Month: March 2006

I realized a decade-long ambition today: I bought a Sears water hose. 😎

As a plumber for large shops, I used to visit about a thousand homes a year. Now, on my own, I make about 1/3 as many calls. Even still, for over sixteen years, I’ve been to a lot of homes and I’ve used a lot of water hoses. Never have I seen a hose that compares with the ones sold by Sears. They’re just good.

Can’t say as much for their legal, department, though. On the cardboard that came wrapped around my new hose, I found this on the inside:

“WARNING: Do not spray water into an electrical outlet. Severe electrical shock could result.”

By rights, other such warnings should be equally necessary. “Do not use this hose for colonic irrigation.” “Do not drive with this hose coiled around your head and eyes. You could have a wreck.” “Do not swing the end of this hose around when others are present. It could hit someone in the eye.” “Do not spray water on passing strangers. They could charge you with assault.”

We’re doomed, I tell ya. :angry:

According to the Washington Post, “Former D.C. mayor Marion Barry pleaded guilty yesterday to two misdemeanor tax charges, admitting in federal court that he failed to pay most of his income taxes for five years after departing from the District government in 1999.”

He faced a possible 18 months in jail and $30,000 in fines. He got probation, and he’s supposed to pay the taxes. That’s why he’s laughing.

Barry is a habitual offender: philandering, drugs, perjury, publicly exposing himself, nonpayment of debts. They arrest him, they convict him, they issue judgments against him–he doesn’t care or comply. He just gets a criminal underclass to vote him back into office for business as usual and dares anyone to enforce the law against him. That’s why he’s laughing.

He’s 70 and in poor health. If he can finish his current term, he can retire at taxpayer expense. Is this a great country, or what? If he dies, he gets by with a lifetime of living off the labor of others. (Of course, he then faces a holy God, but that’s another topic.)

Memphis can be proud when it looks at Barry–proud that it got rid of him fifty years ago. :laugh:

One doesn’t automatically think of concrete as something that can be sawed, but we do it all the time in the plumbing trade. In this photo you see me sawing a path through a driveway. We removed a 24″ swath, excavated beneath it, and laid a 3″ drain pipe.

This isn’t easy work. It takes a few hours to cut that much concrete, get it out, and haul it away. The circle saw blade you see in use here costs $350. We used up about 1/4 of its cutting edge on this job, including some cuts to the brick and sidewalk behind the house.