Hell day ( week) month etc
Posted on June 17, 2009
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What can I say. I get though each day as best I can. Today was a ugly day.
Today was a huge rush to get things ready for the tile guy so that my Dad would have a shower. Its been 10 days since he had one. And so far, he has refused to go over to one of my pals to have one.
But tonight at last I got the fixtures hooked up and the shower fixture hooked up. So a shower is now possible. But it has been a nightmare hassle to get to this point.
I also got the kitchen ceiling light hooked up. So mucho light in the kitchen.
I’m debating do I work on client work ( which is stacked up in 4 directions, if not 5 clients ) tonight or try and install the bathroom sink ( plus the required linoleum under the sink cabinet) ? I don’t know, but its midnight and I’m feeling pretty wiped. I really should change out the power cord on the washer / dryer and run a load of wash cause we are really out of clothes. Fresh socks would rock. But I think I am missing the dryer flex tube for the lint. Always something, no?
My current partial list to do in the house:
Stuff to do on house ( todays draft ) :
Install smoke alarms
Pick up lights for front of house / rear
Install exterior lights
Change furnace bypass switch
install light for furnace
Install linoleum for kitchen & need to purchase ( and transport) more linoleum to complete the kitchen linoleum job ( should do before finishing kitchen cabinet install)
Sell the new LG microwave ( DAd can’t read the black on grey controls) & get replacement
Install range and stove gas piping
Clean up garden
Take picture of front of house for State Farm and email by Wed
Install sink & cabinet for center bath
Install sink & cabinet ( may need ot purchase both /wait for july ) for master bath
Install linoleum for master bath
Install linoleum for center bath
Install switches for bathrooms lights and fans
Fix short in kitchen ( check all outlets 1st ) This circuit is off
Fix short in bathroom ( rip out wall) , replace wire, replace drywall, remudd This circuit is off
Return other stuff and wood to Home Depot
Buy some pressure treated wood for center shower ?
Install shower pan ( required to be hand done with mud and level ) / get estimate $400 ?
Get shower pan inspected by city of Richmond
Buy tile for center shower
Install towel racks and toilet paper rolls
Put the wood backing mounts for center bathroom bars
Duplicate house keys & LEGOJEEP
Finish installing cabinets
Install sink for kitchen
Install waste pipe for sink
Install dishwasher to garbage disposal hook up / drainage
Change power cord on GD
Install dishwasher hook ups , Buy longer drain pipe
Install interior shelves & Drawers and Drawer hardware
Borrow truck from oakland pal to get ikea countertops to Richmond
Return unopened wood countertop ( too short ) to IKEA
Pick up new countertop from IKEA
Find a heat resistant countertop for next to stove ( smal piece of granite 31 by 25? )
Hang new microwave, if I can find one that has a dial and high contrast for Dad. Trying to not to purchase the voice prompt piece of junk no name microwave from walmart.
Install venting for stove in garage
Install venting for dryer in garage
Install faux sink for center bath ( current one is not to code) ( may end up using old sink )
Find and purchase a sink for master bath and a cabinet ( may end up using old sink )
Install backerboard for center shower
Install shower tile for center shower ( in july? when money is available)
Buy more lights / install for Dad’s bedroom
Buy lights for ceiling of living room from IKEA
Buy / order lights bulbs for Pa house exterior from online firm ( $10 vs $30 at home despot)
Someday repaint interior
Repaint garge exterior front of house
Weed front of hosue
Dig up garden for drainage system Buy piping
Get a couch & chairs that work for Dad.
Sort boxes
Move boxes to shed
Sell old oven
Rebuild backyard wood atrium thing
Install drain pipes for exterior
Hook dad up with day care / elder care ( meals on wheel smay not be an option / he may not qualify from what I have read so far)
Other things to do:
Make sure all change of address things are done
pay amex bill
work on LEGOJeep: Fix drivers chair, put on new sheets, sticker cover solution? , wash windows,
Work on my own website
Get paid by various clients that are overdue
Get rid of old computers / TV’s / monitors
Donate mucho stuff to goodwill
March 15th lets meet up to watch a movie I’m in at the Castro : Fruit Fly
Posted on March 5, 2009
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March 15th lets meet up to watch a movie I’m in at the Castro : Fruit Fly
This should be fun and I’m hoping to get a big crew of friends to hang out for. Its my first and only big screen moment ( so far) and I doubt if it lasts all that long, so lets make it an event!
