My Substitute Reality -You're just jealous cause the little voices only talk to me-

Sunday September 21, 2014

Time for Some Upgrades

Filed under: Family,Life,Personal — don @ 4:41 pm

After spending the last 20 years in the San Fernando Valley with only portable air conditioners and paying outrageous prices for energy Betty and I decided it’s time to spend a little of that money we’ve been saving for so long.

We figured the main problem with the energy cost can be improved with a quadruple prong approach.

  1. Install central air conditioning.
  2. Install modern windows.
  3. Add insulation to attic
  4. Install solar panels.

We have #1 done and have #2 in the works.  We hired a window company and the measuring guy is here while I’m writing this.

#3 is going to be done tomorrow.  We are having cellulose blown in to bring it up to R-38.  I’m guessing right now it’s R-0.5 as the insulation in the attic is probably an inch thick.

#4 is going to be the long pole but should also be the biggest return.

I have asked Donna and Daryl both for as much information and feedback as they can give and it’s been very helpful.  Of course they both have solar systems on their houses.  Richard does too but his is a very different animal.

I’ve gotten multiple quotes and I’ve looked at both lease and purchase and I’m leaning more towards the purchase option.  Daryl purchased and Donna prepaid a lease.  Both have pluses and minuses but one of the things I’m trying to do is increase the value of my home.  Having a prepaid lease solar system does improve your value but not near as much of it is going to end up in your pocket if you sell.

One thing we learned yesterday and today is different companies will give you wildly different price quotes.  For instance the first company that quoted our windows said they could do them all plus 3 doors for a bit over $16,000.  That really seemed high to me.  I figured probably $10,000 but wasn’t sure.  While we were about to go with the high price I got a call from another guy who said he thought he could beat the price by $6,000.  We sent the first guy away and had the other guy come quote.  He did quote at a tad over $10,000.  While that guy was quoting Josh remembered there was a guy on his pool league who owned a window and door company so today he came out.  He is going to do everything for $9,000.  Moral of this story is never take the first quote unless you really know what it’s going to cost.  We might have paid a bit more than we needed on the A/C but I did research that beforehand and feel we got a pretty fair price.

On Friday the A/C was installed and they left around 8pm.  By 9pm Betty and I looked at each other and said we had never felt the house be more comfortable in the 14 1/2 years we’ve lived here.  Another plus is we don’t have that annoying window or portable air conditioner noise.  It’s just quiet and comfortable.  I wonder why we waited so long.

All of these projects also qualify for government and power company rebates.  The biggest one will be the federal rebate on the solar panels.  That’s currently at 30% so will be close to $10,000.  The power company rebate will be around $4,000 so it makes a big difference to the actual cost.  The other upgrades also qualify for rebates at different values.  Well, except for the A/C.  If we had gone with a 16 SEER unit we could have gotten $400 back but it would have cost $1100 for the upgrade.  The A/C guy said we wouldn’t really benefit from the extra SEER based on where we live so he suggested we not do it.

Along with all the upgrades we also plan to throw a bunch of junk away and generally clean.  Painting the exterior is probably in the future but we don’t have anything scheduled yet.

Lots of stuff going on in our house.

Tuesday December 24, 2013

Merry Christmas

Filed under: Family,Life — don @ 10:06 pm

Merry Christmas to all!

Sunday December 15, 2013

Speaking of Lies

Filed under: Life,Politics — don @ 1:01 pm

Remember how the left has been screaming about GLOBAL WARMING!!!  CLIMATE CHANGE and how it’s going to kill us all and melt the poles by 2015 and kill all the polar bears by 2020?

Of course you do, you can’t miss it.  It’s on every leftist news program every other day.

There’s just one little inconvenient truth that the left has forgotten to tell you.

The planet stopped warming 10 years ago and they can’t explain it.

Think I’m lying?  Think I’m spouting the Faux News rightist lies?  Think I’m an idiot?  Well think what you want but I have facts on my side.

Here’s the graph the left likes you to look at.

