Category Archives: Etc.

Technical Difficulties

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I have no idea what star I was born under, but seems like it must have been hit by a meteor in the last 24 hours.  It’s been that unlucky.

Yesterday afternoon about 2 p.m., the hard drive in my laptop inexplicably died.  No funny noises, no warning signs, no blue screens of death… one minute it was working fine, and the next, it insisted that it didn’t have a hard drive at all.  At 4:30 (after getting back from getting Gamma’s drivers license) I called Dell — purveyors of the most awesome, idiot-proof warranty in the business — and they agreed to ship me a new HDD asap.  It arrived sometime before 10:30 this morning, as it was on my front porch when I returned from running errands.

I’ve been in the process of rebuilding it for the last four hours.  I’ve located most of my software CD’s, though I may have to re-purchase a few things that I’d bought via download.  I might have some of it on the backup drive, but unfortunately, one of the CD’s I can’t locate contains the software to run my backup/restore system.

I’ve lost a good bit of work, and a whole lot of personal stuff (pictures, family tree back to the 1600’s, etc.), but I’ll survive.  I can reconstruct most of it.  If nothing else, I’ve cleaned a lot of extraneous junk off my system.

*  *  *
If that wasn’t enough, yesterday’s post came up blank, except for the title.  No idea what was going on there, but I’ve reconstructed it as best I can remember.  It was probably because I wrote it from HWTFM’s old lappy, which has considerable problems of its own.

and then there were three!

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… licensed teenage drivers in my household, that is.  Gamma passed her road test with a perfect score yesterday at the Roane Co. TDOT TDOS office.  I dread getting the next insurance statement, though it could be worse:  they’re all girls, and they all have clean driving records.

We had to go to Roane County, because the backlog for appointments in Clinton was more than two weeks.  ‘Twas a good thing, though; the state trooper who served as her license examiner was the nicest fellow — calm, easygoing, just what a beginning driver needs.

Now, she’s on her first venture out without a parent in the car; she took her little sister to the pool.  How wonderful to have a child who is willing to take a younger sibling along!

It’s a new degree of freedom for me.  No longer will the "mom’s taxi" be running up the miles.   Delta will get her license just a couple of months after Gamma leaves for college, and I have two years before that happens.

ketchup time

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I’ve been gone for a week, and busy beyond belief both before and since.  So, this will be less than eloquent, but a catch-up of events to date:

  • Robertsville TSA had a great time at Nationals in Orlando, scoring several trophies and a number of finalists.  Delta was not among them, but she did learn a lot.
  • Gamma got home safely on Wednesday night.  She’s still on German time.
  • Delta and I left Islands of Adventure at 9 p.m. Wednesday, arriving at home about 7 a.m. on Thursday.  Yeah, I drove all night.  Alone.  Was tired.
  • Brother-in-law PJ arrived with his two kids about two hours after I got home on Thursday.  No rest for the wicked.
  • Although HWTFM lived alone for several years before we married, he apparently forgot how to do dishes.  Or even where the sink is.  The house was a mess.
  • We spent two days on the lake with RealtorChick and family; she is a saint for putting up with my extended crew for that long.  The fireworks were lovely from the middle of the lake.
  • PJ and pals left about 1 a.m. to head back to Maryland, but got seriously sidetracked along the way when he lost his wallet sometime in the middle of the night.  Trying to get two kids home with no cash, no cards, no driver’s license… just a checkbook and a work ID, must have been incredibly stressful.  It was stressful for me, and I wasn’t even in the car.
  • Beta’s cell phone has been shut off following repeated defiance of her curfew — by several hours each time, three days in a row.  Thursday night, she didn’t come home at all.  I’ve totally run out of ways to discipline her — no car, no cell phone… she just doesn’t care.  She’s still 17, or she’d be evicted.
  • That said, she did score a 5 on the Calculus AP exam.  Nonetheless, I’m not in a celebratory mood.

There — now that all that’s said, we can move on.

