It was Columbus Day yesterday! Well, I had to work, and I bet you did too. I refused to put my flag out. I mean, maybe it would be different if we lived in the United States of Columbia, but we don't. Did you know that Columbus never actually set foot on any land that would eventually become America? It's true. So why do we celebrate Columbus Day? Beats me. I guess we just need a day off in October. "Celebrate" may be too strong a word, anyway. I mean, unless you work for the government, you probably didn't have the day off. And all those guvmint employees who were sitting at home today can thank Franklin Roosevelt. He started it.
Or unless you live in Nevada, where it is not a legal holiday. Or South Dakota, where it is celebrated as "Native American Day" though it is unclear why they would pick this date, as so many native Americans blame Columbus for, well, genocide (even though there are more Native Americans living today than ever before.) In Hawaii it's called "Discoverer's Day" and instead, they honor Captain James Cook, who put Hawaii on the map (literally). The fact that the Hawaiians didn't call it "Cook Day" is unfortunate for all sorts of untold humorous, culinary allusions. Incidentally, there is a movement afoot in Hawaii to follow suit with South Dakota and call the day "Indigenous Peoples Day" but it is at odds with another advocacy group who wants to have "Indigenous Peoples Week". Either way, I'm still not putting my flag up. Everyone knows the Vikings were here first.
Did you see that movie of Columbus that came out in 1992 to celebrate the 500th anniversary, 1492: Conquest of Paradise? I didn't. But I remember thinking at the time how funny it was that a historical drama about an Italian who works for the Spanish and Portuguese trying to find a way to China and India but instead made his way to Cuba and Mexico was played by a Frenchman in an American movie directed by an Englishman.
Columbus died thinking he had still set foot on some islands off the coast of Asia, even though no one he met there spoke Japanese. He had made four voyages to the New World, and during the fourth voyage the ship ran aground and he was stranded in Jamaica for a year. Nobody came to his aid, so he intimidated the natives into giving him and his crew provisions by successfully predicting a lunar eclipse. This is impressive because Columbus originally had underestimated the distance to China because he was reading his maps as using Italian miles, when in fact they were written using the much longer Arabic miles. Who knew?
Another thing: a big reason why the Europeans wanted a westward route to China and India? The Muslims. They had blocked trade routes when Constantinople fell to them in 1453, and the Ottomans had conquered Egypt thus blocking the Red Sea. I guess some things never change.
Columbus went crazy before he died, claiming to hear divine voices, wearing a Franciscan habit, and calling for a new crusade to take back Jerusalem. He thought that his discovery of the New World was part of God's plan in the Final Judgment and Armageddon, which it seems a lot of people still believe. Following Columbus' death, all the flesh was removed from his body in a ritual that Europeans of status often desired called "excarnation", and it's nasty, but it's supposed to preserve the bones. Anyway, his remains were removed from his original grave in Spain, and then moved back and forth across the Atlantic like four or five times. Everybody eventually lost track of them, as he ended up with a few grave sites in different countries, but last year they dug up the grave in the Dominican Republic and did some DNA tests and guess what? Some of the bones were his! And what is to be gained from all this? It's HISTORY, man! What's wrong with you?!
I'm still not putting my flag up. A few years later, another explorer named Amerigo Vespucci made it as far as the Amazon and wrote in his journals that this was not China and then a mapmaker, a German named Martin Waldseemüller, called the new continent "America" utilizing the feminine and latin forms of the explorer's name, as all the other continents were feminine forms. Evidently, this upset EVERYBODY, because Amerigo didn't discover anything, so Waldseemüller took America off the map and called it simply "Terra Incognita" ("Unknown Land") but it was too late. The maps had already gone to press and the name stuck. Only one copy of the original wall map that reads "America" survives, and it was purchased by the Library of Congress off of eBay in 2001. (Just kidding.) Alternate versions of these maps were originally intended to be cut up and glued on a wood ball, and only four of these globes are in existence -one of which resides in America at the University of Minnesota.
Minnesota, by the way, has an on-again off-again relationship with Columbus Day due to its many Native Americans and Viking descendants.
