Category: general

Good evening friends.  Hope things are well with you.  Here, they are just fine.

I got the air conditioning fixed after work this afternoon (for those don’t who read daily, or catch up sequentially, check yesterday’s entry for context).

After some quick lunchtime troubleshooting with a more knowledgeable friend, we deduced that the problem must be in the power to the furnace/handler in the attic.  What a coincidence!  The power to that unit is exactly where I’d tied into power for our new ceiling fan and not finished up the wiring to snuff.  So, after a sweltering trip into the attic around five o’clock where I did some test rewires (and got a nice 120V jolt because I flipped the breaker marked “AC” instead of the one marked “furnace”), the whole thing was up and running again.

Once running, I had a few hours of complacency where I left things in simply a better-connected version of what I had rigged before (albeit still not to code and therefore technically unsafe) and enjoyed the cool air flowing from our now-functioning vents.  Then, around 9:30pm I decided that if I didn’t finish the thing tonight I might never do it.

And that’s how I found myself at the local hardware megastore a mere fifteen minutes from the shuttering of the megadoors.  I picked up the necessary work boxes to finish the thing correctly, and reluctantly climbed back into the attic around ten o’clock.

I hate working in the attic.  You can’t put your weight in a comfortable place when you’re working in the rafters (tacking wire to board every sixteen inches or so), the angles are wrong and you have no leverage when you need to hammer because the space is so cramped, and it’s hot, stuffy, and itchy from all the insulation. Seriously, I’d rather work outside on a yard any day of the week then be shut up in that claustrophobic nightmare of a crawlspace.  You can have it.

But, it’s all working again… and for that I feel some small measure of accomplishment.

So, I wrote about working in the attic, went away from the computer intending to write something more interesting to close – and then lost all intent.  Sorry.  This is what you get.

Goodnight folks.

Is it only Monday?  How the… seriously?  Because it feels like it should be a Thursday right now, for real.  Lord a’mighy; land a’Goshen…

It’s beginning to heat up in California.  A few weeks ago, on another hot day for early Spring, Sharaun called me at work and said that the air conditioning wasn’t coming on.  Now, usually, when she calls with these kinds of “problems,” I shrug them off and recommend a few troubleshooting tips.  “Did you check the settings?,” I asked.  She had.  “Is it on ‘auto’ and in the ‘cool’ position?”  It was.  OK, so, the easy stuff down… I pointed her to the fusebox outside.  She checked, nothing amiss.

With no fuses tripped, I realized I’d pretty much walked through the extent of my AC debugging skills right over the phone, and, instead of the usual, “I’ll take a look when I get home,” I said something like, “Well, the AC is one of our most important appliances, you should go ahead and look up who to call and get a guy out there to look at it.”  As I hung up I had daymares about what might be wrong with the system, from the simple to the complex, and what it might cost to fix.  About five minutes later, however, Sharaun IM’d me to tell me the unit just kicked on.  Whew… maybe just an unusual delay.

And, I forgot about it.

Then, tonight, it did the same thing… right in front of my eyes.  In fact, after mucking around with the thermostat controls on the wall, to my dismay I realized the unit wasn’t even kicking on when I set the fan to the “on” position.  Not even after leaving it that way for a while, either. So, two strikes for the AC… something’s afoot.  Now… here’s why I’m worried.

Several months ago, I got all Bob Vila and decided to install a ceiling fan in the living room.  Shockingly, things went very well and the fan went quickly and easily.  At the time, I was quite proud.  Well, except for one little bit of “finishing:”  I tied the fan’s power into the AC and heating unit’s line in the attic, but I fudged the workbox for the new wiring junction (didn’t leave myself enough slack when cutting and splicing in the new line, a common novice mistake, I’m told).  Not wanting to make two more cuts and splice in a new section of wire that night, I left the spliced section just hanging in the unclosed workbox, and didn’t re-tack the wires to the rafters per code.

And, of course, despite my best intentions, that’s the way the wiring still sits up there today. Now, I have to wonder… is my lazy connection iffy?  Could the limp wires be tugging on the unsecured wire-nutted connection and causing some kind of intermittent power loss to the AC unit?  The fan works consistently, so you’d think not – but still, the timely seeming “failure” of the AC worries me.  Worse, if my connection is dodgy, in addition to being inherently unsafe to begin with, I’m worried it could start a fire.

So, this week it’s into the attic I go to repair the connection properly – giving me some peace of mind and eliminating it as a potential source of failure for the AC.  Wish me luck.

OK, let’s talk about Obama…

Looks like the “cash for clunkers” plan has been rebranded as the “Car Allowance Rebate System” and even has a fancy new website for the curious.  And, as things get more real every day, I’ve been spending some time thinking about what kind of bumper sticker might look nice on my new Obama-financed vehicle.  Tonight, I did some quick mockups in Inkscape just to get a feel for them.  Imagine us in a new car riding around town with one of these babies stuck to the back:

Not bad, but needs a little color…

Eh… the logo is too temporal and will be obscure and forgotten before the funny fades…

Oh yeah, that last one is definitely my favorite.

That was fun.

