![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Past Week, in Review
Feb. 13th, 2009 04:52 amLast week, got the hot water pipes in the basement insulated. Less time for the long runs of piping to heat up, while the less-chilled water is pushed through at the faucet, should produce some energy savings as well as greater convenience.
After searching for more than a week for ready-made insulation joints or, alternatively, a specially-formulated adhesive to make your own, I again found what I was looking for at The Home Depot. More evidence that the shiney, new big box, that Lowes popped up out of the former "brown field" off Midler Ave, is not really "all that."
Anyway, the project went pretty quickly after that. I used the pre-slit foam tubes that you just slip over the pipes and secure with plastic wire-ties. It ain't rocket science but, as I've learned from other projects, you can always find ways to do a more effective job more efficiently. As a result, the project looks pretty good and works pretty well.
After finishing that, I started a campaign to get Little Jay to read, and work on reading-readiness, in the evening before bedtime using some of the stuff he'd gotten for his birthday. (Grandma, Poppa and Aunt Sarah all got him stuff for that purpose, along with a few "fun" things.) And the little kid is really an eager learner as long as someone is willing to sit down and work with him.
He's especially fond of the Cars-themed book that has puzzle pieces with two-letter word endings which interlock with single letters to make new words. He's also discovered he can make other words by imagining letters not provided in the set. Which has given me some ideas for expanding the game with puzzle pieces I'll either buy or try to make.
Such a shame that, in recent months, all that potential has been set so thoughtlessly adrift in the violent and vacuous world of video games, action figures, and age-inappropriate DVDs. Which I guess would suggest that it's unreasonable to expect one empty mind (or two) to fill another. When will we ever learn?
I'm gonna grab a twenty-minute nap while my son gets ready for work. He's due in at six-thirty, my wife gets picked up an hour later and Little Jay gets dropped off at school an hour after that. Sarah would usually be in that mix but she's covering cold prep for the banquet service at the hotel tonight. Such fun. I never dreamed retirement could be so fulfilling...
After searching for more than a week for ready-made insulation joints or, alternatively, a specially-formulated adhesive to make your own, I again found what I was looking for at The Home Depot. More evidence that the shiney, new big box, that Lowes popped up out of the former "brown field" off Midler Ave, is not really "all that."
Anyway, the project went pretty quickly after that. I used the pre-slit foam tubes that you just slip over the pipes and secure with plastic wire-ties. It ain't rocket science but, as I've learned from other projects, you can always find ways to do a more effective job more efficiently. As a result, the project looks pretty good and works pretty well.
After finishing that, I started a campaign to get Little Jay to read, and work on reading-readiness, in the evening before bedtime using some of the stuff he'd gotten for his birthday. (Grandma, Poppa and Aunt Sarah all got him stuff for that purpose, along with a few "fun" things.) And the little kid is really an eager learner as long as someone is willing to sit down and work with him.
He's especially fond of the Cars-themed book that has puzzle pieces with two-letter word endings which interlock with single letters to make new words. He's also discovered he can make other words by imagining letters not provided in the set. Which has given me some ideas for expanding the game with puzzle pieces I'll either buy or try to make.
Such a shame that, in recent months, all that potential has been set so thoughtlessly adrift in the violent and vacuous world of video games, action figures, and age-inappropriate DVDs. Which I guess would suggest that it's unreasonable to expect one empty mind (or two) to fill another. When will we ever learn?
I'm gonna grab a twenty-minute nap while my son gets ready for work. He's due in at six-thirty, my wife gets picked up an hour later and Little Jay gets dropped off at school an hour after that. Sarah would usually be in that mix but she's covering cold prep for the banquet service at the hotel tonight. Such fun. I never dreamed retirement could be so fulfilling...
