Shoplifting in the Marketplace of Ideas

Garden crap

2008-05-15T04:43:17Z

I may lose the tomatoes.

Sunday, they looked like they were doing so badly under the fluorescents, I moved them outside to get some real sunlight..

Since then it has been cloudy cold, and rainy every single day, and they all look even worse. They were pretty tall, 8-10 inches, but they're losing nearly all of their leaves. They make Charlie Brown's Christmas tree look robust.

Some of the other plants are getting unhappy. The basil has suddenly gone soft and twisty, and the Lettuce isn't liking the light much either. It's wonderful for seedlings, but these things needed to be in the ground weeks ago. But the weather just hasn't been cooperating.

Looks like I'm going to fail at Gardening again this year.

Feeling old

2008-05-14T04:35:24Z

I've been so tired lately. Especially in the morning. Because no matter how tired I am, I've been waking up half an hour to an hour or more before the alarm. Add to that how worn out I've been doing these Target roll-outs. Monday was particularly excruciating, where I did 17 pieces, over 10 hours. My back and arms and legs are all hurting, especially my back. Thank god those are over. They pay like shit. Just have some OfficeMax roll-outs left.

Today I got up, and rolled over, and lost another hour. Staggered into the Kirkland OfficeMax, and proceeded to take 8 hours to build a set that probably should take 5. Broyhill is taking another stab at RTA, and I can recognize the Chinese factory this stuff must be coming out of just based on some of the hardware. It's better, although there were still a few issues.

It was kinda funny, this old lady came by and was fascinated by the foamcloth in my trash cart. I told her she could have it, and she proceeded to pull all of it out and neatly roll it up and pack it into her bag, all the while nattering on about all the things she would wrap up in it for a move she's going to do.

AFC and Money!

2008-05-11T02:43:55Z

The first Angel Food Cake from the new oven just came out. It fell a bit, which means I need to shorten the cooking time. I should have been watching it for the last 10 minutes or so just to see when it started to change.

The temps around 350° varied by +/- 35° or so. I'm sure there is some secret setting like the calibration one to adjust this, but I have no idea what it is, or how to find out.

This time instead of Vanilla and Almond extract, I tried Vanilla and Lemon. I'm very interested to see how that tastes, but I'm going to have to wait an hour for the cake to cool. Maybe I'll update this post.

In other news, I managed to zero out my Wells Fargo card and still maintain the $2k floor in both my savings and checking accounts. This is an important financial milestone for me. Every card is clear now except the NRA card which has a nasty habit of putting the interest on the NEXT billing cycle. It's also important because thanks to my tax return, I was able to re-establish that $4K minimum balance, which back before my long unemployment represented Gallery's funds. That had to go down to $1K per account when things were really bad, and occasionally it would dip below that. Finally I'll be able to do more account closing on Gallery.

And then, to really brighten my day, I got a check in the mail for half of my property taxes. Because of the timing of my closing, they couldn't be sure if the old escrow had paid my taxes yet or not, so they had to be factored into the loan. Since the first half had been collected twice, once by each company, regardless of who paid them, I was going to get it back. I think that perhaps now I should go shopping for that new TV I need.

Still no luck on the Kitten front.

Values

2008-05-09T02:41:47Z

I have a friend who bashes Christians a lot. As far as I can tell, his barometer of Christian values is any value any major Christian figure espouses that is not one he holds. Being a non-Christian, I suppose any common values he may have are not exclusively Christian, and thus are not Christian Values. So anything some hated figure like Jerry Falwell or other televangelist says is used to tar the idea of Christianity as a whole.

I'm not religious. I have no use for religion at all in my life. But I do recognize the social utility of religion. Lord knows there are enough people who need the promise of heaven and the threat of hell to to keep them from being a danger to society (and thus, me.). *grin*

Frankly, I usually find the antics of the liberal anti-religious fanatics more annoying.

But not this time.

It's the Proselytizing that bugs me. And I don't mean the door to door stuff. I mean the recruiting in bathrooms.

"Huh?" you might say?

A few years ago I was going into the bathroom at a local Wal-Mart (Not the one I usually go to) and this older man is rushing out, looking somewhat furtive. When I get to the urinal, there's this carefully folded slip of paper designed to look like a quartered $10 bill. If you were to pick it up and look at it, it would unfold to say something like "Disappointed? Jesus won't disappoint you...." and further blah blah blah. This flier was pretty old, since it hadn't been updated to look like the new $10 bill. The man had placed one on each urinal and stall.

