Tag Archives: Life

V-3!

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I’m at home this morning.  Not for long.  It’s about 9:20 now and I expect that I’ll be in the office by 10:00.  Going in late because the heating & air guy is here doing whatever it is that they do twice a year.  Mainly change the filter in the furnace.  Truth be told, that is such a pain in the ass that I’ll gladly write the annual $150 check just so I don’t have to do it.  I’m not sure who the genius was who designed the filter holder in my furnace, but getting a new one in without either destroying it or cutting your hands and arms or both is nearly impossible.

He tells me that my air conditioner is blowing out 52-degree air, however.  That’s nice.  It’s apparently supposed to blow 55-degree air, and the unit is nearly 30 years old, so bully for me.

Should you be wondering, my thermostat is generally set at around 83 in the summer, so I’m not overly concerned about the cost of the difference between 52 and 55 degrees when the air conditioner is actually running.  It doesn’t run much.

As noted in the title, I’m three days away from starting my first real vacation in about two years.  Last year’s had to be juggled all over the place because I had possible strike duty and couldn’t go anywhere out of cellphone range.  Also couldn’t go to Canada – the dates just didn’t work out.  I ended up taking a week in October to visit Lake Superior (and I’ll do that again this year, I think).  Not having strike duty looming over me this year, I’m headed to Magnetawan this weekend and will spend at least a week and a half there before heading back.  Maybe even two weeks.

This will be a great thing, in spite of the bugs, because it is bloody hot in Georgia.  The temperatures have been climbing well into the 90s for the last few weeks, and when there’s a breeze, it feels more like that which would come from an electric heater.  No relief at all.  I generally start my morning walks at about 5:40.  Even at that time, I’m covered in sweat before I’ve gone half a mile.  Incessant heat basically sucks the life out of me.

I’m also looking forward to finding out if a week in clean air will clear up this stupid allergy/sinus infection/whatever, which is still making me sneeze regularly.

No.  I’m not going to a doctor for sniffles.

Work has been work.  Really not much going on, though I did do a bit of coding last week.  I’ve also managed to move most of the call center televisions away from a (very expensive) series of broadcast boxes that are painfully inefficient, difficult to troubleshoot, and completely unnecessary.  All of the center’s 43 televisions, save 2, are now being fed over Ethernet from three laptops and two u-verse set-top boxes.  My boss (and his boss) are pleased with this effort, since we currently pay something like $2500 annually for “support” on the broadcast boxes.  Said support is generally not good, and I’ve never understood why they were set up in the first place.

Got a document from Dad yesterday – the rough draft of his memoirs.  I’m up to 1942-1946, and am already fascinated and thinking of all of the various things that I can google to fill in some of the blank (to me) spots in his childhood.  A map of where he lived, more about my grandmother, etc.  Would also like to look up some of the songs that he sang as a very young child, as I have never heard of most of them.  Maybe I’ll bring a digital recorder to his house sometime and make him sing them.

Sort of like the guy who wandered around the Appalachian mountains to record folk songs, right?

The heating/air guy seems to be about done, so I’ll wrap this up and write a check to him.  Next entry will probably be from Canada!

 

Jury Duty

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I’d dared to hope that, after 50 years without having ever been summoned for jury duty, I’d make it through life as a jury virgin.

Three weeks ago, I – for lack of a better g-rated phrase – got laid by the Superior Court of Gwinnett County.

To say that I was not pleased by the county’s new interest in me would be a bit of an understatement. Sure, it’s my civic duty. Yes, it’s an honor and a privilege (I’m required to say that). And I even get $30 for participating in this incredibly boring endeavor. But the simple facts are these: I don’t want to do this, I’ve never wanted to do this, I have virtually no trust or respect for any aspect of our legal system, and I’ve done what I thought was necessary to avoid being in the jury pool – namely, giving up my right to vote.

Turns out that Gwinnett County started using DMV records to fill the pool…

To clarify one of the above statements, I should say that I think the idea of American jurisprudence is a fine one, and it might have been great at some point. Unfortunately, it’s turned into just another business, in my opinion.

The police are a revenue arm of the local government, not a force driven to “serve and protect.”

Lawyers have very little interest in “justice” out “finding the truth,” but are deeply concerned about their win/loss record, about how far they can climb politically, and about cashing in.

Judges used to be lawyers – enough said.

Prisons are more private concerns, with a financial stake in staying filled to capacity (or beyond it), cutting costs wherever possible, and using prisoners for what amounts to slave labor – road crews, for example.

In short, I think our legal system is a joke and a shadow of what it was meant to be.

Yet here I am…. Sitting in a big, hot, room, on an unbelievably uncomfortable chair, waiting for my little pod to be called. And I’ve been doing so for the last two hours.

Call me a cynic. Call me a bad American. Call me unpatriotic. Call me all the bad names you can think of.

But please – don’t call me for jury duty again.