Shield Hero 2.8

I’m losing interest fast, here. What this really feels like is a highlight reel rather than an attempt to tell a coherent story.

RPG Real Estate 8

Y’know, Our Boobie Newbie’s sleepwear looks a lot like what Alizee wore in the classic night-elf J’en Ai Marre video. Fits about the same, too. Just sayin’.

More of the usual, with Our Agents getting a bit of sticker shock while shopping, then quickly and accidentally resolving a new client’s housing problem. There’s even room for a tiny bit of plot advancement, although I honestly don’t think this is really going anywhere. I kind of hope not, in fact.

Next week: hot springs!

Skeleton Knight 8

The Tale Of The Ninja Flatcat, leading Our Bony Hero to go all otaku, to the bafflement of Our Rescue Kitten and Our Bountiful Elf. We really need to move the plot along to a hot springs episode. Yes, that means that we’ll probably flesh out the main character, but as long as the girls get some bath time, it will be worth it.

(I wasn’t kidding about giving up on trying to find related pictures…)

Demon Girl Next Door 2.7

Summer festival, summer homework. Our Demon Girl will be fine as long as she’s got one leaf on.

(classical reference)

Komi 2.5

Winter is comingall over this episode. I could have done without the blow-by-blow games of Hanafuda, though.

Yeah, I got nothin’…

…in the way of anime to watch next season.

(overclocked girlfriend is unrelated)

Extreme demand

At the grocery store a few nights ago, every variety of two-liter soda was marked “limit 6 due to extreme demand”. You could still stock up on cans or smaller bottles, which suggests that it’s the supply that’s the problem, and they don’t want to run out going into the holiday weekend.

Smokin’!

I haven’t bought a grill yet at the new house, because I’m waiting for the sale of the old place before ordering a deck with a built-in natural-gas grill. So I tried the simplest of indoor steak methods: a cast-iron skillet on the stovetop.

The over-the-range microwave/fan combo unit was as spectacularly useless as I expected it to be. Fortunately we had put screens in a few windows, so I was able to vent the smoke outdoors before all the alarms went off.

Unrelated, I briefly met another neighbor, the city councilman across the street. Seems nice.

Offered and accepted

On the one hand, the offer is $24K below our asking price. On the other hand, it’s the first offer in the 9 days the house has been on the market, and many of the other houses in the area just dropped their prices that much or more, out of fear of inflation-driven fiscal incontinence. On the gripping hand, it would still net more than enough to pay off the new house. And upgrade it.

Deals can fall through, of course, but we’ve got a pre-approval from a decent lender (that is, Not Cooper), so it’s worth getting started.

Coincidentally, I got a call yesterday from Mr. Cooper, apparently trying to get me to refinance my new house through them. I really wish I had a classic Bell landline phone, so I could have hung up with an appropriate level of force.

AppleTV, Go, Go, Go!

No, really, just go; don’t inflict a JJ Abrams live-action Speed Racer series on the world.

(picture is unrelated but froggy)

I see that you’ve changed your tweet-hiding methodology, so that anything you want to censor is now labeled “Age-restricted adult content”, and can’t be viewed by anyone who isn’t logged in and trackable. Older tweets still have a view/hide toggle, and of course actual “adult content” is still clearly visible, so this is obviously about words you don’t want people to read.

So, yeah, fuck that nonsense. I see you’ve also ramped up the frequency of the pop-up login prompt, but at least it’s still dismissable the first few times in a browser session.

True wisdom…

…from a Girl Genius:

“This doesn’t look good!”

  “This looks really bad!”

    “Let’s look at it from farther away!”

In other news…

I opened a brand-new jar of peanut butter this morning and made myself a PBJ. Liked it so much I made another for lunch. Why is that news?

Huge JIF peanut butter recall over 12-state salmonella outbreak

Yes, my jar is on the list. Fingers crossed.

(classical reference)

Shield Hero 2.7

Theme song: Whole New World

In which the slate is wiped clean, and we are spared the presence of the bozo villain from last episode. And we get one small bonus: the return of L’il Raf.

