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Two months into our new house, amid the Drought of 1988 (redux). What’s gone wrong: Mold. Pervasive mold on every floor, especially in the basement. At the moment, my wife refuses to go down there for any length of time. HVAC. Turns out the mold on the top floor was caused by the 23-year-old HVAC unit that was listed as ‘7 years old’ on the disclosure form. In reality, the AC coil was leaking, and the drip pan was rusted out, so whenever it ran, it ran moisture down into the drywall in my girls’ room. New HVAC system installed upstairs, on credit. #facepalm TV reception. Despite my current efforts (the booster we had on our old house) the Jerry-rigged (asshole was named ‘Jerry’) coax from the attic VHF/UHF antenna won’t pull in our local PBS affiliate after 8am. Dishwasher leaks on the lower left front corner. Plumbing fun: Slow drain in the downstairs bath, indifferent water pressure (cold or hot) in downstairs bath, leaky trap O-ring under the kitchen sink. Our garage door spring snapped ~2 weeks in, cost ~$400 to fix. Still yet, the house is utterly solid, and build to a “they don’t build them like this anymore” level that has Whitney and myself thrilled. The hardwood in the foyer, stairs, and Den is holding up great, and the garage has plenty of possibilities. ...

As of June 23rd last year, I was “promoted” to the title of Architect within my organization, reporting directly to a Third line manager. I was taken off of regular, day-to-day delivery activities and basically given freedom to involve myself wherever I thought best, or wherever my boss needed me. At the time, I was given the following commentary and advice: “Welcome to being the bitch.” “So, are they going to let you code anymore?” “You’re going to have to get used to being very broad, and very shallow. You have to know alot and have a high-level understanding of almost everything, but not get mired in the day-to-day.” “You’re more of an advisor than an architect. Your job is to advise those making decisions and help do technical mediation for those teams.” Those quotes came from the first week. At some time or another in the past year, they’ve all been true. ...

Ah yes, John Carter, aka “John Carter of Mars,” aka “A Princess of Mars.” You single handedly assured that Andrew Stanton of Pixar will never, ever be granted final cut again. You lost something like a quarter of a billion dollars for your parent company, Disney. You know I’ve seen many bad films in my life (current nadir being “Tristan and Isolde”), and John Carter isn’t one of them. It isn’t a great film. Comparison to other alien epics like Cameron’s Avatar inevitably come, and Carter does poorly. We don’t truly care about our hero until well into the second act. Worse, the framework of the story–that John Carter has died suddenly on earth and his nephew Edgar Rice Burroughs (get it?) is reading his fantastic account of his Barsoon Exploits–just feels like faux epic claptrap right up to the end. ...

So, we moved. We sold our old house on the east side of Georgetown, KY and moved to a house on the west side. I’m currently so tired and overwrought I can’t even remember if one capitalizes ’east’ in a sentence. I think you do, but capital letters just hurt my eyes right now. We couldn’t have done it without lots of help from folks at church, especially folks from our small group. We got T’s Chevy Colorado truck (2.8L 4-cylinder, AT for those scoring at home) for almost a week, and schlepped stuff to T’s garage, B&D’s basement, our storage building, my office at work, and a Mobile Attic. Most of the stuff (at least the things not in the mobile attic, actually got moved *twice*. ...

So, Buzz Out Loud ended this past week, which sucks considering I only discovered it last month when I started using Doggcatcher as my go-to podcast reader (I’m aware of the term ‘podcatcher’ and its symmetry with ‘podcaster,’ I just think it’s a terrible word.) So, I had to go in and remove BoL from my subscription list. While I was in there, I the following subscriptions for the following reasons: Mintcast – This is actually a really good Linux podcast; they do news around new Linux distros, the latest in the Gnome/Cinnamon schism from the Linux Mint team, and general sys-admin-y stuff. Nothing wrong with the cast itself, other than it’s middle age sys-admin guys talking about linux Linux Outlaws – This one hurt. I’ve listened to Linux Outlaws for almost a year now–started right after I got my Atrix. The issue I have is the main creative force behind the show–Fabian Scherchel–has moved on. He’s acting like he hasn’t, but he’s really been phoning-in the podcasts lately. His co-host, Dan Lynch, is the ever-present straight-man and I still subscribe to his RatholeRadio podcast, but LO is don’t for me. NPR Culturtopia – Once I discovered that Pop Culture Happy Hour had its own podcast link, random stories from Netta Ulabe (sp?) became superfluous. PCHH is my favorite podcast–bar none–and it’s a welcome change from my normal diet of tech, tech, programming, nerd, tech stuff. Current subscriptions remaining: ...

