Author: Jackie Koerner

Rainy Review of Rain Barrels

Painted Rain Barrels from Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewer Districts Website
Painted Rain Barrels from Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewer District's Website

I’ve always tried to be green about things, especially when it comes to water conservation. I intend on getting two rain barrels for the house once I get my hubby to agree. The rain water collected in the barrels should not be consumed. It is best suited for watering gardens, grass and trees. Some people even use the water to wash their cars, house and even the dog. Using rain water instead of throwing it away down storm drains helps the community and keeps lawns free of muddy grass paths created by rainwater runoff.

A bit more about rain barrels: Lawn and garden care account for 40% of the water consumption during the summer months. This is about 1,300 gallons! Using rain barrels also decreases the runoff into storm sewers and bodies of water. One inch of rain on a 1,000 square foot roof equates to 623 gallons of runoff. Talk about a waste of perfectly good water…

Although not necessary, it’s kind of cool to see how much water you might actually be saving by using a rain barrel – at least us science geeks think it’s cool. To calculate the area of your roof, simply use the Pythagorean Theorem to find the length of the roof. This is easiest if you have a simple peaked roof, but you can go about finding the surface area of your roof by just examining each A of each section of roof. Measure the length of the house, the width, the height of the house from ground to gutter and the height of the house from ground to roof peak. From these measurements, take the width, divide by two – this will be your “run” as shown above or your “a” in Pythagorean Theorem. Then take the height (measured from the ground to the peak of the A) and subtract the height from the ground to the gutters. The result will be your “rise” or your “b” in Pythagorean Theorem – now plug into Pythagorean Theorem to get your “slope”. And finally, take your resulting “slope” and multiply by the length of the house. Don’t forget to multiply by two as this is just for one half of the roof. Voila – the area of your roof. Now, you can multiply your roof size, by the number of inches of rain your town gets per year. Now, multiply by .623 and you will get the number of gallons you could save each year! I think to make this less confusing, I’ll vodcast myself doing this for my own house.

Rain barrels range from free to over $100. I saw a pretty nice looking plastic lined wooden one at Sam’s Club for $100 a few weeks ago. You can also build your own rain barrel with instructions from the Maryland Environmental Design Program’s website. Some municipalities sell rain barrels at a discount to assist with the reduction of rain water runoff. Some western communities, however, do not allow for rain barrels due to the water shortage during summer months.

In St. Louis, Metropolitan Sewer District recently started charging a monthly service fee to residents for rain water run off. They even are charging it to residents without public water or sewer. They take the impervious surface (i.e. rooftops, decks, patios, driveways) area and multiply by a factor to get the monthly fee. The only way to get out of it is if 80% or more of your property borders a body of water. Not many St. Louisians live on peninsulas. I’m not thinking that the use of rain barrels would eliminate the fee, but they began charge a fee due to the issue of overflowing rain sewers. This creates a larger issue than just wet shoes and mucky sidewalks. This ultimately can contaminate drinking water reservoirs.

One of my “tree hugger” friends posted to his blog, exclaiming that rain barrels are bunk. Above I have listed some wonderful uses for the water collected from the roof tops of homes. Josh first said the water was not good to water veggie gardens.  I don’t know of many people who water their veggie gardens with Evian. Besides, fertilizers, which plants love, are made of calcium, manure and decaying biomatter that could possibly make it into the rain barrel from the roof. In response to the “mosquito population” factor, there are actually mosquito dunks designed for use in rain barrels made of bacteria that feed on mosquito larva. One could also use chlorine or bromine, but that might be harmful if use on plants, especially if one does not carefully monitor the ratio.

For more reading, see this great little rain barrel publication.

Our House, in the Middle of the Street

Rear of house (northeastern side)
The Clubhouse and my blue Übersu in the driveway

Back in 2006 when Chris and I were looking for houses, my mom suggested that we call about the house on the new St. Clare Hospital grounds (old Lakewood Golf Course) on Bowles Avenue.  So, I did and I actually got to meet the man in charge of the project.  He told me that if I could move the house, I could have it.  Wonderful!  Now, how on Earth does one move a 2-story stone home.  Very slowly, and with some costs.

It’s great to preserve a historic home, and it can be quite a deal (a steal money-wise and an ordeal to put together).  I decided to be my own general contractor – besides, how hard could this be?!  Wrong.  This became my full time job.  One must coordinate the house movers, the construction company working on the property where the home currently exists, Department of Transportation (road closing permit, large load permit, permitted roads to travel on, which electricians they will allow to move their stop lights and when they allow homes to be moved), electrician to move stop lights (get their rates for the approved day, which is usually a Sunday morning, meaning overtime on several electricians), electric company (to raise lines over house and re-route electricity on grid in case lines snap), phone company (to raise lines), cable company (to raise lines), gas company (to cap off existing gas lines and hook up new service at home), personal electrician (usually cheaper than DOT approved, and they can disconnect electrical and hook up on non-overtime days), excavator (dig basement and they may pour driveway and garage too), and finally (although the first thing one should do) get in contact with a bank offering construction loans.  Whew!  And to think, I had all this coordinated except I just didn’t have a piece of land big enough.  Usually the house movers would do this junk, but to save about $20,000, I opted to do the leg work.  In a matter of 2 months, I certainly learned a lot.  Quite a lot to type here, but if anyone wants more info, please let me know and I’d be glad to help.

