Nothing of particular note going down in the G & G household these days. Just chillin' -- much more in the literal sense (see my last entry) than figuratively (Lil' S keeps us from relaxing). The contractor finished up the repairs for our flooded basement, so once we get new carpet it will be back to normal. As it is, we can use it without carpet, but we still can't take the little guy down there because there are exposed nails. I plugged back in the carbon monoxide detector that was down there. I don't even know if we have anything in our house that could leak carbon monoxide, but I'm not taking any chances. I know several people who died as a result of carbon monoxide leaks. Well, I don't know them personally, but I know of them. That's how Weird Al's parents went, and it's also what got former tennis star Vitas Gerulaitis. Maybe carbon monoxide has a bias against people with long, frizzy hair.
By the way, is there anything more annoying than smoke/carbon monoxide alarms? Why aren't they more user-friendly? Hasn't that technology been mastered? After I put in a new battery I never know if I need to press a button or just let it go. And once I press a button, and it beeps, does that mean it's on? What if it just does a little chirp? Why do I even have to ask this? If I designed smoke detectors, there would be a little green light labeled "On: No Smoke Currently Detected" that's always on when the alarm is functioning properly and not detecting smoke.* Then there would be a red light that says "Smoke Dectected" that only goes on when it detects smoke and the alarm is sounding. Also, the red light would blink when the battery needed to be replaced, and it started making that little chirping noise, and there would be a label on the alarm that says "Replace Battery When Red Light Is Blinking". Maybe this is just asking too much from today's technology. It's only been 45 years since we sent a man to moon after all.
This type of "space age" design would have been very helpful the other night when one of our smoke detectors started chirping. There were two in the vicinity of the chirp, and I couldn't tell which one it was. (Standing in the hall between two rooms trying to figure out which one an intermittent beep is coming from is it's own type of madness.) One of them is connected to our house alarm, and every time I touch it it seems to set off the alarm and calls the security company, so I tried the other one first. The chirping persisted. So I changed the battery in the one connected to the house alarm. In fact, it did set the alarm off, and the security company called, which was pretty annoying, but nothing like what happened next. Something chirped again. At this point, I was losing my mind, and it was starting to affect my marriage. S was getting irritated with my irritation ("It's OK. Don't get so worked up."), and I was irritated -- on top of my previous irritation -- with her lack of irritation ("How can you just sit there and listen to thing chirp every 10 seconds? Why doesn't that drive you crazy?")
Eventually it all got resolved, and things settled down. What had happened is, when we first moved in two years ago, there was a smoke alarm directly above the stove, which would go off constantly whenever we would cook something (I don't know how the lady who lived here before us managed), so I took it down. With no good place to hang it, I stuck it on a shelf in our basement, where it got buried under a bunch of other crap. That's what was chirping. I finally found it, after a half hour or so of chirp-induced psychosis. I was happy to solve the mystery, and stop the madness, but I was also a bit -- I don't know what the right word is -- embarrassed, I guess, because it was really all my fault. I didn't take the battery out of the smoke detector initially when I put it on the shelf. It was going to run out at some point.
The moment made me reflect a bit, because normally I don't get too bent out of shape about things. S calls me a robot, because of how little most things bother me. And yet something relatively small like an untraceable beep will drive me up the wall. I think I figured out what it is. When things that should be simple aren't simple, it sets me off. The "I shouldn't even be having to deal with this" part of life can get to me.
Alright, I see that that jag went on longer than expected. I'll have to hit the rest of the items on my agenda rapid-fire style.
Until next time ...
*My carbon monoxide detector actually has something like this but even then the label is "Operate". You can infer what it means, but "Operate"? Of all the phrase in the English language this is the one you chose? If you want to keep it short, why not "On" or "In Use" or "Activated"? Even "Operational" would be better than "Operate".
By the way, is there anything more annoying than smoke/carbon monoxide alarms? Why aren't they more user-friendly? Hasn't that technology been mastered? After I put in a new battery I never know if I need to press a button or just let it go. And once I press a button, and it beeps, does that mean it's on? What if it just does a little chirp? Why do I even have to ask this? If I designed smoke detectors, there would be a little green light labeled "On: No Smoke Currently Detected" that's always on when the alarm is functioning properly and not detecting smoke.* Then there would be a red light that says "Smoke Dectected" that only goes on when it detects smoke and the alarm is sounding. Also, the red light would blink when the battery needed to be replaced, and it started making that little chirping noise, and there would be a label on the alarm that says "Replace Battery When Red Light Is Blinking". Maybe this is just asking too much from today's technology. It's only been 45 years since we sent a man to moon after all.
