It is Sunday, October 18 and there are only 68 days until Christmas.  Be careful when buying Halloween candy.  You don’t want to confuse it with the Christmas candy that is already out in some stores.  Today we remember the birthdays of Canaletto, Fannie Hurst and Pam Dawber.  On this day in 1648 the first US labor organization, Boston Shoemakers, formed, in 1767 the boundary between Maryland and Pennsylvania, the Mason Dixon Line, was agreed upon and in 1967 Walt Disney’s “Jungle Book was released.  In Rhodesia it is Republic Day and in Alaska tomorrow is, of all things, Alaska Day.

When we first moved into our new house we determined that one of the things that needed to be changed was the faucet in our kitchen.  It was low, making it difficult to fill the coffee pot, or large pots , or rinse dishes.  It was also stiff and did not move freely.  With that in mind, we went shopping and finally found a faucet that we liked.  The other day I had enough time available that I decided to install the faucet and rid ourselves of the one we had.

I cleaned out the things under the sink and got ready to remove the old faucet.  It quickly became apparent to me that the existing one had been installed when the house was built.  The faucet was attached to the sink before it was put into place.  I was not about to pull the sink out so I had to climb in under the sink and reach up to undo the various fittings and lines to remove the old one.  Anyone who has done this knows that not only is the position you are in extremely awkward and uncomfortable, but you are also trying to remove nuts using tools that are not meant  to be used in the limited space available.

It took quite a lot of time and swearing to get the old one out.  I had to keep stopping to give my arms and back a break from the position I was in.  In the process, I would have to climb out from under the sink and then back in after resting.  I banged my head so many times that if I had been playing football in the NFL, I would have been taken to the locker room to go through the concussion protocols. After banging my head four or five times, I decided that maybe I should be more cautious in my ingress and egress.  Easier thought than accomplished.  In avoiding the one obstacle, I was able to find another one to bang against.  I finally decided to go with the one that didn’t cause as much pain or swearing.

I finally got the old one out and was quite proud of myself.  It was out and it only took two hours, a decent amount of pain in my back, side, butt and shoulders, a bump on my head that I knew would not get better soon and the need for a bandaid on the finger that I scraped the skin off.  I stood there and reveled in my accomplishment for a minute or two, until it dawned on me that I still had to crawl back under there to install the new one.  While the new faucets are made to be installed more easily, they still have some aspects that require the uncomfortable positions and working in limited space.

I decided that I was not going to be defeated by this.  I was going to forge ahead and get this thing installed.  I carefully followed the instructions (which I truly believe are written by someone for whom English is their second or even third language)and got it installed.  I reviewed all the steps to make sure that I had not missed anything.  I checked to make sure that all the fittings were tightened and that everything was ready to go.  It was.  I confidently turned on the water supply and water shot out of the side spray hose and went all over the kitchen floor.  If you know anything about me you will know that I was less than pleased with this outcome and put together a fairly long string of profanities to express that displeasure.

I rechecked everything to be sure that I had not done something incorrectly.  Confident that I had followed the instructions, I decided to call the company for assistance.  The only thing harder than actually taking out the old faucet and installing the new one was getting a real person on the phone to talk to.  He walked me through several quick fix things that did not work.  He suggested that maybe debris had gotten into the diverter (the part that sends the water from the faucet to the spray) and had blocked it.  I asked what kind of debris.  I pointed out that it was a new item, fresh out of the box.  He had no answer for that.  

He asked a couple more questions and then put me on hold.  When he came back, he told me that he was ordering a couple parts for me and that I should have them in seven to ten days.  I told him that that was unacceptable.  I explained that this was my kitchen sink and I could not go that long without it.  He explained that he could not get them out any sooner and he would get them ordered right away.  I don’t remember my exact response, but am pretty sure that it was unpleasant.  He then asked if there was anything else he could help me with and I said, “You haven’t helped me with anything so far” and hung up.

So, because I hadn’t been having enough fun, I had to go to the store and purchase another faucet, pull the non-working one out and install the new one.  Without going into great detail, the new one got installed, it does not spray water all over the kitchen floor and it is okay.  I have stiff shoulders, an even sorer butt and a sizable bruise on my back.  I can assure you that I will not be doing anymore plumbing work anytime soon.  If this new faucet falls apart, I will start filling the coffee pot in the shower.

This week our fact tells us that Rush Limbaugh was disqualified from the Vietnam draft due to a cyst on his butt.  That would explain a lot.  His head is up there now because he is checking on the cyst.  That is why he talks out of there, too, I guess.