Monday, October 8, 2007
I'm not sure why we did it, really. You just get carried away at these things. I mean, they're EVERYWHERE! Oversized, seasonal squash as far as the eye can see. We were looking for maybe a forty pounder, but there weren't any. Bystanders were impressed that I was able to heft it into the wheelbarrow. Standing in line at the scale you wonder just why it is that you're doing this, but then you think, well, I've never got one that big before. So it's a first. And picking one is like picking out a Christmas tree, no two are the same, but, wait a minute, yes, they're all the same. In the end you just go with the one you're standing near when you've run out of reasons why not. It wasn't the biggest one, by the way, others were sold in the 200s, I believe. And we were nowhere near this one. So what did we do with it? Just dumped it front of the house for all in the neighborhood to gawk at. Believe me, next year's will be smaller.
The Week That Was
Friday, October 5, 2007
In keeping with the vehicle-slash-engine theme this week, here's a few more thoughts, both enginely and vehicularly...
There's this bad news. Seems we're losing the Space Race, or at least this heat. Huge bummer. I've always said that if there's anything the U.S. Government should be spending money on, it's spaceships. For now, let's send out a memo to the world: THAT'S OUR FLAG UP THERE, PEOPLE!
If we lose the space race, at least we're pulling ahead in the driverless vehicle race. I'm surprised the robots aren't just building themselves by now. Maybe they are. Maybe they're up there on the moon waiting for us. And what an odd headline. The AP makes it sound like the scientists have lost control completely.
Speaking of spaceships, I watched another episode of Firefly tonight, to raise the spirits. I'm kinda sad to see it go as I've only got one episode left and then the feature. It's real good TV. Lileks is a fan, if you didn't know. You can check out his reviews of this piece of good TV here and here buried in some old bleats of his. He's the one that really made me decide to buy the DVDs, so I have him to thank. I'm glad I'm not the only uber-nerd out there.
But tomorrow will be a long day in a distant land where there is no bathroom, no food, no radio transmission, and no people for miles. I'm working in "Rainbow" which is not at all unlike one of the outer planets in Firefly. Who knows, maybe it'll rain and I'll be forced to put it all off to next week, but this is Southern California. My kid doesn't know what rain is. She's never seen it. I tried to explain it to her today, but I just seemed a blathering fable-teller, full of big words, myths, and half-truths. A feeble, luckless fool who lost his way in life only to be found by her sweet smile.
I'm just another guy who, one gray day, turned aluminum into gold.
There's this bad news. Seems we're losing the Space Race, or at least this heat. Huge bummer. I've always said that if there's anything the U.S. Government should be spending money on, it's spaceships. For now, let's send out a memo to the world: THAT'S OUR FLAG UP THERE, PEOPLE!
If we lose the space race, at least we're pulling ahead in the driverless vehicle race. I'm surprised the robots aren't just building themselves by now. Maybe they are. Maybe they're up there on the moon waiting for us. And what an odd headline. The AP makes it sound like the scientists have lost control completely.
Speaking of spaceships, I watched another episode of Firefly tonight, to raise the spirits. I'm kinda sad to see it go as I've only got one episode left and then the feature. It's real good TV. Lileks is a fan, if you didn't know. You can check out his reviews of this piece of good TV here and here buried in some old bleats of his. He's the one that really made me decide to buy the DVDs, so I have him to thank. I'm glad I'm not the only uber-nerd out there.
But tomorrow will be a long day in a distant land where there is no bathroom, no food, no radio transmission, and no people for miles. I'm working in "Rainbow" which is not at all unlike one of the outer planets in Firefly. Who knows, maybe it'll rain and I'll be forced to put it all off to next week, but this is Southern California. My kid doesn't know what rain is. She's never seen it. I tried to explain it to her today, but I just seemed a blathering fable-teller, full of big words, myths, and half-truths. A feeble, luckless fool who lost his way in life only to be found by her sweet smile.
I'm just another guy who, one gray day, turned aluminum into gold.
The House Always Wins
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Let's scrutinize the bill:
(I've cropped out the boring stuff to make it easier on us all.)
At 11:55 AM on Tuesday we were quoted $116.95. That was for the oil change and engine diagnostic, which itself cost like $85. Forget for the moment that I can go down to Pep Boys and buy the Diagnostic Computer for $85 and hook it up myself and tell you what's wrong with the vehicle, but I know that you're going to fix it anyway, whatever it is, and you will not charge me for $85 for the half a minute it takes you to roll the little machine over and plug it in to the car. And these are not the droids you're looking for. (It never works for me, but it's worth a shot.)