Spending five days in a luxury hotel with three young teenage girls (Delta and two classmates who needed close adult supervision) was both fun and exhausting.  The Rosen Shingle Creek is a great place for a student convention because it is secure and not within walking distance of anything (deterring kids who might be prone to wander off), but it’s definintely part of the top-of-the-line luxury mindset, where they’ll nickel and dime (and quarter) you to death.  Why is it that at any Econo Lodge (or similar budget accomodations), parking is free, wireless internet is free, and even breakfast is free?  Not at this place, though.  Parking is $8/day in the cheapest spot, internet (wireless or wired) is $10/day, and breakfast is about $20.  It’s about the same gig as the Opryland Hotel in Nashville — really nice, but there’s an extra fee for everything that others provide as a courtesy.

Given my choice of the matter, I’d always stay at Embassy Suites — comfortable, with all the amenities (usually free), and a free cocktail hour every night.  Okay, not suitable for school field trips perhaps, but still where I’d rather be.  The fact that it costs about half as much (or a third as much, if we’re talking about the Opryland) is just a bonus.

All of our separate travels are over now (except Alpha, who’s still at UGA), and our only remaining trip for the summer is to the farm.  We’ll live in the camper, cook on an open fire, and time will be largely immaterial.  Time to sleep, time to read, time to fish, time to roast marshmellows.  Time to pick fresh cherries.  Time to visit Grandma.  I’m looking forward to that one.

Sweet Sixteen

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Sweet Gamma turns sixteen today… in Berlin.

I’ve thought about her throughout the day, but it just occurred to me a few minutes ago that in almost 20 years of mothering four children, this is the first time that I’ve not had one at home to hug on her birthday.

Sixteen years ago today, I awoke in a puddle.  HWTFM, in one of his classic moments, asked if I’d wet the bed.  I told him I didn’t think so, whereupon he asked if HE’d wet the bed.  Since I was the one in the puddle, I told him I thought we were going to have a birthday party, and no one had wet the bed.  At least not in the sense he was thinking of.

He went on to work, as I suspected at that point we still had hours to spare.  Gamma was the only child born on a day other than Sunday.  After packing the few items I would need for a trip to the hospital, I decided to walk — in the air-conditioned comfort of West Town Mall, being closest to Parkwest, where I was scheduled to deliver.  I called my doctor’s office to let them know that my water had broken, and that I’d be in sometime that day… sometime when I got good and ready, that is.

I took the older two (almost two and almost four years old at that point)  to my mother’s house, and headed to the mall.  At Victoria’s Secret, I bought a new summer-weight robe for my brief stay at Parkwest, met a couple of friends, and walked around until labor pains were stopping me in my tracks every few yards.   I called HWTFM to let him know I was headed to the hospital, hopped in my little car, and zipped on over to the doc’s office.

My regular ob-gyn wasn’t on call that day, so I got his partner.  The girls in the office braced me for the fact that he was upset, having been trying to track me down all day.  Evidently, once the bag of waters has broken, they don’t want you to do anything except go to the hospital and lie there.  (Who, me?)

That should have been an indicator for me to have them call my regular doc, but I won the battle of wills that day.  Without anesthesia.

Not a great deal later, Gamma made her appearance in this world at 6 lb, 11 oz.  My smallest baby.  As was our custom, HWTFM went over to Grady’s and picked up some real supper for me, including their famous chocolate bar cake.  She was beautiful, quiet, snuggly, and perfectly healthy.

It was an excellent day.  And I’m sure that today is an excellent day — surrounded by friends, on what may be the grandest adventure of her life so far.  I miss her terribly, but as you can see from the beach picture she sent last week, she’s happy.

Today, she is also old enough to legally drink beer in Germany.   When she comes home in a few weeks, we’ll hightail it to the driver’s license office to get her ticket to ride.  Funny thing, that we allow sixteen year olds to drive but wait until 21 to drink, and in Germany, they can drink at 16 but can’t drive until 21.  At least there’s still the same 5-year separation of the two, which is probably most important.

Happy Birthday, sweet Gamma!

Out with the Old

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I haven’t written much in the past couple of weeks, as I’ve been tied up as "mechanic’s assistant" in helping HWTFM take the engine out of Beta’s 1991 Explorer.

Gotta take the old one out, before you can put a new one in.

Getting the bolts loose on a vehicle that’s been driven a hard 200k+ miles (it was a farm truck for most of its life) is tough.

When it came to the last four bolts holding the exhaust manifold on, it was worse than tough.  It was a @#$&!.

