A conversation that should have, but didn't take place over 300 years ago...

Yes, I know it has beautiful carvings and inlayed decorations. The view? Fantastic! Good breeze way up here and I can even see the Taj Mahal shimmering there on the other side of the river. It is the railing. No, the geometric designs are great and the marble is of the highest quality. It is the quantity I take issue with--they are only just high enough for me to trip over, which means that when I plummit into the moat, I will do so head-first rather than feet first.

Please see what you can do about this.

Just one little thing...

Yes, I know it has beautiful carvings and inlayed decorations. The view? Fantastic! Good breeze way up here

Just like home

The beach in Kapu is like the one we go to on Plum Island, except:

No sand flies.

No crowds.

The water is warm.

There are palm trees.

The place had one major flaw which will be in an upcoming update--if I can get Internet service--harder here than I expected it to be.

We Stayed at a classic Indian country house which was retrofitted with modern things like electric lights and running water. The place had only 4 rooms but we were the only guests. The center of the house was an open grassy area about 30 feet square and all around was an elevated veranda about 15 feet deep and covered. In essence, the place was a museum that you get to stay at. The residence itself was surrounded by a couple acres of garden with chickens, ducks and geese wandering around. The beach could be reached via a 5 minute walk down a sandy path.

So far so good--what is the big problem? The first morning at 5:00 AM and continuing for 2 hours there was broadcast some cheesy song over what have to be the lowest possible quality and tinniest loudspeakers in existence. The next night it was done by 5:00 AM, having started around 3:30 AM. We came to find out that there is some obnoxious cult nearby that all the neighbors hate, but can't do anything about. I suggested that in the USA, if the police refused to help then the cult compound would find it self vandalized until its leaders saw reason.

Taj Mahal

Here is a detail shot of the decorations: These are not painted-on, but rather inlayed with colored stones.

Here is the whole thing for scale.

Notice the shiny marble of the platform at the base of the monument. It is wonderful to walk on barefooted. They make you take your shoes off, so I figured that I would take my socks off too.

Running like a total tourist

I've only been able to run three times in India and each is pure cliche.

20 minutes on the treadmill at the Lalit in New Delhi. The roads surrounding this place were filled with traffic and the verges were filled with stuff (people, vendors, rubble, piles of building materials etc) Plus the air in Delhi was thick with smoke--not the kind you might think, auto pollution, but rather wood smoke. At first this was a mystery but then I paid attention and noticed that rubbish and wood fires were pretty common. The pollution was so bad that even in-doors, one could see it in large rooms and smell it everywhere. I figured that the air would be at least better inside and it wasn't practical to run out of doors either way. The health club had a treadmill so I figured I would give it a try.

It was awful! I hated that I was a slave to the machine--a half-second of running at the wrong pace and you are thrown off the back or hitting the front of it. I could stand only 20 minutes. Afterwards, it felt as if I had just smoked a whole pack of cigarettes.

The next run was in Agra. It was still polluted, but not quite as bad as Delhi. The streets were just as bad, or maybe not quite so bad, but pretty bad and the hotel sat in a multi-acre compound. I ran 6 laps through the compound in 40 lame minutes. The only thing of intrest were the shotgun toting guards walking their posts.

The last was on the beach in Goa. I ran up the beach for half an hour and then ran back for half an hour.

There are other things besides the masonry that are unsettling

The first thing I noticed in the airport here is that is smelled of smoke. At first I chalked it up to national variations in smoking laws. We lived in Vermont when it became the first (or possibly one of the first) state to ban smoking in bars and restaurants. Libertarian as I am, I opposed these laws even as my pleasure in eating-out rose. Anyway, we would visit NY and MA fairly often and each time would be shocked at first by the smell of smoke in eating establishments. The airport here was like that, but I looked around for evidence: I couldn't find either smokers nor no smoking signage. It remained a draw until we went outside to catch our ride: The smell was just the same, only stronger.

Our guides insisted that this was fog, but my nose said it was some kind of wood or paper burning smell--kind of like what hangs over a campground in the Summer.

