Dust

You’ve seen Raiders of the Lost Ark right?

You know the scene at the end where the Ark of the Covenant is crated up and put in some giant warehouse along with hundreds of other boxes? I’ve always wondered what other treasures were growing cobwebs along side the Ten Commandments. Whatever else is in there I’m pretty sure my boss bought one of the items and is hiding it in plane sight.

I imagine my workplace isn’t dissimilar from yours. There are desks, chairs, computers, products, overreaction, micromanagement, etc., But what separates my work from yours is we have The American flag from the World Trade Center.

Yep. It’s here.

It showed up about two years ago. I was walking up the stairs to the owner’s office. He’s a millionaire and thus a bit on the eccentric side. It’s not uncommon to find his office littered with newspaper clippings, photos of him with people of power, and the occasional football trinket. Anyway I was taking some paperwork upstairs when I saw it. An American flag, about five feet wide and three feet tall, torn and beaten, sitting in a glass display case, leaning against the wall like it were a bicycle. At the bottom of the case was a small plaque that read: Word Trade Center. September 11th 2001.

Needless to say this was weird.

As my brain tried to solve this puzzle I stumbled into the boss’s office. He told me quite simply that it was real and that he picked it up somewhere. Then he moved on to idle chat about business. Two years later it’s still sitting in the exact same spot.

It probably isn’t real. Probably just a copy or something he found while flipping through Skymall. No, it probably isn’t real.

But what if it is?

What if one of the most important American artifacts in recent history is sitting in my office? Is that better then sitting in some warehouse? What’s in that back closet at your office? Look behind the old printer and the broken projector and see if there’s a Da Vinci gathering dust.

--Schoonaert

The Last Word on Water Heaters and Gift Cards

I can’t go on.

I know some of you have been enjoying my water heater saga, but I just can’t talk about it anymore. However, if you were wondering if I’m still dumping buckets of water every 90 minutes here’s a quick sum up. Feel free to skip down to more entertaining topics.

I got a plumber out to the house. He informs me that the small gas heater was discontinued in 2001. I had to switch to electric. After many phone calls, two fired electricians, and a lot of hair pulling, everything got fixed. I was left with a hefty bill and hot water. Could have been worse. Aaarrrghhh!!! Even typing these few words on the subject fills me with dread. I’m done. On to better things.

Among my many wonderful birthday gifts I was given two gift cards. Twenty-five bucks for Amazon.com and Twenty-five for Barnes and Noble.

Schoon Fact: I love me some gift cards.

Sure, tearing through bows and wrapping paper is awesome, but a gift card…

All Americans are united by a few simple truths. We like good food, we have way too many bills and we want shiny things. (We also all hate the Yankees, but that’s a blog for another day.) Those bills are a problem. They make us feel tremendously guiltly about buying Prime Rib or a Blu-Ray Player. More importantly buying these things on credit could add to our bills.

Guilt and Want. Might as well be apple pie.

But when you get a gift card it’s like the universe (or your Mother-In-Law) telling you: Hey, it’s okay. You can’t apply this Best Buy card to your Electric Bill so you might as well go buy yourself something.
With a gift card you’re forced to be selfish. Forced to think about what you want. It's a pretty sweet deal. That’s were I find myself now. What do I want? How can I get the most bang for my buck?

……

No, really! I’m asking here people!

Do I want that Dark Knight Blu-Ray I keep eyeing? Do I want to get a couple of Kurt Vonnegut’s classics to add to my collection? The latest volumes of The Walking Dead comic? Seriously, I’m really torn here. So, I’ll ask you people.

What should I buy? Any old B Movies or Sci-Fi flicks that I need to own? Anyone seen that disc of Pixar shorts? I’ve been wanting to see that.

And don’t say that I should buy something for you. Screw that! They’re my precious gift cards! Yes, my precious.

--Schoonaert

Part 2

Welcome back.

