Hello, Eduoard

Well, looks like we’re going to get some wind and rain here in a few hours. It’s already raining. When I went to bed last night the storm was supposed to go south of Houston. Imagine my surprise when we watched the weather this morning. The damn thing is going to come about 5 miles east of us. I don’t think it’s going to be as bad as Rita here. Although the winds will be damn near as strong. Boy, I hope the power isn’t out for 3 or 4 days like it was during Rita. My damn generator won’t run. May have to make a run to Lowes.

Here’s the map from The Weatherunderground. Click it to see larger.

The Maytag Man is NOT Lonely

We just went through a couple of weeks, yes weeks, of refrigerator hell. Our 10 year old Maytag went greasy side up. Again. 9th time in 10 years. 7 of those were ice maker related and 2 were a cooling problem. Yep. Same problem. And it took 2 service calls to get it done right this time. The freezer was still freezing, barely, but the refrigerator side went south. The coils in the freezer iced up because a circuit board that controls the defrost cycle failed. This severely restricted the air flow from the freezer to the frig. That coupled with a failed thermostat and a damper drive motor and the thing got up to 70°. And it was full of brisket, ribs, sausage and other goodies I was going to do up on my new smoker.

The bad part was the timing of the service calls. It cratered on Thursday evening. I called Friday morning. No service available until Tuesday. A parts changer showed up and told me he would have to order the parts and that would take about 3 days. 30 minutes after he left he called and said the parts were local and he would return that afternoon. As he was leaving after replacing some parts, he said it could take up to 24 hours to cool. It didn’t take that long when it was new or after the last go round so I put it down to his companies CYA policy. Next morning it was all the way down to 55 so I called again. The nice lady agreed it wasn’t looking good so she set up another service call. For the following Tuesday. No frig for damn near 2 weeks. Well, when the time came, a real serviceman showed up. He found the frosted coils and the circuit board overlooked by the parts changer. And I called his supervisor and told him the fellow was a good one.

And who says extended warranties are a waste of money? We bought the thing at Circuit City and against my better judgement bought the extended warranty. After the first 4 or 5 service calls in the first term, we decided to renew. Then renew again. The first time the thing got hot, CC re-embersed us $150 for food loss. This time it was $175. Plus when I pitched a bitch about the long time involved on the second service call they coughed up $125 to buy a dorm size frig. So now we have an extra 4.4 cubic feet of space for goodies.

Oh, we bought a new Whirlpool. Baby Boy will take the Maytag. It has a year left on the extended warranty. The new one has gray sides, stainless doors and it’s a counter depth. Looks great with our new granite. We lost a couple cubic feet but with the new baby frig that’s okay because we gained nearly a foot of space between the refrigerator and the new king-size island we had put in last year. Another cutsie thing with this one is the water dispenser. You can rotate teh spigot so you can put a larger container under it easier. And you can have it measure the water in ounces, cups or liters. 2 ways. One way is to tell it how much you want and it will turn off at that amount. The other way is to just fill your glass or what ever and it measures as you go. Neat huh? Yeah, I know it’s more electronics but hey, that’s what extended warranties are for, no? Plus it’s a Whirlpool.

How Fast Can Things Go To Hell In A Handbasket?

Pretty damned fast, as witness these drawings of the attitude of USS CHOPPER SS-342 during what started out as a routine dive to 150 feet one October day in 1969. She went through these angles in approximately 2 minutes. 2 minutes that probably seemed like an eternity to her crew. If you’re interested, visit Jim O’Brien’s page for the details.

While every submarine that ever ventured beneath the sea experienced things that were never intended, not many have survived something like this. And in fact, CHOPPER, although getting her crew to the surface and back to port, did not survive this. Having exceeded test depth, fought fires in the engine room, bounced off the ocean floor, and experienced a few other non-standard operations I can’t begin to imagine how harrowing this must have been.

