A Busy Day of Rest
I took yesterday off from work to recover from a roadtrip out towards Chicago for a fencing tournament (post pending).
With this recouperative free time, I decided to get a few things done that needed doing before we became embroiled within the clammy talons of the Winter season.
Gypsy needed a tune up and I can usually just drive into the dealer to do so on a weekday, and that is exactly what I did. Apparently, she was up for larger maintenance package than the usual oil change this time around and so I hunkered down with my Nintendo DS for a couple of hours as William Shatner shared his tales of passing a kidney stone on the Regis and Kelly show. Surreal would be one way to put it.
Luckily, Gypsy only needed some minor work and though the whole deal costed more than planned, she certainly seemed in better spirits afterwards.
I then retired home to put up the window insulation around the house. Though it has remained sunny over the past few weeks, the temps crashed on Sunday. The window plastic is a pretty cheap way to squeeze out some extra efficiency from my heater.
I wrapped that project up in time to start waiting for the cable guy (not Larry, The). In my previous post, I had shared my disdain for the poor quality in which my telephone company had left my DSL service. Since I was going to be home anyway I managed to get an appointment for the tech person to come out on Monday between 3:00-6:00.
He showed up at 5:30. If he were to show up any later I would swear that he could limbo under any wire in front of him. I led him into the geek lair and pointed out the cable outlet. After a few minutes of snaking cable and plugging in the cable modem, we were still dead. Well, damn. And we were just talking about how he seems to get the problematic calls in the afternoon.
We did some scouting in the basement when it occurred to me to check the dish outside. As luck would have it, the thing did lead up into a spot in the stucco at about the right spot where the inside socket was located. The tech guy said that it wasn't a problem and snaked a line from the cable box down to that spot and spliced into it. Sort of jerry rig, sure, but it was a workable solution because we had the modem up and running shortly thereafter.
All in all, a productive day. It is a rewarding feeling, to be sure.
With this recouperative free time, I decided to get a few things done that needed doing before we became embroiled within the clammy talons of the Winter season.
Gypsy needed a tune up and I can usually just drive into the dealer to do so on a weekday, and that is exactly what I did. Apparently, she was up for larger maintenance package than the usual oil change this time around and so I hunkered down with my Nintendo DS for a couple of hours as William Shatner shared his tales of passing a kidney stone on the Regis and Kelly show. Surreal would be one way to put it.
Luckily, Gypsy only needed some minor work and though the whole deal costed more than planned, she certainly seemed in better spirits afterwards.
I then retired home to put up the window insulation around the house. Though it has remained sunny over the past few weeks, the temps crashed on Sunday. The window plastic is a pretty cheap way to squeeze out some extra efficiency from my heater.
I wrapped that project up in time to start waiting for the cable guy (not Larry, The). In my previous post, I had shared my disdain for the poor quality in which my telephone company had left my DSL service. Since I was going to be home anyway I managed to get an appointment for the tech person to come out on Monday between 3:00-6:00.
He showed up at 5:30. If he were to show up any later I would swear that he could limbo under any wire in front of him. I led him into the geek lair and pointed out the cable outlet. After a few minutes of snaking cable and plugging in the cable modem, we were still dead. Well, damn. And we were just talking about how he seems to get the problematic calls in the afternoon.
We did some scouting in the basement when it occurred to me to check the dish outside. As luck would have it, the thing did lead up into a spot in the stucco at about the right spot where the inside socket was located. The tech guy said that it wasn't a problem and snaked a line from the cable box down to that spot and spliced into it. Sort of jerry rig, sure, but it was a workable solution because we had the modem up and running shortly thereafter.
All in all, a productive day. It is a rewarding feeling, to be sure.