Lame.

I admit, the lame-o-meter is reading on the high side now. It has been a year since I posted anything on here. It hasn’t been from a lack of anything interesting:

• I left one position and took another.
• I wasn’t happy with the position and went back to where I started. I worked with some great people while I was there, tho.
• We took the kids to Disney World for the first time.
• I did a lot of work on the Spitfire, got it running again only to have it break, again.
• We did our annual trip back home to Michigan, yay for family!
• The Wings won the Cup!

No promises on further updates.

From maytag.com:

“In 1907, Frederick Louis Maytag entered the washer business with one goal in mind: to build quality appliances from durable and long-lasting materials.”

Obviously they’ve changed their business practices in the 100 years since that time.

Once again, we have a problem with our 3 1/2 year old Maytag dishwasher. I’m not going to rehash the endless cycle of problems we’ve had (you can read that here). Since then, the racks have started rusting (again), the plastic drop-down site racks no longer stay up, and the door latch has broken again.

Last night takes the cake, tho. I usually set the dishwasher to run every night after we’re in bed. I was woken up by the machine making a horrible grinding/moaning noise. It appears the motor has broken, for the 3rd time.

The part is covered under warranty, but the service call(s) wouldn’t be.

I’ve had enough. I’d get more enjoyment standing in the street and setting $20 bills on fire than I would paying to fix this worthless piece of junk. Evidently lots of other people have the same problems.

Sorry, Maytag. I’m done with you. I’ll never buy another of your appliances, and I’ll recommend to everyone I know that they don’t either.

Yes, it’s all about ME.

After 3 years, chele and I are ready to bring a new dog into our family. It’s been almost 3 years since we had to put Wuf down, and while we still miss him, we miss having the companionship of a dog in the house. The kids are old enough to have some responsibility with the dog as well.We’re looking for another cocker spaniel, but it’s been hard finding a reputable breeder. We’ve done a lot of web research but it’s difficult to tell the quality of a breeder from a website and pictures.
The right breeder and puppy is out there for us, the challenge is finding him.

P.S.: Wuf, we miss you.

Upgraded to WordPress 2.1. Painless and simple.

First wave down.

We’ve survived the first wave of this ice storm intact. We didn’t lose power, and nothing hit the house or cars. Pictures at:

January 2007 ice storm
Next wave of sleet/freezing rain/ice starts this evening!

Luke 2:8-14 (KJV)

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

I had an exciting weekend! Short story: Saturday afternoon I had my appendix removed.

So now I’m recovering at home.  More updates later as I feel better.

Fun little diversion: This flash game shows a montage of images returned by Google Image Search. The player has to guess what keyword returned the images.

Guess-the-Google

I’ve been going through LinkedIn and re-connecting with former co-workers and friends. If you’re on LinkedIn and know me, reconnect at:

When I upgraded to WordPress 2, I turned on the Akismet plugin. The description of the plugin is to the point: “Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web serivce to see if they look like spam or not.”

I haven’t had to moderate a spam comment since I enabled it.

I stopped by the course at First Baptist Church St. Charles on the way home from work today and threw a quick round. My elbow is finally healed and I was able to throw without pain. It was a perfect day for disc golf, and it showed in my score: 1 over for the entire 18 holes, the best I’ve ever done. I’ll admit, I was playing from the red tees (the easiest), so I didn’t have any killer long shots to make, but still, it was a great round. My best throw was a 70′ second shot on 13 that I intended to just put near the pin. The wind and throw was perfect, because I heard that satisfying *clang* sound of a disc hitting chain.

It’s great to be back on the course.

So Thursday evening I get home from work and find chele sitting on the floor in front of the sink, mopping up water. The aging garbage disposal had exploded out its drain pipe and puked water all over the under-sink cabinet. I’d repaired the connection at least once and was itching for an excuse to replace it anyway.

We took the kids out for supper and stopped at Home Depot. 40 minutes of under-cabinet work after the kids were asleep and the new disposal is working great.

Why I will never buy another Maytag appliance again:

A couple of weeks ago the handle on our dishwasher broke. chele was squeezing it one morning to get the dishes out and it snapped at the hinge. The only way to get the door open was to forcefully push up on the handle while yanking on the door. Joy.

Repairclinic.com had the part for $4.95 plus $4.95 shipping. I tried our local appliance parts dealer and was told that the handle wasn’t available separately. I’d need to special order a complete latch assembly for $60. Figuring that $10 for the handle was a good deal (and if it didn’t work I could get the latch later), I went with Repairclinic. 4 days later I’m arm deep in the door of the dishwasher, removing the latch and shaving the handle to fit.

The replacement handle works great. If that were the only repair I’ve had to do on the dishwasher, I wouldn’t be complaining. However, it isn’t. We went with this particular brand and model after reading Consumer Reports and seeing that this was top rated. In the two years we’ve owned it, it has had the following problems:

• The motor has been replaced twice.
• The “Lifetime Warrantied Rust-Free” racks rusted.
• One of the wheels on the top rack broke in two and wouldn’t stay screwed in anymore.

Now, if this were a cheap dishwasher, I’d just file those under “That’s Life” and go on. But it wasn’t a cheap model, and I was hoping to get a few good years out of it.

That’s why when we had to replace our washing machine, it wasn’t a Paytag, it was an LG

I upgraded WordPress on ammond.org today to 2.0.2. Like every other upgrade, it was a piece of cake. Back up the database and WordPress files, untar the new software, hit the ‘Upgrade’ URL.

Now to go digging into the new plugins.

After a winter of not playing any disc golf, I stopped by Creve Coeur park on the way home from work today and threw 9 holes. It was the first time I’ve thrown since falling down a hill at Quail Ridge and ripping up a tendon. I also injured ligaments in my elbows this winter somehow as well.

Still, it wasn’t a bad round. 3 over par after 9 holes. I decided to quit at 9, to not strain my elbow more. Zack and I are going to try and throw again tomorrow, here’s hoping for a better round.

Name the band from the picture

A huge timewaster. chele and I got 94 without resorting to google.

Edit: Fixed the URL, it went 404. Hosted on ammond.org now, hopefully it won’t abuse my bandwidth.

Saw this one on p.d.o. and p.g.o. today:

Numenorean

Interesting.

I rule.

I do. Stop laughing at me.

Happy birthday to me
Happy birthday to me
Happy birthday dear me
Happy birthday to me.