At 1:42 PM they called us back and quoted a new estimate of $403.95. This is the new total cost that now includes removing the valve cover and peering at the valves to see what was wrong (as previously mentioned.) Fine. I'll suck it up. They said they'd call at the end of the day to let us know the real total of fixing the problem. Needless to say, they didn't.
The next morning, at precisely 8:23AM, I wondered aloud to Mrs. Ditchman if the "service" department were going to call us or just give up on us entirely. The phone rang at 8:24. Suspicious as it was, it was nowhere near the suspicion I had when they told me the new total: $671.45. I had braced myself for a bill over a thousand, and they must have sensed this because then they began to list a few other things that could be done while they were in there: Radiator Drain/Flush ($55), Throttle Housing Flush ($189.00), Brake Fluid Reservoir/Brake Line Flush ($200), new set of belts ($150). I decided to go with getting the new belts and the radiator flush because, well, the car's old, man! I just contented myself that we were getting the "15% Mature Toyota Discount" and the brakes are going to need to be replaced sometime soon, anyway, and this whole "Throttle Housing Flush" scam is really starting to bug me. Every time I take my truck in they tell me I need a "Throttle Housing Flush." They claim it's the quality of the gas we get nowadays, and if you clean out your throttle housing you will see an increase in performance and fuel economy. Guess what? I've had it done several times and to no noticeable effect. And it's not something you can just lift the hood to see if they've done -or to see if your housing is actually dirty- so it reeks of SCAM every time I hear it. When I decline they just make that "tsk"ing sound and shake their heads as if to say, You know, your #1 cylinder was misfiring and it was all because of this dirty throttle housing of yours. Yes, and it's very unfortunate that the gas they sell us nowadays is much dirtier than the stuff they used to sell us, back in the old days. Why, when I was a kid, gasoline was less than a dollar a gallon and it was so clean my parents used to gargle it for mouthwash! Can I get the Middle-Finger Discount with that?
Anyways, $671.45 was in the neighborhood of what I was expecting and it included a new set of eight Valve Adjusting Shims (whatever those are) and I was very careful not to show my hand, as I always complain about the cost at the dealer. Somehow, the conversation ended with, "We'll call you in two or three hours when it's ready for pick-up."
At 12:32 PM, 4 hours later, we called them. New total: $1,122.45. (Cough, cough, choke, eyebrows raise, sphincter cinches up) "What?"
"It needs a new radiator. Do you want a factory replacement or an after-market cheapy?"
There was never any talk about a new radiator. It didn't have a leak when we brought it in. A new factory radiator was like $1300, so guess what? We went with the cheapy. They had to send the car out to "Ronnie's Radiator" -which is probably where we should have began with all this- and who knows when it would come back. By this time, the family was yelling at each other, the kid (napless, having been dragged around in her car seat all afternoon) was crying, and everybody's schedule for the day was shot and the mother-in-law arrived with her good advice about credit lines and new car purchases, and well, I think the family all just gave up on each other.
We coughed up the cash, er, credit card. The service department took it upon themselves to replace the thermostat, water inlet gasket, and radiator cap sub-assembly for an extra $40. This had never been discussed, but I assume it was necessary for the never-discussed leaky radiator replacement. In the end, we got the car out of there before they found anything else wrong with it and before the credit limit was blown altogether. Mrs. Ditchman made it to the counter to pay the bill, but she noticed something amiss. "Yes, um, what about my 15% Mature Toyota Discount?"
"Oh, do you have a coupon?"
It still makes that flying saucer sound. Must be the brakes going out. Or my head is spinning off.
(I've cropped out the boring stuff to make it easier on us all.)
At 11:55 AM on Tuesday we were quoted $116.95. That was for the oil change and engine diagnostic, which itself cost like $85. Forget for the moment that I can go down to Pep Boys and buy the Diagnostic Computer for $85 and hook it up myself and tell you what's wrong with the vehicle, but I know that you're going to fix it anyway, whatever it is, and you will not charge me for $85 for the half a minute it takes you to roll the little machine over and plug it in to the car. And these are not the droids you're looking for. (It never works for me, but it's worth a shot.)
At 1:42 PM they called us back and quoted a new estimate of $403.95. This is the new total cost that now includes removing the valve cover and peering at the valves to see what was wrong (as previously mentioned.) Fine. I'll suck it up. They said they'd call at the end of the day to let us know the real total of fixing the problem. Needless to say, they didn't.