Pictured above is the bar dance and song routine I’ll be best known for years to come ( I bet). As well as the only one, I also bet. I’ve circled my self in yellow to make it easy to find me.
I’m in a pretty silly sing and dance routine in the movie and if a bloopers roll happens I’m in that for sure. The blooper scene is even more fun, as I can be very obviously be seen saying ” Oh Shit” as I realize a really obvious misstep and forget the words of the sing along in one dance number. All while in the front row. The director HP told me it is pretty hilarious. Which I agree. That particular dance number takes place in a bar.
Maureen Keating and my pal Larry Edelstein and Mark are extras as well. You can see Larry ( and me) in the shot I used from the trailer. Note that I am in the back row of this take. Far left. Nearly cropped out. 
Fame is so fleeting. Still it was fun.
Tickets info: $!5 plus 1.50 per ticket
http://filmguide.festival.asianamericanmedia.org/tixSYS/2009/filmguide/title.php/detail/?AlphaRange=FF&ShowShorts=Y&ShowPast=Y&
Movie trailer :
http://www.hpmendoza.com/fruitflyfilm
So the plan is meet up for the movie at 6 pm on Sunday the 15th, then drinks afterwards. I lean towards getting tickets early, but at $16.50 it is a little steep I’ll readily admit.
I’m thinking of doing a group buy. Let me know via email for a reservation by Saturday the 7th.
Movie dets:
Fruit Fly
Centerpiece
(USA | 2009 | 94 mins | VIDEO)javascript:document.managePost.submit()
In English & Tagalog with English subtitles
VIDEO
World Premiere
Directed By: H.P. Mendoza
Exec. Producers: Center for Asian American Media
Producer: Don Young
Producer/Writer/Editor/Music: H. P. Mendoza
Cinematographer: Richard Wong
Cast: L.A. Renigen, Mike Curtis, Theresa Navarro, Aaron Zaragoza, E. S. Park
If there’s one thing this festival needs, it’s a toe-tapping musical, or a tribute to San Francisco, or a young Filipina American seeking her true self, or a nice tune about versatile bottoms, or maybe a crooning love-duet between a man and his Macbook image, or especially a song filled with enough unprintable slang to burn the ears off of every Prop-8′er in the state. Fortunately, all of that, and a thousand things more, is what FRUIT FLY supplies, and for that we have resident boywonder H.P. Mendoza to thank.
The composer and co-star of festival hit COLMA: THE MUSICAL (SFIAAFF ‘06) returns with a solo directorial debut that aims his poisoned pen and catchy Casio keyboards toward that never-dead city to Colma’s north, San Francisco. Here we discover Bethesda (a radiant L.A. Renigen of COLMA fame), newly arrived from Maryland and Manila, eager to succeed in the performance art world and hoping to find her birth mother, who abandoned her as a child. (”Will that help with your show?,” someone asks.) Her new flatmates, various artists united by their rootlessness (I won’t be here long, is the whisper that lingers in these walls), soon whisk our young Dorothy over the rainbow and into San Francisco’s alcoholic nights and hungover days, all filled with (of course) song and dance. Crawling through bars gay and straight, the still-disoriented Bethesda finds herself saddled with quite a few new identities (fag hag, homo honey, fruit fly, hack, slut, etc), but none that she actually wants; she’s got plenty of places to go, but still nowhere to be for long.
Funded by CAAM, FRUIT FLY represents a new generation of Asian American filmmaking; its deceptively casual mash-up and embrace of ethnic and sexual identity politics is nuanced enough to fuel a masters’ thesis, but one doesn’t need a degree to understand what’s going on. It’s also textbook guerrilla filmmaking, a loud-and-proud, indie-Asian/gay hijacking of THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG that turns the Mission, the Castro and more into an all-singing, all-dancing whirl of performance artists, thwarted lovers, sneering sideliners, punk lesbians, fag hags, leather bears and versatile bottoms, all ready to join you, ever so tunefully, in whatever journey you’re on.
