MAX

MAX
8pounds 1.7ounces
June 28, 2005
4:07PM Pacific

Sorry no picture yet but he's already proving himself to be as cool as B-Dog. He's one skinny strong guy. His legs are already TDF grade strong. It took me forever to muscle past those legs to install the tiniest little diaper. Pics up soon.

Max & Amy are recovering nicely. I, however, am in a dire state from lack of sleep and good coffee. In other words... I am a wuss. amen.

Taking espresso to an entirely insane level. Yes the analysis has begun. You can expect even better drinks from the cafe. 

This gauge might is akin to an EKG where a zero reading = flatline. Given we're near the green, the cafe's alive and the patrons are delighted! Happy day 

unplanned expenses

The Volvo died with a potential up to $2000 repair bill. It has been 100% dependable until Thursday when it did something ugly. I made it home and successfully drove it to the repair shop but things were dire. Sadly the repair logic is as follows:

If cost of repair + predicted future repairs is [less than] value of car [minus] value of car in broken state [then] one logically must do the repair.

I.e $2000 + 0 < $4500 - ~$1000

The broken state value is calculated in to introduce the option of simply walking away from the car selling it to the shop for parts. The difficulty in predicting future repairs is also an uncomfortable guess. The one extremely frustrating fact that this calculation applies to TODAY and has nothing to do with yesterday. For example, I get car back this week. Transmission explodes the following Monday for $2500. I need to calculate based upon that repair only. The history may feel relevant but it is not. It might make sense to plug in a default $500 into the future repair field, thus:

$2000 + $500 < $4500 - ~$1000

Still evaluates true.

An independent question is whether the car gets sold after the repair because of the $500 placeholder's variability or the general trust of the machine. Simply put, I trust the 240 volvo to run dependably for a loooong time despite this unfortunate incident.

They're here.... :^) 

REPLY

If you're reading this please take the 15 seconds to post a reply. Use the anonymous option but throw in your name into the reply. On occasion I get, "Yeah, I read that on your blog the other day" but I have no idea what my readership is. I know that I'm certainly wasting time on this thing but I'd like to get an idea of *how* pointless it all is. Thanks.

scarcity & season

Everybody loves blueberry pie. This is a universal truth. Armed with this knowledge I considered the fact that at any given moment, say the dead of winter, I can have a blueberry pie.

Seriously... isn't that great?

Nope

Crazy? Perhaps but there is one thing better than blueberry pie... the anticipation of blueberry pie. It's the scarcity that makes things interesting, makes things worthwhile, makes us actually happy. Having all the stuff all the time isn't really helpful at all. Sure it seems like 27/7/365 access to blueberry pie would be pretty much perfection but it just makes it ordinary.

There's an interesting statistic that wealth has no correlation to happiness in children and adults. There is a minimum threshold to this, abject poverty for example. But beyond that, there is no correlation... none.

There is a particular kind of magic in living within the seasons, waiting for certain produce to be harvested from less than 100 miles away. I explicitly choose to do this which is kind of sad. It would be more interesting if there was some challenge, some effort, some hardship in getting things from faraway lands and items out of season. Climbing to the top of the mountain is one million times more satisfying than pulling over at the scenic overlook for the same view.

Which brings me back to the blueberry pie. The farmer's market is rumored to have blueberries coming soon. But you've got to get up early because they sell out quick.

plumbed!!!!

the machine at the cafe is now hard plumbed meaning water comes directly from the house plumbing versus a little refillable plastic jug thing. With over 40 individual junctions, it was an ugly process. 40 water connections = 40 opportunities for a leak. Then there was the electricity, the pressure settings, the unexplained function, the calls to tech support...

It wasn't pretty. I've been in a particularly foul mood for the past 2+ days as a result. Coffee is one medication that I depend upon to get things done. This is problematic when the thing to get done is fixing/upgrading the machine. I had planned on dialing it at a more leisurely pace but circumstance caused it to become a firefight. It's over now and the cafe and the world is a better place.

"Dude, it's easy"

My first real ride in well over a month. Summitting Mt Tabor is not a real ride and neither is scooting across the river to pick up fresh [coffee] beans.

"There's always a slow guy so it'll be easy"
"But I haven't been riding at all. I've been sick, we've had guests, there has been major reconstruction on the house, I was layed off, I started a new j..."
"Don't worrrrrrrrrrrry. You'll have NO problems."

Well after I crashed and burned 20 miles into a 45 mile ride, I enjoyed the being dragged by the car or, better yet, being pushed along by a 17 year old rider. When I say pushed, I don't mean drafting on his wheel, I mean his hand on my back and pushing me up all the hills.

I think when I got out of the saddle I actually decelerated.

No problem.