User:Greg L/Sewer cover in front of Greg L’s house

The sewer cover in front of Greg L’s house, (these things are also known as manhole covers), is an access port that is pried out of a special receptacle known as a ring or riser ring. Sewer covers are typically found in roads—sometimes sidewalks—and permit access to the sewer below.

This sewer cover was manufactured in Mead, Washington, U.S.A.

This isn’t just any sewer cover though, it is the sewer cover in front of Greg L’s house Greg L made a living in the typography, page layout, and flexography industries before becoming an R&D engineer in the fuel cell and electrical utility industries. As an engineer, he wrote many white papers, assembly instructions for production lines, marketing brochures, and safety compliance certifications (such as IEC, UL, and the CSA). Most important of all, he wrote lots of reports for managers, and in doing so, learned that to avoid “losing” them, one doesn’t bombard them with too much information: succinct sentences; lots of white space.

Greg L believes that links within Wikipedia articles should always be topical and germane. Properly chosen links anticipate what the readership of any given article would likely be interested in further reading. As such, judiciously selected links invite exploration and learning. Greg L believes that in many cases, a reader’s reaction should be “Cool… I didn’t expect they’d have an article on that too!”&thinsp; When links are judiciously employed in articles, they become more interesting and effective. This isn’t accomplished when articles are over-linked. The litmus test should not be “if an article can be linked to, then link to it”&thinsp; (I link, therefore I am). When editors do so, Wikipedia becomes a big, blue intra-hyperlinked monstrosity that is boring.

The only good exception to this is when links are employed for comedic effect or to illustrate a point—as has been done in this essay. For instance, do you have the balls to click this link? at a latitude of 47°&thinsp;38′&thinsp;9.02″ and an elevation of 2091 feet (637 m) (WGS 84 reference ellipsoid). The picture at right shows exactly what it looked like on October 1, 2008. I Don’t Like It [ Citation Needed ] I'm in 7th grade & know EVERYTHING

Given that en.Wikipedia has Big articles—hundreds of which are nothing but date-related trivia—plus many more articles on Wiktionary, the number of articles editors can link to, and the possibilities in which they can be combined, is now astronomical. Now, here is yet another piece of trivia that editors can link to. Go ape shit! Become the first editor on your block to link here!

“Why,” you might ask? Because it can be linked to. How many links can you add to your articles?

Angela Lansbury was born on October 16, 1925. Click on that date and year and read both articles. Fully. I know; it’s a lot of trivia to wade through. Leave a note on my talk page if you really&thinsp; read both of them in their entirety (no skimming now…) and tell me of your accomplishment. If you read both the October 1 and 2008 articles in their entirety (the date this article’s photograph was taken), Greg L will award you your very own “Sewer Cover Barnstar”&thinsp; to show off on your talk page. Your Sewer Cover Barnstar&thinsp; will show the world that you can read anything, don’t even know the meaning of attention deficit disorder, laugh in the face of boredom, and are wasting your talents if you don’t become a patent examiner.

If you find the prospect of reading four articles of pure trivia that was seemingly the product of Professor Marvel’s crystal ball (Oct. 1, Oct. 16, 1925, and 2008) to be torturous, you might consider not linking dates in your articles since one can’t expect any reasonable portion of our visiting readership to do so either. After all, why link to date articles if you can’t even stomach reading two whole dates yourself? If, however, you are a recipient of a Sewer Cover Barnstar, you go right ahead and keep on linking to dates; we’ll understand.

Recipients
The following, as of July 29, 2024 at (UTC), is a complete list of the Wikipedians who have been awarded the Sewer Cover Barnstar:


 * 1) John (not for reading four trivia articles, but because he was the first to link here and because he values the judicious use of links.)
 * 2) Army1987 was awarded here on  7 November 2008 because he actually accepted this challenge and gutted it out. Congratulations! And thanks for the attention to detail in your many edits, like these, to improve three of the four articles.
 * 3) Arthur Rubin was awarded here on 2008 November 8. Not only did he read all four articles, but he took the time to revise the 1925 article. Any improvement, can be nothing but good.
 * 4) Dravecky was awarded here on 2008 -11-10. And he also took time to make improvements like this. Thanks.
 * 5) Graham87 was awarded here on 19 November 2008. He really and truly enjoys to read these articles. Hats off to Graham.
 * 6) Ntsimp was awarded here on 30 November 2008. Likes trivia (that much is clear).
 * 7) BigDunc was awarded here on January 28, 2009. While reading the 1925 article, he pointed out about Meher Baba. What a character! (not Meher Baba). Thanks BigDunc.
 * 8) Benjiboi was awarded here on February 9, 2009. When telling me of his accomplishment, he wrote [doing the challenge] reminds me of an episode of Will & Grace when Will, looking at rather eclectic decor in an apartment of a rather unstable neighbor states "Now we know who's buying everything on eBay."
 * 9) VernoWhitney was awarded here on May 24, 2010. Thanks Verno, for the kind words you had when telling me of your accomplishment (∆ here), where you wrote I think that your page might very well be the most interesting essay, or whatever you want to call it, that I've come across on Wikipedia.
 * 10) JPxG was, on May 10 and May 11, 2021 awarded the the Sewer Cover Barnstar, here for his herculean copyediting on the 2008 article. He laughs in the face of boredom. Greg L (talk) 04:43, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

Trivia

 * The sewer cover in front of Greg L's house was cast by Inland Foundry Company, 11426 North Market Street, Mead, Washington, USA.
 * In April 2004, a Michigan company, East Jordan Ironworks (est. 1883), bought the foundry's name and sales operation and locked up all of its production.
 * The sewer cover in front of Greg L's house was installed only 54924 ft from the factory that cast it.
 * The “IFCO DUC” legend on the sewer cover denotes the manufacturer (Inland Foundry Company) and also that it is made of ductile iron, as opposed to gray iron. In ductile iron, the graphite is in the form of spherical nodules rather than flakes, thus inhibiting the creation of cracks and providing the enhanced ductility that gives the alloy its name.
 * This sewer cover has a diameter of 664 mm.