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2012-366 Day 17 – Woot!

It’s a woot-off! Those who have been around me for any significant amount of time later at night have heard the alarm I have set for 10pm at night and received my one word explanation, “Woot!” Woot.com is a quirky (no longer) little website that has the slogan “One Day, One Deal.” An apt slogan, as starting at midnight Central Time (or 10pm here) they put up one product (usually tech related) at a fairly substantial discount and flat five dollar shipping (whether it’s a iPod or a TV). Except when they don’t. . .

Once a month or so, upon arrival to the main page, you will see a set of flashing yellow lights and a yellow progress bar over the current item name. That means a woot-off has begun! If you click the link above and it is still Tuesday 1/17/13 (and probably Wednesday 1/18, as they often go for two days), you will be treated to a progression of products, one after the other as stock is depleted. As I type this, there is a wireless PC to TV connector for $69.99 which has been proceeded by a small fixed blade knife and, before that, a network backup drive. The more expensive items may take an hour or so to move, but you’ll probably see a fair variety of items over the course of 24 hours.

Woot was successful enough to A) be bought by Amazon, and B) spin off a number of sites that each have their own one day deals in various categories (kids.woot.com, wine.woot.com, sellout.woot.com, shirt.woot.com, and home.woot.com). Each offers products in their niche for the day, and some even feature their own woot-offs (kids.woot, home.woot, and wine.woot at the moment).

One thing that has stayed exclusive to the main Woot site, and one of the most fun items, often only shows up during woot-offs anymore. It is the legendary Bag of Crap (BoC). Whenever the BoC comes up on Woot, the servers immediately grind to a halt, and successfully ordering one is a feat unto itself (I have scored four in the roughly sixty some odd times it has been available, and two of those times were due to the fact that acquiring the BoC was a test of finding a hidden page). What is in a BoC? Well, exactly what it says, Crap, specifically three (or slightly more) items. This is where they stick all of the items that they can’t sell regularly, I have received many different items, from a strawberry planter, to Christmas cards (so many Christmas cards), to mini tripods (a box of 8 tripods counted as one item in an early BoC), and a musical Winnie the Pooh toothbrush holder (which kept going off whenever the box was jostled, poor delivery man). Other folks have been lucky enough to score a TV. For the low price of 3 dollars, plus the aforementioned shipping, you get to play the Crap lottery. It used to amuse Jess, now it kinda scares her.

Wish me luck as I hold out for Bag of Crap number five! (They have a bad habit of posting them when I’m at lunch on the second day of the woot-off, so we’ll see.)

Weight: 236.4 Max: 240 Min: 236.4 Body Fat %: 24.9
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange (Blue?) – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 7 (5717 points, 367/1750 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 17, 2012

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2012-366 Day 16 – Good Service

It’s easy to complain when service is terrible, but it can be a little more difficult to remember to praise excellent service. A few months ago it was brought to my attention that Apple was replacing first-generation iPod nanos due to a battery that could dangerously overheat. I didn’t think much of it, as I had replaced my first-gen nano (which I got five and a half years ago) with a fourth-gen one a year or two ago and the old one was sitting in a drawer unused. Then I heard at the end of December that people who had submitted their first-gen nanos for replacement were receiving the a brand new, latest-gen nano. I checked to see if my first-gen was a part of the recall, found out that it was, and submitted a request for replacement. A week or so later, an empty box was thrown onto my patio by the FedEx guy.

About a month later, my brand new, shiny nano showed up (well, actually, FedEx tried to deliver it three times during the week when I wasn’t home, so I had to spend part of a Saturday afternoon hunting down their facility in Sun Valley). Seeing as I bought the nano over a half-decade ago, it was certainly a pleasant surprise to see the company handle the situation the way it did.

I’ll save my Apple vs PC thoughts for another time.

Weight: 236.4 Max: 240 Min: 236.4 Body Fat %: 24.9
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange (Blue?) – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 7 (5471 points, 121/1750 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 16, 2012

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2012-366 Day 15 – Anniversary

So today marks the seventh anniversary of marriage to my beautiful wife, Jess. I am so blessed to have her as my wife and companion in life, she does so much for me and loves me so well. As the title of the website says, we often feel we are the only two people each other could be with.

