E:/LETTERS/JANBAN11.TXT 3 January 2011 Good news: the thaw and re-freeze left the lake smooth and slick. Bad news: there is a lot of open water. Good news: it's supposed to remain below freezing to the end of the week. Thought there was good news in that our open streak was in front of the park, suggesting that the creek was flowing in that direction. Then I remembered that the sandbar the creek left while flowing our way is all above water now -- and then I noticed that the open streak also extends in front of us. The open water is a beautiful shade of blue in the morning sun. --------------------------------- Grumble, gripe, snarl, snap, etc. Today was a beautiful day for a bike ride, and might be the last nice day for a while -- It *is* January. And my book was due at the library today, no more extensions, so I had to go in and confess to losing it. (To my surprise, the fine was only $25; I guess great classics are easy to replace.) So I figured I'd drop some magazines off at the emergency room, take a ride on the boardwalk, take care of business at the library, and then Go Someplace. Perhaps to Walmart, perhaps to the mexican supermarket on Lake Street, maybe around the south end of Winona Lake. It has been quite a while since I pumped up my tires, so I figured I'd better top them off, just in case they weren't hard enough. It seems that the rubber in the pump's chuck has finally given up the ghost. After many, many efforts I managed to get the chuck onto the valve in a position that didn't let air out -- but absolutely nothing would persuade the pump to put the pressure it had let out back in. I was particularly disgruntled because the pressure had been high enough before I started fooling around. It wasn't until I was in Walmart, grumbling that this was the second time a pump had done that to me, that I remembered that I have a frame pump. More disgruntlement: when I stopped at the Trailhouse to order a new Joe Blow (or a repair kit for the old one), there was a sign on the door that they are closed until Wednesday. And, of course, I didn't find one single thing on my list at Walmart. With the exception of the watch, I couldn't even find the correct department to verify that they didn't have it. Yes, there are signs of all sorts all over, but those don't actually help unless you go to the store frequently and know what's there to be hunted out. They need a map posted somewhere, or a computer where you can check the inventory. Inventory guides were a solved problem before the end of the last century. (Though I do remember visiting a library that was an early adopter -- the programmer of that one didn't even know what "algorithm" meant.) I did pick up a packet of "basting pins" while checking out the craft section. I paid a few cents extra for brass- colored pins to make it easy to pick a big safety pin out of the box. I suppose that's why the smallest size of safety pins used to be brass colored. [I was much surprised, when I opened the package, to put a pin on a magnet and see it fall off. Could it be that "brass" means "brass" and not "brass colored"?] 4 January 2011 Decided to wash today, and that hasn't worked out much better: On the last wring of the first load, the water came up in the shower and the bathtub. A lot more in the shower than in the bathtub even though it's farther from the washer. (Reality check: farther as the housewife walks, but if measured through the walls, closer.) Could have been a lot worse; it was the last half of the last wring -- and we could have found out about the clog by flushing. And it's draining enough to make it safe to wash hands etc. When Dave reported that the handyman couldn't get here until afternoon, I said "It isn't particularly urgent" -- that was before I didn't flush. Much puzzlement over where the blockage might be, but Billy (Billy Goat Handyman) happened to notice something white in the flower bed, brushed the dirt off it, and found a clean-out port for the sewer line. He said there was a clump of roots about forty feet from the house. So now it's all draining freely, and it was done in time for me to run the second load of wash. Despite the wind, I hung the sheet on the line -- it was frozen before I got it all pinned. I took it in still damp. Haven't cleaned the tub and shower yet. 6 January 2011 Now I have. Shower still needs Lime-Away and other drastic measures, as we've been using Clean Shower instead of scrubbing for a long time. There's a dusting of snow on the ground, and all the lake I can see from here is white. Might be some blue around the drain outlet at the end I can't see. Though it's so overcast that it's more likely to be wrinkled