These things annoy me for a couple of reasons. First, they must think I'm really, really stupid, and that all they have to do is TRICK me into reading their text and I will magically be transformed. I'm sorry, but if you have to trick someone into believing (that is the idea, right?) then that says very little in favor of your faith. The second is "You're soaking in it". These little tracts are written in such a way that they sound absolutely convincing to someone who is already a believer. But if the intended audience is someone who does not believe in God or the Bible, citing the Bible as proof fails. It's a circular argument, and only succeeds for those already inside the circle.

They also annoy me because they aren't even as inadvertently entertaining as a Chick Tract.

But yesterday I ran across one that REALLY pissed me off. I went to the bathroom at an Office Depot I was servicing, and there on the floor was yet another little religious come-on, titled "Under Attack" On the front was a picture of a New York firefighter looking over the rubble of the twin towers. You can already tell why I'm pissed. I may not be religious, but if there's one thing sacred to me, that's it. Using the tragedy of 9/11 to try to sell people on your church is lower than low.

It then goes on about how we're all going to die some day, and how we must accept Jesus to be ready for death. Remember what I said about circular arguments? The people who write these things fill them up with phrases and Cant that only have actual meaning to those who have already accepted it. Stuff like "the gift of Eternal Life through Jesus" is probably very meaningful to Christians, but without all the background, it's just as nonsensical as "There's no Prob with Bob."

And in fact, I kind of disagree with the premise of belief in Jesus as a sort of holy "Get out of hell free" card. I mean, if I'm going to be judged and held responsible for my actions, then *I'M* the one responsible. Punishing someone else for my "sins" is wrong, and telling me it's already been done 2000 years ago only compounds the injustice. (It also brings to mind the Jules Pfieffer (?) quote "If Jesus was sacrificed for our sins, do we make his sacrifice unjustified by not committing them?"). I'm sure it makes perfect sense to Christians, but it's nonsense to me, and I don't choose to believe in things that don't make any sense.

I know I have some Christian friends who read this. It's not meant to be an attack on them or their faith, but just on these creeps who use this technique of evangelizing. And don't try to explain Faith to me. If it were explainable, it would be Reason, not Faith. the closest you can come is Pascal's Wager, which I guess I've come as close to as I'm going to get by simply not being a rotten person.

Till Later

2008-05-08T04:35:40Z

Yesterday I finished work early. I got home in time to do more Rototilling, and finished off the garden.

And not a moment too soon. While they've gotten very tall under the fluorescents, the Tomatoes are starting to die off. (Oddly, one that went around the shop light is greener). Tonight I was working too late to try to plant. Hopefully tomorrow I'll finish early enough to finish my irrigation project (More on that later).

Other plants seem to respond very well to the fluorescent lights. The Celery, Cantaloupe, Basil, and Forget-me-nots are thriving. The Cantaloupe is clearly more sensitive to pot size. The ones in the 2.5" peat pots are much bigger than the ones in the 2" squares.

The Jalapeños are doing so poorly, I may change around the garden plan.

Daily Bread

2008-05-07T07:53:41Z

So, I baked my first three loaves of bread this evening. They came out quite nicely.

I think it was a bit unrealistic to expect the temperature control to be as precise as what I was doing manually. But the question is, how precise does it have to be? This cooked well enough, and I didn't have to pull up a stool to run the oven.

I ran the wire from the thermocouple on my multimeter up through the vent under the front of the oven door and up to the rack, thus avoiding the oven door seal. The temperature varied from about 15° above 425° to about 30° below. I would have liked it to be tighter and more centered. The calibration is adjustable via arcane settings, but I'll use it for a while before messing with anything. It may also be more stable at lower temperatures. Time will tell.

And even though I didn't have to pull up a stool, I did watch the bread bake for a while. It's nice to have a huge front window.

(The oven light however doesn't warm the interior as much as on the old oven. Although it's still a nice place to let the bread rise).

Stove In

2008-05-06T05:50:21Z

Mike lucked out, he was at a Mariner's game. So I asked Gary, but his buddy actually did the helping.