So the water heater’s leaking and we’ve returned home after an unsuccessful search for a replacement. Now comes the time I’ve dreaded. Time to take matters into my own hands and attempt to turn the sucker off myself. While it’s true I have no handyman skills I am capable of reading, so I consult my Home Repair Guide that I bought when we moved in. It seems simple enough.
1) Shut off the gas by closing the valve.
2) Shut off the water valve above the unit.
3) Connect a hose to the beast and drain it.
4) Kick back and enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Back on hands and knees I go and venture into the crawl space. I locate the cobweb covered gas valve. The thought occurs to me that these copper pipes are ancient and that one good tug will probably destroy my entire house.
It’s with this fear that I reach out and start to turn the lever.
To my shock it moves with ease. On to the water valve. I snake my arm through the pipes, grab hold, twist and…nothing.
Frozen solid.
Not even a wiggle.
Shit.

Against my better judgment I grab a rag and add a bit more force. My arm shakes, the pipes shake, the valve laughs at me. I venture out into the garage for some PB Blaster. (For those unfamiliar with the product it’s a spray you use for rusted bolts. I had to use it to change my lawn mower blade. This has nothing to do with the story; I just wanted to show that I do have a tiny bit of maintenance ability.) I soak the valve, wait a few minutes, and try again. Nadda. This game continues for the next couple of hours. I spray, wait a while, empty the water out of the pan, try and turn the valve. The game ends when I form a huge blister on the palm of my hand and brake off half of the valve.

After some much needed cursing, Rachael and I decide we’d be better off just shutting off the main valve and turning off all the water in the house. Thankfully that valve turns and all the water shuts off.

As per our Home Improvement book, Rachael and I turn on a faucet to drain the remaining water in the house. We’re shocked at the amount of water that’s coming out but we just figure there’s a lot of water to drain or maybe it’s taking water out of the water heater. Whatever. The only think I know is that I turned the main valve and the water is certainly off.

So Rachael and I connect a hose to the water heater and I start filling a bucket. It takes about three minutes to fill a bucket before I have to empty it. I’m crouched next to the heater filling the bucket. When it’s full I switch it with another and slide the full one to Rachael so she can dump it. Now while this whole water heater debacle was a horrible experience this next part was one of my favorite moments of my married life.

I’m tired. Rachael’s tired. But we have three minutes between bucket exchanges. In that span Rachael hunches over in the crawlspace doorway and reads aloud from the hilarious book; Shit My Dad Says.

We could be bitching about the situation. I could be cursing the stuck valve and she could rue the day she hooked up with such an unhandy dude. But we don’t. Instead she reads, we laugh, and we make the best of a raw deal. I was really proud of us at the moment.

Of course that pride was quickly forgotten when it became apparent that there shouldn’t be this much water in the pipes. Now, folks, I turned the main shut off valve. I swear by all the universe I did. But, for reason’s still unclear to me, I managed to turn it on (or MORE on) instead of off. I know this makes no sense but when I turned the valve again the faucet dried up with in seconds.

It’s late Saturday afternoon. The water is finally off. We’re tired. We’re frustrated and we still have no replacement water heater.

Oh! And did I mention that when we got home I tried to find a replacement heater on line and promptly downloaded a nasty computer virus? Yeah, I did that to.

What’s next for our heroes? Tune in next week.

--Schoonaert

House Of Mysteries #112: The Curse Of The Water Heater.