It is Sunday, October 11 and there are only 20 days until Halloween.  Now is the time to start remembering where you hid the candy you bought in August when they put the Halloween candy on the shelves.  Today we remember the birthdays of Eleanor Roosevelt, Elmore Leonard and Daryl Hall.  On this day in 1811 the Juliana, the first steam-powered ferryboat began operations, in 1890 the Daughters of the American Revolution was founded and in 1987 200,000 gays marched for civil rights in Washington.  In Sri Lanka it is Deepavali, in Western Samoa it is National Day and in the US tomorrow is Columbus Day.

As in years past, I have taken time to discuss tomorrow’s holiday.  I try to provide different information each year so that you don’t get bored.  Here is this year’s contribution.  At the end of the 15^th century, it was nearly impossible to reach Asia from Europe by land.  The route was long and arduous, and encounters with hostile armies were difficult to avoid.  Portuguese explorers solved this problem by taking to the sea – they sailed south along the West African Coast and around the Cape of Good Hope.

Columbus had a different idea.  Why not sail across the Atlantic?  His logic was sound, but his math was faulty.  He believed (erroneously) that the circumference of the Earth was much smaller than his contemporaries believed it was.  He felt the journey by boat from Europe to Asia should be not only possible but comparatively easy.  We all know how that worked out.

One final point I would like to make is that though he did not really “discover” the New World – millions of people already lived there – his journeys marked the beginning of centuries of trans-Atlantic conquest and colonization.  That is it for this year.  I hope you have gained from this annual delving into Columbus.

For all of you who have been sitting on the edge of your seat for the past week, yes, we finally closed on the house and are technically done with it.  I say technically because we still have a project that has to be completed so that the buyers can have the house free and clear.  There is the matter of a stairway that needs to be built.  The town granted a conditional certificate of occupancy after paperwork was filed saying the buyers would be responsible for seeing that it was done according to code.  We have hired the contractor and are paying for the work, but it has to be completed and the town has to sign off before the entire transaction is complete.

As I have said, once it is all done, I will regale you with the foolishness that we endured trying to get this sale completed.  All I can say is that if you are looking to move, have your town inspector come by and get the process going as soon as possible.  I am hearing horror stories from people in other towns who have had the same types of problems.  It appears that the Code Enforcement people are very good at interpreting rules and regulations any way they want.  The problem is that you have no recourse.  You are at their mercy.  The question that is always asked is why do they bust your chops so much.  The answer is simple – because they can.

One of the benefits of having to drive back and forth, a one hour drive each way, is that I had a lot of time to ponder and wonder about things.  I think I have mentioned the one question before.  Why is it that the right outside rear view mirror is different than the left outside mirror?  Who decided that it was an advantage to look in the right mirror and see things that appear to be farther away than they really are?  To top it off, why do they put the message on the bottom of the mirror in lettering that is hard to read?  It is confusing to look in the inside rear view and see a car approaching you and then look in the outside mirror and have that car seem farther away.  What is the benefit to that?  Don’t drivers have enough to worry about with texting, talking on the phone, selecting music from their MP3 and drinking coffee?  They already use normal mirrors for the left side.  Why can’t they just use those same mirrors for the right side?  I would love to hear the explanation for that.

Here is something else that has puzzled me for a while.  When you are driving, the road signs tell you that something is coming in ¼ or ½ mile.  However, the odometer in cars shows the mileage information in tenths of a mile.  Wouldn’t it make more sense for the road signs to be in tenths also?  That way the information would be of more value.  I am sure that many accidents are caused by drivers being distracted trying to figure out how many tenths of a mile equal a ¼ mile.  

There are also signs that say construction will begin in 1500 feet.  Again, how does that equate to tenths.  Of course with construction, it is not as difficult because the cones have been laid out for a mile approaching the area where work is being done, so you know it’s coming, you just are not sure when.  Another indication, if the work is being done at night, are the lights they use to light the work area.  These lights can be seen from space.  They provide more light than workers would get if they were working on a sunny day.  I have the opportunity to ponder these things because I put the car on cruise control, doing the speed limit (unless it is 55) and let everyone else fly by me.

This week our fact tells us that researchers at the Texas Department of Highways in Fort Worth determined that the cow population of the US burps some 50 million tons of valuable hydrocarbons into the atmosphere each year.  The accumulated burps of ten average cows could keep a small house adequately heated and its stove operating for a year.  I have to ask why the Department of Highways is researching cow burps?  Are the roads in Texas in such great shape that they do this type of research to keep busy?  Now before you go and build the pen for your cows, make sure you get the necessary permits from your town.  