It took a while to transfer the power cable from the old oven to the new one. Did you know that ovens don't come with a power cable? Mainly I had to fight with the strain relief. Did you know that the strain relief comes with the cable, not the oven? Making it fit the new opening took a fair bit of modification, and I had to unscew a lot of things they don't normally plan on you unscrewing.

Anyway, once I got it all in place plugged in and leveled, it worked first time out. It was a bit tricky to get it in place because I had to install the anti-tip bracket. While I'm unlikely to climb on the open oven door and tip the stove over, you never know what the future holds.

I ran up the oven, and then all the burners to burn off any manufacturing leftovers. It beeps when it's done preheating. It got to 400 in 13 minutes.

Tomorrow I think I'm going to bake bread, And for once, I won't have to sit there with the multimeter turning the oven on and off manually the whole time. Although I doubt the oven will be able to control the temperature as tightly as I could (+/- 5 degrees!).

Did you know that ovens don't come with Broiler pans? They seem to be a premium as a reward for registering your warranty and coughing up $9 for shipping.

I'm just going to keep the old one. Never used it anyway.

I've got a Stove in my Van

2008-05-05T07:15:25Z

While I may have had bad luck finding kittens, another phase of my post refinance plan has gone very well. A high priority has been to replace the ancient stove (That's cooker to you, Zaan :-) that was original to this house.

Basically the builder put in the cheapest Kenmore stove he could get... well, maybe one step up from that, because it was self-cleaning. But it is vintage 1995, and the oven thermostat had a hysteresis of about +/- 90°, so bad that if I wanted to bake anything, I had to put the temperature sensor from my multimeter in the oven, and manually control the temperature. I got pretty good at it, and it got me thinking a lot about PID control algorithms - it's a robotics thing, don't worry about that.

Since I frequently use a real wok to cook, not one of those nasty flat-bottomed Teflon-coated things they call a Wok, or maybe a "Stir Fry Pan", which requires the use of a ring, a glass-topped stove was out of the question. Coil burners are better IMHO anyway - easier to fix. That put me in the cheaper end of the spectrum. But the one thing I really wanted in a stove was the electronic thermostat.

This one has just what I want. Coil burners, electronic thermostat, a large window (the old one didn't have one), and self-cleaning. And no funny features I didn't want.

And the price? One reason I went tonight was that Sears had one of their periodic "Friends and Family" sales. I got an e-mail from Impact about it (Impact does some work for Sears). Basically the store stays open late on a certain Sunday and gives you an extra 10-20% off on stuff. The stove I was looking at was originally $429. The sign showed it marked down to $399. Then there was some other sale going on that marked it down again, plus this Friends and Family sale.... In the end, I got the stove for $309 plus tax.

However, being under $399, I didn't qualify for the $75 delivery and installation service rebate. ($65 to deliver, + $10 for Saturday delivery since nobody's home during the week, +$10 old stove haul-away. I'd be out $10). So I had to pay for the stove, go home, get the van, drive to the adjacent warehouse, and have the box stuffed in the back. Yay, I get it a week earlier.

I'll see if I can draft Mike to help me get the stove up the stairs and into the kitchen tomorrow, after I pull out the old stove. As for what to do with it, I'm not sure, the thermostat is the main issue. I wonder if Goodwill takes appliances? Maybe freecycle or Craig's List.... Unless anyone who reads this want to take a crack at it first.

Mission Failure

2008-05-03T23:51:21Z

Trying to deal with a low grade background Fury here....

Yesterday I managed to get to the Escrow office just before closing (as in 15 seconds) to pick up my checks. Annoyingly, I guess to make sure that the payoffs got to the creditors they were aimed at, they gave me checks made out to the exact amount I owed to each card (Except for the Wells Fargo card, which went up too much) instead of giving me one fat check for the full amount of the cashout and letting me pay the bills as I saw fit (i.e. electronically). I had to hit the websites last night to get current bills just to get the payment addresses for some of them.

So today's mission was threefold. 1: Get to the Post Office to send off the checks (for security, too much mail theft around here), 2: hit the comic shop which is very near the Post Office, 3: go to the Everett Animal Shelter and pic out a couple of kitties.

