Mostly Harmless

It’s been a quiet day today.  In a couple of minutes I’ll wake Lily up from her nap and we will get to work. The kids are asleep and I’ll get everything that we’ve carefully hidden. In case I am too busy, Merry Christmas everyone!

It snowed here Friday, so when I got home I started shoveling before I even went inside.  My driveway is on a slope so if you don’t drive an SUV (I do) then going up the ramp is a problem.

This picture is me 2 years ago when I had some forethought. Friday night I thought of that picture a lot. With some effort I was able to clear the driveway in short order.  It was messy but any car would be able to make it up that ramp.

It all was good afterwards, except Friday night and Saturday morning it snowed again and all my work was for naught.   On top of that, Saturday my back started to hurt.  Today I plan to take it easy and go outside and salt the driveway.  If I can I’ll gas up the snow thrower and see if that helps.

It will be fun but no matter how long it takes I need to clear that driveway.  The kids still have school and my folks need to be able to use their mini van.

Update: Let’s hear it for warmer weather, some rain, and Lily. She and I went out and scraped all the ice off of the driveway.

I wanted to stop much sooner but she kept us till my folks car could come and go without touching any ice.

She’s always been much more determined than I am.

We used the old tree; no one really liked the 2007 tree. Last year’s tree was pre-lit and many of the lights went out.  This one has about 20 strings of lights on it! When it gets cold it can heat up as room

I put up the branches and the lights.  Mom and the kids started putting on the decorations and then Alek came and helped finish off the tree. It’s good and the whole house is nice and in the Christmas spirit.

Naturally I took lots of pictures. You can see the set of photos on Flickr.

This morning the kids woke up to snow on the ground.  It’s still snowing lightly and after I run some errands I’ll take some pictures.

The set of First Grade 1/144 models from Hobby Search came today and my son wanted to get started.  After dinner we sat down and he got to work. I think he did pretty well for someone almost 7 years old.

All I had to do was show him how to clip the pieces off the plastic mold and make sure he followed the instructions in order.  Except for helping him with the torso, he assembled the whole thing himself.

As he got closer to completing the model he wanted to skip ahead but I was able to convince him to keep to the instructions. I know how he feels; I like to jump around too.

In the middle of assembling his model, he realized that he was working on Char’s Zaku II.  I’m working on the MG version and that got him excited. He completed his model and wants to do more.

We’ll work on a few more FG models before trying the speed grade models. He’s very proud of his work and so am I.

Today we observed the anniversary of a close relative’s death by visiting the cemetery and leaving offerings (Chinese family members).  It’s very respectful and Lily and I want our children to understand the reasons for this.

But my five year old girl is sick and the place we were going to is very cold.  She would have gotten much worse so we left her at home.  After the visit the whole family went to Flushing to eat, did some shopping and we came home around 4 P.M.

She was still upset about it.  I once again explained that where we went was very cold and she would have been miserable.  I promised that next time we go, she will come too (if she is not sick again).

She: It was very cold?

Me: Yes, windy and freezing.

She: Let’s go to a different cemetery. Once that has heating.

What could I say to that?

My soon to be 7 year old son is fascinated whenever I build a model.  He really enjoys just watching me and examining the parts I put together. It’s part of that whole son dad thing and I like him watching me too.

His school teacher wants him to work on things that have  step by step instructions to get him to work on his patience.  She knows about the models so we agreed that I would work with him on some easy models.  After looking some over with him, I ordered a set of  Speed Grade models, 2 of each, and tomorrow I’ll start one with him.

It’s going to be interesting.  I’ve explained that he will make mistakes and should not get frustrated.  He is really pumped about working with me on this.  He knows the difference between models and toys and I know he’ll work on this seriously. Today we picked up some clippers so he can remove the pieces from the mold.

These are pre-painted and meant for small kids. Once we’ve completed one I’ll post it on Flickr.

Hot and muggy summer weather does not bother me.  I once dragged Lily through Washington D.C. in 101 degree weather and did not realize she was suffering, I was fine.  Summer in Las Vegas was great with it being over 100 and no humidity.

Autumn is very cool and New York winter never gave me a problem.  I’m not saying Minnesota winter would not wipe me out, but even with cold snaps I can’t get into too much trouble weather wise.  Our winters here are just mild and lately getting milder.

The transitions are a pain.  This is damp but not wet, colder but not cold.  One day it’s summertime and spring like the next. Then back to hot followed by cool evenings.

This weather is “in between” and it always bugs me.  For the next few weeks until fall settles in, I’ll be irritated by Mother Nature’s lack of making a decision. The changes give me headaches and my muscles hurt.  I’ll be more cranky than usual.

Sigh, I’ll have to deal with it by playing with the kids more.  The girl just started kindergarten and claims she is not happy.  She likes the bus ride, that’s very cool.  But she says she does not like the work (it’s her second week).

For 3 years she attended half day pre-k and knew everyone.  There were not many girls in her school and she was treated like a princess.  Once she told me she was going to marry one of the boys in her class. When I asked about another boy, she said she’d marry that one later.

I wonder if we are raising the next Liz Taylor?

At her new school she’s just one of hundreds of kids.  It’s good for her but she needs to adjust. She will learn to make new friends and enjoy being in class. She’ll be cranky and we’ll deal with her maudlin behavior.  For now she’s just in between.

Lily went to the U.S. Open today with our son, so I took the girl to the American Air Power Museum.  She had fun and I took some good pictures.  I’ve just made this one my desktop image.

It came out much better that I thought it would.  The P-51 Glamorous Gal was not able to take off because of the weather.  That was a shame, seeing it in the air would have been awesome.  The plane was in fantastic condition.

In my closet on the ceiling, the plasterboard is soft and discolored in a small area.  Looks like a leak in the roof and there is this noise which I though was something dripping.  The noise was constant and we just figured that it was some leak from a pipe in the attic.  I had no idea why there would be a pipe there (there wasn’t) but the stain looked like water damage, so it was either a pipe or the roof.

So I go get the ladder and climbed into the attic.  I had to crawl through a small space to get to the top of my closet.  It looked bone dry and the insulation did not seem to have any mold. There was no sign that the roof was less than perfect.

So my Dad went into my closet and pushed a wooden dowel through the soft part of the ceiling.  The hole he made was around a 1/4 of inch wide if that much.

When he took the dowel out approximately 20 wasps came through that tiny hole like dive bombers. I just made an appointment for Terminex to come here TODAY.

I’m glad it’s not a roof or some mysterious non-existant pipe but now I am locked out of my room while I wait for the exterminator.

UPDATE: Well the gentleman from Terminex was here. What happened is this: by poking the small hole in the ceiling, we made a simple extermination job really, really complicated.  If we did not make that hole, then he’d have made it but would have a) covered it up and b) pumped poison into the nest and just kill them.

My closet (with it’s door closed and a towel at the bottom!) has over 100 hornets inside. So he gassed the nest from the outside and then gassed the closet.  There are a bunch of dead hornets in my bedroom.  I’m to NOT go inside that closet until FRIDAY.  At that time either things will go really well and I’ll have a lot of dead hornets to clean up, or things will be really bad.

Either way if I open up that door and a dozen or more are still alive, I’m going to get stung. Can’t wait for Lily to come back home… all of her clothing is in that closet.