I have to go now.  There is a slight chill in the house and I need to go give the cows some soda.

It is Sunday, October 4 and there are only 400 days until the presidential election.  Maybe by that time Gov. Christie will have figured out that he is not getting the Republican nomination.  Today we remember the birthdays of Richard Cromwell, Dick Tracy and Patti LaBelle.  On this day in 1648 Peter Stuyvesant established America’s first volunteer firemen, in 1883 the Orient Express made its first run, linking Turkey to Europe by rail and in 1969 the UN started issuing postage stamps at its Geneva headquarters.  In Bangladesh it is Shab I Barat, in Lesotho it is Independence Day and in Massachusetts it is Grandparents Day.

Today being the birthday of Dick Tracy, I thought I would provide you with yet another entry into the useless information file.  Dick Tracy was a tough and intelligent police detective (originally called Plainclothes Tracy) created by Chester Gould.  He made his debut in the comics in 1931 in the Detroit Mirror.

Tracy used forensic science, advanced gadgetry and wits in an early example of the police procedural mystery story.  However, the stories often ended in gunfights jut the same.  On January 13, 1946 the two-way radio became one of the strip’s most recognizable icons, worn as a wristwatch by Tracy (I wonder if it had an apple symbol on it).

Gould wrote and drew the strip until 1977.  Since that time, various artists and writers have continued the strip, which still runs in newspapers today.  That should help you fill the Dick Tracy section of your file.

You might recall that I mentioned being able to view myself in the mirror while taking a shower.  While I try not to make a habit of doing so, I recently took a couple of minutes to look critically and discovered something interesting.  I realized that my navel is not centered on my body and is, in fact off to the right.  I have also known for some time that my left ear is lower than my right ear.  One also has to wonder why I should care and what, if anything, does it prove.   However, this would explain a problem I continue to have when dressing.

When I was in the service, we were trained to be sure that we were “squared away” when we dressed.  That meant that we had to be sure that the line of our shirt was even with the fly on our pants and that the outside edge of our belt buckle lined up, too.  I try to do that even now because it just looks neater.  The problem I have is that I always tried to line things up using my navel as a guide.  I was never completely satisfied and always felt that my clothes were askew. Now I know why.  Next time you work up the nerve, check to see if your navel is centered.

The good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, it looks like we will be shed of our old house in the next couple days.  There is still an issue that needs to be corrected, but that is being dealt with.  The contractor who is taking care of it confided in me that the people in town who deal with this stuff are more ridiculous than he remembered.  All I could do was nod my head and say, “You don’t know the half of it.”  My adventures with these people are rife with ridiculous and soon I will be able to share some of that with you all.

By the way, I just used the word rife.  Whatever happened to using words like that?  You never hear about plethoras or dearths any more.  People do not use the many words available to them in our language.  Imagine the looks you would get if you told someone that you were going to take a postprandial nap.  Very few people know that postprandial refers to the period after lunch or dinner.  There are a number of words that people do not understand.

“I just had dental work done and now it is difficult to masticate.”

“Dude!  I was always told that would affect your eyes.”

While I realize that English is tough to master and not all the rules make sense, there is no reason for dude, bro and awesome to be some of the most commonly used words.  We can’t even speak in complete sentences anymore.  “I am going to run to the grocery store.”  “Cool, bro.  Want me to come with?”  Is it really that difficult to add the word “you”?  Do people realize that when they are talking they are not limited to 140 characters? … but I digress.

I have been running in circles for months dealing with the town on various matters.  I don’t want to spoil the story, but speaking of language, officials there do not understand logic or how to respond to logical questions.  Like I said, I don’t want to spoil the whole story, but let me just give you a teaser.  One of the issues I had to deal with was a railing I had installed on my front steps.  I was told that the railing failed inspection because the space at the bottom was large enough for a 6 inch sphere to fit through.  I asked why that was a problem and I was told that it meant that a small child could put its head in there.  I didn’t even want to get into why a small child was running around putting its head under stair railings.  My question was, “But if a child could put their head in, couldn’t they also take it back out?”  This was met by a stare that told me I had just started speaking a foreign language.  Oh well, the end is in sight!

This week our fact tells us that bird droppings are the chief export of Nauru, an island nation in the Western Pacific.  So many questions!  Who are they exporting the droppings to and for what purpose?  How many birds do they have that it makes exporting them worthwhile?  What does being a dropping collector pay?  What kind of money do they make on the exports?  I could go on, but why bother?  I do not know anyone on Nauru, so I have no way of getting answers.  I was hoping to end this with an amusing bird dropping wrap up, but I’ve got nothing.  See you next week!

