Rants, musings, and other general purpose blog entries reflecting the thoughts du jour.
Lady Robin is firmly ensconced on her nest and isn't particularly interested in moving any time soon so no pictures of the eggs yet!
Taking a peek out the front door during the storm revealed that the nest is indeed happily occupied by a mommy robin… :)
About six weeks ago, I filed an "informal appeal" of the rather insane increase in the tax valuation on the house from $205K to almost $272K hoping they'd see reason and find a much more appropriate number for the next four years. Theoretically, the county is supposed to base their valuation for residential homes on comparable sales (typically in the year prior to the revaluation which in this case would be 2019). However, in practice,…
Some little bird has been busy making a nest on one of my porch columns…no eggs from what I can see but I would suspect it won't be long until that nest has some tenants! Patience (the Japanese maple at the southern end of the flowerbed) had a bird nest in it at one point but the leaves have grown in so much in the past week that I can't see if it's still there.
I managed to get a quick run to Wegmans and by and large it looks as if things are slowly getting to be less panicky and insane, at least for the moment. There was plenty of meat in the coolers, everyone seemed to be respecting the purchase limits and maintaining the proscribed two meter distance (or essentially the length of the trolley) which isn't that easy to do in confined spaces. All except one individual…
One might not normally think of a Formula 1 racing team as being at the forefront of medical device development but the Mercedes engineers at Brackley have managed to do just that. In an impossibly short time-frame, the engineers along with clinicians in London reverse-engineered a CPAP unit and have designed a even better replacement they can put into mass production to the tune of 1,000 units per day assuming the 40 prototypes do well.…
After three weeks of the outside unit being down thanks to a buggered contactor that had fused (so the unit wouldn’t shut down unless you pulled the fuse), it was nice to finally get the replacement part and install it. It was pretty much a drop-in replacement moving the wires one at a time and now the heat pump is back in working order just in time for a near 90 degF day! :) The…
The dawn of a new age is upon us… ;)
The Fed and other central banks just blew a massive load of liquidity all over the markets and dumped the key interest rate on the deck. The markets responded by another massive sell off to the tune of nearly 3,000 points on the Dow! If that’s not the clearest indication the market has zero confidence in the government’s ability to respond to this crisis, I don’t know what is. Maybe the administration might try for…
So President Trump tells the nation that he’s taken the COVID-19 test given his contact with people who have tested positive for the virus. But then he’s waiting 1-2 days for the lab to report the results?!? How is it possible that the most powerful leader in the world or at least his CDC chief can’t be bothered to fast-track those results given how much interest there is from the media? I’d understand if someone…
It’s about four minutes from the house to DQ and passing right by Soprano’s Grille. What to do? Crank up “Fratelli D’Italia” in honour of all the Italians who courageously confronted this nasty Coronavirus with opening their windows to song and music and showing that they have the biggest hearts in all of Europe! And I think I’ll play it again on the way back down Rogers Lane! :)
Normally Formula 1's silly season is during the summer break when everyone is speculating which drivers are going to be in their seats or elsewhere but the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) apparently decided to really drop a deuce on the championship right at the end of the testing sessions at Catalunya. For those who are not dyed-in-the-wool petrolheads that seriously miss the sound of the engines before the turbo-hybrid era and wonder how many…
It’s Bernie v Biden today in the Tarheel State and already we can see this battleground state living up to its recent reputation. Katie woke up long enough in her school’s carpool lane to rate both of the leading contenders a solid “MEH!” before casting her vote for Biden. Alex, OTOH, is solidly feeling the Bern! Guess it’s up to me to be the tie breaking vote.. :) Truth be told, I was sad to…
Especially when they owe you money because between the time they cut a check for the delay rental on the coal leases I inherited and the time I actually tried to deposit the check…the mining company had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection! Part of this is my fault for sitting on the rent checks for about five weeks because my credit union isn't particularly convenient to where I live and I just discovered mobile…
Alex surprised me today on the way to his school by mentioning that our state is amongst the ones "voting for President" tomorrow on Super Tuesday which I'm sure he saw on his favourite news programme this morning. I explained to him as best I could in terms he'd understand that we weren't really voting for the President but rather voting to choose who will be allowed to stand for election in November when we…
Sooooooo…I discovered that my DirecTV which has been flaking out a bit of late has decided it doesn't want to serve up HD channels and it's missed a couple of recordings it shouldn't have. Not terribly surprisingly, I saw the 771 error message and the diagnostics say that the dish is mis-aligned which means "send human to sort this out straightaway!" Then begins the fun of calling for service to a call centre where clearly…
Just spent the last 3.5 hours writing up a proposal politely suggesting to Wake County that their assessment of my home's tax value was utter bollocks and suggesting a more appropriate number for them to use. After going through this in 2016, I had thought that I had four more years to play with as NC counties normally only do this once every eight years but our friends at the assessor's office want to strike…
Canes lose both their goalies to injury and the emergency backup goalie who is a maintenance worker and Zamboni driver with the Marlies comes into the game in relief. #90 David Ayres stands tall and shakes off two early goals against to stone the Leafs in the third and win his first NHL game at the tender age of 42. Unbelievable! A new Canes legend has been born 40 years to the day from the…
To those that would say that us Southerners can’t appreciate modern art, I would suggest their idea is utter bollocks! This bit of artwork comes after soon after our latest SnowpocalypseTM !
I was in need of a decent song to lift my mood a bit so I can work through some tasks this morning whilst the virtual schooling is going on and WFOX once again came through: Amy Grant's "Find a Way" WFOX. Plays only music that I like, always open to requests, and NO COMMERCIAL INTERRUPTIONS…EVER!!! :)
Fifty years ago today, Fayetteville and Fort Bragg would be shocked to their core by the murders of Jeffrey MacDonald's pregnant wife Colette and their daughters Kimberley and Kristen in their home on Castle Drive. Not surprisingly given the notoriety of this case, the Fayetteville Observer ran a retrospective story (linked below) and one picture in particular took my breath away. The officer standing behind Jeff MacDonald as he's getting into the car is my…
Back in the day, the laundromat in the old hood was THE place to hang out and socialise. Lots of good memories and this one even has the obligatory billiards table! :) Especially when there are towels full o’ sewage from the latest main line clean out I’d rather wreck their machines with rather than mine. One heavy bleach cycle and one hot rinse cycle later…I think we should be good to return these utility…
No, that isn’t a scorpion but rather the head of a plumbing snake my neighbour and I lost in my main sewer clean out last April when we tried to clear a clog that a professional plumber didn’t completely clear. The plumbers who came today to clear yet another nasty clog (after having the hot water heater die a couple of weeks ago…plumbing curse!) saw the snake head on the video scope and managed to…
Today started out somewhat gloomy and overcast and not just because of the weather here in the Raleigh area. Today would have been my father's 75th birthday and there's no getting round the fact that ever since he passed away four years ago, words just cannot properly express just how terribly I miss him. Sometimes it's something really stupid that takes my breath away. When I would ring him up on his birthday to wish…
No matter what one might think of the President, or his administration’s policies…you’ve got to admit that getting his signature on the legislation raising the purchasing age to 21 for tobacco and e-cigarette products can’t reasonably be seen as anything other than a GOOD THING. Would I prefer an outright ban? Yes…even knowing it would likely suffer the same fate Prohibition did…bootlegging and the black market will get round the government ban. But the difference…