It was weaker inside of the hotel and weaker yet inside of our rooms, but never absent. Large metro areas often have air pollution, but the ones I've been too mostly featured the hydrocarbon varieties--diesel soot, gasoline exhaust--that sort of thing. Manhattan was a little of an exception, what with the street vendors cooking out of carts, but this was far stronger.

As we traveled about the city, I saw that people would routinely gather sticks or trash and burn it. It has been cold here, so it may be for warmth, but my in-laws say it always smells like that, so possibly it is just to get rid of refuse.

There are some benefits though: Light rays!

In the masonry belt

Hot places seem to be made mostly of masonry while cooler places use wood. I'm not sure of what the reasons are for this; I presume it is some combination of material availability as well as suitability to the climate. Heavy stone, concrete or brick structures are hard to keep warm in Winter but they are great for staying cool in hot weather. Also, in the US South West, the Medereranian and the Middle East there is not so much forrest, so it all kind of makes sense.

So, I have been in a place where nothing looks familiar, since I have always lived in Northern climes. It is a lot like being around an "announcer". This is a term I just made-up since I don't know if there is an actual name for this personality. What it is is a person that makes declarative statements all the time: It can be very draining in either of the two flavors. Flavor one, they stay things which are true and obvious--the implication being that you are an idiot for not already knowing each fact which is pointed to. The other flavor is worse, they make declarations which are risible, false or wrong-headed. You are left implicitly agreeing to their nonsense if you stay silent, or stuck arguing with an idiot if you don't stay silent. The constant revisitation of (sound) assumptions leaves one tired and wrung-out.

It is sort of similar when you are in a forign place. Nothing looks familiar and so the assumptions about what you will see, hear and smell are not met and you get that same feeling of unease.

Also, when masonry is not properly maintained--it really shows.

Properly maintained:

Not properly maintained.

saffron crocus

In normal household, bulbs are forced for the holidays. In Pecchia house, bulbs force you.

I had these in a paper bag in the basement and planned to plant them next Summer, but they decided to sprout anyway. If they bloom I will post.

Christmas Dinner

(Well, the part I care the most about...)

This brings new meaning to the idea, when you see something troubling, like this, that you can't "unsee" it. On a more serious plane, I imagine that even the act of imagining a scenario will cause synapse activation. To take it even further, if one were to fixate on an idea, then this could transform your brain into

Life goes on, whatever the damn govt does. Till it doesn't.

A day of a million little things instead of one big thing.

We hatched a plan around a year ago that I was just setting into motion: I would fabricate a desk top and mate it to legs purchased at Ikea. The reason for this is that we didn't know what the final format would be for the new room and so saving the work surface for last would allow us to figure it all out later.

Later finally came and I made the desk top: As has become routine with Ikea, there were missing parts--one of the two T-legs was nowhere to be found. I kept all of the boxes in one spot so there is no chance it was misplaced. I checked the receipt and we did indeed pay for two legs. The only conclusion I can come to is that they didn't give us all of our boxes.

I was tempted to drive all the way down to Stoughton today and get the part, but it is an hour each way and another task awaited me right after noon and this would wipe out the first half of the day. Eh, we will order it after the new year and just say "no" to an hour (each way) to get the part.

Instead of the big drive I...

• Roasted some coffee since we used the last bean this morning.
• Realized that we were not out of yeast after all and made some bread dough.
• Searching for the missing box, I came across some coat hooks I purchased about a year ago. So I made the coat rack for Surenna's bedroom (her sisters each already have one) and installed it.

  

  The lag-bolts are hidden under the flanges of the coat hooks and counter-sunk because the hooks are solid metal in the back.

• Picked-up the kids at their various schools and took them to the doctor's for immunisations--the two younger ones were emotional about it but remained compliant.
• Made pull-apart rolls (half-baked) for Christmas and two pizza crusts for dinner tonight.
• Even though the desk will have to wait till after the new year for completion, I still spent around an hour sanding it.

