Category: July 2017

Weather watching

I wonder if my aversion to talking (or even thinking) about the weather is because I’m from the Pacific Northwest? There are a lot of wonderful things about western Oregon and Washington, but in my opinion, the weather isn’t one of them. Weather discussions back home were at best boring, and very possibly extremely depressing.

“Rain? Yep. Still raining? Rain. Drizzle. About to rain. Wet and dripping, but not actually raining at the moment. Sprinkling. Damp and cold. Raining off and on. Pouring. Wet wind. Been raining for awhile. How long? Oh, dunno, maybe ten or twelve days. No, actually 3 weeks I think.” Are you ready to shoot yourself yet?

But yesterday we had tickets to see Carlos Santana! At what I believe is the biggest venue in New Mexico, the Isleta Amphitheater. Which is very much an outdoor arena, with no shelter whatsoever.

So I’ve realized that I can be very interested in the weather after all! I obsessively took photos of clouds and rain all afternoon.

3 hours prior to the Santana concert:

2 1/2 hours prior to the Santana concert:

2 hours prior to the Santana concert – it’s raining hard:

1 1/2 hours prior to the Santana concert:

1 hour prior to the Santana concert:

THE SANTANA CONCERT!

The new (used) washer and dryer

I’ve never actually had a brand new washer and dryer. John bought himself a new set when we were first dating, but our relationship was so new that I’m not even sure I knew he was buying them until after the fact. And I certainly didn’t yet have standing to veto his choice.

Turns out, the front loading washer he bought always smells of mildew. Normally mildew is not an issue in New Mexico, due to our  exceedingly dry, high-desert air. But this washer is the king of mildew. And I can’t leave the washer door open to dry out, because we don’t have a full laundry room, so it hangs out in the hallway and blocks the door. And anyway, it was new 12 years ago, and we’ve had several tenants using it since then, because his house has been a rental for 10 years. So this set in no way qualifies for the title “new”, even if the washer didn’t smell like wet tennis shoes.

I don’t remember what washer and dryer we were using when we were previously living in Albuquerque. Possibly a used set had come with the house. When we moved to California, a used set came with that house, and I happened to really love them. When one broke, John went to great lengths to find a new-used one (the style was discontinued, so we couldn’t just buy a new one).

But when we sold our house in California, I forgot to write in the listing that the “washer and dryer don’t convey.” So the buyers included the washer and dryer in their offer. And we didn’t want to counter-offer just for an old washer and dryer, because buyers don’t always accept a counter-offer, and then we wouldn’t have a contract. So (sigh), I left them my washer and dryer.

Now I’ve just purchased three rental properties, all of which came with a washer and dryer set. The washer and dryer in the first house were in such bad shape that I put them out on the curb for free. And the third house I’ve told her I don’t want them, because she says the tub is rusted and will get rust on your clothes if you leave them sitting in there for very long. Yep, that’s what I’d do. Definitely non-ideal. But the washer and dryer in the second house look perfectly serviceable, so we’re going to move them to our house to replace the ones John bought 12 years ago.

I usually don’t supply a washer and dryer in the rentals I own (just hook-ups), mainly because old washers and dryers require servicing. And often, in the nicer rentals, the tenants prefer to have their own.

I’d actually sorta like to have my own, nice, new, washer and dryer set too. Part of me is like, “If you can afford 3 rentals, you can afford a stupid set of washer & dryers, new even!” It’s true, but we’re spending a lot of money right now getting the rentals in good shape, plus the remodel of our house. And this new-to-me, used set looks just fine.

It’s so dark

Our house on the hill has a new coat of paint and we are struggling to like it.  It is really dark!

Originally, the house was creamy yellow-ish color that is traditional for the southwest territorial style, with brick coping (trim) along the top of the house. It was that color originally, well before John bought it. We know it was originally the traditional creamy-beige color because you can still occasionally see bits of that color in little out-of-the-way places. Since I don’t have photos of our actual house when it was that color, here’s examples of the traditional color in local territorial style architecture:

Apparently the previous owners didn’t like the original color, because at some point before John bought it, they painted it a pinkish color, which is common here in the desert. We’ve never liked the pinkish tone, and I admit, I’ve sometimes disparagingly called it “the pink box on the hill.”

I originally wanted to go back to the traditional cream color, but we were afraid it would stand out too much on the hill, so we decided to go with brown. I initially was picturing something like the color on the left, as a compromise instead of the color on the right:

 

Unfortunately, our brown turned out to be REALLY brown. The house is every bit as obvious sitting up there as it always was – the only thing that is now less obvious is the brick coping, which blends into the brown from a distance. Here you can see it, now a  brown box on top of the hill.

What’s become way more obvious is the white windows, ouch! We went with white instead of brown windows, because white trim is traditional for the territorial style. But since we went with a significantly darker stucco color than traditional for the style, the white windows are really glaring. BAH! WHITE WINDOWS STARING AT YOU!

We hope it will be improved once we add more of the traditional white trim. For example, we intend to build 3 white pergolas.

So here’s the question: did we paint it the wrong color, or would any color stick out like a sore thumb up there, simply because it is a boxy, 2-story house stuck on top of a hill with no landscaping or anything to moderate it?

