Lowes: Still Useless

So, I've been having some issues with the toilet in the kids' bathroom. It's been wanting to run. A lot. Health kick or something.

The other day I went and bought a different kind of chain--one of those chains made out of bb's, as opposed to the links that were in there before--hoping that it wouldn't get tangled and keep the flapper open just enough for a slow leak of water. It seemed to do the trick. The other night, though, it was running, and I wasn't sure what the problem was. I took the back off the tank and looked in to find the water still running. It was filling, but slowly. I pondered calcium build-ups slowing the flow of water or something.

Then I looked at the bulb/float and how it was connected to the water inlet.

Hmmmm... I pondered, looking at the screw-based mechanism of operation that served as on/off switch. How does this work? I lifted up on the arm that connected the spigot with the bulb.

CRACK!

As I stood there with a bulb-and-arm mechanism in my hand, watching the water flow unchecked into the tank now, my eyes grew to the size of saucers as I silently panicked on the inside. However, ever the cool head, I quickly reached down and shut off the water into the tank. Catastrophe averted; face saved (ish).

The next day, after dinner, I loaded the kids up into the car and we headed to Lowes because, I thought, this will be an easy fix. Bulb, bulb arm, snap a few things together, and we back to flushy paradise.

Not so fast, my friend.

Of course Lowes doesn't do the simple and convenient thing, and supply you with a replacement arm and bulb. Of course you need to replace the entire fucking system. Convenience? That's for pussies. Ease? That's also for pussies. Someone manning the plumbing section of the store, ready to answer your questions with anything other than a blank look? As if.

So, I took the cheap replacement kit, guaranteed to fit my toilet. After wrestling the old mechanism off the toilet (not that it was difficult in and of itself; the problem was just getting the right angle and fitting my fat overly large hands into the small space between the wall, toilet bowl, and vanity cabinet) and successfully not blasting myself in the face with the last bits of tank water, I reinstalled the new mechanism. Everything was good, tight, and, seemingly, ready to go.

Time for the bulb installation and we'd be good to go!

Again, not so fast, my friend.

Seems as though the replacement kit, guaranteed to fit my toilet, features a long, brass rod to connect the bulb with the spigot. So long, in fact, that I can either screw the rod into the spigot mechanism or screw the rod into the bulb, but not both. I muttered a few curses under my breath, wished the people at Lowes to be afflicted by the public lice of a thousand camels, and went to bed, reminding the children to just go ahead and use my toilet for any needs.

The next day, back to Lowes, where I figured they'd have a replacement arm that was shorter. I mean, it is a plumbing supply store, right?

Not so fast--oh fuck it, you get the idea.

In fact, they offered a replacement arm that was the exact same size as the one in the replacement kit I bought. Variety is the spice of life, and these motherfuckers are living it to the blandest.

That meant another trip to Home Depot.

Off we went. Once I finally found the toilet supply aisle (one thing Lowes has over Home Depot is better marked aisles), I found a shorter arm for the set up. It was $1.75 or something like that.

But, here's the kicker: I went through the self-checkout (yet another thing that Home Depot does right and Lowes fails epically at). I paid for my merchandise. I gathered the children and prepared to head off to Target for some groceries. The lady manning the self-checkout lines (you know, the Overseer), called out to me to stop me. She asked if my kids could have some candy, and she produced a little cup filled with Jolly Ranchers and Redvines and such. Are you fucking kidding me? Free candy and exactly what I need for my home repair project! Sold.

But, not only that, but my daughter picked out a piece of candy that had one of the ends ripped off, and the lady stopped her! She was like "Oh, I can't let you have that one, sweetie, it's been opened!" And then...she smiled!

Free candy, the right part, and service with a smile? If Jesus were to go looking for supplies to man the old carpentry shoppe, I'm sure he'd go to Home Depot. And if it's good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me.

Unum Plumbum, Unum Letum

Have you ever woken up with a song stuck in your head? Of course you have. We all have. This happens to me all the time. It happened to me this morning!

"What song?" you ask. "Gee, Officer Krubke" from West Side Story. The only problem is, my sick and depraved brain morphs it into a mash-up with the Violent Femmes'"Waiting for the Bus". I've been repeating "Gee, Officer Krubke, drive that thing fast, my precious time keeps slipping past."

That's neither here nor there, nor applicable to the anecdote I'm about to tell you, but I thought it offered an interesting look into the depths of my mind.

Undaunted by the episode of the prior weekend, I returned to the task of working on the plumbing in the house. I even tried to be authentic and let my asscrack hang out while wrestling with the pipes. Regardless of my backside attire, I took full advantage of those precious few moments when the kids aren't A) vying for my undivided attention and B) trying kill or maim one another.