The next morning, at precisely 8:23AM, I wondered aloud to Mrs. Ditchman if the "service" department were going to call us or just give up on us entirely. The phone rang at 8:24. Suspicious as it was, it was nowhere near the suspicion I had when they told me the new total: $671.45. I had braced myself for a bill over a thousand, and they must have sensed this because then they began to list a few other things that could be done while they were in there: Radiator Drain/Flush ($55), Throttle Housing Flush ($189.00), Brake Fluid Reservoir/Brake Line Flush ($200), new set of belts ($150). I decided to go with getting the new belts and the radiator flush because, well, the car's old, man! I just contented myself that we were getting the "15% Mature Toyota Discount" and the brakes are going to need to be replaced sometime soon, anyway, and this whole "Throttle Housing Flush" scam is really starting to bug me. Every time I take my truck in they tell me I need a "Throttle Housing Flush." They claim it's the quality of the gas we get nowadays, and if you clean out your throttle housing you will see an increase in performance and fuel economy. Guess what? I've had it done several times and to no noticeable effect. And it's not something you can just lift the hood to see if they've done -or to see if your housing is actually dirty- so it reeks of SCAM every time I hear it. When I decline they just make that "tsk"ing sound and shake their heads as if to say, You know, your #1 cylinder was misfiring and it was all because of this dirty throttle housing of yours. Yes, and it's very unfortunate that the gas they sell us nowadays is much dirtier than the stuff they used to sell us, back in the old days. Why, when I was a kid, gasoline was less than a dollar a gallon and it was so clean my parents used to gargle it for mouthwash! Can I get the Middle-Finger Discount with that?
Anyways, $671.45 was in the neighborhood of what I was expecting and it included a new set of eight Valve Adjusting Shims (whatever those are) and I was very careful not to show my hand, as I always complain about the cost at the dealer. Somehow, the conversation ended with, "We'll call you in two or three hours when it's ready for pick-up."
At 12:32 PM, 4 hours later, we called them. New total: $1,122.45. (Cough, cough, choke, eyebrows raise, sphincter cinches up) "What?"
"It needs a new radiator. Do you want a factory replacement or an after-market cheapy?"
There was never any talk about a new radiator. It didn't have a leak when we brought it in. A new factory radiator was like $1300, so guess what? We went with the cheapy. They had to send the car out to "Ronnie's Radiator" -which is probably where we should have began with all this- and who knows when it would come back. By this time, the family was yelling at each other, the kid (napless, having been dragged around in her car seat all afternoon) was crying, and everybody's schedule for the day was shot and the mother-in-law arrived with her good advice about credit lines and new car purchases, and well, I think the family all just gave up on each other.
We coughed up the cash, er, credit card. The service department took it upon themselves to replace the thermostat, water inlet gasket, and radiator cap sub-assembly for an extra $40. This had never been discussed, but I assume it was necessary for the never-discussed leaky radiator replacement. In the end, we got the car out of there before they found anything else wrong with it and before the credit limit was blown altogether. Mrs. Ditchman made it to the counter to pay the bill, but she noticed something amiss. "Yes, um, what about my 15% Mature Toyota Discount?"
"Oh, do you have a coupon?"
It still makes that flying saucer sound. Must be the brakes going out. Or my head is spinning off.
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Had to take the 4Runner in.
She's a good car, she is, but she just hasn't been right lately. No power. Blinking 'Check Engine' light. I can tell it's my wife coming up the street just by the flying saucer sounds the vehicle makes. And the paint's peeling back and little plastic pieces are raining off it, littering up the neighborhood. But it is nearly ten years old, and it's been from Mexico to Canada and back again. And one time it had a bear in it.
As is our fashion, we took it to the Toyota Dealer to get it fixed. I'm not sure why we do this. Something about the term "dealer" just doesn't sit right, you know? (The House always wins/Guy in the alley selling kids crack, etc.) It doesn't sound particularly trustworthy. But then something inside of you says, Toyota makes the things, they should know how to fix them good and proper! But at 230,000 miles, do honest-to-goodness Toyota parts really matter anymore? We should've just taken it to the cheapest and quickest guy on the closest streetcorner. But then, those guys don't give the car a wash when they're done with it, and you're usually pulling strange tools and rags out of the engine compartment when you get home and look under the hood to see if you can figure out what you just dropped another thousand on.
