Mindful

You really can’t fill your mind to the full level. There’s always room for more knowledge. Now, I’ve certainly become overwhelmed too often. The chaos of nature sometimes comes at us too fast. Now maybe my memory of being overwhelmed is a bit flaky but it seems I’m more prone to being overwhelmed as I age.

Being mindful is a great condition to be in. If the opposite is being mindless, then a mindless condition/action might have a deadly outcome.

I have enjoyed learning and still want to learn more. My last post was about the notion of boring. Boring is so very subjective. I’m certainly biased but I find my posts very interesting and I consider a few to be educational. Oh no I used that boring word, “educational”.

I’m becoming self-taught on various branches of physics such as cosmology by reading books such as Neil DeGrasse Tyson’s “Astrophysics for People in a Hurry”. At the end of the chapter 7 titled, “The Cosmos on the Table” he describes the names of some chemicals as sesquipedalian. I had to look that one up. The word sesquipedalian is sesquipedalian. It’s a self-referential word.

Now that I overused my new word of the week, I’ll move on.

On a trip this past spring I came across a strange sign in a small Texas panhandle town. It was too interesting to skip taking a picture so here’s the sign.

What happens at 34 or 36 seconds?

I spent more than 5 minutes looking around trying to figure out the purpose of this sign. You might notice the railroad tracks in the background so I assume it has some connection to freight operations on the railroad. Why does it state such an odd specific time? Would 1 minute be too long? When do I start timing? Do I need to carry a stopwatch? Please provide your guesses in the comment section below. I’m mindful but clueless about this sign.

 

Oh be quick or take your time. It doesn't matter to me.

birds of a feather, what the flock

Hanging out with the flock is good and educational but we need to explore too. Diversity has benefits too if you have an open mind. Different thoughts, ideas and views of this world can open your mind if you let it. Often those strange birds ruffle others feathers. If no one is being harmed or hurt what is the big deal?

I'm going to make my move

You can uncover plenty of diversity in blogland. I don’t care for all of it. I don’t understand much of it. I still click around and will even drop a comment on some of it.

I don’t believe progress was ever a smooth and gentle process. I abhor violence. Yet I can understand how some passionate people can go over the top in their protesting. Understand but not agree. I watched a rebroadcast of this eco-terrorism documentary the other day. It won an award in 2011 at the Sundance Film Festival.




 The destruction of private property by this group was wrong. Firebombing is not a solution for anyone’s cause. Fires become uncontrollable. Complete destruction of our environment is also wrong. There should be a balance between these extremes.

I find a large spectrum between the extremes. It’s unfortunate that rating seeking news media emphasized the extremes. We don’t need to do the bird thing. We can mix it up with other flocks and still progress.

To add a bit of diversity to this post, I offer you below, two links to completely unrelated posts that I read recently. Two bloggers that I discovered awhile ago, Anita and Jene, posted about love. Love - very different than firebombing and more effective. Too bad it doesn’t get noticed by as many people. Very touching words - check them out.

15 Minutes Can Form a Lifelong Bond
Blink

stars deserve more attention

What?

As we were told in “Stairway To Heaven”, ‘cause you know sometimes words have two meanings, you might be thinking of the wrong type of star.

The stars needing more attention are those all around us. Most noticeable on a clear night. However our most important star, our sun, is out for us in the day (hopefully our sun being a star is not a news flash for anyone here).

NEWS FLASH - Earth’s orbit around the sun - misunderstood (or unknown) by too many!

For all of recorded time the earth has been taking a yearly trip around the sun. Yes, the orbit is not very noticeable on a daily basis. Even the top thinkers back in Greece got details of this celestial movement wrong.  But that was well over a thousand years ago.  Hundreds of years ago, Galileo pointed his telescope up at the sky and started to straighten out this solar system operation.

According to a recent survey (2012), about 25% (that’s 1 in 4 ) of Americans got the question about the earth-sun orbit wrong. The survey included more than 2,200 people in the United States and was conducted by the National Science Foundation. The question was: Does the Earth go around the sun, or does the sun go around the Earth?
(you can find the whole NSF report here)

There are three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see. Leonardo da Vinci. BrainyQuote.com

Today we can add a fourth class, those who don't look up from their smartphones long to see the world around them.

Today with international space programs, a space telescope providing amazing photos, internet accessible space news and findings, regular monitoring of our star (the sun), I would think only a  small percentage of Americans would have any problem with that question. Are we really staring down at smartphones too much?

Ooh, it makes me wonder, 
Ooh, it really makes me wonder.