I had actually prepared last night for the potential new arrivals, cleaning out the old water and food stations and preparing the litter box. I filled them all this morning. Then I dug the old cat carrier out of the garage and cleaned it up and put a towel in the bottom.

I should have paid greater heed to Banner's difficulties.

The Everett Animal Shelter was devoid of kittens. But they told me there was some kind of adoption event at the PetSmart all the way down in Woodinville and gave me a bad address. I found it anyway. There were actually two shelters there with cats. One had two kittens who were kind of tired out and not very interested in anything. They were $100 each. The other group, Oasis, I have no idea what they wanted for their kittens, because the woman running the set-up there completely ignored me as if I wasn't there. In fact, as I watched her deal with a couple adopting a kitten, she only talked with the woman. I didn't notice it immediately, but I realized it later. After about 15 minutes of watching her gaze through me without acknowledging my presence and vigorously chatting up the other middle aged women looking at the kittens so that I couldn't get a word in edgewise to ask for her attention, I just got really pissed off and left.

Eventually I found myself all the way up at the PetCo in Smokey Point. I'm sure there were other places along the way, but I knew this one because it was next to one of my Office Depot stores. They had nothing. On the way up, I spotted another PetSmart. NOAH was the shelter there, and they had no kittens either. They old lady from NOAH talked to me and mentioned how odd it was that there were no kittens this year.

Out of options, I left, and hit Wal-Mart for some groceries. Mistake. I was in a poor mood to deal with the teeming masses of people. And of course, I got stuck in the self-checkout line behind two consecutive women with no clue how to operate the machine. (Look, it's a BAD idea to buy greeting cards at the self-checkout because they weigh virtually nothing, and the scale under the bags won't detect them, and you'll have to sit there and be confused by the "Skip bagging" screen five times before you figure out the right thing to do.) But I did strike up a conversation with the oddly pretty woman behind me in line, mostly grousing about the idiots ahead of us. Of course, when it was my turn, the machine had to refuse to read one of my items. I ended up punching in the UPC manually. At least I knew how to fix the problem.

So here I am, home, after managing to NOT kill anyone in the parking lot, with kitten chow in the kitchen, but no kittens to eat it, a hundred unnecessary miles on the odometer, and I'm gritting my teeth. It's raining, so I can't work on the garden. Maybe I can bring myself to do something in the shop, but my mood is really, really pissy at the moment. I'm calm, but right under the surface, I know I'm ready to go off at the slightest additional frustration.

Working

2008-05-02T04:53:20Z

Big Target roll-out. The stuff is pretty good again this year. I was paired up with one of the new guys, who is really slow at building, so in spite of the usual piss-poor payouts, I probably made some good money today. (Seriously, I can't believe how slow this guy is. And I can't even figure out why. But he only got 6 pieces done in about 8 hours, while I did 16.)

While I was working I got a call from the escrow company. Since I'd shot them copies of my current balances on the cards and they were more than what was on my original application (Well, Duh, that was made over a month ago) there was some adjustment to be made. Fortunately I don't have to come up with the extra $640 or so at Closing, they'll just leave some balance on the Wells Fargo card.

Since I don't have to make a mortgage payment this month, I'll just nuke what's left and achieve the same effect. I didn't need to have any cash back out of this deal anyway.

Tomorrow's the big day.

When I got home, I spent about an hour annoying the neighbors with the tiller and finished off the second quarter of the garden. So I figure it'll take another three hours or so of work to till the whole thing. And probably another two tanks of gas....

Mini whiteboard

2008-05-01T07:18:01Z

I haven't forgotten the Whiteboard, it's just been slow to accumulate. But I thought I'd toss out this one I came up with today.

"He's like an Idiot-Savant who isn't actually good at anything."

and a few days before:

"How do Pimps get paid?"
"By the piece."

I may repeat these in a proper update.

Holy shit!

2008-04-29T04:20:40Z

Sign of the Times

2008-04-29T04:00:35Z

Things worked out pretty well today. While I was at my first work order, in nearby downtown Everett, I got a phone call from the title company. My paperwork was ready. Since they were in south Everett, and my next call was in Wallingford (North Seattle), I took a little time to stop by and sign a 3/4" thick stack of paper.

The new mortgage closes on Friday. I don't have to come up with any cash, in fact, I'm going to be getting some back. (In part because of the timing of the first installment on property taxes, they don't know which escrow account it's going to come from, so both need enough to cover it, and I get it back from the other.)

