Feeling Weird

I awoke this morning tired and with an odd “sinus headache” feeling. I quote the term “sinus headache” because I’ve never suffered anything quite like this before so I’m not sure about it. It feels weird and I hope my body corrects itself soon.

Today’s Personal Project
Find out if I’m going to have to do a two-car shuffle today. Even if the JacKmobile is given a clean bill of health (read below) I will probably take the Mazda camping; why not, it’s already paid for…

Today’s Daily Challenge
Share one way that you save energy in your home or at work.

The benefits of saving energy are numerous! Taking time to conserve means less contamination of our planet’s land, water, and air. Using less fossil fuel also reduces the carbon emissions that contribute to global warming. Finally, saving energy leads to lower utility bills, meaning more money for you.

I’m cheap. I wear sweaters (or sweatshirts since I am always alone). I close off my bedroom and use a space heater instead of heating the entire house.

Sticky Sensor Syndrome?
I heard from Harry at Peach Auto yesterday that they believe the root of my woes with the Jackmobile trace back to a sticky pressure sensor in/for the transmission. They ordered a new one and replaced the one the Jackmobile had. Their initial conclusion is that they fixed the (this) problem and kept the car overnight so that they could test it at highway-speeds today.

If this fixes the transmission I am going to ask them to perform an oil/oil filter change today as well.

I am super-busy today at work and already have plans for this evening (read below) so I’m going to see if they can keep the Jackmobile until Monday. If not, or if I need to pay them in order to keep the car (a practice I’ve seen some mechanics employ) I will have to do a two-car shuffle in order to get both of my cars back home (or perhaps to the office). Weeeeeeeee!

I Need A Home Makeover Show!
Or I really need to sell my house (as is). Last night I wanted to crank up the oven to reheat some ribs (unfortunately fair-tasting) that I bought at Kroger last night while doing some grocery shopping for this weekend (I still need to pick up a couple of things).

My house was build in 1956-1957 and most of the utilities within are original (I know the circuit panel was updated at some point; the kitchen sink was replaced at some point; I’ve replaced the water heater (and need to do so again), the A/C (and hope that I don’t need to do so again), and the refrigerator). However, the (bad, bad) plumbing and most fixtures are original as are the stove top and oven (two separate units).

The oven was made by a company called Caloric, which I believe was purchased by another company whose name I can’t recall in the early 1960’s; it’s gas with an accessible pilot light and a seemingly questionable heating design; it’s pretty inefficient these days. Since I haven’t used the oven in some time I was a bit reticent to do so. I turned the knob, the pilot light grew lager, but the heating element didn’t ignite. Huh. I cleaned things up a bit, and tried again. I opened the kitchen door to allow maximum ventilation and tried once more, with a slight puff into the cavity containing the heating element there was a bit of a blow back and thing immediately turned blue (this is a good sign for a gas flame). Whew.

Should I add “Renovate Kitchen” to my growing list of things to do on this house?

While I’m talking about my house I’m looking to hire someone to thoroughly clean and repaint the ironwork (railings, whatnot) on my house as it’s starting to rust. Maybe I should spend a weekend doing this as homeowner penance.

I’m A Busy, Busy Man
We are trying to wrap some stuff up (a phase of my project) at work today. I would like to get out of the office relatively early since I am double-booked for the evening.

My first stop for the evening will be the High Museum of Art for a wine tasting. I’m going to try to go to more wine tastings like I did (oh shit Barb was that nearly twelve years ago?), to learn about wine and hopefully improve my social skills.

My second stop for the evening will be the Peachtree Tavern for GASHCAT show. GASHCAT is a band From Louisiana that I heard about earlier this year and I really dig their (nearly identical to Neutral Milk Hotel) sound. From what I can gather from Peachtree Tavern’s website, because they never answered my question on Twitter and calling bars never seem to produce useful information, GASHCAT is the opening act. While this means they will be playing a shorter set than I’d like to hear it also means that I might get home at a reasonable hour tonight — which is good since I have to pack up a car with camping gear sometime tonight or tomorrow.

Stats & Goals
Daily
Current Mood – weird
Current Music – listening to a recent KEXP “Music That Matters” podcast
Website Of The Day – If you are a Mac user with a need to edit photos (or graphics) then you should be checking out Pixelmator.
Mode Of Transportation To Work – my (rental) car
Exercise (b)Log – nothing
Morning Weigh-In – not checking

Monthly
Foot Mileage – ~6.7 miles
Wheel Mileage – 0.0 miles
Pushups – 0
Situps – 0
Stairs – 0 flights

Days Of Bed-Making – 4

Vegetarian Meals – 10
Carnivorous Meals – 7
Pancakes Eaten – 0

Marta Rides To Work – 0
Bike Rides To Work – 0

November Goals
– none

2012 Goals [will be a little less fluid than last year]
– Get my weight under 200 pounds, or at least whittle myself back down to where wearing a 36″ pant size is comfortable
– Completely read ten books, audio books permissible
– Run Sharpened Stone as a real business
– Save $500 for the sole purpose of donating to charitable organizations of my choice
– Attend at least one professional photography workshop
– Ride in no fewer than five 50 mile or 50K bike rides
– Run in no fewer than one one 10K
– Submit at least one application under the name “Sharpened Stone” to Apple’s iOS store
– Restore the ITP Estate to a condition where it can be put up for sale at any time
– Buy a new iPhone (iPhone 5), a new iPad (iPad 3?), and MacBook Air [look, not all goals have to be altruistic]

The Unmeasurable
– Continue backing up all data, including the off-site storage
– Become a proficient and profitable programmer in Objective-C
– Do not create a solution for something which is not a problem
– Eat smaller portions
– Start, and continue, to make my own bread using my bread machine as well as using the technique outlined in Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking
– Read and discard magazines during the month in which they arrive (even digitally)
– See more live concerts than I did in 2011