Sweet Sixteen

What an interesting day we've had today!

It started out rotten. The red Subaru (Ruby) overheated while I was taking Mary to her zero-hour class at 6 a.m. I managed to get it home after stopping a couple times to let it cool off, but it was nerve-wracking. After last winter's van debacle, I'm very anxious about cars becoming immobile on public road, but I also didn't want to take a chance that the engine was going to seize up on me, not when there's a tight schedule. Deb needed to be at school by 7 and Cheryl needed to at school not long after that, and I needed to be at work by 7:30, so there was an intense desire to get the car home so at least we wouldn't have to deal with a tow truck. And we could figure out the problem later, when there was more time.

As it was, Cheryl ended up taking Deb to school and I went off to work because we have a big customer demo today. And the lab is a bit of a mess. Lots of prep work to do, cleaning up the lab, dry-running all the software before the real show begins, watching over the demo to make sure everything goes all right, then switching over to another lab where we are packing up a flight simulator cockpit to send to a trade show exhibit in Washington, D.C. Took me til after 5 p.m. before I could leave, and then only because Cheryl had sent me a message that the family was going out to eat for Mary's birthday at 5:30!

Mary, the cosmopolitan one, decided that her birthday dinner would be at Haru, a local sushi place. It was absolutely delicious. Deb didn't think she liked sushi until she tried it, and then she was all over it! Another successful conversion! (This is all James's fault, by the way.) This may turn out to be on ongoing family tradition...

Then it was time to head home for some birthday cake. Which hadn't been made yet. So I had a little bit of time to get under the hood of the red subaru and try to figure out what was going on. I managed to pull the radiator out, but didn't find anything obviously wrong with it. Guess I'll have to run a water check on it tomorrow.

Ran out of time, so went back in the house and ate cake with the family and watched Mary open her birthday cards. She was quite pleased with the attention. And can't wait to go to the Mall and spend some money on some new outfits. And books. Mostly books, I think.

Me, I can't wait to shut my eyes and try to catch up on some sleep. It's been a long day.

On the Cusp of Adulthood

All of our children are interesting in their own ways, with idiosyncrasies that drive us crazy and make us wonder if perhaps we picked up the wrong bassinet at some point during our brief hospital stay so many years ago. But then we notice that they have a very strong resemblance to the both of us -- and to some of our relatives -- and we sigh and accept the fact that they are simply doing the same thing to us that we did to our parents. Attempt to drive us crazy so they can put us in a home and inherit all our money and live lives of riotous abandon until they run out of money and then come crawling back to beg our forgiveness and ... wait a minute. Haven't I heard that story somewhere before?

Mary is about to reach one of those "magic" ages of youth which should probably be marked with a huge party and a new car. But we aren't that kind of family, and she really isn't that kind of girl. When we asked her what she wanted for this Most Significant Birthday, she rattled off a list that went something like: "Well, I need money for {this} and money for {that} and money for {some other thing}, so why don't you just give me a bunch of money and that'll take care of it?" -- and being the kind of parents we are, we said, "Sure!" (while thinking "Whew!" in our heads) because our family is all about reducing the anxiety caused by an overabundance of choices. Especially when gift-giving is involved.

So tomorrow when she reaches that Golden Age of Youth (right before the Bronze Age of Get A Job and the Tin Age of Please Move Out of My House), she will be showered with money (mostly dollar bills because we're very cheap) so that she can go to the Mall and buy stuff. Which would be much easier if her Aunt Jan was here to help her. Because they both like shopping, apparently. And her parents just aren't into that sort of thing. Unless it involves Joanne Fabrics or Radio Shack. (So we're thinking of shipping her down to Abilene for her 18th birthday so she and Jan can just go crazy.)

Our family tradition is that the birthday person gets to pick out where or what we're going to eat, and Mary has chosen a nice little sushi place over by the grocery store. She likes sushi. For this, you can blame her brother, James, who introduced us all to this place. And, incidentally, is good friends with the son of the proprietors. In fact, when he was still stateside, we would go with him over to the sushi place and get free stuff because the proprietors liked James. And he used to eat there often.

Now I'm getting hungry.

Best part is, we don't have to worry about making anything at home. And no clean-up!

Monster in the Pit

I'm a horrible person when it comes to leadership, judging by the number of pit crew who showed up to help out tonight.

Band practice starts promptly at 6:30, which means that I generally want to be at the school by 5:30 to start setting things up. Tonight was a bit of a special case since they were going to be practicing down on the field instead of on the parking lot where we usually practice during the week -- which means my team and I need to get all the carts out so they can be loaded, and we need to get the podiums set up down on the field. Lots of things to do.

But when I got there at 5:30, there was no one there. Except the drum majors and some sax players who were doing a sectional. Some of them helped me load up the podiums and I drove them to the field, and then the drum majors set them up for me while I headed back to the parking lot to help set up the front line carts. By the time I got there, one of my team had arrived, but he was eating his dinner (in his car), so I continued to set up on my own until he finished and was able to help me.

We finished getting all the carts lined up and then the kids loaded all the front-line instruments and we headed down to the field just in time for the start of practice.