Also, when you take it to the dealer you get to walk across the lot and see all the nice new Toyotas that you know immediately that you can't afford, and then Mr. Allsmiles comes out, puts one hand gently on your shoulder, and convinces you that, no, hey, sure you can handle the payments! Your credit is marvelous! What a beautiful child!
We didn't buy a new car. Yet. The service department never called us back at the end of the day, actually. Oh sure, we got the first call where they let you know that they changed the oil and ran the diagnostic check ($130 so far) and then said that they need to pull the valve cover and check the valves because the computer showed that it's misfiring on the #1 cylinder and they'll have to replace the valve cover gasket when they do that (another $250) and then they'll be able to really get to the bottom of things and find the problem and we'll get back to you by the end of the day with the bottom line (could be untold thousands).
And they never called. I picture them standing around the car in their monogramed Toyota button-ups, smoking Winstons and putting back jelly doughnuts, trading diagnostic dilemmas a la House. But the dark, paranoid, conspiracy nut inside of me is convinced the salesman who approached us was texting the service department while he was walking us around a new Sequoia: HLD OFF. ALMST GOT BIG $ALE. EZ MARK.
What burns me is that I've been staring at eight valves on the Chevy 454 in the back of my boat all summer and I could pull a valve cover off and change the gasket with one hand tied behind my back and a live chicken in my mouth and they're gonna charge me two-hundred-and-fifty dollars for this?! Tell you what, stand over there and have another bear claw, I'll pull the cover off and you lean in and let me know what you see and I'll make sure the boss pats you on the back for it. By the way the old gasket's fine, it's made of rubber, not paper, and it'll last forever.
But I don't. The family car's gotta be fixed and I don't have time to waste. That Sequoia was looking awfully nice, though. Nice and big. Could pull the boat as good as any Tundra all the way to the Great Lakes. But that's just what the Ditchman family needs right now, a second car payment. Well, maybe next year.
Or maybe next week, if this 4Runner is on its way to the great Pick-A-Part yard in the sky. Guess we'll find out later.
It Was A Zoo.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Since I spent the better part of our first autumnal weekend working on the landscaping (boat), Monday was declared FAMILY DAY by Mrs. Ditchman, and one could tell by the twitchy look in her eye that it was a concept not to be debated nor voted upon. So we went to the zoo!
The midget who lives with us has a special affinity for animals and when we explained the concept of "zoo" to her she just started to glow, which was neat. She has a goodly number of animal books from which she can name all the animals and do all the sounds they make. I find it especially entertaining, as I take Mrs. Ditchman's animal sounds lesson one step further and make up sounds for creatures like The Musk Ox, The Golden Eagle, The American Beaver, and so forth. Imagine my delight when we were in the grocery store recently and the kid pointed up at an inflatable dolphin and squealed at full volume: "EEEEEEEEEEEE! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Awesome.
So yesterday was Founder's Day at the San Diego Zoo, or something, which meant that it was free admission. Bells go off in our heads when we hear the words "free admission" and there is a certain Pavlovian response that motivates us to take full advantage. Unfortunately, this Pavlovian response was clearly echoed in nearly half of Southern California yesterday. We got within a couple miles of the zoo and it was bumper to bumper traffic, and upon reaching the parking lot, we found it was also LOT FULL day at the zoo. I was ready to quit right there and go to Ikea or something, but when your little angel is chanting "ZOO ZOO ZOO ZOO" from the back seat, well, there's just no turning back.
It was a zoo, all right. Evidently it was also "Spanish-Speaking Day" at the zoo, as it seemed that most of the population of Baja California had made their way across the border for Founder's Day. I had large designs to shoot an over-the-top cutesy video of the kid saying the animal names and sounds while we were at the zoo, pointing out all of God's creatures. Unfortunately, upon sight of all of God's other creatures, I just lost the ambition. Seriously, there were heads and strollers as far as the eye could see. And people were LOUD everywhere we went. At one cage, a very large man in a Superman shirt was YELLING FULL VOLUME at the animals trying to get them to move. "PUT ON A SHOW! COME ON!" And he accompanied that with an ear-piercing, full-fingered whistle that caused everyone within a fifty-foot radius to shake (except the animals.) I suppose he thought he was being funny, but that would be giving him the benefit of the doubt, which he no doubt did not deserve.
