Greetings from the doghouse.

Maybe the title is wrong. I was just informed that I am not in the doghouse. So I guess I'm in the you're-a-jerk house. I'll explain.

Yesterday I got home from work and then dropped Twila off so she could look at trees. After that I had a couple of things to do, one of which was to acquire three feet of wire. You're supposed to be able to buy anything around here, but maybe not wire. I'd looked around a bit on Thursday, but mostly I'd learned that drugstores and many hardware stores don't carry wire. I also asked at work, but that came up blank, too. After all, we're building the optics for a telescope, and electricity isn't a component. I didn't need any special wire, just a few feet to repair the air conditioner exhaust in my so-called office, because it had slipped out of my jury-rigged nail and cardboard attachment to a skylight. I knew I could fix it with a little wire.

My first stop was a hardware store in Tarrytown, at least theoretically. The store got good reviews online. I parked about 1/4 mile away to avoid meters, then walked to where the store isn't. The address is still there, but the hardware store has been replaced by something. So I walked back to my car and took stock of things.

The good news in all of that is that I really don't have to go in my office now, because on Thursday night my 2-year-old iMac went totally south for the 3rd time. The previous two times I took it to an Apple store in Boulder and they replaced the CPU, graphics card, RAM, and whatever. The first time they did that the iMac lasted one day, then the same thing happened. The second rebuilding lasted a couple of months, so I suppose I should be grateful. Apple (not that Steve Jobs has an ego, or anything) calls its repair technicians "geniuses". They aren't.

This is getting too long, so I'll sum up quickly. I dropped the computer off at a non-Apple, non-genius repair place (that was the second thing I had to do). Then I went to two more places that no longer exist. Finally I went to Radio Shack and paid $9 for wire. Along the way I had to deal with many... well, I'll just reiterate my long-held belief that the easiest job in the world is to be an [word that means "anal orifice"] hunter. When I got home I was in a poor mood, and I started to write a blog titled "Crap and more crap," but I'm glad I didn't post it.

While I was writing, Twila came home, and something went haywire. It might have been my suggestion about the direction of this blog, but I did say ten minutes later that she was right. So I don't know. At the moment I'm just keeping my mouth shut and hoping for the best.