Oh, and it looks like the administration either finally got around to, or caved to “broken campaign promise” pressure, implementing a national website giving us plebs five days to review any bill passed by Congress before the president signs it into law.  A step in the right “de-mystification” direction, to be sure, although ultimately I question 1) who will care, 2) who is gonna look at the feedback that pours in, and 3) how effective is five days for the public to rally against something anyway.

Well, that’s it for tonight… turned out to be wordy and media-rich.  Who would’ve known.

Goodnight.

Monday again, and it’s always sad to see another weekend go. I’ve been suffering from a semi-permanent yen for non-working days lately, something that hits me every now and again and fades with time (and time off). This too shall pass.

For Father’s Day I did two things I’ve been wanting to do for near a month now: cleaned out and organized the garage, and put the finishing touches on the landscape lighting I installed a couple months ago. You may say those sound like odd things to want for Father’s Day, but having been out of town for three weekends straight it really was what I wanted to do.

So, I put Long John Silver, Baron von Tollbooth and the Chrome Nun, Spitfire, Red Octopus, Blows Against the Empire, Bark, Dragon Fly, and Sunfighter into an “on the go” playlist on the iPod and set to work (props to those who understood the connection between those records without having to look-up the artists).

… is it sacrilege to say that pre-Earth Starship was better than, or at least as good as, Airplane ever was? Anyway…

As the mega-mix of those awesome records washed over me, I hung bikes from rafters, organized the hiking gear shelf, buried low-voltage wiring under mulch, and in general got the lead out of my long-time-wasting duties. I had, at the end of it all, intended to go for a bike ride to get some exercise… but instead I’m sitting here typing about it. In the end, I opted for a half hour or so swinging shirtless in the hammock with Keaton. We listened to more music and enjoyed the evening sunshine. Then before bedtime we all three walked down to the frozen yogurt place and had a little Father’s Day treat to cap the day.

Good stuff.

Saturday we made a pilgrimage down south to see Anthony’s long-lost daughter, who had been studying abroad for the past year. Keaton got to go swimming, eat fruit salad, and play with big cows and baby cows. Sharaun and I carpooled down with Ben and Suzy, and the ride was better than driving (thanks guys). It was fun seeing Anthony’s daughter again, and a personal relief for me, as the father of a girl myself, that, despite having aged a year abroad, she still seems not that far off from the eight year-old she was when we first met her. Here’s hoping Keaton can weather her teens as well.

And, with that… goodnight internetizens.

You guys came back!  Cool.

Thursday night in our living room right now, and I cut the air Sharaun’s been running all day.  And now, I’m too proud to admit that it’s hot in here and I’d actually be more comfortable with the air on, because of the big stink I made about it “being nice outside” and “not wasting money.”  So, we swelter.

Today was a good day.  We had an “offsite” at work, where the troops all get together at the lake and barbecue chicken and hot dogs and hamburgers and whatnot.  I was in charge of chicken, and it came out well.  Then, around 10pm Jeff texted me to share that the Senate had passed the Cash for Clunkers legislation I’ve been waiting on (read more here and here).

In an attempt to figure out which version of the bill actually passed, I contacted a “connected” friend via some late-night IMing, and she was able to help me find the final approved language on Thomas here. Luckily for me, the House version I blogged about before is the language that passed the Senate  – and that means we’re eligible for $4,500 for the busted Ford, as long as our new vehicle averages 19MPG or better (and yes, I already have an Excel spreadsheet).

Additionally, one of my favorite bits in the text reads, “Combination with other incentives permitted.”  Hear that?  “Permitted!”  That means in addition to the $4,500 credit I might be able to double up with some other “hookup” deal (either through work or well-connected friends).

Now it’s off to Obama’s desk and then into the implementation phase, which the bill specifies should take thirty days (meaning dealers should be ready administer the program in that amount of time post-Obama).  Thirty days then; thirty days for Sharaun and I to figure out what vehicle we want and how to outfit it.  Thirty days and Obama gets us a new car.

And, despite some shame, I’m ready for the handout.  Goodnight.

Internet!!  Man, long time no talk!  What’s been going on with you?

Tuesday night and I’m tuckered from some surprise post-work wakeboarding.  Now, it’s probably been four years since I last got up on a wakeboard, and back then it took me pretty much a whole season before I was able to do it consistently… so I was a little worried I’d not remember the mechanics of it all.

I did have some issues standing up on my first set of pulls, but did OK the second time around.  I’m still nothing much to watch on the water, but I sure had a great time – and it satisfies the “work out tonight” requirement nicely.

Sorry I didn’t write last night, didn’t get to it until too late and didn’t have much to say.  Tonight tho, let’s talk about stuff.

Sharaun, who doesn’t read much (not that I’m much better with my fickle on-and-off appetite for books), has apparently tuned into the latest female-groupthink brainwaves and has been addicted to reading those Twilight books.  I know, making fun of some subconscious ladies-only mental connection isn’t really fair; the books surely must be entertaining for so many to enjoy them, it’s just fun to point out that they are totally chick books.