gray. I closed the curtains after I dressed -- Al is still sacked out. Yesterday Dave found him on the doormat staring soulfully through the patio door, when it had been at least half an hour since he'd had a chance to sneak out. He spent the rest of the afternoon curled up on the bed, then walked out to the living-room patio door, stopping in the kitchen for a rest. Later I kicked the large sheet of crumpled paper we'd left for him after Dave unpacked a package; he came alert, checked out its rustling properties, found a cat-sized crumple, and curled up for another nap. I'm going to Aldi this morning. Yesterday morning I walked to the church because I'd forgotten to clean the fridges Tuesday night. Stopped at the Trailhouse to buy a new floor pump, but the sign saying "closed until January 5" was still up. I stopped again on the way back, in case they meant to open at noon, but it was still closed. If they are closed again today, I'll authorize Dave to get it from Amazon. I did get two fast fifties at the ATM, so I accomplished two-thirds of my errands. 7 January 2011 To Aldi yesterday, but forgot to check the Trailhouse. Orientation for my license class tomorrow; the classes themselves start at eight, but this meeting is at ten, and only two hours. Googled, and it appears that the "DHS grant" that pays for tuition, books, and lunch comes from the Department of Homeland Security. Filtered through the local ham club, who are putting a lot of unpaid labor into this. Just as I was about to lie down for a nap, Dave said that the new freezer would arrive in half an hour -- delivery had been delayed to give us time to get the stuff out of the old freezer. It's going to take a while for me to learn where I put everything. I left the dry cereal on the table in the sack I brought it home from Aldi in; it's quite cold in the garage now that the furnace doesn't leak heat. When I find out where stuff is, it will stay there. The freezer came with dividers like the dividers in old-time ice-cube trays. And three plastic baskets. I don't know where to put the clothes pins we used to clip to one of the wire baskets. Guess we'll just have to go to the clothespin bag each time we want to close a newly-opened bag. I usually bring them into the house to open anyway. Didn't sort the flour, but it's all in one bin now. Al is still sacked out. He never did get to play with his paper; yesterday Dave used it as a mask while painting the quarter-round on his new desk-shelf, then threw it out. I hope I remember to drop a sheet of tissue paper on him when he wakes up. Time for bed. Got a little sewing done today: I "darned" my new cotton pantihose by running a thread around the hole and puckering it closed, then I got a start on sewing pink bands to one of my linen sheets. I don't have to get to school until ten, but I'll still have to get up early. I usually sleep until after nine, and it's going to take a while to scrape the ice off the car. Falling snow was melting on the windows when I parked it after going to Aldi. Cleaning it before going to Aldi was easy -- it had been well below freezing when the snow started, so nothing stuck. But it kept coming down -- main reason I didn't stop at Aunt Millie's is that I didn't want to clean the car a fourth time. I'd gone to Big R, but didn't find either socks or ground corncobs. Forgot that I could use a third pair of black pants. Also looked for cheap gloves, but I got my last pair on clearance, so I don't expect they'll be back until next fall. I dropped one black glove on a previous trip to Aldi. Kept superstitiously keeping track of the gray pair that belongs in the glove box. And kept the emergency keys to the car pinned to my clothes. You'd think I'd have found out which pocket I left my car keys in by now! 10 January 2011 Dave has ordered a Joe Blow pump on the Internet. Should get here Wednesday. I've got the book and the URL, but haven't begun my homework. Went to the ladies' room at break and thought that you could tell who paid for the Orthopedic Capital Center. I haven't seen a handicap stall like that anywhere but the hospital, and the regular booths have two grab bars each and are big enough that you could get a walker in if the door opened out. (I don't understand this obsession with having stall doors open in -- even when the stall is so small that the door barely clears the toilet.) Noticed a staircase, decided to get a little exercise, found a mezzanine around the gym that takes up the majority of the building. Now I knew that various athletic events take place at the OCC, but it hadn't quite gotten through my head that the place is a fieldhouse; I was thinking of it as a