The Manic Mechanic

That famous holiday, a favorite for the florists, chocolatiers, restaurants, candy makers, wineries, Hallmark and others, has come and gone. I hope everyone was able to make the best of it, and didn't fall into the "Singles Awareness Day" negativity. Valentine's Day can be whatever you make it. A coworker from years ago would get gag chocolates from another friend who worked at the company. It was a highlight of his day.

This week had been a downer for me, as it happened every year. My Mom's name was Valentine, and being that her birthday is four days prior, we used it as an extra day for something nice. Mom would say that my birthday fell on a holiday, so she was in her right to claim the next closest for hers, and none other would be more appropriate. Yeah, it was in the realm of silliness, but it was our little bit of fun. About two weeks apart, we had out own personalized days, mine thanks to that weather prognosticating critter from Pennsylvania, of course.

For whatever reason(s), the last week or so has been rougher than usual on me. Another winter in a row filled with constant pain and the side effects of narcotics play a part, so does the colder-than-usual weather, feelings of uselessness for greater than in the past, getting one more year older, I could go on. I've mostly salvaged the days for the better, and today seemed to be no different. Jeff had been asked to be a personal chef for some friends of mine. It seems he and his partner have decided to change up some things in their lives, and coupling that with buying some sort of business, he asked Jeff to take a shot at helping them entertain in a little bit more formal fashion. Tomorrow is the gig, a sort of test run for them as well as Jeff. We went to Wegman's today to pick up the fresh ingredients for the meal as well as our own weekly supplies. Well, wasn't the store a total mob scene, with the typical batches of self-absorbed Columbia patrons that normally tend to block aisles and snarl traffic with their carts and clustering, except at least three if not more the usual number of them. We didn't get into the store for more than two minutes before declaring it to be an absolute disaster, with Jeff's already busy mind planning the event and being more easily frustrated as a result, I put the single loaf of bread I managed to pick up on entering the store back on the rack and we both went back home. I went for a nap, and apparently Jeff did the same in order to cool off. After a while he went to our local supermarket instead, with me staying behind this time. I said we should just take care of this gig tomorrow and deal with our bit some other day. I conked out again while he made his run. Just as well we put off our grocery run, as our mostly empty fridge became filled with food for the party. Because of the setback, we ended up changing our dinner plans. We had picked up a really nice rack of lamb and other stuff to have for our VDay dinner. Because Jeff had to do prep for tomorrow, and I didn't want to overburden him with even more kitchen mayhem, I made us dinner for the night. My appetite has been shot for months now, and rather than attempting to enjoy an involved meal after a day of stress (and pain for me) we had a nice, relaxing meal of sandwiches and soup and chips and samples of tomorrow's big dinner. And you know what? For that moment, it was just as good as that lamb dinner would've been. If all goes well, we will have our postponed dinner in the early evening on Monday.

