Lights On

My uncle came over yesterday and my neighbor also stopped over and between the three of us we got all the lights wired and working. So now we can actually see down here in our family room - it's kind of strange. We've just had these two table lamps for years. Now we have more light than we know what to do with. We installed two switches: one for the main lights and one for the accent lights. We're decorating this room like the Academy Awards/Kodak Theatre and we have the posters from the Academy Awards on the wall and the accent lights are lighting these up.

Here are the main lights:

Here are the accent lights:

And here are all of the lights together:

Now there are just a few things to finish up before we can re-drywall the ceiling:
1. Replacing the downstairs bathroom vent fan ducting (currently flexible ducting) with solid ducting. This ducting goes through the ceiling in the family room on it's way outside.
2. Fixing one of the heating and air conditioning vents; when the builder installed this vent, it didn't have a place to screw one side in so they just kind of shoved the screw between the joist and the vent and hoped it would stay up there.
3. Running a little more speaker wire to the back of the room so that when I'm able to upgrade to a 7.1 speaker system, it will be easier to hook it up.
4. Closing in the open area between the kitchen and the family room (we're doing this so that we have room for more cabinets in our fairly small kitchen.)
5. Plus I'm sure there are other things I'm forgetting and other things that will probably come up.

When we were done working and I had finished cleaning everything up it was time for the super bowl so just the three of us watched. Actually Grace and Julie weren't really into it so much, but I was watching. I wanted the Giants of New York to win because they were so bad last year and they just had an incredible year this year and as most people are, I like to see the underdog win. But I also wanted the Patriots to win because then the '72 Dolphins wouldn't be celebrating any more about having the only perfect season. So basically it didn't really matter to me; I don't really like the Patriots and was just hoping for a good game. In the end it turned out to be an exciting game, but there were a few quarters there (the second and third) where it wasn't so exciting. I read today where this was the most watched super bowl ever. I'm guessing it's mostly because of the Patriots bid for a perfect season more than anything, but I think it was touted as that it was going to be a good game. I'm sure that helped with ratings as well.

Today Grace and I slept in (she really needed that extra sleep) and then we went to Panera Bread for breakfast. After that we ran over to Lowe's (my new favorite home improvement store) and got some of the supplies to do the projects I mentioned above. But I have to tell you she was so cranky today. It was a challenging day. Lets hope tomorrow is better. Hopefully this is just fallout from not getting much sleep Saturday night when she was supposed to spend the night at her aunt and uncle's house. Tomorrow she has school so that should help too.

As an example of how today was, when Grace got up around 9 am, I told her to get dressed while I took a shower and then we could go to Panera Bread for breakfast. I got out of the shower and she was watching TV...in her pajamas. So I went out and started the car and wiped the snow off too. I came back in and she wasn't watching TV anymore, she was picking out a necklace to wear...in her pajamas. So after much discord we finally made it to the restaurant at 10 am. She was pretty good while we were out but returned to her cranky self when we came home.

If your state votes tomorrow (22 of them), please get out there and cast your vote! That's what our country is all about; every vote counts! So I'll be dropping Grace off at school and then running over to vote. After that I can work on the projects I listed above!

Have you heard about a rise in animals being given up to shelters or being abandoned because of foreclosures? It seems there has been a large increase in these animals being given up because their houses are being foreclosed upon and they can't take their animals with them. Speaking of foreclosures, there has been talk that this is similar to the depression from back in 1929 and the years afterward. But this doesn't even compare number wise to the devastation of the depression. Here are some facts to consider: "Back then, about half of all mortgage debt was in default. Unemployment had reached 25 percent, thousands of banks and savings and loans had failed and annual mortgage lending had fallen by some 80 percent. Similarly, new residential construction had dropped by 80 percent as well. By comparison, only 3 percent of all today's mortgages are labeled seriously delinquent, meaning roughly 1.5 million loans are 90 days past due or in foreclosure. In sheer numbers, that's a lot of troubled borrowers. But as a percentage of a much, much larger base than in the early 1930s, their number is relatively small." These quotes are from this article. I don't think we're anywhere near where we were then, but clearly regulators have let some things be swept under the rug that shouldn't have been.

Announced today was Microsoft's bid to purchase Yahoo!. That's scary. Yahoo needs to remain independent in my opinion. How will Google be able to search anything under Yahoo!/Microsoft control after that? I'm not sure how fair and open Microsoft would be in that situation. They hate Google and the fact that Google is a more popular search option than MSN is. Plus something else I read today is even scarier than that; Yahoo! openly supports open-source software development. Why would Microsoft continue that? And how would Yahoo!'s purchase of Zimbra fare as an open-source competitor to Outlook? This is just not right. I would be very sad if this happens. Hopefully something will happen to stop this or find someone else to take over Yahoo!.