A man without fire

Or, well, at least a working furnace. First I installed the nest in the summer and it worked great. Now as things are getting colder I simply told it to heat the house. Nothing. It didn't work. I checked the logs and apparently the heating wires don't have any power. So, I pull out a volt meter that I barely know how to use, and with some sleuthing figure out that a little black box in the furnace is converting the 24V of power down to 3V, which isn't enough to run the nest. No idea why it steps it down. So in order to make things comfortable, I hook up the old thermostat and check that the heat comes on. No worries.

Then this morning it's cool in the house. I can't get the heat to turn on. I don't understand why. I feel like a failure. I can't get a wire to tell a box to make a flame. I don't pretend to be a handy man, but shouldn't I be able to fix it? I can't. It's pissing me off. Why can't I fork myself, become an expert in all professions needed around the house: mechanic, bike mechanic, world class cook, plumber, electrician, carpenter?

*sigh*

Time to read a poem that I got the other day.

Has a nice ring to it

Today could have gone better. Dad had surgery and it took close to twice what it should have - because there was a goof. Not a small goof either. Pretty scary when thinking about it.

While I waited most of the day with my mom and brother at the hospital with nothing much to do other than wait, I kept on trying to spin my wedding ring. Nervous habit, or perhaps comforting habit it's hard to tell. But today I had forgotten to put my rings on. I wasn't exactly doing my normal routine. But I missed my wedding ring so much. A lot of the time I don't wear my ring when traveling and it doesn't really bother me too much - I think that it's because I'm with Laura. Having it on reminds me of her, of us, and being close. It's nice.

*sigh* Like I said, today could have gone better.

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness snuggle the crap out of them

Bus Collision

Today has been a bit of a sobering day. A bus hit a train, leaving at least 6 dead. One of my co-workers who sits like 3 cubes away "missed" that bus. Apparently he tried to flag down the driver, but the driver didn't stop. So he had to take the next bus. I would assume that the bus was fairly full, which if my co-worker had gotten on the bus he would have been near the front of the bus which was sheared off in the collision.

I've ridden a bus my fair share over the years and I would never have imagined dying on one. For collisions they are usually bus vs something smaller than the bus - and the bigger thing usually wins.

Perhaps it is morbid but I'm often thinking about death as I'm riding my bike to and from work. I feel by thinking about it and identifying the possible causes of injury I can be better prepared to avoid it. I've pictured myself being killed by a bus quite a few times... The buses are just so wide and the side mirrors are inconveniently located a head height.

I'd rather show up late to work than dead. In the physics equation of collisions, on my bike I'm pretty always going to be the softer object with less mass. And you know what they say, whether the stone hits the pitcher or the pitcher hits the stone, it's going to bad for the pitcher.

So, I'm going to redouble my efforts on getting from point A to point B alive and well. There's no prize for almost not getting injured.

Picture of me demonstrating safe biking technique.

How to find the memories

Thinking about all the digital content that we're generating of our life - the pictures, the videos, etc, I was wondering how some future person will find all the "important" or "quality" memories. At some point it will be impossible to go through them by hand and people will have to rely on a digital agent to do the work. I'd think that it would figure out "good" memories by checking the photos / videos for people smiling, laughing. Maybe cross reference that against a digital calendar for important dates like "Frank's wedding" or "trip to Cuba". These digital agents might even create slideshows automatically. Perhaps finding a song played a lot in your music album or recognized from some videos.

In a way it will be great to hand off boiler plate work of like "make me a scrap book" to a computer. On the other hand it will be creepy that software will be able to know and guess so much about us.

Trial by toddler

Dear diary,

It has been a long journey to get to this point. Some days it feels like countless years, but it has been less than two. Tonight the tiny person was testing me with every single action. It's difficult to remain cool in times like these, but then I just think WWID? and then I sit down and have some hot chocolate.

You would think that someone so small that depends on you for almost everything would be more lenient. Alas it is not so. It seems counterintuitive to evolution, but they try to break you and force you to break down crying in an ball of despair. Lucky there is an easy remedy for this - tea and cake, but of which we keep well stocked.

I must sign off now. I believe that tonight will require multiple applications of cake.

Yours in my hour of trial,
Jim

Best parts of the days

Life is pretty good right now. My biggest complaint might be about headaches, but that's another topic.

One of my favourite parts of the day is when I'm leaving the house. Don't get me wrong, I'd rather stay at home and play and have adventures. It's the send off that I love. It's better than a 21 gun salute. Laura and Alice go to the front window and wave. Not just any wave - almost anyone can do that. This is a special wave. A manic, double arm wave where you are bouncing up and down like your bottom is on fire. All the time with a huge smile. It's really hard to top that.

It's one of the things that makes my day.

Getting into the swing of things

The Art of Negation

Lately Alice has been showing off her mastery of negation. "Mommy AT wok. Daddy na AT wok! Alice na AT wok!" It's really interesting seeing her work these things out and the joy (really, joy) she experiences being able to express a newly learned construct. Pretty cool.

And for no particular reason, here's a picture of her looking cross eyed at my car keys and wearing my shoes. I guess she was on her way to "wok".

Alice go wok! Bue bye!

A raccoon with opposable thumbs

Living with a toddler feels like living with a raccoon with opposable thumbs. Anything packed becomes unpacked and spread across the floor. Boxes emptied, cupboards purged, wallets cleared out, closets unloaded, and purses dumped. It is possible to clean up, but the raccoons come back and they like the mess. They like it just fine.

*sigh*