An impact wrench didn’t work.  Cheater bar didn’t work.  PB Blaster Penetrating Catalyst didn’t work.  Heating the plates with a blowtorch (to expand the plate, but not the bolt) didn’t work.

A humble little Black & Decker drimmel tool cut right through them.  Finally, the engine is out.

What a way to spend Father’s Day, eh?

Seriously, it takes a committed dad to agree to take on a project of this magnitude for any child, but especially one who isn’t even here to help (or watch, or ooh and aah at his efforts) — she’s at the beach.

HWTFM is a seriously committed dad.  It’s one of the many things that I treasure about him.  So… we’re off to visit my dad, partake of some steak, and generally admire what good fellows they are.

Wild Ideas

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5 x 8 = 40, and 4 x 10 = 40. Therefore, 5 x 8 = 4 x 10… except that five eight-hour days are more costly to operate than four ten-hour days.

The Y-12 National Security Complex implemented this schedule for salaried employees (hourly employees turned it down) a few years ago, in an effort to reduce operating costs while boosting productivity. A nice side effect is that employees save fuel, reducing their commute by 20%. The three-day weekends are pretty sweet, too. An article in the Tennessean this morning indicates that local governments and community colleges around the country are now exploring this possibility.

A few school systems nationwide have also made this transition, beginning in Southwestern states where the population density is low and students must travel great distances to school each day.

In Colorado, where state law has allowed the abbreviated week since 1980, more than a third of school districts have switched to a four-day schedule. The savings include transportation costs (reduced by 20%), utilities, and food service.

Custer School District in South Dakota has had a successful experience, while others have not.

The positives: cost savings (energy, food, fuel), improved attendance rates, longer periods of uninterrupted learning time
The negatives: long-day burnout, missing a day due to illness is a 20% greater learning loss

Note that I didn’t list child care as either a negative or a positive; for parents working a 5-day week, it does create a need. On the other hand, parents who work have often found (in the systems that have already switched) that it’s easier to find someone to keep their children for one whole day, than for a few hours after work every day.

Such a radical idea won’t work if it’s top-down, though. It would have to be something with broad parental support, and careful consideration of unintended consequences. But, it’s worth thinking and talking about.

Celebration

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Two graduated, two to go!

The shot’s a little fuzzy, but it captures the air of confidence, celebration, and enthusiasm of last Thursday night.  Beta is now a high school graduate, accepted at the university of her choice, planning to major in physics.

College will be a whole new experience for her, and likely one that she will embrace.  The concept of concentrating on what one is interested in, of being judged by mastery of material rather than quantity of homework completed, suits her just right.

This is the child about whom I received a concerned comment from a geometry teacher several years ago, notifying me that she had "a 104 test average, but a 14 homework average."  Her philosophy has always been to spend her time on what she doesn’t understand, while coasting through what she does.  Unfortunately, that doesn’t work so well where high school grades are concerned.

It does work well in most college classes.

I remember clearly how much the dynamics of our house changed two years ago, when Alpha left for college.  This Fall will also bring change, as there will only be two children at home, and only one without a driver’s license.  The younger two generally get along very well, so I foresee a bit calmer environment.

Beta has already selected a roommate, and despite the fact that they’re very different people, I think they’ve made an excellent choice. 

Congratulations, Beta… go get ’em, tiger!

Creamsicle’s Adventure

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Creamsicle is Gamma’s little orange and white cat — the runt of the litter, that Gamma received as a birthday present from her godmother three years ago. 

Creamsicle is an adventurous little cat, frequently stalking birds, squirrels, mice, and even small rabbits in our yard.  When she was not yet fully grown, we had to confine her to the house one spring, because she was darting down into a rabbit hole to steal baby bunnies.  Yet, she does not leave the yard, and is decidedly more of a house cat than an outside cat.

Yesterday evening when HWTFM went to pick Gamma up from a birthday party at Big Ed’s, Creamsicle had stowed away in his truck.  She had probably hopped through an open window to enjoy the warmth sometime in the late afternoon.  Unfortunately, when he got to Big Ed’s, the cat bolted as soon as he opened the door, running across Georgia Avenue through the parking lot and into the dense underbrush.