RPG Real Estate 7

Theme song: Burning Down The House

After succeeding by failing, Our Boobie Newbie takes Our Dragon Loli home to meet her parents. And her little sisters, who were happy to show off their character growth.

(picture is unrelated)

Skeleton Knight 7

Theme song: I.L.B.T.’s

In which the side view is most impressive, and…, um…, oh yeah, Our Bony Hero raises the dead and gets to meet the ninja catgirl again. Sorry, gotta keep my priorities straight there.

(I’m not even looking for related pictures for this one any more)

Demon Girl Next Door 2.7

Theme song: National Brotherhood Week

Delayed. I guess that’s fair, since they really pulled out the stops last week to wrap up a big story.

Komi 2.4

Theme song: Deck The Halls

In which Christmas is Merry.

Next-Gen Forger

This is a very nice adult version of Anya.

Unrelated,

I had a big batch of incomplete-Edge-downloads due to the way it flags supposedly-insecure images it’s already displayed to you, and I wasn’t looking forward to clicking through the download-anyway-dammit dialog box 100+ times, so I went to see what they were actually storing in the .crdownload files.

Answer: the completed download it thought was too scary to download. A quick rename and the problem went away.

Speaking of scary and unrelated:

NSFW

Quick, drop her into a volcano!

Electrical Happy Dance

Scary warnings about rolling blackouts are not just for California and Texas. But I’m in Ohio now, and we’re apparently fine. Which is good, because it gets pretty darn hot and muggy in the summer, and I’m not used to that any more.

Bait and switch is bad for customer retention.

This is from my wish list:

“Hey, wow, that out-of-stock item that I wanted is back, and at a much better price than when I last bought one!”

“Oh, fuck no. Just mark it as out of stock, don’t actively participate in ripping me off.”

I made a quick trip back to California to close out the house, which is now on the market. Fingers crossed for a short, victorious bidding war.

Downside: when I left, I was almost over the sinus infection that I had acquired while packing up all the dusty stuff. When I arrived, I could feel it coming back, and by the time I got to the airport to fly home again, people were treating me like Typhoid MaryCovid Karen due to the rather impressive coughing fits.

Remo Williams, R.I.P

Fred Ward has died. I liked him in a lot of his roles, but I loved him as Remo.

Side note: Joel Gray was very sensitive about taking a role as an ancient Korean martial-arts master, and spent a lot of time making sure that it was handled respectfully, even buying his own props in Korean stores. Doesn’t matter now, though; modern “critics” can’t wrap their heads around the fact that the past was not illuminated by the enlightened values of the last ten minutes, nor that it made more sense to hire a dancer than a martial artist for the role.

“Tell me you’re in California…”

“…without telling me you’re in California.”

I could have gotten a lot more of these; it wasn’t an outlier.

Alarm, false

Things I didn’t want to hear: “hey, your alarm system went off after midnight Friday, on the window in the back by the trees”. I wasn’t there, my parents weren’t there, so I had them dispatch the police, who reported that everything seemed fine. And I got to spend the rest of the night wondering about it…

My stepdad went over the next morning, and couldn’t find any sign that anyone had tried to get in, but he also couldn’t clear the fault in the alarm system, suggesting that that particular sensor just… failed. Haven’t seen that before.

When I got home, I discovered that the alarm dispatcher’s map of zone numbers to windows did not match the system’s, so when I checked the correct window, it turned out to have settled slightly in the frame, enough that the contact is weak unless it’s very firmly closed. I also discovered that the former owner’s son wasn’t kidding when he said that his parents had never opened most of the windows; I’m going to need to have 23 years of accumulated grit scrubbed out of the frames to make them all operate smoothly, before having the brand-new 23-year-old screens down in the basement installed.

When the old house sells, I’ll also have all the window shades replaced.