Since our anniversary is so close to Christmas, we generally forgo any large gifts and instead spend a day together (although again, due to the proximity to Christmas, it may not actually be on our anniversary). Since our anniversary was on a Sunday this year, and we were not scheduled in advance, I decided to take our trip today. How did we celebrate? Well, rather simply, but for a brief review, read on.

The plans I made didn’t require us to leave until 1, so we went to the early service at church and then figured out who would be available for our usual after-church lunch. Keith and Cathy were able to, and Dan and Vicki could join us after they help with the worship for the kids at the late service, so we all got to enjoy some Senor Sol (so good!). We said our goodbyes and headed home quickly to gather ourselves.

I determined since we generally head south for our trips, this time we would head north, and targeted Santa Barbara. I saw a commercial for The Artist the night before and remembered Jess wanted to see that (and it would probably be gone from theaters soon), so I looked to see if any theaters in Santa Barbara were playing it. Fortunately, one still was and had a showing at 4pm (which is why we didn’t have to leave until 1). We got to Santa Barbara and I aimed for downtown, figuring we could walk around for a bit and then figure out where the theater was from there. Turns out the theater was downtown and just a few blocks from where we parked.

A quick aside on The Artist, a black and white silent movie set in the late 1920s – early 1930s. I found the movie to be quite well done, although it did drag a little in the middle. I also found, and Jess told me she had the opposite feelings on this, so YMMV, that it took a lot more concentration and energy for me to watch than a regular movie. I almost felt I couldn’t blink, as I didn’t want to miss any potential story points (also I found out I’m only middling at reading lips). In all, though, despite the fact that I wanted to slap the main character a couple times, it was a very good movie. End aside.

After the movie, we turned to our good friend Yelp to help find us a dinner location. Jess was in the mood for Italian and after finding several VERY crowded places on State Street that weren’t quite what we were looking for, we got the car and drove to the edge of downtown to a pizzeria attached to a fancy Italian place that was quite good. We enjoyed some bread with olive oil and garlic, an antipasto, and margherita pizza with an extremely thin crust. We then headed back and got some Menchies for dessert before returning home.

In all, a wonderful day with a wonderful woman, and I hope to enjoy many more anniversaries with her.

Weight: 236.4 Max: 240 Min: 236.4 Body Fat %: 24.9
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange (Blue?) – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 7 (5471 points, 121/1750 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 15, 2012

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2012-366 Day 14 – Commercials

Why exactly is it that so many companies nowadays are trying to sell their products by making their users act like jerks? Or how about commercials that show their product doing something of which it’s not capable? I’ve seen (or heard) so many commercials in the last year that leave a bad taste in my mouth, and I have to wonder what the people who are creating these ad campaigns are thinking. Here’s some that have stuck out to me.

1) The Summoner Ad

Ha, ha, men checking their phone on a date and lying about it. What bothers me the most is how clueless they paint the woman. Obviously she would have no clue how a phone works or about a phone’s capabilities, she’s a woman! Give me a break. Makes me cringe every time.

2) Recent Kit Kat Radio commercials

There are a few of these, and all follow the same formula: some person is eating a Kit Kat and refusing to participate in an activity that they would be otherwise expected to do. The one that sticks out to me as most egregious is the speed dating ad, which consists of a woman eating Kit Kat bar and refusing to interact with the man across the table from her during their speed date, claiming she’s on a Kit Kat break. There’s no indication that the man is hideous (and even if he his, that doesn’t justify her completely blowing him off), and he spends the entire commercial just trying to get anything out of this woman. Why is she someone I want to be like, and why does painting a Kit Kat customer as a complete tool make it more attractive?

3) Nissan Frontier Commercial

“Fantasy. Trucks can’t snowboard. Do not attempt.” “Or do barrel rolls. Do not attempt.” Then why are you showing me a CGI’d truck doing it? What can your truck do? They do it in another one where the truck is used as replacement for broken landing gear on a plane. Why is your campaign showing us all this stuff your truck can’t do?

