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WEEK 25 2005

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Saturday 25 June 2005

Saturday - I was talking to someone in the real estate business early this spring about selling my home, and how I should preprare it if I do, and his advice was to do as little as possible. If prospective buyers complain about the carpet or the kitchen cabinets, for example, then offer an allowance (money off) for those items. Whatever I picked would be unlikely to suit them, and the opportunity to do it their way would be a plus in trying to sell the place.

So when I saw the following, I found it funny.

Joanne Jacobs, a blogger on educational issues, is selling her house. She had this to say about "prepping" it:

My house now has a master bedroom suite (formerly my daughter's room) and a family room (formerly the hall) and very few books, because they look messy. There is nothing on the counter tops: I had to hunt for soap to wash my hands. The idea is to make the house look uninhabited by someone with exquisite taste.

Well, I'm going to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival on Thursday for four days. I'll get to stay in a room with towels I can use and visible soap.

(Emphasis mine.)

I returned home from the Egyptian exhibit down at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to find the house at 80 Fahrenheit. The computers were unhappy, with little warning messages on their screens, but still running. I had forgotten to change the master A/C control from "vent" to "low cool" this morning so the fan had been blowing warm air into the house all afternoon. There doesn't seem to be any damage - it's a fairly cool day today.

I suspended the jobs running on the PC's until the house returned to the low 70's.

Friday 24 June 2005

Friday - Happy Birthday to Abe Vigoda, i.e. "Fish" from Barney Miller. Good grief - he's still around and still working. He already seemed positively ancient as an actor on Barney Miller, years ago.

I didn't know he was in Dark Shadows as well.

A friend compared the squirrel, pictured below, to my cat, Phoebe. My male cat. Well, maybe he could stand to lose a few pounds. Cut me a break here though - I have put him on a diet of expensive veterinarian prescribed food, maybe he'll lose weight someday...

Thursday 23 June 2005

Thursday - just a day of work, nothing much to report.

There were a bunch of squirrel like creatures running about that I photographed on Tuesday, over in the soon to be developed fields. Looking at the picture, and zooming in, I noticed something that I'd missed at the time - one of them was female and very pregnant:

Update: According to the Internet, this is an Antelope Squirrel.

Wednesday 22 June 2005

Wednesday - a warm day, in the 90's. I did a walk in the morning - about 4 miles, and my feet hurt. They aren't tired, but wearing hiking boots instead of sneakers puts pressure on different parts of the sole.

Does that make me a tenderfoot?

These boots aren't new, they've plenty of miles on them, but they also have mileage left. When I hurt my knee, some time ago now, I stopped hiking as much because of the pain when going downhill. It was like someone driving a spike sideways through the knee joint. I'll say ACL damage, though the doc just claimed it to be cartilage.

In addition my longtime usual hiking partners, my brother and a friend from college, found other interests. Involving wives and girlfriends, and other sorts of nonsense like that.

Then, driving up the 99 last year I had a thought: "Wow, look at those thunderheads over Sequoia. Guess I'll never be up there again. I miss that high country..."

And then I decided: "No, I'm going to get back up there this year."

Naturally it's been one of the snowiest and rainiest years on record! I believe the road through Yosemite, usually opening on Memorial Day is still closed. My friend was in Sequoia just a few weeks ago - he said that the snow banks towered over his car. Sheesh.

Tuesday 21 June 2005

Tuesday - still keeping busy. Biked for about an hour this morning.

Monday 20 June 2005

Monday - working away on things.

A friend called, and asked if I wanted to hike the Grand Canyon this fall, down to, and overnighting at Phantom Ranch or thereabouts and back. It sounds pretty cool, so I said "Yes". I'll need to get into better shape however. Walked about 2 miles today.

Something to look forward too in late October!

I need to plan a summer vacation - a couple of weeks off at the least. If I don't it will never happen...

Sunday 19 June 2005

Sunday - not a lot to say, pretty tired. It's fairly warm out, so I went out for a walk in the early evening. It's getting near to being a full moon. I think I read something about us being particularly close to the moon right now - it's probably a fairly small change in distance - the moons orbit is fairly circular.

Picture of the Week

Photo Notes: Out at William J. Fox field I saw this DC-3 in Baja Air livery. It looks to have been re-engined with turbo-props. Remarkable that it's still flying after all this time.

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