The single most unpleasant houshold task

My neighbor and I were having a chat on Thanksgiving day and somehow our wide-ranging conversation turned to the least desirable handy man-type task we have done. He, a liberal, me a conservative; we agree on little--but we were of one mind on this: Changing a kitchen faucet is the least pleasant task.

• There is no room to work--all the manipulations are in the narrow space between the back of the sink and the wall behind the sink.
• It is dark and the drain pipes are all in your way.
• It is wet since you normally only change a faucet once it gets to be a problem.
• It is messy since your head is below the work and so water and rust fall into your face.
• It never goes smoothly since the bolts are all rusted into place, or the copper leads kink, or any of many other things go wrong.
• It is always an emergency--no faucet gets more use, or is more critical to the smooth operation of a household, than the kitchen faucet.

Given all of this, it was with supreme dismay that this evening, at the height of making dinner while my wife was at karate, the faucet sprang a leak. Visions of my last weekend before Christmas spent in miserable frustration danced in my head. Or really, more like clogged on my head. What was especially galling was that I just put the thing in a couple of years ago and if you have ever purchased a faucet you know that they all come with 10, 15, 25 year or lifetime warranties--so it shouldn't be malfunctioning in 2 years! Plus, plus--I just threw away the box after having it sit in the basement all this time. That is where the documentation needed for free replacement would be, so I would pay for a new one and get the fun of putting it in.

Figuring I had little to loose, I set about taking the faucet apart. I got to the very bottom of the thing and found a plastic ring out of position. I adjusted it and then reassembled the thing: Voila, it works now! But I've got my eye on it.

Five Goldennn years

Five years ago today, I made my first blog-post. In all that time I still haven't hit the 1,000 mark for posts, but should do so early next year. Well, it is just a hobby--not a job.

I would like to thank each of my five readers too, but really five is a guess--it could be three. Either way, thanks! I hope to write something you will find interesting soon.

Darn Blurry picture

At the wedding, we thought we had the perfect opportunity to take a Christmas picture: The kids were all dressed-up and we had a good setting.

But no. All the shots came out blurry!

Killin' time.

I just couldn't get anything going today project-wise. I need to make a table for the new study and I have all the materials at hand but don't want to create dust in the basement while my wife is down there wrapping gifts.

After running a few miles (less than normal for a Sunday and slower) I did finally reinforce the stairs to the basement. One of the the angled 2x8's was badly cracked and would flex whenever weight was put on it--like whenever I went up or down the stairs. This has been a problem for all eight years we have lived here. Today, I rummaged-up a 2x4 and nailed it to the inside edge of the weak beam. It is noticeably more solid now and took all of 10 minutes. Why I waited 8 years? Can't say.

It was a day filled with little things: Cleaning dishes, cooking, taking the eldest daughter to CVS for her Christmas shopping etc.

The Second Coming

The Poem by William Butler Yeats: The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

The Second Coming!

Hardly are those words out

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,

Is moving its slow thighs, while all around it

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

American Dream 2: Default, Then Rent

I was reading this article in the Wall Street Journal this morning:

Not surprisingly, people will default on loans where they owe a lot more on their house than it's worth. A couple of thoughts come to mind: If you could afford a $500,000 loan when you purchased a house, assuming that you still have the same income, you should still be able to meet the payments If it drops in value to $250,000 this has no bearing on the affordability of the payments. But why would you do that when you could default and then rent or buy the house across the street, which now only costs $250,000 and is just as nice as the one you are in?

A few of the people in the piece were offered slightly better mortgage terms from their lender, but nothing close to as good as just walking away from their home. So the banks end up having to sell a house for $250,000 that they're owed $500,000 on.

Here is a proposal which would help everyone: The bank decreases the principal on the above home to $225,000. The owners now have every motive to stay and the bank is more-or-less in the same situation as if there was a default. Here is the added twist: The terms of the agreement are that if the house is ever sold, the bank gets the first $25,000 of profit plus 50% of any additional gain. The 25k is to recapture the 10% equity granted to the homeowners (the house was valued at 250k, but principle was reset to 225k). The remaining 50/50 split incents the owners to stay put for the long-term and yet allows the bank to recapture some of its losses if the house ever regains value.

