I think I'm pretty burned out on life, and about the only emotion I'm feeling with any sort of intensity is anger, like when people call me direct when I'm on not on call.  A poignant reminder of why I can have 5 gigs of mp3s but can rarely listen to them at work (in the car it works well, though, and it only took me a day to fill up 2 gigs worth).

I dodged a bullet Friday night, we almost went shopping for a 8k BTU ac, so we could have a big one downstairs, and two smaller one upstairs, but a front came through with a bit of thunder and lightning, and everything cooled off. We're still using fans and open windows.

I just finished The Arms of Krupp, the story of the Krupp family and their rise and fall as steelmakers/weaponmakers. While it has a few sexual curiousities in it, in general it's fairly dry and boring, and would need an immmense amount of spicing up to make it a Hollywod movie. Recommended for those into steel making, or the Ruhr, or heavy industry.

Saturday was our 12th wedding anniversary, we went out to a meh Italian dinner, and generally had an okay time. Have I mentioned my emotional burnout?

Most of the weekend was spent working around the house. I got a 75% on the plumbing, patching a hole under the kitchen sink with rubber tape, the whole inner section of the J pipe is rotted out, weird. Of course, a big box hardware store has about 10 different J pipe configurations, so it's going to take some time to find the right one.

I had better luck with the upstairs bathroom faucet, I bought a whole new one. I decided spending $40 on a name brand one (Peerless) is better than spending $20 on another cheapie one, since every five to ten years you have to replace the guts anyhow, might as well go with something that I'll remember (plus, Peerless puts their name on the faucet). 

I found out my road bike is a Columbia Royale, and our garbage picked three speed is a Huffy, made in England. Once I get a chain on Columbia I can start riding it, it's got to be better than a FreeSpirit. I should see if the Huffy is worth anything.

I did some gardening too, transplanting some cukes and some basil, and even picking some basil for last night's mozzarella/tomato salad. The toughest work this weekend was outside, cementing in various and suspect rat holes. With their holes cemented in and five poisoned ones found, I think we've taken a major step towards eliminating the rat menace threatening the home. It is a little premature to pull out the Mission Accomplished banner, we're certainly going to keep an eye on the area and continue depooping the yard, but I do think the tide has turned.