I don’t understand how some of this stuff makes it on TV or the radio, and who thinks it’s such a good idea. I’m sure I’ll find more commercials that bother me over the course of the year, and I’ll be sure to let you know about them.

Weight: 236.4 Max: 240 Min: 236.4 Body Fat %: 24.9
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange (Blue?) – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 7 (5471 points, 121/1750 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 14, 2012

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2012-366 Day 13 – Disneyland

So guess where I am today? (I really have to stop putting the answers to these introductory questions in the title.) Yup, the happiest place on earth, toting two little girls on their second and first (respectively) trips to the Magic Kingdom.

Enjoy the break, I’m sure I’ll be back to my wordy self soon. 🙂

We’ll also give the footer a break since I’m updating from my phone.

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By Matt
January 13, 2012

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2012-366 Day 12 – Karate II

Day 12 and I’m already repeating subjects? Actually, with 366 days to cover, there are bound to be subjects that need updating, and this is one that I’m (possibly irrationally) excited about, so it gets the honor of the first re-visitation.

So, if you recall from my New Year’s resolutions , that one of my goals is to get my 5th Gup Green belt by the end of the year. That assumes a steady two month progression through all the belts, which is pretty much the expected pace. I have to tell you, it felt really good to have a belt other than white, like the journey had truly begun. All would be smooth, I had gotten great marks on my test and earned all the medals (little stars you can put on your Gi pants that represent high marks in Effort, Kicking, Intensity, Technique, and Unity), and I felt confident. But then Chad, Kyle, and I got to talking, and realized there could be more to it. . .

As Master Kemmer mentioned at the belt ceremony, it had been a year or two since he had allowed someone to skip a belt level (essentially taking both belt tests at the same time, not passing over any material), but he had three people do it on this last belt test. Two of the people made the leap from Purple to Blue (bypassing Orange) and, by jove, we had just achieved a purple belt (yes, I busted a “by jove”! It’s my blog, not yours!). So we had a brief discussion with Master Kemmer who pointed out that it would not be easy, the people who had just done it had attended pretty much every class session possible, and that the final decision to allow us to attempt it was his alone even if we did go through everything but did not seem ready. You don’t get the honorific “Master” for no reason, and I felt those were perfectly fair conditions.

But what of this extra time commitment? The adult classes for lower belts are Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday at 8pm and Saturdays at 12pm (with a Forms class at 11am). While I was a white belt, I was attending Thursday classes and any Saturday classes I could when not out of town. With the Holiday season over, my Saturday attendance will improve, but I doubt that would be enough. We have a Bible study on Tuesday evenings, so adding the Wednesday class would be the final piece. But I’m married, so I can’t just make that decision by myself (I’d have to get permission to tell you about the great Softball incident of some year I don’t remember, but I’m not sure I want to relive it either), so Jess and I talked about it (wait, is this a marriage blog now too?). Her main concern was if the time commitment was too heavy and whether I would be grumpy (that has NEVER happened to me! 😉 and was concerned there would be a repeat of a couple years ago, where we were overscheduled. I didn’t feel it was the same, as the karate class represented a hour and a half to two hour time commitment nightly, where some of my previous evening commitments took up three to five hours, and this time would come partially out of my gym/running budgeted time. We came to an understanding and, after a brief confusion over the fact it started that night, I was off to class.

So I attended my first class on Wednesday last night, and was struck by a couple differences in tone when compared to the Thursday night class. The first difference, upon entering, is that the class preceding the Wednesday one is the Advanced class, so there were Black and Red Belts as far as the eye could see. The class preceding the Thursday class is the Juniors Advanced class, which is a little smaller. The second difference is that Master Kemmer teaches the Wednesday night class and Mr. Weirman teaches the Thursday night class. DO NOT get me wrong, I am a huge fan of Mr. Weirman’s Thursday night class, but there did seem to be a little extra intensity and pop from the students in the class that Master Kemmer was teaching. This was also my first class where I was not a white belt, and it lent some extra energy and excitement putting a different color belt on.