convention center. I also found a padded bench where I could do my stretches. Looked down and saw a small group of people on the other side of the basketball floor being addressed by, I presume, their coach. Reflected that if I could see them, they could see me, further reflected that they were athletes and would know what was going on -- but they disappeared behind the -- parapet? -- when I lay down. And I don't think any of them were looking up anyway. I also learned that I'll need to bring tea when I go to stay the whole day; there were three pots of coffee, but no hot water. We still have the quart Thermos Dave used to take to school when he was teaching. It's stainless steel, so I suppose it still works. The two-hour class didn't seem all that stressful, but I slept the whole afternoon. I don't recall what I did with yesterday. Today I darned my new cotton pantyhose (again!), ran a load of wash, hemmed pink bands to sew onto a linen sheet, and ran out after supper to put seventy-two dollars worth of groceries into one of those little short-wheelbase carts. Dave had an exciting day -- the last rinse of the load of wash came up in the shower and bathtub again. At least this time the water was clean! So he called the handyman, who arrived during my nap. He brought a longer whatever it is they clean drains out with this time, and said that if there's a next time, he'll bring a colleague with a robot camera. He also said that there was a brief fad for cardboard sewer pipe about the time the house was built. I sure hope our builder wasn't one of those who used it! 11 January 2011 We've seen ice fishermen a couple of times, but none today. Well, none that I know of; the snow is coming down so thick that I can barely see to this side of the lake -- and if any fishing shacks are out there, they are *white*. Thirty-two of the Christmas letters are in the mailbox. Three more are waiting for stamps. I skipped the cards! 2 January 2011 On first rising, I noticed that Al's dish was empty, diverted to the kitchen to fetch the coffee can of dry food, and in the hallway the furnace blower wasn't just loud, it was howling. Which caused me to think that I had a clue as to why we've been waking up at eight thirty instead of nine. Perhaps I should set the thermostat instead of the alarm clock when classes start! One fishing shelter was on the ice when we woke up. Haven't seen anybody skating this year, and skaters have been rare in recent years. I was thinking that rollerblading would keep the kids in shape, but then thought that rollerblading might be the problem: keeping a growing child in skates is expensive, particularly now that the handmedown networks have unraveled, and being able to rollerblade most of the year would reduce the whine level on the few days a year that skating is possible. And I hardly ever walk along the canal, where it's possible to shovel off a hockey rink. I suppose I could go that way on my way to church this morning; I looked out yesterday and said "no way I'm walking up that hill after dark", but the fridges should be inspected before the supper tonight. I did refill the ice trays last Sunday -- after church, the upstairs ladies' room was full, so I kept on going and looped back through the basement to get to the other one, and that took me past the kitchen, so I thought I might as well glance at the fridges, and as long as I'm in here . . . Yesterday I spent a few minutes picking out the ends of the hems of the sheet I'm about to sew pink bands to. Should you be curious, I'm keeping a diary of the process on the Rough Sewing page -- the link is at the bottom of the list of techniques in the Plain Text section of the Table of Contents. 3 January 2011 A quiet day at home. Canned soup for supper -- Aldi's clam chowder is better than the fancier brand we ate a few days ago, which annoyed me -- I don't like clams. I made a little progress on the sheets, cleaned up some papers that had been on the floor for years, in a spot I couldn't get at until I cleared out for the duct cleaners. The papers are now on the foot locker, but there ain't nigh as many as there was a while ago. Found my "portable desk" among them -- letterhead and various kinds of paper sandwiched between two letter-sized sheets of corrugated cardboard, stuffed into a form-fitting plastic bag. I put it into my attache' case. 14 January 2011 Marinated duck breast, baked by a recipe for Zuni chicken, with box mashed potatoes and canned creamed corn. Sewed pink bands onto a sheet; now all I need is to repair the hems at the corners. Time to start on the remaining two sheets, but both are on the bed. Needed zig-zag for the mock-fell