Link Meme – Thanks Phlemmy

Link meme rules:

1. Must be clean, no R rated material.
2. Tell 5 people.
3. Only 5 links allowed.
4. Link back to person who tagged you.

You can link to business, favorite, affiliate sites, etc.

1. Say what? Do you even read my blog?
2. Five huh? Okay here goes. Meg, ATM, Cookie, bothenuke, Fathairybastard
3. Indoor Gardening Tips, Pandora (free innarw3bz music), I Can Has Cheezeburger, Get Firefox, Project Gutenberg for free ebooks (classics)
4. And it was phlegmfatale whut tagged me.

Daylight Savings Time – What a Pain in the Butt

I just got to go through the clock setting again. I woke up yesterday, looked at my nightstand clock and thought, damn, why am I sleeping late? Thought nothing more of it. This morning, same thing. Only as I was putting on my watch after the shower I noticed according to it I wasn’t up yet. Checked the wall clock in the bathroom and nope, still not up. Then it dawned on me.

I remembered having to reset the clocks last month. And last year, too. And I had to set the one on my nightstand even though it’s teeny tiny brain is pre-coded to change times on the correct dates. But thanks to our all-knowing, non-thinking congress, my clock is now obsolete. And oh yeah, there have been some studies that indicate DST actually costs energy. Once again, thank you congress for meddling in my life.

My New Toy

Did I mention my new toy? Well, the below video is a product of said toy.

I’m on the Verge of Not Likin’ ‘em Anymore

Norah Jones and Tori Amos, that’s who. I mean, I know I should separate the art from the person but I really have a hard time doing that. Actually, I’m not real fond of the ones who think like I do using their art to spread the word. When Jones came out with her Not Too Late CD last year with the song My Dear Country in which she laments about George Bush winning the election that just about did it. I did delete that track from the MP3s I burned for my MP3 dingus but damn. I still have a hard time listening to anything else she does because of it.

And now Tori Amos is doing an anti-war track called Yo, George in an anti-war film called “Body of War: Songs That Inspired an Iraq War Veteran”. It’s a 30 track deal in which she’s joined by other foreign policy experts Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young and Pearl Jam. None of who I ever listened to anyway. But Norah and Tori? Just damn. Think I may just stick to instrumentals from now on.

Do You Really Know What Your Spouse Does For a Few Exra Bucks? Workin’ at the Mall? Maybe Not

What are you doing here? – man asks wife at brothel

WARSAW (Reuters) – A Polish man got the shock of his life when he visited a brothel and spotted his wife among the establishment’s employees. Polish tabloid Super Express said the woman had been making some extra money on the side while telling her husband she worked at a store in a nearby town.

“I was dumfounded. I thought I was dreaming,” the husband told the newspaper Wednesday.

The couple, married for 14 years, are now divorcing, the newspaper reported.

(Writing by Chris Borowski, Editing by Matthew Jones)

And of course it begs the question – WTF was he doing there? Maybe she got so tired bumpin’ nasties at work she wouldn’t bump nasties with him?

When You Get in Water in a Kayak Where Great Whites are Known to Lurk…

you are out of your ever lovin’ frickin’ mind. Click on the thumbnail to see a larger image. And yeah, he was trollin’ for sharks. Kinda. “Trey was just one of a team of scientists hoping to discover why a large group of great whites, which travel off southern Africa’s tip during the summer, regularly swim so close to the beaches.”

Hell, there’s food on the beaches. Any dumbass oughta know that.

Sometimes I Wonder

You’d think a Harris County, Texas, America district attorney would know better than to send a personal email on a county computer box using his county email address. But not Chuckie. No sir. Maybe he thought he was exempt from the rules. I guess it wouldn’t have been too bad except he’s married and he sent this – “The very next time I see you, I want to kiss you behind your right ear,” – Not to his wife but to his squeeze from the 80s. Damn, Chuck. Good luck in divorce court. If you’re interested in how the emails were made public, click here.