Jomegat's Weblog

We are on the road and have been for a couple of days now. Today we stopped in VA where we lived for 18 years until 6 years ago. We went to church there and discovered that we only recognized one face in ten. That was surprising, because when we left, we knew ten faces in ten!

After church we went to our old neighborhood, primarily because someone had hidden a geocache there and I wanted to log it. It was hidden at Ben Lomond Manor House. Beth and I had no trouble finding it, and then we all hung out for a while to let Penny stretch her legs. The manor house was used as a field hospital during both Battles of Manassas during the Civil War. The photo above shows where the manor’s slaves lived.

While Penny stretched her legs, I moseyed on over to the rose garden.

Normally, cultivated flowers do not hold my interest, but since they had so few “weeds” in bloom, I decided to take a look, camera in hand. To my delight, I saw a hummingbird moth (Hemaris spp) darting among the flowers. I had never even heard of these until last week when I saw a photo on a blog I read. Here’s the shot I managed in my excitement:

After a bit we got in the car and resumed our drive. On the way, Va got a call from our neighbor back behind us. Seems the house to the south of us was fully engulfed in flames, and she wanted to be sure Penny wasn’t in our house. It must have been quite a spectacle.

One of the sad things about this incident is that we never once spoke to the people who lived there over the past five and a half years. They moved out last month, and put the house on the market. The sign came down quickly, and Beth says she had seen a couple unloading a moving van into the house. I thought it was still empty. I hope they were OK, but I really don’t have any other news on that front.

Tonight I saw this American Toad (Bufo americanus) in the backyard. He really didn’t want to sit still for a portrait, but I insisted. When I first saw him, he was near the deck, so I got out the camera and put it between him and the deck so he wouldn’t go underneath to hide. That worked just as I had intended, as he hopped away from the camera. I managed to get about 20 shots, and maybe this one turned out the best.

The funny thing I noticed was that if I put the camera in his face, he was far more brave and would sit still for a bit. If I positioned it to his side, the slightest motion would send him off for a better position. I didn’t try putting it behind him, as that wasn’t the shot I was really after.

Today we had to leave the house early so I could meet a guy who would give us an estimate for electrical work on the church. This is work I am well able to handle myself, but unfortunately, it would not be legal for me to do it. We have to have a licensed electrician. We used to have a member in the church who is licensed, but he moved to Texas last year.

Anyhow, the bid came in at over $2600, which was about double what I was expecting. Ouch. After I showed the estimator around, I dropped my car off for an oil change and tire rotation. Then I walked to the office from there.

My buddy Wayne was having his car serviced too, but not at the same place. He also walked to the office this morning, but from about triple the distance I did. After work Jonathan and I gave him a ride to his garage (but first… we had to walk to mine).

In other news…
I have been hacking together some software to process geocache data that I download from their site. Though it is still very much a hack-job, I was able to use it tonight to add about a thousand geocaches to my Tomtom. I’ve been virtually cruising down I-81 downloading caches in preparation for a trip we’ll take soon.

Today as I was wandering about the yard I scared up a Pickerel Frog (Rana palustris).

Even though Fish & Game says that these frogs are widespread, this is only the second third one I’ve ever seen. Frogs are actually a lot less common this year than they have been in the past few. We’ve had less rain than usual, so I suppose it must be a factor. I’m sure that’s why my bulfrog/green frog population in the catchment pond is so low.

The name Rana palustris means “frog: swampy.” Maybe if I spent more time in swamps I’d see them more often than once every three years.

This particular specimen did not want to hold still long enough for me to get a good shot. I’m glad I took this one even though the photo was sure to be sub-optimal (frog is obscured by the grass, etc), but I did it because I thought it might be my only shot – and it was. Shortly after this one, it disappeared into the grass (which desperately needs a good mowing) and I was unable to find him again.

We went to the company picnic today. Even though I have worked at this place for 11 years now (well… in August), this is the first picnic I have attended. It is also the first time they’ve ever held it on a Sunday. They moved it from Saturday to Sunday so that I could attend, which I did not ask them to do, but I did certainly appreciate it.