Which leads me to another gripe about the zoo: was this, like, "Animal Maintenance Day"? It seemed that over half the cages were empty, if not desolate. Were they out being washed? A sign in front listed some of the animals that couldn't be viewed yesterday and among them was "Giraffes." Seriously, now. Where are they gonna take the giraffes where you can't at least see their heads?
And if they weren't missing from the cages, they were sleeping -which is like watching an Andy Warhol film. I noted that all the animals looked distinctly depressed, which garnered a nice eye-roll from the wife. "How can you tell?" she asked. I just said that I watched Discovery and Animal Planet all the time, "Those animals don't look depressed." (Except when they get eaten, of course.)
The kid liked it all anyway, I think, and when she first saw the orangutan she just lit up and repeated "Nana-tan, Nana-tan" for an hour and that was worth the price of admission. She also liked the hippo -or maybe it was the rhino- she kept saying "eye-no eye-no eye-no", but after a while the eighteen-month-old just wanted to swing on the railing and stare at other kids and stuff. I personally thought the highlight of the day was the Swamp Monkeys, which I'd never heard of before. It was the highlight because, well, just the idea of "swamp monkeys" sounded amusing to me.
Also it was hot, and it cost $3.99 for a coke, but I expected that misery. That's the thing about "misery" altogether: if you can see it coming, you can brace yourself appropriately, which is what made the busiest day of the year at the zoo so difficult to begin with. The day was finished off with a sufficient amount of beer to wipe the slate clean, at Gordon Biersch with the people over at The Dawg Run, and then a bit of time with my wife and the pooftas at Dancing With The Stars, and the day ended wonderfully, without having to blog as the internet was down. (It's been happening quite often lately, and it's really cutting into my routine.)
Upon reflection, the day would have been Near Perfect if I had only read this site ahead of time, which states clearly in the final paragraph:
The midget who lives with us has a special affinity for animals and when we explained the concept of "zoo" to her she just started to glow, which was neat. She has a goodly number of animal books from which she can name all the animals and do all the sounds they make. I find it especially entertaining, as I take Mrs. Ditchman's animal sounds lesson one step further and make up sounds for creatures like The Musk Ox, The Golden Eagle, The American Beaver, and so forth. Imagine my delight when we were in the grocery store recently and the kid pointed up at an inflatable dolphin and squealed at full volume: "EEEEEEEEEEEE! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Awesome.
So yesterday was Founder's Day at the San Diego Zoo, or something, which meant that it was free admission. Bells go off in our heads when we hear the words "free admission" and there is a certain Pavlovian response that motivates us to take full advantage. Unfortunately, this Pavlovian response was clearly echoed in nearly half of Southern California yesterday. We got within a couple miles of the zoo and it was bumper to bumper traffic, and upon reaching the parking lot, we found it was also LOT FULL day at the zoo. I was ready to quit right there and go to Ikea or something, but when your little angel is chanting "ZOO ZOO ZOO ZOO" from the back seat, well, there's just no turning back.
It was a zoo, all right. Evidently it was also "Spanish-Speaking Day" at the zoo, as it seemed that most of the population of Baja California had made their way across the border for Founder's Day. I had large designs to shoot an over-the-top cutesy video of the kid saying the animal names and sounds while we were at the zoo, pointing out all of God's creatures. Unfortunately, upon sight of all of God's other creatures, I just lost the ambition. Seriously, there were heads and strollers as far as the eye could see. And people were LOUD everywhere we went. At one cage, a very large man in a Superman shirt was YELLING FULL VOLUME at the animals trying to get them to move. "PUT ON A SHOW! COME ON!" And he accompanied that with an ear-piercing, full-fingered whistle that caused everyone within a fifty-foot radius to shake (except the animals.) I suppose he thought he was being funny, but that would be giving him the benefit of the doubt, which he no doubt did not deserve.
Which leads me to another gripe about the zoo: was this, like, "Animal Maintenance Day"? It seemed that over half the cages were empty, if not desolate. Were they out being washed? A sign in front listed some of the animals that couldn't be viewed yesterday and among them was "Giraffes." Seriously, now. Where are they gonna take the giraffes where you can't at least see their heads?
And if they weren't missing from the cages, they were sleeping -which is like watching an Andy Warhol film. I noted that all the animals looked distinctly depressed, which garnered a nice eye-roll from the wife. "How can you tell?" she asked. I just said that I watched Discovery and Animal Planet all the time, "Those animals don't look depressed." (Except when they get eaten, of course.)