seam, so I swept the sewing room, brought the Necchi back in, and set it up. Found the GEAR '89 Saratoga clothespin in the process: when I dropped it behind the sewing machine, it landed on the shelf of the table. I wonder when and where my car keys will turn up. And Dave's black NSVFD coat. He misses the mittens that are in its pocket. I intend to start on my homework as soon as I record this entry. There's a sound CD with the book; says it runs sixty-three minutes. I am *not* looking forward to playing it. 15 January 2011 My Joe Blow floor pump came last Wednesday, and I promptly topped off my tires -- after a couple of contretemps. Tried to put the chuck on the front tire with Presta already selected -- it has to be in neutral -- and like to never figured out how to fit the chuck between the spokes in back. Still haven't found the box of Presta caps. Al is curled up on a sheet -- the one on the ironing board. I said "Aw" and thought I'd start on the remaining four bands instead of finishing the corners of the sheet he's sleeping on -- but the first step requires the ironing board. So I resumed work on the embroidered poncho shirt, attempting to take photographs to document the procedure. I really, really wish digital cameras had been invented. I don't call a camera invented until you can pick it up and take a picture with it. I finally got five pictures. Whether any of them are of usable quality, I won't know until it's too late to re-shoot -- just like the film days. Of course that part isn't the camera's fault -- it's the fault of needing to borrow a computer that's in use by its rightful owner. Meanwhile, Al got off the ironing board to investigate the proceedings in the kitchen, so I'll finish the sheet and start the four others. Can't go beyond separating the bands and pressing creases into them today, because both of the sheets I want to modify are on the bed. I never get that much done in a day anyway. 16 January 2011 Worked on my poncho shirt instead, and decided to leave the four bands all in one piece until they are wanted -- easier to keep track of them. Written after church: Sparkling-fresh layer of snow on everything, but no current precipitation. I was overdressed on the way home from church, and took my coat off in the driveway. Slept late, got my signals crossed and put on sweat pants intending to wear my shawl, then put on a different dress that requires my long coat, didn't think quick enough to pull off the pants. And the easiest way to carry them home after the service was to put them back on. Rather depressing sermon about persecution -- with real- life examples. Didn't help that I know that there are much worse incidents than those he mentioned. If the roads are still clear tomorrow, I plan to go for a bike ride. And buy eggs and cat food. And bread. Wanting to go in all directions: bread is east, cat food is north . . . I guess there isn't anything west that I can't get at Owen's; I could go out Harrison and come back by 250 East. Evening: The weather forecast says that tomorrow I don't want to go anywhere by bike, and not very far by car. Homework is not going well. My eyes glaze over when I see a table; my conscious mind may know that I need this data, but the organizing bit of the brain classes it as "look it up when needed; don't clutter long-term memory". The practice tests help; a bit put to use tends to stick. It was from the test, not the book that I learned that meters equal 300 divided by megaherz -- mainly because soon after guessing correctly on that question, I answered two other questions with its aid. Some of the questions are giggles: "Which voice mode is most popular: AM, FM, SSB, PM", some require you to know the principle, calculate the answer in meters, then convert meters to inches. I tried the Extra Class exam just for fun: though I got nearly half the answers, on most of the rest I couldn't even read the questions. Dave remains confident that I could go to Extra in one swell foop if I put my mind to it. He doesn't quite grasp that I don't have the Velcro for most of it. Velcro is a term I picked up from an article about a fellow who trains managers -- he said that he prefers that his students have some managing experience so that they will have mental Velcro -- pre-existing information to which the new information can be attached. Dave is more excited about this than I am -- he's refurbishing my hand-held and shopping for a microphone. If I learn how to trigger a patch with my hand-held, maybe I won't have to take up cell-toting after all. A hand-held, at least, has some use while I'm waiting around for an emergency. I won't consider cell phones invented until