Who Am I?

This was written a few years back, when I was living alone in my rented duplex. While most of the following is true, I'm now married, so things are very different than they were when I wrote the following:

I don't know what my earliest recollections of my childhood really are. Like most people I think I remember things from my childhood, but do I really? Do I really remember any of the stuff I think I do, or am I just repeating stories that have been told since I was tiny? When you look at the same pictures over and over for decades, and associate stories that were told repeatedly, they become the story. They become the memory.

There are many things that have shaped my life. Many experiences have shaped me into who I am today. I'm not saying I'm anything noteworthy--certainly I am not. If anything in our past--I mean anything no matter how insignificant--were to have not happened or happened differently, we would probably not be here today. We may be somewhere near, both literally and figuratively, but not here. The Butterfly Effect is almost staggering with its implications. Anyone would agree that had certain traumatic or important things from their past not happened or happened differently that things would be different. The slightest little thing is all it takes. When you add the passage of time into the equation, those seemingly insignificant events are multiplied, sometimes exponentially. One teeny little thing back then could mean a huge, huge ripple in today's world. That makes me wonder about things I did when I was little. The things I did, the things I saw, the experiences that shaped me. What would my life be today if any one of those things were changed somehow? It's mind-boggling.

Sometimes I think back on things I've done, and they seem surreal. I can't place myself in the scenario now that I'm reviewing the experience later in life. I remember bits of it, but that's about all. A good example? How about inner tubing down the Euphrates River in Turkey? How many people have done that? I think, "Did I even do that? Why the fuck can't I remember anything about it? Was I too stoned on Turkish hashish? Drunk? Both?" The fact is I did do it. I remember just enough to know that it really happened. I don't remember any of the logistics of it. I don't remember who went or how many of us, how we got there, where we stopped or started or anything like that. It's obvious that I was not in on the planning part of the deal or I would remember more details. But I did it, and so did my roommate, John Turcotte. I have a couple of pictures somewhere to prove it.

I sit at a computer at work all day long, staring at multiple monitors and juggling minute details of aerospace fabrication. I saw this question posed on the Internet: when you go home at the end of the day and turn off your work life what do you picture? That made me think a little bit. I treasure quiet and solitude more than I ever have. When I was looking for a house, one of the things I wanted was a good view of a sunrise or sunset. I'm not picky in that regard--either one will do. By "view" I mean I can see a fair amount of sky uninterrupted. I don't want to have to climb a tree or go to the end of the road or whatever, I want to just be able to look out the window or sit on the deck or porch and be mesmerized by the colors of mother nature. I think that's what I'd like when I finish my work life.

Why am I such a worry wart? Did my dad cause it? Is it a direct result of his temper? Did his beatings or his hollering and belittling make me this way? Probably yes. Actually, I'm sure of it. He never gave out praise--only criticism. He always had to maintain a position of superiority. God forbid you should challenge something he just shared. I think my constant ducking under the wire and fearing his wrath instilled me with a definite lack of balls. I can't ever "man up" when I want to. It has also seriously affected my social skills. I'm constantly worrying and fretting about cause and effect. I find myself not wanting to start something because my mind screams, "but what if...?" I hate that about me. I sit and take the easy way out, the coward’s way out. I avoid things "just in case" I may have some sort of crisis or conflict I have to resolve. I'm a lousy communicator. Horrible.

I've noticed that I have developed a sort of shell, a shell that you can't see, but nevertheless is there. I guess you could just call it a safety buffer. It isolates me (or at least attempts to) from things that make me uncomfortable. I can't stop looking over the news every day, but I seldom read it. Scanning would be more accurate. I read the bullet points in the form of the headlines, but I hardly ever click into a story to actually read it. When I am looking deeper into a story like that I've noticed that I get that weird feeling of dread when I have a realization that there is going to be something uncomfortable in the story. When that happens I tend to stop reading it instantly. For some reason lately, it makes me wince when a story describes someone's suffering or outlines the things that led up to their demise. I want to put my hands up and close my eyes. I want to fly back to a moment in time before that feeling washed over me. I want to wish it away. When they say, “What has been seen cannot be unseen” I know what they’re talking about. If I’m exposed to something uncomfortable like that it will eat away at me. I don't know why this feeling has started happening to me.