The theme for the month at Cutting Edge Karate is goals, and I’m going to chase pretty hard after this belt skipping one, as one, it is doable with some hard work, and I’m looking forward to the work (already spent 15 minutes in my private dojo working on the block progression for basic form number 3 today). Two, it will allow it to be possible to exceed my resolution, rather than just meet it. And three, I just don’t think I’m going to look that good in Orange.

Okay, maybe three isn’t a good reason.

NOTE: The links in yesterday’s post didn’t show up (which is kind of bad for a post on websites). I fixed them, so you can check them out if you like.

Weight: 240 Max: 240 Min: 240 (ordered a fancy scale on Amazon today, soon you’ll get all sorts of numbers)
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange (Blue?) – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 7 (4386 points, 536/1500 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 12, 2012

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2012-366 Day 11 – Web Sites and Design

Even though I hold a degree in Computer Science, Web Design was not as large of a part of the curriculum as you might thing (try not at all, it’s not programming). I teach more about web design in my upper division introduction to computers class then we covered. I’ve picked up enough html in my time (you know, since the days of prodigy) and now teach it, so I’ve had the opportunity to create a few web pages. In doing so, I’ve gotten to practice and hopefully hone my webdesign skills (unless I’m feeling intentionally lazy, like with my class webpage, which I keep intentionally simple to demonstrate the basics of html I’m teaching – yeah, I’ll go with that: http://www.csun.edu/~mew31142).

Since Geocities (oh man, I’ll have to see if I have a copy of my R.E.V.E.L.A.T.I.O.N.S. site, it was epic) went away, the earliest example of a website I have is the Teachers for a New Era Virtual Professional Development Center: http://www.csun.edu/tnevpdc/. Whew, that’s a little rough to link to, I certainly think I could do a lot better now. I’m not involved in the project now, but my e-mail is listed on there, so I still get the occasional e-mail about it (mostly people promoting their own sites and wanting me to add them). I did this site via a brute force approach, so there is a lot of unnecessary repetition of code, and the style is a byproduct of fixed pixel size and older monitors. The main design had to go through a couple people, so that’s not purely me.

My other “professional website” (i.e. one that I got paid to do) I’m a lot more proud of: http://www.landclearing.net/. It’s the homepage for the family business of a friend, Magnum Land Clearing. He provided me the information and pictures, and I shaped it into what you see at that link. I think it’s a nice, clean design, it scales well on different platforms (looks great on my phone), and even includes a project page view-able with and without JavaScript. Actually, this reminds me, the projects page is probably due for an update.

There’s one more page I’ve developed recently, but since it’s an internal webpage for my work (which does a look up in the student id system, by far the most programming intensive site I’ve done), you don’t get to see it.

The next webpage I’m interested in developing is a secret, I just need to clear some time to work on it. I’ll let you know more as details develop.

Weight: 240 Max: 240 Min: 240
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 6 (3425 points, 825/1250 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 11, 2012

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2012-366 Day 10 – Role Playing Games

Excuse me while I go and firmly affix my nerd hat. You may use the intervening time to run screaming if you desire.

There, done.

So I’m very close to finishing my latest reading project, but it’s not necessarily one you might be expecting (well, if you read the title you might have an idea). The reading project is a game called Chrono Trigger (I found a re-released version for the DS during the break on sale, I never got to play it when it was originally released, as I didn’t have a Super Nintendo growing up), and I’m not kidding when talking about the reading aspect. This brings me to my larger point, that video game RPGs (Role Playing Games) can basically be viewed as interactive stories, and table top RPGs are interactive story generators.

Granted, just like regular books, there are good RPGs and bad RPGs, so you may or may not enjoy your reading experience. Chrono Trigger is widely regarded as one of the best RPGs made, and I will say that, in my experience, the game has so far lived up to the hype. This is not, however, strictly due to the game, it is the story aspects that truly make it great. While I won’t go into great depth here, you might surmise from the title that some time manipulation is involved, and you would be correct. The way that the layers of time interweave is impressive, but even more impressive is the character development that takes place within the game. Not only that, but due to branching paths, the character development you experience may be different from game to game (I only intend to play through once, I’ll read about the other ones :). For a more contemporary example (Chrono Trigger was originally released in 1995), from what I understand of the current RPG giant Skyrim, it is basically a giant story you can write yourself, with a plot line that you can move forward on when you desire. In either case, you can build yourself up to incredible power by being patient and completing a lot of quests, or you can move through the story and take your lumps, the choice is yours.