Sure I know my wonder of physics and universe is not shared by even the majority (I guess?) but doesn’t a little of this knowledge intrigue people? Physics can get complex quickly. Going out in the sun for too long can get you a quick sunburn too. Is a good tan, all that some want to know about our star?

Yes, there are two paths you can go by, 
but in the long run 
There's still time to change the road you're on.

I suggest to those of the 25%, put down your smartphone, find a dark area on a clear night and look up. Hopefully, those stars will trigger a little curiosity. Check out some educational videos on youtube. Check out a book. Here’s a great youtube clip, I found packed with good info.

fourth grade fragments

It’s Friday. So kids open your browsers to the fragmented posts that can be found at Mrs. 4444’s blog.

(Lisleman background info - regular readers probably can skip over) We have two daughters who teach. I’ve mentioned this here and there before. One them teaches at an elementary school. My career was electrical engineering.

Thursday I had a fourth grade experience. Most all my fragments today focus on that.

One of our teaching daughters suggested at least two years ago that she should set me up with the teachers who do a science unit on electricity. I was open to it but her idea seem to always come too late in the school schedule. Not this year. She set me up to present to four fourth grade classes. I was busy Thursday afternoon visiting the four classrooms.

I wasn’t sure what to expect. Would the kids be bored. My daughter suggested powerpoint which I remember giving her help on years ago. I never liked powerpoint that much when I was in the corporate world. Fourth grade kids expect powerpoint slides instead of squeaky chalk? Yes I did know the chalkboards were mostly gone but I thought whiteboards were mostly used. The kids were good. I hoped for questions and they had plenty to ask.

I showed them an electromagnet I made from a coil of wire that I found in an old electric toothbrush our daughter donated to my junk collection. My theme for the presentation was various common things utilizing Faraday’s electromagnetic induction discovery. In addition to the electromagnet coil, I show a speaker and a few motor toys/gadgets. I explained how I learned about electrical transformers before there were toy transformers. (You can see a few of my toy/gadget video clips under the “Playing Around” tab.)

Planning to demo a few different devices saved the afternoon for me. The demo of a speaker playing beats from an old toy failed after the second classroom. A broken wire was to blame.

The technology in the classroom surprised me. I used a document camera projector thing to show the electromagnet picking up a permanent magnetic. Back in the day, the overhead projector was high tech. I can recall cleaning chalk erasers for the teachers at my elementary school.

The status of my electrical/electronic junk collection has now increased a level in usefulness.

Packing up my stuff and setting-up in each classroom would be easier if I had used a rolling cart. Next time I guess.

Experimenting with various electrical/electronic components is more fun as a hobby than as a student or employee. From the time as a student, all the way through as a working engineer, watching something I built or even partially built has been a joy. I was reminded of the good feeling that comes from sharing knowledge.

This past weekend we visited the Christmas lights at the zoo. They put on a spectacle of color and shapes. Hopefully I’ll remember to post a few pics soon.

when the plumbing plans your day

“... when the men on the chessboard get up and tell you where to go …”

Well it wasn’t men on a chessboard telling what to do this morning. It was a sink drain telling me it was broken. Actually my wife did the talking. Plumbing was not scheduled in any of today's plans. Plumbing can be rude and pushy like that though.

Nothing like a broken do-hickey on your drain pipe to mess with your day. The socket holding the pivot lever which makes the stopper move up and down broke off. The remaining drain pipe was left with a hole in it’s side. It’s easier to just say the do-hickey, doodad or thingamabob broke on the pipe.

I searched around for a picture/diagram of the setup. I discovered a new name in the process, clevis strap. Next time I’m at a hardware store I should inquire about their selection of clevis straps.


At least part of my pipes are clean now.

Remember this other Jefferson Airplane song? 

When the drain is found
to be clogged
and all the joy within you dies
don’t you want somebody to fix-it
don’t you need somebody to fix-it
wouldn’t you love somebody to fix-it
you better find somebody to fix-it

don’t trip I need a trip

I’m just tripping out a little on meanings. I’ve been known to trip over my pronunciation of my list of tricky words. The combination and sequence of certain sounds overloads my speech processing and trips my internal circuit breakers. I probably just need a trip to a place with little paper umbrellas in the drinks.

“Stairway to Heaven” reminds us. “Cause you know sometimes words have two meanings.”

It also reminds us Led Zeppelin (or is it Lead Zeppelin) performed great guitar riffs.

