Category: Uncategorized

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I See Pavement

That’s ridiculous.

This was certainly a Monday. I haven’t really had one of your “I hate Monday” Mondays in a while. Today kind of made up for it. I upgraded some software on some servers in one of America’s Finest Almost As Good As Dysfunctional Cities last weekend and the ease of the install was balanced by the problems surfacing today.

Things started broken and the love just flowed from there. Not simple catching up from the weekend problems either. A copier here, a balky DVD driver there, the emails back and forth with Mr. Boss, you’d think things were going badly.

The day went as long as you would imagine after all that bullshit. But my day was beautiful and relaxing compared to Mrs. Toyota Highlander driving in front of me this afternoon. We were headed up through the twisty bits, past the fire station in Pinyon through the evening shadows. I hated the low light and the tight formation in front and behind but she seemed bored. The slow left sweep was easy enough, but didn’t seem to warrant even her steering input. Not left, straight.

The result was not the obvious falling into the abyss moment, but more moon buggy action over rocks and low manzanita. She corrected and stayed out of, well, being dead. No airbag deployment, but she was fully shaken. As her fun house ride took her 60 degrees from vertical at one point, I saw an Allstate commercial playing out in slow motion in front of me. She hooked a wheel on a tree which righted her and left me with room to slow to a stop. She looked fine, but I was in no mood to stop and confirm. I think I recovered from my own heart attack about five miles later.

Four miles after that, I informed the fine folks at the Garner Valley fire station. Aw, too close to Pinyon. They weren’t worried, so I wasn’t either.

Houseblogging? Not today since I got back to my little alpine nirvana well after dark. More tomorrow, I hope.

Your best (alive) pal,

bob

UPDATE: Does this qualify for a Genius! post? It’s quick, you’ll love it. Report came in of a failed mouse. Our friend was moving it all around, but damned if the cursor would move. People checked connections, drivers, but nothing seemed to fix the problem. Until they figured out what she was pushing around the mousepad—her cell phone. Yep.

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Let’s Get Ready To Be Really Nice!

Would you rather…
give your donations to the winner of Charity Cage Match,
or
hire the International Rock, Paper, Scissors Champion to decide?

a) I’m lookin’ at you Red Cross!
b) Jerry Lewis always throws scissors first…

Punches for Pints? That’s not right.

– bob

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I Hear It’s Going To Replace Pigeons

Would you rather…
paint all of your pain killers Metal Flake Deep Azure,
or
sell all of your newspaper stocks to get into this Inter-Tubes ‘net thing?

a) That is one sharp analgesic!
b) It’s the wave of the future, you know.

You think your stomach is upset now?

– bob

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I Hadn’t Considered That

Would you rather…
form a group solely to debate the implications of Harry Potter’s haircut in the upcoming film,
or
that your obituary describes you as a “noted American thinker”?

a) But Harry’s hair doesn’t NEED cutting!
b) What will we do now? She’s dead!

Hmmm, good point.

– bob

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Genius! – Foot In Mouth Disease Edition

Friends,

It was Are You Sure You Don’t Have T.B? Day at the Far Eastern Outpost today (I’m still clean). This gave me the opportunity to check in on the clinic staff to see if everything was running okay.

During my visit, one of the lab techs apparently tried to murder some little kid while giving him a flu shot. You have never heard such howling. The kid runs out of the clinic with tears streaming down his face and blubbering like a bloodhound that just ate a bee. The tech then comes out of the lab and asks me if I’d like my shot. “Are you kidding? I don’t want to cry. What do I look like, an idiot?” I said to chuckles all around, and all within earshot of the kid and his parents who were standing just outside the window. I got such a look…

Your (idiot) pal,

bob

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Expressing Outrage

Would you rather…
be a proud voter for Kinky
or
Cheek?

a) “Angels could do no more.”
b) “[he] has stated that he can not accept the position if elected…”

Or maybe just mild pique.

– bob

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Houseblogging: Special Election Coverage

Let’s start with this. That electronic voting machine was the most convoluted gizmo I’ve seen in a very long time. I suppose the absurd level of Are You Sure That You’re Sure Syndrome is necessary for people who just aren’t all that sure their votes have been counted. But still, I was asked three times on the screen, then the paper printout scrolled behind a window. And scrolled. And scrolled. Even after all of that, I could change it again.

Absurd!

I feel not disenfranchised! Or something.

