Kagan's abortion stance has both sides guessing

I think it’s completely absurd that anyone can be appointed judge for life and we “don’t know” what she thinks of certain things.  Things that are important to a lot of people.

They should have me interview her.  I’d get it out of her!  Just see the previous video.

Kagan's abortion stance has both sides guessing - latimes.com

Candidate Meeting

This is the meeting of the South San Joaquin Republicans candidate night.  Sorry about the shakey video, my inflamed nerves were acting up and the lighting in there is a nightmare, windows all around, everything is backlit.  The sound in there isn't so good either.  But here it is, submitted for your approval.  As bad as it is, there are some amusing parts.  Heck, the rendition of the National Anthem at the end is worth the trip.

Joe the plugger’s idea

Here’s my idea for plugging that darn oil leak in the gulf of Mexico.  If you use it, I want a small piece of the action.  Note there are modifications such as the cable or chain tensioners.  The plug can be solid or filled with weights.  etc. 

They were somehow able to get that giant “box” in place, so why not some kind of thing to jam in there.  The idea is it has to be able to get in there with the oil and gas escaping under high pressure. 

click to enlarge:

Critters of Manteca

This is some kind of spider found on a cactus in the backyard. It lives in a little silk "house" on the side of the cactus and when someone comes near it jumps out and stares at you. With at least four eyes. Also note the highly colorful greenish turquoise appendages. It's about 2 cm in length. I decided not to mess with it and it's still living out there. If I'm missing it's because this thing crawled inside and got me in the middle of the night.

City adds $1000 to cost of housing.

Background: Two meetings ago I questioned a proposal to adopt what the city calls “building standards.”  What that means is new mandates about how homes (and businesses) are to be built.  The stated goal is “energy efficiency.”  Absent from any of the documents was any estimate of how much these new rules would add to the cost of a home.

Well a few weeks later there was a “public hearing” on the matter.  Odd, because the measure had already been approved in the first reading.  The 2nd reading and passage and “public hearing” were at the same time.  In other words, it didn’t matter much what “the public” thought about the idea, the “hearing” was a mere formality. 

Well here were things take a strange turn.  After the public hearing, the “Building Guy” says he’s got some information for me.  For me?  Why yes.  And sure enough they actually attempted to find an answer to question I asked at the earlier meeting.

First, note that in the email I got a promotion to individual from my  previous rank of no one. 

So in response to the query, the chief guy from the state pulled a figure out of his ass of estimated from $590 to $1,095 in additional costs and further guessed calculated that over the lifetime of the house it could save as much as $5,157.  I asked how long this “life of the house” was.  No one knew.  But it wasn’t 20 years. (“No, longer.”)  Over the next hundred years?  “Hm, not sure if that long.”  So according to government figures you’ll enjoy these savings sometime between the next 20 to 100 years.

Seems like a lowball figure to me on the costs.  Maybe one of you in the building trades can say.  The estimate has absolutely no supporting calculations other than “what the guy at the state said.”  And the savings is based on an assumption that the wonder-house will use 15% less energy.

My guess is that the estimate doesn’t include compliance costs.  Those are the costs of following the code.  The code is in three large volumes and specifies everything from where to bang in nails to tables and graphs to figure out how much insulation you need.  Compliance costs are what it costs in your time to read and understand these books, and to modify your architectural plans, and everything else associated with actually following the code.  I wonder if the state’s estimate is simply the costs of the added insulation, the more efficient lighting fixtures, etc.  Which may be only a fraction of the total.

I was about to move this issue off my radar screen when I noticed one other thing.  On the paper someone scribbled to figure the “percentage increase” in costs.  It has two math errors.  Where it says =3.52% that should be 0.352%.  It’s off by a factor of ten.  Sure easy enough mistake, I’ve made that one a few times.  But now we’re left wondering.  The initial estimate at the first meeting was given at 1 to 2 percent.  Just 1 percent is $1,677.  So who knows, are the percentages correct and the real figure is ten times more?  ($5,900 to $10,950 ? )  Probably not, but one never knows. 

By the way, if all they did was come up with three phonebook sized books on “how to build a house that uses 15 % less energy” why not just publish that and let builders build that if they wanted to?  What customer wouldn’t want a house that costs less to heat and cool?  So why is the government involved at all? 

Eyjafjallajökull

It’s a name only Spock’s mother could pronounce.  Now you know why the press calls it “that volcano in Iceland.”  

Ow! My gut!

I haven’t updated lately.  I’ll try to avoid going into a Manteca Bulletin-esque tale of personal woe (How I was a fat kid, how I fell off my bicycle, how I can’t eat onions, how I got a bad haircut, how we used the hot tub at our honeymoon at Half Moon Bay, etc.)

At right is an artist’s conception of what I looked like at the emergency room Tuesday afternoon.  Oh, I’m not going to go into the excruciating pain, urinating blood, the vomiting, turning colors, etc.  But I guess I just did.

It all turned out well.  Jackie did a yeoman’s job as an ambulance driver.  I’ll be damned if I was going to pay those people a $1,000 for a glorified taxi ride.  And the people at San Joaquin County Hospital did a fantastic job.  Despite the fight taking place in the waiting room when I staggered in doing my impression of Oswald meets Ruby, they took me in right away really took good care of me.  I even got a CT scan.  The machine looked like it was the first one ever made.  But hey, it did the job.

Time to stop being appreciative for all that everyone did for me and get back to complaining.