The Comely and Buxom and Ailurophobic Bouddica took my daughter to a birthday party on Saturday, so it was just me and the boy. What better father/son activity is there than a trip to the hardware store? With the possible exception of fishing or stuffing dollar bills into a stripper's g-string, I could think of none. If you remember from the harrowing tale from last weekend, I was only able to replace three of the four stems in the two bathrooms. I decided with half of the family out of the house, this would be an excellent time to finish the task.

After laying down a layer of WD-40 that was enough to lubricate AND fumigate the interior space of the walls, the boy and I shoved off for manlier waters. I needed to get some new screws to mount the handles onto the stems so that they wouldn't jiggle as much when turned. I also bought light bulbs for my daughter's new pink floor lamp. Since there's a Chick-fil-A across the street from the Lowes (more or less), the lad talked me into buying him a lemonade and my stomach talked me into buying it lunch.

Back home, I shut the water off, reminded the boy not to flush the toilets, and then began wrestling with the stem. After a bit of forcing and muttered curses beneath my breath, the stem finally came out. I quickly replaced it with the new, and then turned the water back on. Immediately, a fountain of hot water came bursting forth to shoot me in the face like I was the antagonist in some kind of Tom and Jerry cartoon.

I'm kidding. What kind of a homo...wner would I be (yeah, I stole it from Jon--sue me. Unless you're Jon, then you might have a case) if I did plumbing like that? The fixture worked like a charm and I quickly went about swapping out the old screws so that now the new handles no longer jiggled when turned on. Do with that as you will.

No sooner had I exorcised the demons in my showers than the toilet downstairs began to leak from the tank into the bowl. Guess I have my Sunday project all lined up!

This was simple enough. Again, I returned to Lowes on Sunday (look, people...it's three miles from my house) and went to the dreaded plumbing section. Here I looked about until I found a working facsimile of the flapper from my toilet. My son, eager to push buttons, wanted to know if we needed help.

"Do we need help, Oh Master of the Plumbing Universe and He Who Provides Me with Dinner Daddy?" he asked, eagerly.

"DEAR GOD, NO!" I projected (all that time spent on the stage really was preparing me for a life of home repair--who knew?) for all to hear, "I don't feel the need to lose more brain cells by talking with the incompetent...help...they hire around here!"

I then decided that the 30-year-old shower head in my bathroom needed swapped out. I had done this in the kids' bathroom a few months ago, so I figured why should they get all the luxury of a non-calcified shower head? Looks like I just figured out my Sunday project, Part Deux.

Home again, home again, jiggity jog went this sumptuous plumbing hog. Five minutes later, the toilet downstairs was fixed and then, later in the evening, while my son was taking his bath, I switched out the shower head. Awesome.

It was even more awesome this morning when I didn't have to chip limestone off my body after showering. While that calcified exoskeleton might have come in handy during, say, clobberin' time, you will remember that Ben Grimm didn't get to stick his rock-covered penis in Susan Richards. Although, Alicia Masters wasn't a bad booby prize...

So, what's next? Well, I still need to work out the fabrication on the handles of the shower, and I want to finish the work on my daughter's closet and do the touch-up jobs on the trim and what not. Oh, and that whole replace the siding thing. And install new windows. And redo the brick molding on the front door.

Ah, the life of a homo...wner: always exciting.

Eff You, Lowes

This weekend, I had a bad case of the Catholic Guilts. These things hit me once in a while and, for long stretches of time, I sit around depressed over shit that is completely out of my control and doesn't affect me in one way or the other. For no good reason at all, I'll get all upset over the thought of people starving or not having air conditioning or being eaten by crocodiles or any of a thousand other sundry afflictions that can befall humanity. Specifically, that can befall humanity that isn't me.

I learned that, when I'm suffering from a case of the Catholic Guilts, watching Cars is akin to Superman being jabbed in the thigh by a big hunk of kryptonite. What? Lightning McQueen stopped the race and pushed The King over the finish line so that he wouldn't suffer the indignity of crashing on the final lap of his final race? Characters can be developed? People can learn lessons? Cue the water works. Not that I cried or any unmanly shit like that. No. Moistened...maybe. Tears? Not that I'll admit.

It's just a damned good thing I didn't watch Hoosiers is all I'm saying.

But then...I watched Cars twice this weekend. I'm fucking stupid. Then I tossed in The Incredibles, as well, just for good measure. What? Suburban husband and father longs for the good old days when he didn't have a gut and could smash things into atoms? This causing tension at home? Family recovers and fights evil together? Craig T. Nelson still has a job? Moisten me up again, Cowboy.