Somewhere around 8 pm, another pit crew member showed up, but there was nothing to do until the end of practice, so we sat in the stands and watched the band play -- and get yelled at by the directors -- until it was (finally) time to wrap things up and put all the toys away.

Now the second person really came in handy because there were two tractors to drive so I let the two guys drive the instruments back to the parking lot so they could be unloaded into the trailer while I worked with the drum majors to pack up the podiums and the yard markers and all the other paraphernalia so it could be put away, too. After all that stuff was put away, I had to go around and make sure all the gates were locked and the bathrooms were closed. And while I was in the middle of that, the lights went out (because running the stadium lights costs serious money, and we don't want to waste it now, do we?) so I had to close gates and bathrooms in near-darkness.

Back in the parking lot, after the kids had unloaded all the instruments, we put away all the carts and the safety cones and everything else that could possibly be stashed into our trailers, then said good-night and headed home.

All three of us.

If this were a real game or a competition, we'd be in serious trouble.

Why is it that I can't motivate people to show up?

In the Nick of Time

Finally figured it out.

The inner and outer brake pads were swapped. One has a longer tab along the outside edge: that's supposed to be the inner pad. I had them in the wrong place.

When I put them in the right place, they worked great. No noise, no throbbing. Just smooth braking.

Just in time, too. Adam needed to do some traveling this afternoon.

So after that bit of success, it was time to celebrate -- by cleaning my garage!

Hey, I get my fun however I can.

Broken Brake Blues

We put the Pontiac in the shop on Thursday because it was making a horrid scraping noise and one of the drive shaft boots was missing the retaining clip, which had splattered grease all over the backside of the front passenger wheel.  They replaced the drive shaft as I had requested, then mentioned that the brakes were grinding metal (thus the horrid scraping noise).

Well, I can fix brakes on my own, so didn't bother having them charge me for the labor on that. Now I'm wishing I would've had them do it for me. I didn't intend on spending so much time on it!

Started up early this morning, pulling the caliper brackets and pads off. Sure enough, the inner pads on both front brakes were worn down to the metal. Oddly enough, only the inner pads; the outer pads were fine. Hmmm.

Checked the caliper bracket pins. Lower ones were frozen solid, rusted. OK, simple enough to replace. Took 'em to NAPA for core and got new ones. Plus new pins. Plus mounting clips. Asked 'em if they could check the rotors, but they didn't have a mechanic available on Saturday. Suggested I try their store on the other side of town.

So I drove to the other side of town and handed the rotors to the guy across the counter, who measured 'em with the calipers and shook his head. "Too far gone," he said. Not a problem, says I. Just give me new ones.  Which he did.

Took it all home and started putting it together. It was early afternoon by then, nearly three. Got it all put together by five. Took it for a quick test spin. Something wrong. Something is grinding. Back on the jacks, pulled the tire off, flipped the pads on the driver side brake, put it all back together again, took it for another test spin. Much, much better, but now it's got a rhythmic rumbling whenever I push the brakes at low speed, the kind of noise that comes from a rotor that isn't polished. What's up with that? I just got these!

Back to my garage, but I've run out of time to work on this issue. Got to pick up Deb at work by 7, then get some dinner, then work on my lesson for tomorrow. And I still have basement work to do.

The good news for today was that the cabinets for the basement kitchenette were delivered. Now they're sitting in the garage just waiting for the rest of the basement to catch up. Electrical, drywall, paint. Coming soon.

Friday Night Lights (Out)

I'm starting to dread Fridays.

Anxiety builds up day by day until it's ready to explode Friday morning. There is no way to be completely ready. Something is always forgotten. And it is impossible to focus on work when my mind is distracted by the upcoming performance.

It's not like I'm doing everything myself. There is an entire pit crew there to do the work, and plenty of students to handle the loading and unloading of instruments on the carts. But there is always the thought at the back of my head -- what if I mess up? What if I forget something?

What if something goes wrong?

I am not a list person. My brain just doesn't work that way. I can write lists up and down and all over the place, but when things start happening, they start happening too fast to worry about lists.

It doesn't help when I'm behind schedule with the Color Guard carrying cases and hurrying to finish the first one in time to show it to the CG director. It completely crowded out of my brain the important information that one of the pit crew was going to meet me at the school at 4:30 to get started on the safety cones.

I remembered this fact about 4:40. And so ran out of the house in a panic.

Got to the school and there were two pit crew members waiting for me, both wondering what had kept me. Now I'm embarrassed and frustrated at the same time, but there's no time for that -- we have to get the signs out in the parking lot and -- oh, no! There's something going on at the freshman campus and there are still cars parked in the lot where the band needs to practice. What am I supposed to do about that?

We put the signs and cones up and then load the podiums on our "extra" cart and I head down to the stadium to drop them off, abandoning the parking lot to whatever fate befalls it. Not much I can really do short of running through the freshman campus screaming for everyone to get their cars out of my parking lot. (Like they care.)

Got the podiums set up and suddenly I'm getting phone calls from the pit crew again -- the big trailer is locked (and I have the key). Well, that's not quite true. The back door of the big trailer is locked, but the side door is unlocked. And the percussion section leaders have a key of their own because they store their instruments in there. But, being the "what can I do to help you" kind of person I am, I rush back to the parking lot to unlock the trailer for them ... only to find that the percussion section leader beat me to it. So I wasted a good rush.

