Jul

23

Leon’s getting larger.

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Apparently, a few nights ago when I was lying in bed, I started laughing uncontrollably at the thought of applying an Airplane quote to my greasy asshole. I gather “the plane is getting closer” signified the growing turmoil in my abdomen. And “Leon’s getting larger” represented the extent to which my balloon knot had dilated. I don’t recall much of this, having been more or less asleep at the time, but my wife assures me it was made all the more terrifying by the accompanying odors.

Jun

13

Sunburn.

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Living West of the Cascades, with its nearly omnipresent comforting cloud cover, I’m highly conscious of the effects of that big yellow fireball that sometimes appears in an otherwise blue sky. On the rare occasions when Madame Sol and her Hot Fusion Orchestra insist upon being heard, I’m slathering the SPF 45 on my pasty white skin.

Only, being a lazy creature at heart, I often only apply to the body parts that have been burned in the past. Neck backs, arms, and face. The past experience, however, has little to do with the burn-ability of the skin on those body parts, and has everything to do with blocking. That is, given the activity with which I am engaged, where is the sun going to be pointing? With hiking and driving being the most common engagements, the answers: neck backs, arms, and face.

Guess what happens when the recreation takes the form of kayaking in the Sound? Say hello to red legs.

Jun

5

I’m not handy.

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When we bought the house, the guy that inspected the place to make sure it wasn’t a money pit told me that the piece of plastic that had been installed between the tub and the floor wasn’t really the best choice for keeping moisture from fucking with the subflooring, and suggested a silicone caulk instead. As a project that ultimately might need doing, the recaulking of the bathroom made it on to the list at 87 with a bullet, then utterly failed to get done for nearly a year.

Today, while I was trying to clean the bathroom so that we could replace the shower liner that had developed a pink mold of some sort, I got it in my head that the plastic strip should be removed. I pulled it up quickly, and then discovered that I was at a loss as to what to do next. Rooting around in my “tool box,” I discovered that we actually had white silicone caulk and a caulking gun. Of course, what with my general lack of understanding of even the simplest of tools, I couldn’t figure out how the damned thing worked. Well, I analyzed it for a while, I saw that the trigger would push the plunger forward slightly with each squeeze, and that the tube of caulk appeared the right shape to go into the barrel. I even figure out that the little hole in the handle would work nicely to snip off the end of the tube and that the little metal wire that was attached to the bottom of the barrel would no doubt puncture some sort of inner seal.

What I couldn’t figure out is how to get the plunger out of the way so that I could put the tube into the barrel. I kept trying to pull it back–which, incidentally, was the right impulse–but the end of the plunger kept getting caught at the end of the barrel. I watched a video or three on YouTube to try to figure it out, to no avail. Eventually, I concluded the damned thing was busted. Only I remembered that the last time I messed about with caulk, I had the same problem, and when I looked at the replacement caulk guns in the Home Depot, they all had exactly the same problem. What the fuck?

What the fuck turned out to involve unscrewing the end of the plunger, pulling the damned thing back, then reattaching. Why couldn’t I figure this out? I’m not handy.

May

31

Lawn maintenance.

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One of the aspects of owning a single-family house is figuring out what to do with all the land that surrounds the building. Or, in the case of those houses with sheds, detatched garages, or mother-in-laws, buildings. The vast majority of homeowners, when the decision was most pressing, chose to fill a significant portion of the property with grass. With a lawn. And most subsequent homeowners declined to radically deviate from the now-standard grass-centric approach to landscaping.

When D and I purchased our first house last summer, we were left with a choice: leave the lawn essentially in tact, tear it up and replace it with other landscaping immediately. Being not exactly flush, what with having to deal with all the costs associated with new home ownership, and what with plants being, well, expensive, we opted for the third way: retire the lawn slowly over time.

Which left us with a choice as to what to do with the lawn in the mean time. Naturally, not being insane, we gravitated away from plug-in electric lawnmowers. Again, having not hit the lottery lately, we opted away from the rechargeables. But we were disinclined to go with fossil fuels as well, aggravated that the sorts of technologies that make automobiles relatively low polluters don’t seem to have been adopted by the lawnmower industry.

And so we went with a reel mower. Human power. Which works great if you (1) live somewhere relatively dry, where the grass doesn’t grow meters per year, (2) are on-the-ball enough to mow regularly, and (3) have worked out the issue of weeds, with chemicals or sweat or indifference or otherwise. Seeing how (1) Olympia is not dry, (2) I am lazy and not easily motivated by the frowns of neighbors, and (3) our dandelions and hairy cats’ ears are prolific and hardy motherfuckers that don’t respond to anything short of a combination of Round-Up and napalm, I should have known the reel mower wasn’t going to work out. Nevertheless, I kept at it for almost a year before breaking down a few weeks ago and purchasing (gasp!) a gas-powered mower. Leaving the lawn looking, well, better than before. Improvement!

May

29

Cough.

