I'm growing my beard again. After nearly half a year going as "Baby Face Buchheit" (and here Steve cringes hoping that name won't stick), it's time to get my whiskers back. They're now long enough that they move independent of the skin beneath, and while still scratchy I'm on my way to softness. Smooching shall restart shortly thereafter.
Told the guy to order the furnace last night. Here's a link to what I'm getting, in case you care. Energy star certified, single stage, 4-speed blower, 40,000 BTU, hot-point ignition, aluminized steel heat exchangers (lifetime warrantee), 95.5% AFUE, a slight improvement on what I currently have. I thought about upgrading to a DC motor, but the cost differential didn't make it worth it, the four-speed blower should help though (current furnace is on or off). Only a 3% increase in efficiency won't be giving us a good ROI, but it's higher than the other options we had. It'll blow about 25% more air (at full blower speed) than out previous, and the BTU's are the same (I have a small house, the furnace is centrally located, it's kept us warm enough), so we should be as warm as we want to be. As I'm sure you've all noticed I over-think and over research all my big purchases. This is the fastest I've ever spent $2822 of my own money, so part of my brain is still wary. But things are going to be very tight this fall as far as budget goes. Good thing I cut my own hair.
Last night was not only our general council meeting, but also the County Commissioners were at our place beforehand. The mayor and I gave them a piece of our minds concerning the timing of rolling out the new MARCS radio system. That was somewhat cathartic, but since we are the only community in the SE corner of Ashtabula that has our own police department, the other township trustees could only give us some moral support (and it was probably the first they had heard about this). There's another meeting later this month that we can go and express our displeasure and desire to slow down the transfer (so we can get past the New Year, where we can qualify for grants, also new fiscal year).
It's been a while since I've talked about the big D. I'm doing better, thanks. At least now I feel stressed, instead of thinking, "Why am I doing/behaving like this? I must be stressed out." Feeling the emotions again is a good thing. I sometimes dip back in to big D, like slipping beneath the waves. Fortunately those episodes only last for a day or two. I'm sure I could be doing better with talk therapy, but when do I have the time for that (see stress comment before)? So we continue limping along, but we're better. It's easier to see myself objectively, and to perk myself up. Although I still have behavior that one part of my brain is yelling, "Don't do that, do go there, stop that, don't get that extra helping, etc" but I still end up doing it anyway. Although the other night I did stop one stress-behavior/bad habit from continuing. So progress on that front. I've only called myself an idiot a few times in the past week, so progress there too.
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