'Sup, holmes...

That greeting would probably have gotten weird looks even when it was temporally relevant. Now that we’re likely 30 years past its expiration date, I’m sure it lands all the harder. Anytwat, some updates in the realm of Highcastle. I’m trying to recall the significant events since the last update in January.

We had our spring HVAC checkup and our aging downstairs York unit needed a freon recharge, with a warning that it might not last the entire summer. Given our desire to pay off the new upstairs Carrier unit first (installed May 2024), we decided to try and ride it out for at least one more summer. It lasted about a month before blowing the new capacitor (installed by Bryce from Atlas AC during the spring checkup, which ended up costing us $600). He mentioned that the sealant treatment (for which we paid 3K last summer) might have gummed up the system and led to the new capacitor’s rapid failure. Giving consideration to the incremental charges adding up and in light of tariff nonsense running amok (regardless if real in any given case, we’ve already seen what some companies do to capitalize on manufactured scarcity or ‘third party’ cost increases), we decided it was time to replace the downstairs unit as well before the cost might increase even further.

We essentially got the same system as upstairs, just the 5 ton model. It’s specs are slightly updated due to new federal regulations about freon. It’s some newer version (read, more expensive) that I gather is more energy efficient. All told, the butcher’s bill ended up approaching 16K. We paid the additional 2k for 10 yr parts/labor. Maybe a gamble that anything significant will go wrong in ten years, but if it does, we don’t have to pay for it. Carrier is a more reputable brand than York, and it’s considered one of the top three HVAC manufacturers from a quality/performance standpoint. So there’s that. But, certainly 16K we didn’t want to add to our consumer debt after paying off the house in December 2024.

That was the single biggest house related expenditure by far, but not the only one. Within a few days of the HVAC purchase, the microwave decided to die (again), almost two years to the day from purchase. We had bought the same model Panasonic because we didn’t want to buy a trim kit (which can be as expensive as the microwave itself), but after having them fail essentially at the two year mark twice in a row, we decided to try and find a more reliable model. We ended up going with a Frigidaire and its trim kit from Home Depot. The military discount helped with the trim kit, but not appliances because of course it doesn’t. There went another $750+ in a puff of oily, vaguely meat scented smoke.

Are we done? Of course not. In an attempt to mitigate the back door mud trails being left by Roci, Skittles, and Nynaeve, I went ahead and ‘splurged’ on two pallets of sod so I could skip the part where we wait on new seed to come in incompletely in the heavily shaded areas of our backyard. $900 gone in a puff of whispy grass and fading dreams of electronic gear. Tack on another $1400 for flood and car insurance, and our bank account is fighting a failing battle to stay afloat. I reviewed the highest charges to our credit card dating back to December, and these were the biggest.

In fairness, there were some discretionary expenses in there that weren’t strictly (or at all) necessary, including the Rush 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition, and the Conqueror’s Challenge (Middle Earth). Not to mention over $400 for thumb drives as part of Scanocalypse 2025, and my recent $632 purchase of a DeWalt table saw. In my defense, the tool and sod purchases are part of keeping the home functioning and livable. The table saw was a purchase I envisioned as for the post HVAC payoff time frame, but recent developments with crumbling infrastructure (gutter fascia and garage door jamb disintegration) motivated me to save nine with a stitch in time. I haven’t gone to the trouble to get real estimates from contractors on fixing these issues, but my experience is that they’ll generally charge 3x or more what it would cost me to fix.

A particularly stark example is a contractor that came out to repair damage made by Atlas AC last year. It was some drywall damage from the installer falling and hitting the wall at the bottom of the attic ladder. He also had overstressed the attic ladder hinge and the framing had begun to show cracks. The contractor applied some mud, texture, and paint to the wall. He drilled wood screws all around and through the rectangle of the attic ladder frame into the main house framing.