I brought a few things for the entertainment. Wayne had suggested that we have a solar-oven cookie bake-off. I did the research and found some plans for the ovens. I also bought the supplies for them and transported them here (except for the boxes). Supplies included aluminum foil, aluminum tape, oven/roaster bags, plexiglass, carton knives, cardboard boxes, and wire. Here are two of the resulting ovens:

The one Jonathan and I worked on is shown in the upper part of the photo above. Too bad the sun didn’t cooperate! Almost as soon as the ovens were finished and stoked with cookie dough, the clouds got pretty thick. It sprinkled a bit too. In spite of that, the ovens did reach temperatures of 110°F. I had brought an IR laser thermometer (we use them in our labs all the time). Soon the clouds got even thicker and the “oven” temperatures dropped to around 85°F. The grass also clocked in at… 85°F. We baked zero cookies.

Another item I brought was a pilot ladder I had made earlier this month. They have these at the Maryland Renaissance Festival, the difference being that you have to pay a buck to try climbing theirs. This one was free. In spite of the unlimited number of attempts, I was still not able to climb this contraption. David gave it a try too:

With the expected results:

Some of the younger girls (about Beth’s age) finally did manage to reach the top without being thrown off. I awarded the first one to do this with a $10 gift card from Target. She was pleased.

There was also a swimming pool there which is where Beth spent most of her time. The whole family had a great time.

Today after lunch, Beth, Penny, and I headed down to Sandogardy Pond again. There were a lot of people there as both the temperature and humidity were nearly 90. Beth swam. I took pictures of aquatic plants.

I’m pretty sure I’ve posted pics of this species already this year, but they were out in force today, so I took several more shots. I liked this one the best.

I also came across one I don’t yet know. I have misplaced my “main” field guide, and have had no luck thus far with the FG’s I do have on hand. It might be one I used to know and then forgot:

If anyone out there recognizes it, I’d be grateful for an ID.

Penny spent the whole time taking sticks to people and convincing them to throw them for her. Most obliged. Kids tend to throw them out into the pond, but that does not daunt Penny in the least:

We came home after about an hour. I took a nap, had some supper, and then Beth and I went out again in the evening to do a little geocaching. We found two and then came home.

As far as I know, we still do not have the building permit for the school remodelling project, so that’s still on hold. Jonathan and I did stop by there after work today though to pick up some tools. I had been thinking we might clean up enough in there to make the room usable tomorrow, but that would have been a two hour task. Instead, Jonathan proposed that we move one of the cubby-hole cabinets in front of the door to close the area off to kids. I thought that was a brilliant plan, so we executed it, and were on our way.

It started raining this afternoon, so when I got home, I didn’t go outside. Maybe I will tomorrow, rain or shine. We’ll see.

Our remodelling project at the school is on hold now. We do need a building permit, so until we get one, we’ll just cool our heels. I expect that won’t happen until Friday or so.

When I got home from work today, I had a package (this time, one that I was expecting) in the mail. I had ordered a ten-pack of solar powered flashlights. Yes, you read that right. Solar. Powered. Flashlights. That used to be a joke, but with the addition of a rechargeable battery, it starts to make sense.

Unfortunately, they sent me the one-pack instead of the ten-pack, even though I paid for the ten-pack ($18.67 at Meritline). I sent them an email to hopefully clear this up. They are certainly worth $1.87 each, but I did not want to pay $18.67 for just one.

I plan to use a couple in a hacking project I have in mind. I want to build a heliostat (that is, a sun tracker) so that my solar phone charger can always point at the sun. I’ll use one of the solar panels from the flashlight to drive a motor which will rotate my big charger until the little panel finds itself in the shade and stops the motor.

I also noticed today that the Indian Tobacco (Lobelia inflata) is in bloom now.

Today I went to my first VOAD (Volunteer Organizations Active in Disaster) meeting. It was about a 15 minute walk from my office, so I went ahead and walked.

They were throwing around acronyms like a defence contractor (I would know, having spent 13 years employed by one), most of which I had no clue as to their meaning.

The meeting started at 11:00am, and they served pizza at noon thirty. I had no idea how long one of these couldbe expected to go, and for whatever reason, I had it in my head that a long lunch would be sufficient to attend the entire thing. But they hadn’t even gotten half way through the agenda by 1:30, so I bailed.

I’ll go to the next one if I can, but with a better clue as to how long I can expect it to go (i.e., forever).

After work I went to the church again to work on our renovation project. I taped and slapped some mud on a few joints, while Kevin and Brian framed up the new doorway in the hall. Jonathan dropped me off and then headed out for supper (I wasn’t hungry yet, having eaten my fill of VOAD pizza), and then on to class.

He’s finished with his statistics class now, and his grade is plenty high enough that he doesn’t have to take the final exam (hoorays!) He was pretty stoked about that. He needed a 79 on his last unit test, and knocked out a 95. He needs to sign up for the fall semester now.

