So what does one do to celebrate the fact that one’s furnace did not require a thousand dollar repair?

How about go to New York for a day?

Sounds good to me!

We seriously dodged a bullet today.  $200 sure beats the hell out of potentially $1500 or so.

When we woke up this morning it was really cold in the house.  The furnace had quit on us over night.  Unfortunately for us the extent of my knowledge of furnaces starts and ends with, “The furnace is in the cellar.”  So I called one 24 hours on call plummer and they called me back at a little after 6:00am to tell me that they could maybe get to us by 1:00 or 2:00.  Not good, but better than nothing.  Jen got to work and started calling around for other options.  One of them said they could be at our house much earlier.  Winner!

When he got here I told him that the furnace itself was still warm to the touch, but nothing was reaching the vents upstairs.  He cracked open the blower and found that the motor was dead.  He took it out and started looking for a new one.  The prices ranged from around $500 to around $1200 or so.

Then he noticed something.  “That doesn’t look right,” he said.  He fiddled inside the motor for a second, then turned on the power and BAM!  The blower was blowing again!  It was just a nut inside that had shaken itself loose somehow and once it was back in place we had heat again.  He then gave me a quick lesson on how to change the filters (a retarded monkey could do it.  I know, because I have the IQ of a retarded monkey and I did it), charged us a minimum repair fee on top of the flat trouble shooting fee, and left like a Spiderman slinging webs and flying off into the night.  Except there were no webs, he had a van, and it was morning.  I went to Home Depot, got new filters, jammed them into place, and all is right with the world.

Bullet dodged.

Whew!

That was so awesome!

I went to the bathroom… because… ya know… sometimes you have to go to the bathroom.

I looked out the window and there were FIVE deer in the yard.  Two were eating leaves off of the storm-damage-branches that are still in the yard, three more were eating leaves off of the storm-damage-branches that I have already moved to the edge of the woods.  I grabbed my camera and ran outside!

I tried to sneak around the house on the garage side, but there was deer number six, sitting just beyond the tree line.  Sitting… like, belly on the ground all four legs curled up and sitting there.  I took two pictures but she was watching me close the whole time and I didn’t want to scare any of them away.

I snuck around to the other side of the house and tried to come at them that way.  The two who were actually in the yard saw me right away.  (it’s tough to sneak when you’re as gigantic as I am)  I managed a couple more pictures but then they ran off into the woods.  The other four joined them.  Five of them went just beyond the big pond/puddle.  The sixth stood at the edge of the water.  She stood up as tall as she could get and stared right at me and stomped her front hoof a couple of times.  Was she telling me to piss off?  I don’t know.  I crept a few inches closer, still not even into the back yard yet, and she ran around in a weird circle.  More hopped than ran.  It looked like she wasn’t using one of her front legs.  It looked strange.

When I reached the edge of the back yard they kinda calmly ran up the hill so that they were almost out of sight.  That’s when I heard a noise off to my left.  There were four more in the woods behind our little garden spot!  They ran up the hill to join the others.  Then a few seconds later, two more joined them from off to my right!

Twelve deer!

I still haven’t seen an antler, but when they were running they had their tails straight up in the air and I no longer have any doubt as to why they are called white tail deer.

That was just so cool!  I wonder if they’re back out there.  I should go look again!

Welcome to the new and improved home of Robbie’s home recordings.

We are Verizon FiOS customers and our wifi is a touch on the screwy side these days.  The router they supplied to us seems to lose the ability to broadcast every once in a while.  The one PC that is plugged directly into the router never loses internet, but all the 100 other devices do.  We’ve been good for the last half hour or so.  I’m on the Mac in the cellar right now and it’s got a strong enough signal to download Yes’ “Close to the Edge” while loading a couple of webpages in Firefox at the same time.  I hope this is a temporary thing.  I do not want to call Verizon and their world famous customer service department (sarcasm very, very much intended).

The Boston Bruins played 10 games in October.  They won three and lost seven.  Terrible.

The Boston Bruins played 13 games in November.  They won 12 and lost one in overtime.  They earned 25 out of a possible 26 points in the standings.  Holy Hockey, Batman.

When October ended they were in the cellar.  When November ended they were on top of their division and they hold the number two spot in the Eastern conference.  They passed Toronto in the Northeast division last night by Beating the Maple Leafs 6-3.  They have played Toronto three times and scored at least six goals in all three games.  The Leafs have played well against every team except the Bruins.  Just as it should be.  Tyler Seguin has four goals in three games against the Leafs this year.  Phil Kessel has two goals against the Bruins since the trade.  They both had an assist last night though.  The Bruins top line of Krejci, Lucic, and Horton was sputtering in recent games, but they came through with three goals last night.  Two for Lucic (giving him 10 on the year) and one for Krejci.

When the Bruins play as well as they have played in November, every game day feels like Christmas.  Keep it up, B’s!

Bobby Valentine?  Really, Red Sox?  You are hiring Bobby Valentine?  Like… the guy who ran the pot smoking Mets team?  Really?  The guy who let all star players stay in the locker room playing cards during a playoff elimination game?  Really?  The guy who, after getting thrown out of a game by an umpire, put on a fake mustache and snuck back into the dugout?

That clown is going to be the new manager of the Boston Red Sox?

Really?  You’re not just messing with us, are you?

How in the name of Ted Williams does this change anything?  You just had a player-friendly manager oversee the biggest September collapse in over 100 years of major league baseball, and now you’re bringing in some one who is even more of a player-friendly manager?  Even worse, he’s one of those guys who always spouts off to the press.  He’s good for a sound byte, not for righting the Red Sox ship.  Just wait until the first time he throws Josh Beckett under the bus.  He’ll be throwing 85 mph fastballs right down the middle to every hitter he faces.  Do you think Pedroia and Youkilis are going to stand for that type of crap?  Especially after all the years playing for a manager who went out of his way never to publicly criticize his players?

