Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m just dumb, or don’t speak English correctly, or have a short attention span. Whatever the case, I can’t make heads or tails of the Baltimore County Land Records website. All I want to do is get a better copy of the plat for our property, so that I might begin the process of understanding exactly where the fuck my lawn ends and where the neighbors’ begins. The copy of a fax of a copy I have shows a trapezoid with vague and blobby notations of distance, but no point of triangulatory reference for anything except the west corner of our road frontage. Which means our garage could be in someone else’s yard. And there’s no mention of actual distance from the pavement to the beginning of our property, just a smudgy line which could be our hedgerow. Apparently I will need to hire a surveyor, at the approximate cost of one months’ salary, just to nail a ribbon on a tree and say “It’s here”. Before I can do that, I have to get the plat, and in order to do that (as far as I can tell from this suck-ass website) I have to make an appointment, with… somebody. There are names and numbers listed, but none of them say “I’m the guy who will help you get that thing you need”. Searching on their website for the obvious stuff, like “copy of plat” returns a “Google Custom Search Result”, which is quickly becoming Internet shorthand for “we don’t give a rat’s ass about you, and we’re too cheap to catalog anything properly.”
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In the meantime, I’m shopping for a new laptop. Idiot Central, the 17″ MacBook Pro I’ve had for four years, has only sported half a usable screen for the last month or so, and I’m tired of not being able to use it without an external monitor. I’m also really sick and tired of opening my bag to find that it mysteriously woke from sleep and cooked itself like a Hot Pocket. The trackpad button has been sticking in the down position, which means it’s always wanting to select something. It’s still a good, fast machine, so it’ll likely end up as a production unit on my desk, but its days as a primary computer are done. I use a laptop mainly as a travel rig these days, so I’m looking at a 13″ MacBook Pro as a replacement. It’s portable, small, and fast, and I don’t have the extra $500 to pony up for a 15″.
Update: It gets better. Remember how I was talking about the trackpad sticking? I did a little poking around this evening. The trackpad sits directly under the battery compartment.
See that bulge? That means the battery is fooked. It’s been swelling in the center and putting direct pressure on the trackpad above. I guess it bulged to the point where it finally disabled the trackpad completely. The funny thing is, my boss at work, who also has a 17″ MBP of similar vintage, just had his battery replaced today at the Apple Store due to the exact same issue. I have to see if he got it replaced under warranty or not, because I think we may be heading to the Columbia location this weekend, and we may be walking out with a new iPhone, a MacBook Pro, and a replacement battery.
Yesterday afternoon, after a gaggle of older screaming kids had finally vacated the neighbors’ pool, I called over to see if I could bring Finn for a swim. She knows that Aloha means “hello” because we talk about it when I put on her pink swim shirt and she literally vibrates with excitement when we get near the water.
I set her down on the steps and we both got in slowly, basking in the afternoon sun, until she was up to her chest and I was floating in front of her. Instead of free swimming the whole time like we normally do at the Y, she was content to sit on the steps and watch as I crept up to her toes underwater and surfaced with a loud “Boo!’, which sent her into fits of giggles. Then she would stand up, hold her arms open, yell, “Ready!” and jump into my arms for a brief tour of the shallow end before practicing her paddle back to the stairs, and we would do it all over again.
There was a moment when the sun hit her face as I knelt in front of her, and her blue eyes looked deep into mine, right before she stood up to jump into my arms again. In that moment, I saw the trust she had in me, knowing I would be there to catch her as she made her leap, and I made a quiet promise to myself that I would never let her down. And as her arms wrapped around my neck, the sun warmed my back, and her giggles filled my ears, I felt like the luckiest man on earth.
I ordered a set of plug wires from RockAuto yesterday afternoon, as well as five dash bulb sockets and lights. Originally I was going to buy a gas tank sender and get the new tank ready for installation, but I suddenly came to my senses and realized that I don’t have an entire weekend to deal with that project. So, I ordered wires to go along with the plugs I’ve already got, and I figure I can get them installed in a couple of hours.
I also worked with the third bench seat a little more, and have it almost to the place where it’s ready to go in—but I have to do some POR-15 work on the mounting plates and bed before it goes in for good. The bed itself needs a good media blasting and sealant coat soon, because there’s some light rust coming up under the purple paint that I’d like to mitigate immediately as well as some flaky areas around the wheel wells.
I’m moving up my plans for a welder to near the top of the list, because I see some metal repairs in my future.
I stumbled on this forum thread this evening while waiting for Photoshop to restart: New girl with a Metro. A Metro is a very rare, very desirable art-deco inspired delivery van made by International Harvester from the 30’s to the 60’s. What makes me smile is not just the enthusiasm which the new owner has for her new truck, but the support she’s getting from the forum members.
File this under “Wish I’d thought of it first”: What The Fuck Is My Social Media Strategy?. Reminds me of the good old Web Economy Bullshit Generator.
Yep, I’m still here. I haven’t had a whole lot of time to write lately, and by the time I’m settled down enough to write I’m usually out of things to say. I haven’t been doing much picture-taking either, so I guess I’m just falling down on the job all over the place.
That having been said, life is good. The girl is talking up a storm, work is rolling along smoothly, my efforts to organize and structure my life are slowly bearing fruit, and I feel better about everything in general. Stick with me, guys; I’ll get back to a reasonable writing schedule soon.
If this little car isn’t sex on wheels, I don’t know what is: 1958 Berkeley B65. Apparently it only sports a two-cylinder engine, which was standard for the make; they specialized in tiny motorcycle-powered sportscars in the late 50’s. Normally I dislike yellow, but I think it fits this little skate perfectly.
