Journal

2019 - Week 13 Cooking

We went out to the new Palms Imax theater in Waukee to see and early screening of Shazam! It seems like they opened early to start bringing in money. There seems to be thinks that are not in place yet. Also it seems like some parts are a flow design nightmare. The parking lot appears to be unlined, the “sidewalks” seem to be just other colored concrete (we saw people parked over it). They’re still installing some of the decoration on the outside. Inside, the kiosk where we get the tickets (from the fandango purchase), it is unclear where we’re supposed to scan the bar code. There is a restaurant, and snacks and these work about what you expect. It seems as if they haven’t gotten down the amount of frequency you need to clean the bathroom, or change the paper towels (I got it twice, once with no paper towels, once with just a single one). The closes bathrooms to the IMax and upper end theater are far enough away it doesn’t make for a quick run out mid-movie and return. So for the upcoming big screen experiences, it seems to exclude it from anything of any length (2.5+) from wanting to be seen there. That being said, the sound in the XL Digital screen has better sound then where we have been going. They also don’t even seem to be remotely concerned about recycling. Shazam!, was pretty good though. I think DC is finding the right balance, between darkness and humor.

I decided to put the fridge looking on hold for a bit. The one I limited it down to is supposed to come in stainless still and black stainless (black being more expensive). But they were out of stainless, and I prefer the Costco delivery over others I have worked with (also the money I get back). So I’ll wait to around the next appliance holiday sale or whatever and check again. I do have everything measured and noted. The old house challenge of having narrow (by comparison) doorways. I went all the perspective pathways and found the easiest one (31” max width) was the one with the most width. This is also related to the fact that I’ve blown through my flex spending already (new bifocals + new CPAP), so if anything comes up, we don’t want to be in a bind.

I’ve been adjusting our near term financial goals to have more in reserve. The adjustment has been a bit hard, as most money adjustments are. It is also challenging to know that I can pay off the last of my student loans, but that may not be the best financial choice.

Also, I’m going to Weezer this week. I’ve seen them before, but I also get to see The Pixies, which is also pretty cool (I’ve never seen them).

2019 - Week 11 Cooking

We are at about 1.5 weeks of having a fiber optic internet connection from CenturyLink. This is something I’ve been wanting for…well as soon as I realized it could be a possibility. I still am thankful that Mediacom is investing in Iowa to upgrade all their connectors, however, fiber!. Anyways, so far the stability has been rock solid. I upgraded our internal network to support the connection better (I did this previously so it could take full advantage of the speed that we had from Mediacom previously), and eve at that it peaks out at around 4/10s of the capacity. So far I’m pretty happy, not to mention saving 40% for 5x the speed is not a bad thing.

From time to time I look at condos in the area that we’ve vaguely talked about moving to, and I’m of the opinion that it might be a requirement now to have fiber to the home. I guess we’ll see.

I’ve been drinking my beer cellar out of Founders and Goose Island. Most are recentish, but some reached back over nearly six years. With the January drinking break, and Cleaning the cellar, my alcohol spending is way below normal, which is probably for the best.

Downpour of June 30, 2018

I was waiting for the rain to start, to cut the heat a bit.  I did not expect the amount of rain we got.  We watched some episodes of Luke Cage season 2 while the sky turned overcast, then the rain started.  Things went fine until around 9:15 PM when the power went out.  I often am stunned with how much sound we are used to with the low hum of the various electronics around the house.  Up and down our street, the lights were out, except for some solar powered lights at a house down the street.  We start to look around outside, find flashlights (batteries dead, but just bought new batteries).  With the darkness, heavy rainfall and rain against the windows, it was very hard to see.

Our garbage and recycling bins floated away.  I went to go find them as Shannon had expressed some concern about them.  The first thing I noticed when starting my trip outside is that there was a river on the dead end our driveway is on.  I headed down on the strip of land next to the street.  I got to the driveway and there were white caps generated as the water rushed over my driveway edges.  it was about a foot or two up the driveway.  I got to the backyard and spotted the bins.  They had camped out at the new fence that my neighbor put in.  I went to retrieve them from the fence and put them closer to the house.  The further away from my house I got, the softer the ground got.  There was water pooled on the ground between our yards.  I pulled up the bins and dragged them (with quite a bit of water inside) towards the house.

