May

3

cupboards, stimulus check, and false alarm

Filed under house, taxes, government, friends at 4:00 pm | 1 Comment

It’s been a good Saturday thus far, and by good I mean I’ve been able to get a lot done.

For starters, I installed hardware on all our kitchen and bathroom cabinets. When we moved in, the cabinets had no hardware and the finish was starting to wear off where we constantly grabbed the doors and drawers. Not wanting to install new cabinets simply because the finish had worn off, we decided to finally put on some knobs. Not being a big fan of home improvement work, I’m pleased to report things went fairly well: only 1 mid-project trip to Home Depot, 1 broken refrigerator magnet (don’t ask), and 1 mechanical pencil accidentally vacuumed up.

I also noticed we had a sizable deposit in our bank account today, thanks to the generosity of the government’s Stimulus Package.  (As an aside, if Rachel and Micah hadn’t been out of town when the bill was signed by the President, we had an opportunity to be there at the White House.)  While I’m happy just about any time the government decides to give us some money back, doing so during an election year has me questioning the motives. Perhaps we’ll do our part to stimulate the economy by paying some extra on our mortgage, or tucking it away in savings.  The best part is we received our second snail mail letter from the IRS today letting us know the money was coming. Helpful, and well worth spending money on postage.

Finally, being from Grand Rapids, MI, I’ve been casually interested in Cornerstone University’s recent hiring of Joseph Stowell as their new president. I saw a headline today that made my heart stop for a moment: Cornerstone University President Joseph Stowell takes life, Christian school in a new direction. No, he didn’t commit suicide. False alarm.

Now we’re off to have dinner with some good friends who are in town from CA!

Feb

14

winter weather advisory

Filed under traffic, weather, government at 7:48 am | 2 Comments

Starting last week, the National Weather Service began issuing winter weather advisories for our area, with storms expected to hit yesterday and today. The storms actually came this time, and I’m sufficiently impressed. Depending on the area, there are multiple inches of snow topped off by a thick layer of ice, with freezing rain and sleet still coming down. Having said that, I’m still amazed at the hysteria of many people here:

* A guy in the cube next to me parked his car over a mile away yesterday because there’s a hill on the street leading to our building. Apparently it froze during a storm several years ago and caused a traffic backup. Hearing the weather forecast, he wasn’t going to risk it this time around.

* The schools closed all day yesterday in anticipation of the storms, before it even started snowing or raining. The rain didn’t start until early evening.

* The traffic reports on the radio today are spending more time telling you how to drive than they are giving updates on the accidents. (E.g., “Speed is your enemy.” “Because the roads are covered in ice, you need to allow more time to brake.”)

Well, the status of the Federal Government is apparently the thing to watch around here. They let out early yesterday, and have a 2 hour delay today, except for “essential” employees, I believe. It’s still unclear as to how that impacts my work schedule, so I braved the elements and drove in to work this morning. Knowing the commute would be a bit longer than usual, I figured I’d stop off at Starbuck’s and get something dark, bold, and black to drink to make the trip more enjoyable. I pulled into the parking lot, and the store was completely dark. They were closed. They can close because of weather?! Surely, if anyone is considered “essential,” it should be Starbuck’s employees.

Jan

11

that’s my DMV

Filed under government at 8:58 pm | Leave a Comment

Shortly before Christmas (sorry for the tardy post), a couple blogs I frequent highlighted an interesting story from the Washington Times. The story details how a couple guys dressed up in crazy disguises (complete with spray paint and buckteeth) obtained driver’s licenses from the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles.

I hadn’t realized before this incident that the Virginia DMV also issued ids to several of the 9/11 hijackers.

Our DMV’s compiling quite the track record …