I was sick all weekend (hayfever). Hot/cold, freeze/pollen, dust/grass…thankfully, none of it’s made it to my lungs. Yet. Grace was sick all weekend (Hand/Foot/Mouth). Hasn’t eaten normally since middle of last week. Nobody slept well. I didn’t get to go to church, as I stayed home with Grace. A bright spot was we had a new couple from our church over to the house to have Easter dinner, Tyler and Kayla Williams. Really enjoyed their company, their sunny disposition. Whitney and I are SO FILLED WITH HOPE. :-)

“Why do you like Europe?” In our house, we do lots of “apropos of nothing” discussion. One minute, you’re talking soccer, the next you’re analyzing the selfishness of the Baby Boom generation. Last night’s verbal ejaculation came in the middle of another dull, overwrought Shonda Rhimes pilot, Scandal--or as I like to call it “Scrawny balloon-lipped gal who flounces through every scene.” Anywho….“What, you mean like to live there or to visit?” I replied. ...

I typically abhor facebook. It’s banal. It’s boring. And, 20% of the world’s population is on there, so–like a bad High School Reunion–you sorta have to be there too. This thread I’m about to copy/pasta reshare single-handedly changed my perception of FB: Status: On cruise shuttle. Entering radio silence. I hope the world can survive without my exciting posts for a few days…. Okay okay, a little self-important, but hey, this is the Twitter/Facebook generation where every meal and waste elimination is comment worthy. But then….in the comment stream: ...

In working on my small group lesson this week, I’m stuck again in James 1, and there’s this verse (26) Ifanyonethinks himself to be religious, and yet does not [bb](http://www.biblestudytools.com/nas/james/1.html#fn-descriptionAnchor-bb “Or “control”")bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, thisman’sreligion is worthless. You could pretty much summarize my last 5 or 6 years right there. I’ve deceived myself time and again, focusing on what was easy, felt good. I can rationalize anything, it seems. ...

When I was born, my head was almost too big to fit through the birth canal. That explains much about me to this day. Just sayin'.

You know how you go out looking for the right car, with a checklist and a list of requirements? I’ve been doing that for the better part of two years. I’ve driven every small car known to man at intervals, trying to find some reasonable personal transportation when the Camry of Doom goes kaput. What I’m *really* looking to do is duplicate the love I had for the 1998 Impreza 2.5RS, a car with All-Wheel Drive, a sweet 5-speed manual transmission and the turn-in responses of a B13 Sentra SE-R. I still remember the test drive I took at the now-defunct Oldhan’s Subaru in Nicholasville Kentucky back in college, and whoo boy, was it FUN. Pity I had no job at the time. :-) ...

It’s been a rough few weeks, almost entirely self-inflicted. As the Eastern KY saying goes: “Work is aggravating me to death.” Nothing about what I’m doing is hard; tedious and frustrating, sure, but not difficult. Basically, I fight whatever fires appear, and 90% of the time these are communications issues between teams, not technical problems. Corporations tend to self-select for people who can hide within bureaucracy, stifle their own opinions, and dumbly line-up behind meaningless mandates. That’s wearisome, to say the least. ...

The listing Yes, there’s Kitchen-Aid porn in that picture. Jealous?

Nothing like a deadline, I guess. So, we’ve known we needed photographs of our house up on various MLS/Zillow.com sites, and our realtor scheduled a photographer for today. Today?! Yeah, lots of work had/has to be done. We were up last night until after 1am, and back at it again this morning ~7am. I had a Diet Mountain Dew influenced crisis of confidence at 11pm, but…uh…pushed through it. I stuck my head in our oven. ...

So, my home sweet home is on the market. It’s been a long road getting here. Whitney’s been feeling the tug to get out of the house since before the housing crash (!), and she’s been a steady force there throughout financial crises. Anyway, so it’s up. We’re supposed to be hosting a photographer Thursday, so it’s been continuous clean/declutter/reclutter/clean/declutter since New Year’s. I’ll give Whitney all the credit–she’s got the place looking great, especially the paint, staging, and her attention to detail. ...

Prove: Authoritarian Decision-making is myopic Assume: You work in a engineering-centric corporation with attendant corporate hierarchy. Engineers believe no one is as intelligent as an engineer. (Dilbert’s Razor) Engineers view non-quantifiable job skills as unimportant (Scientific Postulate) Engineers age and seek more salary, responsibility (That’s life) Engineers become managers (by 3) Engineers often communicate poorly (self-evident) Persuasiveness is not quantifiable (self-evident) Charsima is not quantifiable (self-evident) Persuasiveness and Charisma are unimportant (by 2, 6, 7) New idea implementation requires persuasion (The “He who has the Gold makes the rules’ axiom) Engineer managers must persuade to promote new ideas (by 4, 9) Engineer managers will be told ‘No’ (by 5, 10) There’s no point in resubmitting the idea; all pertinent facts were included, by definition. We were told ‘No’ (by 2, 8, 11). Those in power will only see an idea once, no matter change in market conditions (by 12). Those in power will not be given a chance to change their mind (by 8, 13) THEREFORE: Authoritarian decision making in an engineering-centric corporation is myopic. (13,14). QED * * * ...

