Taking It Higher
As the sewer saga continues, the pipes connecting from the east were full of dirt, so they were most likely old floor drains. After the plumbers cut and pulled out the old cast iron pipe, we flushed the upstairs toilet a few times, and dirt came out with the water, which meant the cast iron pipe that runs under the furnace room and workroom are rusting out. Instead of sawing up the floor and tunneling under the furnace room and walls in the work room, the plumber suggested rerouting the drain pipe along the ceiling and bring it down in the library close to the new double clean we had installed two weeks ago. The plumbers got the pipes hung and ready to connect next week.
New 4" PVC replaced the old cast iron grain pipe.
The plumber will cut the black pipe behind the electrical conduit and rebar to make a connection to the new 4" PVC. I don't envy the poor guy. That is going to be a difficult cut and connection to make. He carefully explained to me how he is going to do it in Spanish and English to make sure I understood how difficult to task is. I told him I really appreciated the fact that he was doing it and not me.
The long run
Le long pipe
The back walls is 12" solid concrete. The plumber went through several big concrete bits making the hole in the wall.
The pipe runs through the wall in to the ceiling above our IT area, takes a turn over one of the workstations and runs under some ductwork and then comes out from the drop ceiling and down the wall where I had a book shelf. We printed the map of Albuquerque and pinned it to the wall 20 years ago. One of the plumbers asked me what the bright yellow divisions are. I explained the divisions are where we taped that four sections of the map together, and while the rest of the map's sections faded, the color under the tape didn't fade.
The pipe dropping out of the ceiling, down the wall.
The plumbers will make a diagonal cut in the floor from the new clean out to the corner of the wall where the drain pipes will be connected to the clean out.
Perfect PET
Spunk with the coasters Susan Graham created. I had Spunk's coasters looking over me the whole time I was in the hospital.
The doctor said my PET scan was completely clear, with no questionable lymph nodes. This is really significant, because all prior PET scans over the past 7 years had questionable lymph nodes. In 2013 I had two biopsies of questionable lymph nodes that came out as inconclusive. And just a year ago there was no question about a relapse of lymphoma . To have a clear PET scan is a sign that the stem cell transplant was a complete success. I will have another PET scan in six months, and in April I will start getting all my childhood vaccinations. My white counts are still in the tank (I'll get a Neupogen shot tomorrow), but I've managed to stay healthy despite my stubborn immune system. The problem is I had to miss the indoor motocross this year, and now I'll have to miss the Super Nationals this weekend, so no motocross or cool car photos this year.
All clear
Spunk and all the kitties did their jobs purrrfectly!
Cat Scan
I had a PET scan this morning for a three month check after the stem cell transplant. A CAT scan was originally scheduled with the PET scan, but the nurse who gave me the radioactive injection told me my insurance denied the CAT scan. I told her that's because I get daily cat scans at home. She looked confused for a moment and then started laughing and asked how many cats I had. When I told her six, she thought that was plenty of cat scanning. I'll get the results of the PET scan tomorrow.
Cone Head Style
The dried echinaceas, with the help of the finches and other critters, come up with some pretty creative cone head styles.
Amoeba & Sliver Moon
Amoeba suspended
Floats in space
simple life form
Plasma bound
Moon tugs
At the earth
Pulls against the spin
One day
Earth stops
Oceans slosh
Sudden halt
All scattered
Floats in space
Lifeform suspended
All is bound
¿Qué Pedo Guey?
"¡Fuchi capesta! My eyes are burning!"* And thus the sewer saga continues. Less than a week after digging up the sewer line, roto-rootering out the clog, we re-scoped the line and there was a new clog forming in the same spot as the clog we had just dislodged, but we could not see if there was a "T" at that place in the line. With only one restroom feeding the line above the clog, there should not be enough usage to create a new clog, so we assumed there must be another source for the clog. The technician was able to push the scope through the clogged area and we discovered a "T" on the east side of the sewer line about 15 feet from the new clean out (the other "T" for the two restrooms south of the clean out on the west side of the sewer line, and south of the "T" connecting on the east side of the drain). Given the newly forming clog and the "T" on the east we decided we needed to dig up the line from the new clean outs south 15 feet.
We discovered a sewer line dropping from under the slab and connecting to the main line at the place the scope indicated the clog was forming. Under the slab, the sewer line runs north to a "p-trap" and then we don't know where it goes from the "p-trap". The plumber will cut a hole in the top of the pipe on Monday so we can see if water is running through it. There is a possibility that the line runs to the restaurant and they accidentally connected to that line when they were redoing plumbing last summer. Until we cut the pipe it's a mystery where the pipe runs to.
The floor cut and hammered.
Still dusty
The mystery pipe
"P-trap" on left, what we presume is a clogged vent in the middle, and the pipe starts its slope to the main sewer line on the right.
Pipes, pipes and more pipes.
A 3" pipe from a floor drain in the bathroom under the slab that will tie into the main drain where we saw the "T" on the east side on the main drain.
Dirt from the hole.
A 15 foot long trench exposing lots of pipes and the sewer line.
*From Cheech and Chong's "Pedro and Mann at the Drive-Inn"
It's Alive!