Speaking of which, when I let the photographer in at the old house, we discovered that the maid service who’d scrubbed the place had managed to break the shade covering the sliding glass door. It was this sort of shade, where you have to open the vanes before you can move them; someone on the maid crew Just Tried Harder. The realtor sent over a handyman to fix it, who happened to be a few blocks away and got it working enough that they could finish up the pictures.

Uber Eats goes hungry

If the restaurant closes in less than, say, two hours, don’t bother ordering through Uber Eats. The flake-out rate for their drivers is high enough that by the time they actually get someone to go pick up your food, the restaurant will be closed when they get there.

House: updated

When I got there Thursday, the house had not in fact been staged yet. Also, the landscaping fixes were still in progress. As in, the easy stuff was done, but the trenching required to fix the sprinkler system hadn’t been started, and the new bark/mulch hadn’t been laid down in front or back.

The stager came Friday. So did the junk truck. So did the landscaper, who got as much done as he could and then made it look nice for the photographer who came Saturday, before finishing up the work later. We officially listed the place on Sunday.

After letting three trucks jockey for position Friday morning, I drove over to the local recycler to get rid of the paint, oil, etc that the junk truck couldn’t take. (well, they could take it, but they don’t, because the dump charges them for hazardous waste that they’ll accept for free from non-commercial sources)

Monday we had a full set of inspections done, which turned up nothing that would be a dealbreaker in a sale, but did find a handful of smallish things likely to come up when they do their own inspection. There was one head-scratcher where the inspector’s interpretation of the plumbing code disagreed with the plumber’s, which would be about $600 of work to fix. This is so far down in the noise that I can’t care about the money, and will just pay for it to be fixed.

(no plumbing problems here!)

Dear Expedia,

I’m not sure how you managed to bait-and-switch me on my flights back to Ohio. I explicitly selected United in my search parameters (because that’s where all my miles from Japan are), and didn’t notice that you chose “partner airline” Alaska for the flight from San Francisco to Chicago. As a result, not only could I not use my points to upgrade my seat, I couldn’t even pay to upgrade until 24 hours before the flight.

The split also affected how boarding passes are generated. Alaska’s site said “check with United for their flight”, and United’s site said “check in with Alaska for boarding passes”. I feared that I’d have to talk to a human being when I got to Chicago, like our primitive ancestors once did, but what they weren’t saying was that I just had to wait until 24 hours before the second flight for it to appear in United’s app.

It was a long day, and when I got home I wanted nothing more than a quick delivery from the local Cassano’s, but sadly, they had no delivery drivers last night, and were only offering pick-up. I really didn’t feel like getting back into a vehicle, so I ordered from the backup pizza joint, Marco’s, which is five minutes away on foot. I had it delivered anyway. 😁

Shield Hero 2.6

Finally, the turtle story is over. Sadly, the scenery-chewing villain (more annoying than the OP song) ran away to fight another day, and Our Heroes came tumbling after. And is it just me, or did Our Noob Girl’s sudden competence come completely out of left field?

RPG Real Estate 6

In which Our Overworked Agents scramble to house a bunch of refugees. Then it’s Our Warrior Gal’s turn to pull the perfect property out of her back pocket, while Our Boobie Newbie frets about the trouble with half-dragons. In the end, the two halves are tied together quite tidily with a ribbon labeled foreshadowing.

Skeleton Knight 6

In which Our Bony Hero gets his pelvis handed to him by someone who actually knows how to use a sword, but in a good way. Once again, His Dark Secret is accepted without any difficulty, leading to that most precious of moments, Our Busty Elf Maiden walking in naked while he’s bathing (buythebluraybuythebluraybuythebluray).

(picture is unrelated; you know the drill)

Demon Girl Next Door 2.6

In which Our Demon Girl scores a significant victory and moves forward toward a new goal, with her best girl by her side.

Komi 2.3

Nothing demonstrates more clearly the difference between koi and ai than trying to read Our Komi’s mind. Our Pyscho Lesbian and Our Chuu-ni both fail to learn the lessons being taught by Our Hero, because their passion for Komi is self-centered, while his relationship with her has always been about understanding her feelings.