It is Sunday, September 27 and there are only 89 days until Christmas.  Stores already have decorations out and one chain has already started advertising their lay-away services.  Today we remember the birthdays of Thomas Nast, George Raft and Wilford Brimley.  On this day in 1540 the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) was founded by Ignatius Loyola, in 1787 the Constitution was submitted to the states for ratification and in 1963 at 10:59 AM the census clock recorded the US population at 190,000,000.  In South Belgium it is French Day, in Taiwan it is the Moon Festival and in the US it is Gold Star Mother’s Day.

I am sure that not everyone knows much about the Gold Star Mothers, so I thought I would give you a bit of information.  The American Gold Star Mothers, Inc. was formed in the US shortly after World War I to provide support for mothers who lost their sons or daughters in the war.  The name came from the custom of families of servicemen hanging a banner called a Service Flag in the window of their homes.  The service Flag had a star for each family member in the US Armed Forces.  Living servicemen were represented by a blue star, and those who had lost their lives were represented by a gold star. Gold Star Mothers are often socially active but are non-political. Today, membership in the Gold Star Mothers is open to any American woman who has lost a son or daughter in service to the United States.  Now you know a little bit about the Gold Star Mothers.

Recently, I came across the words unkempt and disheveled. They were used in a sentence describing a group of unsavory people inhabiting an area under a highway.  I thought the writer was being somewhat repetitive, considering both words are synonyms.  You are either unkempt (disheveled) or disheveled (unkempt).  Saying someone is both is like saying that a woman is a female.  I have found that this is an issue with reporters lately.  They do not use the English language properly.  They tend to overwrite things in an effort to sound  … but I digress.

Anyway, I thought that a person could be unkempt or disheveled.  My question was could they be kempt or sheveled?  Yes, they can be kempt and kempt is, as you may have already suspected, the opposite of unkempt.  You cannot; however, be sheveled.  There is no such word.  Why is that?  I looked into it a little further and found that if a word has dis it is not necessarily a prefix.  So you can be discouraged, but not couraged.  You can be distraught, but not traught.  You can be disheartened, but you can also be heartened.  You can be displeased or you can be pleased.  One has to wonder how much wine was consumed over the years as the language was developed and rules were created to explain away some of the discrepancies (and no there are no crepancies).  Is it any wonder people don’t want to learn English?

We have now been in the new house just a few days short of a month.  I know, where does the time go?  We continue to settle in and get adjusted to our new surroundings.  We have purchased a few items to help fill rooms that we never had, like our sun room.  We decided that we wanted at least one comfortable chair and hassock for the room.  We started our search on line, but the lovely Elaine felt that she did not want to buy a chair without sitting in it first.  I agreed that it would be a good thing.  Besides, I did not want to have the problem of having to load the chair into my car and carting it to the store when we found out that it was not anywhere near as comfortable as it looked.

We went to several stores and were surprised at the dearth of chairs with matching hassocks that were available.   We found several that were okay, but did not come in the color we were looking for.  We found salespeople that had no idea what their store had or what colors it came in.  We went to one store and the salesperson took us to see a chair.  She said it came in three colors, but it actually only came in two.  

One store we went to had a salesperson who took us to see two different chairs.  He then said he had something else to show us.  As we walked with him, we passed a chair that looked like a possibility.  When we asked he said that he had not even thought about that chair because he forgot they had it.  It turned out that only the floor model was available and it looked like it had been tried out a number of times.  We continued on to what he wanted to show us and it turned out to be mattresses.   Mattresses!  We came in and told him we were looking for a chair with a matching hassock and he took us to see mattresses.  We headed for the door while he was in the middle of his pitch.

Have you gone furniture shopping lately?  Why is it that a store does not have all of the same type of furniture in one area?  We went into several stores and the salesperson took us to one area to show us a chair.  Then we were led to another area to see another chair.  There were a couple stores where we walked all over the store so that we could look at three different chairs.  Why couldn’t we just be led into a room where all the chairs with and without hassocks were displayed?  That would have made things a lot easier.  But what do I know?  I’m just the guy who goes in looking for a chair and is shown a mattress.

This week our fact tells us that smearing a small amount of dog feces on an insect bite will relieve itching and swelling.  That is assuming that you just happen to have dog feces handy when you are bitten.  Of course, there are several over-the-counter remedies available that will also do the job AND you won’t smell nearly as bad if you use them.  Either way, I think I may have the mattress you want to help you ease the pain from that bite.