Bread and circuses, indeed

I am willing to accept that the determination of New Orleans to hold Mardi Gras celebrations six months after Katrina is worthy of note. But is it really the only story worth this kind of headline treatment…for hours at a stretch?

Maybe it’s just me, but I would have thought that this minor footnote would have deserved more prominent treatment.

But like I said, maybe it’s just me.

Technorati Tags: New Orleans, Hurricane Katrina, Iraq

Blinded by the light

So your wife desires to replace a serviceable but unloved light fixture (upper right corner of picture below) which does not illuminate that corner of the kitchen as it should.

She purchases a new, mod-looking, low-voltage, halogen fixture whose installation instructions are wrtten in Italian.

You cannot read Italian.

Your first step is to purchase an Italian phrase book. No, you’re kidding.

The first thing you do is to Google the website for the light fixture manufacturer. You locate and print the English version of the installation instructions. You then rest for several weeks.

Fully rested, you ascend the ladder to remove the old light fixture and discover that the plaster of the ceiling above the light is cracked and unpainted. Also, the electrical box containing the wiring is too deep; that is, it sticks out beyond the ceiling and must be replaced. Further, the old electrical box was well-plastered into the ceiling by helpful previous owners of the house.

You next step is to rest for a couple more weeks. During that time, you purchase a new electrical box and related fittings.

Again fully rested, you once more ascend the ladder and scrape away as much loose plaster as you can. You then use a hammer and flathead screwdriver to chisel plaster from around the electrical box. You make a dusty mess. You then remove the old electrical box.

Then you apply wallboard compound. You wait, you smooth it out, you wait some more. Then you and your wife decide which of the many cans of paint in the basement actually matches the color of the kitchen ceiling. You mix paint with the sand texture stuff that you meant to identify on this blog earlier but forgot to, so here it is. You paint. You let it dry. You call it a day and watch The Ladykillers (the 1955 Ealing Studios original).

The next day, you install the new and more shallow electrical pan (you refer to it as a ‘pan’ rather than a ‘box’ because it is round). You attach a metal collar to the pan that brings it fairly flush with the ceiling. You then attach the black, white, and ground house wires to their fixture counterparts. You fit those wires into the electrical pan, mount the light fixture’s transformer to the pan, enclose the transformer with its cover. Then you summon your wife for assistance, because the instructions for installing low-voltage cables make your head hurt.

Your wife, on the other hand, is familiar with such installations. She tells you what to do - drill this hole, install that molly, attach those anchors. She then takes over, attaching and tightening the two cables, then attaching the lights. Then you test. And it works.

However, your cheap-ass Broan range hood which you have owned for two years selects this very day - nay, this very hour - to stop working. No fan, no light. Nothing. Behold, the cheap-ass Broan range hood:

Your brief flush of success over the light installation is immediately replaced with confusion and dread. Why did the cheap-ass Broan range hood stop working? Why did it stop working now? Did it have anything to do with the new light fixture? Is there a short-circuit at fault? Do you smell smoke? Is the wall getting hot?

And so on, and so forth.

You expose the range hood wiring and check the wires using the inexpensive voltage tester in which you’ve never been entirely confident. No current detected. The device is somewhat spotty and inconclusive when you try testing other fixtures and wires, and you decide to pitch it and get a new tester. But first, you shut off the circuit and visually inspect the wiring connections of the new fixture. They are sound.

You decide that the first thing you must do is to make sure that the problem is a broken appliance rather than bad and dangerous house wiring. You journey to the home store and buy a new and more reliable tester. You test the tester and come away heartened. You then test the wiring to the fan and find that current is indeed headed there. It just has no place to go when it gets there, because the cheap-ass Broan range hood just doesn’t work.

That much, at least, is reassuring. More so than the idea of the house burning down. And the lights do look nice.

You resolve to buy a better range hood soon, keeping in mind that you hate installing range hoods. About as much as you hate installing light fixtures, as a matter of fact.

Note: After doing some Internet searching, you learn that range hoods have internal fuses. Imagine that. You must get the model number of your cheap-ass Broan range hood and do some investigating…

Technorati Tags: Home Repair, Home Renovation

Working title: Illinois governor dumb as a stump

This story is so weird that I am forced to break my self-imposed embargo on political stuff. Originally and cheerfully reported by Kevin McDermott of the P-D’s Springfield bureau (link defunct):

Gov. Rod Blagojevich, giving an interview to a television crew in Chicago recently, first suspected something was amiss when the interviewer cut him off in mid-sentence to intone sternly: “I’ll be in charge of what my listeners get to hear.”

It got stranger from there, with the interviewer suggesting “role playing” involving “a hot 17-year-old.” By the time he asked if Blagojevich was “the gay governor,” the Democrat had already decided he would be having a serious talk with his aides who had set up the interview.

The television crew was from Comedy Central’s national cable program “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” which airs politically charged, totally fake news reports geared for laughs - though Blagojevich didn’t know that when he sat down with them. [...]

“The Daily Show” segment, which aired last week, pitted Blagojevich against Illinois state Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Greenville, a pharmacist who is trying to override Blagojevich’s executive order with legislation. [...]