The kid liked it all anyway, I think, and when she first saw the orangutan she just lit up and repeated "Nana-tan, Nana-tan" for an hour and that was worth the price of admission. She also liked the hippo -or maybe it was the rhino- she kept saying "eye-no eye-no eye-no", but after a while the eighteen-month-old just wanted to swing on the railing and stare at other kids and stuff. I personally thought the highlight of the day was the Swamp Monkeys, which I'd never heard of before. It was the highlight because, well, just the idea of "swamp monkeys" sounded amusing to me.
Also it was hot, and it cost $3.99 for a coke, but I expected that misery. That's the thing about "misery" altogether: if you can see it coming, you can brace yourself appropriately, which is what made the busiest day of the year at the zoo so difficult to begin with. The day was finished off with a sufficient amount of beer to wipe the slate clean, at Gordon Biersch with the people over at The Dawg Run, and then a bit of time with my wife and the pooftas at Dancing With The Stars, and the day ended wonderfully, without having to blog as the internet was down. (It's been happening quite often lately, and it's really cutting into my routine.)
Upon reflection, the day would have been Near Perfect if I had only read this site ahead of time, which states clearly in the final paragraph:
Avoid visiting during Founder's Day celebrations in October. True, admission fees are waived for kids, but the typical zoo crowd of 20,000 can easily swell past 50,000, making for a most unpleasant visit.No exaggeration there.
Monday, October 1, 2007
Much to the chagrin of my wife, I spent the better part of the weekend landscaping the front yard. Okay, I was working on the boat. But it is among the top five Eyesores of Eastview Court, so if it could be cleaned up just a little, my world would be prettier. Of course, there's no use washing and waxing that thing unless it works.
And guess what? It works! Raise your hand if you've heard me say this before... okay, all of you smart-asses put your hands down. No, really -I fixed it! Well, I think I fixed it. I haven't taken it out on the water yet. And by "fixed" I mean "repaired to functionality", not "immobile, stuck in one place."
I've had the thing in parts and strewn about the garage for months (years) now and I think what finally made me tackle the task was that I needed to clean the garage once and for all. But it's been a challenge, as it seems that every time I piece that boat together and take it out on a test run, I just break another pushrod or overheat the engine from a bad impeller or whathaveyou. But I think I've got it this time. I really do.
The reason for my confidence is that I've been using my new tool: the Compression Gauge. This allows me to test the compression in the cylinders after I fire it up, instead of taking it out on the ocean and blowing a pushrod there in the helpless nowhere. Anyway, The Gauge tells me I now have full compression in all of the cylinders, so yahoo! Of course, that's when everything started to overheat, so there was a certain amount of web searching and part replacement in which I had to engage.
So I've been piecing it together for a few months now. All summer, really. And since the annual insurance bill on the thing came due and we didn't use it but thrice last year, and none this year, Mrs. Ditchman asked me (albeit sarcastically) if we should pony up the cash for next year. Since no one had done us all a favor and stolen it out of my driveway, (I long ago stopped putting the padlock on the trailer) I figured I'd give it another shot.
I consider the internal combustion engine to be one of the modern marvels -so efficient, so compact, and so simple. It really is. It's a beautiful system, and once you get the gist of how it works, there's nothing to it. As well, it gave a lot of unathletic nerds a chance to be men in the past century, as, if you can fix a car, you're in. Unfortunately nowadays, all cars are electronic and computer-controlled, so the nerds are back, and the men have moved on to something else.
The powerboat is just a floating box with a combustion engine in it, and then a drive shaft and a propeller hanging on the back. Fairly simple, really. All you need to do is keep the boat from sinking and the engine running and you have success (!) which I have encountered to varying degrees in my lifetime.
My Dad loved boating and he was pretty good with engines, and in those things we are alike. I remember when I was about ten and we were standing in the garage, looking under the hood of his '56 Austin Healey when he asked me, "Do you know how an engine works?" I shook my head and he explained it to me. It took him about a minute.
As simple of a concept as it is, there are, unfortunately, a few hundred greased and moving parts that all have to work in near-perfect synchronicity in order to contain the endless and rapid succession of explosions created by the oxygen, electricity, and gasoline. It's just a couple of those moving parts that have vexed me for so long, and that one-minute lecture on mechanics my Dad gave me twenty-five years ago was insufficient.