I feel a certain tendency toward hermit life that may or may not be related to it. I feel just almost as unsure and confused about my direction in life now as I probably ever did at any point. I feel sometimes like I should start seeing a shrink. Will I ever though? Probably not. I'm too wishy-washy and indecisive.

This is a tough time of year for me. When daylight savings time ends and it gets dark earlier each day it just exacerbates how I’m already feeling because of the cold temperatures and short amount of daylight hours. It’s no wonder that there are so many people with depression issues this time of year. Take what’s already going on in your head and add a Christmas season to it. Can you cope? I have trouble sometimes. It’s no wonder it was so hard on me when I was married to Sue. Her being a Jehovah’s Witness meant there were no lights, candles, or music in the house that represented the upbeat nature of Christmas season. There was a definite void during that time. I remember the very last Christmas season we were married, she was in Kauai with her daughter and I was left more or less to myself (her son, Keith, was there of course because he lived there, but seldom showed his face.) I had a sort of reawakening that week. I experienced Christmas on more of a personal level for the first time in five years. I didn’t really care that it was missing so much during the first couple of years we were married, but I think I slowly began to notice it, and maybe even resentful of it. I needed it but didn’t know I needed it. Everyone else was experiencing it but me. Anyway, during that Christmas I took walks around the neighborhood, admiring and taking pictures of people’s light displays, feeling the crisp temperature and feeling a little more in touch with things. I was able to play Christmas music at home as I sat at my computer for the first time since before we were married. I was able to come and go on a whim, visiting other people and meeting friends at restaurants. It was a good time. I think that I need to get into things a little bit more this year to combat the feeling of depression. It feels heavy this year--much more so than last year. Last year I was still reveling in the newness of being divorced--being free to do as I chose to do. This year there is more of a feeling of solitude. Though self-imposed for the most part, it still gives me a feeling of melancholy.

Why is dating so hard for me? Am I afraid of commitment? It occurred to me that we treat being with a woman like having a job. Think about it: people all the time are in jobs they don't like. They are constantly saying shit like, "God, I can't wait to retire" or "If only I'd win the lotto." People will do almost anything to put up with their job because they hate looking for a new job so much. We've all done it--knocking on doors, talking to people we don't know, filling out applications with mostly accurate information, handing them a resume that makes us look like the best possible person they could ever hire. That's exactly what we do when we date. Exactly. Then all goes well and we might think, "She's not so bad... She has a lot of really great qualities" and decide to stick with her permanently. Time goes by, then you start to tire of the crap you have to put up with. You don't really see the positives any more, but the negatives just eat at you. You wish you could retire or hit the lotto. Instead, you sigh and plod onward with resignation. Like a job, having a relationship is easier than looking for a new one.

I've often wondered what my favorite color is. Everybody has a favorite color. Why don't I? It's not rocket science to have a color you treasure over others, a color that you favor well enough that you would let it influence choices you might make in your life. Not me. I can't choose a favorite color. I know what my least favorite color is though: green. I hate things that are green. Plant life is excluded though--I love green living things. I just hate anything painted or colored Kelly green. I like light greens or earth tone greens that some people paint their houses, but I don't like green cars, green clothes, or pretty much anything else green. I could say I love blue, but in reality it's the sky--I love the blue of the sky. I could say yellow, but I don't think that's it either. I love yellow flowers, yellow houses (most anyway), and although I find yellow very cheerful and upbeat it's far from a favorite color. Purples? Nope, though I do love lavender flowers. Red? Huh uh. Sometimes I think my favorite color is white of all things. The color white is so perfect in its simplicity. I have always loved the sight of a lady in a white petticoat dress. While I love the look of snow, there is seldom “just” white in any given snow scene. Even when there is nothing else visible in a snow scene, snow has shadows, and snow shadows are blue. It’s different than just plain white. Even clouds--they have always got some degree of gray that is there defining them somehow. So, what is my favorite color? All of the above.