They need someone who will rule the locker room with an iron fist but keep it all behind closed doors.  They don’t need a clown like Bobby Valentine who will let them run amok and them publicly slam them when they have a tough day at work.

This is a really bad move.

I have to tell you, the kars4kids jingle is evil!  It’s maniacal, it’s torturous, it’s EVIL!

I have been trying new things for my morning commute.  Last week on Monday and Tuesday I thought about taking 495 to route 3 but when I got there 3 was backed up all the way to Canada.  No way, kids.  So I stayed on 495 South and took route 2 East to where it meets up with my normal route at route 126.  It worked well both days last week, but last week was Thanksgiving week and I expected the traffic to be light.  Monday was much heavier than Tuesday, but both were okay.

Yesterday I tried it again and it still worked well, but it was also the day after a long holiday weekend and I expected many people to have taken the day off.  Today, would be a decent test.  At least it would have been if not for that effing kars4kids jingle.  I was listening to sports radio this morning and just as I was reaching route 2 that horrible, evil jingle came to me over the air.  I immediately reached over and turned the radio off, but it threw my concentration off and I stupidly took the route 2 West exit instead of 2 East.  I probably drove for 5-6 miles before I noticed it.  I saw a sign for route 190 and realized how dumb I am.  After I corrected my idiotness and got back on track the traffic was about the same as last Monday.  Maybe a little heavier, but not bad.  Everything is fine until you get to the rotary in front of the Concord prison.  After that it’s slow for a few miles as you go through 3-4 stop lights, but then once I got back to route 126 everything was normal.

I do so hate that kars4kids jingle.  I hate it.  It is EVIL!

Remember how I was all happy and optimistic about cleaning the filter in the fish tank and getting a new light and all that?

This morning my lovely wife took a look and the light was off. Funny, I had turned the light on before we went to bed (day is night and night is day for our fishies) but sure enough it was out this morning.

Either the bulb blew (there is only one in the new cover, where the old one had two) or it took eight hours for the whole schlebang to burn out.

Urge to scream, rising… rising… rising…

The last weekend was so long that I can’t remember everything.  Let’s see.

On Wednesday it was mostly about preparing for Thanksgiving.  We got to sneak out and pick up the kids at school, which is always awesome.  Pies and brownies were baked and brownies were eaten.  We took the kids and their German ancestry (on their Dad’s side) to a German restaurant and I ate wiener schnitzel.  More proof that my days as a member of the picky eaters club may be coming to an end.

On Thursday we celebrated Thanksgiving.  I helped Jen with the cooking.  Mostly with the lifting as I don’t want her to hurt her back any worse than it already is, so let the big guy carry the heavy stuff.  We watched most of the Macy’s parade.  The kids proved how worldly they are.  They both commented on how the entire parade is really just one great big commercial.  They are brilliant!  The holiday feast was shared with my parents and Jen’s parents.  We all went around the table saying what we are thankful for, and we all included my mother’s health.  May the remission continue indefinitely.

On Friday Jen’s back was in really bad shape.  We were supposed to take the kids to see the new Muppet movie, but she couldn’t handle it so she stayed home.  The movie was fantastic.  We were laughing out loud all over the place.  The only down side was that Jen wasn’t there.  We made up for it a little bit by telling her every single thing that happened in the movie.  The kids went to their Dad’s for the weekend in the mid afternoon, and Jen and I went to my parents’ house so I could run a quick errand for them.  When we got home we had leftover Thanksgiving dinner.  Our microwave started acting screwy.  This becomes important later.

On Saturday Jen and I went out to breakfast and then paid another visit to my parents.  We discussed our microwave troubles and they suggested going to Dracut Appliance to look for a new one.  We checked it out, but our microwave hangs above our stove and under our cabinets and we didn’t have the measurements so it was just a browsing trip.

At first…

Our freezer is a little screwy these days too.  Come to think of it, so is our dishwasher.  Our oven is okay, although there are a couple of quirky, bothersome things about it.  By the time we left the store we were mentally remodeling the entire kitchen.  We were moving the appliances, building new cabinets, taking down the wall between the kitchen and the dining room, and pretty much redoing the whole space.  The amount of money required to pull that off is way out of our range right now so we started thinking about doing those changes a bit at a time.

On Sunday we made a trip to Home Depot.  We picked out new appliances and were all set to order them, but the oven we wanted was out of stock.  The fridge we picked is pretty simple.  It was also comparatively cheap.  We went on the website, searched for available items within the dimensions of the space our fridge is in now, and picked the one with the largest capacity in cubic feet.  So in a couple of weeks two of our wonky appliances will be replaced and we’ll be well on our way to remodeling the kitchen a bit at a time.

In the afternoon I did a little raking and Jen cooked an awesome dinner.  After that it was time for band practice number two.  We were much better this time.  Last week we picked a handful of songs to work on, and we managed to pull all of them off.  We were feeling pretty damn proud of ourselves.  After practice Jen and I had a date night planned.  The date consisted of the two of us sitting on the couch petting the cat’s belly.  Really, when the cat decides to allow you to pet her belly you really cannot refuse.  It ended up being the simplest date night ever, and it was fantastic.  I loved every second of it.  I love every second I spend with my wife.

And that, my friends, are a few of the highlights of this past holiday weekend.  I can’t wait to see what we do next.