When it snows, it...

This winter, a water-damaged spot on the ceiling of my home office, right above where I sit, grew to about 2 feet in diameter.  At 7am this morning the guy from VT Energy Contracting and Supply came to look at it.  Sarahmac and I thought it was a leak in the heating system -- we have baseboard heating; the furnace is in the garage, and the pipes run from the garage through the crawlspace.

So, after cutting a hole in the ceiling and pulling out a load of soggy blown-in insulation, we determined it was, in fact, a leak where the soldering had come off.  They'll be back in 2 weeks to fix it. Until then, we have a bucket on the floor to catch the water-and-antifreeze solution, and I need to reorganize my workspace.

Drip, Drip, Drip

In other news, Sarahmac dropped off the car for 120k service and to look at the coolant system because the check temperature gauge had come on (again).  They told her not to bother having anything on the car fixed because the car frame is rusted so badly that it would require thousands of dollars of work to get it to pass inspection in October.  They hoisted it up so she could take pictures of it.

 

 

So it's time to start seriously sitting in cars, like I said I was going to over 2 months ago.  (been busy)

At least our beloved Jetta gave us 6 months notice, so we hopefully won't be rushed.

Finally, CCTA changed their schedules just 2 weeks ago, so Sarahmac missed the bus to go pick up Finn (we're a 1-car family), so I biked.  When I left the house, it was a very light rain, which turned to a wet snow.  Someone was having fun this April Fool's day.

This is all the fault of our 70's bathroom, which we finally decided to remodel. When we first started seriously spec'ing out the project, Sarahmac opined that as soon as we'd chosen a contractor, the car would break down and the house would fall apart.  We don't have a final plan signed, but we essentially chose a contractor last week.

Robin Hood (2010)

The reviews were lackluster, so we weren't expecting much, but we were pleasantly surprised at this new take on the Robin Hood legend.  Maybe it's because we watched the director's cut.  Robin's not much of an outlaw in this version, and there's much more politicking at the national level -- I'm used to it just being John usurping the throne from Richard, and everything being okay once Richard returns from crusade.  Here, we get Eleanor of Aquitaine, William Marshal**, Isabella of Angoulême, and a First Barons' War-inspired conflict that plays hell with the historical timeline and makes the origins of the Magna Carta more noble sounding than the reality, but definitely worth it for art's sake.  Aside from the introductory scrollwork text, which really should have been cut, this was fun to watch.  Frankly, I liked this (and the Kingdom of Heaven director's cut, for that matter, looking through the list of Ridley Scott historical epics) better than Gladiator.

** and William Hurt is amazing.  I definitely preferred his performance here to Mark Ruffalo in The Kids Are All Right.

Australia (2008)

We were expecting to have to fast-forward through Australia, and it lived up to our mediocre expectations.

The first hour and 45 minutes plays like some hideous offspring of Out of Africa and City Slickers, with Kidman in the mashup role of Karen Blixen and Mitch Robbins (I had to look that up), and Hugh Jackman in the mashup role of Denys and Curly (though he manages to not die).  While I'm slightly intrigued by the idea of Billy Crystal and Jack Palance making out, let's move on.  So anyhoo, they drive the cattle to Darwin, and I'm like, what are they gonna do for the next hour?  And Sarahmac (who reads the netflix movie description before putting the disc in, even though we know these descriptions are often misleading) says, "WWII has to happen".

So the next hour is some horrible ripoff of how I imagine Pearl Harbor, and interspersed throughout the entire film are these poorly coded messages about the nobility of the aboriginals and What Harm We've Done Them that were better examined in Rabbit Proof Fence.

All in all, nothing new to see here, and very disappointing for a Baz Luhrmann effort.

Apples to Oranges?

Good:Transparency compares the cost per gallon of several different products.  The difference, of course, is that we don't use any of these other items by the gallon.  Tap water costs a lot less than $4/gallon, for example.  To do better, you would need to try to determine the utility/$ you get for each of these.  Coming up with a way to convert between the utility of a gallon of gas (20 miles traveled) and a gallon of coca-cola (1 all-night gaming session?) is the real trick.

Accidentally waking a sleeping giant

Audiosurf is a great, cheap game that has maintained its interest for me for 2 years now.  The other day I was playing some R.E.M. songs and hit the top score on "The Wrong Child".  The problem is that artma3bk is a truly elite player who must have simply had a bad game. 

artma3bk quickly rectified the situation, and then went on to play some other R.E.M. songs that they hadn't played before...