York City Halloween Parade

Well Sunday we went tot he York City Halloween Parade sponsored by the YWCA. The parade was just ok this year. There was no candy, or at most, maybe 2 or 3 floats gave out candy. But I expected this since it says in the rules no throwing candy. So props to the 2 or 3 floats who broke the rules. Another person who broke some rules was a fellow handing out rulers for Phil Avillo. The rules state there is to be no smoking along the parade route while in the parade. And wouldn't you know it this guy decided this rule didn't apply to him and smoked anyway....well Phil Avillo will not be getting my vote this year. Yes I know I gave props to the people who gave out candy when they weren't supposed to, but I like candy and can't stand cigarette smoke.

The parade was long, windy, cold and entertaining. But the firetrucks were missing?

Shocking!

In case you didn't read my last blog, I put in a new dishwasher last week. And the dishwasher requires electricity to run, so I thought I would let you know about my electricity rule.

Here is my rule:
After 2 shocks I turn it off when hooking up or taking out something that uses electricity. Why after 2 shocks you might ask? Well here is my reasoning. The first shock was just an accident and won't happen again. The second shock is someone above trying to tell me I should turn off the electricity. So that is when I turn it off.

However, when I hooked up my dishwasher last week I did not follow my 2 shock rule. And probably much to everyone's surprise I aired on the side of caution. I decided that after I got shocked one time it was probably a good idea to turn of the electricity. Turns out things go much quicker when you don't have to worry about getting shocked. I got shocked the one time, turned off the electricity and it was much easier to connect the wiring. I may have to adopt this rule as the new electricity rule.

Doh!

Well a couple of weeks ago our garbage disposal broke. No biggie I will go get a new one and put it in. So off to Sears I went and found a pretty nice garbage disposal, better than our broken one, on sale. So I purchased the disposal and came home with it to show my wife. Her first words were who's going to install it? I said me of course. She asked if I ever installed one, I said no but how hard can it be. Turned out it wasn't that hard. I got the old one out and the new one in, in less than 1/2 an hour. I turned it on made sure it disposed of stuff and called it done.

The next day our dishwasher breaks. The stupid pump to drain the water out stopped working. So I got the shop vac out and sucked the water out. This is how we did dishes for a while, we would run the dishwasher then suck the water out, when I say a while I mean like 4 times. So this past weekend we went dishwasher shopping. We went to Lowes where they had a very nice one we liked, then went to Home Depot where they didn't have the same one, but a very comparable one. We ended up with the one from Home Depot. But we can't get it delivered til Wednesday.

So Wednesday comes around. They are supposed to be there between 11 and 3, they show up at 12:30. They haul away my old dishwasher for 1 cent. The then bring my new dishwasher in for $55.00, which I have a $55 mail in rebate for, so it turns out they delivered it for free. After 3 trips to Home Depot to get the parts I needed to extend my water line and electric I begin to hook it up.

Ok 1 hour goes by and everything is hooked up. Shouldn't have taken this long but it did. I then go to put it back in the hole which the old one came from.....it doesn't fit! What?! I though all these things were the same size. It's about 1/8 of an inch wider than the other one. So I go get my Dremel and sand off 1/8 of an inch from the hole and taa dow it's in. All that's left is to hook up the drainage hose to the garbage Disposal and I am on my way.

Ok all hooked up, I run a rinse only load first just to test it out. It seems to work, but then I hear a dripping. I look over at my sink and water is coming out from underneath. Crap the clamp they gave me wasn't tight enough and water seeped out. So I got a different clamp from the garage and put that sucker on there nice and tight. I run the load again. This time I get an EO error. I look up what this means, and it means there is a drainage problem. Crap that's the same thing that happened to my other dishwasher.

I unhook the drainage hose from the disposal and stick my screwdriver into the hole to make sure it isn't clogged. Wouldn't you know it! I can't get my screwdriver throught he hole. There is a plug closing the hole. I go to my garage and this time read the instruction manual that came with my New Garbage Disposal. And what does it say under the part labeled to Hook up with dishwasher. it says to pound out the plug with a screwdriver and hammer. Flippin' thing.

I pound it out and VOILA the dishwasher is working. So after 2 floods of the kitchen floor and grief from the wife, though not as much as I thought I was going to get, I have a working dishwasher that I didn't need and garbage disposal. Yee Freaking Ha.......btw. I really like the new dishwasher.

Old Sean vs. New Sean

Today after dropping off my kids at the day care I started to leave, I pulled out of my spot and started heading up the row to the exit. Then all of the sudden a green car comes fly around the corner and can't keep her car on her side of the row. I think oh crap she is going to hit me. Luckily she came to a SCREECHING halt about 1 ft. from my door. She waved as if to say "To say sorry my bad". I just kept on my way.