I ended up being more than a bit on the cranky side today, anyway. I know, what else is new. I slept worse than usual the night before, with the weather alert radio going off four times in the middle of the night, warning of high winds and extreme windchill from the nasty weather system currently beating up the northeast. During most of the day, the weather was very calm, and a late afternoon snow had begun once Jeff returned from the store. So much for all the noise that kept me up the previous night. Jeff couldn't get a couple items while out, the store was out. So I did the deed going to another grocer nearby. There was already a couple fluffy inches of snow everywhere, and during the short time I was out, perhaps 15 minutes or so, the snow had erased all the signs of me leaving the house. The footprints, the dry area where the truck had been, the tracks on the street were completely gone. I had recently bought a little cordless snowblower to keep the walkways and deck clean, and I've been jonesing to use it since. Knowing how my actions here at home can affect statewide weather patterns, buying this snowblower as well as getting the big monster blower all set for use at a moment's notice meant there was a good chance our area would remain snow-free. Sure enough, though it amounted to maybe three inches of accumulation before stopping, the long-promised wind had finally shown up as well, and unless there's going to be some drifting, my maiden voyage of the new toy snowblower might end up being a disappointment. I love how technology is blasting ahead in so many ways. For years, I used an electric snowblower to keep the decks clean. I used to shovel the snow from the deck, and I had engineered in a means to make this task a bit easier. The railings have a six inch space between them and the deck floor. All that is needed is to push the snow off the edge rather than heaving it over the top. I hadn't considered what would happen to the snow once pushed off the deck. Being a story in the air, and with bushes and shrubs below, the snow would crash onto the plants and break them. So, I had gotten a little electric blower to fling the snow well beyond the area of the plants, with the bonus of giving Mom something very easy to use as well. A couple years ago, though, I inadvertently ran over a stray bungee cord hidden in the snow, and it wrapped around the spinning axle and blade. The resulting friction melted the plastic housing and the bearing mount. In my attempts to cut the tangled rubber with a utility knife and slicing open three fingers quite badly, the damaged blower has been sitting in the basement since, waiting for me to fix it. Last year became the time that cordless, battery operated outdoor tools such as lawnmowers, edgers, trimmers and even chainsaws and snowblowers had finally matched the power of corded electric and even some gas engine powered equivalents. I decided replacing the old corded blower with this new cordless thing would be even easier for me to use than the old one. It's lighter, I don't have to bend over and pick up the icy cord, and it's even more maneuverable. I really, really detest not being able to do even a fraction of the tasks I would think nothing of. I've been spending a lot of money on effort-reducing things to help me along. And I am that fucking stubborn to want, nay, need to continue doing some stuff on my own. I mean, I already am burdening Jeff with a lot of things. And this is a man that suffered a heart attack not long ago. I have to pull as much of my own weight as I can, no matter any consequences. And I absolutely can't change that.

Since I'm in the social media space here, I can talk about things I can change. I'll be cleaning up my LJ presence, streamlining it some, perhaps freshening things a bit. I paid for it, so I might as well use it. This will remain my primary point of presence on the net. I already ditched a lot o other things, and those remaining, like Facebook, will most likely only have links to here rather than any substantial posts over there. I have gone on a lot about how I don't like FB and how it handles information. Sadly, most, if not all of the people I knew from LJ have migrated over there, and seem to have lessened their once detailed posting for lighter fare. The remaining few that have continued their long-form posting style have ended up being boxed in by the format of other social media, and more often than not, I never see these posts because Facebook decides to let me see what they think is important, and not what I want to see. A good many if not all of my posts are not seen by anyone there at all, once again due to how the site works and not including my stuff in what others might want to read. Of course, I can pay the fucker(berg) to put my posts in the streams of friends. Nah, never going to do that. If people really care, they'll come looking.

Tonight the wind is howling outside, gusts so far at least 30mph. And it is only 8 degrees F as I write this. However, we are reaping some of the benefits of my earlier work last year. The drafty front door is gone, the cold air that used to come in through the recessed lighting in the kitchen is gone too. These were the most major air infiltration points upstairs, and there is a big difference in comfort levels as well as energy usage. As I write I am also babysitting the upstairs woodstove, keeping it filled with wood and making it undeniably cozy. When the wind blasts outside like it does, it blows across the chimney and creates a vacuum. This "turbocharges" the draft through the stove and makes the fire burn very hot. The stove has a catalytic converter, similar to the ones in cars. This captures and burns unburned smoke and gasses from the wood fire, and adds to the heat. The studio here is a balmy 80 degrees. Snickles, who never misses a chance to sleep under the covers with us, is instead parked in front of the stove hearth. A warm dog in winter is a content dog, that's for sure. Since having these damn spine troubles, my legs absolutely can't take the cold anymore. I park a little space heater under the desk to keep them warm, also so I can keep the rest of the house cooler. I don't need it now. This was also planned way back when I was designing and building the house. A woodstove was intended as a form of backup heat and as an occasional thing to use, like a fireplace. It didn't take long to find out the stove is much more enjoyable in the winter than previously thought. And on a night like this, it's one of the few things that make me feel secure and happy in a time where I feel less of these things.

Anyhow, I've rambled on enough for one night. I hope everyone has some way of escaping the cold if it's currently causing grief. And I hope you had a good Valentine's Day. Even if the highlight was only sandwiches.