I also intend to plant trees, which will help moderate the exposed feel up there, as well as soften the look of the house from a distance. But trees grow very slowly in the desert.

Dear Trader Joe’s

I love you. Really, I do. I spend more of my grocery money with you than anywhere else. I get on the freeway every week to go to you. You don’t know how much I hate getting on the freeway!

But I love your vibe, and in particular, I love all your organic food! In the war between gluten-free and organic, you definitely come down on the organic side, which suits me. What war, you may ask? Well, from a grocery store’s perspective, there’s the ongoing issue of optimal use of limited shelf space. From a shoppers perspective, there’s the annoyance of having to hunt through tons of unwanted products to find those rare few desired products.

For example, I also frequent another specialty store, and there the big “GF” signs predominate everywhere, but unfortunately they seem to not have realized that organic foods extend beyond just fresh fruits and vegetables. But you, Trader Joe’s, offer all kinds of unexpected goods in organic form, like organic mustard and organic mayonnaise!  Organic baked beans! All kinds of organic, but otherwise unhealthy snack foods! Amazing!

I used to be a gluten-free fan, until I realized that if I ate totally organic, wheat products no longer caused stomach aches and migraines. My theory is I’m possibly sensitive to glyphosate, which has recently started being used in much greater concentrations on wheat, now that they’ve developed “round-up ready” crops. So for me, gluten-free is “been there, tried that, didn’t work,” but organic is – yes, and I mean everything – from cooking oils to animal crackers.

So I figure that my immense devotion (and regular financial support) entitles me to a few comments.

Like, your paper towels suck. I bought them instead of my normal name brand, because I didn’t feel like stopping at the unnamed grocery store across the street from you. The first time John tried to dry his hands, your paper towels dissolved like toilet paper, and stuck in shreds and globs to his hands. This was very funny, but seriously Trader Joe’s, do you really want people making potty jokes about your paper towels? Your marketing people will tell you that your paper towels should evoke images of sparkling clean kitchens, not horrible bathroom incidents gone wrong.

And I just want to say for the record, this frozen pizza was burnt before I cooked it. See? Fresh from the freezer and still frozen solid, but clearly burnt along the edges by you, Mr. Trader Joe’s, and not by me. No user error here.

And my fancy, expensive goat cheese? It grows mold exactly one day after I buy it, before I’ve even opened it! It doesn’t matter when I buy it. It gets home to my refrigerator, sighs, and thinks, “Ah, finally, I can grow the mold I’ve been harboring all these weeks.”

So here’s the thing. I really don’t care when you PACKAGED the cheese. I don’t need your “packaged on” date. I need to know when it will grow amazing, multi-colored mold in my UNOPENED package. Give me a sell-by date, or use-by date, or something useful. Because I’m beginning to suspect that your “packaged on” date is a deliberate attempt at deviousness, because you KNOW it will grow mold within 12 hours of purchase.

Speaking of deviousness, my final gripe is with your products that proclaim, in huge print “NITRATE FREE!” and then in tiny print, “except what’s found naturally in celery.”  Because you know what? Just because it’s natural, does not mean it’s not nitrates.  Your preserved meat products are NOT nitrate free. What you should say is, “All nitrates sourced from celery.” You should also mention that your bacon and corned beef taste so much of celery, they’re barely edible.

Let me talk to you a minute about nitrates. It’s true that nitrates aren’t inherently bad or evil. They naturally occur in many foods. Which is why you probably think it’s fine to be so devious.

But nitrates do have an effect on people. Nitrates are converted in our mouth to nitrites, which are later converted to nitric oxide, which can dilate blood vessels. For some people, this can be a good thing. Many athletes promote nitrates in their diets in the hopes that increased blood flow will decrease recovery time and speed up healing of injuries. Blood vessel dilation can also reduce blood pressure by allowing for more blood volume with less pressure against the walls of the vessels.

The problem is, dilating blood vessels can cause migraines for those susceptible. One of the primary characteristics of migraines is the dilation of blood vessels in the brain. Excess dilation can even cause small amounts of BLOOD LEAKAGE IN THE BRAIN. This is a very straightforward reason why some people need to be aware of the level of nitrates in the foods they are eating.

So quit writing “NITRATE FREE!” on your products that are loaded with naturally occurring nitrates. You are attempting to mislead your customers, most of whom have not been in the mood lately to put up with a lot of self-serving BS (for reasons I won’t go into, but we all know).

And no, I don’t care if “everybody else does it.” You aren’t everybody else. You are Trader Joe’s, and I expect more out of you than that. And you know I wouldn’t say those things if I didn’t love you.

Inspired comic

John sent me these comics; I think he got them from Laura, who may have posted them on facebook. I’m not sure, since I don’t read facebook anymore. But that’s my best guess as to why John sent me a comic that Laura reads.

This one is a really interesting comic commentary questioning a basic assumption we have in our society, http://theoatmeal.com/comics/unhappy

If you made it through that sorta-long, thoughtful comic, you can graduate to this shorter, funnier one, http://theoatmeal.com/comics/dog_paradox

Hey, read the first one first!