During my brief research for this post (oh I’m sitting in my Institute for Better Postings chair) I learned that “trip” also has a nautical meaning. Living in the midwest and never being in the Navy I don’t get nautical much. How about you? Didn’t Olivia Newton-John have a hit song about getting nautical?

I found a site that offers learning guides for English titled “Free Language Stuff”. It has a section on multiple meanings. One of their guides gave me the idea for this problem sentence: My family always takes a trip on that rug.

Ohh it makes me wonder.

Oh yes the nautical trip meaning, Trip an Anchor - The act of breaking out the flukes of an anchor if they are caught on some obstruction.

Why do we have the multiple meanings? Do other languages have as many of these as English?

It won’t surprise you that I’m more familiar with linguini than linguistics. However, I often have a taste for linguistics. Digging under a layer or two of linguistic material reinforced the fact that I didn’t know much about the field. Did you know there is a theory of homonymic conflict? Best I can tell it has something to do with semantic change. Now is that the type of change I should support or the type that confuses the store clerk?


Tripping out on the Stairway To Heaven is better than tripping on it.

Ohh it really makes me wonder. 

flip me a Friday fragment

Don’t foozle your Friday. Frame some fragments in a post and link your framed fragments over at Mrs. 4444’s blog.

(Warning: The post of fragments you are about to read contains Lisleman’s fact and fiction. It only takes a quick spin on my office chair to start my fragments spinning.)

(a text) K C U @ 3:32 -  I've received many of these type texts lately since our daughter got accepted in a graduate program and she has been commuting into the city on the train.

I have a BSEE and the idea of masters or even PhD crossed my mind but family, living, and money didn't seem to allow it. I do enjoy learning. I look back with NO regrets. In fact pursuing it may have kept me from some of the vacations and events I had with my family. It’s hard to say, but they do cost money and time. Don't stop learning.  Learning is bigger than any course work and is as close as your own head.

Men are from bars, women are bloggers. Sure I blog and there’s few men bloggers that visit here. But my no politics and very little sports coverage might not match well with guys. I really don’t know. I suspect that guys just don’t read blogs much. Maybe the internet is like Playboy - the many distracting pictures keeps you from reading the good stories on blogs.

Just a short fragment on politics. I just confirmed that our congressional district was redrawn and we are now in a different district. Every house seat is subject to change in the upcoming election so my representative might have changed anyway but now it will for sure.

Now that I used the word politics I might as well use the word religion. In my opinion religion is a very personal thing. I’m not very religious but I have prayed many times. I certainly don’t think any one religion has the answers. Also we can learn from other religions.

The reason I mention religion is the recent news story about the possibility that Jesus had a wife. My first reaction about this ancient script was “they found a honey-do list?” If Jesus was married I would think she would have be referenced at least once in those stories while he was hanging with the boys.

Married - no matter either way. I read this Chicago Tribune article about it and completely agree that this news prompts people to discuss religion which is good thing when everyone acts respectfully. The author of the article who is with the Archdiocese of Chicago, brought up a bible passage (Matthew 8: 14-15:) in which Jesus cured Peter’s mother-in-law of a fever. The strangest part for me is at the end of passage. After the fever left her, she waited on them and in some versions served them a meal. I’m thinking Peter saying something like, “Ok my buddy healed you, now off and make us sandwiches.” Don’t you think there is humor in the Bible?

The good years, the growing years, we tend to categorize the periods of our lives. Lately, I wondering if retirement is going to be the annoying years. 

I love it when readers go for a scroll on my blog. Please feel free to scroll around the blog. If you saw my last post you know I went to the ledge and back.

Oh there's a new treat for readers going to the bottom (of the page) - see/listen - new slideshow.

she makes a man want to speak spanish

I asked the famous Latina blogger (neither of those adjectives apply to me) if I could learn Spanish from watching Shakira on youtube.

Lisleman:
My question - Could I learn Spanish by watching Shakira on youtube?

Unknown Mami:
No but you could learn to shake your hips like a moneymaker.

First off, my hips never had the motions expressed by Shakira.  Secondly, how embarrassing having to tell the doctor that I was shaking my hips like a moneymaker when I collapsed in pain. (would be an interesting post though)

I picked up a few words already.

Como se llama - does not mean anything about the llamas of Peru.

Baila en la calle de noche - except I can’t dance worth a damn.

Shakira is very bonita.
 

Is this idea loca?

Would it require tequila?

confused wisdom

Do you impart your wisdom to others?

I have, but before we start discussing reasons and situations to share your wisdom we need to be clear on the definition.