Just before the July 4th weekend, I got a call from my wife telling me that a puddle of water had formed in the downstairs basement. This was not good. Our gas water heater lives in the adjacent crawl space and I feared it had sprung a leak. I came home at lunch, got down on all fours and opened the crawl space door. Yep, standing water and a lovely smell that told me it had been leaking for a few days now. Now, what happened next was the first in a series of errors I made in what is being called: The Water Heater Incident of 2010.
What I should have done was call the plumber. What I did was shut the door and went back to work.
You see folks, I’m not what you’d call “handy”. No, I’m what you’d call “clueless”.
To be fair I was trying to close out the month at work and my stress level was already in the red so I chose to shut the door and deal with it after work.
At the end of the day I literally crawled into the mess and mopped up. Once that hellish chore was done I got to inspect the damage. Two pin hole drips were dancing out of my rusted out water heater. Again, I should have called the plumber. But by this time it was 8pm on a Thursday so I simply shoved a couple of baking pans under the water heater and collapsed on the couch. Well, I collapsed for 97 minutes because that’s hold long the shallow pans could hold water before the overflowed. Back on all fours. Smack my head and back against the ceiling, dump the pan into a bucket, crawl out, empty the bucket, collapse on the couch. This was a little game I ended up playing a lot over the next few days.
So did I call the plumber on Friday? Nah, that would’ve been smart. Instead I focused on the ultra stressful task of closing out the month at work. 10 hours later that chore was done and I came home to mop up the mess and start the 97 minute game again. But Saturday, the wife and I took action. We headed out to Home Depot to buy us a new gas heater. We figured once we had the thing my brother-in-law could come over and do the switch out for us. Simple right? Heh.
We gave the toothless wonder at Home Depot the measurements and he pointed us to our water heater. The price was fine and I just wanted to get this done so I told him we’d take it and he shuffled off to get a forklift to bring it off the shelf. As we’re waiting for Captain Useless we notice that the box says “electric”. Now, again, I’m not handy but I’m pretty sure that gas and electric are different. I drop this knowledge on Toothless and he sheepishly confirms my suspicion. Jackass.
So he fires up the Bozoputer to check if he can order us a gas model. Then we got this exchange.
Toothless: “Huh. I can’t find one.”
Me: “Okay. So what does that mean?”
Toothless: “Well, I can’t find one.”
Me: “So, do they not make them anymore or what?”
Toothless: “I’m not sure. I can’t find one.”
Home Depot, kids. Trust the experts.
Our frustration boiling we hit Lowes. More teeth but about the same level of knowledge. No gas heater for us. Confused and angry, Rachael and I decided there was only one thing to do in this situation. Stop at Five Guys Burgers and Fries for lunch. Oh sure water was rapidly filling the pans, but we needed brain food damn it! Besides have you been to Five Guys? Beyond tasty. Anyway, with happy tummies we vow to return home and at least shut off the water heater so we could stop playing the 97 minute game. The only problem with this idea? Neither one of us knows how to do this. But she’s smart and I’m…well, she’s smart and between the two of us I was sure we could figure this out. Right?
Stay tuned for the shocking second part of The Curse Of The Water Heater.

--Schoonaert

Quick

I watched The A-Team at the Dollar Theater over the weekend.

Now, I can see some of you rolling your eyes all ready. While it certainly wasn’t high art if was quite the entertaining flick. Stuff blew up, the pretty actors were pretty, and Liam Neeson did what he always does in movies: excelled at telling people what to do. Who doesn’t love Liam Neeson? The guy trained Batman, trained Darth Vader and unleashed a kraken! Has Bill Cosby ever unleashed a kraken? Yeah, I didn't think so.
Seriously, if there was some kind of crisis and I saw Liam Neeson I would rush over and beg of his council.
Anyway, the movie was a lot of fun. Next time you’re shopping, or buying a burger from Sonic, you need to rent it from the Red Box.
Speaking of which, in what genius boardroom was the Sonic/Red Box union spawned? Cheap dvd rentals combined with delicious fast food? A plan so brilliant I can only assume that Liam Neeson had something to do with it.

Well, I know this entry was short and hardly entertaining but it was my first step back to blogging on a regular basis so back off!

Be seeing you soon,

--Schoonaert

Dirt

How do you know if you’re an adult?