In my home everything whispers. When I want it to be, my house is completely quiet. Sometimes I want to turn up the quiet and make time stand still forever, but of course it passes. I love to shuffle around naked, feeling the various rugs between my toes as I step onto them from the bare floor. I walk carefully--almost reverently--as if I'm afraid to make a sound that might disturb the empty silence. Though I often have music playing, there are many days I don't feel like it. During those times I will just sit and listen to the sounds the refrigerator makes, lost in my own thoughts. I just feel like sitting alone. The silence during those times--sometimes deafening in its emptiness--is only broken up by the occasional sound of a rooster out back or a car driving by out front. I feel relaxed. In the early hours of a still morning I will find myself placing an item on the counter or in the sink so carefully and silently lest it break the silence with a rattle or clink. The dark hours of a sleepy morning are a slow transition into my day, and I choose to ease into it with silence.

There are many times people might ask me something like, "Who's your favorite actor or actress?" I can never remember names at the drop of a hat or when I'm under the gun, but I do have a few that pop into my head from time to time. When I choose an actress it's usually because of sex appeal, but one exception is Angelica Huston. There is something about her that captures my interest. She has a self-assurance about her that seems so genuine. Someone else I love is Charlize Theron. Besides being beautiful, I think she's a very good actress. Cate Blanchett--I love her. Another actress that has me lusting after her for some reason is Mary Steenburgen. I can’t explain it really. She’s not a particularly good actress. I think it’s her voice--it’s a voice I imagine speaking softly, privately, into my ear. Speaking of voices, I love the breaking voices of Blythe Danner and Debra Winger.

I wish I could live life without always having to justify something. I have this splinter in my mind that is always asking, “How can you justify owning this? Are you really getting enough use out of it?” I’m constantly plagued with this kind of mental activity. I don’t want to justify ownership of something, I want it to be completely frivolous and impulsive! I have to keep telling myself, “No, I don’t use it very often, but when I do, it’s great to have!” My hot tub is a good example of this. A lot of people think hot tubs are a chore to maintain. They are not. They are very easy to maintain. I don’t use mine nearly often enough to “justify” ownership of it. I’m not a playboy, a thrower of parties, or any sort of socialite. Nor am I attached to anyone else that I might regularly share it with. I cannot justify owning it, but I want to own it. I tell myself that owning it is a luxury and a treat. Those times when I do use it make up for all those times I’m ignoring it and letting it sit forlornly in the back yard. No matter what I own or think of owning, that same thing echoes over and over, “How often will I use it? Can I really justify buying it?” I just wish I could adjust my mental default settings. I want to turn off notifications for justifying my choices in life. I want to be impulsive and I can’t!

Real Estate & Romance

A lot of things happened all at once when I started to finalize my house deal last summer. I already had my loan pre-approval squared away before I started looking, and things were looking good. When I found my house I submitted an offer for full price. (I did not want to lose this house!)  The buying process was well underway by probably a week or so when someone at work mentioned VA financing during our conversation. What?--I can save a quarter of a point or better in interest? With no mortgage insurance?! Up until that point I didn't know that the industry's standard 20% down payment actually determined whether or not you needed mortgage insurance. (It's not like I buy houses all the time!) Anyway, like I said--I had already gotten my financing process underway, using a conventional loan, and when I found out about the VA loan option I talked to my lender again. "Sure, I can switch it over to VA no problem," he said. Cool! 3.25% instead of 3.50% is always a good thing! Well, it was cool for a short time, then I found out that the seller said no and threatened to nix the deal. It turned out that the only reason she accepted my offer to begin with was because it was not a VA loan. Why? Well, if it were a VA loan she would have had to put a new roof on it. She had no intention of doing that (even though it needed one), so she refused anyone wanting to buy with a VA loan. Shit. Well, I talked to my finance guy again and asked if there wasn't some other option I had to side-step around the mortgage insurance and he said he would look into it. In the meantime he switched it all back to conventional loan and things progressed. Imagine my surprise when I went to sign all my papers and found that there was no mortgage insurance on my loan after all. Score!

Now let's address the romance part of this blog post title. For that I'll have to back up a little. No, a lot...