Median Temperature over the Last 110 Years.

Median Temperature over the Last 110 Years.

 

 

Looks pretty damning doesn’t it?  Looks like they are right and the earth is headed toward hellfire and damnation (although they don’t believe in hell or damnation).

 

 

 

But look at a graph of the last 10 years.

Median Temps 2002-2012

Median Temps 2002-2012

 

 

Well look at that!  The average temp over the last 10 years has been pretty stable.  The temperature hasn’t been going up.  It’s flatlined.  In fact if you plot just the last 7 years it’s actually gone down.  But the left won’t tell you that.  It doesn’t help their story.

 

 

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not actually suggesting that the earth is not going to get warmer and the poles aren’t going to melt and the polar bears aren’t going to all die.  The earth has been warming and cooling for millions, nay billions of years.  What I am suggesting is the left has been lying to you and they keep lying to you.  Just look at Politifact.com and the Lie of the Year if you have any doubts that the left lies.

What I do want you to do is think for yourself and get the data for yourself.  Don’t rely on MSNBC or Fox News to get your data.  They both have agendas and neither one is really looking out for you.

I got the data from these plots here if anyone wants to check it out.

Wednesday November 20, 2013

Happy Birthday, I’m 10

Filed under: Cool Stuff,Life,Personal — don @ 8:27 pm

On Sunday November 17th a special day happened and nobody said a word, not even me.  I forgot it until Monday morning.  What was it?  Ten years of sobriety.  Ten years since my last drink.  Ten years of a much better life.

I had been thinking about taking the day off work until I looked at a calendar and realized it was a Sunday.  So I think I’ll take December 8th which is 4 days before my 60th physical birthday and combine that with this one.

I think I deserve it.

Wednesday September 11, 2013

12 Years

Filed under: Life — don @ 6:39 am

twin_towers1

Monday September 10, 2012

Never Forget (11 years later)

Filed under: Life — don @ 8:11 pm

Sunday July 29, 2012

Where Were You in ’62?

Filed under: Life — don @ 12:30 pm

This is an article by Bill O’Reilly. You can see it here.

Fifty years ago, in the summer of 1962, America was a far different place from what it is today. President John Kennedy was presiding over Camelot, and despite fouling up the invasion of Cuba, his approval rating hovered at around 80 percent. Unemployment was 5.2 percent with the average family income at $6,000 a year.

Most Americans did not have much money but made do. Millions bought Elvis Presley’s record “Return to Sender” and went to see “Lawrence of Arabia” in movie theaters. At home, “Wagon Train” was the top TV show.

Years later, the film “American Graffiti” featured the ad campaign “Where were you in ’62?” Well, I was on Long Island, hanging around. During the day, we swam at the Levittown pool and played stickball in the street, and in August, my father took us to a lake in Vermont. Also, we went to Jones Beach and baked in the sun without block while secondhand cigarette smoke engulfed us on the blanket.

My folks had little disposable income, certainly not enough for air conditioning or a color television set. But again, there was little whining in my working-class neighborhood. We had fun with what was available. Most everybody worked. Nobody was on welfare.

In fact, just 6 percent of Americans received welfare payments in 1962. Now that number is 35 percent. More than 100 million of us are getting money from the government, and that does not count Social Security and Medicare, programs workers pay into. This is a profound change in the American tradition.

Also, we now have close to nine million workers collecting federal disability checks. In 2001, that number was about five million. Here’s my question: Is the workplace that much more hazardous than it was 11 years ago? Is our health that much worse?

The answer is no. What we are seeing is the rise of the Nanny State.

Self-reliance and ambition made the United States the most powerful nation on Earth. But that ethic is now eroding fast. Instead, many Americans are looking to game the system, and the philosophy of “where’s mine” has taken deep root. About half of American workers pay no federal income tax, leaving the burden to be shouldered by the achievers. As The Edward Winter Group once sang: “Come on and take a free ride. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!”

