Category: General

I changed my permalink defaults away from and then back to the way they were before. I had simplified them but then realized that none of the Google links were going to work.

Still working on getting my images embedded…

*Updated 2007 03 17* Since figuring out how to embed videos into these posts I’m updating some of my favorites so they include this technology.

Ever wonder what it would look like if a “planet killer” sized asteroid impacted the Earth?

Well, wonder no more (be prepared, it is about 7 minutes long). It may seem a little depressing, and definitely scary. But it should serve as a reminder about exactly why we might want to continue to expand out into the solar system and, ultimately, the rest of the galaxy.

As a reminder of my previous post, if you are from Georgetown, Ontario, Canada you may be interested in attending a Homecoming event targeted, not just at a particular school or graduation but for the entire town for anybody who’s ever lived there.

Head on over to the Homecoming 2007 page for details!

Have you ever wondered what the US interstate system looks like in one glance? Wonder no more.

As you may or may not know, we are planning to renovate our master bathroom this year. It has scope-creeped somewhat from the original “Bathroom” concept, but we’ve now capped the project at a size that we think will be doable and worth the pain.

Our current project now extends from the master bathroom to including expanding the window in the master bedroom from it’s current 4 foot width to about 12 feet, replacing the counters in both bathrooms and the kitchen with Silestone. Adding a couple of extra pot lights in the kitchen and living room, and adding a new fixture in the dining area.

Excluded from the plans, to go on our Someday/Maybe list, are the replacement of the remaining carpets in the house with wood flooring, replacement of the remaining windows in the house and… and… and… the list goes on. Every time you touch something, there is a domino effect for things that you really should also touch “while you’re there”.

Right now we’re hung up on bathtubs. There are lots of bathtubs out there but very few that we really like. It seems that *most* offerings include water jet jacuzzi technologies. I’ve had a whirlpool bath before and I not only disliked it, I hated it. If the jets are not running, the water in the pipes gets cold fast and then any movement in the tub causes the cold water to flow in to be replaced by the still comfortably warm water that you’re soaking in. If you turn them on, any part of your body that is near the jets goes numb after a few minutes. It also make it tough to read anything that you don’t want to completely destroy as the effervescing caused by the air you introduce to the jet stream to delay the numbness from the jets naturally soaks everything in the vicinity.

Ideally I’d like something that just causes the water in the tub to circulate á la magnetoheterodyne (see “The Hunt for Red October” if you don’t know what this is.). Anyway, the closest it looks like we’re going to get is a “soaker tub”.

Holy cow it’s difficult to find one of these that a) Fits into a 5 foot alcove, b) is *designed* for an alcove – most are free standing which means you have to mess around with adhesive-based flanges to protect your bathroom walls and c) have any depth to the water – sure the *tub* may be deep, but then the overflow is halfway down the tub wall. I’d really like to be able to keep both my chest and my knees under water at the same time…

Anyway, we’ve pretty much settled on the American Standard Lifetime Soaker tub (I’m providing a link ’cause it’s amazing how hard these bathtub sites are to navigate). American Standard is our front-runner ’cause of their uniquely high overflow drain. Unfortunately, they do not offer anything in this line without the whirlpool options. Here is their comparable, flanged unit but with no “soaker only” option.

These are not life-making-or-breaking issues, but I’ve decided to try to do this project by getting the stuff I want, rather than my usual approach of a) doing all sorts of research to see what works best for me and then b) buying whatever the store has available ’cause the items I want and that are recommended are never available outside of a consumer’s reports lab someplace on the West coast.

I’ve been in contact, off and on, with POWWEB – my site hosting provider – for a few months now. They seem to feel that my really slow site is OK, I don’t.

Anyway, I’m talking with their help desk *again* to try to resolve the loading issues. What’s really annoying is that they keep closing my trouble tickets after cursorily inspecting things and not actually resolving the issue. Sorry for any inconvenience this is causing.

Please stick with it. Waiting for the site to load doesn’t seem to help, when the site fails to load, you pretty much need to refresh to get the missing pieces. Then, of course, other pieces will be missing.

I may need to look into a new provider…

This brought back memories of “Hinterland’s Who’s Who”… until about a third of the way through… Really, you need to take a look at this offering from Collegehumor.com