My temper is not helped by this.

Then there is the potluck thing. Or "tailgate" thing. One of the pit crew had promised back during band camp, on the night we had to skip dinner because of a gas leak, that we would have a "tailgate" party at one of the home games, and use up the frozen lasagna he had taken home that night. We thought it was going to be last week, since it was the first home game, so we brought a salad. But no one else brought anything (because there had been a remarkable lack of communication about it). Since there was still a deplorable lack of communication, we didn't bring anything tonight, either. So, naturally, this was the night when this guy decided to bring the lasagna. Again, no one else brought anything.

Unfortunately, yet another crisis drew me back to the stadium, and by the time I returned, the lasagna was put away and it was nearly time for the front line to go. So they went.  And I went. Back to the stadium. Again. Waiting. Where's the front line?

The first tractor arrives with four of the carts. Minutes pass. Where's the other one? Oh, there it is! Wait -- it's only got three of its four carts. Where's the other one?  The tractor driver unpins the carts and starts heading back, no explanation. I race after him, catching up on the other side of stadium. One of his carts blew a tire! Wish they would've told me -- I have a spare tire and all the tools back on the track. I race back to get them, then (again) to the other side of the stadium again. (Whew!) We change the tire, the tractor driver and I. We try to drive to the track. Rats! There's not enough air in it. It starts to wobble, the tire starts to come off. We need air! I race back (again) to the track to fetch the pump, then back to the cart. Now the stem is twisted too much to lock the pump on. I need to pull it off. I race back to the track (again) to fetch the tools (because I forgot to leave them with the cart) and then back again, only to discover that the tractor driver managed to get it pumped up. Mostly.  At least enough to get it safely back to the track.

But we're late. The band has already started to come out onto the field. And then is when I notice, much to my shame and embarrassment, that my crack pit crew team has not noticed that the pregame podium is not set up!!!  The marching band directors and the Color Guard coach are putting it up! Where is my crack pit crew team!???!!

I just want to crawl under a rock -- but there's work to do. We tend to the cart tire, pulling it off and moving the tube back into position so we can inflate it properly and then re-install it. By the time all that is done, the pregame is over and the band has left the field and the football game has started.

We get a few minutes to relax before the half-time panic. Here we use the word "relax" to mean something only slightly less than a complete panic attack.

When half-time arrives, the team is behind on points and we're only slightly behind in time. It's a rush to move the football benches out of the way and the podiums and yard markers into place. We stand on the track and watch the performance nervously, hoping everything goes well. The band sounds great. Too soon, they're done, and we move back in to get all our equipment off the field and put the football team's equipment back in place. We want all the podiums out of the way before the band swings around to march in front of the stands. We're only half-successful.

But at least we're done. No more performance, no more anxiety. The only thing left, is to get the equipment back to the trailers after the game is all over. But before the traffic starts up. Which means that we have to leave about five minutes before the end of the game.

One final point: we leave the trailers unlocked when we go to the stadium. Because there's nothing left in them, what would be the point of locking them? So I, as the "keeper of the keys", generally don't worry about making sure the tractor drivers have a key because they shouldn't need one. And I generally stay in the stadium to make sure everything is picked up.

Only this time, someone (we won't name any names) locked the trailers before they went over to the stadium. Not sure what was going through their minds. Don't really care. But when I started getting slightly-sarcastic texts from the guys at the trailer ("Did you forget something?" "We sure could use a key over here!") I almost blew a gasket. Again with the rushing back to the trailer. And arguing with the pit crew team about the procedure we've always used. And feeling tired and exhausted and angry and just fed up.

My final task on game nights is to sit in my car after most everyone else has left in order to make sure all the students get picked up. This is performed with a classical music accompaniment, courtesy of my car radio. It helps me relax, calm down, unwind.

I really needed it tonight.

Living with Error

I don't like the job that the HVAC guys did. They didn't do the heat drops in the big room like I wanted. But I'm not sure if I want to do anything about it.

The basic work was done last week, but, as I mentioned on Thursday, we found out they hadn't finished the job (after the inspector asked us, "Um, weren't they supposed to {name of important HVAC task}?"  So I called up the company and talked to the guy who'd originally written the proposal; and, sure enough, they had missed three steps on the procedure. So they came back today to finish.

They installed the bathroom heater vent correctly, but they did a weird job on the family room. Instead of putting the vent near the outer wall (and the window) which I was expecting, they stopped short of the wall by about six feet. Which kind of defeats the purpose of ventilation, doesn't it? I thought the purpose was to drop the heat at a point furthest away from the return air vent (which is in the hallway) so we get maximum air flow. And the wall with the window, which is generally the coolest spot in the room, gets the most heat.

Am I missing something?

Oh, and one of the vent pipes curves down into the room. Which is specifically something I told them I didn't want.

I'm not sure if it's worth fussing about, though. The job is done. It's time to move on. It annoys me, but it's going to annoy Cheryl more if we don't hurry up and get the basement completed. And I don't have enough energy left to deal with it.

So now it's time to get the electrical done and then the drywall up and then the flooring in and then the ceiling up and the paint on and finally, finally, finally start utilizing all this extra space we have down here.