He had bought some new matched paint for the wall damage and already had the drywall mud on hand. I’m guessing maybe ~ $20 in supplies? I’m not sure what a quart of paint costs at Home Depot. Any guess as to the cost? I’m betting you under estimate, like I would have. $1300. For $20 in supplies and ‘four hours"‘ of labor, because he applied the mud and then sat in his truck for an hour while it dried before applying texture, after which he sat in his truck for another hour while waiting for it to dry before applying the paint. All that to say, whenever possible, I’m making my own repairs and maintenance checks whenever possible and avoiding something that could fail catastrophically. This is mainly electrical or plumbing work that involves gas supply.

Hilariously (or not), he didn’t actually correct or remedy the hinge issue, which is the weak point. I learned afterwards that screws aren’t typically used here because they lack shear strength compared to the framing nails that are used (and were already adequately in place). I didn’t realize this until after he was gone. I’ve decided to fix the issue myself.

On the creative front, it’s still been a slow incremental roll towards visual and musical disciplines. I performed “The Spirit of Radio” for my winter performance piece, and it was mostly okay, but I Rushed (pun intended) the main riff a few times. Shaun was still charitable (as per usual, I honestly don’t think he can be arsed to care, it’s a paycheck), acknowledging the rough spots that need work. I learned a valuable lesson about setting up my Logic project and the utility of CC commands to make patch/scene switches on my AxeFx so I can concentrate on the performance. It also has further instilled my desire to play live single takes for my performance videos. This probably deserves its own separate post. I’ll leave off here as this has already stretched on (as per SOP) beyond my own interest.

Spring Has Sprung

In Texas, at least. After a slow start, it appears all of our trees, most of our shrubs and the lawn are making a full recovery from Snowmageddon ‘21. Our biggest tree, the one out front which was planted when they built the house, was probably the slowest to sprout buds. For awhile, I had serious concerns that it didn’t make it through the four day hard freeze back in February. Thankfully, it finally began to display some buds and eventually a full complement of leaves to get that good ‘ole photosynthesis jam going. By current estimates, it’s mainly some potted plants that appear to have met their demise. We have a few shrubs that look dead to me, but Aeyong is optimistic that by cutting them down to their base we’ll encourage some new growth from the roots. We’ll see. If they don’t recover, shrubs are easy enough to replace.

In that horticultural vein, I’ve taken a bit more interest in getting the yard in good trim. I apologize, that wasn’t intended as a pun, but now it is, so there. You’re welcome. We haven’t really gone to any great lengths with our yard, other than regular mowing and seasonal fertilization and occasional seeding. The front has remained pretty thick and healthy, but the backyard has some bare patches, including one large swath of dirt in the back corner. I’m going to try de-thatching and scarifying with, you guessed it, our new de-thatcher/scarifier. Hopefully it will clear up a lot of dead grass and leaves and open up the soil to allow more root growth and nutrient/water transfer where it’s needed. Along with that, I’ve got a big bag of Humic DG which is supposed to enhance nutrient absorption and improve soil structure. It’s a bunch of small spherical granules that disperse into the soil, some of which immediately break down into humic and fulvic acid, combining with essential nutrients and persisting in the soil to allow plant absorption for extended periods of time. The humate portion remains even longer, thereby further extending that nutrient cycle.

I’ve seen a few customer testimonials and just Humic DG alone can make a big difference to yards, plants, and larger agricultural applications. My plan is to de-thatch, scarify, mow up the detritus (I have so few opportunities to use that word, so back off), and then lay down probably half the 40 pound bag of Humic. I’ll be seeding and fertilizing in the near future, but I do want to give the yard a little time to recover so I’ll probably wait a few days to a week to do that. Not everyone recommends seeding in the spring, but our bare patches definitely need it. I probably need to get some peat moss to mix with the seed. Although it probably sounds like I’ve gone all 4H (when I was in school it was all farm kids, I’m probably showing my age), but I really just want a nice green lawn that I can maintain. I don’t want to spend a great deal of additional time keeping it in shape. Hopefully some well timed interventions will get it ready for summer.