some model is as convenient as the dime I used to carry. They've done pretty well on the "small enough to carry at all times" front; if phones were any smaller, you couldn't dial them. I suppose one could come apart into an earpiece, a mike, and a pick for poking buttons, all tethered together in case you drop one. The pick could be part of the half that didn't have the buttons. By George, that could actually work! 17 January 2011 On the way back from the grocery this morning, I *finally* remembered to stop at the post office. It Martin Luther King Day. Dave added "potatoes" to my shopping list, so I bought a small steak. A nicely gristly one, which I grilled on the electric griddle. There was plenty of non-gristle for Dave, and I didn't see him reach for the steak sauce. Zapped the potato on "pot 1" and then gave it two extra minutes, but it wasn't quite enough. Next potato I'll zap on "pot 2". Didn't touch my sewing today, but I scaled (and in one case cropped) the pictures I took of the poncho shirt and copied them to my computer. Haven't written comments. 18 January 2011 When the soap was spinning out of the second load of wash, I heard the familiar ominous gurgling. Dave called Billy Derosset and he said he'd call the robot-camera guy. And before I hung a sheet from the first load on the shower-curtain rod, I had scoured the tub with Ajax with bleach. Mama once said that it's no trouble carrying water into the house in buckets, it's carrying it out again that gets you down. And oh, 'tis true, 'tis true. Pity we don't have an outhouse. (That would cause a few cases of apoplexy, I'm sure. Will take the camera guy a while to get around to us; in the meanwhile, Billy pulled a big wad of hair out of the sewer line, so we can at least flush while waiting. The camera is even more science-fictional than I thought: it will cost only $180. Of course, it's also sfnal to say "only" $180. Dave said that Billy said that there might be another clean-out port buried in the lawn. If so, the camera will find it. It was warm today, so all the ice and snow is very slick, so I declined to go to Handwork Circle. I can take care of the fridges in the morning -- and buy stamps too. 19 January 2011 Camera work done -- not a robot, a camera and light pushed in on a stiff cable that looks like heavy-duty drop cord. And shaped to be easier to pull out than to push in. He'll be back Monday or Tuesday to put in a new line. Well, *he* won't; he'll be in Haiti. Two of his employees. It's comforting that he thinks it's a simple- enough job to delegate, but you never know what's down there until you dig it up. There wasn't a second clean-out port, unless it was hidden in the really-big mass of roots, but there will be! In retrospect, I'm surprised that the camera cable isn't marked every ten feet. I walked to church by way of the post office this morning. Finally got the last three Christmas letters in the mail. 22 January 2011 No more need for the mirror! I've been wanting a shelf for Al under the sewing-room window, and thinking that the table under my computer would be just perfect, and reflecting that now that I have a flat- screen monitor, there is room for a computer on the monitor stand. Today I dropped one of my #10 (invisible-small) needles while my hand was over the furnace vent -- brought in a powerful shop magnet, but no luck -- and now the vent is under the little table that Dave's dad made. As an unforeseen side effect, it is now possible to see both sides of my computer. Not only no more need for the mirror on the wall, I might sometime dare to pull my thumb drive out of the USB port -- it's now possible to put it back! 23 January 2011 I think I've mastered the art of plugging in a data cable that I can see. Got over putting it in upside down the third or fourth time. I may need to move the mirror -- the light on the E/F drive is on the side next the wall. Just noticed: the mouse cable, which is white, passes behind the thumb drive. Never mind. I've never noticed whether the light goes out when I shut the computer down. My otherwise-excellent textbook commits a mortal sin. Gordo noticed that in the current question pool, it just happens that all the numbers that you are supposed to divide by are smaller than the numbers that they are to be divided into. Now it would be reasonable to pass this tidbit along -- BUT NOT IN THE TONE OF VOICE HE USES FOR CALLING THE READER'S ATTENTION TO LAWS OF NATURE. Somebody is going to have to spend great pain and effort un-learning that the little number always goes into the big one. He also appears to have failed to notice that *all* the numbers have been chosen to be easy to calculate