Storm Spotting, 8/23/2007

Posted in: Weather by Steve on August 23, 2007

2 groups of storms came through Chicago today, one in the afternoon while I was getting my tooth filled, and the other one came right after dinner.  The first storm collapsed a loading dock roof in West Chicago.

Here’s the pictures from when I was out spotting for the second storm.  Debbie and I went out and saw a bunch of intersections that were flooded.  We saw a transformer that was on fire next to where I spot.

Here’s the best of the bunch:

Stop Clubbing the Baby Seals

Posted in: General by Steve on August 14, 2007

Okay, I’m really not clubbing any seals, even though that is one of the 100 things to do before I die.  Again, just kidding, I could never do such a thing.

So tonight, I worked with my grandpa to get our house rewired so the new air conditioner and my computer equipment are on separate circuits in the house. I knew it was going to take a while to get done, but we got it all finished in 5 hours.

First, we had to find out where the circuits were traveling to. This meant that we had to take out all the receptacles (lights, light switches and plugs) on the second floor to see where the current circuit led to and how it reached each plug. After finding this, we had to pull the existing wires with the new wires through the pipe, 6 different times. Then we rewired the plugs with the hot lead into 2 switches, 2 ceiling lights and 4 plugs.

It was crazy how my grandpa was able to keep everything straight in his mind. Sometimes, I can’t even do that when working on a computer.

But it is now set up so that all the electronics in my office are running off of a single 20 Amp circuit, the air conditioner is running on a separate 20 Amp circuit, and the rest of the East bedrooms (lights, plugs) are on the original circuit.

Now that I’m running all my equipment on the new circuit, I’m going to get my office organized a little neater. I’ve been reading up at Decluttered to get some tips. I could do the same with my desk since it really needs it. I’ll be trying to configure everything so I don’t need to have everything sitting on the desk all the time.

Regarding the cluttered desk, I have teddy bears on my office wall. I will get Aqua Teen Hunger Force: Movie Film for Theaters today, and I will someday open an In N Out Burger in Chicago.