All through my elementary school years I went to school with Brenda Lewis. I had a pretty good crush on her. She was the spunky little red-haired girl that didn't take shit from anybody. I must have thought about her a lot because I can remember a lot more details about her than I can from pretty much anybody else of that period. When I finished 6th grade my family moved and I lost sight of her. We didn't move far--it was just to downtown Auburn--but that meant we went to different junior high schools. Life goes on when you're an adolescent, and I eventually forgot about her. She moved out of state at one point, and didn't return until our senior year of high school. I think I remember catching a glimpse of her once, wondering why she looked familiar. Could that have been her? Fast forward a couple decades. Our 40th reunion was in the making, and I was on the committee. Part of that entailed being on the lookout for new names registered for the event. When I saw her name I was excited. We emailed a few times, comparing stories and rehashing memories. The reunion kinda came and went, but she wasn't able to attend. Time went by and we went our own ways and communication waned. Fast-forward to last summer. We had been friends on Facebook for a while by then, but that's about it. Anyway, she had spent 7 months in Oklahoma tending to her aging parents' affairs, and was super-excited to finally get to come home and wake up in her own bed. Imagine her surprise when she came home to an empty house. It turned out that her husband left her the day before she got home. Though I was skeptical to open my doors to a potential roommate because I treasure my alone time (especially when I was going to be moving soon) I did so anyway. After all, I had an extra bedroom at my rented duplex, and would have two extra rooms at my new house, so why not? She accepted my offer to move in, and we have been hopelessly in love ever since.

An Alternate View of Seattle in 1962

I was perusing a bookshelf full of crap here at home and found a few old nudist magazines I had bought at a yard sale a long time ago. I got a kick out of this issue because it was promoting the '62 World's Fair on the cover and inside on the title page.

It's interesting to know that the Seattle has been cool for a long time.

Zombies?

We ended up with this sticker at our house recently, and I'm not sure where it came from. I'm also not sure what I'm going to do with it. Obviously, I'm probably going to stick it, but where?

I could put it on something out in my shop.

I'm not redneck enough to put it on my vehicle. Well, I guess I could put it on my Civic, but really--an old Honda Civic on a Zombie Apocalypse Response Team? What am I going to do, drive them out of town in a safe manner while explaining my mileage? I know--I could put it on my truck! No, it's not the right look either. My truck isn't lifted 24" over stock and riding on oversized tires. It has no Yosemite Sam mudflaps hanging across the back, and there is no gun rack in the window (if rednecks still even use gun racks any more). It looks more "grandpa" than redneck.

No, I don't have a good vehicle for this sticker. I could "bless" someone else's car in a parking lot, but of course I would never harm anyone else's property. Besides, I can't run worth a shit anymore. I'd probably be spotted by the owner, and they'd find my body a week later, crumpled up in the parking lot along with the sun-faded, flattened Starbucks cups that litter the ground.

Ooh, wait--the Harley! Hmm. No. While it does have a look that would compliment such a fine sticker, I'm not really a sticker person. Besides, if it were on a bike, it should be one ridden by someone that looks like Randall Tex Cobb did in the movie Raising Arizona.

I could take it to work and find a good spot for it. Now that I think about it, it does sorta speak "Boeing" somehow.

Or, I could put it on something out in my shop. 

Why Edgewood?

I don't think I ever really expected to find myself living in Edgewood. I don't know--it just seemed to be "between" everything. It was a place that was not on anyone's radar. It was a place people drive by or drive through and not notice. It has almost none of my favorite stores, and a pretty small selection of restaurants.

When Sue and I were going through our divorce I just wanted something cheap enough I could afford, and big enough to hold all my shit. I just wanted a new starting place. I was hoping to find something close enough to work that I wouldn't have to use freeways. When I stumbled onto the little duplex I ended up living in for 2+ years, I knew it was perfect. It was cheap, it had a garage, and it had plenty of space for me. It even had the back yard between the two units fenced. How often do you ever see that? It had two bedrooms, gas heat, and even a storage shed out back. When I met my new neighbor, Wendy, we became friends right away. I so enjoyed spending time at her place, watching movies or ball games, and playing with her little "chi-weenie" dog Louie, and her two kittycats. After living up here for a couple years, I realized that I really liked the rural nature of the area and the commute (or lack thereof). I can get to work in 15 minutes, and without using a freeway!