in your head. For example, the last problem I worked (I forget whether in the book on or the practice tests at www.aa9pw.com) called for dividing 240 by 24. Attended a Fellowship Committee meeting after church, and came away without being appointed chairman. Candy wasn't so lucky. She's seriously overbooked; hope she delegates a lot. I'm not in serious danger. Everyone knows that I'm disorganized and forgetful, and have no leadership ability. Which reminds me that I ought, at least, to create a new poster for Handwork Circle. Cain't find clip art -- it was true in clip-book days that the more art you have, the less you have to use, and with the whole Web to choose from, I have none at all. I wish Dover hadn't given up listing clip art by artist; Ed Sibbut's work was always usable. 24 January 2011 When estimating the job, Steve said that it might take two days, but it was no sooner than 9:30 when the guys unloaded the backhoe, and when I looked out and said "oh, man, they are already halfway to the street" it was 10:09. They are laying the pipe as they go, so when they get to the street it will be time to use the bulldozer end to put the dirt back into the trench. Of course, they can still dig up something unexpected. The trench does appear to be headed for our water meter. And this perspective probably exaggerates the length of the part dug up. I'm collecting hand-wash water in a bucket, but if the job is finished before the buckets are full, we won't have to carry it out. At one point along the ridge of dirt, three chunks of frost layer have fallen out of the pile in such fashion as to make it look for all the world as though they had dug up a sidewalk. Had me going for a minute when I first noticed them. 10:47 -- they've run out of pipe and are going back to the shop for more. But he said that they've reached the new pipe that, we presume, was installed when the road crew broke our sewer line. The second clean-out port is to be installed at the other end instead of in the middle -- looking at the new port at this end suggests to me that it's easier to stick it in where you have to join two dissimilar pipes anyway. Anyhow, when the boy -- no names on these jackets, or I didn't see it -- told me where he was going to put the clean-out, he seemed to think he might be the one who had to put an auger through it, so I suppose it's all right. 12:35 -- that really was concrete I saw -- a piece of old foundation. Dave said he said there was a really-big piece down there, but they couldn't budge it and it wasn't in the way, so they left it. 25 January 2011 Major shopping tour this morning -- I went to Owen's for soda, Aldi for crackers, and Aunt Millie's for bread. Aunt Millie was mostly out of everything but loaf bread. There were some english muffins, and I snitched some bagels out of the restocking cart. Dave had eaten lunch by the time I got back. I zapped a Santa Fe Style Beans and Rice Entree that I'd bought at Aldi; I could taste hot pepper, but otherwise it was devoid of seasoning, so I added some bacon grease and a pinch of smoked salt. Then I slept until it was time to go to Greek's Pizza, We were a tad later than we meant to be, but were still the first customers. Going out to eat is more fun if you dress up a little; I thought wearing my cleaner pair of everyday pants was sufficient, but it is missing a vital hook, so I threw it onto the ironing board and put on my wool pants. Guess what was in the pocket? Now the question is, when did I drive the car wearing dressy pants? I wear my brown wool pants only when Dave is driving. I dripped pizza sauce on my last halfway-decent T-shirt. Rubbed it with soap and threw it into the laundry when I got home; found a lot of subtler stains when I looked at it, and rubbed them too. We had a medium sausage, mushroom, and onion and liked it very much. We ate the whole thing, and foraged among the warts on the serving platter for crumbs. Last night I finally listened to the CD, and got the neckline of my new poncho shirt more than half stitched in the process (though I'm going to have to pick out one corner of the slit and do it over). Listening was less taxing than I thought it would be; when the record ended, I waited a while for the next track to start. But it was rather heavy on gosh-wow and very light on "here's what it sounds like". I'll click one of the other choices of media player should I listen to another; Windows Media Player is simple to operate by virtue of giving you no choices; there wasn't even a hint of a way to note where you left off and take it up again later. One can jump from track to track, but it doesn't tell you which track you are on. I have, by