He went to find Gamma first (tossing a football in the Blankenship parking lot), thinking that she could better call the cat than he.  Unfortunately, too much time had gone by, and they had no idea where she went.  Delta and I arrived a few minutes later, and we searched for an hour and a half, with no luck.

Last night when I went to pick up Beta after work, Gamma and I searched some more — this time, with a flashlight, and with Dog (of whom Creamsicle is very fond).  Shining a flashlight into the woods behind a house on West Geneva Ln., we saw two glowing eyes that seemed to respond to Gamma’s call, but they would come no closer.  Gamma was ready to tear off into the ravine with a flashlight, but motherly instinct kicked in and I wouldn’t let her.  Crawling around the woods in someone’s back yard at 11 p.m. is not a good practice; doing so when there’s an obvious steep gully is an even worse idea. 

After all, we could only see the glowing eyes.  It might have been someone else’s cat or dog, a possum, a raccoon, a small fox… it wasn’t worth the risk in the dark.

I’m pretty sure Gamma cried herself to sleep, but I promised that we’d look again this morning.  And we did.  The underbrush was quite dense and filled with poison ivy, but I started from the Tennessee Avenue side of the gully, while Gamma entered the woods from the Geneva Lane side.  When I came to an old fence in the brush, I stopped to call the cat (I could have gotten over the fence, but it looked so old and brittle that I would have risked damaging it).  After just a couple of calls, Creamsicle came trotting to me.  I carried her back up to where the truck was parked on Geneva Lane, and we all came home happy.

Except HWTFM, who’s a little miffed that we missed church to find the cat. 

Shop Local

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On Friday, we stopped by a couple of stores in the Briarcliff shopping center, on the way to a friend’s house.  I noted to hubby that it sure would be nice to have a little shopping center like that — grocery store, liquor store, dry cleaners, asian restaurant — at the entrance to our neighborhood.  Or even anywhere on our end of town.

He replied that neighborhood shopping centers have mostly gone away, with all the successful stores clustered in the center of town.  But it wasn’t always that way; I remember when Oak Ridge’s neighborhood shopping centers were very much alive and well.  As a young child, I lived off Delaware Avenue; we bought most of our groceries at the Piggly Wiggly, right there in Elm Grove Center.  Now, I think it’s a karate school and a consignment store… but I’ve lived on the west end for nearly 40 years.

Part of the reason might be that in the 1960’s, fewer families had two (or more) cars.  Neighborhood centers thrived as a result.  Now, with fuel prices jumping a dime or more overnight on a regular basis, might there be a revived need for these neighborhood centers?

From the vicinity of the Roane County line in Oak Ridge, the nearest grocery store is Kroger, about five miles away.  A new grocery store on the west end of town would draw customers from half the town!  Maybe not everyone’s business in its entirety, but they would surely get some business from the majority of west-end homeowners.

Given the rise in gas prices, most people I know are trying to combine trips and drive less.  I know that I am.  While it’s painful, it’s also an opportunity for someone.

Good Reads

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I love to read. These days, much of my time is consumed by reading for information rather than for pleasure, but during a trip to Books K2, a table of "101 books to read before you die" caught my interest. Unfortunately, they don’t have the book list on their website — only in the store.

Noting that I’d already read quite a few of the works so designated, it seemed likely that the rest would be equally worthwhile. I picked up a copy of Wicked, the life story of the Wicked Witch of the West from Baum’s Wizard of Oz. Wow — it’s exemplifies the saying "there are two sides to every story," but also introduces a host of social commentary.

Admittedly, when I bought it, I thought it might also keep Delta occupied for a day or two (her book habit is voracious), but it’s really not a tale for children. Perhaps in a few more years.

Lacking the time to read as much as I would like, a distant second is audio books, downloaded and played through my iPod. That way, I can enjoy good books while doing other things (driving, cooking, sewing, folding endless baskets of laundry). Currently, I’m making my way through another of the books on the 101 list: Pillars of the earth. It’s a long one that will keep me interested through the long list of domestic chores on my list this month.

Listening is not as much fun as reading, but it does allow me to do two things at once, and to get more enjoyment out of whatever task is keeping my hands and eyes busy. For those of us who drive long distances several times per year, Audible.com is an excellent resource.

Now, on to work — but have a little fun where you can!