Raining on Jason's moving day

At work the ERU is doing a training scenario, with 20 other agencies, all are going to get wet. Jason my stepson is moving out, and into his very own home. The garden is getting a good drenching, lots of seeds need it a lot.  Good luck to Jason, he has a really nice yard with a lot of potential. I'm a little sad he can't enjoy having the place to himself, but he's a more social creature than I am.  It will be nice to have the garage space back, to be able to set up a table to do gardening stuff, maybe some hypertufa pots, etc. Also I can toy with the valve to the backyard hose.

Official Food, Inc. Movie Site - Hungry For Change? - About the Book

Official Food, Inc. Movie Site - Hungry For Change? - About the Book

Furnace Filter

Changed the furnace filter. Back when we had to buy a new hot water heater, we had eight people in our cracker box northside domicile, so I thought the number 50 gallons made sense. No one from the gas utility that we purchased it from told me I was crazy. When it was installed in the very tiny space, the intallers did not suggest we could get by with something smaller. So ever since, 8 years or so trying to get to the furnace to change the filters has been a royal pain.  So I have developed surprising freak show, snake lady skills to get in and out with the help of barbecue tongs.  This is not to say I don't curse and hrrrumph plenty, and pine for the day we can afford an on demand water heater in a thought out convenient place.  This is all preamble to one of the more remarkable conversations I had with a repairman.  I'm reminded of this every time I change the filter and am contorted around the water heater, face pressed against cobwebs and dust.  We had a Centerpoint Energy tech out one time to service our furnace. He looked at the water heater capable of serving a fraternity, or a commerical laundry and said, "What the hell is this, this is an outrage, this would have never been put in MY house. This makes no sense. What lunatics put this in?"
"Your company."
He visibly shrank, looked at his toes and coughed.
I did all I could do not laugh.
"Oh." he said.

Blogger Buzz: Blogger integrates with Amazon Associates

Blogger Buzz: Blogger integrates with Amazon Associates

Reaction to Health Care

It is simply crazy. The GOP is couching it in terms of freedom, liberty, patriotism. It has NOTHING to do with any of that, but it affirms what Samuel Johnson said famously, "the last refuge of a soundrel is patriotism."  Or the US Constitution. The GOP relies on the fact that their receptive audience doesn't read, relies on FOX news, and wouldn't know the Constitution if it hit them in the head. The GOP is only interested in protecting the profits of a pernicious, heartless insurance system.  When you cut desperate people off from their insurance to keep your profits over a certain average to please Wallstreet, there is only one description for that. Evil.  Whether AETNA or Blue Cross makes 45 percent on their investment or 30 percent has nothing to do with my liberty, or my identity has an American.  I think making sure my neighbor has the care they need, in their time of need is a higher value.
What's sad is how successful the GOP was for 8 years of the Bush administration, when the fear of homosexuals and then Qaida boogie men kept them in office, despite the majority of the people that voted for them, were voting against their economic self interest.  Karl Rove and Dick Cheney had better hope there's nothing to Karma.  Now we see their new talking heads Boehner and McConnel bleating on their fear mongering nonsense.  The sheep are avidly listening and posting their BS.  Retweet. It's a word.  LOL
Health care reform is such a no brainer if you have a smidgen of humanity and compassion. The GOP keeps saying the Democrats will get punished in the next election, I think they are underestimating the number of people the insurance industry abandonned and the number of families they condemned to bankruptcy or worse.  It's a farce.

I'm sure it just kills the right that Obama, a black man accomplished something that no other president since Teddy Roosevelt could.

This does so much good, let the GOP run on the platform of repealing it. That's a sales pitch I want to see them attempt to deliver. LMAO.  Make my progressive day.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/nightlinedailyline/2010/03/david-frum-on-gop-now-we-work-for-fox.html

the haul from the washer

While I was at work googling, my intrepid wife Julie and stepson Jason made the repair. They took the catch out and it was clogged with 3.65 in change, cable ties, I recognize a few of my ear plugs, a purple Hersey kiss, some sticks that may or may not be parts of laundry baskets.  So if anyone reads this internet message in a bottle, F 21 failure code, go get your change out of the washer, it will require a small hex wrench, and a phillips head screw driver

Rough start

I could not sleep so I didn't turn in till 11 pm, so getting up at 4 am was TOUGH. The front end loading clothes washer is on the fritz. I emptied the washer thinking maybe the weight of the load, heavy towels was the problem. The lint filter was used up, so I took that off.  Draining seemed to be the issue.  I put in some bleach and ran the "Clean Washer" cycle thinking that might resolve it.  Nope.  When I got to work I googled and found dozens of links to do-it-yourselfers who took off the drain catch, and found all manner of things. Chemical handwarmers, hairpins, nails, bullets, foam earplugs, rubber bands.............so it should be interesting.  This was frustrating enough. I wasn't going to make a smoothie but I'd soaked some flaxseeds, so rather than have them go to waste, I fired up the Vitamix.  Julie's making onion bread in the dehydrater, so I'm looking forward to that tonight, but I brought a piece of pork roast with me to work, with an Indian dinner.  So I stumble out of the house frustrated by the washer and mid winter frost is covering all the cars.  Julie's car's dome light was on, and the frost made it appear that the windshield was smashed.  I told myself to take a deep breath. It was just frost, but I started her car to make sure it would start, and turned off the dome light.  Scraping this late in the year is a bit much.