the way, been passing the practice test every time for some time. A disturbing number of wrong answers, but within the tolerance. Did I ever mention that Dave solved the clothes-pin problem by putting the wire basket that had the clothes pins on it on top of the cabinet next to the freezer? Dispenses clothes pins, and keeps stuff from falling off the cabinet. The dolly Dave made for his computer went into service today. He really enjoys his new built-in desk, but is in a quandary as to what to do with his old desk, which is too nice to get rid of and too big to keep. 26 January 2011 Didn't do any homework today -- I think I did take a practice test. Whether I last tested today or yesterday, I missed only two, and one of those was from accidentally hitting the arrow key, which moves your tick from one radio button to the next. I don't think *that* mistake will happen on the paper test! But I don't know for sure we won't be ushered into a computer lab for the exam. Did a couple of loads of wash: the new sewer works fine. After the banner meeting, I devilled six eggs with devilled ham, inspired by the "double devil" recipe in a book Dave bought. I missed putting the olive-slice garnish on one; perhaps I should go eat it. Dave bought a couple of desk grommets to route cables through his shelf. 27 January 2011 It's a disadvantage of the new arrangement that I have to think about grounding myself before I touch the computer. When I had to grope about the back, grounding happened automatically when I put my hand on the printer stand for balance. A while back, I found a pair of red gloves in the Manager's Special bin at Owen's, put them into the glove box in the car, and put the gray gloves into the pocket of my red coat. I think of acrylic fitzal gloves as fifty-cent gloves, but the red ones were a dollar. I passed a general-class practice test this evening! It was mostly a lucky choice of questions, but there was a little learning involved -- I'd looked up "Beverage Antenna" in Wikipedia after taking another practice test. 30 January 2011 I passed another General-class practice exam today! One of the wrong answers to "What is one use for a Beverage antenna" was "Portable direction finder". The Beverage antenna is very directional -- to find out why I'm giggling, you'll have to look up "Beverage Antenna" the way I did. (Before I looked it up, an Extra I won't name speculated that it might be an antenna made of beverage cans. Which we both found amusing.) And now I see Marvin the Martian waving an illudium PSK31 space modulator, and can't remember what number did follow the "Q" in the Bugs Bunny cartoons. (Looks up PSK31 to make sure it's 31, learns enough about Phase Shift Keying at 31 baud to make Marvin fade away.) 31 January 2011 I've taken to keeping Wikipedia open in another tab while taking practice exams. Another giggle from the Technician exam: Q: why are UHF signals rarely heard outside the local area? Answer B: The FCC forbids them to travel more than fifty miles. But this is the one I *really* like: Which of these meters could you use to determine whether a feedline and antenna are properly matched? A) voltmeter B) ohmmeter C) directional wattmeter D) iambic pentameter ------------------------------------- While getting the newly-made bed ready to be occupied tonight, I took all the pillows off the cedar chest and noticed that there is a suitcase under them. Inside the suitcase are a number of things that I've been looking for for *months*. I'll unpack and list them tomorrow -- but I'm pretty sure Dave's black NSVFD coat isn't in there. (It wouldn't fit, and has been seen since the last time I saw that suitcase.) All reports say that tomorrow will be a splendid day to stay home and wash clothes. I've put the pillowcases and some other bleachables in to soak overnight. I took my Tuesday night walk this morning, and finished tracing the hand on the Stop! banner after wiping the fridges and re-filling the ice trays. 