Granted, it's no Jimmy Fucking Chitwood hitting the final shot.

Fuck you, South Bend Central!

Apparently, the cure for a case of the Catholic Guilts is a trip to Lowes.

A couple of months ago, I replaced all the faucets in the two bathrooms upstairs: the one I share with my wife and the one that the kids use. Well, the stems coming out of the walls are 30 years old, and so even though I put on new faucet handles and everything, they dripped. Worse, I bought these lovely brushed nickel faucets, but they were made by a company called Danco. They were supposed to be one-size fits all sort of deal, which I thought was great. I won't have to worry about dicking with the stems. Unfortunately, the options for the one-size-fits-all are a nylon cube with a whole cut in it to fit down on top of the stem or an aluminum block that you can tighten down onto the stem using iron screws and an Allen wrench.

The metallurgists out there probably already see the problem here. Alternatively, if you've paid any attention to the various stages of human civilization, you would know that iron is a lot harder than brass or copper or whatever it is that they use to manufacture the stems. Therefore, when you're turning the water on and off, you tend to shred the tiny teeth in the stem that provide the grip for turning it on and off. It's the part at the top of the picture to the right.

So, with the head thoroughly shredded, and the butt end leaking badly (pray that I never have to write those words again), I went off to Lowes, the home improvement supply store, in order to get my fix. Armed with the faucet handle I'm trying to attach to my plumbing, I make a beeline for the plumbing department to seek the parts I would need, because I've decided to forgo Danco's lousy design (had I simply plopped the aluminum box back on the stem, I would be replacing them again in another month) and essentially craft my own faucet. Instead of using their one-size-fits-all bullshit, I decided to get a shorter stem and attach it directly to the faucet. However, this is where I ran afoul because I asked the attendant in the plumbing section for help.

Asking for help at Lowes is like asking the Pope how best to pleasure your girlfriend: you're not going to get the answer you want.

Spying pretty much exactly what I needed, I asked my friendly neighborhood plumbing assistant how I could tell if the head on the stem was a size H (which fit the back of my faucet handle) and he said he didn't know. They he asked if I had a Price Pfister. I said, no, it's a Danco. He then informed me that I was looking at Price Pfister stems. I said, that's fine, all I really want is something that will fit the handle so I can use it. He then said that Danco doesn't have that type of back, despite the fact that I held it up for him and showed him exactly what I needed and then told him what I wanted to do! Finally, after I had slaughtered untold number of neurons by conversing with this feeb, I went home, growled at my wife, got my kids ready, and went to a birthday party.

I should also add that birthday cake with a cream layer between the layers of cake, lots of ice cream and MILFs aplenty also help to ease a case of the Catholic Guilts.

So, Sunday, I go back to Lowes, where I eschew their "advice" and "assistance." I decided that, the best way to find what I needed, was to fit the stems onto the faucet handle before purchasing them. So, I poked holes in the tops of the plastic packaging holding the pieces I thought I needed and discovered, within about five seconds, how to check and see if stem head was a size H or not (it's in the first set of letters, in case any dumbfuck from the plumbing department reads this; for example, a 12H-H/C, is a size twelve, H-head stem that can be used for a hot or a cold valve...brilliant, no?). I found ones that looked reasonably like the stems I had at home, purchased them and took them home.

However, the threads didn't sit far enough back be set into my pipes, so had to repackage the one I had opened and take them back to Lowes. Frustrated, this time I went looking harder for exactly what I needed. And, I found it. I found exactly what I needed in the convenient catalogue that they placed there, presumably for the customer. Once having a near match for the old stems, I called for assistance. Figuring I was armed, knowledgeable and prepared, this should be an easy sale.

"Can I help you?" the man asked as he came to answer the assistance call.

"Yes, I'd like this one right here that's shown in the catalogue. Do you stock them?" I was rather proud of myself.

The guy looks around, fumbling through the various stems hanging there. "I think this is it." It wasn't, but it was a reasonable facsimilie. So reasonable that I had purchased four of them a few hours earlier and had to return them.

"Well, it is a size H. It's a 12, but I need something with threads further back. Also, do you have it in a 10? That would suit my needs better."

"I don't think so."

"Okay, well, see, here's some threading on my stem. Do you know what that's for?"

"Uh, no." (Turns out the threading wasn't necessary for installation.)

"I see. Well, this piece here, the one that looks exactly like it, the one in your catalogue placed here for my convenience...do you carry that piece?"

"I can check."

He wanders off. Five minutes later, he comes back.