In Person: H.P. Mendoza, Richard Wong, L.A. Renigen
– Jason Sanders
Sunday in Richmond
Posted on February 8, 2009
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Woke up around 6 am mind a wander of what to do and focus on. I plan to drive to Palo Alto and pick up a bunch of random things from tools to work clothes. Then roll back. Is there adventure and joy to be had between the two places? Possibly and likely. But not today can I indulge so
So i got an iphone
Posted on January 21, 2009
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Its pretty and I even wrote this post with it via the iPhone wordpress app.
Well it’s about time
Posted on January 21, 2009
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So I got myself am iphone for my 40th birthday . It’s pretty sweet and quick. I even wrote this post via the wordpress app for iPhone
Ze latest on the Richmond House
Posted on September 12, 2008
Filed Under life sucks, plumbing, remodeling, richmond house | Leave a Comment
Inspection day!
Could not seal the plumbing outside the house last night so the plumbing inspection saw the Fail Whale.
But I did get sign off of a sorts on the insulation for the rooms. So I can start drywalling and mudding those rooms.
But a stupid little piece of Big Daddy’s stapler is missing. So I can’t use it to tack on the plastic over the insulation. I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out the stupid thing, plus calling tech support before I discovered that it did not work cause I was missing a little piece of the stapler.
I’ve searched for the little piece all over, and can’t find it, hopefully I can buy just the replacement piece locally. I do not want to buy a new stapler.
Last night super sucked. I drove up from Palo Alto with my Dad in the hopes he would be able to help me watch the filling of the drain, waste, and vent plumbing with water. HIs vision is way too poor so that did not work.
The traffic was totally screwed and it took 2 hours to drive up (normally a 45 minute deal) , and we were not able to pick up the insulation from Truitt-White in Berkeley. They close at 4:30 pm, we drove past that exit at 4:40 pm.
So could not finish the insulation in time for the inspection on Friday afternoon.
As it was the ceiling insulation is suppose to be R-30. The bundle I picked up is R-13. Less then half the value it is suppose to be. So I have to double up the stuff that I do have.I may have to buy yet more insulation.
So the big challenge of this project. The plumbing.
I got everything set, which took 45 minutes. This involved putting on the rubber caps, double checking all the straps for the pipping, putting on the thread tape for the clean outs, and so on.
The garden hose had a sprayer on the end. I planned on filling the piping with the hose just hanging in one of the vent pipes. Holding on to a sprayer wide open for 2 hours as the syetm filled would not do. But the frackin sprayer would not loosen from the hose. So that had to be cut off. At the time the hose was on a nice rolling cart, all wound up on a spool. Naturally the short hose that ran from the cart to the source was crimped and was not pushing water to the hose around the cart. So I had to unwind the entire length of hose, unscrew it from the cart tap, then unscrew the shorties from the tap, and replace it with the full length hose. Another little irritation.
Finally I start filling the system. I had forgoten to keep a close eye on the front of the house. Big frackin ooopsie.
In front of the house are two pipes that connect down to the sewer line that goes to the street. The 1st one has a pop cap. Which is a plastic cap that is suppose to pop off in case the water gets backed up from the sewer line. Something that is very very unlikely since my house is on a hill. After the pop cap pipe is the clean out and reverse flow preventitive valve. This acts as the primary safety for water and nasty sewage backing from the street line. It think, think it may also stop rats or mice entering from the sewer line as well, but not certain.
So the plan was put a big rubber cap on top of the 1st pipe ( on top of the plastic pop cap) , and put a inflatable plumber’s ballon on the 2nd to stop the water flow. Getting the rubber cap on really tight and secure on the 1st pipe was a challenge, since the concrete above it was in the way of tightening down worm screw on the rubber cap. The rubber cap has a metal band tightened by a worm screw. Beyond that I really was pushing it cause the plastic pop cap was in place via a big rubber fitting. I was under the impression the plastic pop cap was on correctly and tight.
It wasn’t.