And that’s just video games, where despite the freedom you are given, your party is ultimately constrained within the vehicle of the story. Table top RPGs grant you all of the freedom with none of the limitations, and bring to bear all of the power that comes with the imagination. In high school, I was able to enjoy playing a game called Shadowrun with a regular role playing group. A lot of funny stories (that wouldn’t make sense to a lot of people outside that group) arose from the sessions, but I’ve always felt that the most important thing to arise out of those occasions was the exercising of creativity when faced with a situation with a myriad of possibilities and attempting to figure a way out. Yes, the stories and situations were definitely action oriented, but that just lent more excitement.

For instance, Shadowrun is a game set in the near future in which some magical abilities have become active, but science has also advanced to the point where basically cyborgs are feasible. So you have a group of three to four people of varying technological and magical abilities, and perhaps they have been assigned to get a briefcase out of a storage facility that is being well guarded. How do you approach the situation? Do you try to sneak in? Do you break down the front gate and assume you have enough firepower to overwhelm whatever is inside? Do you bribe one of the people inside for reconnaissance information ahead of time so you know what you’re dealing with? There is no guarantee of success, your plan succeeds or fails depending upon what you do, and an element of chance (dice) is introduced to make the results even more uncertain. It is the exercising of your mind in trying to deal with these situations that makes role playing such an interesting endeavor to me, and when you add in the randomness, you suddenly get into multiple contingency plans when things aren’t going your way.

Sadly, our group dispersed over the state of California after high school and role playing was confined back to video games for a long time. Happily, I just recently got invited to another group and got to play in my first session with them last Friday. This group plays Dungeons and Dragons, which I’ve only played once previously way back when I was a kid (I think, the entire experience is hazy, but it seems like I played in a class on a weekend at Pierce once). I had a blast, and while we did not achieve our main objective, we all survived and had plenty of amusing stories to tell. The details of how things are resolved may be different, but the possibilities are the same (just downgrade the technology available). I would recommend role playing games to anyone who wants to exercise their mind and problem solving abilities, and would even be willing to put together a light game for anyone that wants a low pressure introduction.

So there is my (not) shameful (not) secret, I enjoy role playing games. Whether as a story vehicle, a mental exercise, or even just a way to hang out with good friends, I sincerely recommend trying to find a good one, either in video game format or the table top variety. It will even translate to any regular games you might play, as the ability to formulate multiple, creative plans based on changing conditions can lead you to victory in anything from Poker to Monopoly to Settlers of Catan.

Weight: 240 Max: 240 Min: 240 (One day I’ll weigh myself again, we’re looking into getting a scale).
Yearly Mileage: 6.5 miles (+2.5)
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 6 (3425 points, 825/1250 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 10, 2012

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2012-366 Day 9 – God and Football

So over the course of 366 days, I’m bound to run into some topics that may be controversial (I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t). Today is probably one of those items, so I’ll start with some ground rules:

1) You may have a different opinion than me. If you do, I accept that, and it doesn’t offend me.
2) You are free to express any differently held opinions (or if you have the same opinion, you can express that too). If you do, however, do so respectfully.
3) Don’t expect me to change my opinion easily.

Yes, the headline says “God and Football,” but you can really extrapolate this topic into any sport. And yes, this has been triggered by the recent activities of a certain Timothy Richard Tebow, but keep in mind that I’ve held this belief since before I’d even heard of the man (and that was back at Florida). So what is this controversial belief with which you may or may not agree? Are you prepared?

God does not care who wins sporting events. Period.