On my way about I noticed down the street that there was a car with blinking lights, so I headed back across the front of the house, checking various things in my yard.  I noticed that my neighbor to the west of me had part of a tree down (In the morning we noticed that it looks like the tree got a hair cut and lost a bit of height too).  I walked down the street, to point my flashlight at the car and noticed there were people in side.  I gingerly stepped into the street to make sure I had some sure footing.  The water on Franklin Avenue was to my mid-calf, and very quick.  The two people in the car seemed relatively calm, and I invited them into our house in case they wanted a place to hang out, but they seemed ok for their situation, even after I stated that this would probably go on for another hour or so.  I told them my house was the one on the corner and they're welcome if they change their mind, then I headed back to the house.

People were occasionally going by in cars, jeeps and the like.  So we figured out what to do, Shannon headed upstairs to go to bed, and I played cards on my iPad for a bit then headed downstairs to go to bed (no power, no CPAP, not fair to Shannon).  I eventually fell asleep and was woken up around 1:30 AM, when the lights came back on the the basement.

I headed upstairs to go to bed, and did so.

Looking around a bit on the news and social media, it appears as if there is quite a bit of damage all over the metro,  It'll take a bit to recover from this.  But power's back for the most part, they've already started chopping up the down branches from the neighbor's yard (apparently it knocked down their power / etc lines).

2018 - Week 15 Cooking Results

A couple of accomplishments this week.  After some questionable previous financial decisions, we have finally consolidated our house debt into a single loan (at least it will take effect very soon) and have plans to accelerate the pay down a bit, but also free up general monthly income.

We're continuing to aggressively (but not overly aggressively, as to continue to enjoy life) go after things we need vs not.

We have also been slowly re-organizing and cleaning the edge locations of the house.  Donate or give away things we don't actually use (camping is out, per my sleep apnea), then fill that space with things we do, or at least one of us does.  We free up space, then organize space then free up more space.  Some decisions are just things we have put off doing, but now do, cause it is what is next (some / most of this is probably on me).

As my mental state has generally stabilized in what I suspect is an acceptable normalish range, I think a lot of this is more possible and things are generally easier to do.  I do not have to work through getting myself motivated to do a thing, but generally can just get started.  I still spend an excessive amount of time analyzing my thoughts because I suspect they will be unreasonable, but more often then not, now, they are not.

Roasted Chicken Thighs Salad

While cleaning the kitchen yesterday, I simply roasted some chicken then let it cool and refrigerated it.  Then combined it with a some mayo, sour cream, mustard, celery, a bit of diced pickles and pickled jalapenos.

Thai Style Red Curry Chicken with Vegetables

I followed this for the most part, and served it over quinoa.  This added a nutty underlying taste to it, which I thought was nice.

N'duja With Eggs on Flatbread

Little spice, little fat, little eggs.  Good stuff.

Pizza

Delayed until today.  I took the dough out already to do the final rise

Taco Salad

Another easy choice.  I may need to stop eating very spicy salsa.

Turkey Torta

Buy Torta rolls from CostCo, Make tortas, easy peasy.  This worked out pretty well.

2017 - Week 27 Cooking

At this point, I am filled with confusing emotions, I have both relief and guilt and it it kind of shows how much my home is part of the base of my comfort.  Most times we have a clear timeline of when people will be here (few hours for a get together, a weekend for an event).  We have a full house (us plus 4 cats).  I'm glad my parents found another place to stay.  I don't know if Freyja was stressed because of the extra people in the house, or as a reflection of our own stress of having extra people in the house.  She seems to have recovered relatively quickly and is no longer hiding under our bed (after a bit of encouragement from me), but is still a bit tentative around the house (probably still smells like other people).

Week 51 2016, let it be know as a poop storm

So this week has been kind of terrible, but that being said, it could’ve been a lot worse.

Sunday, HVAC issue that I wrote about last week.