Sadly, this is followed by another round of Our Misunderstood Giant failing to communicate in awkward and embarrassing ways, which I just can’t get into.

So, on Sunday, instead of catching up on last week’s anime that I wanted to watch, instead I watched the available episodes of Virgin Road. It’s a real mixed bag. As much as I approve of the concept, the premise has massive holes in it, (apparently eventually explained in the novels, in a likely retcon), Our Psycho Lesbian is shallow and annoying, Our ExeCutie’s lack ofsubdued personality is handwaved away by her backstory, and Our Bubble-Headed Tit Queen is More Than She Seems. It looks like there’s a very slow reveal of what’s really going on, slow enough that this season is unlikely to catch up to anything that’s teased in the OP.

Now, let’s write up last week’s anime, two hours before this week’s episodes start showing up!

Shield Hero, episode 2.5

Are we there yet?

No, seriously, how long is this turtle story?

RPG Real Estate, episode 5

Let’s play house… in bikinis! Our Boobie Newbie excels at this game, despite assigning the Mama role to someone less top-heavy. Then Our Agents are bullied into finding a free house for a spoiler, and Our Dragon-Service Loli (or Loli-Service Dragon) hints at hidden depths. Or something like that. Fluff and cheesecake.

Skeleton Knight, episode 5

In which Our Bony Hero and Our Busty Elf free more slaves from mustache-twirling rapists, bond over their shared desire to cuddle the fluffy mascot, and head off to adventures in elf-ville. Oh, and apparently she likes her men stiff, since the revelation of his dire secret bothers her less than missing a meal.

The tone shifts continue to be jarring, with Miss Nearly-Nude Canada bouncing between crushing testicles and snuggling the fluffball. She’s kind of like the love child of Emma Peal and Benny Hill, constructed of equal parts Action Girl and Comic Relief.

(and, yes, she really is from the village of Maple in the forests of Canada; this world has been isekai’d many, many times)

(picture is completely unrelated, for the usual reason)

Demon Girl Next Door, episode 2.5

I like it when Shamiko spends time in Crisis Management form.

Komi, episode 2.2

This one was a pretty random collection of unconnected short chapters, with Our Komi being scared of a storm, several boys imagining date scenarios with their classmates, Our Psycho Lesbian obsessing over Komi’s panties, and a visit to a cat café.

Unrelated,

At first, I thought my dishwasher was broken. Then I found that it’s controlled by the wall switch right next to the one for the garbage disposal. I’ve never seen that before. It works, but is loud enough that I’ll be ordering a Bosch Real Soon Now.

The fridge is not just old and loud, but contagious. When the compressor kicks on, it generates vibrations strong enough to cause the toaster six feet away to start vibrating in sympathy, adding even more noise. It’s also set up for a man in a wheelchair, so I have to reach down even for the top shelf. Fortunately it’s currently only holding Diet Pepsi, lunch meat, and leftovers, but it’s now at the top of my list for replacement.

The washer and dryer are functional, and blessedly IoT-free, but they’re energy hogs. Hopefully they’ll hold out long enough for me to get new gas lines run, because I’d rather have a gas dryer.

I’m not a fan of the electric oven/range combo unit, but replacing it also requires running gas lines, so I can install a dual-fuel unit and have a gas range and electric oven. Since I’m still just starting to settle in, I’ve only used the range to boil water for the good ramen I brought from California, and it at least did that well, but I had to unpack some Le Creuset for it, since the only other pot I’ve unpacked doesn’t have a flat bottom that’s stable on the ceramic smoothtop.

And I really hate the “over the range” microwave oven/fan combo unit. In fact, I hate it more than I expected, even though it’s the only recent appliance in the kitchen. They’re astonishingly popular in new and renovated homes, but they’re just not very good. They’re too high up to use regularly as a microwave, and they’re simply poor range hoods. I’d rather buy one of the high-end countertop microwave/convection ovens; I’ve got plenty of counter space now.