"We don't really carry that one. And we don't order parts in for people. You'll have to go to a plumbing supplier."

I hesitated for a second. I wanted to ask him if this was or was not a "plumbing supply store", as I was standing in the plumbing section. I then wanted to ask him why the fuck they had a catalogue there for the customer's convenience if they wouldn't be so helpful as to order in the parts that were requested or needed.

"Very well then," I said, with as much aplomb as I could muster, "thank you for your time."

As we are walking out past the customer service desk, my daughter, a bit frantic over the idea of not being able to shower, asked, "What are we going to do now, daddy?"

"The only thing we can do, honey," I said, projecting my voice for all to hear in a rather stage-worthy performance, "We're going to Home Depot, where maybe they have someone who actually knows what they're talking about." I then left the store.

To cut this rather unwieldy tale short...I went to Home Depot. Five minutes later, I left with exactly what I wanted. An hour later, I had replaced three of the four offending stems. As it was getting late and the kids were looking to me for sustenance, I felt I should cook some dinner and not wrestle with the fourth stem which is stuck in the wall, most likely covered in 30 years worth of crud, corrosion and blech. Once I get it unstuck, I'll switch it out and all will be well. I smell WD-40 in the future.

Oh, and I bought the Price Pfister fittings. There, on the package, emblazoned in solid black letters against the Carolina blue background, it says "Perfect fit for Danco products." Lowes plumbing assistants: incompetent AND illiterate.

The War of the Seals

A long time ago, someone took the sap of a tree and let it polymerize, thus making latex. In time, people discovered there were lots of wonderful things you could do with this natural polymer: make it round, inflate it with air, and heat it in the presence of sulfur and you can get something for on your car; slip it over your John Thomas, and you can have yourself a guilt-free bout of naughty during shore leave; mix it with some cooking oil and you can correct your graphite-laden mistakes; cast it roughly in the shape of a woman, put a dark, curly wig on it, call it Dannah Dean, pump it full of air and--well, *nervous laughter* you get the idea. Rubber is pretty damned versatile stuff.

One other thing you can do with it is to shape it in the form or rings and saucers and it helps to create air- and water-tight seals on various implements you might find around the house or, let's say, lab. And that is where today's bugaboo leads us.

At first, there was the War of the Roses, then later came the War of the Worlds and then the War of the Ring and, somewhat recently, the War of the Flowers. The past two days, I have been fighting the War of the Seal.

No, no, not that seal. I leave that to the nefarious Canadians or Heidi Klum. No, the seals I have been fighting are the little rings that you deftly position in the proper places to create the aforementioned water- and air-tight connections.



It all started simply enough on Sunday, when my wife came home early from work. The toilet in the kids' bathroom had been making dripping, "snoring" noises for a couple of days, but I had not the time to fix it (there was a lot of couch-sleeping to do). After digging around in the tank for a while, I decided I needed a new rubber gasket for the connector between the tank and the bowl as well as a new flapper. Having successfully and (somewhat) dryly disassembled the toilet tank, I was off to Lowes were seven bucks later I was prepared to finish this task. I had even had the good foresight to buy new bolts for the reconnection of the tank to the bowl as the old ones were a bit corroded and Courtney Love nasty. Hooray for me, the Bob Vila of my age.

Having successfully returned home, it was a quick snap of the wrist and a bit of a turn in order to get the new gasket on as well as the new flapper. A couple of adjustments, and the flapper chain was adjusted to the right length. Then came the daunting task of reassembling the toilet, something which I have successfully done before.

As you might be able to guess, things did not progress quite as swimmingly as I had expected them to, else we wouldn't be here now, sharing this story.

I refastened everything back to where it needed to be, secured the bolts on the toilet, and had the rubber rings in their proper place. Things had been tightened just beyond finger tight, so as to avoid cracking the porcelain, and the water inlet flow was tightened so that things could now proceed. I turned on the water and was quickly inundated up to my ankles. While one side of the tank was sealed properly, the other was unleashing a cascade of water that put me in mind of the beautiful Angel Falls. This is approximately when I went on a 45-minute rant in which I taught my children several hundred creative new ways to swear. Finally, after being foiled at fixing the leak for about the fifth time, I stomped out of the bathroom and told my wife to take the children somewhere for dinner, because I wouldn't be able to cook after spending an hour + with my arms firmly ensconced inside the toilet tank.

Because my life is a sit-com, I completely took apart the whole set up and started at the beginning, tightening everything and setting the tank gingerly back on the bowl. I tightened the bottom of the bolts to secure the tank to the bowl, recited the Hail Mary and--just as my wife was walking out the front door--turned the water back on to discover that I had successfully stopped the leak. Dancing a joyous jig, I celebrated, and my wife asked if I wanted her to wait for me. I looked at the gallons of water on the floor and decided, "No, you go on ahead." I then cleaned up the bathroom floor, showered, and fell asleep watching football.