Anyway, her newfound interest in vampires and teenage lust works well for me as she graciously allows me to listen to music (at a reasonable volume) as she reads.  Nice to get some non-TV tunes during the normal TV’s-always-on evening hours.  TV is way overrated, and I’ll take some tunes anytime over even my favorite shows.  Tonight I got to listen to the whole (A+B-side) of Jethro Tull’s long-winded but excellent prog masterpeice, Thick As A Brick.  Not often you can sit through that.  Go vampires.

Oh man I’m falling asleep sitting up.  Goodnight friends.

Hey guys. Sorry the week ended empty around here last week; we made it home safe from Oregon (but not without a little drama) and the evenings robbed me of writing time.

The return trip from Oregon almost wasn’t.

When I bought the tickets for our trip, I recall debating between coming home Wednesday evening or Thursday morning. And as our week up north progressed, I had all the while been remembering the Thursday morning flight. Come to find out, as serendipitously checked our itinerary Wednesday morning around 8am, that I was wrong and I’d booked the flight that evening. Crap.

Text messages and e-mails flew from the iPhone in a fury: Sharaun; we leave today, not tomorrow. Things were arranged; rides from the airport, packing, rides to the airport, rides from work to my folks’ place. Everything was planned and trimmed and faded just right. Then my dad had to go to the hospital unexpectedly (everything’s fine, just unplanned), and our shiny new plans began to unravel. The carseat was in his car; he was our ride to the airport; the car was what Sharaun was going to use to pick me up from work.

In the end, a buddy ducked out of our meeting early to give me a ride to the house; we had to abandon all hope of getting the carseat if we wanted to make our flight; and we had to make a hail Mary run for the airport train to beat the check-in and boarding deadline.

Thankfuly we were able to arrange a last minute pickup at the airport (from a picker-upper who was able to score a loaner carseat so we could be a road-legal family), and my folks are graciously shipping our seat back to us.

Harrowing, to be sure. But; we got home.

And, at home…

Thursday as I rounded the last corner on the way home from work, the steering wheel on the Ford locked up tight; turning became a test of all my arm strength. Somehow, I’d lost all power steering, and it was like trying to turn the wheels in wet cement. Fearing that Rusbuqeutte, the patron saint of junkyard cars, had abaondoned me, I muscled the aging beast through the last couple turns and into our garage. Lately, one of my biggest fears is that the Ford will give up the ghost just prior to me being able to take advantage of the new legislation I’ve been waiting on (need context?).

I shuttered as I shut off the car; could this be a game-ender for my intended endgame? Would I make out with the handout or wind up empty-handed? (Anyone see the effort here?)

Anyway, I topped off the power steering fluid on Friday (after a Keystone Cops style morning trying to get to work on time) and the beast sprang back to full loosey-goosey steerability. So, all is not lost. And, with each new failing I can’t help but think I should take my buddy Jeff’s advice and retire the thing now – only to drive it one last time: Up to the dealership to collect my cash-for-clunkers dosh and my new wheels.

We’ll see, I s’psose.

And, this weekend we’re running away to Yosemite and staying in the valley. I love going to Yosemite; it’s one of my all-time favorite destinations. We have three days this time (give or take accounting for travel), with one of them deducted to the “extremely strenuous” Half Dome day-summit – hence today’s accompanying picture.

I’ve done it before, but never in the marathon up-and-back, seventeen mile, leave in the dark return in the dark format. Here’s hoping for a not-too-crowded ascent of the cables, and a safe summit and return.

Wish me luck; goodnight.

Good evening internet denizens.  Fancy reading a blog?  Gonna be all over the place, I fear.

Outside, the light is failing.  I can see the soft gray of the sky through the two massive trellis-climbing plants I bought a month or so ago.  I had the new landscape guy actually put them in the ground for me, the sixty gallon pots and prospect of digging in this rocky soil just put me off.  I think he charged me $30 for the labor.  $30… and I swallowed easy.

With regard to spending money for things I could do myself, I still trend miserly… but ever more I catch myself mentally “billing out” my time.  Like when I considered planting those big trellis plants through which I’m now watching the sky darken in the half-light of dusk: I could have easily planted them.  Could’ve dug the two massive holes, churning through rocks upon rocks.  Maybe it would’ve taken me an hour, maybe an hour and a half.  In my head though, I still calculating what I think that hour and a half is worth to me… how many hard-earned dollars I’d consider a “good trade” for spending it playing with Keaton or reading a book.  And, in the end, the “pay the man” attitude won out this time.

Strange, but for some reason this makes me feel old.

We’ve got the windows open tonight; the 100°+ temperatures of the weekend have given way to milder days and even milder overnights. And, since Sharaun’s in the process of putting Keaton down, I managed to switch of the TV and put on some music instead.  Some long drawn-out County Joe & the Fish jam is playing, and it actually sounds really good.  Y’know, there can be good long jams, the kind that keep you excited and pace well, and there can be bad long jams.  Even the best jam bands are guilty of the occasional stinker of a twenty minute “Dancing In the Street,” after all.

Gosh guys, I have nothing.  It’s like 11 o’clock and I have nothing.  Goodnight.