1 February 2011 After three O'clock and the storm is just getting started. Rumor has it that the library is closed for the next three days. 2 February 2011 Bright and sunny, substantial fresh snow on the ground. As I was filling up the wastebasket beside the keyboard, I was thinking "Ack! I should have stocked up on tissues when I was at Aldi.", but there are four boxes, plus a "boutique" box in the cupboard in addition to the boxes scattered all over the house, so I think we'll last. And if it doesn't, there's an un-opened package of Aldi's cheapest paper napkins. So far it's only draining sinuses. Once again, I hemmed the banners on Wednesday morning. Or put the rod pockets in, depending on your point of view. The pockets on the "world is a village" banners are a tad narrow, so I made these three inches wide -- but I'm not at all sure I didn't use that same bit of card to measure the previous banners. I'm always forgetting how wide the previous pockets were, and they are up high on the wall and I can't measure them, so I'm recording it here. 3 February 2011 Got my teeth cleaned and X-rayed this morning. I'm going to have to go back in March to have a cavity filled. Nobody else came to Banner-Making, which didn't surprise me. I ironed the banners and hung them over the banner board, then went to the kitchen to re-fill the ice-cube trays. Whereupon I wiped the gaskets of the fridges, suited up, and left without even looking at the ice-cube trays. Pretty nice walk, except for our driveway. I was a little uneasy driving over it with the truck in four-wheel drive this morning! Easier to keep straight coming back -- practice, more snow flattened, or a little of each, I suppose. Opened the suitcase: My red linen scarf, a pair of maroon furoshikis (24" handkerchiefs), two bra handkerchiefs, my yellow nylon poncho, a pair of shoe bags (I think I'll leave those in the suitcase), a pair of traveller's sewing birds (ditto), the missing silk undershirt, three paperback books, a golf pencil, a yellow furoshiki, three pairs of socks wrapped in a yellow bandanna, a ball of alpaca yarn with two #000 knitting needles and a swatch, wrapped in a black furoshiki, the other ball of alpaca yarn with a sock cast onto three #00 needles wrapped in a yellow bandanna. Alas, no sign of the missing persian wool. Nor did it contain my orange cotton- linen scarf. 5 February 2011 Just realized that this is the January issue. Well, I've got some extra time to wrap it up and mail it today. The weather got so threatening that the students were sent home early. Which is aggravating -- I got home in plenty of time to take my afternoon nap, but I'd tanked up on tea all through the morning on the assumption that I'd be there until five! But with all the excitement, I think maybe I can nap after all. And there was a full mug of tea left in the one- quart thermos. I used only one tea bag, since I was going to leave it in all day. I must say that a dry tea bag is much easier to get into a thermos than a wet tea bag is to get out! I wanted to take a little bottle of lime juice for the tea, thought I'd better put it into a plastic bag with a bottle of ice -- happened to have a 250 milliliter bottle in the freezer -- decided that if I was taking a refrigerated bag I might as well put in a few fruit-and-nut bars in case I didn't have time for breakfast -- and I didn't, but I ate a doughnut instead of my ration bars. Doughnuts aren't nearly as good as I remembered them. Tasted as though it had been made with cake flour and baking powder. Then in the morning, I took the bag out of the freezer, plopped it into my bag, remembered that there was a single- serving bottle with a little frozen milk in it that ought to be used up, filled it with milk and put it in the bag too -- and ran off without my lime juice. There was orange juice on the snack bar, but that doesn't turn tea into cold medicine. I think it must be nap time, because I can't remember what the next paragraph was meant to be. 7 February 2011 Oops! I forgot to put onion wedges in the mixed vegetables baked under duck fritters that I'm making for supper tonight. When I took stuff out of my bag at class yesterday, I saw that I'd brought the book I won as a door prize on Saturday instead of the textbook. I swear, I distinctly saw the fifties-era graphics with the neon letters. So I put it back into the attache' case, and we referred to the book a *lot*. Then when I got home, I unpacked the bag to show Dave how stupid I'd been -- and it was the textbook. Still haven't found _Bleak House_, either. Could I have left it in a waiting room? There was a basketball game going on during class time, so I couldn't use my bench for stretches, but I made a vertical loop up the back staircase and down the front staircase during one of the breaks. During class, I carried Dave's cell phone in a passport pocket quite conveniently, and he says that it costs only a hundred dollars a year. I said that that would work out to twenty dollars a call, but I suppose that if I had a phone on me all the time, I'd find uses for it. Besides which, I'd not be paying for calls, I'd be paying for insurance. I'm going to send this mess tonight, so you'll have to wait until March to find out whether I passed the test. I've already signed up for the General class: orientation in March, class meetings and exam in April.