Now see that is where the New Sean comes into play, anyone who knows me probably thinks that it is weird that I just continued driving. But I am trying to be a more calm Sean these days, trying to set a good example for my children.

The Old Sean would have stopped the car and started into her about how this was a parking lot and you should not be speeding through a parking lot and not only is it a parking lot, it is a Day Care parking lot were children often are located, especially in the morning when the teachers lead a line of them to the bus stop. And how she could have very easily hit one of them. And how she barely stopped in time not to hit my car and that if I was a child she probably would not have seen me as soon as she saw the car and most likely would have hit and injured the child. And that she had her child in her car and could have injured her child if she had hit my car or another child. But no i didn't say any of that.......

However, on the way to work I started thinking that I should have said something. And that this new Sean stuff was just a bunch of crap. I really wanted to say something, but I didn't. What if this happens again, but next time she doesn't stop in time? Then I would feel guilty, ok this New Sean stuff has to go. Enough of the polite nice Sean.......

Dallastown Halloween Parade

Ok so far the Dallastown Halloween parade has given out the most candy. Last Thursday was the Dallastown Halloween Parade and we decided to go, I know big Shocker. Well it was raining when we left the house, not hard but enough to be annoying, but when we got there it had stopped raining. After driving around for 15 minutes I decided I would just drop of the wife and kids and then go look for a space myself. So after I dropped them off and finally found a space to park in the rain started and didn't stop.

But seeing as we were already there and all we decided to stay and am I gad we did. We were at just about the end of the parade route, but people were still throwing out candy by the handful. Also something different about the Dallastown Halloween Parade was that they put all the fire trucks at the end of the parade, not scattered throughout the parade. it was different but i think I like this way better.

So quick recap:
Plus - They gave out lots of candy - All the fire trucks at the end
Minus - Hard to find parking - RAIN!

We're off to see the Wizard....

Well last night after the Manchester Halloween Parade we headed down to the YWCA of York to see the Wizard of Oz performed by the York YWCA Synchro-ettes. It was a synchronized swimming team performing the Wizard of Oz. Much to my amazement it was actaully really good. Allison has a thing for synchronized swimming so she had to go see it. I am glad we went.

Manchester Halloween Parade

Well after the candyless Mechanicsburg Halloween Parade, I am happy to report balance has been restored in the Universe. The Manchester Halloween parade was much better than the Mechanicsburg one. Mack and Jack collected enough candy to fill their bucket. Which to me, means the parade was a success. I highly recommend anyone with a candy addiction attend this parade annually.

However, I was reading the rules for the York City Halloween parade today and it doesn't look good on the candy front. The rules state no candy is allowed to be thrown from a vehicle, it must be handed out from people walking along the parade. Also anyone distributing said candy needs valid license from The Bureau of Permits and Health Licensing. What kind of crap is that....it's candy people.

Just Married

Well it finally happened, Hell froze over and Rich got married. Mr. I'm never gonna get married tied the knot this weekend at Lauxmont Gardens in Wirghtsville, Pa. All in all I would say the wedding was a success; both parties showed up, they both said I do and no one objected to the wedding. The ceremony took place at the Chapel at YCP (York College of PA).

Then off to Lauxmont Gardens we went. It was abit chilly outside, it is October afterall, so the cocktail hour happened inside. The best man speech was good. And some vandals, who shall remain nameless, toilet papered and soaped the Bride and grooms car.

As I write this they are flying over the Pacific Ocean to Fiji. I wish them luck and many years of happiness.

One for Snyder

While reading Chucks blog, about the 25 worst tech products of all time, I ran across this nifty entry..the Apple Pippin. There are 2 reasons Snyder would be interested in such a product. One it was put out by Apple. And secondly it's name is very simular to one of Snyders favoritest people, Scottie Pippen.

Gutters Follow Up

Well incase you didn't read the comments from the last post, the people at Century Spouting did not show up yesterday because in their words "it was windy", in my words "it was nice out". However they said they would be out first thing this morning.

Well first thing this morning 7:30am I received a call from the people at Century Spouting. Guess what....correct they won't be out today because one of their guys called in sick. WTF!

The guy called me up and said they were scheduled to come out today to put up gutters, but couldn't because one of his guys called in sick. I told him "no! you were scheduled to come out yesterday and didn't." So I said "so you are telling me you won't be out today" His reply "One of my guys called out sick" My reply "So that's a no?" He then repeated that one of his guys called out sick. I told him "this is a crock of shit" and hung up.