Fast forward to yesterday when I went to remove some solvent from one of my most recent reactions, only to find that the collection flask in the back of the hood was full. Dutifully, I emptied it, and then went about reassembling the apparatus. Much to my dismay, the seal for the collection flask--which should be circular--was rather ovoid. Needless to say, no seal was formed. I then spent the better part of ninety minutes tracking down a replacement seal, traveling from one person to the next asking if they knew if any spare seals had been shipped when the new parts had arrived here in the lab. Finally, and fortunately, I was able to find some, though I've been sworn to secrecy as to their location. A quick thirty seconds later, and I was in bidness once more and my vacuum was pulling top-notch.

What does the future hold in this war? Difficult to say. However, you can rest assured that I will no longer allow the little rubber disks to get the better of me. Long is the war, but my ability to out-think a lifeless polymeric disk will prove to be the factor that will tip the outcome in my favor.

Ruby Vroom

Sorry for the delay. It's been a bit hectic around here of late. Currently, a full half of the household is afflicted with some bronchial/pneumonic/allergy plague (that would be the younger half) and I'm going mad with the constant, continuous coughing [1]. It sounds like a fricking sanitorium around here.

I was also, you know, remiss to remove the picture of the lovely Leelee Sobieski off the top page of my blog. Plus, after Lisa-tastrophies suggested casting Leelee as Princess Leia, I about passed out thinking about Leelee in a Slave Girl Outfit. Tasty. Then it suddenly hit me: gratuitous Leelee Sobieski pictures![2] Not to mention, I'm still really just in absolute love with the idea of Kevin Smith directing remakes of Star Wars. I don't even care if Yoda spouts out "Snoochie booches!" instead of "Concentrate!" when he's on Luke's back while giving Luke his Jedi training during The Empire Strikes Back. Seriously, Harvey Weinstein, get this done.

Speaking of movies...did you guys (and fine ladies) know that there's a live-action G.I.Joe movie in the works? Makes sense after Transformers (which I still haven't seen, more on principle than anything else) and all, since for some reason the two are inexorably linked (at least in my mind). Anyway, I found out after coming across the following picture while reading one of my favorite new blogs, Pfangirl:
As Pfangirl put it: Wow, a hot girl in a leather cat suit. No one has thought that up before! (I paraphrase).

After a bit of due-diligence (read: reading blogs), I discovered that said hot girl is named Rachel Nichols, who apparently is a popular blonde actress from the tv show Alias and some other movies which I've never seen. At first, I was confused. I mistook her for ESPN's sultry slice of NFL coverage, who actually has red hair. You can imagine my confusion. Also, didn't Scarlett wear an outfit that was much more yellow and much less black? And just where the hell is she supposed to keep extra bolts for her crossbow? On second thought, maybe I don't want to know.

Rachel Nichols...

...and more Rachel Nichols.

One final update, we won't be putting the house up for sale this spring. The realtor came out and looked at the house and basically said the following: "The interior looks awesome, the yard and the landscaping look great, the exterior of the house looks like shit." Again, I paraphrase. So, I'll be busy here in the next few months scraping and repainting trim, replacing rotting wood, replacing damaged siding, reglazing exterior windows and touching up parts of the paint where it has peeled away from the house (I have a bad feeling I'll be painting the whole damned thing in the fall). If I can get a weekend where it doesn't rain and/or drop below 40 degrees, I'll be able to get a bulk of that stuff done.

Oh, and major announcement coming later in the week.

[1]: I loves me some alliteration.
[2]: If you think it's easy to find a picture of Leelee Sobieski that won't trip the porn filter at your work, think again. Oh, and, yes, I am encouraging goofing off on my blog while at work. Deal (hi, Amanda).
[3]: I didn't put a three, but see if you can catch the obscure pop culture reference from the title and how it fits into this entry. No fair using Wikipedia.

I'm So Tired...

I haven't been posting a lot lately. My kids went to visit their grandparents last week for spring break, and I've been doing a lot of work around the house trying to get it ready to put on the market so we can move. Exhaustion has been, well, an understatement, to be honest. There's still a lot to do. I have to finish hanging the baseboards in the bathroom downstairs. I have a few more screws to screw into the shutters on the second story. I have to pound some edgers down into the ground around one of the beds I made at the back of the house and I have to finish putting the edging in on the bed I made at the side of the house, plus I need to put down some more mulch and some more stones in various beds. This is not to mention all the mowing and edging I need to get done, too. I guess I just need to find the right tools for the jobs at hand.