So the entire plastic pop cap unit when pushed by the backed up water and my rubber cap came off. That water then drained into the subarea under the kitchen where I had dug out a trench for the new sewer pipe line fitting conecting to the kitchen sewer line . Filling it with water.
I was soo pissed and frustrated.
I called up Joe Farrrel to bitch and ask for help. Joe had installed the sewer line and I had told him I would be testing it. On the phone he had forgotten that fact. Even though both I and his foreman had told him. He has offered to help, we will see.
I ended up draining the water under the house by loosing all the rubber fittings under the kitchen. Which was a very muddy job, and at the point in the semi-dark. Scooping out 2 gallons of loose mud from the pit, and hand scooping the water into the sewer line = no fun. I pray that the rubber fittings will tighten back up now that they are covered in mud from the backed up water.
Notes from Michigan
Posted on September 6, 2008
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Well the flight was so so at best. Seats are too small. Paying $2 for water or a Coke seems kinda screwed up.
My sucky (but free) phone, the Treo 650 taught me a new lesson. I pulled the battery preflight since I was not sure how to turn it off / turn off the signal while flying. But somehow the battery ended up becoming totally drained and I could not use it when I got in to Phoenix. Tried charging it for 15 minutes in the PHX airport as well as Detroit, but it kept reporting “battery is extremely low – phone will shut off in 30 seconds” Even when plugged in.
The Tom Tom unit of my Mom’s is toast, so after a fruitless 30 minutes of tech support and resetting and software updates looks like we have to send the sucker in. The firm does not do hot swapaping via mail so my Mom will not have it for this roadtrip.
So could not call out, check in with my Mom for the airport pick up. Then once at the Detroit airport tried calling her via payphone, but she didn’t pick up. Next checked my messages and discovered she was in the cell phone waiting area. I asked a skycap where it was. He claimed it was on the same level Well without a way to reach her I started to see if I could walk to the Cell phone lot. The cop told me, nope, not possible. Another airport worker told me, “well you can catch a shuttle”.
I can’t wait to replace the phone.
But ze Apple 3g still seems to have some issues. So I’m kinda waiting for an hardware update before I do pick one up.
Anywhoo
I’m at the edge of Detroit and its nice to see my Uncle Bob, Aunt Eileen, Great Aunt Beth ( who I shared a great road trip from FL to MI a few years ago), Uncle Pat, and of course my cousin Devlin, whose wedding I am attending. There will be plenty other relatives showing up soon,
Word Press Camp San Francisco schedule
Posted on August 16, 2008
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Here is the Saturday schedule (sans speakers)
So I don’t have an official badge ( even though I did get a pdf of the badge from the site on Fri night) but I’m in good company since neither does Scott Beale. 10 % or so of us are all in the hand made badge class. Course I could have printed out the the badge if I knew I was suppose to.
http://2008.sf.wordcamp.org/
-kevin
User Track: Developer track
10 am Open Source biz models Even faster web sites
10 50 music performance ( don’t miss)
11 am LOL cats abd the secrets of virality secure coding with word press
1130 wordpress and microformats past present future
noon lunch
1 pm switching to wordpress painlessly
120 450 wordpress power user power tips
140 hassle free upgrades wordcpress api’s iphone and beyond
***2 pm matt muttering ( state of the word ( founder of wordpress)
3 pm get friendly with buddy press intro to jquery
320 democratizing the web through global voices Consulting and getting paid for your wordpress skills
340 an interview with Om Malik Color theory and the making of monotone
4 pm Liz Danxico and Jane Wells Riding the crazyhorse
5 pm music performance
510 pm kathy sierra kicking ass and creating passionate users
The cool badge I was looking forward to having
Posted on August 16, 2008
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But no such luck for the badge to be at the check in desk.
This event needs more power plugs. Next time I’ll bring an extension cord.
-kevin
Thar ‘ she glow’s
Posted on August 16, 2008
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Fun with the FLG. My pal Kezia called me on Tues at 830 am for some last minute help on the latest Flaming Lotus Girl project “Mutopia”. So I popped over the BoxShop in SF for a few hours on Tues eve. Everyone was working really frantically and they still had a ton to do before going to the playa.
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