Monday, I was taking my car into the dealership (they give me a ride to work so I don’t have to bother anyone) to get an oil change / tire check.  My tires had been leaking, and I’ve just been to busy to get ‘em in, so I had just been filling them up.  On my way to the dealership, one of my tires, clearly had a big problem, so I pulled into the gas station to fill up the tire to make it to the shop, to see that it had clearly been shredded.  We paid for roadside assistance to make sure that we could get help when we went on our multi-state road trip.  So I called them to get a tow truck to take my car to the dealership.  You got the service, use the service.  The first group came back and said 4:PM, and I’m like I Can’t wait all day for that, got sent back to the customer service, they got another group that said 11:AM, which, while a while, was way better, then I got a text update that it was then 7:PM, So I tried to navigate through the menus to get to a person to talk to about the situation (I’m not even quite sure how I got there).  And added a window notification so I could then go to work.

The benefit here is that because I had been pacing around the Git & Go (thanks for the accommodation for the place on Franklin and Merle Hay), I had already gotten my steps and then some in for the day.

My co-worker came and got me and I made it to work.

So due to the combination of stress, forgetting my morning pills (including an acid reducer), I think forgetting my breakfast, drinking way to much iced coffee (normal + 2 starbucks unseated ones at the gas station) and probably just coming down with a stomach bug, I was at work for a couple of hours an then proceeded to return my lunch to the world.  

Not wanting to reduce Shannon’s earning hours, I had my brother come and get me (who happened to be in town visiting).

I attended one final meeting, but basically most of the rest of the day, I rested.

Tuesday, I was still feeling less then stellar, being without a car I decided to work from home, which is a clear benefit, and proceeded to work through a number of mostly email or process related things, and get on the right track for a number of items.  I took a couple of breaks through the day, and started eating a bit more then crackers around lunch time.

My HVAC people came over in the afternoon, did a visual and computer check of the furnace and found nothing the matter (good) and had no charge for the visit (also good).

2 tires only had leaks in them (which were fixed), the front two tires were shredded and had to be replaced, so the cost could’ve been twice as much, but I got away without having to much cost.

Late Tuesday, we went over to the dealership (I may have slept through the shuttle driver) and I picked up the car, everything seemed fine, though it seemed odd that my stereo was asking for it’s code (only happens when it completely loses power), I finally found the code (which I need to put in a more digital location) and thought that was taken care off.

Wednesday, I was right on time to make my 9:AM meeting, get out to the car, lights light up and unlock the door, put the key in, and…

nothing.

No click, no lights come on, nothing.

I thought that maybe I left the headlights on (not that I do that, but it could happen), but they were off.

So I call the dealership and they’re going to send someone out to jump the car.

I joined my 9:AM at home

My co-worker, over lunch, was nice enough to deliver me my other laptop allowing me to at least split screen (only in an emergency will I have my personal devices touch my work anymore).

Dealership called back and was like the post just wasn’t connecting well, so they fixed that.

I had a fairly productive day at home and made a bit of progress.  The only complaint I really had is that when coding, the auto-complete doesn’t work so well on remote desktop, though in thinking about it, I did install visual studio on my pc work laptop, so I should’ve used that instead.

Wednesday afternoon, we received a bill for Shannon’s PET scan from earlier in the year, which was unexpected.

So I think the Gremlin’s power is fading as we have only had a lightbulb here and there pop, but on that, we’re almost out of florescent lightbulbs and can start transitioning to LED.

So it could’ve been worse.  There could’ve been an actual problem with the heater, or twice the cost for 4 tires instead of 2 (though the back two do only have ~5k miles left on ‘em).  And we were able to payment plan the PET scan, which we will pay off more rapidly, just don’t have the cash without robbing the emergency fund.

The rest of the week, has, on the other hand, been pretty good, baring a few burned out bulbs here and there.

2016 - Week 51 Cooking

After a salt laden mistake of epic proportions (120x the salt that should've been in the recipe), I'll start back with the pumpkin bread making.

Yesterday, we took a trek to Omaha with the DMFS to go to the Alamo Draft House to see Rouge One.  Alamo had way better food then our local Flix Brewhouse, but still the concept of dinner at the movie is challenging in both distractions from the movie (food delivery, etc + normal bathroom breaks) vs at a normal theater (bathroom breaks).  It's hard to hear the server, it's hard to see the food (you eat with your eyes first).  All the places that we've been to like this, we've had problems getting things.  At least this time we didn't have to get stuff off our bill.  Anyways it was still fun to trek with people that wanted to see the movie and make an event out of it.