So after a certain amount of reverse-engineering, book-learning, and self-reflection, I think I've zeroed in on the problem, and I'll not bore you with the specifics, but this old boat is nearly twenty years old itself, now, and I've scraped away enough rust in that engine compartment to find that there's no part where a part was supposed to be in some cases. Float a steel engine out in the middle of the water and sooner or later you're scraping rust off it. I think I've replaced just about every part on that engine, and scraped and re-painted every other.
Why do I do it, you ask? Not sure. On some level, it's just what men do. The garage is the cave, which is where men go when the vexing problem of women is insurmountable, and the set of problems that automotive repair presents are the ones that men are capable of solving. Women want to discuss. Men want to solve. The engine either works or it doesn't, no discussion necessary. Men want to be left alone and in charge of their own destiny, and this is why they go out to sea.
And guess what? It works! Raise your hand if you've heard me say this before... okay, all of you smart-asses put your hands down. No, really -I fixed it! Well, I think I fixed it. I haven't taken it out on the water yet. And by "fixed" I mean "repaired to functionality", not "immobile, stuck in one place."
I've had the thing in parts and strewn about the garage for months (years) now and I think what finally made me tackle the task was that I needed to clean the garage once and for all. But it's been a challenge, as it seems that every time I piece that boat together and take it out on a test run, I just break another pushrod or overheat the engine from a bad impeller or whathaveyou. But I think I've got it this time. I really do.
The reason for my confidence is that I've been using my new tool: the Compression Gauge. This allows me to test the compression in the cylinders after I fire it up, instead of taking it out on the ocean and blowing a pushrod there in the helpless nowhere. Anyway, The Gauge tells me I now have full compression in all of the cylinders, so yahoo! Of course, that's when everything started to overheat, so there was a certain amount of web searching and part replacement in which I had to engage.
So I've been piecing it together for a few months now. All summer, really. And since the annual insurance bill on the thing came due and we didn't use it but thrice last year, and none this year, Mrs. Ditchman asked me (albeit sarcastically) if we should pony up the cash for next year. Since no one had done us all a favor and stolen it out of my driveway, (I long ago stopped putting the padlock on the trailer) I figured I'd give it another shot.
I consider the internal combustion engine to be one of the modern marvels -so efficient, so compact, and so simple. It really is. It's a beautiful system, and once you get the gist of how it works, there's nothing to it. As well, it gave a lot of unathletic nerds a chance to be men in the past century, as, if you can fix a car, you're in. Unfortunately nowadays, all cars are electronic and computer-controlled, so the nerds are back, and the men have moved on to something else.
The powerboat is just a floating box with a combustion engine in it, and then a drive shaft and a propeller hanging on the back. Fairly simple, really. All you need to do is keep the boat from sinking and the engine running and you have success (!) which I have encountered to varying degrees in my lifetime.
My Dad loved boating and he was pretty good with engines, and in those things we are alike. I remember when I was about ten and we were standing in the garage, looking under the hood of his '56 Austin Healey when he asked me, "Do you know how an engine works?" I shook my head and he explained it to me. It took him about a minute.
As simple of a concept as it is, there are, unfortunately, a few hundred greased and moving parts that all have to work in near-perfect synchronicity in order to contain the endless and rapid succession of explosions created by the oxygen, electricity, and gasoline. It's just a couple of those moving parts that have vexed me for so long, and that one-minute lecture on mechanics my Dad gave me twenty-five years ago was insufficient.
So after a certain amount of reverse-engineering, book-learning, and self-reflection, I think I've zeroed in on the problem, and I'll not bore you with the specifics, but this old boat is nearly twenty years old itself, now, and I've scraped away enough rust in that engine compartment to find that there's no part where a part was supposed to be in some cases. Float a steel engine out in the middle of the water and sooner or later you're scraping rust off it. I think I've replaced just about every part on that engine, and scraped and re-painted every other.
Why do I do it, you ask? Not sure. On some level, it's just what men do. The garage is the cave, which is where men go when the vexing problem of women is insurmountable, and the set of problems that automotive repair presents are the ones that men are capable of solving. Women want to discuss. Men want to solve. The engine either works or it doesn't, no discussion necessary. Men want to be left alone and in charge of their own destiny, and this is why they go out to sea.
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