ETA: I almost forgot to include this lovely little ad for the holiday. It's from a Spanish department store chain called El Corte Ingles (colloquially: The Tailor's Cut) As such, it's in Spanish, but you don't need to speak the language to tell what's going on. Click the "CC" button on the bottom right of the frame to turn on English subtitles) If you click the YouTube button on the bottom right of the frame, it will take you to YouTube itself, where you can also see it closed captioned. Do what I initially did. Watch it in Spanish, and see if you got the gist of the story. My Spanish is rustier than the Titanic, and I got pretty close. Love knows no language barriers anyway. The guys are adorable, with an awkward, dorky charm that's nearly squee-worthy.

Sometimes life throws you some lemons.

We didn't make any plans for Valentine's Day. We rarely do, and in those rare occasions where we do, it usually is a quiet night at home. Not worth trying to find a restaurant with the crowds and bustle, etc.. For this year, it was just as well we didn't plan anything, after all, there was the nasty storm that lasted for two days, dumping over a foot of snow on us and forcing Jeff to take up residence at a hotel for two nights close to work because he is essential personnel. I waited until today to tackle literally tons of wet snow, made worse by the rainy, sleety intermission yesterday afternoon between two furious acts of crystalline white horror. The dogs as well as myself suffering a bit of cabin fever as well as missing the major component that makes our little unconventional (yet still totally valid) family a complete, happy unit.

It then appeared things weren't so bad after all.

The weather today was bright and sunny, and, especially considering the snow situation, downright warm. So warm in fact, were it not for the blowback from the snowblower, I could've quite comfortably cleared all the snow in my t-shirt and jeans. I let the dogs out, who had lots of fun running, chasing and carousing in the snow. I dispatched all of the snow from the driveways and the walks, along with some paths from the house, garage and woodshed, saving the three foot high snowbank left by the plowing of the street for last, a means to keep the dogs corralled. As I was just finishing up, I ran over a branch that was hidden in the snow that jammed the augers and broke a shear pin. I was essentially stuck, with about eight feet or so of snow to get through till my freedom, but instead I had to jostle and wrestle the 350 pound machine manually through the snow. I made it, putting the machine in the garage and assessing the damage. I couldn't remember where I put the spare pins (these are made to break in cases just like this, it save the transmission in the machine from damage, instead breaking a sacrificial, two dollar pin). I head back into the house to take off my wet clothes and finally get something to eat, and the phone rang. It was Jeff, coming home early from work. Perfect timing, I got the driveways and walks cleared for his safe arrival. I greet him at his truck in my underwear (he practically dared me) where he surprised me with a beautiful flower arrangement. Picture a man wearing a t-shirt and tighty-whities standing amongst a foot or more or rapidly melting snow trying best not to cry and failing. That was me.

We talked about what to do this evening. I needed to go and get parts for the snowblower (there's potential for even more snow). He needed to take his clothes to the cleaner in order to have them ready Saturday. There are restaurants not far from the Home Depot. It's not even four o'clock yet. Bingo! Honey, I'm taking you out for Valentine's Day dinner. And off we went.

My mother used to always say to me through the years, "Things have a way of working out." Well, today was a perfect example of just that. An interesting convergence of seemingly unrelated events major and minor. Circumstances that aligned just right to make for a very pleasant, surprising outcome. I got my parts, we had a nice dinner, and got back with plenty of time to avoid the traffic, crowds and whatnot and still enjoyed our quiet night at home.

Life tossed a few nice, ripe lemons our way. But it made for some rather sweet lemonade after all. Or perhaps lemon snowcones, as the case may be.