A box of old 3.5" floppy diskettes. We have boxes and boxes of floppies.
After painting the office, and between sewer sleuthing, we have been going through 40 years of old file boxes that we've had stored offsite for the past 30 years. The file boxes include 25 plus years of old computer components and archiving technologies long gone obsolete. After Dolores dumped a box of 3.5" floppy disks and a box with old Syquest 40 Mb removable hard drive cartridges and a Syquest drive on my desk, the company's president wanted to know if we had any way of reading the old, obsolete, archived data. Not with anything that's been around for the past 20 years, that's for sure, so I dug out an old Macintosh SE/30 and tried to fire it up. It showed the drive was bad, and it wouldn't read any of the boot diskettes I tried. Then I pulled another SE/30 out of storage and the screen wouldn't come on. So, I took both computers apart and swapped drives, and after several shocks of turning the Macinstein SE/30 on, off and back on it came alive and booted up, launching QuickMail Pro as it started up — we have like ten million diskettes for QuickMail Pro from over something like 20 years of using it as our mail client before Mail became available with Mac OS X. I connected the Syquest drive, rebooted the Macinstein and mounted a removable hard drive cartridge from an old project. I opened Microsoft Excel 5.0 and Word 6.0 and Ready Set Go and they all worked. I don't know how many people know that Microsoft developed MS Office for the Macintosh long before Windows existed. After getting everything running and digging out an old SCSI external hard drive to test moving files via external SCSI hard drive, I asked the company's president if he wanted me to do anything with the old archived files I could access. The answer was no not at the moment. He just wanted me to see if we could still access the obsolete media in case we needed to retrieve some of it one day. I have have had to retrieve ancient files from old projects in years past, but it's been a while. It's good to know we can still access some of the old files, and, besides, it was a fun exercise dinking around with old hardware, and taking a walk down obsolete cyberware memory lane.
1989 Macintosh SE/30 — it cost us $5,000 with a 40 MB HD and 8 MB RAM in 1989.
Two SE/30's I took apart to swap the drives. Apple had not intended users to work on these Macs. Fortunately I still had the tools to get to the screws and crack open the case.
An SE/30's logic board.
It's Alive!
QuickMail Pro
Microsoft Excel 5.0
MS Word 6.0.1
This Macintosh SE/30 was very generous as it was sharing the removable hard disk with cyber phantoms when I tried to eject it.
Lobo Louie volunteered to shred diskettes for us. Shredding diskettes is better use of his energy than attacking people.
CSI
People who have been flying off the handle over Trump are sissies compared to Lobo Louie, who flew into a rage after he heard we are having to break out more of the floor in the library and dig up the sewer line again. His reaction was to go medieval on the first person who walked by his shelf, jumping on him and biting him on the neck, bringing him down in the library near the newly poured concrete covering the hole in the floor from when we dug up the floor only a week ago. It's not completely clear why Lobo Louie lost it and went looney over breaking up the floor and digging out the sewer line again, but he kept mumbling about having a bad hair day and not taking that stinking noise, stinking dust and stinking stink after he was pulled of the neck of his unsuspecting victim. Lobo Louie was booked, mug shot and then arraigned by Lobo Lucy and his alter ego Lobo Louie the head bobber and charged with assault with teeth, tongue and bad hair. Bail was set at $1. If convicted he will be sentenced to the office with the sewer smell until we figure out the source and get it fixed.
Taken down for the count by Lobo Louie
Arraignment by Lobo Lucy and Lobo Louie the head bobber
Pantera In The Wild
I really liked the Pantera when I first saw one in the early 1970's. This one, that I photographed in a drive by leaving the parking lot from the vet's listening to squalling cats in stereo, is in really good shape — it's probably a 1972 or later model. Apparently the first Panteras imported from Italy by Ford in 1971 had no rust treatment, low quality paint, and lots of solder to fill in body flaws and so they didn't hold up well to the elements. Ford made De Tomaso tighten up quality control in 1972, including Ford Cleveland 351 cubic inch (5.8 liter) V8 engines. The 1972 Panteras were rated at 0 to 60 MPH in 5.5 seconds, about the same as Laurie's Mazda Speed 3, and the 1973 models did 0-60 MPH in 6.5 seconds, about the same as my Mazda RX-8. Laurie's Speed 3 has a 2.6 liter engine, and my RX-8 has a 1.3 liter engine — speed has become much more efficient over the years. Panteras in good condition like this one have asking prices of up to $175,000, but probably average around $40,000 from the listings I looked up. While I think Panteras are good looking cars, I'll stick to my RX-8.
Color, B&W, Sunset
Rain fell all night, turning from wet to icy to light hail that left a thin covering of white on the ground in the early morning hours, only to disappear as soon as the sun broke through the clouds. The sunlight was warm, yet frosty winds bit at the bare skin on my cheeks as I walked out to photograph the sunlight dancing on the face of the Sandias behind bare cottonwoods, their finger-like branches reaching for the sky. White light turned yellow, chased by purple as colors climbed the mountains into the clouds, where they kissed the sky and turned to blue.