So I can get back to my garage.

The Show Must Go On

Friday night was the culmination of a week of intensity and anxiety. Can I combine those and call it intenxiety? Or anxensity?

Whatever you want to call it, the moment the Marching Band instruments were all packed away after the performance, I felt an overwhelming calm and peace come over me like a blanket. Unlike the wet misty blanket of rain that was falling all over everything else.

The rain felt good. My brain and muscles were hot and bothered.

But I'm getting ahead of myself again.

You already know about the fiasco with the podium rails (unless you haven't been reading the blog, in which case you might want to go back a few posts and read about it).  And the fiasco with the tractors not starting. So I was keyed up all week in anticipation of further failure.

It didn't help that I started feeling ill Friday afternoon. At work. Like, feverish and achy.

But there were places to go, things to do, preparations to be made!

First stop was Sears to pick up the lawn mower air filter. Because, for some odd reason, they don't run well when they're all clogged up. While there at the mall, I visited the little shoppe where Adam is working. Cute little half-store, barely wider than the door, stocked full of little bottles of olive oil and other tasty things. Smelled good. It was a bit weird that no one was standing out in the middle of the store waiting for customers, though. Two people were there, but they were in the back playing with the computer or something.

Ran home to change clothes (off with the fancy shirt, on with the Pit Crew T-shirt), grab a few tools, and head over to the school. One of my crew met me there at 4:30 and we started putting up cones (for parking lot safety) and pulling out the tractors. Put in the air filter, checked that they both started (they did!), then the rest of the crew started showing up and we pulled out the carts and things.

We picked up the newly-recovered rail from the band office and loaded all the podiums onto a cart and took them out to the stadium to set them up. Roped off the Band section in the bleachers. Then back to the trailer to help the kids load up the instruments. When they were ready, my drivers took both tractors with their tractor-loads to the stadium and the band marched over and we patiently waited for the game to start.

The rain actually held off awhile so the band was able to do their complete show at half-time. But the director told us to get the instruments back to the trailer right afterwards, and it's a good thing he did -- because the rain started coming down heavy right after we had everything back in the trailer.

And now that everything was packed away and all the kids were going home with their parents and there was nothing else to stress about, it was time for me to go home and relax for awhile.

Until next week.

Lost & Found

My prayers were answered today with the finding of the lost podium rail.

One of the music directors sent an email to everyone on the school district staff to be watching for the rail, and his effort paid off: the maintenance staff at the high school found it outside the stadium gates, as though someone had tossed it away.

The music director sent me a picture of the found rail. I was confused for a while, wondering if this was the rail we still had or the one we were looking for?  But he clarified the situation after a while: it as the found rail. We have all four! So now we are ready for tomorrow's game!

If it doesn't storm.

The meteorologist said it was going to rain on Friday night and on into Saturday. But the devil is in the details. Exactly when is it going to rain? That's a very important question because the band directors will have the kids ready to go right up to the last minute if there's even a hint that the skies might clear for fifteen minutes. They really want to put on that show!

Band season is now in full sing. And robotics season just started tonight with our Parent Night, where we get to meet all the new parents and explain to them how their children will be spending all their evenings at school from January through March.

Basement season is in full swing here at the Meyer house. The plumbers are supposed to come over tomorrow and finish up some things they missed the first time. We were wondering where the heat ducts for the bathroom and the den had been installed. Turns out they hadn't been. So we had to call the plumbers up and request they come back and finish the job.

Now I just need to pull the electrical permit and we can get our rough-in done, then start dry-walling!!

Today is Also Not My Day

We hadn't heard back from the plumbers in regard to the schedule. We had no idea when they were coming. Until today. Because they showed up, suddenly, unannounced. And we were completely taken by surprise.

The premise of our last communication with them was that they would call to arrange a time to begin. Instead, they just showed up. Not a good way to start a business relationship.

Oh, well. We want the basement done. So they got started. Not the guy I had originally talked to. Some other guy. Nice guy, kinda quiet and reserved. Had a few questions about the duct work. Which Cheryl directed to me. I was at work. Which doesn't work when there are questions to be answered about duct work that I cannot see.

So I came home and talked to the guy. Tried to help him figure out what needed to be done. Simple enough. Route this thing over there, then put that thing over here and make sure the other thingie is set up here in this corner where it won't hurt anybody.

Kinda miffed that the first guy's instructions weren't as clear as I had hoped. Which means I'll have to watch this new guy to make sure he does what I want.

And how am I supposed to fit in my regular work while I'm trying to watch this guy?

He finally left, but he's not done. Only got some of the duct work done, and the water run for the kitchenette. Tomorrow he'll have to tackle the shower enclosure and the bathroom vent fan. And a few other miscellaneous odds and ends.

Meanwhile, it's Marching Band rehearsal night, and I need to get my Pit Crew team through a dry run so we'll be ready for Friday. Unfortunately, we can't load up the carts with the instruments because the band is using them, so we just practice unloading the carts from the trailer and driving them to the stadium so we can do a mock setup.

Unfortunately, one of the tractors won't start, so we can only practice a half-set of carts. We go on down to the stadium with the carts, then grab the big podium from its storage spot and -- wait a minute. The storage area lock is missing. And a couple of the safety rails for the podium are missing! Panic in the streets!