Wisdom is much more than knowledge. I once told my younger sister that even if her kids achieve more advanced college degrees than her, she will still have a mother’s wisdom that their knowledge alone fails to provide.
 
Here’s a bit of knowledge I just picked up. Google docs and the blogger editor has a tool called “Define” that provides many web based references for any target word.

Perhaps it’s a tiny bit of my wisdom (or laziness?) to use that tool in this post. The tool provided this definition of wisdom (from wiktionary) - 

The discretionary use of knowledge for the greatest good; The ability to apply relevant knowledge in an insightful way, especially to different situations.

The reason I started to reflect on wisdom was a post I read recently. Marcy of “The Glamorous Life” showed her wisdom in her post about another blog post in which a recent college graduate told the world that her generation is the only generation capable of doing social media. After reading Marcy’s post, I thought, it’s common-sense that knowledge and wisdom are not the same. 

But maybe your first wisdom moment is grasping the concept of wisdom.

Doing great things within your school life can leave you with a little too much arrogance when you step into the real life.  Arrogance gets in your way when collecting wisdom.

A friend shared an email of funny and ironic pictures. Two of them illustrate my knowledge vs. wisdom comparison.

Having wisdom is understanding the meaning of “you often get what you paid for”.

Having knowledge of the pet door operation does NOT mean you have the wisdom to use it the best way.

If we are open minded we learn that our initial perceptions of others can trick us. Our wisdom regarding people increases with age because we experience different people with various levels of trust and interaction during our lives. 

If I take time to reflect on my own handling of events, I can become very frustrated in my inability in some cases to apply wisdom (one should know better situation). Wisdom goes unused when emotions like anger charge into the situation. Not all the time. Progress is emotion trumping wisdom less often. 

I don’t hold any special magic keys to happiness or success, but I seen applied wisdom and it improves life. Improve our world, share your wisdom in a comment below.

attitude adjustment

One day you up and the next day you’re down 

you can’t face the world with your head to the ground 

the grass is always greener on the other side they say 

…

we made enough mistakes but you know we got what it takes 

from the Blues Magoos song “We Ain't Got Nothin' Yet" 

It’s easier to give advice than follow it. Even following your own advice can be hard. Your attitude, state of mind, outlook, feelings color the way you process the world around you. I’m no philosopher, guru, or life coach. Many of you know this stuff better than me. No I’m just a simple guy who traveled through a good number years trying to pay attention. Just when I think I have it figured out, wham, I’m knocked for a spin. I think it’s just the nature of life. 

Last night I watched NOVA’s presentation called, “Mind Over Money” (did you know scientists study emotions and attitude). 

 “So what we've been discovering about sadness is that sadness has this effect on making people pay more to buy things...” Jennifer Lerner, social psychologist Harvard University 

I wonder if this effect provides the underlying support for women shoe prices.

I know close to zilch about yoga but I did take a class with my wife once at the park district. Also, as a kid there was a period I was under the strict surveillance of nuns. It was not called yoga but you had to hold a variety of positions during a mass given in Latin. 

Writing this post about yoga was relaxing and I didn’t even need to buy any Lululemons. I found this funny clip about yoga girl. 

My favorite line is “when you do your Chaturanga do your toes curl”

namaste

time tangents

Time for a tobloggan.

What? Ok, I’ll explain because I just coined that term a few posts ago. I barely remember what I posted how can I expect you to remember.

A tobloggan is a post that takes off and glides across your keyboard with ease. A great tobloggan will even pick up speed after it is posted.

A recent post by Jillsy Girl asked that common question (ok maybe not too common with people younger than 30) regarding doing your life over again the same way if you were given the chance.

My over thinking comment included the following:

...The posted question is an interesting one but I think the only good answer is an appreciation of the life we have lived...

Of course this hypothetical scenario can not happen. I can go off on tangent here and start a discussion of time travel and that paradox. But that discussion might mostly be with myself because I don’t think that was the point of the question.

The question offers an open out-of-box thinking opportunity to examine your life’s successes and failures. Most of us have not been in prison so we can rightly say we made at least a few good choices. Maybe we can set the bar a little higher than prison time.

How about those traffic tickets?

Life is filled with an abundance of good, bad, high, low, bright, dark, milk chocolate, dark chocolate, etc (I have not seen too many bowls of cherries but they are tasty when you find one). In other words how do you compare a life to another life?

Much of what happens to us is luck. Good attitude, training, learning from mistakes, focused attention and other attributes are important to be able to seize on that luck. Often it just passes us by without our knowing it.