As a side note, I saw part of the Star Wars Christmas special...it's uh...I don't even understand how it made it on TV...ever.

Today we had the fun with our furnace deciding to take a break.  Since our house isn't very well insulated (yes I have plans on fixing (paying someone to fix it, that is) that at some point), Shannon reported to me at 9:21 AM that it was 43º (after she got up to feed the cats).  We had already talked about re-lighting the water heater (it gets cold, the pilot blows out, my theory is that hot air pushes up and when you get a combo of cold air and wind, when the hot air stops pushing out, it'll kicks back and blows the pilot light out)  So in the winter we just take the task of testing the water in the morning, and if it's warm, not hot, relight.  Annoying but not a game changer.  The next time it comes up for renewal, we'll probably get a non-pilot light water heater.  So I knew to relight that, but I also saw exhaust come out of the side of the house, so I thought that was working, and felt warm air (as opposed to cold) so maybe it had restarted itself.  So I made a line.  If it fell one more degree, call someone one the weekend, if not, we'll just keep an eye on it.  As of about 3:30 the house had fully recovered to it's normal temperature.

I'm still going to call our HVAC people to make sure that it's not something that I should be concerned about (like a failure of some internal sensor or something), but it did give me a nice chance to break out my layers and my house puttering sandals (thanks Mattas!).  Anyways, that put me behind the eight ball for time, quite a bit, making me be less then a good host (Sorry 1/2 of my brothers).  Doesn't help that the selection of food is sparse since it is grocery day.

Anyways, busy morning.

2016 - Week 47 Cooking

So this week we've got Thanksgiving, so there will be simple cooking.  I'll probably do a good chunk of that shopping on Tuesday.  We adulted and on the recommendation of the appliance repair guy (who came and re-repaired the oven), we are replacing our washing machine, which has survived just over 12.5 years.  The benefit of getting a new one, is the added technology features, and the much bigger capacity, allowing us to wash things like the comforters, without having to go to a laundromat (which is fine, just inconvenient).  Estimated repair cost (without labor) is almost half of the on sale price of what we got.  We'll be getting it delivered and hooked up pretty soon.

We added another cat to our house, more like took over the care of another cat that was family related.  So we're pushing into the crazy cat people territory.  There has been quite a bit of adjustment to the cat dynamic.  So we'll have to be patient as the various levels of cat hierarchy organization are re-built.  We've updated all her shots, got her tested and have a follow up booster already scheduled.  Then we also have an estimate for some dentistry.  It has balanced out the house by gender, with Myself, Loki and Máni on one side, and Shannon, Moonshadow and Freyja on the other.  Hopefully this settles out soon.

I also had to say farewell to my brother as he headed out west.  Clearly I have mixed feelings about this.

Tree Trimming, before and after

So a lady from the city stopped by, and at first, my neighbor was all excited because she thought her numerous complaints about the lack of curbs on Franklin Avenue had finally had some notice taken.  But it was not that.  Apparently someone had complained about the obstructed view from 43rd to Franklin, while going left.  This was certainly a justifiable complaint.  Most springs and fall we cut back the tree sprouts that come up from around the tree in our front yard.  So, this picture here, is a nice view of what the tree looked like a year ago (I got tired of looking for a picture of my own).  It's gotten a bit bushier since then.  I saw the point and started to get to work.  I got the view cleared and on the advice and help of my neighbor across the street (Lonny) we proceeded to cut back all the other parts of trees and used his electrical saw to trim the tree and make it look, well, tree like.

Tree After

There are a lot of cut pieces left over.

The cut leavings

I have to say, that the tree does look a lot better but the 2 days of effort (so far) have really been taxing to myself.  Anyways, one more thing to do, and it'll be all gone.

Update 06/15/2014 1:17 PM

Thanks to Sean of Juan O'Sullivan's for coming by and hauling away and helping load the brush pile.

Farewell Blessed Sink +3

So one of the many oddities of this house, is that the utility sink in the laundry room would glow at certain times of the day (most times of the year).​

​Blessed Sink +3

But with the new window.​

​New Frosted Window, Blessing - 3

Not enough light passes through the window to make the sink glow.  It makes me said, but hopefully it'll reduce the breeze that basically just flows through the old window.​