I don’t care if it’s your local church softball league or the Super Bowl, God has nothing invested in the outcome. Jess brought it to my attention that people are saying since Tim Tebow passed for 316 yards in his playoff victory over Pittsburgh, that was a symbol of God wanting him to win the game. Because John 3:16 is a thing, you know, the verse that always shows up at sporting events? What then is the significance of 10/21 (completions/attempts) or 15.0 (passing average) or the fact that when we add in his rushing yardage we get 366 yards of total offense, a far more significant number to the overall game as it includes all of his contributions?

Keep in mind that I am not a Tebow basher. I’m not one of those people who has spent the last three months criticizing his play, ability, or religion. In fact, I have quite enjoyed the consternation he has evoked in the football establishment, the never ending stream of articles decrying his poor mechanics and unsustainable lack of turnovers (the second part of which I agreed with and played a factor in the three losses to end the regular season). On the flip side, however, was my mounting frustration with the attribution of Tebow’s football success to Divine Providence.

And here’s where I have to explain myself; why doesn’t God care about sporting events. In the moment, some of these events can seem like world shaking activities with eternal significance, but really they are footnotes in history. Unless you have a connection to the winning team or individual, no one but the history books will remember the victors in certain events. Who won the various events in the first Olympiads in the Greece of antiquity? Most of those answers have been lost to time. A story line could have been proposed in the Denver – Pittsburgh game that compared the openly religious Tebow to the quarterback of the Steelers, Ben Roethlisberger, who has been accused of rape a couple of times. Yet the Broncos were one or two bad bounces of the ball away from losing that game. If Pittsburgh had won, would that have meant that God favored an accused rapist more than a devout follower?

If God is favoring Tebow, why didn’t the Broncos go undefeated with him at the helm? Were Matthew Stafford, Tom Brady, Ryan Fitzpatrick, and Kyle Orton (the man Tebow replaced) more deserving?

Taking this example down to a more personal level, I have played in our Church’s softball league for over a decade, coaching a team for the last four or five seasons. I have won one championship and had the best record in the league (but did not win the championship, in a different year) over the time that I have coached. Was there someone closer to God than me in those seasons on a different team? I can guarantee it. Then why was I rewarded with victory? Is it some sort of aggregate scale, where the person with the Holiest team wins? Then what determines who wins city league teams? I’m certain that at some point in the past, some team of Atheists has beaten a team that included at least one Christian. How is that fair? It makes far more sense to extricate religion from sports altogether, to understand that there can be areas of life the God may not have a strong preference in (take breakfast for instance, I’m not sure God is wholly invested in your decision between toast and yogurt, and will not brand you a sinner should you choose both).

Let me set one thing straight, I am not saying that God does not have control over everything, that He could not change the course of activities if He wanted to. I am saying that God has placed the laws of physics in the universe and can allow sporting events to play out according to them because they do not have an effect on His eternal plan for mankind, regardless of what any athlete may say or do during or after any loss or win.

Just a warning, future controversial topics include my view on politics and my beliefs on Heaven. . . 🙂

Weight: 240 Max: 240 Min: 240
Yearly Mileage: 4 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 6 (2972 points, 372/1250 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

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By Matt
January 9, 2012

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2012-366 Day 8 – Home Improvement

So here we are, eight days into my resolution and an eventful day has pushed this update to the very limit. I would have missed my resolution if this was anywhere east of the Rockies!

But it’s not, and part of the reason this was so late has been a recent spate of home improvement projects. Some of you know that we recently bought our condo and have been in it for just over three months now. The first month and a half or so was a flurry of planning, projects, and painting. This initial rush died down as the holiday season wound up, leaving a couple projects in mid-completion (I only asked that you politely ignored the hanging light that had the chain tripled up on itself, please), and quite a few still on the drawing board (quite literally in fact, as Jess wrote a list on the chalkboard closet doors she painted earlier). Since we decided to stay home for our week off between Christmas and New Years, it seemed like a natural time to knock some things off the list.