We search for awhile but don't find the missing rails. We set up the podium anyway, just to give the new guys some practice, but now I'm alarmed. We can't use the podium without the safety rails. And our first game is coming up very quickly!! What are we going to do!?

The worst part is having to tell the Band Directors. They won't want to hear excuses; they will want to know what we are going to do about it. And Panic doesn't count. So I'm going to need to institute a search during the daytime, and meanwhile look on-line to see if we can get any replacement rails.

But all I really want to do is go to my room and hide under the covers.

Today is Just Not My Day

It began, like all other days, with getting up. Out of bed. Because the cat woke me up.

"Feed me!" she whined.

I looked at the clock. It was 5:30. In the a.m.

Stupid cat.

But I got up anyway. (Stupid me.) And walked downstairs. Avoiding the cat, who kept intertwining between my feet. Not sure what that's all about. If she trips me and I fall down the stairs and break my neck, how will she get fed?

Oh. Right. She just goes to the next (alive) person and wakes them up. And says in her little cat voice, "Feed me! But avoid tripping over the body at the bottom of the stairs. He was too clumsy to feed me."

Cat food for the cat. Coffee for Cheryl (who isn't up yet, but will be in a couple hours). Antacid meds (because I am old and things don't work as well as they used to).  Then back up the stairs and back into bed, for thirty precious minutes of closed-eye meditation. (I can't sleep once I've actually woken up -- just drift around in my head, anticipating the alarm clock's chime.)  Promptly at 6:59, right before the alarm is supposed to go off, I get up, shut off the alarm, and head downstairs again.

The cat sleeps on her cat-tree on the other side of the family room, quiet. Content. I pour some milk on a bowl of cereal. The cap apears at my side as though teleported, looking up at me with doleful eyes. Are you kidding me? How many times do we have to go through this? I don't give milk to cats. I take my cereal downstairs to the basement, to eat in peace. While reading the news. Which is anything but peaceful. Still too much anxiety in the world. So I switch to the comics, which is much more entertaining and a whole lot less stressful.

After breakfast, it's time to get ready to go. Clean and dressed, I head out to the garage with my bag o' stuff for Sunday School - and Mary, my only companion on these lonely Sunday mornings. But first, time for the car shuffle. Gotta move Adam's car out of the driveway, then move my car out of the garage, then move Adam's car back into the driveway. Should've done this last night, but I have no energy at night.

Then ... it happened. Right at 8:15, my scheduled time of departure. Major lower GI cramps. The kind that indicate last night's dinner did not agree with me. (This happens to me quite often, actually. I have a very finicky system.) But I don't have time to deal with this right now. I have places to go, things to do!

So we zoom off to church, just Mary and me. The early risers. So I can get my room prepped, and she can ... do whatever it is that she does. We come in downstairs through the Children's Ministry entrance, then she scoots upstairs, and I start prepping. And groaning. And waiting for the pain to pass. And it does, after a while.

I'm supposed to start in the gym. The gym was being repainted last week, but all that was supposed to be done by now. Is it? Can't tell. The "Wet Paint" signs are still up. I investigate. Nope, the paint is dry. Nothing has been done all week in here. So I set up the gym for Bernie&Tim's class. Then turn on the computers so we can log the kids in (because we run a safe, secure Sunday School).

Oops. Chrome got an update. Now Chrome doesn't work anymore with the check-in software. Have to switch over to Internet Explorer. Which I hate. Oh, well, any port in a storm.

Now time to prep my class. We're studying the book of Genesis. So I set up three columns on two whiteboards: People, Places, Things. Today the kids get to pick their favorite stories out of Genesis and talk about the people, places and things involved with each story.

Class starts and I have no helper today, so Mary and her friend, Tiff, come down to assist me. We have a strict policy of at least two adults (or near-adults) in each class. It's nice to have the help -- and fun to find out how much Bible-reading the two girls have been doing on their own!  It's interesting to see which details they remember and which they do not. I urge the little kids every week to read the Bible with their parents because it was obvious for a long time that this wasn't happening. They were struggling to remember the most basic stories: Adam & Eve, Noah, Joseph. So we began working on memorizing the books, memorizing the stories, memorizing the verses. It's still a struggle, though, because if they're only getting pushed on one day a week (because they're so very busy the rest of the week with everything else), it's difficult to make any headway in their routine.

We need the parents to be diligent about these things!

We finish our lesson and head upstairs for worship with the adults, then after singing for a while the kids are dismissed to go to Children's Church. I go along with them to make sure the teachers have enough helpers -- and of course, this time they don't. The assistant is missing! So I go along with the younger class (4 years to 2nd grade) to help out the teacher. The kids are extra-squirrely today! Someone must've put sugar in their cereal this morning. I have to call kids out by name and take away some contraband (toys) so they'll pay attention (maybe), feeling like Mr. Grinch. But the teacher -- who is a real schoolteacher, by the way -- is able to complete the lesson, so the kids do their craft and then get a chance to play with the show-and-tell stuff she brought. Then we bring the kids down to the gym to have their own worship time.