As everyone seems to know, a lot of snow fell here recently, and I waited until the next day (Wednesday) to hobble out of the house to the garage, fire up the snowblower and have at it. It wasn't a huge snow, only about 6-7 inches. Anyhow, since my back is in absolutely no shape to even touch a snow shovel, mostly hanging from the handles of the big, self-propelled snowblower is fairly easy, and I have to say, sending a rooster tail of snow high into the air that blots out the sun in my general vicinity is kinda fun. It does, however, fly back at me quite a bit, and after about an hour I pretty much look like the abominable snowman by the time I'm done. I park the thing in the garage, trudge back into the house where I strip myself of my snow-covered outerwear, boots and whatnot and otherwise dry off. While I got most of the snow off of me, I didn't realize there was close to two inches on top of the geeky Mad Bomber hat I use to keep my big flappy ears warm. I set this in the kitchen sink to thaw out, and shook the copious icicles out of my beard. I relax a bit, sore and hurting from the exertion (which I still am as of this writing). I play with the various four-leggers in the house, including the stray cat that makes herself all-too-comfy here. A little while later, I head to the kitchen for a snack, and I notice a furrball on the kitchen counter. The damn cat is always jumping up, looking for anything she can to eat. I yell like I usually do to shoo her off. It was then I realized I was yelling at the hat I put in the sink earlier.

I had a good laugh at my own expense.

Bonus irony points: It was at this time the doorbell rang, it was UPS delivering one of my purchases. A new, black Milwaukee electrically heated jacket. That would've been nice to have on while doing the snow. Well, I know how my irony goes. I was wearing my old red version while slingin' snow. Take that, old irony monster.

Some big changes coming here at La Casa Mayhem starting this coming week. Jeff has a new new job, at a new place, with his old boss (which he likes a lot) at a spanking new huge facility with state-of-the-art everything and the chance to build his staff from scratch in his own way. It's a chef's woodie-inducing dream, though it will be a bit hectic and sometimes frustrating at the start, I'm sure. There's more money in it for him and no manager-on-duty nonsense every several weeks, plus no weekends. So, a major w00t for him. I just hope the stress of getting the place up to speed does not impact his cardiac recovery.

Did some tuning up of my f-list, removing mostly people who obviously disapproved of my friending them in the first place, and a couple others. Nature abhors a vacuum, Mayhem abhors douchery.

Angry Birds for Android was a nice addicting distraction while it lasted. I'm through all the levels and want more. Any suggestions? The Scruff app is, well, interesting.

The weather bureaus are making noises towards there being another SNOMG Event early next week. I hope I don't have to be moving snow in the middle of the night again. I just got the deck cleared off yesterday, the front walk is still unusable due to low and fallen branches. Using the small electric snowblower to clear the deck, it picked up a small bungee cord hidden in the snow and it got wrapped around the shaft. It was too tangled to unthread, so I got a retractable knife to cut it out in pieces. Despite my being careful, I slipped and cut my one finger down to the bone. I left a trail of blood in my path from the snow thrower to the bathroom, where I performed first aid. The cut was so clean that continuous pressure for a half hour plus a tightly applied bandage not only stopped the bleeding, but the cut is imperceptible and looks almost healed up. It does not even hurt. Go me, I guess I can still heal kinda fast despite my old age. Now, for that spinal cord thing...

The house is playing host to one of the other stray cats. Kodi made sure the poor thing spent most of the day huddled beneath a covered end table. Once Kodi hit the hay with Jeff, this one (alternately named Tigger or Tommy) popped out and enjoyed some petting time and exploring. While in the bathroom where the litter box is also kept, T/T wandered in, found his way through the anti-Kodi barricade to the litter box, and had a go. It's as if he's been doing it all this time. Either Pinky is coaching him (Pinky is the reason why we have a half dozen "visitors" these days) or cats have some sort of sixth sense when it comes to taking a shit.

To paraphrase Sheriff Brody in Jaws, we're gonna need a bigger litter box.

In my earlier post I lamented on not having the frame of mind to make creative posts (or posts in general) here on LJ. My reasoning was not entirely forthright, because there have been times I wanted to make a post, but external factors thwart my attempts. One in particular, actually.



This is Pinky. Beneath Pinky is my keyboard. She insists on laying in my keyboard drawer practically every night, or practically any time I am in front of this particular computer. I push my keyboard as far back on the surface as I can lest she provide her own input, and she settles in for the evening. I'm allowed the use of my mouse, but alphanumeric input is verboten. Actually, since the keyboard itself (as well as the mouse) is Bluetooth wireless, I can remove them both and let Pinky have the full 16 by 24 inch surface to stretch out on. The table itself is a dire mess, so ol' Pink can't lounge on the upper deck yet. You can also see a bit of my now-scrawny legs lost in my jeans. I hope to change that soon.