On top of this, I'm starting up a new project at work. It's fun, but it's got some tougher chemistry involved, plus, I've got so much to read when it comes to papers and such. There's a whole bunch of biology to learn, there's biological tests and assays I have to familiarize myself with, and then there's just the new chemistry that has to be learned (I did a Baeyer-Villager the other day...and it was fucking sweet).

The thing that's tired me out the most, though, is the whole writing thing. It's not that I have a lack of topics swirling around in my mind; quite the opposite, to be honest. But, also, honestly, it's tough to find the time. I just put the kids down to bed and I still have to gather up the trash and take it out and straighten up the kitchen. By the time I'm done with that, it'll be well after nine, and already I need to start getting ready for tomorrow when I get to do it all over again.

The thing that I'm most tired of, though, is rejection. Yeah, I got two more emails this week telling me thanks but no thanks. Or whatever the form rejection is these days. It's not us, it's you. It's just not what we're looking for. Grow a larger copulation organ now. All of that crap. It's soul-crushing. I realize you have to keep trying, but I've been working on these things now for years. Too many years to even think about, because when I do, I just get depressed more. I've progressed very well on the whole Hundred Kings Saga thing, but now I'm getting to the point of wondering why should I even bother? I pour my heart and soul into carefully crafting a land and characters to populate the land and all the other subtle little nuances that breathe life into a set of words and make them a person and all I get is "Sorry, no."

I guess the big problem is that I'm tired of the form letter. You know, you could at least put my name in the title of the email. "Dear Author" just doesn't cut it. Blegh. Thanks for carefully considering my book/letter/synopsis. Next time, introduce yourself right before you kick me in the nuts, okay?

Maybe I'm slitting my own throat with this post, but I just don't care anymore. I just don't. I'm out. I'll probably keep working on the stories, but they'll be all mine. I'll be happy with the way they end and how they work out. But, I won't cry over the little details that I've worked in only to have some heartless assistant send me a form rejection letter. Screw that. I don't need that stress on top of it. That's right, I'm giving up. Even though we didn't give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor, I'm giving up now.

So, this is the end. I'm getting out of the writing business, for a long while. That means things will slow down here even more. Don't worry, I'll still be puttering around your sites (I mean, I have to have something to do between reading ring-closing metathesis papers) and still providing my soulful wit in your comments sections. But, for the most part, I've ridden off into the sunset.


Thanks, all. It's been fun.

Sayonara.

I'll let Bender say the rest.

A Thousand Gross

Some of my progress this past week was stalled by the line into my refrigerator that delivers water to the filter and the ice maker. Seems as though the nigh-on-thirty-year-old connection was a touch corroded and needed replaced. Having never done this before in my life, and really not having much of a clue about plumbing other than the word comes from Latin and has the same root for their word for the element lead (plumbum...hence the symbol Pb), I had some issues getting everything sealed up right fine. I thought I had it Wednesday night, but there was still a tiny bit of water leaking out, and (this is one of those things that didn't make sense to me) tightening the connection made it leak more...huh. It got to the point where I had to shut the water off for the whole house (because no one thought to have a shut off just for this connection) on Friday. I came home Friday evening and--gallantly, I might add--fixed the issue. Let's hear it for PTFE tape!

Anyway, last night I sat here, sweating, writing like a mad fiend, working to finish up chapter 22 (you know, which I alluded to doing earlier in the week). The chapter, for various reasons, turned out a touch longer than I intended, but it's for the better. A little character development never hurt anyone, right? No matter the reason, it's the ends that are justified, and the ends are that I am finished with the chapter. I'm still working on 30, however, and I'm also working on chapter 23. 23 is in its infancy because I know how to finish the chapter, but the first part is awfully slow.

With that out of the way, I thought I'd toss some numbers out. I realize that it looks like I set this one up, but it is honestly the word and page counts I had when I finished chapter 22 last night.

Word Count: 144,000
Page Count: 470

It looks like I'll end up around 160,000 words, which still might be a lot, but it's a big book. You might be able to see why I hardly ever try to write short stories.

More updates forthcoming.

My Son, the Jedi

Not a lot of things make me feel especially studly. Sure, bedding my buxom, redheaded wife is one of them, but one of the few others is either doing something that improves the house or fixing an appliance/machine that needs it. And, for the latter, get it to run as good as new.


