Saturday, August 29, 2009

My new red shoes

Well, made a quick get-away to Lake Huron for the day and Samson had his first exposure to a real lake. We know that he loves playing in the pools at Whiskers, but he had never seen a natural body of water before today. Samson was a little tenuous when he was first exposed to Lake Huron, but after a few minutes of barking at the waves, he absolutely loves the water.



















In the course of our visit to Lake Huron, I bought a pair of Crocs. A couple of my friends have them and I was always interested in getting a pair. Well, I found a pair that fits that were on sale (half off). How could I refuse a deal like that? I will tell you, these Crocs are comfy and they are the best beach shoes ever. They give me great support and they rinse right off. These will be my beach shoes for years to come.


Publish Post

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

18 August, 2007

For those of you who were with me two years ago today when I had my change of command and retirement ceremony, thanks for being there for one of the most important events in my life.

















It was a memorable day shared with friends and family. For those of you who were not able to attend, you missed a heck of a party!


Sunday, August 16, 2009

Final staining has begun

On Friday, a replacement closet door was delivered and I set right to work to stain it for installation. It takes about 3 days to properly stain and seal the door, so I am hoping to have the door ready for installation by Tuesday at the latest. I had no idea that this project to upgrade the closets would take close to three months!




Look for some final images after this door is installed. The transformation has been pretty amazing.

New window images

I am happy to report that my hot, dirty manwork paid off. Chris, the expert installer from Window World of West Michigan, arrived a little before 9AM and he set right to work. I showed him where the window was to go and he said to me, "Wow, thanks for clearing out the egress space for me. It will make my job a lot easier."


There are a lot of shady window sellers out there, who peddle low quality windows for high prices, or will use a bait and switch technique to sell you a window you don't need. Window World is not that kind of window seller. With this final window installation, we have replaced every window in our home with Window World Comfort windows. We also have greater comfort indoors and lower energy bills to boot!

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Hot Dirty Manwork

Tomorrow morning, the professionals from WindowWorld of West Michigan will pay us a visit and replace the egress window in our basement. An egress window is one where you can escape from the basement in the event of an emergency. The current window is drafty and as part of our overall maintenance plan, we decided to replace it with a new double paned window.



Before the new window could be installed, I had to clear out the debris that had collected there. Over the weekend, I removed all of the leaves and I was surprised to see how much organic matter and gravel still remained in the egress space. Thus, I had some hot dirty manwork to do when I got home from work.

This egress opening is a virtual magnet for leaves and other debris, so I was hoping that once I remove the leaves and other stuff, that there would not be too much else that needed to be removed. Well, I was wrong. Whomever installed this egress window must have added a couple cubic feet of gravel and stones to the bottom of the egress space. In order for the window to be installed, I needed to remove enough gravel and dirt to allow open access to the window sill. A coworker gave me a post digger, so I was able to clear out a lot of the dirt and gravel, as the egress space is too small to effectively use a shovel.

After approximately 30 minutes of digging and removing gravel and dirt, the window sill is now clear of all obstructions so the installation tomorrow should occur without a hitch. Updates to follow on the new window as conditions warrant.

Yep, it was hot dirty manwork tonight!

Sunday, August 9, 2009

SAILING, METAL FATIGUE OR JUST A COINCIDENCE?

It was a busy week at work for the General, so I let my blogging lag a bit. I will endeavor to dedicate at least a few hours per week to writing. I also feel strongly that if I have nothing to say, I should do just that: say nothing. That being said, I do have a few updates on the happenings at this magical place just East of the Equator.

Last Sunday (8/2), Deirdre's colleague Dorothy invited us to go sailing with them for a few hours. Dorothy and her husband Daryl own a 30 foot Catalina. The weather was perfect for sailing, with a strong southern wind, little to no chop in Lake Muskegon, and a clear blue sky. We drove to Muskegon where they keep their boat, and soon after we arrived, we got on board and left for a few hours of sailing. Growing up, I learned to sail at the Detroit Yacht Club, and I kept sailing on and off, ever since. I suppose my 22 years in the Navy helped a little, too! Dorthy and Daryl's son, Braden asked me to take the helm, which I happily obliged. In addition to ourselves, there were some of Deirdre's co-workers aboard, and none of them had any experience sailing, so it was up to me and Braden to keep on an "even keel" and allow the land lubbers to enjoy themselves.

Most of the 90 minutes or so we spent sailing were uneventful. With the strong southern winds, I was able to guide the boat to a respectable 4-5 knot speed through the water, and only once did things get a little interesting. I was in a broad reach heading west when a gust of wind filled the sails and in a matter of a few seconds, the sailboat went from having 0 degrees of heel to 25 degrees of starboard heel. This gust was unexpected, and my aforementioned land lubber passengers were a little startled when the boat suddenly heeled over. I steered the bow into the wind to right the sailboat, and as quickly as the heel came, it went. However, it was fun to see the look on the faces of the people in the cockpit with me as a few of them thought that the boat was going to capsize. I tacked back and forth a few times, gave Braden some lessons about the Nautical Rules of the Road and generally had a great time. We returned to the boat slip, and we then settled in for some grilled burgers and conversation. It was a great way to spend a lazy Sunday afternoon and evening.

The next issue of the week had to deal with our corkscrew. On Wednesday night, I made Chicken Cordon Bleu, and I wanted to serve a bottle of Chardonnay with the meal. I cut the foil off the top of the bottle and proceeded to work the corkscrew into the cork so I could pull it out. While I was inserting the corkscrew into the cork, I noticed that the corkscrew seemed to be twisting in an unexpected way. Undaunted, I then tried to extract the cork, but instead of removing it, the corkscrew broke off inside the cork. Thankfully, I had a back up corkscrew, so the cork was removed without incident a few moments later and we enjoyed the Chardonnay with our meal.

However, I was deeply troubled by the failure of the corkscrew. Was this failure attributable to operator error, metal fatigue from use, or was it all just a cosmic coincidence? Upon further review, I determined that the corkscrew failed due to metal fatigue. The corkscrew failed due to repeated cyclic loading. Of course, I needed to find a scapegoat, so during our visit to see Amy at Art of the Table, I confronted her with the failed corkscrew and said to her, "It is because of all of the wonderful wines you have sold to us that my corkscrew failed!" We all got quite a laugh out of it, and Amy handed me a brand spanking new corkscrew, emblazoned with the Art of the Table logo. All in all, it has been a good week.