for a while, then heard a tip - use *Energizer* brand batteries in the key fob and it will work.
Well guess what? It worked. One $3 Energizer CR2032 battery later and the 2011 Ducati Diavel starts just like it's supposed to!
- Will England
Thursday, August 30, 2018
LG G7 ThinQ Live Sound
Shot two videos of the marching show at halftime - one on the T3i with the Senheiser mic and one on the LG G7 ThinQ phone. Listening to the LG right now in the car a *whoa *! Seriously solid sound. Will have to wait till I get home to upload the video but another home run for LG!
-- Will England
#sprintemployee
Monday, August 27, 2018
Thursday, August 23, 2018
Samsung Note 9 vs Samsung Note 8 Side by Side
Take a look at the Note 9 vs the Note 8 side by side!
![]() |
| Note 8 beside the Note 9, front side. |
Not any real physical difference in size. Haven't activated it or done anything yet. But it's still the same (large) size as the Note 8!
(Shot on the Moto Z3 Play stock camera)
- Will England
Wednesday, August 22, 2018
MotoZ3 Play and MotoMods - Sprint Product Ambassadors
Quite simple actually - line up the gold studs on the phone with the studs on the mod and the magnets will pull them together easily. Watch and see!
We'll check out the Hasselblad camera more later - but MotoMods are an exciting and fun part of the new Moto Z3 Play!
- Will England
The Product Ambassadors are Sprint employees from many different parts of the company that love technology. They volunteer to test out all sorts of Sprint devices and offer opinions freely to the Community. Each Product Ambassador shares their own opinions of these devices, therefore the information in this post does not necessarily reflect the opinions of Sprint. The PA's do not represent the company in an official way, and should not be expected to respond to Community members in an official capacity. #sprintemployee
Tuesday, August 21, 2018
Moto Z3 Play - Adding a Memory Card or Changing SIM card - Sprint Product Ambassadors
Monday, August 20, 2018
Moto Z3 Play Unboxing - Sprint Product Ambassadors
Looks promising! Stay tuned for more on the Moto Z3 Play!
-- Will England
The Product Ambassadors are Sprint employees from many different parts of the company that love technology. They volunteer to test out all sorts of Sprint devices and offer opinions freely to the Community. Each Product Ambassador shares their own opinions of these devices, therefore the information in this post does not necessarily reflect the opinions of Sprint. The PA's do not represent the company in an official way, and should not be expected to respond to Community members in an official capacity. #sprintemployee
Earning Boy Scout Merit Badges with Schoolwork
Personal Fitness - Gym class;
Sports - if you're in two team sports;
Art - 2D art, painting etc;
American Business - typically 7th or 8th grade Social Studies;
American Heritage - US History;
Animation - Some High Schools have Art Animation courses;
Chemistry - Chemistry;
Communication - Speech, Debate class;
Drafting - CAD class;
Electronics - Robotics class / club;
Entrepreneurship - Various business classes;
Geology - Earth Science class;
Graphic Arts- Art class;
Insect Study - Biology class;
Inventing - Business class AND robotics club;
Journalism - Journalism class;
Law - Various Social Studies classes;
Metalwork - Metal shop class
Moviemaking - Videography / Journalism class;
Music - Choir, Band;
Nature - Biology, Earth Science;
Painting - Art - Painting class;
Photography - Photography, Journalism classes;
Personal Management - use your lunch account as your budget;
Plant Science - Biology class;
Pottery - Art Ceramics class;
Public Speaking - Debate, Speech class, Student Congress, StuCo membership, Boys State participation;
Robotics - Robotics class or club;
Sculpture - Art Sculpture class;
Soil and Water Conservation - Earth Science;
Theater - Drama class or club;
Welding - Metal Shop class;
Woodwork - Wood shop class
Scouting Magazine gives a few more tips on using your school course work toward merit badges in their August 20 blog post.
I hope this helps give you and your scout some ideas to rock out those merit badges!
- Will England
Saturday, August 18, 2018
LG G7 ThinQ Final Review - Sprint Product Ambassadors
Yes, there's some quirks - it features a dedicated Google Assistant button, which doesn't do a whole lot just yet. It's still nice to have a button instead of barking "OK Google" to get it to respond to the normal lot of Google commands. The battery life is fair, lasting me a whole day, but it could be better. The photos are clear and crisp, but at full zoom they're a bit over-sharpened.
The phone fits cleanly in my hand even with a serious Spigen case installed, and the tall 18:9 display gives my old eyes an easy view. Fingerprint unlock works flawlessly and the centered rear reader is in just the right place. The narrower device allows me to work easily across the whole screen without shifting the phone in my hand and risking dropping it. (I'm looking at you, Samsung Note).
Sunday, August 05, 2018
Another New Website - willengland.com
Nice layout and look and feel; relatively easy to build on if you're used to contextual menus. Their new Blog tool reminds me of the LinkedIN article editor.
Next steps could be an eCommerce shop to sell something; link to a photo sales site for photo shoots etc. Who knows? More of a test bed for bigger accounts like the Shawnee Mission West Band and W&N Photography, and get my hands around using it for what the kids call a 'side hustle' these days (and back in the day too).
Post your feedback in the comments - always looking for constructive feedback!
- Will England
LG G7 ThinQ Swipe to Search Personal Content - Sprint Product Ambassadors