That was just the scenario I was faced with this weekend. Last week, the drive belt that links the axle on which the lawnmower blade turns to the self-propulsion mechanism of the front wheels got chewed up by the blade. Fortunately, I had a spare lawnmower that I stupidly forgot to change the oil in last summer and thus pretty much seized everything up within. Nicely done. A very unstudly moment, to be sure. However, I was able to pull parts off of this old mower and figure out how the belt mechanism worked. I couldn't get the belt off, but I figured Lowes would have the correct replacement. After a 30 minute wait to talk to the guy to make sure the belt I picked up was the right one (and then 30 seconds to confirm...if that), I hustled home and began to fix the mower.


I was cleverly able to loop the belt around the blade so that I didn't have to take the blade off. After this, it was just another quick stretch and pull to get the belt through the opening in the housing for the blade to the pulley for the self-propulsion mechanism. A few twists and a flick to make sure it was tight, and I was back in business. I felt like many a bekilted Scotsman taunting the English after the battle of Stirling Bridge. As an end note, the mower runs as good as new. This was studly moment number one.


Sudly moment number two came on Saturday, when I decided I had had enough of watching Brady Quinn getting screwed and his falling stock, so instead I took my anger out on a light fixture above our kitchen sink that has largely been useless since we bought the house. It was an old (and I do mean old) fluorescent light that had no earthly use. Plus, the bulb was burnt out, and I just plain didn't like it. So, it had to come down. I bought some track lighting to replace it. However, I quickly discovered that the people who owned the house before us, or their contractors, or someone, are complete dolts. Instead of installing a box for the line to come through above the sink, they just had the electrical wires (and the insulation) sticking through a hole drilled in the ceiling. Class act, these folk. So, I wrestled and swore and swore some more and then finally got everything to fit the way I wanted it (if my son hadn't been asleep, I would have gone to get the box to fix it properly, which might be this weekend's project). I got the lights hung just in time before my wife came home, so it was a nice surprise. She, in fact, really liked it. Now, I can leave a light on for her at night when she is working that isn't the one over the stove, which burns out about every ten days. No lie.


So, because I was lazy, I took the old light fixture and laid it on the table in the dining room. I didn't think anything of it, but I did, later, take out the light fixture and such, but I left the bulb there. We'll fast-forward back to Sunday now. As I was preparing the kids' lunches, I was standing at the fridge getting some water from the filter so that I could microwave some macaroni and cheese (modern conveniences are even more wonderful when you've got kids to feed) when here comes my little boy (who is two and a half) into the kitchen, wielding the fluorescent bulb. He came in holding it in front of him and then, when he made sure that I could see him, he stopped, spread his feet shoulder-width apart and then held the bulb up over his head. At the same time, he made this face where he was gritting his teeth and scowling, as if he was trying to frighten off his enemies. In all, he looked quite the young Jedi standing there, ready to face off against Darth Vader.


The funny thing is, this must be a genetic thing because he's never seen a Star Wars-related thing before. My daughter has watched the Clone Wars cartoons with me, but other than that, there's not been too much Star Wars watching with my kids around. Clearly this is a case of genetic nerdiness fandom. As amused as I was, fluorescent bulbs are notoriously fragile and, with the glass being so thin, they tend to form razor-sharp shards when they shatter. Neither of these scenarios is exactly copacetic when it comes to two year olds. I was able to get him to hand me the bulb and I quickly disposed of it properly.


Oh, by the way, if you've had a really bad day working at the book store or something, the sound of long fluorescent bulbs shattering against the back of a steel dumpster is very, very rejuvenating. Or so I've heard.

Updates? Updates. Who needs updates? You do.

Ah, so I've been silent for some time. I think I posted once in September, and that was just about puke clean up duty. That's always pleasant.

So, the story goes like this. I changed projects at the end of August. I'm still employed at SCYNEXIS (apparently it's spelled wrongly if you don't capitalize EVERYTHING), and I'm still loving it, as much as anyone can love a job which revolves around chemistry (that fickle bitch). I just changed projects on which I am working.

The joy of changing a project, however, is that I have to wrap up everything from the old project and hand it off to the appropriate authorities and all. It also means I had a shitload of paperwork/deskwork/computerwork to do. Essentially, I would come in, sit at the computer, and start pulling apart the multiplets and splitting constants that I had to report on my NMRs. Whee. And type up all these reports and how I made stuff and all that. Serious eyestrain issues here. It was not the type of thing where I would want to come home and, after doing the fatherly family guy thing, sit in front of my computer and type more stuff. So, I had about a two week period where I didn't feel like writing much. It got me out of the groove. I suck. I know. I admit this. It's just how I am.