When my wife got out of the shower we played the guess who just called game. When I told her she didn't believe me. So she looked at the caller id and called them back.

Let's just say they WILL be out today to install our gutters.

Gutters

Well after weeks of trying tog et someone to come out and put up gutters, someone should be showing up today. we tried for weeks to get Rick Jackson to come out and put up gutters but would never return our calls to set up a time, oh well, his loss. So then we called Century Spouting they came right out to give us a an estimate. I asked how long it takes from when they receive the contract to get the gutters up. I was told "Oh no problem, pretty much right away". Well apparently right away to Century Spouting means 2 weeks. Long than I wanted, but a hell of alot quicker than Rick Jackson. So I guess we will see tonight if we actually have gutters or not. I will keep you updated.

No candy?

Well this is the second time I have written this because I decided to spell check the original and somehow everything got deleted. so anyway here you go:

Last night the wife, kids and myself went to the Mechanicsburg Halloween Parade. She had heard about it on the radio and we decided to go. Halloween is my wife's favorite holiday right after her birthday. So we try to go to as many Halloween Parades as possible.

So we get to Mechanicsburg, find the Parade route and then find a nice spot to sit. The parade is set to start at 7pm, and around 7:15pm we see the first vehicle. Since it's a Halloween Parade we brought my daughter's bucket with us to store the candy they throw at you. Well were we in for a disappointing evening. About 1/2 an hour into the parade I look in my daughter's bucket and see 4 pieces of candy...yup 4 whole pieces. Give me a break what kind of Halloween Parade is this? No one pelting us with candy, what is the point? I expect to be pelted with candy at Halloween Parades not have to chase down people in order to get some candy. The wife and I couldn't figure out why there wasn't more candy, I speculated that it was because the people who put on the parade didn't want to clean up the left over candy. It had to be that or the participants are just that freaking cheap.

Well today I decided to see if i could figure out the reason, and I did. I looked at the registration form for the parade and i clearly states that candy is not allowed to be thrown from vehicles. WHAT KIND OF CRAP is that? Isn't that the reason for a Halloween Parade? What the point unless it is to collect candy?

Well we won't be attending this parade next year, but we still have many more local parades to go to this year. I will let you know how these parades fare against the Mechanicsburg Halloween Parade. But please let me tell you again...DON"T GO TO THE MECHANICSBURG HALLOWEEN PARADE!!!! It sucks!

Littering

I was driving behind someone the other day, a smoker, when they decided they were done with their cigarette and threw it out the window. Now my question is why don't smokers consider this littering. When I am done with my water bottle I don't throw it out the window, or when I finish changing my son's diaper I don't just leave it there. I find a trash receptacle and put my garbage in it.

Now it's not like this is an isolated case of one smoker throwing there used up cigarette out the window, there are a bazillion cigarette butts along the road and other places. I was hoping a smoker could explain this rational please?

Brown Follow Up

Well I went to the UPS store the other day to attmept to file a claim. However, I was told that i could not fiel the claim, that the person receiving the package had to file the claim. Doesn't really make much sense to me since I am the one who purchased the insurance. But anyway, I told the buyer that he had to fiel the claim. He also tried to but UPS says they will need to take the server and box for analysis. They are going to analyse the box? Can't they see from the picture that the box didn't make it? Anyway I am not sure what is going on now, the buyer doesn't want to be out of the money he paid me and the server that he bought, UPS says they will need to take it for a while, so I believe he is going to take the front bexel off and give that to them since that appears to be the only broken part right now.

I will post more as I learn more.

Gilbertology

I was surfing around a little bit todya and found a bit of a Michael Jackson-ish article about a Wizard's star. from the title I hope you can figure out which one, if there is more than one. Anyway here's the article: http://msn.foxsports.com/nba/story/6023864?FSO1&ATT=HMA

What has Brown done for you?

Well let me tell you what that have done for me, or should I say to me. They have screwed me, first with their scamming now with their delivery of the package I sent via UPS. If you read the blog entry below this one you will see that I was frustrated with UPS last week. Well now I don't know what I am, but it far exceeds frustration.

I checked my email on Saturday to see that my one package was delivered. It was the package that I didn't have a box for and therefore let the UPS Store pack it. Well the guy who received it sent me these pictures of the package:





You have got to be kidding me. How can they even deliver something like that? How is it possible to mess up a package that badly? Did they drop it from a plane? Well today I guess I will be calling UPS and the wife will be going to the UPS Store, I am afraid if I go the cops might end up showing up. Has anyone ever filed a claim with UPS before? Oh did I mention this is also the one I didn't buy the extra insurance for? I haven't and fell that I may need to now. GRRRRRRRRRR!