It was around June of last year when it occurred to me that my savings were growing to the point where I might be able to pull off a down payment on a house. I was also getting a little tired of the noisy furnace, the single-pane windows, and mushy ground around the place during monsoon season. I started looking at realty websites, and the more I looked at houses in various places, the more I liked the possibility of staying in Edgewood. The trouble is, a lot (most?) of the properties in the area have either a view of the valley or are on acreage, neither of which I could come close to affording. After looking for a while I found a house that I wanted to investigate. That meant I needed to get into the house to see it, right? I hunted down a realtor. I didn't buy that house, but with both of us looking, things started happening. We looked at several, but none of them did it for me. I had gotten into the routine of checking real estate sites several times a day, noting the new ones when they would pop up. Then one Saturday morning I was on the computer for a while doing more looking and had been at it for a while. I was just about to go out somewhere, so before I got up to go I hit "refresh" one more time. There was a new entry! It was so new that the pictures weren't even posted yet. I read the whole ad and realized it was only down the street where I already lived. After reading it all and checking the street view online, I hit refresh again and pictures started showing up. A big 3-bedroom rambler with a detached shop?! 1/3 acre at the end of a dead-end street?! I called my guy right away. "I have to see this house!" I told him. He called back a few minutes later and said they were having an open house at 1pm, so I could actually get inside without him this time. Well, to make a long story short, I went, I looked, I loved it, and I bought it. I love this place!

Next: Moving!

Unlimited Wonderful

I have always loved to poke fun at translations between Asian and English products over the years. Many times they mean something completely different that what they probably intended. While things have gotten much better they still pop up occasionally. Sometimes it's the owner's manual of the product, and sometimes it's the packaging. This was on the package my camera flash trigger came in.

You can't deny the warm feelings they give: Unlimited!

How To Build a Makeshift Shop Urinal

I don't think I have ever done a "how-to" blog post before. Why now? Well, I was taking pictures of it as I went along so I could play show & tell at work, but then when I was all finished I decided I may as well compile them all into a blog post. It just kind of turned into a "how-to" on its own.

Think of all those times when you're out in your garage or shop, right in the middle of a project, and you've got to pee. You don't want to have to go all the way into the house, especially when you're dirty. Maybe you live somewhere where you can't just step outside the door and pee lest someone calls the cops on you. Wouldn't it be cool if you didn't have to?

Well, here is my solution.

This is a "poor man's design" that uses a specialty funnel, a length of garden hose curled into a trap loop, and it's flushed by pouring water into it after you use it. Simple right? Of course, where you have the water routed after it's outside your shop is your business. Some folks bury a gallon can that they've cut full of holes, and run their hose into that. Some folks just let it go where it goes. As seldom as it's used it probably doesn't really matter much--more a matter of aesthetics.

Materials needed:

• (1) Hopkins FloTool Funnel, part number 10705 (about $6 at O'Reilly Auto Parts) 
• (1) Short length of cheap-quality 5/8" garden hose with the male end still attached. (I bought a "hose leader" at Home Depot for about $8.) If it's not the cheap quality variety it will be large around the outside to fit into the funnel. 
• (1) length of 3/4" schedule 40 (the thick stuff) PVC pipe (I bought a 2-foot piece at Home Depot for $1.64) long enough to go through your wall if your shop or garage has drywall installed. 
• (1) O-ring that fits snugly over the male end of your hose (see picture below) 
• Miscellaneous lengths of wood for your wall mounting (you probably already have) 
• Miscellaneous screws to attach (you probably already have) 
• Spray silicone or equivalent 

Points to ponder:

• First of all, as you can see from the pictures, my shop is sheet-rocked and insulated. If yours has no drywall or insulation you can skip installing the PVC pipe though the wall space as I did. Your project will be much easier!

• I have a long drill bit (I think it's about 16" long) that I use when I'm dealing with drilling through a wall space all the way to outdoors. If you don't have this sort of luxury, you will have to figure something else out. Again, if you're not sheet-rocked you can skip it anyway.