Stopped by Wal-Mart on the way home and bought some things I haven't bought in a LONG time.

Cat Litter and Kitten Chow.

The plan is to hit the shelter on Saturday and see if there are a couple of kittens I want.

Garden stuff

2008-04-28T07:18:42Z

So, here's the new trimmer and accessories in the box...

... and out.

From the top, Trimmer, Cultivator, and Edger. The green bits are hangers for the tools. At this writing, virtually all of the paint is already off the tines and blades.

I don't have a picture of my nicely edged sidewalk and driveway. It was a LOT of work, since it's been a few years, and the soil up front is a very sticky clay. But now I have no excuse to not keep up with it, and it really does look a lot neater, even if my lawn itself looks like crap.

The picture below shows the garden now that I've started working it over with the cultivator. However, I had to stop at about this point because a) my arms were killing me from four hours of work, and b) it was starting to drizzle. Last year when I went crazy and started sifting all of the soil, I hadn't dug as deep at the south end of the plot, so I hit some really big rocks, including some that actually jammed the cultivator twice to the point where I had to take the tines off to get it out. But every year the plot gets better. The rocks are going into the big black bucket so I can dump them off the wall. One advantage a dedicated tiller/cultivator has is that all the weight is at the tiller end. This set-up is evenly balanced, which puts a lot of work on the hand near the engine. This big an area is probably a bit much for this machine. Or maybe for me, since the machine is handling it fine. It's definitely a workout.

The interesting comparison from the last panorama is that basically I did nothing and all the dead plants went away on their own. No burning required.

I then proceeded to vege for the rest of the day, and then actually nap for another few hours in the evening. So much for getting stuff done in the shop. But then, I always set higher goals for myself than I can possibly reach.

I got yer stimulus package right here....

2008-04-27T04:38:29Z

Man, I wish I had a dirtier post to go with that title.

I decided to do some yard work today. The lawn needed serious mowing. Well, not so much in the front, the moss has pretty much destroyed my front yard, but the back was horribly long.

So I dug out my ancient mower, which probably has about 1 of its original 3.5 horsepower left in it now, removed the blade and sharpened it, then reinstalled it. I really should have balanced the blade, because man does that mower shake....

In any case, I managed to get it all cut, taking an extra half tank of gas to deal with the overgrowth in the back. I definitely got a bit of sun, as my reddening noggin tells me. I didn't feel like getting out the blower to push all the clippings into the blackberries. I'll probably do that tomorrow.

Then I decided to pay a little attention to the garden plot. I really need to get it ready for planting. The seedlings are getting a bit too big to keep indoors any more. I've been dithering about whether to buy more steer manure and rent the big rototiller again. I just don't like the whole rental business and the timelines associated with returning the gear. Still, it would have been cheaper than what I did next.

So there I was, raking the end of the bed where the carrots were, trying to smooth it out, and realizing just how hard-packed the path from last season was, and pulling out a lot of rocks. I decided that I did need a tiller. I decided to go look at what the stores had in the way of a Mantis or something. I didn't want to spend too much.

Well, they're all a lot more expensive than I thought. Even the smallest dedicated tiller was almost $300. But then I was looking at the gas-powered trimmers, and all the accessories you can get for them. And I started doing a little math, and then I remembered I had a coupon at home for $25 off a purchase of $250 or more. I did take the time to comparison shop at Wal-Mart, but Lowes had the advantage with the coupon, and they had a special on the low-end Troy-Built trimmer (They're all the same 31cc motor, but the trimmer heads are different). I managed to JUST hit $250 with the trimmer, the tiller attachment, and an edger, plus a new gas can for the two-cycle mix. (Okay, and another $2 for some 2-cycle oil). The coupon basically covered the sales tax.

The tiller and edger are not actually "Troy-Built" but they fit. In fact, apparently ALL the manufacturers adhere to the same standard. And there must be some association, since the manual for the tiller had some of the same illustrations as the manual for the trimmer....

As it turns out, I could justify all this, since I DID need to do some trimming, and my ancient little electric string trimmer is certainly not up to the job (I bought that back when I got the Vancouver house, along with my mower). I tell you, It was a real Tim Allen moment when I got the thing started and saw what it could do. And the less said about my manual push-edger, the better. It was reasonable in Vancouver, where I had no sidewalks, just a short driveway that needed the occasional trim, but it doesn't work so well here.