After church -- after cleaning up my room and shutting down the lights and all the other stuff we have to do before leaving -- I head upstairs to meet with Cheryl and start my next task, which is changing the oil on someone's car. Out in the church parking lot.

Naturally, I forgot my drain pan, so I have to improvise with a plastic storage tub. And I forgot a funnel, so have to improvise with a plastic coffee cup. And I forgot a change of clothes, so have to do it in my Sunday outfit.

Changing the oil is easy. Except for the part where I had just drained the oil, and the lady whose oil I was changing suddenly turned on the car to check a computer readout.  "Shut it down! Shut it down!" I shouted, seeing in my mind's eye the oil-starved pistons carving grooves in the cylinder walls. Or, worse, bone-dry crankshaft bearings melding with the engine case. (Been there, done that.)

She turned it off. And I put the oil in. And then she turned it on again. And ... a very serious Error Indication came on: "Low Oil Pressure". Oops. Can't drive the car if the oil pressure is low. This car is toast!

Spent an hour or so pulling my hair out, trying to figure out what to do next. Finally gave up and drove the lady home (along with her family) so they could continue on with their day -- which included a birthday party -- then I drove back home to eat some lunch and do some research.

Turns out that, for this particular car, any time an Error Indication is Set, simply fixing the problem doesn't reset the Error Indication. That is, even though the car now had sufficient oil in it, the "Low Oil Pressure" indication was still lit up. It is necessary to manually reset the Error Indication after the problem is fixed. Kind of like those "Check Engine" lights, which tell the driver that they need to take the car to an expensive repair shop to have someone reset the error indicator so the light goes away.

You'll love the "reset" procedure: With the key in the ACC position, depress the accelerator pedal three times in rapid succession, then press and hold the brake pedal, then turn the car OFF.

Worked like a charm, too. Now the Error Indication went away, and the car ran fine.

The only problem was that I had wasted three hours dealing with a non-existent issue.

Got the car back to the lady and her family, then Cheryl and I went out shopping at the hardware store and ordered our new kitchenette cabinets.

Then home to relax for a little while before the crazy week begins.

Marching Band boosters dinner Monday night. Also, our last Marching Band practice before our first game on Friday.

I'm not feeling ready for the season yet.

Attack of the Killer Yellow Jackets!

The yellow jackets built a nest in our fireplace. Actually, in the enclosure on the backside of our house which keeps the rain off the fireplace. The enclosure sticks out two or three feet off the back side of our house and kind of hangs in the middle of the air with no obvious means of support, so technically it's not really part of the "house" so much as it is a camouflaged umbrella over the fireplace so the metallic parts don't get all rusty and gross.

Only they didn't seal it up very good because the wasps found a way inside and they built a nest in it and now it's all icky and gross.

How can we tell that it is all icky and gross?

Cheryl heard a buzzing noise coming from the fireplace one day -- actually, the sound wasn't coming from the fireplace; it was coming from the TV nook that was built next to the fireplace (obviously designed to fit those old-fashioned big, fat, deep TVs with the huge CRTs in them, because the nook is over two feet deep!). She pulled all the books out of the nook (because that's what we were storing there) and felt the top of the space (which was obviously made out of cheap MDF or chipboard) and it was sagging and kind of soft. Like something was filling it with moisture. Like thousands of icky wasps.

So she called the exterminator folks and they came out on Friday and sprayed some stuff out of a can and pumped some other stuff out of a little accordian-looking thing (the "duster") and then when we REALLY hear those wasps from inside the TV nook, angrily buzzing around like someone had set the place on fire. Which, in a way, we had done.

While the exterminator was there, he also sprayed/dusted some other bugs (European Paper Wasps) that had infiltrated the hollow metal supports of our deck tent. He said that the EPWs have a very painful sting, but die quickly when dusted. The Yellow Jackets, on the other hand, have a slightly less painful sting but take forever to die. Like, at least 24 hours.

He also said not to try and take the fireplace apart to clean out the dead wasps and the nest. Instead, he told us just to seal up the enclosure to make sure they don't come back next season to reclaim the nest. Because they will, if given the chance.

After the exterminator had left, Cheryl and I each took a turn sitting in the TV nook and listening to the angry, dying wasps. It was weird and wonderful, all at the same time. Like an audio nature show.

Just Can't Help It

It's in my blood. I just gotta build stuff.

Every year, the Marching Band Pit Crew gets a project or two from the band or the color guard, usually something innocuous like percussion cabinets or drum stands. This year, the color guard asked us to come up with something to store and/or carry their flags in. They currently have to carry them all in their hands, to and from the school. Very tedious.

We thought about purchasing some fancy flag-carrying cases, but those generally run in the hundreds-of-dollars range, and our budget for the entire year is a lot less than that. So this is our chance to come up with something clever and cheap and quick.

My idea looks something like this:

I'm thinking of getting some 1x2 strips at the lumber yard to make most of it, slapping on a couple hinges and a latch, then maybe covering it with thin plastic or canvas. It doesn't have to be super-resilient, just do the job. And survive one season. I figure we'll try it out this year and see how things go.

Naturally, I had to prototype it. And I had just the thing to try it on: a cheap rolling clothes rack kit we bought a few years back when I was helping with the middle school musical. It consists of lots of poles, and we don't have anything to carry all the pieces around in.