• Caution: If you just try to run a full-sized spade bit into the drywall and go all the way through it will not reach and will catch your insulation, turning all your wall insulation into a giant wad of cotton candy on the end of your drill bit. You'll have a real problem on your hands then!

• Measure carefully! Make sure you exercise your due diligence and investigate obstacles, distances, angles, and anything else that could be a problem when you decide where to put it and start drilling into your wall.

Let's get started. Here's how I did it.

Carefully drill into the drywall *only* (no farther into the wall!) with an extra-long (mine is about 12" long) small drill bit and stop. As soon as it penetrates the drywall unhook it from your drill and wiggle the drill bit all around the best you can to "clear" any insulation from its path. If you don't it will wind up on your drill bit and you'll never get it out!

Push it all the way into the hole until you feel it contact the outer wall and hook the drill motor back up to it and finish drilling through the outer wall. Now unhook the bit once again, leaving it still embedded in the wall. Go outside and check your work. Is it in the right place? If not, make whatever changes need to be made and do it again. Small holes are much easier to patch if they're in the wrong place than full-sized holes are!

Carefully drill through the drywall with a 1" spade bit, stopping as soon as it goes through:

See that insulation hiding there just waiting to grab your drill bit? Again, don't let that happen:

Go outside and do the same thing as inside: barely drill through and stop. After you clear the insulation out of the way with whatever tool you feel like using, feel free to put the spade bit back in and clean the hole out a little better, angling it as needed, and still drilling from each side.

Try fitting your piece of PVC pipe into the hole. Repeat the drilling with the spade bit as much as you need to if the hole isn't clear enough. You may be able to press your pipe into the hole from the inside, but I couldn't quite get it. I found it easier to push from the outside of the shop back in. That was because the drywall had enough "give" to it and allowed the pipe to break through any hole imperfections. Notice the angle of the pipe. That was my choice. I don't think angle matters really.

This is how much of the PVC section protruded through the outer wall before I trimmed it down to about 6 inches or so:

Identify the orifice for posterity:

Cut the male end off your hose section if you haven't already, and roll your O-ring over the threads, placing it just below the shoulder. It should be a snug fit. If not, use a smaller O-ring:

Carefully pop the screen out of the bottom of the funnel and feed the hose down into it. The O-ring will make a nice, snug "squeaker" of a fit as it goes down into the tapered funnel neck. Give it a good twist while you're pulling it and it will snug up easily. Sealing it isn't necessary because the O-ring and the taper of the funnel work together pretty well.

You should now have something that looks like this:

I made the wall mount out of a couple of scrap pieces of 5/4" cedar decking. I screwed the two pieces together into an "L" and screwed the whole thing to the wall. The odd dimensions are so it would align with wall studs. If you have to, go buy yourself a stud finder. You'll probably need it around the house eventually anyway, right?

Next, I found a piece of 2x3 and carved a section out of it with a jigsaw and wood rasp. This was just to provide clearance to help the funnel nestle in closer to the mount. That allowed me to attach it a little more securely than with just the little tab hole on top of the funnel. I'm pretty sure that one hole on the funnel was only provided my the manufacturer for hanging it up on the wall when you're not using it.

Here is that part installed:

A couple of screws later and the funnel is mounted! Both attaching points are nice and tight against wood, so there is no tendency for the screw to pull through the funnel plastic. It's a pretty solid mount:

Next, I fed the hose into the PVC. This can be a tricky part. I clamped a vice grip on the PVC so it wouldn't move while I was playing with it. I then had to put some spray silicone on the hose to get it to go all the way down through the PVC. Yes, it fit that snugly.

Another angle:

After looking at it and analyzing the hell out of it (like I do everything), I decided that I needed to raise the whole thing up. I just decided the top of the hose arc was a little lower than I thought it should be for a good siphon action when I "flush" it.

After raising it up a few inches, here is the finished product:

And here's how I flush it:

Epilogue: Sure, maybe any old can or jar will do in a pinch when you need something to piss in, but this is much better. It's got that homemade vibe and backwoods engineering thing going on!