It seems win-win to me: The owners save the trouble and expense of moving and a hit to their credit and still get the lower monthly bills they could get by defaulting and then renting. Banks initially loose about as much as they are loosing anyway, but they have a long-term chance of getting a bunch of it back instead of no chance of getting it back.

Crikey! I should patent this!

A little speech commentary

Before the commentary about the content of the speech, here is an astute take on the whole event:

Roger J. said... I am curious about why one would even want to listen to an "acceptance" speech for an award that was not deserved and proffered only to make a political point about a previous administration. (From Althouse)

Now that is out of the way here is some selected commentary with the caveat that I am only looking at a couple chunks of it and am not up for a full Fisking. Indeed, there are many parts of it that I like. So, here goes:

But perhaps the most profound issue surrounding my receipt of this prize is the fact that I am the Commander-in-Chief of a nation in the midst of two wars. One of these wars is winding down. The other is a conflict that America did not seek; one in which we are joined by 43 other countries — including Norway — in an effort to defend ourselves and all nations from further attacks.

Clearly what he means is that we did not seek war in Afghanistan but did in Iraq. I think this is an artificial distinction: In both cases a country was offending us in some way, we made demands which were unmet and we responded by invading.

Where force is necessary, we have a moral and strategic interest in binding ourselves to certain rules of conduct. And even as we confront a vicious adversary that abides by no rules, I believe that the United States of America must remain a standard bearer in the conduct of war. That is what makes us different from those whom we fight. That is a source of our strength. (1)That is why I prohibited torture. (2)That is why I ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed. (3)And that is why I have reaffirmed Americas commitment to abide by the Geneva Conventions.

(I added the numbers since I want to write about each of these things)

(1) The previous administration did not allow torture either. There are different definitions of torture, but for the record, nothing defined by the administration as torture was ever allowed.

(2) King Canute ordered the tide to stay out as well and with as much effect, though his point was the opposite of president Obama's. For the president it doesn't matter that the prison remains just as open now as it did when he ordered it closed. Words, actions, what's the difference? Incidentally, I was listening to NPR commentary on the speech and they actually misspoke that Obama had "closed Guantánamo," I guess words and actions have no distinction with NPR either.

(3) The United States has never renounced the Geneva Conventions. The view of the previous administration was that conferring the benefits of the convention to enemy combatants who do not abide by any of the rules of war corrodes the Conventions. That is, why should any group sign the treaty when they already can expect all of the benefits without having to follow any pesky rules themselves?

Logic and Gaia

I am well aware that finding logical inconsistencies in environmentalist positions is like shooting fish in a barrel, but this thought just occurred to me:

We know that there have been vast changes in climate in the past, most notably ice ages and periods of warmer climate in between. One would presume that in the absence of mankind, these shifts in climate would continue. Now, if one can encapsulate a general philosophy of environmentalists, it is that they think Man should have as little impact on nature as possible.

The current issue of man-made global warming (AGW) would seem to fit into their philosophy well: We are causing the planet to warm due to our use of fossil fuels and therefore should take efforts to counteract the changes we are causing. Here is the rub: The data are unclear about warming*, but let's offer a hypothetical--What if there was unequivocal data indicating that the Earth was cooling? By this I mean such clear-cut evidence that there was no doubt in the mind of anyone that the planet was cooling-off by a lot. Whatever the actual cause, does anyone doubt that conservationists would be utterly convinced that Mankind is to blame and that therefore we should take (economy-crushing) steps?

In other words; any detectable change will be opposed by the pro-nature crowd and yet this would seem to violate their basic philosophy. They would have the Earth locked in amber, as if this period in time just happens to be the perfect and ideal climate--when what is natural is for the climate to constantly shift over time.

*Warming or cooling seems to depend a lot on what the baseline is. If you start at the end of the little ice age 1850, then we have been warming. If you start in the warm year of 1998, then we have been cooling etc.