Purty

Now if only it were less than $2000...

Because I'm Tired of Looking at GBox

This is from May 2001. That silver thing is a tiny foil ball, the cats' favoritest toy ever. I think she weighed about 4 lbs here, and had just been rescued from the shoulder of I-83.

Also, it's totally Caturday.

Killer App?

More like "Irritating Poking App":



And also: wow is that ugly. Of course, there's no accounting for taste; nothing could be crapper than MySpace, and look how popular that is.

Do Whatchoo Gotta Do

So the other day, when my brother and I were coming to my house back from the Senator (we watched The Bourne Ultimatum; verdict: see it, but bring some dramamine), I was pulling off 83 to make a right on North when I noticed that a Crown Vic with handicapped tags was semi-parked on my street, but was sticking out into the right lane far enough that I couldn't get by it. A jackass vendor (who has been annoying me and my neighbors for weeks, since before Artscape) was unloading bottles of water and soda from the trunk. Because the light was red, I took the opportunity to put down the passenger window and shout (politely!), "Next time, why don't you just park, instead of blocking the turn lane?"

Jackass Vendor immediately got defensive as I gestured behind him to the row of empty parking spaces (the nearest of which was about 10' away). "The light is still red!"

What followed was a legendary rhetorical exchange that featured me totally losing my temper and shouting incisive things like "YOU CAN'T PARK THERE!" as he parried with deft maneuvers like "I gotta license" (followed, inevitably, by "NOT TO PARK ILLEGALLY, YOU DON'T!). Truly the pinnacle, though, was when he pulled out his trump card: "Hey, don't hate the game... hate the game!"

This gave me pause. I rallied bravely, though, and threatened to call the cops, like the square white property owner that I am. He advised me, as apparently all morons in Baltimore have been trained to do, that I should "do what [I] gotta do". At this point, the light turned green, and the Crown Vic pulled slowly and sloppily all the way into the turn lane, made a painfully slow and boat-like right turn in front of me (I was about a foot behind them), pulled into the middle lane then back into the right lane (which I was in), was honked at by me (and thank god Fun Car has a proper German horn), wallowed back into the middle lane, and was passed by me. I circled the block to one of the spaces I had been gesturing at, called 311, and told them the short version, that I wanted them to see if Jackass Vendor actually had a license.

They took a really long time to respond, as periodically noted by me looking out the window and seeing that the JV was still there, and eventually I gave up watching, assuming that either the police were not going to respond, or they had and JV did indeed have a license. Ah well.

Several days later, the matter more or less forgotten, the craziest of my neighbors came up to me as I was leaving the house and congratulated me on getting rid of JV. "Eh?" I said (I am always on). Apparently, the police DID respond, several times (JV refused to leave when they asked him to), and finally asked to see his vendor's license, which turned out to be a license to sell water at the Greek Festival, in 2005. So, not so much with the valid. So they ran him off. Beeotch has not been back since. To which I say: "HA ha."

Good Thing...

...this didn't happen in Boston...

Soon, My Precioussssss...

I'd take an exciting action shot, but I seem to be experiencing some Groundhog Day fun because of various issues with my new toy, I mean Eminently Responsible Purchase...

When I test drove it initially, there was this annoying pulsing at low speed that they had already diagnosed as a faulty ABS speed sensor, and said they'd fix before I took it home. So I bought it, and when I picked it up, it still did it. Also, the front bumper cover had this habit of popping off at the front of the wheel well, which looked kind of ghetto. Also, the buttons on the AC console were sticky and virtually unusable. Shortly thereafter, I discovered that the screw-in part of the antenna was missing, they had put too much (and dirty) oil in it, and there was some sort of rattle from the undercarriage on rough roads. So I took it back in, gave them the litany, and rode the Metro to work.

A couple days later, after replacing a second faulty ABS speed sensor (I guess it's a good sign that they fail in pairs; not so much if they fail in fours), changing the oil, applying epoxy to the bumper cover mount, "tightening some stuff", and cleaning the AC console, they pronounced it good to go. So I took the metro back up, noticed that lo, the brakes were fixed, the oil was clean (but still too high), the bumper cover still popped off, the rattle was still there, and the AC DIDN'T FUCKING WORK.

I called them the next day to report all this, and they apologized and asked me to bring it back in. Between then and when I brought it in, the AC buttons started to mostly work, so I assume that they worked after they cleaned them. An honest mistake. Then the AC got stuck on automatic, at 72 degrees, which was fine in the face of the fact that it was over 100 several days running, but still annoying.

So yesterday morning I drove it back up there, took a tech for a brief ride (explaining that, although the AC buttons seemed mostly to be working at the moment (embarrassing!) they had not for several days. He seemed to think that the unit needed to be replaced, which, well, yeah. He heard the rattle, I explained again about the oil and the bumper cover, and then I took the metro to work.

Thus far I've heard nothing. It's lucky that I don't have to drive during the week, but I'm REALLY hoping they fix everything this time, because Fun Car Is Fun.

PS to David: it in no way looks like a Dodge Omni Aries.

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UPDATE: Good news, if somewhat slow in coming: the rattle was apparently the brake pads, which have been replaced (I'm not sure I buy this, but hey! Free brake pads!). He didn't say if they'd done anything about the loose bumper cover, but they are replacing the AC unit completely; the part arrives today and I should be able to pick up the car tomorrow. Whoo!

Fantastic

So, the crappy Home Depot ceiling lights in my parlor are... crappy. Also, because the windows in that room don't open (nor would I particularly want them to, since they are giant 1st-floor windows just above the public sidewalk), it would be nice to replace them with a couple of ceiling fans.

A caveat; the parlor is the room I am trying to keep most traditional in the house. So despite the fact that I am not ordinarily fond of fiddly metalwork or, for that matter, brass, I need something like the following contenders...











...in order of increasing wackiness, of course. I actually really like the third one, but I need at least one of them to have lights (preferably both) and I can't find a picture of that fan with a light on it.

I am ignoring the issue of cost, of course, because these are all ludicrously expensive, or at least way more than normal ceiling fans would be.

Thoughts?

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For reference, here is a very crappy shot of one of the lights that are there now... can you say "on sale at the Home Depot?"



Here's a shot of the room, with one of those lights in the background:



And yes, that is Daphne (the cat I enjoy torturing) in the bread basket. Apparently I had not yet learned to take unblurry pictures at this point, or possibly, was already drunk.