It’s a question I’ve asked myself a lot over the last few years.
I pondered it during my college graduation, considered it on the day of my wedding, and thought that I needed one’s permission to buy my house. While I’m not sure when I became an adult I do know the exact date that the childhood door slammed shut. April 10, 2009. The day I spent my day off moving a giant pile of dirt by hand. Dirt that I not only paid for but that I was excited to get.
Folks, only grownups get excited about dirt.
And I was excited as a lovely little man named Sid backed up his dump truck and unleashed three yards of dirt all over my driveway. What a thrill to know that it was only 9am and I had the entire day to load and unload my wheelbarrow. For those who have forgotten I have a giant hole in my backyard from a pond. This pond had become a soul sucking abyss and it had to be destroyed. Thus Sid and his dirt.
My plan was simple.
Step 1) Fill wheelbarrow
Step 2) Maneuver wheelbarrow through garage into backyard
Step 3) Empty contents of wheelbarrow into the pit.
Step 4) Repeat steps 1-3
And it was working. Oh sure I had a couple of close calls where my cat like balance nearly failed me (Dropped a bit of dirt in the exact spot my wife parks) but after a couple of hours I was feeling pretty good. The Monster Abyss was dying and the pile was shrinking. Another hour and I was nearly done with plenty of dirt left over. Or so I thought. As I pondered what other projects I could do I took my first steps across my new yard.
Kids, did you know that trapped air under fresh dirt acts just like quick sand?
I didn’t.
(Hey just because I’m an adult doesn’t mean I’m not stupid.)
I dug myself out; made sure I didn’t break my ankle, and then cursed the gods of home renovation.
As I packed the rest of the dirt down I came to the horrible realization that I didn’t buy enough dirt. Worse it was Easter weekend and no one was going to be open to deliver me more.
Crap!
The rest of the day was a blur of cursing, trips to Lowes, and unloading bag after bag after bag of top soil.
But at last I emerged the victory. The Abyss was full(ish) and I hadn’t killed anyone. I consider that a good day.
The lesson here: You can never have enough dirt.

--Schoonaert.

Things in my brain

In these tough economic times we need a moral booster. If I were running the show I’d make it legal for a person to punch three people a year. Now here me out, January 1st everybody would get a little coupon book in the mail.
It’d read: Good for one free punch. No tag backs.
Picture it. You’re in line at the 10 items or less line. Jimmy McDumbfuck has a cart with 27 items. As he pours his bag of nickels on the counter to pay you punch the shit out of his neck. Jimmy starts to get mad when you present him with your coupon. He grumbles, collects his Slim Jims and walks off. How awesome would that be?!?
No? Yes? Maybe? Well, I’d dig it.

Rachael and I are slowly (oh so slowly) making progress on the Yard-Of-Doom! In our attempts to make the backyard look less evil, we’ve circled the trees in Sand Pebbles. I won’t bore you with the details but basically we spent a Sunday driving back and forth from Lowes, our car loaded down with bags of stone. It’s an odd thing to be in the back seat of your own car while shotgun is occupied by bags of rocks. Stranger still when said rocks are buckled in like a child. (This is what happens when you don’t own a truck, kids.)

Rush Limbaugh makes me sad inside.
During my lunch hour I escape to a local park where my car radio keeps me company. For some reason my car gets very few AM stations. (AM. I know. What can I say? I likes me some talk radio.) For the most part my options are ESPN or Rush.
I’m a sports guy so this usually isn’t a problem. But on occasion I’ll tune into Rush.
Ahh, Rush.
Have you ever seen Hook?
You know that scene where Peter Pan’s little girl frowns at Captain Hook and scolds: “You need a Mommy very badly!” That’s Rush.
Hmm.
Could Rush Limbaugh, Icon of aggression, elitism, and generally unpleasantness in fact be Captain James Hook?!? Hey it makes more sense than Robin Williams being Peter Pan. I must test this theory.
Perhaps I’ll call into the show and hold a ticking clock next to the phone.

--BJS