I also got deeply involved in this whole home improvement project. I've essentially gutted my bathroom downstairs and redone it. New floor, new crapper, new sink, new closet door, new wall coverings, new light fixture, new mirror, paint, floorboards, moulding, wainscoting. The whole deal. It looks nice, now. It's been a pain to deal with in between. So, if you ever come to visit me, you know where you'll be pissing. There's even some fine artwork on the walls. And you will admire my handiwork.

Let's also toss in that I'm now a soccer mom. I take my daughter to soccer practice and try to entertain Thomas so that he doesn't run out onto the field during games or practice. It didn't work one night, and he went running into the goal while all the kids were shooting at it. Predictably, he got drilled right in the face. He's alright. I think he's learned his lesson. I've learned mine. I have to be a better goalie, no matter how damned tired I am. Anyway, we're 1-1-1 on the season. There's no overtimes, so we end in ties. We've also been head-butt free, so we're one-up on France.

In case you didn't notice, football season also started.
And I have killed six mice over the past two days.
Yes, I've been distracted.

However, tonight, I picked up the last chapter on which I had worked. I was right near the end, anyway. It was one of those chapters where Sleepy Karl took over and I couldn't finish it in one night. So, I finished it tonight. I feel better about that. So, Chapter fourteen is done (it used to be fifteen, but I switched it...seemed more appropos, timing-wise). Chapter fifteen is up next, along with 13. Both are achievable. I still have 4, 7 and 10 which I am chipping away upon. So, there's plenty to keep me busy.

Anyway, Sleepy Karl is taking over again, so I'm going to wrap this up. Here's the work:

Word Count: 62137
Page Count: 206
12 chapters complete. Hooray.

Happy Yom Kippur! (I'm late, I know, but I started this post on Monday. Honest).

Hints for Heloise

Since you're never going to read this in the daily featurette, I thought I would share this little sniglet of information with you.

If you find yourself at night cleaning up vomit and your wife has hidden the twin bed sheets from you, a queen-sized bed sheet turned sideways is very effective. Just be sure to spritz it with a little Febreze first to help mask the fact that the room was just covered in vomit.

Puke Scrubbing in Durham, NC.

Wainscoting for One, please

I hung some wainscoting in my downstairs bathroom today. I did the three walls that don't have porcelein fixtures on them. In all, it was very tiring work, mostly because the bathoom is little, I had to get on my knees a lot of hammer paneling nails into the base of the wall, and of course that whole measure once cut twice thing. I will say that my measurements and cuts were pretty much dead on. The only time I had any issues was when I let my jigsaw wander a bit while cutting, so I would get tiny bows in my otherwise straight line. These were easily remedied, and I have to say, I'm pretty proud of myself. It'll look even better when I get the baseboards on and all that good stuff. I'm not looking forward to trying to cut around a sink, with all the pipes that come from the wall with it and all. The toilet is less of a worry, only because there is but one pipe that comes in for that, and I should be able to do that part pretty painlessly. Should being the operative term here.

I'm going on vacation next weekend for about a week and a half. I don't think I'll be able to check in, so be aware of that (especially if you're a certain history buff from Wisconsin who is planning on meeting up with me over the course of my trip back to the home country). I am, however, going to be taking my little notebook with me, so I can write out the epilogue. I have a twelve or thirteen hour drive ahead of me. I should be able to come up with what I want (I know the story I want to tell...it'll be short and full of denouement) and thenI can put it on the paper for typing later on. So, expect a big leap forward sometime after July 4th.

With that in mind, you'll understand that I've been really busy trying to get a bunch of stuff done at work. Consequently, with no children, I have plenty of time to stay late. I've been busting my ass in the evenings to try and get the precursors for the final products put together. It's almost like grad school, just without cyclopropanes. This has meant more nights of me coming home, crashing, and either watching television or playing a video game. Not a lot of writing.

I do, however, have some updates. Most of the work has been done in the infamous chapter five. That's the much-touted battle scene. It's coming together rather nicely right now, and, as anticipated, I'm typing much more quickly than in either of the other chapters I'm currently working on (four and seven) in which most of the action is spoken and not done. However, I'm apparently very good at writing dialogue, or so said my ex-girlfriend, Julie (who, by the way, I've been looking for on the internet lately, which is another reason why I haven't been writing much...distractions, distractions!) who got to read most of King of Thistles (about 2/3) when she was acting as my copy editor. Free editorial advice is great...except when she is not very used to the genre and has some issues trying to see where the story is going. *sigh*

Oh well.

Updates:
Word count: 29012
Page count: 96

Also, Sierra Nevada's IPA (#354) is mighty tasty. You should drink some for yourself.
New South's Pale Ale (#353)...not so much.