In other developments, I got my second COVID vaccination last Wednesday, and the side effects were slightly worse, I suppose. The arm soreness was about the same, but I think I felt some more systemic effects this time. It’s a bit hard to tell because the day of the vaccination I also ran (a modified attempt at resumption that was triggered by the broken elliptical) and scalped the lawn. Scalping the lawn (and bagging the clippings) is something that’s useful to do 1-2 times per year based on the advice I’ve seen. It’s somewhat like de-thatching, I suppose. In my yard’s case, it takes considerably more effort to push the mower across high spots in the ground. All that to say, the additional fatigue I felt the day after was probably a combination of the vaccination and the physical efforts of the day before. I also woke up around midnight feeling febrile, but didn’t bother checking my temperature. I just took a gram of Tylenol every six hours for the first day or so and things slowly got better. As I’ve said, eminently better than getting sick with COVID.

Things at work are going well. I’ve worked in the new location the last two weekends, and it’s a nice setting. Essentially the same drive as before with the last two miles being on surface streets. VES has been keeping me gainfully scheduled, one weekend at a time. My no-show rate has dropped a bit, down to only 15% of the last two weekends. I’ve been averaging about $2500 per weekend, which is okay. I’ve been hoping to maintain closer to $3K per weekend, for a monthly total of $12K. Based on how they’ve been filling my schedule (partially) and the no-show rate, I’m not sure that’s achievable with only a two day workweek. At least it’s adequate for our financial goals of paying the house off slightly faster and maintaining a discretionary income. I only want to work enough for those two criteria, as I really value my free time.

Back to homefront matters, Aeyong is recovering fairly well. She had her cast removed the week before last, and she’s jumped back in to her normal routine. Maybe a bit too hard because she’s got some wrist swelling today and will need to rest a bit. She’s been catching up on several things she wanted to accomplish including trimming and bathing all the girls. She also has been out in the yard working, and this weekend she decided to help me out by dusting and cleaning the bathrooms upstairs. That was a nice surprise because it had been nagging me for several weeks and I had been too busy with regular work and work around the house. Still, she’s probably paying for the uptick in activity right now.

I’ve been trying to improve the garage layout the last few weeks to coincide with efforts in the yard. I installed some overhead storage shelves and moved the treadmill and elliptical all the way back against the wall. Not a huge change, but the added floor space has been nice. We took the vertical shelves that were previously on the back wall and moved them into the laundry room, giving us some more storage space in there. We had a little half shelf in the laundry room before, and now that has moved to the garage as a rolling storage cart for our air compressor and shop vac. I’ll eventually install another identical set of overhead shelves in the other garage slot and hopefully free up another section of the floor. Eventually I want to have a rolling workbench with some good working tools - table saw, miter saw, router, and maybe a few other tools depending on how things develop. I’m going to try to ease into woodworking, but I already have all sorts of ideas for projects. I don’t know if it’s just a natural part of aging, or a genetic thing I get from my father. He was definitely a DIYer at his core. Nature, nurture, or perhaps a bit of both?

After all this fairly mundane material, I haven’t stopped pursuing my core disciplines, although there have been more days “off” when I was working at VES or had my time manhandled by DIY, medical, etc. issues. I finished a Premiere Pro course, and I’ve just started a Photoshop course. I also signed up for a basic piano course, mostly to cover some fundamentals that I know I’ve been lacking. I’ve really only slowly learned songs and then just spent my time practicing them, but I haven’t spent any considerable time at learning scales, improvisation and some of the basic skill set I need if I want to advance further. The same could be said for my other disciplines as well. I’m alternating my drumming practice between Mike Michalkow’s course and trying to learn Xanadu for the eventual Rush AFTK deep dive video. Check back next year, probably. Then there’s also bass, guitar, singing, drawing, writing, learning to speak/read/write Korean. Not to mention maintaining my CMEs for work. The days are just packed, and that’s how I like it.

A Few Milestones

Today marks nine years since my retirement from the Army, and it’s been overwhelmingly positive in retrospect. I got a good job, moved back home, and have spent a significant amount of time furthering my development as a musician, songwriter, and producer. There have been ebbs and flows over these years, some times of drama, but mostly a nice steady arc to the days. We got a great house six years ago, and I’ve been enrolled at Berklee Online for the past several years. Aeyong has turned our yard and house into a natural conservatory of sorts, and we’ve got a beautiful green space that envelops our house and will only shelter us further with time. We lost Bridget to the inevitable march of time, but have since welcomed Skittles, our Chihuahua mix and resident spoiled princess of the brood.

