Saturday, March 13, 2021

One Liner Alley

 On channel 258 (DirecTV) last night:

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies   

a fine piece of cinema-tology.

Saturday, March 6, 2021

Hey, it's Friday - what could go wrong?

 It seems like I am always complaining.  When the wife and I first married, I'm not sure we had problems.  Had a blow out once driving to Lubbock.  We lived in rentals and had children and barely survived monthly after bills were paid.

I remember borrowing my father-in-law's travel trailer once.  It was parked in the front yard of our rental.  I started worrying about the stuff in the septic tank.  Climbing under the trailer, I removed this plug just to see.  The entire tank emptied in our front yard.  That was a disaster I suppose.  Soap works wonders.

After moving to Ardmore, we eventually bought a nice 3 bedroom - garage converted to a Den.  I suppose we had some problems there - like termites.  I had no idea what a termite did.  The Den was eaten alive.  Some company came and fixed the little beggars.  I replaced a few pieces of sheetrock and painted.  I have no idea whether the termites ate the rest of house.  What I didn't know, didn't hurt me.

Same house, lived at the bottom of a bit of a hill surrounded by residential.  Our sewer line (why is it always sewer?) went out the east side of the house and connected to a main sewer line about 3 ft from house - y'know, that vacant area between your house and mine.  We moved to Amarillo and left the house to sell with a realtor.  It seems the city sewer stopped up 50 ft down the way and backed up into our house.  go figure.  House sold anyway.  We bought that house in the early 70s for 14,000.  I bet it sells for 150 to 200 K now.

Same house, the pipes froze under the house.  I crawled under the house with a small blow torch and defrosted the pipes.  It is a wonder I didn't burn down the house.  guess I was lucky.

Same:  the furnace sometimes chose to not turn on.  It was located in the hallway.  I would have to open the furnace door and hit a certain valve with a wrench.  Clunk.  It would start right up.  One Christmas we went home to Levelland.  When we returned the furnace had shut down.  The house was in the 30s or below.  My fish tank had an inch of ice.  I lost some of my favorite fishes then.  Sad, really.

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Everyone, who owns a house must have these same problems constantly.  We survive to complain loudly.  Did the Indians in tepees have problems?   

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So new car described in below bloggy, came with only one key.  I stopped at the ford house and ordered another on Tuesday.  They were ready on Friday to deliver the key.  I have one of those fobs  with a button start machine.   So the new key would cost about $250 or more and must be programmed.  I drove in and waited.  Waited.

I like the service guy at this Ford place.  He came and explained.  When they tried to program the new key, the car computer cried Wolf and shut down everything.  It is part of the security system.  So my car sets there - won't start - waiting for another new key to arrive.  Scary,  I could have lived with a key instead of the push button start.  Yep, I could have.   In my youth, all cars had a push button start.  You put in the key and then pushed a button.  Even earlier, the start button was located on the floor beside the clutch pedal.  You had to push on the clutch and the starter button at the same time - heel / toe,

That was my Friday's disaster.    Looking forward to tomorrow.

m

Thursday, March 4, 2021

A Misc. Thursday

 So our Texas governor has decided that masks and other restrictions have gone on long enough.  Bless his heart.  And, predictable:  Weeping people have begun to proclaim him to be a heartless, ignorant, block-headed, you name it.  C'mon folks.  The only way we are going to get back to normal is to be normal.  Everywhere I went, people were joyful - except the talking heads on TV.  Most of those don't vote in Texas.

I just had a phone call about my Discover Card.  Oh No!!  The mere fact that I don't have a Discover Card and have not had one since 1990 (true date) - that has no value.  Sold my 2014 Flex.  Starting to get calls and letters about extending the Flex's warranty.  Hopeless people.  I bet they would be mad if someone conned their grandparents out of a bunch of cash.  Stupid people.  The Discover guy was in India - betcha.

Since I bought the 2019 Flex I have been trying to rearrange that loan to another Credit Union.  Nobody is calling me back.  They are all working from home and passing the project to others who don't know what is happening.  Thus. Thus. It is a roll-your-eyes waiting thing for me.  I did receive a notice from my CRUDIT union about my credit score.  They sent me 2 different letters on the same day each with my credit score from TransUnion.  Amazing.  Not that it matters, but the 2 letters had 2 different credit scores listed.  go figure.

We spent yesterday down in the Georgetown area looking a houses - lots - other stuffs.  Our thought process is  that we are getting older and we may need to be nearer one of our permanent children.  This would mean selling this house - moving - buying another house somewhere else.  The process is all a bit long winded.  No, we found nothing that was truly interesting.  Wouldn't matter if we did.  We need to sell this house first.

A bit of advice that I learned about 1980 when we moved from Ardmore to Amarillo.  Don't buy a house while you are still selling your old house.  Sometimes things happen in the market and you will pay 2 house payment at the same time (plus utilities).  Just take that bit of advice.   The same thing applies to job searching.  Don't quit your old job before you get a new one.  With those two touches of brilliance, we move on.

In Georgetown, downtown, we picked a nice restaurant.  Went in.  No menu.  Scan the thing and see the menu online.  Wow.  The prices were high for a small restaurant.  $12 for a hamburger - sure it was a very good burger, but $12 to start?  Tea was in a small 8 oz glass.  Really.  I know I am cheap.  3 of us.  $50 total bill before the tip.  Golden Corral and CiCi's pizza are looking better all the time.

The new car ran fine.  It has some features which are new to me.  If you have these things on your cars, bless your heart.  Example:  I push the cruise control button.  A car diagram shows up on the screen with 2 white stripes in front of it.  I can adjust the white strips to 1 or 2 or 3 or 4.  This is the distance between me and and car in front of me.  If I set my car at 75 mph - and the car in front of me is going 60 mph - my car automatically slows down to 60 mph.  If I change lanes, we "wham" it back up to 75 automatically.  Marvelous.  The car has other stuff too.  Just think about the great new toys I get to mess with.  Tech is certainly moving forward.  Next thing you know, the car will be able to give me my Covid -20  shot when it's time.

later

taxes done and at the people to finalize.   ( jealous? )

Mtz

p.s. while typing this, I received 2 more calls about my credit cards.  One was for Chase bank (don't have that card) and then another general one which didn't list a specific card.  These people must be hungry.  All these phone calls do is interrupt my wife's nap time.  She is going to have a headache.  I can see it now.  Do you think these callers are really getting through to someone?  It must be paying some dividend.  Ya Think?