Height of laziness

I admit to cutting a few corners in jobs I've had in the past. By and large I used that tactic to help get a job done more quickly when possible and without compromising the task being done. The building I currently work in is over one hundred years old. It was renovated in 2003 and aesthetically they did a good job. But as with any renovation job where the absolute low bidder gets the contract, there are a few flaws. The basement is a source of concern, as water has leaked through the courses between the bricks in certain spots on more than one occasion. It's a potentially dangerous situation because the water will weaken the aging mortar between the bricks. This resulted in the entire foundation in the front of the building to be excavated and resealed (again).

At the end of 2003 they tore off the roof to replace it. Nobody thought to check out how the water drainage system works in the building, and wound up creating multiple breaks in the century old downspout system where the pipes enter the attic space. Almost every office space on our floor received some sort of water damage whenever it rained. My office still bears the scars of the water leak above my work space. Needless to say the roofing contractor was called back on a number of occasions to fix the leaks. And for a while it looked as if they succeeded--until this morning.

Late this morning one of our faculty members came running down the hall to tell me he had water leaking from the sprinkler head in his office. Naturally, fearing the sprinkler head might burst (also not a first in this building) I hustled to the ultra-safe and structurally sound basement to grab some plastic sheeting we have in storage from the first round of leaks. The physical plant workers were called, and a plumber showed up a short time later. After a quick check up in the attic he announced that the problem wasn't leaky plumbing. It seems that the roofing contractor set a five gallon bucket under one of the broken downspouts and it finally overflowed. I'm assuming that one of the Hispanic workers thought the contractor said "bucket" when he asked about fixing that one downspout.

As predicted

It rained last night, which is good. Apparently we have governor Sonny Perdue, who looks like the love child of Curly Howard and Boss Hogg (Dukes of Hazzard), to credit for the rain. On Wednesday he led a group of a few hundred people on the steps of the Georgia state capitol in a prayer session in an attempt to ask God for rain. As he only included a Christian God, it's possible he may have prayed to the wrong god. Perhaps Mohammed, Buddha, Vishnu, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster could've helped us by now. We'll never know. But one thing's for certain: I credit Sonny's office staff keeping tabs on the Weather Channel's web site and their ten day forecast for the coincidental timing of prayer session and the rain.

Of course the rain was part of a strong cold front that's currently blowing in from the northwest. The NSW issued a wind advisory for this area yesterday afternoon, which is not good. My first thought was that strong, gusty winds combined with trees weakened by a severe drought is not a good combination. So far my guess has been correct. First thing this morning a number of building on campus lost power when a tree limb fell onto a power line. I've been listening to the local police scanner today and there have been multiple calls about trees down, including one that landed on someone's car (and they've issued another tree down dispatch as I wrote that sentence).

I love windy days, but I hope it settles down soon. In a few hours I'll have to walk to my car under a canopy of nearly century old oak trees, which are pretty damned big, pretty damned heavy, and pretty damned weakened by the severe lack of rain here.

Note to self....

Don't watch Robot Chicken while eating lunch, unless you can do the Heimlich on yourself after aspirating food while laughing.

Conserving

With the drought in the south already pretty bad and apparently to get worse, trying to conserve water has become a priority at my home. We've done little things, like not running the dishwasher, short showers where the water is turned off when shampooing or soaping up, setting only two laundry days per month. Over the weekend we got our water bill. I knew what we have been doing was working as the amount was less than in the past. Calculating our total water usage compared to a few months ago, we've managed to cut our usage by 20%. That's pretty good, especially with an eight year old at home who likes to play in the sink but also understands that water is too hard to come by these days just to waste on washing Barbie's hair.

Endorsement

Rudy Ghouliani scored what some people are saying is a significant endorsement from Pat Robertson. Riding that 9/11 horse apparently plays well with the evangelicals these days. I guess they're willing to overlook his multiple divorces, his stand on abortion, and occasionally taking to crossdressing. It certainly looks like they're okay with these sins for the sake of partisan politics and electing a Republican who's willing to kill and torture as many "terrorists" as possible. And Rudy seems to be their man...or woman, depending on the day and time and how "fresh" Rudy's feeling at the moment.

Getting caught up

Hello, blog. It's been a couple of weeks since I've posted but things have been busy. At home my daughter's been sick, at work I've been occupied trying to get final teaching assignments done for spring. Class planning is challenging and at the same time a combination of being fun and a pain in the ass. But for the moment, I'm working on a newsletter from our department to be sent to our alumni to let them know what we've been up to and to ask for money (the money part is really the reason for doing this). I'm almost done typing in the text of the letter that our department head wrote, and my impression is given the tone of what he's written, this will be as successful in raising funds as Planned Parenthood sending solicitation letters to members of the 700 Club. Cultivating relationships with alums takes time and a fair amount of ass-kissing. This newsletter will not achieve either of those goals. Were I to get this letter, I'd read it, mumble "F-you buddy,"and throw it in the trash with mixed feelings about the department. Then again, whenever I get unsolicited letters from my alma mater, I usually mumble "F-you, buddy," trash the letter, and move on with my life.