In other news…
Va called me sometime during the day asking if I was expecting a package from Fair Point (our bankrupt telephone company). Nope! But there it was anyhow – a box full of Internet access. They have been putting real-estate type signs up all over the place declaring that they have broadband in our area, but since we’ve been happy with our current ISP (the local cable TV monopoly) we saw no need to switch.

But I guess Fair Point didn’t see it that way. Va called them and asked them why they sent that to us. They explained to her in no uncertain terms that we had ordered it three times in the past six months, which is absolutely false. They were insistent, and even got a tad belligerent with her. She threatened to cancel our land line, and they said something like “That’s your prerogative.” Maybe they didn’t know that it was not an empty threat.

I really see no reason for a land line any more. We’re going to get another cell phone and give it to David. I had been thinking we’d try to port our old number to his phone, but then he’d be all the time getting calls from the pharmacy, dentist, and relatives, and since their message would somehow get through, they’d have no reason to update their records. By abandoning the number, that won’t happen. David won’t get those calls, and the callers will have an impetus to actually update their records. Once we get a fourth cell phone, we’ll pull the plug on Fair Point.

It’s our prerogative.

I was pretty wiped out yesterday. Jonathan and I showed up at the church at 8:00am and started the school remodelling project. I had him get the Internet back up while I started moving furniture into the corner, or out of the room. By 11:30 no one else had shown up, and I was beginning to feel discouraged.

But it wasn’t long after that that four more guys did show up, and then things started to move a little faster. We emptied out a closet, unwired some walls, and then started taking them out. Here’s what it looked like today:

The first shot shows where the closet used to be. The second one shows where the hallway used to be.

Today Kevin Schofield was going to meet me there after work so we could do some drywall work, repairing the places where the walls we removed met the walls we left intact. I was planning to buy the drywall as soon as I got off work, but the forecast was calling for thundershowers. I decided it would be better to do it at lunchtime instead and maybe beat the rain. So Jonathan and I ate a quick bite and then bought some drywall, some joint compound, drywall tape, and a roll of R13 insulation.

The R13 was $37! I thought I was grabbing a 32′ roll, but it’s just shy of 8′, and it still cost quadruple what I was paying for the stuff I put in my attic. Yes, quadruple the cost for a quarter the insulation. Unbelievable. I’ll take it back tomorrow – we only wanted it for a sound barrier, but I’m not paying 16x for that. I’ll go to Lowes later and get some cheap R13.

After work we stopped at Taco Bell, and then Jonathan brought me to the church. Va would be there (as would many other members of the school board) later to interview a new teacher’s aide, and I’d catch a ride home with her.

Anyhow, Kevin showed up and we got to work. He tore out a few more studs where the new corners are and we re-built those. I patched some drywall here and there. I had been thinking that Kevin would be a great addition to the Pathfinder Club. He has two boys aged 10 and 14, and he mentioned that they might be interested in joining. So I told him I’d like for him to join too, and he agreed! Hoorays!

While we were working, the promised thunderstorm came. It poured. I noticed I had the Pathfinder trailer open, so I went out in that to close it. I got to stand right in the spot where a valley in the roof dumps its rain on the ground. I got…. wet.

We worked for a couple of hours and then he needed to get on home. Va and the board showed up to conduct the interview. After a while I decided to take a break. While the board talked about the candidate, the candidate was waiting in the fellowship hall, so I thought I’d talk to her a little bit. While we were talking, Paul, one of the school board members, was going in and out, and then he asked me if I had my camera with me – the sky was perfect.

So I dashed out and took about fifty shots. It’s hard to choose from among that many, especially when none of them are fantastic, and they all look pretty much the same. But this one seemed pretty OK:

I went back to work after that, and the meeting ended shortly afterwards. Va and I were heading home when Katrina (the teacher) called – she was taking the candidate to the Haggett Farm (my buddy Ken’s place, which is where my banner photo was taken) but the road leading there was closed. The storm dropped a tree across the road, and she didn’t know any other way to get there.

Well, I do know another way to get there, but didn’t think I could explain it to anyone over a cell phone. I kinda needed to see it myself. So we turned around and met them at Target, and led them by the alternate route. I did have the GPS with me too, so that helped.

When we got to Sharon’s (Ken’s sister) house (they both live in their own houses on the farm), we found that the power was out. Maybe it had something to do with the tree in the road. I asked Katrina if she could find her way to her house, and she didn’t think she could. So I plugged her address into the GPS and it led us there. Va and I got home at about 10:30.