Survivalism

Past weekend, risking some serious chemical burns, Dad installed a battery backup for the sump pump in the basement, thus reaching the first level of paranoia in getting ready for floods, locust and plague - being ready for an unlucky combination of torrential rains, power losses and gasoline shortage (or generator breakdown).

The battery for the pump came "dry", without electrolyte, so we had to add it ourselves. It took almost a month to collect the right amount of sulfuric acid from various shops, one quart at a time. We were expecting the FBI knocking on the door any time.

If the neighbors were curious to look at our lit by the cold November sun porch yesterday, they would see Dad wearing safety goggles clumsily holding a menacing looking canister in his rubber-gloved shaking hands (the shakes were from the cold, not from the exertion, said Dad). The gloves were mostly for the show, as a clerk in one of the stores where we bought the acid said - oh, you be better off without the gloves, it will eat right through them anyway.

Ode to Dishwasher

It was a number of years ago, when our dishwasher started to show first signs of age. First, it was innocent, even funny. Like a ketchup-smeared plate that it somehow "forgot" to wash - one among all other perfectly cleaned peers. Then it got more serious: rheumatic creaky rails, bad odor, undigested cleaning materials, and blown fuses.

Still, we were content to put up with it like with an old dog. But then, it started to have "accidents". Every morning, we would wake up to a pool of fetid water on the floor. The usual remedies didn't help. One day, after hours of cursing, Dad fished out of the drain pipe a pea-size ball bearing that was clogging it. The dishwasher started to lose its marbles, disintegrating on the inside. Keep reminding ourselves that it's just a stupid machine, we decided that it was time to go.

A few days later, when the delivery guy was taking it out, stripped naked, in a full view of its replacement - a gleaming smug Bosch, the dishwasher did what any frighten animal would do - it thoroughly peed all over the floor. We didn't know it could hold that much water...

But it wasn't the end of it. On the second day, in the middle of the night, Bosch emitted a series of panicked beeps and shut itself down, tub full of water. Not again, thought Dad, not again... After some serious swearing, Dad emerged from the bowels of plumbing in the basement with the culprit in his hand. This time, it was a cherry pit. Funny thing though - we didn't have cherries for months. We pondered it a minute and thought of the old guy smiling at us from the dishwasher heaven.

Дима Петров

Дима Петров,  1965 - 2011

(more pictures with Dima)

Halloween

After two days of darkness and cold, the power finally came back on the Halloween night. Wary and tired Norwalk residents were not much in the mood for the trick-or-treaters and Max and Dennis came back from the street practically empty handed. It didn't help that Max, in his military fatigues and a replica M-16, looked more like a looter. We fared much better in Stamford that survived the storm without much outage.

More pictures

Meanwhile, on the West Coast, two cute dominatrices and their gimp got caught on camera.