Now there are many little things I wish I had done over the years. I wish I had saved that erector set from my childhood. I wish I had taken a free trip to Puerto Rico while I was in the Air Force.

The bottom line for me - I’m happy with almost all of my life story. How about you?

another circus 

I’m not a teacher

But maybe my blog is, on occasion.

My occupation has never been listed on any form or resume as teacher but I have taught. You probably have too. All of you parents out there are teachers. Also, the aunts, uncles, brothers and sisters can be teachers too. Much of the teaching is done informally but if the student learns, what’s the difference?

You could start teaching to strangers at the bus stop. I doubt it would go over well but you might get on the local news (which if you do please mention my blog as your inspiration).

I actually did teach in a formal setting once. A summer class on programming at a community college. It was interesting, alright, I got paid, but it left me feeling frustrated too. In the end I wanted to throw a few of the students out.

So to the teachers out there who list teaching as their occupation and guide those monsters wonderful children - my hat goes off to you and all the best because it’s an important job. At this point, I want to remind you (one of you might remember) that I have daughters who teach and of course they are the best in the world (IMHO).

My most common teaching experience has been informal on-the-job type teaching. From this I learned the absolute best way to learn something thoroughly is to explain or teach it to another person. At one point in my career, I was involved in customer training/teaching. The most interesting part of that assignment was having an audience of English as a second language customers. No problemo (which really should be “no hay problema”) as long as they are educated and I have a translator along.

A post or two ago (do you count in posts?) was about I-imagination. The idea was the idea. Well using I-imagination, I wondered what it would have been like to have been taught by the renowned teacher Socrates. Of course, I’ll assume I could understand and speak ancient Greek and I didn’t mind wearing a toga.

“I know that I know nothing,” Socrates apparently said once but I’m guessing it was not during a job interview because it does convey much confidence.


The above picture is a painting of the school of Athens. It doesn’t look like any classroom I’ve been in. The guy sprawled across the steps looks like trouble to me. I don’t think they taught in classrooms and maybe typical age of the students were older.


One common aspect of the painting and my informal teaching experience is the teacher-student ratio. It’s either one-on-one or very close. Today that is mostly found in tutoring arrangements. Good attitude and confidence are key factors in successful learning and tutoring can provide those.


I recently learned of company called StudyPoint that is expanding their tutoring services. Tutoring offered by StudyPoint is all done one-on-one but I am sure if they have Socrates types they don’t wear their togas. That would be distracting.


Another Greek, Mentor, was the tutor of Telemachus. He must have been a great tutor since his name has become synonymous with it. I wonder if in the far distant future Lisleman will become a word meaning great blogging or lighten up already.

washing Wednesday

Well it’s still Tuesday but don’t you wish you were a day early for washing?

Today my birthday presents came!

Such excitement - a new washer and dryer. As a bonus birthday treat I was allowed to install them. (saved about $90).

After connecting gas and water hoses, I was very ready to hit the start button.

Before I get ahead of myself, I should tell you what I’m dealing with. Pretty basic models from Whirlpool. The soon-to-be-scrap metal units were about 15 years old (not real sure since we never celebrated their birthdays). They were also Whirlpools.

My wife had heard horror (that’s too strong of an adjective, there was no blood or decapitated bodies in the stories) stories about the newer computerized units in which I believe you can play a DVD. No, she wanted simple turn the dial and push a button type (like me?). Also, she wanted top loading with agitator so that narrowed the selection. I like simple too but honestly the idea of maybe connecting the washing machine to the internet with Wi-Fi is sort of exciting.

Ok - back to “hit the start button”.

My first check I planned was to be water temperature selection, so I thought, I’ll just fill it with some water and check. Twisted the selector knob and push the button. Nothing. The old one would let you load while the water was filling. You could even watch the agitator churn the clothes. Hours of entertainment. The old one died a slow death because one day the agitator became very mellow and barely moved.

Hmm, I’m guessing new safety features on this one (damn government regulations) so I closed the lid. Click, Red Light. Oh, the lid is locked. Still no water.

DAMN NOW I need to open the instruction booklet and find the English section.

• Section - How to wash clothes
• Step 1 - sort and prepare clothes - OH c’mon, really, why not start with WEAR CLOTHES UNTIL DIRTY!
• Step 2 - add detergent
• Step 3 - add clothes - Now this is interesting, as mention above we would add detergent, clothes with the water filling in the past.

So at this point I decide I need a plan B. I’ll check the operation with some actual clothes. Add clothes, detergent, make selection, shut lid, and press start. Some noise but NO sound of water running. Double check hoses and shut off values. Everything looks good. Then I hear water filling - yes! It appears to have a long delay before the water starts.