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On the way back from Greece, D picked up something that had her more-or-less bedridden for a week. Fever, cough, and world-weariness. A virus, no doubt. [Aside: does anyone else think of Hugo Weaving when reading the word "virus"?] In due course, I was infected as well.

The major symptoms drifted away after a week or so, but a persistent cough remained. With that yellow goopy lung shit as a chaser. [Aside: one of my fondest memories is watching Disney employees at Epcot attempted to sweep my hacked-up pulmonary discharge on a family vacation some years ago.] After two and a half weeks of this, D convinced me to follow in her footsteps, see the doctor, and get me some antibiotics. [Note: the antibiotics aren't as stupid as they might first appear. The doctor told D she had an opportunistic bacterial infection, preying on her weakened state due to the virus, and it was the bacterial infection that was lingering.]

Of course, by the time I got the appointment, the cough, although still present, had dissipated somewhat. Become more intermittent. Which meant I was a relatively healthy-looking fellow sitting in a doctor’s office. There’s something vaguely shameful about that, isn’t there? I mean, unless you’re looking to score some recreational drugs. The doctor actually seemed to think so too. He ended up giving me a prescription for Zithromax, but suggested I should refrain. To avoid damning the human race with superbugs, like MRSA.

Now, after caving and buying the damned antibiotics, taking them as instructed, the cough, although improved, doesn’t seem to have gone away completely. Likely it’ll resolve itself in due course. But a there’s a nagging voice in my head that’s repeatedly asking, “Is there something really wrong? Like lung cancer? Maybe you should go back to the doctor.” Damned pixies.

May

28

Windsor.

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There was a line in Stranger than Fiction that has bothered me for some time. The narrator and author Karen Eiffel, played by Emma Thompson, describes Will Ferrell’s narrated and authored Harold Crick as using the “half Windsor” knot when donning a necktie to save time. As opposed to a “full Windsor.”

Now, I learned to tie a tie many years ago, from my father. And I end up wearing a tie a dozen or so times per month, so I’ve had a lot of practice. I always tie in the same way. But some of my ties don’t end up looking particularly good with my ordinary knot choice, with a too-small bulge at my neck.

So, percolating in the back of my mind for a couple of years has been the thought that perhaps all this time, I’ve been using the half Windsor. And that if I were to graduate to the apparently more time consuming full Windsor, what I’d lose in waking hours, I’d more than offset with style.

Today, that thought has been addressed. Finally. I have been doing a halfway job all these years. And tackling the full knot has a decidedly fuller look. Huzzah!

Apr

24

Greece in images.

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Having just returned from Greece–almost a week late, by the by, what with Iceland’s volcanic activity–I’ve yet even finish unpacking. But D, with her prioritization skills, has managed already to upload a few photographs of our travels. The camera crapped out on us several times throughout the trip–dead batteries, a cracked battery door that required tape, etc.–so some locations are underrepresented. Also, more photos forthcoming.

Apr

4

Greece.

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Departing for Greece tomorrow. For two weeks. Pictures forthcoming.

Mar

22

Skeet skeet skeet.

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The old “Chappelle’s Show” sketch about onamonapia intended to confuse whitey came to mind as I went out to the shotgun range yesterday. That, and how I was almost certain to see an awful lot of whole clay pigeons sailing over the horizon. But I had bought a couple of boxes of shells and, garshdabnit, if I wasn’t going to use them.

So with a collection of oddballs, I went to the Evergreen Gun Club, got set up on a range with a couple of hundred clays and two shotguns–a double barrel over-under, and a single-shot pump. Ended up having a slowed down machine, so turned out not to be that bad a shot. Hit about every other clay toward the end. [Or, if you believe my business partner's son, in the direct competition I came out very well. 18 hits, to my competitor's 4, to a smattering of double-misses.] Found the whole thing much more satisfying than target shooting because (1) there’s a moving target involved, and (2) the target explodes when it gets hit. No binoculars or spotting scope necessary to see where you’re at. Lovely.

Also got an idea for a liquid core clay. Could throw some fake blood in there. Or a flammable fluid of some sort that would ignite on impact. Goes down in flames. Cool, no? Just need to find me an engineer.

Feb

19

Furnace.

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A week ago, D and I had plans to go up to Port Townsend for a weekend getaway. Friday morning, we woke up cold. In the house, that is. Furnace didn’t seem to be working. Had to leave early, though, so did nothing about it, I suppose with the hope that it would fix itself, or at least wouldn’t get any worse. Returned on Sunday to find a house with an uncomfortably cool ambient temperature. And a cat huddled under our down comforter.

Spent the better part of the evening incinerating wood, baking cookies and cornbread, and huddling around the space heater. Suppose we were well-enough off, as these things go.

Monday morning, telephoned the furnace repairman. The one we used once in the old house to do a check-up. Turns out, he doesn’t work on holidays. Damn you Lincoln-and-Washington-observeders. Called another guy. Came out promptly. Within an hour or two. Got it working pretty quick. Rah rah.

Only today, woke up again to find the temperature well-below the thermostat. Guy’s down there again, apparently fixing. Hope this works this time, because this money pit shit is getting ridiculous.

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