At least Noah had time to build the Ark

Like Captain Ahab and his Moby Dick, I too have been challenged by whale.
To follow up my Thanksgiving in “Moist” style, I was thrown into the deep end… literally. On Friday, instead of trying to battle to crowds at Wal-mart for some cheap-a$$ laptop that I don’t need, I decided to be productive and improve my home with some home improvement. For some time the Bathroom sink faucet has become more and more faulty and I was going to replace it with an equally crappy replacement. Now, I do see myself as a rather handy person around the house. I have tools and I know how to screw… things together when necessary. If you’ll if you’ll review my previous post titled “Fun with power tools” you’ll see what I’m talking about. Replacing the faucet would not be my first foray into plumbing, but is has been the most adventurous, and by adventurous I mean time consuming, stressful and painful. The whole thing went south right from the get go. I cleared off the vanity, got all the tools I thought I would need and began. I turned of the hot water valve below the sing without incident. Then I tried to turn off the cold water valve, I was able to turn it a little about a quarter turn when it stopped, but the water was still on. Okay, let me try to turn it again with more force, still not going anywhere. One more time and POP the pipe leading to the valve snapped. Well now I was in a predicament. I water coming at me with the pressure of a fire hose and this cold water at the end of November, Cold! In a panic I tried my best to divert the horizontal gusher in the bucket I had strategically place to collect any leaking water. Every three to five seconds I had to quickly dump the water to the tub and reset to collect more of soon to be rising water all while my wife and family tried to get to the water main under the house in a rarely used, dark, creepy crawlspace. From what I’ve gathered fro other eyewitness accounts it too was a comedy of errors leading to no success, leading to the timely assistance of my neighbor from across the street. He was able to turn off the water at street; he was also very knowledgeable about plumbing and repair. Now here I was soaking wet from freezing cold water, admiring my latest screw-up while my toes went numb from the same freezing cold water two inches deep on my floor. Now this happened Friday at 1pm, so I have some time to clean and make as many repairs as needed. I was even luckier that my very knowledgeable neighbor has a good friend who is a “real” plumber. After the removal of the counter top, vanity and most of the old carpet in the hall way outside of the bathroom, my new plumber was able to come out to my house late on a Friday and replace the 50 year old and mostly disintegrated pipe and valve. He did this in all of 5 minuets for a very modest fee. To my truly fortunate surprise, I have beautiful cherry glazed hardwood floors beneath my cheep, crappy, twenty plus year old carpet. Now that we know, we may have to remove more carpet, but that’s another post. As of Sunday I made no less than eight trips to the hardware store, spent over a hundred and fifty dollars from my Christmas bonus and learned how to assemble, disassemble and reassemble all of the piping and hardware including the vanity and countertop in my bathroom. I was even able to finish my original intention of replacing the faucet with a high quality Moen replacement. As for any really bad water damage, almost all of the water drained to the dirt foundation of the dark, creepy crawlspace. Aside from a little caulking, the bathroom is as good as new. Damn! I forgot to get caulk, now I have to go back to the hardware store.

Thanks giving day space filler.

Happy Thanks giving!

Welcome to my parlor said the Flytrap to the Spider

I've noticed lately that all of my friends have become very introspective lately on their Blogs, I'm not going to do that today.

Several months ago we purchased a Venus Flytrap, since then I've become rather obsessed with finding insects to feed it, aside from one really confused mosquito, the only bugs that have that I found are spiders. I've been really concerned that they aren't working, as more and more of the traps have turned black and fallen. So went the online search of "How can I improve my green thumb for exotic creature eating plants." What I found is this:

Dionaea muscipula, or Venus's Flytrap, is a low growing perennial herb native to coastal bogs of North and South Carolina. (I don't live anywhere near here) Leaves will reach up to 5 inches long with flat, winged petioles. The blades are reniform (kidney-shaped), 2 lobed with the lobes hinged and fringed with stiff cilia. The upper surface has 3 sensitive hairs that when stimulated by insects cause the lobes to close together quickly (much this closing happens within ~1/30 of a second, or fast as I would put it). Plants are easy to grow and are great plants for terraria. They are hardy in USDA zone 8, (Again, I don't live anywhere near here, I'm not even sure what zone I'm in) but growing them in nature may be a challenge because of their need for low nutients and low pH -- difficult unless you intend to simulate their natural bog environment.

Culture: Dionaea muscipula need full sun to partial shade to high indirect lighting and a humid atmosphere with a moist to wet soil. If grown in containers, the container should be placed in a tray with at least 1 inch (2.5 cm) of water at all times. (Done this) Water must be distilled or rain water because they do not tolerate city or hard water. During the winter months, they should be allowed to go dormant from Nov-Feb. (Ah ha! This is what I needed to know) Plants need to have winter temperature of 45-50° F (5-10° C) or the small bulbs should be lifted and stored in moist peat at a cooler temperature.

Now that I know it's suppose to go dormant I'll stop worring untill Feb when I can't get to wake up. Utill then I have to help my daughter stop calling it a "Penis Flytrap". She's four and doesn't understand why Mommy and Daddy laugh when she says it.