Presiding over and joyously encouraging this societal shift is the purveyor of social justice President Barack Obama. His entire campaign is now built around making the rich “pay their fair share.” And where will that money go? To those in need, of course. And those legions are growing larger every single day.

Fair-minded people do not begrudge a safety net for Americans who, through no fault of their own, need help. A compassionate society provides for those battered by life. But what is happening in this country is far beyond a helping hand. We are creating a dual society. In one corner: Americans who work hard to succeed. In the other corner: folks who want what you have.

And the second corner is the growth industry.

Thursday July 12, 2012

Things that make you go “Hmmmmmmm”

Filed under: Life,Politics — don @ 7:25 pm

I found this here.

BLACK POLITICAL HISTORY: THE UNTOLD STORY
NOTE: All answers are “b.”

1. What Party was founded as the anti-slavery Party and fought to free blacks from slavery?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

2. What was the Party of Abraham Lincoln who signed the emancipation proclamation that resulted in the Juneteenth celebrations that occur in black communities today?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

3. What Party passed the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution granting blacks freedom, citizenship, and the right to vote?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

4. What Party passed the Civil Rights Acts of 1866 and 1875 granting blacks protection from the Black Codes and prohibiting racial discrimination in public accommodations, and was the Party of most blacks prior to the 1960’s, including Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Booker T. Washington, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

5. What was the Party of the founding fathers of the NAACP?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

6. What was the Party of President Dwight Eisenhower who sent U.S. troops to Arkansas to desegregate schools, established the Civil Rights Commission in 1958, and appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to the U.S. Supreme Court which resulted in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision ending school segregation?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

7. What Party, by the greatest percentage, passed the Civil Rights Acts of the 1950’s and 1960’s?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

8. What was the Party of President Richard Nixon who instituted the first Affirmative Action program in 1969 with the Philadelphia Plan that established goals and timetables?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

9. What is the Party of President George W. Bush who appointed more blacks to high-level positions than any president in history and who spent record money education, job training and health care to help black Americans prosper?

[ ] a. Democratic Party

[ ] b. Republican Party

BLACK POLITICAL HISTORY: THE UNTOLD STORY

NOTE: All answers are “b.”

10. What Party fought to keep blacks in slavery and was the Party of the Ku Klux Klan?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

11. What Party from 1870 to 1930 used fraud, whippings, lynching, murder, intimidation, and mutilation to get the black vote, and passed the Black Codes and Jim Crow laws which legalized racial discrimination and denied blacks their rights as citizens?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

12. What was the Party of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and President Harry Truman who rejected anti-lynching laws and efforts to establish a permanent Civil Rights Commission?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

13. What was the Party of President Lyndon Johnson, who called Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “that [N-word] preacher” because he opposed the Viet Nam War; and President John F. Kennedy who voted against the 1957 Civil Rights law as a Senator, then as president opposed the 1963 March on Washington by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. after becoming president and the FBI investigate Dr. King on suspicion of being a communist?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

14. What is the Party of the late Senators Robert Byrd who was a member of the Ku Klux Klan, Ernest “Fritz” Hollings who hoisted the Confederate flag over the state capitol in South Carolina while governor, and Ted Kennedy who called black judicial nominees “Neanderthals” while blocking their appointments?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

15. What was the Party of President Bill Clinton who failed to fight the terrorists after the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993, sent troops to war in Bosnia and Kosovo without Congressional approval, vetoed the Welfare Reform law twice before signing it, and refused to comply with a court order to have shipping companies develop an Affirmative Action Plan?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

16. What is the Party of Vice President Al Gore whose father voted against the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960’s, and who lost the 2000 election as confirmed by a second recount of Florida votes by the “Miami Herald” and a consortium of major news organizations and the ruling by the U.S. Civil Rights Commission that blacks were not denied the right to vote?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

17. What Party is against school vouchers, against school prayers, and takes the black vote for granted without ever acknowledging their racist past or apologizing for trying to expand slavery, lynching blacks and passing the Black Codes and Jim Crow laws that caused great harm to blacks?

[ ] a. Republican Party

[ ] b. Democratic Party

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