I also lost one of my USB hubs a while back and with it, my flash card reader connection. I remedied this tonight and can now go through some photos that have piled up on the SD/CF cards.

We are currently experiencing a notable SNOMG Event as I type this. The power has been on and off, lightning flashes in the distance, and a sticky/wet snow is clinging to everything it touches. I expect more busted up trees and shrubs from this one similar to what happened last winter during the numerous snowpocalypseses. I hope Jeff does not have to go to work (he is considered essential personnel who have to trek in even during facility closure, which is lunacy IMO), and I hope my doctor's appointment gets axed. Jeff had a wild ride home today, it's not gonna be nice tomorrow morning. My two snowblowers, By-Tor and Snow Dog, are squared for battle.

There's something quite assuring about a nice, warm house, a fire going in the woodstove and everyone home safe and sound while Ma Nature breaks bad on us right outside the door. If the power goes, no big deal, the warmth and safety continues unabated, and the generator is ready if the power gets knocked out for the count.

On a final note, youse guys make it pretty darn difficult for me to go skulking off into that dark, cold night. I acknowledge and cherish the friendships I have beyond my cat-covered keyboard, and like any friendship, it takes a certain amount of effort on my part to keep it thriving. Yeah, I could close up shop here, but the one who would ultimately suffer the most is me. I ain't gonna let that happen, trust me. Thanks to all of you who have kept my head in this space.

It seems there's some sort of bigass snow event headed our way in the not-too-distant future.

BRING IT ON.

Despite all that has been happening here with our collective health, I still managed to collect and split a nice batch of firewood a couple days ago to load into the racks and wheelbarrows by the house and get the snowblowers ready. The big generator (Yes!) is ready in case of any power issues, and there's a nice warm fire in the woodstove along with plenty of food in the house. If we do have to get someplace for whatever reason, there's two capable 4WDs.

The Boy Scouts have nothing on me. Besides, all they do is prepare you for Mormonism these days.

Our little, unassuming holiday has been quite relaxing and nice. The other half of the turkey breast we had for T-Day, roasted white and sweet potatoes, carrots and green beans along with crescent rolls made up our dinner, and Jeff has his beloved Dallas Cowboys fired up on teevee for his evening entertainment. I'll head down to the basement workshop (of Mayhem, of course) and wire in the 5kW electric heater I had ordered a couple weeks ago. This is one problem I've been dealing with since my surgery that has upset me - I just can't warm up anymore. Used to be I could work outside in subfreezing weather all day as if it were nothing. Nowadays I complain about being cold, even when sitting in front of the woodstove or one of the space heaters. I hope this passes.

Hope y'all had a great day.

So, the Great Snow Of Doom of 2010 rages on as I type this. This continues the highly unusual trend of measurable accumulation for each "snow event" around these parts, since my little patch of Maryland more often than not gets little flurries, false alarms, sleet or winter rains instead. This winter, if a single snowflake fell from the sky, it has been accompanied by a craptillion family relatives in a blanket party of varying depths. Currently there appears to be about a foot of sky cocaine on the ground, piling up since about 2pm this afternoon. Various weather websites say anything from a few more inches to a doubling of what's currently here is expected.

This is a view from my front door, taken a few minutes ago. It's shot using what available light there is.



Yes, it's both pretty, and pretty ominous. The power has flickered a few times already, leading a chorus of clicking relays and little beeps around the house as a half-dozen UPSs dutifully come to life and one of the printers resets. While power failures during bad weather are rare here, those which do happen are quite often in it for the duration. This will cause a bit of minor bummage, but at least we will stay toasty warm from the heat of two woodstoves and there is the 15,000 watt generator in the garage that will run everything if the outage lasts more than a day. The view from the back of the house is less interesting, as the scene simply fades to white after a couple hundred feet. No sign of the neighbors, no lights, nothing. Just a whispering roar of a slight wind and the combined decibels of countless billions of little ice crystals crashing to the ground, all joining the White Party orgy.