This type of "space age" design would have been very helpful the other night when one of our smoke detectors started chirping. There were two in the vicinity of the chirp, and I couldn't tell which one it was. (Standing in the hall between two rooms trying to figure out which one an intermittent beep is coming from is it's own type of madness.) One of them is connected to our house alarm, and every time I touch it it seems to set off the alarm and calls the security company, so I tried the other one first. The chirping persisted. So I changed the battery in the one connected to the house alarm. In fact, it did set the alarm off, and the security company called, which was pretty annoying, but nothing like what happened next. Something chirped again. At this point, I was losing my mind, and it was starting to affect my marriage. S was getting irritated with my irritation ("It's OK. Don't get so worked up."), and I was irritated -- on top of my previous irritation -- with her lack of irritation ("How can you just sit there and listen to thing chirp every 10 seconds? Why doesn't that drive you crazy?")
Eventually it all got resolved, and things settled down. What had happened is, when we first moved in two years ago, there was a smoke alarm directly above the stove, which would go off constantly whenever we would cook something (I don't know how the lady who lived here before us managed), so I took it down. With no good place to hang it, I stuck it on a shelf in our basement, where it got buried under a bunch of other crap. That's what was chirping. I finally found it, after a half hour or so of chirp-induced psychosis. I was happy to solve the mystery, and stop the madness, but I was also a bit -- I don't know what the right word is -- embarrassed, I guess, because it was really all my fault. I didn't take the battery out of the smoke detector initially when I put it on the shelf. It was going to run out at some point.
The moment made me reflect a bit, because normally I don't get too bent out of shape about things. S calls me a robot, because of how little most things bother me. And yet something relatively small like an untraceable beep will drive me up the wall. I think I figured out what it is. When things that should be simple aren't simple, it sets me off. The "I shouldn't even be having to deal with this" part of life can get to me.
Alright, I see that that jag went on longer than expected. I'll have to hit the rest of the items on my agenda rapid-fire style.
- Speaking of things that should be simple not being simple, I had to relay to S over the phone a work order number that a guy had written down for us and I couldn't tell if his 4s were Us. What the hell? I understand bad handwriting if you're taking notes and trying to keep up with a lecturer, or if you're just writing yourself a note, but if you're just writing ten numbers on an invoice for somebody else then there should be no such thing as bad handwriting. Unless you have cerebral palsy, you have the eye-hand coordination to make a 4 look different from a U if you really want to.
- Lil' S has figured out how to talk to Siri on an iPhone. It's cute, and it's funny to hear what she will reply to his baby-babble, "I found 15 churches. Several of them are very close to you."
- Why is proper comma usage so difficult? It's seems like, since the written word is such a common form of communication and since the comma is such a vital bit of punctuation, that we could've made the rules for commas a bit simpler. I put punctuation in the same boat as taxes. It should be something any dope can do correctly on his or her own, and yet the vast majority of us need a professional or software (or both) to get it right.
- I got a new computer. It's one of those tablet/laptop combine thingies. S's parents bought it for me, seemingly out of the blue. I asked S why they wanted to buy me a new computer, and she said, "It's for that house ceremony thing", referring to the blessing they did for their new house in November. Uh ... S's parents buy a new house, so I get a new computer? Okay, sure. Thanks. I appreciate it.
- The other day when I was laying some cable at my office, I noticed the guy in the stall next to me had on those Aquasox-type shoes with individual toes, and instantly I didn't like him. Without even seeing him, I didn't like him. I admit it. I'm prejudice against people who wear those things in public.
Until next time ...
*My carbon monoxide detector actually has something like this but even then the label is "Operate". You can infer what it means, but "Operate"? Of all the phrase in the English language this is the one you chose? If you want to keep it short, why not "On" or "In Use" or "Activated"? Even "Operational" would be better than "Operate".
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