Til now.

I didn't put a back or front on it yet, or a real hinge. Just duct tape. 'Cause that's the way I roll with my prototypes. I might slap some cardboard on it for a back, then do something different with the lid. But not tonight.

First Day of School 2015

We've all been eagerly anticipating the first day of school, especially the high school kids who were working all summer (ha ha!) on their Advanced Placement prep assignments. And ended up working on it right up to the last minute. Because some of it took longer than they had anticipated. (Or perhaps their ability to stay focused on the assignments for longer than five minutes was not quite up to par.)

I'm not ready. The beginning of the school year means that the Marching Band kicks into high gear, and we start having games, and the pit crew (for which I am chief) has to get serious about making sure everything goes smoothly. Moving the instrument-laden carts into place, helping the kids get everything ready, setting up podiums and speakers and power cords and microphones and ladders, keeping the tractors in tip-top shape so they don't stop when they are supposed to be moving forward, and all those other little activities that keep us busy during performances.

The kids are not ready. They're still stuck in their weird summer sleep schedules and will be struggling to re-orient their inner clocks so they don't oversleep or end up being too tired at the end of the day. They have their summer homework mostly done, but that's not the same thing as all done, and no one ever knows how the teachers will react when someone presents them incomplete homework. Some of it is pure busy-work, and some of it is crucial so that the student is not left behind.

Cheryl is not quite ready to jump back into the parapro routine, judging by the frazzled expression on her face. She'll be getting up early in the morning, much earlier than she is used to getting up, and heading off to school so she can be there by 7 a.m. Which means that the coffee needs to be ready by 6!

This is the only time of the year when everyone else in the family gets even close to adhering to my very logical, very early-bird schedule. If only the cat would meow in their faces when she's ready to be fed at five-thirty in the morning.

Oil Change

Many, many years ago, more years than I care to remember, I took my relatively-new 1986 Plymouth Voyager to one of those cheap oil-change establishments because the terms of my house rental did not allow car repairs in the driveway. And I did not want to get in trouble with my landlady.

The name of the establishment escapes me; perhaps it is best left to the fog of history. The operation was performed, the patient was blessed, the bill was paid, and I was on my merry way, cruising across Seattle along the Alaskan Way Viaduct enroute to my home in Ballard.

At some point on that journey -- my memory is unable to recall exactly when, but it was someplace along the viaduct -- a sudden sharp metallic noise like a rock smacking against the underside of the car occurred -- an idiot light came on -- panic arose in my throat -- but the car gamely drove on, wounded but not mortally so. I managed to make it home. I turned off the car. Whereupon the remainder of what oil remained in the engine poured out onto the ground, on the driveway of my rented house.

My landlady was not going to be happy about this.

Investigation of the underside of the car revealed that the oil plug at the bottom of the oil pan had simply disappeared. The obvious reason was that the morons at the oil-change establishment had failed to properly torque the bolt and it had come loose on the way home. As a consequence, the engine came within a hair's-breadth of being damaged beyond repair.

A short walk to the auto parts store brought me a new plug and crush-ring, along with five quarts of oil. And a resolution never to darken the door of one of those oil-change establishments again.

One would think after such an experience, the lesson would be learned. But I was weak. And lazy. And busy with other priorities. So when Cheryl's car needed an oil change, against my better judgement and in the face of historical evidence, I suggested that she take it to one of those oil-change places. (It also has a car wash attached so one can purchase a combination oil-change/car-wash at one time.)

I should've known.

She brought the car home and parked it in the garage, and all was well until the next day, when she pulled out to run an errand and we discovered a pool of fresh oil under her car. Not the entire contents of the engine, but enough to warrant immediate action. I took a look underneath and discovered that the morons had forgotten to put in the washer/crush-ring/gasket that goes along with the plug. (At this point, I hadn't researched the Hyundai Sonata to find out which one it used.) So oil was dripping slowly through the threads and onto the garage floor.

I thought about redoing the whole operation myself but anger took over, anger at having paid for something which was done poorly -- and at the risk of damaging a car which is not yet paid for - so I decided to take it back to the shop and make them do it over. Cheryl called the shop to make sure they were open -- and they were, but for only another forty-five minutes -- so I rushed over there and explained to them (in a tone that left no doubt of my restrained anger) what had occurred. Luckily, they believed that old adage about taking care of the customer, and they did the entire oil change anew, even throwing in an additional car wash to take car of any oil which might have gotten splattered onto the underside of the car.

My anger was somewhat mollified. But the moment I got home, the car went up on the ramps so their work could be double-checked.

And there it was: the brightly polished oil plug, embraced by a ring of bright steel, clinging tightly to the bottom of the oil pan with nary a hint of oil or visible thread.

I lay underneath the car for quite some time, staring up at the engine with all kinds of memories wafting through my brain, memories of Ballard and Voyager mini-vans and pools of oil on rental driveways, memories of panic and fear and anger and frustration, thoughts of the lingering fear that continues to shape our actions when once our trust in the work of others has been betrayed.

A thousand successful jobs can be overshadowed by one near-disaster. Memories of failure are long and deep, while those of "ordinary" success are forgotten almost as soon as they are experienced.