Enjoy it while it lasts.

P.S.: Many thanks to everyone who sent emails and left comments here and on Facebook with all those birthday wishes. You guys (and gals) are pure win, and it helped make my 48th year on this rock a lot easier to take. Y'all are the best.

Mother Nature stopped by yesterday, leaving us with about 24 inches of snow as an early Xmas present. Today Jeff and I dug out. Jeff was worried about an all-day task. I said not to worry. About two hours, and it was all cleared.



Power tools save time, and one's back.

A new usericon in response to the latest brouhaha making the rounds.

Also, it's snowing it's ass off here. Either I did not watch the weather reports lately, or this came up totally unexpected. I had to bail on some car work I was doing, Jeff and I attempted to get to the couple stores we had planned on, but after watching people wipe out in the traffic circles, crashes on I-95 everywhere and people shooting around like idiots while cellphoning, we turned around and went back home, stopping at the grocery store on the way. The Bloom store, normally fairly barren, was packed, though it did not seem to be the usual milk/bread/terlet paper panic items in people's carts. Judging by the road conditions, this snow took even the highway department by surprise.

At least the snow waited till Jeff and I completed all of our moving chores.

Saturday we headed up to PA to clean up the apartment, I filled in the holes in the drywall where pictures, curtain rods, and whatnot were mounted, I replaced a section of veneer that the dog had chewed off the kitchen cabinets and touched up paint here and there. The place looks at least as good as when Jeff moved in, so he best get his deposit back. Kodi got his hair done while we worked and is looking good now. We came back and did more moving and shuffling of furniture and whatnot, and now the place is looking a bit less than a warehouse and more like a home. We should have a pretty serious yard sale this spring, and I got a a huge amount of obsolete, broken and worthless electronic crap, computers and other cruft to toss. The house and garage get new roofs this spring, and I hope to put the mega-addition (with lift!) onto the garage as well as a separate building for the tractors/tillers/yard and garden stuff. Time to get busy, get organized, and get out for vacations too.

There's a lot of living to get on with.

Still having flaky comment notification email issues, as are apparently quite a few on my list. From the LJ status page, "Comment notifications, payment receipts, and other outgoing email from LiveJournal may be delayed or missing.". More can be found in the eyeball-shattering yellow status box on the LJ support page. Also it looks like some will need to reset their passwords:

"In order to make sure your data and journals are extra safe, we're tightening up our password security. This means that many of you will be prompted in the coming weeks to change your password. We know this is a pain in the neck, but improving our password guidelines will make the entire site safer. Please see the password FAQ for our full guidelines."

Been trying to clean up the rat's nest I call my studio. It's been collecting boxes and junk and parts for the new PCs being built here. I need a couple nice new desk chairs, as well as some sort of narrow, tall high-density shelving for the increasing numbers of CDs, DVDs and such. I've already reached critical mass as to what a 12x12 foot room can comfortably hold and not look like a warehouse. Since the studio is situated in the den off the living room, I'd like to keep it looking better than it has been. Since I'm indoors a lot more these days (and getting awfully pale) I get to see how badly I trashed the place when I was busy elsewhere or just coming in here to unwind. Speaking of cleanup, this keyboard is just about ready to be declared a Superfund site. I've been using it since '88 and it looks like it. However, no one has come up with a keyboard quite like this old Northgate. It's taken some poundings over the years and is still going.

It's snowing again, and this time we were promised some real accumulation. It should make tomorrow's commute an absolute ass-stinking hell. Few things in life are as frustrating as Maryland traffic in the snow. It's also when I tell work "I'll get there when I get there", since I was nearly killed going in to work in the snow and to this day the time I was off for recovery gets repeatedly counted against me. Never mind that I was ready and willing to come back in about a month but my employer would not let me back with the restrictions I had at the time. Ah, well, I can be a prick about it too. Current forecast: 6 inches by morning. Wonderful.