But how will I know the water temperature matches the selection if it goes through the whole cycle? Look at manual - pick up manual - actually read some part of manual.

If you need to open the lid (they offer the explanation that you forgot an article of clothing - what if you are just plain curious does that count?) during an operation in which its locked you can push the start button and pause the operation. If you push and hold for 3 seconds you can abort the whole mission.

Houston we have a problem!

A few tries with the lid and pause button and I get the feel of it.  I own this machine now.

Finally I am master of the washing machine. I changed the temperature selection, paused operation, unlocked the lid and checked the water. I still could not check the water while it was flowing in, but it was still dripping.  I even flipped over to spin and had the water pumping out of there.

It does sound completely different than the old one too. Different mechanical sounds from the motor. Maybe its voice will change in a few years.

Then a strange sense of pride and responsibility came over me.

At that very moment, in my basement, I knew I was the only one of the household that knew the operational details of the washing machine. The gatekeeper of the washing machine. I would need to prepare a tutorial for others.

I hope that I can calmly explain the operation to my wife. Maybe I should consult our daughters the teachers for guidance.

Oh, I just realized I gave all my attention to the washer. The dryer is also a new Whirlpool but maybe back in its development an Apple engineer was involved because it just worked. No need to open the manual on that one.

another circus

pretending to give a sh-t

My teacher daughter shared this clip with me. The Onion once again produced some funny shit satire.  I need to browse over to their site more often.  Of course if you don't give a sh-t just skip it.

In The Know: Are Tests Biased Against Students Who Don't Give A Shit?

another circus         solar info link

   

mother nature post or what hell was that

This post was inspired by mother nature.  This morning at 4 AM I got to experience my first earthquake.  

I realize that some readers may have experience a few earthquakes in their life - but I live in northern Illinois.  

 

This farm field on Plank Road in Hampshire was the epicenter of an overnight earthquake in Illinois, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.  (Stacey Wescott/Tribune) 

You probably know Illinois as the place shaking things up with our politicians not natural disasters.  Hmm, maybe Blago (former governor awaiting trial) combed his hair this morning.  

My initial reaction to the boom and shake - What the hell was that?

Shortly afterwards I heard my daughter getting ready and then leaving for her opening shift at Starbucks.  She didn't report anything, so I figured the loud boom and window rattling was from a snow plow which have awaken me before.  It wasn't until she returned that I found out it was an earthquake.  I had taken my time before getting on the internet today so I had not seen any news about it.

But it certainly was an unusual event that I wanted to share.  Also, it got me thinking about the many potential and actual disasters I have witnessed in my life.  Now I can add earthquake to my list.

The hurricane while living in Biloxi Mississippi was probably the scariest.  Right up there on the list has been tornadoes here in Illinois.  Funnel clouds are amazing and scary at the same time.  I understand the fascination those tornado hunters have.

Another disaster I found myself and family in while not in Illinois was a forest fire.  This huge blaze added some memories to our vacation to Montana.  The town of West Glacier was evacuated about 15 minutes after we finished dinner there and headed back to the hotel.  Do you prefer your salmon smoked?

In Costa Rica, wife and I watched huge flaming globs of lava being thrown from a volcano - a natural fireworks show.  I guess that had some disaster potential but I felt we were a safe distance away.

And I had detours on a road trip coming back home with one daughter caused by floods and a tornado.

Maybe when you stop and think about it, mother nature can really throw some nasty stuff in your life's path.  Any natural disasters to share?  please comment.

Christmas Joy and sewage

( I know many of you are well holiday seasoned by now.  I want to share this Christmas day experience with you anyway and I will probably repost it next December. )

Legend has Santa coming down the chimney.  This past Christmas we had unwanted presents coming up.

We had a Christmas Day disaster.  Now I realize that in the big picture of life many people have suffered through more extreme disaster such as hurricane Katrina.  But like Katrina we had sewage flooding but fortunately on a smaller scale.

photo from FreeFoto.com

It was looking to be a quiet Christmas Day this year because the grown kids schedules put our family celebration off for two days.  It was just wife, still-at-home daughter, and myself.

I had just settled down to some blog and web surfing when out of the basement there arose such a clatter.  My wife rushed upstairs to sound an alert.  We all needed to report to the basement ASAP.

It was flooding.  Initially, we both thought it was the problem we had spent big bucks on just little more than a year ago.  We had an annoying problem with the fast draining of washing machine loads.  Plumbers had dug into the floor and replaced sections of the drain pipes.  Could it be that it was back again?