Anyway, with the four hundred and some-odd dollars that I should be getting this week, the expense is more than covered.

And tomorrow I'll be edging the sidewalks and driveway and getting the bed ready to plant. And I'll be wearing a hat this time.

Unless it rains.

(Man, I'm getting so mundane lately)

boggle

2008-04-25T05:42:12Z

Will Smith in a superhero movie.

Hancock.

Looks like it could be really good.

What a day

2008-04-25T05:13:20Z

Oak Harbor, Bush Commercial Quad roll out, Two experienced guys helping this time.

It went pretty quickly. That was actually part of the problem. I'm supposed to be the team lead, but in the rush to put up all the signage, which is supposed to be my responsibility, they got ahead of me and stuck the OfficePro wood block sign on the side of the Quantum locker. Nothing for it, can't take it down without leaving a dozen screw holes in the side of the locker.

This is the second time this guy misread the layout too. In some ways, having trainees is better.

PLUS my service visit to the store had to happen at the same time. And I had the wrong project plan document, and screwed up my report, and Tech support was closed already.

Feh.

Crazy people

2008-04-23T02:40:30Z

Last week when I was doing the Bush Commercial Quad rollout at the Shoreline OfficeMax, I had an encounter with a crazy lady.

Earlier I'd gotten a call about my mortgage being approved, and shortly afterward I was talking with the appraiser about when we could do the appraisal.

As I was standing there talking on the phone, this rather impatient and agitated lady with some binders in her arms was staring intently at me as if she expected something. Now, the fact that I have a name badge on often causes people to mistakenly assume I'm an employee and that I know where things are, so I take a moment, lean towards her and quietly say, "I'm sorry, but I don't actually work here."

She suddenly snaps "You asshole!" and stomps off. But unsatisfied, she pops back around the divider, leans in and carefully reads my name badge aloud and says, "I'm going to report you!" and again stalks off. The appraiser and I found this somewhat amusing.

Alas, poor Pat, the cashier did not, because she had to endure the crazy-lady's profanity laced diatribe, and apparently explaining that I was not an OfficeMax employee and I only assembled the Furniture was wasted on deaf ears. I'm still not clear on what it was this lady actually wanted from me.

The story spread quickly, and soon we were all laughing about it in the back room. And since this was one of the stores I'm handing off to the new guy, I said "Dammit, now I can't work here anymore!"

Keeping you appraised

2008-04-19T18:13:28Z

I learned something from the appraiser. All this time my house has been taxed as having a finished basement. But it's not. Even the drywall I've put up isn't enough to make it finished. It has to be painted and have flooring.

I doubt I can get any back taxes back, but if I'm willing to wait forever in line, I could perhaps lower my taxes in the future.

Speaking of getting taxes back, I got my federal refund yesterday, and it was payday. It's quite a nice boost to my bank balance.

I must resist the urge to throw a ton of money at the credit card, since that will be taken care of a week from now.

My slight disagreement with the Everett Clinic was settled in my favor. $82 in my pocket. I'm quite satisfied with that resolution.

It's SO empty here.

2008-04-19T10:19:07Z

The kitchen is completely clean. There is NOTHING on the dining room table except an oil lamp as a centerpiece. There are a few things on the coffee table, but the sofa is also clear.

The bathrooms are clean, floors scrubbed, towels I've never used are hanging up.

It's so not me. It feels like I'm moving out or something.

It's like, I could even Entertain in here, it's so sterilized.

But at least I can visit my stuff in the spare bedroom. That is PACKED with junk now.

I still need to vacuum and move those tomato stakes tomorrow before the appraiser shows up at 10:00.

Why this bugs me so much probably takes a little explanation. In spite of all the things I'm open about on here, I'm still a very private person. Even things that might seem inconsequential to other people might be personal to me, and I guess I kind of mark my territory with them. I have no problem letting people into my shop, but upstairs is a bit different. And my Den or Bedroom are strictly off limits. Letting someone in there is like letting someone into my head, except that they'd probably get it all wrong too.