While they’re installing gas, I’ll also have a line run to the back porch, so that when I get around to having a deck built, I can have a built-in gas grill that’s free of the tyranny of propane tanks. That’s a late-summer, post-old-house-sale thing, though, like replacing all the flooring and window shades.

Speaking of which, the old house goes up for sale on the 15th. It got thoroughly cleaned last week, staged, and power-washed, and I had the landscaper do some touchups to the yard as well. I haven’t seen the pictures yet; it probably looks like normal people lived there. 😁

Now to hire an adorably-precocious orphan and a lethally-gorgeous spinster to be my fake family…

Dear Expedia,

I’ll be traveling from Dayton to Salinas and back soon, so I went to book flight, hotel, and car rental. If I say “I’m going to Salinas”, then the only airport available is San Jose (San Francisco almost always has better flights). If I say “I’m going to San Francisco airport”, then the only available hotels are in and near San Francisco. In order to fly into SFO but stay near Salinas, I had to make two separate orders, one for air/car, one for hotel. I could find no way to put it all into one.

Good news, bad news

Good: the Toto Washlet seat arrived two days early.

Bad: with a broken hinge, visible the moment I opened the box. No damage to the box, so it was packed that way without anyone noticing. Bad Toto, no Kansas for you!

Also good: Amazon returns are pretty painless now. I just taped the box shut again and took it to the local UPS store.

Now to order another one…

Bolted!

While the locksmith was here for the deadbolt on the front door, we installed a Level Bolt. I had originally planned to install the first one in the door leading to the basement, since that would let me evaluate it without any security issues, but since I have to use the front door until the empty POD is picked up, I put it there.

TL/DR: I like it, and will be buying more soon. Installation was painless, it’s bluetooth-only so it can’t be hacked via wifi, and it doesn’t present as a “smart lock” from either side.

POD, unpacked

When the driver from PODS called to say he was on his way, I warned him that the driveway started out a bit steep, but leveled off. I had previously discussed this with them on the phone, but the drone photos on Zillow don’t do it justice. Normally, they back the truck up to the edge of your driveway and use their “podzilla” to lift it off the bed and wheel it into place, but in my case, he had to back the truck uphill, then lift the pod off the bed, then drive the truck back out from under the podzilla. He had about four inches of clearance due to the curve of the driveway.

I was out shopping, so I don’t know if the same driver picked it up on Friday. In a thunderstorm.

How was the experience? Expensive but worth it; you gain a lot of control and predictability for your move, and the POD itself holds up to the elements nicely; it went through a pretty impressive thunderstorm yesterday without a drop of water getting inside. I’m still annoyed with the design of the locking mechanism that won’t take large secure padlocks; it looks and feels flimsy, especially when compared to the sturdy latch on my Penske truck.

The unpacking crew arrived on schedule three hours late and quickly got my furniture out, assembled, and placed. Nice guys, and not their fault they were late.

(picture is unrelated; honestly, if I keep hiring workmen, I’m going to be talking pure Southern Ohio Hillfolk within a month)

Delay of anime

Between the house stuff and the work stuff, I might be able to watch some of this week’s anime on Sunday. Maybe. Or else I’ll be out trying to buy some appliances. The fridge in the house is old and loud, and the fridge in the garage is older, louder, power-hungry, and leaked quite a bit of water in the vicinity of one of my piles of boxes. Surprising for a unit that doesn’t have a water line and has been empty for months (at least); it must have been saving up a whole bunch of condensation for me.

On the bright side, the Jira upgrade went pretty smoothly. We did run into the intermittent startup failure that they introduced in recent versions (apparently due to some friction between the specific versions of java and ehcache they bundled into recent releases, that escaped QA; still no fix from Atlassian, but I hear they’ve been busy recently…). I’ve got a bunch of test services to update now that Production is finished, but those aren’t Mothers Day Weekend tasks.