The water was rising and we didn't have time to ponder plumbing.  We just needed to scoop water and stop the spread of the water.  Daughter and mom started picking up and moving stuff.  Stuff - no time to ponder why this stuff exists here - just get it moved out of the water's path.  Our daughter had an incentive to get the stuff out.  Most of it was hers.

Maybe 10 or 15 minutes into this it became clear that the water was still coming up strong.  We knotted up an old towel and jammed it into the drain pipe.  The towel didn't hold.  It started to be pushed out by the water pressure.  We slid a big tub filled with collected water on top of it.  That worked.

What also became clear was how UNclear the water looked.  It also smelled.

Fortunately I had an old wet vac and it still worked.  The 5 gallon attached bucket filled quickly.

For the next 5 hours (the alert was sounded about noon) we all worked on scooping, sucking, squeegee-ing the sewage.  We hauled 5 gallon bucket after bucket of water up and out to the back yard.  Obviously we could not use a drain.  Luckily it was raining then snowing outside.

I was ankle deep in raw sewage all afternoon.  After I was able to lower the water level, I checked the drain by moving the big tub off.  It was still coming in!  I started wondering now how much water could our house have in the drains.  A quick check between us confirmed that none of us had used any drain for hours.

I called my house-building-carpenter brother (thanks bro for being there).

Me- "Merry Christmas, how much water is there in the drain pipes of a house?"

Bro- "Huh?  What are you talking about?"

Me- "I pissed off someone in Bethlehem and now we have water flooding the basement."

After some back and forth Q&A, it was determined that the water was coming from outside the house.  It was backing up from the sewer system.  Our neighbors were sharing their waste with us.  How nice!

We had called a few neighbors and ones at home checked and no problem was found anywhere we called.  We were special.

Did I mention - it was Christmas.  Who would be around at the public works department?  My wife called the police department.  After some questions they promised to relay the issue to the public works department.

I was not hopeful.  We had slowed the flow to a manageable amount but it was still seeping in.  It would need to be watched and sucked out all night.  We started brain storming about where we could use a toilet, a shower.  I would sleep on the floor upstairs. 

Who did I pissed off in the Holy Land?

Maybe our karma was not too bad - the public works called back.  Some more Q&A and he said he would over in about an hour.  Wow, a public works guy coming out on Christmas.

I was watching the drain, when my wife called down to announce a truck was out in front of the house.  I eagerly threw on a coat and headed out into the snowy night.  As I stepped off my front porch the truck pulled away.  Hey come back, don't leave now, I wanted to yell but they would not of heard me anyway in that big noisy truck.

Surely they will come back.

About 10 minutes later I spotted the truck.  This time I stood in the middle of the street to stop them.  There were two of them sitting high in their cab.  He rolled the window down.

"We are working on it."

I thanked them and asked if coming inside to see the situation would help.  No, they could figure it out from the outside.  He did come by later to explain what had happened.

Outcome - grease clog about 100 feet down the pipe from us.  They unclogged it and I was able to shower and use the toilet again.  It was about 9 PM when the water flowed the correct direction again.

It's impossible to be prepared for everything that flows into your life, but this experience taught me a few suggestions that you might find helpful.

Our damage was limited because we have shelves and file cabinets which keeps stuff off the floor.  Those plastic storage tubs are great because they stay dry inside.  You should own a wet vac.  We should also own more buckets.

Another lesson learned was about plumbing (I've never had good luck with plumbing projects) in a house.  The drains only have water in the traps.  A sink trap holds less than a gallon and a toilet trap would hold more but not much more.  If you have water flowing up from the lowest drain and its more than a few gallons, call the sewer department.  The problem is outside your house system.

I would like to thank

I feel honored and surprised. Ok maybe not as much President Obama did with the Nobel Peace Prize but still it's nice to be recognized.

Blogger friend, Fantastic Forrest over at Traveling Through Time and Space has awarded my blog the Honest Scrap Award.  Thanks FF, this gave me some ideas for the blog.

I'll be doing a post on scrap very soon.

This award comes with some rules.  (is that common?  an award with rules?)

First off you need to thank the blogger that awarded you and link back (see above).  Next you must list ten things about yourself.

Ok things about myself:

1.  I dislike running.  I hated the track sessions in High School and later in Officer Training School the required running times about broke me.  I always thought exercise should be combined with a game like baseball or tennis.  Of course running is part of most sports but when there is a game involved it's more interesting.  I thought the running story in the "Forrest Gump" movie was hilarious.