Your pal,

– bob

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Genius! – Peekaboo Edition

Friends,

I met the new maintenance guy a couple weeks ago out in the parking lot after his tour of the Far Eastern Outpost. A nice enough older gentleman, he’d been around the block, fairly well traveled. The impression I was left with after our first meeting was that it appeared he was looking for an easier job that would allow him to comfortably slip into retirement. He was kind of wrong about the easy part:

The refurbished security cameras came in yesterday and his task was to reinstall them. The unit in the dining room should have been a piece of cake since the new motorized camera units simply clip into receptacles in the ceiling. Whoever removed the cameras from service had disconnected the power from the bucket prior to removing the camera.

This is the part where I get to talk about electricity. Direct Current is like your car battery. One wire is positive and one wire is negative. Alternating Current alternates the polarity so many times a second that wires can be connected either way.

That’s nice, I hear you say, but how can you tell which is which? If you have a voltmeter, you can test the wires and see if your reading goes negative if you swap the test probes. You can also tell what you should have by reading the label stuck to the equipment you’re connecting. Now a question—would it be a bad idea to connect wiring for a Direct Current-fed device backwards? Would it be worthwhile to check before you make those connections just to be sure?

One more problem presented itself to our noble handyman as he held the two wires in his hand—three holes. He had three places to choose from and was positively flummoxed. Sweat poured from his brow. He was going to connect these wires no matter what. No testing needed. This inequality though was just too much…

But wait, you’re wondering how I know this, aren’t you? Our intrepid fixer of things had earlier taken apart an adjoining camera mount to get ideas on how to assemble the returned unit. The security staff and I had a very good view into his eyeball from the monitoring station. Once he completed that reassembly, the camera was available to monitor his progress on the new one. It was just a matter of time until the call came.

“Hey, is that Bob the I.T. guy there?”

“You know, this would be easier if you had a voltmeter…”

Yep.

– bob

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Australia Was Taken

Would you rather…
spend the last day of your campaign bringing up everything you left out until now,
or
make the District of Columbia a penal colony for sexual predators and white collar felons?

a) Um, health care?
b) You elect ’em, we lock ’em up!

…and some other cool stuff too.

– bob

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Houseblogging: Kitchen Edition

Here we go again…

I made a deal with my dear sister. I’ll host Thanksgiving at my place if we can go to her new digs on Christmas. There was some hesitation, so I sweetened the pot—with guilt! If we have America’s Biggest Meal at my house, I’ll have all new kitchen countertops installed before then!

Me and my big mouth.

Everyone in the family is excited about spending the holiday in the pines. They’ve all heard about the deal and thought it’d be neat to see my refurbished kitchen. Well, I’ve gotta tell you, me too.

New tile, new sink, new faucet for that new sink. It shouldn’t be too hard and it really hasn’t been so far. I was concerned that the water lines leading to the backsplash mounted faucet ran straight from the basement were unfounded. There were unions at a perfect spot to install new shutoff valves. Bits of panelling came out easily to allow for the new backsplash. We even got the entire field of countertop tiles laid today. That’s a lot for me to get done in a weekend.

I’ve got a little problem with taking plenty of time to do stuff. I sit, and I stare, and I think about how to complete a project for a very long time. Some might say way too long. The time deadline is good for me though, even though I’m feeling a little rushed (rushed? you’ve had the countertop extension in place for over a year. – ed The trees in the Money Orchard didn’t produce this year. More fertilizer? A trip to North Korea?).

I’ll just have to suck up the grand (so far) and make it so. And this, it’s turning out very nicely so far…

Things in kitchen go on table! Is crowded!

There we find the unions in a surprisingly accessible spot. We win!

The backerboard is laid, and my god is it sexy or what?

Can you feel the shut off valve love?

This is the original insulation in the house. Remember, this joint was built in 1949, so the “fireproofed cotton” isn’t really unexpected. Surely better than asbestos.

Ever hear of Lo-K? Throw your speculation into the comments, won’t you?

Hey look! It’s tile! The picture blows it out a bit, but the tiles trend towards green to go with the rest of the house.

Another tile shot that shows a mostly level countertop. How about that?

Your pal,

– bob

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Sammy Gets Oakland, Dave Gets Boulder

Would you rather…
convince Home Depot to join four-party non-proliferation talks with Lowe’s, Menards, and OSH,
or
arbitrate the Van Halen reunion tour?

a) The gruesome renovation videos are posted on the This Old House website.
b) Eddie’s willing to drop the bowing and scraping requirement.

An 82-volt cordless screwdriver is clearly something that must not get into the wrong hands.

– bob