Jess has heard this rant several times since we moved into the new place, I dislike home improvement projects. I dislike the fact that I have to go back to the home improvement store three times to accomplish a single task. I dislike that fact that I’m kind of starting my home improvement knowledge from scratch, and so there are many things I’m still learning how to do. I’m used to succeeding at most things I do (er, I’m not sure how to phrase that without sounding kinda prideful, or at least anymore than I already am guilty of), and each project presents a new challenge annoys me.

Take the hanging lamp for instance, we had a ceiling fan in the dining alcove that shorted out just after we moved in. We decided to replace it in November, so I went to the store and got a new ceiling fan. Taking the old one down revealed that they had knocked a piece of the ceiling out with the old installation (pretty much everything we’ve found in the place has had just a little extra something knocked out or beat up, the repairs before us were just a bit sloppy), but the wiring and bracket seemed sound. That was, until I put up the ceiling fan we got and discovered that the screw locations on the fan were too wide to fit onto the bracket mounted on the ceiling. No problem, I thought, we got a pretty big fan, so a smaller fan would probably have a smaller bracket, and we didn’t really need a large fan in the room to begin with. So I went back to the store and bought a smaller fan, got it home, took it out, and discovered that even though the fan was smaller, the bracket was the exact same size as the larger one.

Back to the store for the third time in the same day. I returned the smaller fan, went and looked at a hanging light and determine the bracket would probably work, but I’d find an employee and talk to them first. I found a guy and told him my story, he opened a ceiling fan and saw what I was talking about, and he then showed me an adapter that should make the brackets mesh. At this point, however, I wanted to go with a sure thing, so, after having him open the hanging light to verify the bracket would fit, I selected that one and took it back to the condo. Jess and I threaded the wires through the chain, I hooked them up to the ceiling wires, tightened all the ceiling pieces and tested the light. It worked! Unfortunately we then looked and noticed that the chain was too long (I had balanced the light on a chair on the table before). This all had taken place on one day, and at that point it was well into the evening, so I made the executive decision to zip tie the chain back on itself to an acceptable length, and I was retiring from the light hanging business for the time being.

I was finally ready to unretire during our winter break, and, with an improved understanding of what was going on, removed the light, disconnected the wires, removed the excess chain, shortened, stripped, and reconnected the wires and chain in a little under half an hour. And my project for today, putting a door handle on our storage unit (it had only the deadbolt on it before, which made it difficult to shut easily as you had to make sure it was seated correctly which required holding the deadbolt housing and turning the key at the same time) required only one trip to the store to acquire the handle. The tricky part was that our drill (an awesome christmas present from my parents) is corded, and there are no plugs out where our storage area is (even daisy chaining my two 25 foot extension cords would not reach the nearest outlet). I struck upon some inspiration, however, and pulled the car into the carport where our storage unit is. My initial attempt met with failure, however, as the small converter which plugged into the auxiliary jack (you know, the old cigarette lighter) on our car which has a single three prong plug did not generate enough juice to turn the drill even once. I was about to give up for the moment until I remembered I had a power strip that plugged into the auxiliary jack in the trunk.

Pulling out the power strip, I noticed the packaging said it provided 150 watts. I thought that might work, so I plugged everything in and gave it a shot. I got a good two second burst from the drill, which I could do again after a two second rest. I marked the door, and with three two second pulses on each side, was able to get the initial holes. I then swapped out the drill bit with a Phillips bit on an extender and was able to get the handle’s screws most of the way in. I was able to finish up with a regular Phillips head, and success was mine! It’s a little off center to the left (Ssh, don’t tell Jess!), but I was just glad to be able to do it in one shot! I guess there’s hope for me yet.

The problem solving part of me likes home improvement projects, the rest of me could definitely leave them. That being said, I’m grateful to have a home to improve and a wife who in excellent at it in her own right (she was painting and replacing cabinet hardware while I was doing all this, but this isn’t her blog entry ;).

Weight: 240 Max: 240 Min: 240
Yearly Mileage: 4 miles
Current Belt: Purple – Next Belt: Orange – Next Test Date: 3/12
Fitocracy Level: 5 (2399 points, 799/1000 to next level) – ID: disciplev1

Posted in Matt 2012-366, Matt General. Tagged with , , , .

By Matt
January 8, 2012

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