2.  After seeing a few James Bond movies growing up, I thought being a spy would be the greatest career.  They all got fast cars and fast women - right?  Part of my Air Force career included cryptography (I can't say anymore or I'd have to kill you).  It was interesting stuff but didn't include any fast cars or women.

3.  lighten up already - nobody gets out alive - I don't like people who take themselves so seriously that they become arrogant, boring, and a jerk.  Chill out - I heard or read the following once about someone: "Often in error, never in doubt."

4.  I would rather read non-fiction than fiction.  True stories can be stranger than fiction.  One of my favorite stories was Serpico (also a great movie).

5.  I listen to song lyrics.  The best ones are the ones that make you think.  Such as the song by "Police", "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da".  (lighten up already)

6.  I don't spell well.  I consider it a sign of being a better engineer.  That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.  I thought about blaming my bad spelling on the French.  Faux is really a fake word.

7.  I don't understand why people like lists.  A few paragraphs about myself would be better than this list.  The best ten things, the top 100 places, etc. are just opinions and everyone has one.

8.  I believe our brains are wiring to find patterns.  So we deceive ourselves by seeing/finding things that we want or are trying to see.  My best example is that tragic things come in threes.  Who thought that one up?  Some victim of a tragedy that was looking for company?

9.  One of the best things of my life (everyone's I think) is learning.  Don't ever stop because there is an endless amount to learn.  I'm very proud that a couple of our daughters are teachers.

10.  I served 10 years in US Air Force.  Started enlisted and finished an officer.  It bothers me that many people today don't even know the difference between those categories.  More importantly I wish more people would accept that you can support the troops and still be against a war.  I believe there have been some necessary wars and some unnecessary wars.  Unnecessary and sacrifice of life do not go together.

11.  Oh no I broke the rule of 10 things.  I'm on roll here people, just bear with me.  I would jump at the chance to go into space.  I might even consider some running if I knew I had a chance.  Doing a loop in a plane would be cool too.

The last step of the rules is to award ten fellow bloggers.  I consider this the "complete the sharing" step.  Now some of these ten bloggers have already been presented this award but you can get awards multiple times.

Please welcome these award winning blogs with a visit:

Two Yorks and a Bean

pearl whyyoulittle

Flying Pinto

Sick Days

Live High

gone bananas

The Fifty Factor

Unknown Mami

ONESTONEDCROW

Lilly's Life

step ladder to a mistake

My definition of a mistake
A mistake can vary from the tragic type that breaks a bone, removes a limb to one that just breaks wind (some in my family consider that tragic too).

A mistake requires some human decision involvement For example, like the tree falling in the forest question (oh if you are married - it's the husband's mistake) there needs to be some human interaction. I don't think nature makes mistakes. However nature offers us the opportunity to make mistakes. Ever jump into a lake expecting it to be deeper and less filled with rocks?

I have.

Serious mistakes might land you here:





Hopefully, I didn't make the mistake of too much explanation and you're still reading so I can tell you my story of a funny mistake.

My goal that day - replace my garage door opener (motor unit part) single handed.

The tricky part of the assembly was getting the chain on the pole and connecting the gear in the motor unit. After some attempts, I found a brilliant solution, use a step ladder to hold the motor unit up with the other end of the pole attached to the wall. The top of the ladder was too high and the pole would easily slip off so I used a middle rung/step of the ladder to hold it.

It worked!!

Well kinda, my mistake was not checking sizes. The motor unit would not fit between the rungs of the ladder and I could not slide the ladder off the assembled opener.

Now the step ladder was part of my opener. I wish I had taken a picture. Maybe I would have been on the cover of DIY magazine. The fix was to remove one rung of the ladder (easier than taking the opener apart).

Here's a couple of pictures of an opener and a ladder. Picture the motor box part NOT attached to the ceiling BUT stuck between the rungs of the ladder.

Poor planning == mistake





Almost forgot to mention this post idea comes from the spin cycle.

======= update =====
a friend sent me this link to a brilliant garage door opener idea.
Check this out

I forgot about this

USA Memory Champion (Chester Santos)

Chester Santos is the current United States National Memory Champion. I knew that but forgot - no really National Memory Champion - who knew?

This guy has a website that offers courses on memory improvement.

This reminds me of speed reading (you know back when people read books often) courses. I took a speed reading course and it worked but only for a short time. Use it or lose it problem. I suspect the same may hold for this too.

Oh there some good video clips on his site.
Here's his site.