I can’t be honest. Not anymore…not since 2008, basically. My honest, analytical opinion would hurt too many feelings and likely get me fired, or sued, or jailed. Suffice it to say, there are things I’d like to get off my chest and express that I just can’t. That’s hard, because my blog has always been the place where I did that, consequences be damned. Well, these days, “consequences” includes four other people. ...

Perhaps I came out of the womb worrying. Pehaps it’s learned behavior. Luke 12:25 says: 5 And which of you by worrying can add a single [a](C)hour to his [b]life’s span?26 If then you cannot do even a very little thing, why do you worry about other matters? What does this have to do with 2011, anyway? I worried alot this year. I worried about myself, my wife, my kids, my parents, my job, my church obligations. And, frankly, I freaked-out. Often. So often, that yesterday and today, I talked myself through “this is usually the part where I freak out,” because the triggers were all there. Self-awareness is all that I have sometimes whenever I see fear, rage, selfishness, hate, guilt, jealousy, betrayal, disappointment, anger, etc. building. I finally can see it coming and I believe I can choose something different. ...

Some things are stories. Some things are not. There are facts I remember about my idiosynracies and ticks, and those of my fellow humans that just don’t go anywhere. They’re kinda just…there. These are those: I once roomed with a guy D.E.F. D had this curious Pavlovian response to riding in a car for any length of time > 2 minutes. He’d go to sleep. My other roomie once took him on a road trip from Georgetown, Kentucky, to Jackson, TN. D slept the entire way there and the entire way back. I hate the blue ring optometrists use for glaucoma checks. Basically it goes like this: They dilate your eyes, you can’t open them for love or money, and then you need to open like a droog from Clockwork Orange so the optometrist can move this DEATH MACHINE towards your eyeball. Really, it looks like a scene out of a Bond Movie, complete with bad dialog. Only here the thing–it’s not Sean Connery’s penis they’re going to ginsu, it’s YOUR EYEBALL. Usually, this procedure takes like 2 minutes at the end of the exam. Poor Dr. Jones in Jackson, Ky used to devote 20 minutes to this and we both dreaded it. Supposedly, there’s a puff-of-air thing they can do to check for glaucoma. I believe this is a lie perpetrated by optometrists, cruelly giving false hope there will be no more BLUE RING DEATH MACHINE. Once something reaches a certain level of messiness, I mentally refuse to deal with it. I focus my attention somewhere else, like a pair of shiny keys or maybe the weather outside. This drives my wife nuts, part 1. When I’m upset, I fold things. I’ve compulsively folded an entire load of towels without realizing it. When I’m REALLY upset, I clean things. I once reorganized my DVD collection at 2am while listening to PCHH I have an extreme fear/fascination thing with knives. Once when I was 2 or 3, I got my dad’s jacknife out and cut my fingertip to ribbons. Whenever I see my kids near one, I’m sure the same thing will happen to them. Yet, I like knives very much–my father and I used to bond over them every Christmas–and my cherished birthday present this year from my wife was a Ken Onion Chive by Kershaw. Segue: I used my pocket knife in lieu of scissors when wrapping all my gifts this year. Yes, I’m unaccountably proud of this. I seemingly can’t do household chores without music or a podcast playing. This drives my wife nuts, part 2. I have a mental block about the following things: Housepainting, Barbecue Grilling, Drum Brakes, carburetors, general carpentry, automatic transmissions, audio/visual equipment, HVAC operation & repair. I’m sure I could think of others. People with explosive tempers and feelings of paranoia oughtn’t own firearms. I do not own firearms. Tempur-pedic isn’t all hype. Try one for yourself. As I get older, I find increasingly fewer things offer any escape. Video games, meh. Kids…sometimes. Joey’s gone this week, and I miss him pretty badly. My phone is like a security blanket. Seriously can’t believe how fast I got here from May ’til now. This drives my wife nuts, part 3. I basically couldn’t care less what I wear, provided it’s decent and has < 2 holes in it. #tdmwn

When I was about 5 years old, my mom decided to drop me off with my aunt at her office while she did business in town. As my aunt worked in the District 10 Department of Highways in Jackson, Kentucky, her job was utterly regular and somewhat dull unless something extraordinary happened–>lots of overtime, somebody got fired, that sort of thing. View Larger Map As it was the middle of summer, nothing like that happened. Anyway, my mom rented a VHS video of Pound Puppies and dropped me off. My Aunt took me to the big conference room in the middle of the cinder-block building and plopped me in front of the television, daring me to move. ...