I've probably become a lot more hermit-like since I moved up here, after all, I used to entertain a lot in my Vancouver house, but then, there were pretty well defined areas that people generally didn't go into that were filled with stuff.

Some people need a blank slate for inspiration, I need stimulation, and with my ADDish mentality, I need a lot of little things to flit to and from. That's why I accumulate so much junk.

This makes me think sometimes that I need a Celebrity girlfriend, like a Model or someone who has to travel and be away most of the time.... I'm acclimated to being alone so much that I wouldn't be bitching about their absences. And when she is home, it would be like a special occasion every time.

Like that will ever happen. *snort*

Where the fuck is Al Gore?

2008-04-19T00:18:05Z

I want to kick his ass.

It's APRIL EIGHTEENTH, and it's SNOWING!

Global warming my ass!

I'm glad I haven't planted my garden yet.

--

And annoyingly, now I can't mow my lawn before the appraiser comes.

Weird...

2008-04-18T06:33:57Z

The clean kitchen floor makes me feel uncomfortable.

Maybe it's some kind of nesting instinct, but my clutter makes my place mine and cleaning it up alienates me.

Good news Bad news on the Mortgage front.

2008-04-17T07:07:19Z

My Underwriting was approved with no additional conditions. The appraisal is scheduled for Saturday morning.

Bad News: That means I miss a second SRS meeting in a row. Even worse, it means I really have to clean up around the house, especially around the kitchen and bathroom, the appraiser told me. Plus I somehow have to fit in time to mow the lawn....

I just spent most of this evening cleaning part of the kitchen counter and mopping the floor (Including moving the fridge) in the kitchen and the front landing. This was NOT easy. The damned linoleum has this dimpled texture that really holds on to the dirt, and the kind of crap I track around tends to really stick, especially given how long it is between moppings. (Forget cleaning the carpet, I'd be better off just tearing it out than trying to steam clean it.)

Other bad news, given the time it takes to process everything, my lock will run out before it's done (thanks to that stupid paperwork glitch). On the plus side, my broker will either extend the lock or reprice if I can get a better deal at her own expense (again, thanks to that paperwork glitch).

Man, I also need to go through and hide the porn....

In other good news, I've managed to lose four of my OfficeMax stores! Yay! I've just finished training a guy who will take them on. And if all goes well, there are some guys up north who will build bikes AND take on all of the stores from Mount Vernon on up. That leaves me with two OfficeMax and two Office Depot stores (Although one is a 6 hour store, so it's 2.5 days per 2 weeks, not just one day a week). That is SO much better than the 3-4 days a week I've been doing boring store services. It'll make my pay a bit more random, but it should average higher, and I won't have to do the 140+ mile round trip to Oak Harbor or Bellingham any more.

Tomorrow's the day.

2008-04-15T03:07:47Z

Only 15 miles before LeRed Jr. hits 200K

Garden update.

2008-04-12T10:19:30Z

Earlier this week I potted the Lettuce and the Marigolds. The Lettuce has really started to stand up since then.

I also moved the tray of pods that didn't start back upstairs, figuring that since it's warmer up here, it might have a positive effect on germination. Today I noticed 6 of the Bell Peppers were starting to sprout. Mind you, several of those have been planted for - what is it now, two months? They were in the first planting. Lesson learned, even starting early can be foiled by cool temperatures. (Although I'm NOT going to go to the expense of the heating pad I've seen that goes under the trays.) Based on that, I set up my cube heater with the thermostat in the laundry room to bring the temperature in there up a bit. Still, both the Bell Peppers and Celery are WAY behind where I'd like them to be, and the Jalapeños are still not looking happy at all.

Tonight I potted the Forget-me-nots. They had long roots hanging out the bottom of the pods.

I noticed one more Cantaloupe, the last pod, has started to sprout. That's an amazing germination rate.

The Tomato plants are really stunning this year. There is no "Shakira" among them. They're all straight and tall. It's going to be hard to pick 12 of the 18 to plant. Anyone interested in some extras?

Even though it's supposed to be started in the ground, I'm considering trying to start the corn in pots, just to get a head start.

I'd like to get my hands on a large collection of the light plastic 3" pots they sell plants in, but you can't buy them anywhere. I'm wondering if I should hit Freecycle or Craig's List. It would be better to have something reusable instead of the peat pots.