I spent about five and half years working the regular grind as a federal employee, but about two and a half years ago I switched to “Fee Basis” which is somewhat equivalent to a contractor, but without the contract. I get paid directly for the work and there’s no ongoing agreement or contract that binds either the VA or myself. That being said, our clinic has had Fee Basis examiners the entire time I’ve been there and long before as far as I know. That switch is probably the single biggest improvement in quality of life I’ve ever experienced, even compared to my retirement from the Army. I went from working full time to working nine days a month and earning twice as much. This is largely predicated by my ability to perform a large number of exams and handle complex cases that the regular federales don’t like to bother with. It’s really been a perfect storm of an employment situation for me.

I’ve had significantly more time to work on my various passions, and I’ve added filmmaking, video editing, video effects, drawing, and writing to the multitude of musical disciplines that provide great fulfillment and purpose to my life. As part of the added boon of income, we’ve been paying our mortgage off at more than triple the required amount, and so we’re hopefully going to see it paid off in the next two years, about twenty two years ahead of schedule. There’s one big milestone that we need to pass, and that’s another salary waiver approval for Fee Basis employees. The VA has been allowing Fee Basis to earn double their normal authorized annual salaries due to shortages of personnel and it’s been a policy that’s required renewal every two years. This year marks the end of a two year period, so we just need one more approval. By all signs it should happen because the VA has been one of the departments that’s seen expansion under the last several administrations.

Once the house is paid off, I intend to keep working at about the same rate I do now, but being completely debt free will put us in a position where we could probably survive without me working at all. I like the extra security of financial surplus, not to mention discretionary income, so I imagine I’ll keep working indefinitely, albeit on the reduced schedule which will eventually decrease even further. A lot more has happened over the last nine years - we’ve both passed fifty and it’s receding below the horizon, we’ve attended a lot of great concerts, and taken a few small trips. We plan to travel more once the house is paid off, although we’re limited by our dogs and some health issues. It can also be argued we’re both home bodies who really enjoy living in our own little world.

File under short term milestone, I’ve quit practicing any musical instruments for the past month, trying to get this chronic elbow tendonitis to fade away. It’s been in the left elbow for almost two years, and the right elbow started acting up a few months ago. It’s just the cumulative effect of playing so many different instruments - guitar, bass, drums, keyboards. It got worse when I bought acoustic drums and had been working on my double stroke by repetitively practicing the stick bounce off the drum head. That shock is transferred directly to my lateral elbow and it really has taken its toll. The problem with the elbows is that we’re constantly using them, and even something as trivial as picking up a coffee cup or tearing a piece of paper can tweak the injury. I have seen some improvement in the symptoms, so I’m hoping to start gradually re-introducing some practice to my schedule starting next month.

One benefit of the extra time is that I rekindled my interest in drawing and writing (which have been gathering dust for years) and I’ve made some progress, although I have a long way to go. I look forward to combining all my various disciplines into great storytelling in the future.

April Showers

actually the weather is quite nice today, but we did have some serious rain this weekend, so the official mowing season has arrived. And that's just FAN-FRICKIN-TASTIC, MAN!  Seriously. The annual milestone inspection has essentially passed at work and we did pretty well without any serious deficiencies. Everybody has probably breathed a big sigh of relief and returned to their functional levels of ambivalence. I know I have. (anyone from work reading this should disregard that last statement as me just trying to sound cool and get back to something more productive than reading my blog).  :)  Aeyoung and I are looking forward to two weeks of leave starting next week with 5 days in Vegas. We haven't traveled much since we've been married (not counting the work sponsored relocations) and since I'm going to be going on an extended leave of absence next year, we want to take advantage of the time we have. The sad part is that we probably won't be doing any gambling other than throwing a couple of coins in a hotel lobby slot machine. We're not so big on giving money away with nothing to show for it. We plan on checking out the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam and whatever looks interesting in Vegas that week. We'll probably watch a few shows and just relax.