Weed Wacker Woes

I don't know how they did it, but they* managed to destroy the Black & Decker Weed Whacker.

The silly thing had only been running for about twenty seconds when there was a sickening sound like a wounded giraffe with his tongue stuck in his throat, and then a horrible burning smell like all the empty plastic jugs in the recycling bin melting at once, and then a mind-numbing sensation like all the money in my wallet flushing down the drain at the same time, and then it was over.

The motor was jammed tight.

Pulling the casing apart revealed that the filament had become wrapped around the base of the shaft just above the bearing, and subsequent (futile) revolutions of the shaft had generated sufficient friction to melt not only the filament itself, but also the casing which supported the shaft and bearing.

Time to buy another weed-whacker. And an instruction manual to go with it.

Quick. Before the grass reaches to our knees!!

________________________________
*They were not us anyone you know. Hired guns. Non-family. Mercenaries.

Dean Jones has gone Home

He was my Disney hero from the first time I saw him in The Love Bug. And Blackbeard's Ghost. A good guy trying to do the right thing. Nice smile. Comforting voice. Not the super-athletic type, just an ordinary guy ... like me. Someone I could relate to.

He disappeared for quite a while, at least from my consciousness. Occasional appearances on the TV, some movies I didn't bother to see (i.e. Beethoven). I heard somewhere he'd been Born Again but didn't know any details.

After the kids came along, we got a copy of That Darn Cat and it became a family favorite. And he became a family favorite. Same sweet guy, same charming smile. I looked him up on the Internet a one point, way back when before it all got monetized, and found he'd done some Christian productions. But they weren't generally available. Yet.

His death made me curious again, and resulted in a YouTube search, revealing what I consider to be his bravura performance. Filmed live in 1986. The VHS is a bit scratchy, but it's a powerful video. Wish I could've seen it live.

But I watched it at lunchtime today. And then again tonight after dinner, with the family. Amazing. The guy had some serious acting chops, far more than those old Disney films give evidence of. And he had a serious passion for Christ. Makes me wish I'd met him before he went home.

I would dearly love to see it performed live by someone who can put as much into the performance as Dean did. Surely there's someone who has done that? Or can do it?  Perhaps Kirk Cameron could pick it up.

But I'm not sure if he could ever do it as perfectly as Dean Jones.

YouTube Link: St. John in Exile - Dean Jones

Learning to Lawn

Today's funny story. A young man with the Marching Band, trying to earn money for the upcoming trip to Florida (i.e. Disney). Asks if he can mow our lawn. Well, why not? No one else is interested in doing it.

So he comes over to mow the lawn. Using my lawn mower. And my weed eater. Does a fantastic job in the back yard. Then comes around to the front. Figures out he needs to add a little gas. Goes into the garage.

Grabs the wrong gas can. The one with the gas/oil mix. Which is clearly marked, "FOR SNOWBLOWER ONLY".

I guess he doesn't know what a snowblower is.

From the front porch, where I'm unraveling the electric cord for the weed eater, I catch him out of the corner of my eye, carrying a red can back into the garage. It doesn't look like the right one, so I go ask him, "Did you just fill up the mower? Which can did you use?"

He points to the one with the gas/oil mix. Which is clearly marked, "FOR SNOWBLOWER ONLY".

I ask, "Didn't you see the writing on it?"

He looks down at it.

"Oh! I'm sorry. I didn't see the 'S' there."

Huh?

"I thought it said 'FOR NOWBLOWER ONLY'".

Now I'm really confused. How does 'nowblower' equate to 'lawnmower'?

Never mind. He's a teenager. Hormonal overflow probably distorts the Language circuits of the brain.

Fifteen minutes and one siphoning operation later, the lawn mower is running again.

But ...

He tried using the weed eater for about five minutes (while I was siphoning the lawn mower) and managed to get it completely snarled. So after I get the lawn mower running again, I move on to debugging the weed eater. Which turns out to be completely pointless.

Not only is the weed eater line tightly wound around the motor shaft, it's also used up.

I give up. The lawn is good enough. It's getting late, the mosquitoes are out. I'm ready to head indoors. I pay the young man out and go inside where it is cool.

We'll try again next week.

Deb's First Day of College

It seems a bit presumptious, this going off to college before one has even completed High School. But what can I say? Ours are exceptional children. Smart, witty, trained in the Fine Arts, able to quote Monty Python at a moment's notice, practical, confident, and comfortable in the knowledge that They Know Everything (and its corollary, We Know Nothing).

Deb is taking a couple college-level classes this year because there just aren't any more Advanced Placement courses of interest remaining in the High School catalog. She's already taken the ones which addressed her particular talents; now it's time to give the big ol' college a chance to keep her challenged and growing.

She and her sister took the bus downtown to GRCC and then, while Deb sat in the classroom for an hour and a half, absorbing all the instructors words with rapt attention, her sister wandered through the Library and dreamt of all the books she longed to read. Or played on her iPod. One of the two.

And when the class was done, they scooted on out the door and down to the bus stop and home again, home again, jiggity-jig, to share a wonderful dinnertime conversation with the rest of the family before heading off once again, only this time to the High School Open House, wherein they met with teachers and friends and lockers to prepare for the beginning of the real school year.