Stephens said on Wednesday he was aware the segment was a joke when he agreed to do it. “I thought the governor was hip enough that he would have known that, too.”

Seriously: when you get out-hipped by Ron Stephens, you’ve got problems, brudda.

Does it not beggar the imagination that neither Blagojevich nor his hapless staffers understood the nature of a nationally-known political satire? Hell, I’ve never seen an episode and yet I know about it. It’s a funny enough story until you reflect on how out of touch Blagojevich and crew must be in order for this to happen. Considering Gov. Rod’s lackluster standing in the polls (39th in approval and falling), however, you can kinda see the appeal of insularity.

No comment

There are weeks when I’d be happy to never write another political post ever again. Or to read them. This is one of those weeks, I think.

It’ll pass, I’m sure.

The one lesson of Portgate that you must learn

So whether you believe that George Bush is greedily doing business with a government just two steps removed from al Qaeda, or is at the very least culpable of overall neglect when it comes to port security, this much should now be clear to every red stater from shore to shore:

The only thing that has protected the United States from a post-9/11 terrorist attack is shithouse luck. That’s all.

Unless you still believe that George is keeping you safe. George, who claims to not even have known about the sale of the ports until after the government signed off on the deal. Good luck harboring that illusion.

Note: When I talk about “overall neglect,” I’m talking about stuff like this: inadequate cargo inspection, inadequate spending on security, inadequate personnel.

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Dubai, Portgate

Is it civil war yet?

Flashpoint?

Every day - every hour - is a test for the nation of Iraq. Today, however, was something else again, and the question of whether Iraq is in the first throes of a civil war or merely being pushed to that state seems largely irrelevant. The Western media has given the bombing of the Golden Mosque the standard perfunctory attention, but the significance of this attack - taken in the wider context of religious protests and sectarian violence - will be greater than we can guess.

Every war has a flashpoint. We may have just seen it in Iraq - even if we don’t yet know exactly who set it off.

Technorati Tags: Iraq

Awfully busy

Hope to break radio silence here tomorrow.

Whittington speaks

Harry Whittington’s up, he’s out, he practically apologizes for being shot by Dick Cheney:

“My family and I are deeply sorry for everything Vice President Cheney and his family have had to deal with,” he said. “We hope that he will continue to come and seek the relaxation that he deserves.”

Never mind that what Cheney “had to deal with” was brought on by his own arrogant and evasive handling of the incident. The list of things that Cheney “deserves” may be long, but it’s not long enough to include “relaxation.”

Misplaced sympathies aside, it’s good to see Whittington up and around. That is a tough old dude.

What, no dental?

Say what you will about the murderous al Qaeda network - at least it offers employee benefits to its operatives. That’s good, because the pay is lousy. Per a West Point study:

Indeed, some of the documents used by researchers indicate that al Qaeda has vacation plans — seven days every three weeks for married members, five days a month for bachelors — and provides its members with 15 days of sick leave a year.

One document states that al Qaeda operatives must request vacation 10 weeks in advance, and another document outlines the pay scale for members: about $108 a month for married members, less if they’re single and more if they have more than one wife.

Multiple marriages are encouraged. That’s some corporate culture.

No mention of whether flex-time is available.

Technorati Tags: Terrorism, al Qaeda

Netflixed

Just as I once sneered at the invention of movable type (the original) and swore that they’d have to pry my buggy whip from my cold dead fingers, I scoffed at the advent of Netflix. What can I say? I fear change. Even after M had given a friend a subscription to the service as a holiday gift, I harrumphed. Why, there was a perfectly servicable Blockbuster a mere mile or so from my house. What did I need with newfangled electronic means of renting movies?

Well, M gave me a two-month, two-at-a-time “unlimited” subscription for V-Day - “just to try it out,” she said. And so I have, and so I now come before you with a bag full of mea culpas. Netflix is a lot of fun. Actually, it’s awesome. I had no idea. I understand now why Blockbuster is riven with fear.

Ironically, my Netflix experience begins in the wake of the “throttling” story making the rounds these days - heavy renters’ orders being delayed via a “fairness algorithm.” I’m not likely to have that happen to me, because I don’t expect to spend most of my waking hours watching DVDs. It’s more likely that I might not find myself in the mood to immediately watch a film I’d ordered a while back…but moods can change. Mine can, anyway, and frequently do. So long as I’m not being charged late fees while waiting to get psyched for X the Unknown, it’s all good.

So I’ll bet you’re burning to know what’s on my Netflix queue. No? Well, I’m going to tell you anyway:

• The Shield, Season 2, Disc 1 (already here)
• The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (should arrive today)
• Monty Python and the Holy Grail
• Night Gallery, Season 1, Disc 1
• X the Unknown
• Scarface (Pacino)
• Them! (I am so psyched)
• The Shield, Season 2, Disc 2
• The Mummy (Hammer Films with Cushing and Lee)

Yes, good times. We’ll see whether I tire of this before the two-month trial is up, or decide to plunk down cash to continue the subscription ($14.99/mo at this level).

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