Hunting gutter snipes

If you know what this is then you have a good idea what I did for my Saturday "Honey-Do" project. This odd thing-a-ma-bob is one well engineered little machine. So much so that I feel compelled to acknowledge it here. So here goes...

A couple of weeks ago, just before dark, the wind commenced to blow. Not your gentle kite-flying breeze but rather your precursor-to-a-wicked-storm gale force wind. It did blow. Then all of a sudden there were thunderous crashing sounds - obviously right on the roof over the kitchen. Said gale force wind had torn one end of the gutter loose and was proceeding to just beat it against the roof. Why it didn't come off completely I will never know. The flailing 14' section of gutter eventually folded up the incline of the roof and became lodged under the lip of one of the roof vents.

So I knew I needed some form of attaching device to reconnect the loose end of the gutter. Off to research my choices at Lowes. I looked at plastic brackets. I looked at 10-packs of Ferrule and Gutter screws. Then I spied the Amerimax 5-1/4" Aluminum Hidden Gutter Hanger. It was gutter love at first sight.

After a half hour of drill motor and right-sized-socket, extension cord and ladder logistics I was ready to scale the heights and do battle with the errant gutter. I gently eased it from beneath the roof vent lip. To my great surprise, like an extended tape measure rotated and bent, the gutter simply 'snapped' back into position. Only a very slight amount of adjusting was necessary to straighten out the kink. Even the proper slope was intact to insure the run-off runs off in the right direction.

Now all I had to do was fit these Hidden Gutter Hangers and screw them in. It took longer to go up and down and move the ladder six times than it did to re-secure the gutter. Ahhhhh... now I have plenty of time to do some real snipe hunting. Ha! Get your mind out of the gutter. I would never kill a snipe.

Externalities - The hidden costs...

True Cost

• Kalle Lasn | 15 Jul 2009

What is the real cost of shipping a container load of toys from Hong Kong to Los Angeles? Or a case of apples grown in New Zealand to markets in North America? And what is the true cost of that fridge humming in your kitchen, that car purring on the road or that steak sizzling on the grill? Practically every one of the products we buy in the global marketplace is undervalued because the environmental costs haven’t been taken into account. As a result, every one of the billions of purchases we make every day pushes the world a little deeper into the cosmic red.

But what if we were to implement this simple idea: true cost?

We calculate the hidden costs associated with products – what the economists nonchalantly refer to as “externalities” – and incorporate them. We force the price of every product in the global marketplace to tell the ecological truth. [More...]

Soylent Green is the economists answer to ever rising population numbers and ever diminishing natural resources. Processed field corn and soybeans provide most of the "delicious and nutritious meals" that we can afford. Monied interests and mega-corporate farms have convinced us that the only economical way to feed the nation is by offering "New and Improved" Soylent Green.

Bon Appetit

Haute Dogs!

10 Off-the-Wall Hot Dogs

Check out the most formidable findings between a bun (or on a stick)

By Brynn Mannino
Posted June 17, 2009 from WomansDay.com

The Chihuahua

Crif Dogs, the popular New York City eatery located in the

East Village, is beloved for its variety of wrapped and overloaded
franks. This particular culinary explosion contains a hot dog blanketed
in bacon then capped with sour cream and avocado. Photo courtesy of Chelsea Peretty/chelseaperetti.blogspot.com

Everything is as it should be.

Image by Plamoe via Flickr

Everything is as it should be.

Everyone is doing what they should be doing.

1000 Words to celebrate freedom

Michelle and Barack Obama

Shaving your palms

Blogging about blogging is a lot like sending yourself e-mail. Both practices I have engaged in for a number of reasons. Testing out a new e-mail addy, making sure the new mail proggy works correctly, even double checking filter rules. But blogging about blogging is something I really try to avoid at all costs - except for today. Today I am going to engage in the tradition of link-love under the guises of telling rendering a great adventure analytical tale observation about blogging. In any event it will not be a long one, tail that is.

Two distinct philosophies of blog publishing are typified in the works of Humorlessbitch (Zo) and Listics (Frank). Now I am not here to offer deep contextual reviews of respective expressed world views(Weltanschauung ( [ˈvɛlt.ʔanˌʃaʊ.ʊŋ] (help·info)) . (See also Life-world (Lebensveld). Derived from phenomenology (q.v.), it refers to the taken-for-granted universe of daily social activity-- the forms of life (Wittgenstein).) Rather I am here to amplify certain nuances in blogging styles.

I wonder, for instance, if Zo gets to see how her blog is presented in different readers. Publishing only the 'teaser' looks like this in Google Reader.

One Split Second Before Sex

from HUMORLESSBITCH

rabbit blog: You’re craving that one split second BEFORE you fuck the guy, and nothing more. Most of us are hung up on that moment, thanks to being flooded with its supreme significance through every minute of our waking hours on earth. Well, yes … it represents everything. The moment at birth when your gaze locks onto [...]

"The moment at birth when your gaze locks onto ... " Yeah, you got me clicking on the headline link looking for the next phrase. An endearing reflection of grandson's first breath and love.

... someone to whom you’d just become the center of all existence.

Never mind that it isn’t true. Obviously, we are meant, in order to thrive, to believe it for a while. To live in the center of her love, in order to learn. In order to become a human child. Obvious, too, that the craving of that moment, anticipating it, is way easier than growing up.

A wonderful roller-coaster ride that takes a sudden left turn and drops you squarely into the rabbit hole blog... who in turn sends you head-spinning off to
"Poets and Writers." Poets and Writers and rabbits, oh my.

Frank on the other hand lays his meat, maintenance and a cherry pie right on the table in his Saturday Farm Report. In his usual style Frank seasons the offering with a slight spicy aside ... " that’s (J)erry Garcia on the pedal steel on the cut above." referring to Jefferson Airplane's Volunteers, The Farm ... eliciting fragmented memories of a hot summer day in East Lansing on the campus of Michigan State University... it was a day long happening...hippies and blankets, insence smoke and music...bellbottoms and tie-dyed t-shirts...and music. All contained in a hastily erected cyclone fence corral. The guy at the gate insisted on the $5.00 admission fee that I didn't have...so I and hundreds of others watched from the periphery...until the inevitable happened. The promoters abandoned their economic pursuit in deference to the pressing crowd. The fence came down and Jefferson Airplane took the stage. Grace Slick belted out...

Look whats happening out in the streets
Got a revolution got to revolution
Hey Im dancing down the streets
Got a revolution got to revolution
Aint it amazing all the people I meet
Got a revolution got to revolution
One generation got old
One generation got soul
This generation got no destination to hold
Pick up the cry
Hey now its time for you and me
Got a revolution got to revolution
Come on now were marching to the sea
Got a revolution got to revolution
Who will take it from you
We will and who are we
We are volunteers of america

And if you don't mind my saying Zo, you remind me of her.