I'm a Modern Man"

I recently started reading (really just listening on CD) Geoge Carlin's "When will Jesus bring the Pork Chops" and one of the early chapter is this great monologe that I wanted to share...

"I'm a Modern Man"
George Carlin,
November 5th, 2005
Beacon Theater, NYC

I'm a modern man,
A man for the millennium,
Digital and smoke free.
A diversified multicultural postmodern deconstructionist,
Politically anatomically and ecologically incorrect.

I've been uplinked and downloaded.
I've been inputted and outsourced.
I know the upside of downsizing.
I know the downside of upgrading.

I'm a high tech lowlife.
A cutting edge state-of-the-art bicoastal multitasker,
And I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.

I'm new wave but I'm old school,
And my inner child is outward bound.
I'm a hot wired heat seeking warm hearted cool customer,
Voice activated and biodegradable.

I interface from a database,
And my database is in cyberspace,
So I'm interactive,
I'm hyperactive,
And from time-to-time,
I'm radioactive.

Behind the eight ball,
Ahead of the curve,
Riding the wave,
Dodging a bullet,
Pushing the envelope.

I'm on point, On task, On message, And off drugs.
I got no need for coke and speed,
I got no urge to binge and purge.

I'm in the moment,
On the edge,
Over the top,
But under the radar.

A high concept, Low profile, Medium range ballistic missionary.
A street-wise smart bomb.
A top gun bottom feeder.

I wear power ties,
I tell power lies,
I take power naps,
I run victory laps.

I'm a totally ongoing bigfoot slam dunk rainmaker with a proactive outreach.

A raging workaholic.
A working ragaholic.
Out of rehab,
And in denial.

I got a personal trainer,
A personal shopper,
A personal assistant,
And a personal agenda.

You can't shut me up,
You can't dumb me down.
'Cause I'm tireless,
And I'm wireless.

I'm an alpha male on beta blockers.
I'm a non-believer and an over-achiever.
Laid back but fashion forward.
Up front, Down home, Low rent, High maintenance.

Super size,
Long lasting,
High definition,
Fast acting,
Oven ready,
And built to last.

I'm a hands on, Foot loose, Knee jerk, Head case.
Prematurely post traumatic,
And I have a love child who sends me hate mail.

But I'm feeling,
I'm caring,
I'm healing,
I'm sharing.

A supportive bonding nurturing primary care giver.

My output is down,
But my income is up.
I take a short position on the long bond,
And my revenue stream has its own cash flow.

I read junk mail,
I eat junk food,
I buy junk bonds,
I watch trash sports.

I'm gender specific,
Capital intensive,
User friendly,
And lactose intolerant.

I like rough sex.
I like tough love.
I use the f word in my email,
And the software on my hard drive is hard core, no soft porn.

I bought a microwave at a mini mall.
I bought a mini van in a mega store.
I eat fast food in the slow lane.

I'm toll free,
Bite sized,
Ready to wear,
And I come in all sizes.

A fully equipped,
Factory authorized,
Hospital tested,
Clinically proven,
Scientifically formulated medical miracle.

I've been pre-washed,
Pre-cooked,
Pre-heated,
Pre-screened,
Pre-approved,
Pre-packaged,
Post-dated,
Freeze-dried,
Double-wrapped,
Vacuum-packed,
And I have an unlimited broadband capacity.

I'm a rude dude,
But I'm the real deal.
Lean and mean.
Cocked, locked and ready to rock.
Rough tough and hard to bluff.

I take it slow.
I go with the flow.
I ride with the tide.
I got glide in my stride.
Drivin' and movin',
Sailin' and spinnin',
Jivin' and groovin',
Wailin' and winnin'.

I don't snooze,
So I don't lose.
I keep the pedal to the metal,
And the rubber on the road.

I party hearty,
And lunch time is crunch time.
I'm hanging in,
There ain't no doubt.
And I'm hanging tough,
Over and out.

Fun with Power Tools

For the two days of this weekend I had two jobs required of me.
On Saturday I spent almost all day tending my children while Sign Foo was manning a booth at the Deaf Center Bizarre. I had the fun opportunity to make them breakfast and lunch and we played and had all the great Father/Children time that should come more often.

On Sunday however, I spent working in the yard. Using the blower to clean up leaves and doing most of the general yard work to prepare for winter. I also used a considerable amount of time repairing the roof of the garage where some of the shingles have worn and started to leak. It’s just a seasonal fix; I plan to reroof the garage this coming spring or summer. Before I was finished my wife asked me “Why do men like power tools?”
This got me thinking about the past few years of me acquiring an assortment of fun power tools. The first (as it usually is) was a drill, not the most expensive or powerful, just a general utility drill that I used, and used, and used. After enough use and enough times when that particular drill was not enough, I bought another and more tools as well. As well as my new (and old) drill, I have circular saw, two kinds of jigsaws, a sander (Used on the Dresser from several posts’ back) and a CHAINSAW! That I have not yet used, but long for a Zombie attack so I can pretend to be Ash from Evil Dead. (Groovy!)
And to answer my wife’s question, is that they symbolize the ability to both destroy and create. It takes power and skill to take something raw and make it refined. Well, it’s my answer at leased.

Bring on the Deadites already!