Because of my love affair with this house, I cannot bring myself to let go of the pictures.   My favorite is above.  There are more in my flickr library.  The ‘Clubhouse’, as Chris and I call it, was torn down on November 6, 2006, one day before my 24th birthday.  When I drove by on my way home two days later, the dust was still settling.  I still hope to rebuild this home someday.

myPhone

Tuesday night was a pretty good night. I picked up my iPhone. So far it is okay. Sure it is a cool little gadget, but mine has frozen several times in the past 48 hours. I know this ratio of freezes to hours is skewed considering I am doing some pretty heavy setup, but it is nonetheless frustrating. Also, the wordpress app does not swivel, so I can’t type with both hands.

The Apple of my Phone

Isight
Image from axb500 - please click to visit his Flickr page

Today was a great day.  I was feeling under the weather for the past week, and increasingly so today, so I stayed home and caught some sleep.  I also have a huge cold sore on my upper lip, which now looks like I just got a horrible collagen treatment.  But today was a great day.  Why?  I just received some wonderful customer service from a worldwide company when I thought, and always exclaim, customer service is dead.

I usually would omit the company’s name; however, it’s a bit obvious where I went once you know which phone I got…so, I called the AT&T store in my town on Tuesday regarding the iPhone and how to buy one.  The gent on the phone said I could pay with either cash, credit card, or gift card.  I told him I would probably be in the next day.  I sold my iPod Touch last night for $200.  The person purchasing it gave me cash.  Instead of driving across town (10 miles) to the credit union to deposit the cash, I just figured I could take the cash to the store and get my phone.  Since the store always closes before I get home from work, and Kari was begging to go to the library, I figured we could run out for 30 minutes.  Today, I waited in line behind the customers already there.  Both of the people had escalated situations, so Kari and I waited patiently for about 20 minutes.  I get up to the counter and the gent starts to put in my order for my 8 gig iPhone.  Cash not an option.  So, he sells me two $100 gift cards.  Enters the order again.  Swipes the first gift card.  The software program will not let him change the card amount to $100.  It keeps populating the $212.08.  He closes the software and restarts it.  Tries it again.  Nada.  Same thing.  The salesman calls the manager over and several other salesmen.  The salesman explains to me that the gift cards will work in the store to buy an iPhone, but not on a presale.  It only allows for one method of payment.  They then see if they have any in stock.  They went back and found one, a 16 gig.  It was an order that had been there for 5 days and their policy is after 7 days, they can be sold.  They were going to give me the 16 gig for all of my trouble, but they called the guy and he said he’d be up later in the evening to pick it up.  They then checked other stores.  Nada.  Then they suggest to void the gift card transaction, I get my cash back and go to the credit union to deposit it, then come back.  I said that was fine.  They then pull out manuals and consult the help desk.  The gift card transaction cannot be voided.  Kari’s getting antsy as it is going on an hour of being in the store.  The manager gives her a display Blackberry to play with.  She’s delighted and begins “calling” Papa and Grandma on her new red hotness.  The saleman and the manager go in the back and call the Regional Sales Manager (big boss man over the region, I’m told).  He told them to see if it would be alright to apply the gift cards to my account (we’re current cellular customers), for me to pay for the iPhone on my credit card, give me the next 8 gig iPhone that comes in the store, any headset, car charger and case I wanted in the store.  I was surprised by this and said that would be fine.  I told the salesman that I had no idea which case, headset or charger to get as I hadn’t really researched it.  The salesman in training said he’d hook me up.  The salesman said, “He did say any headset, charger and case.”  So, once the saleman in training came back to the counter, he had a three pack of iPhone skins, a namebrand car charger, and a Jawbone headset.  He told me these things were top of the line, especially the headset.  Sure enough.  I looked at the headset online when I got home, after an hour and a half in the store.  Not bad, salesman in training.  Not bad at all AT&T for taking care of business – thank you.

The Rural Roar

If anyone thinks living in the country is quiet, come on over mid-July after nightfall.  I couldn’t even hear the dog clopping up the deck steps 5 feet from me.  Although it is noisy with all the critters, it is still quite peaceful.

Brrrrrring. Phone.

Phone - Brrrring

It’s time to start shopping for a new phone. My phone isn’t so terribly old, but it shuts off whenever something happens (i.e. a phone call or text comes in) regardless of the battery level. The iPhone 3G comes out in 10 days; however, I’m cheap when it comes to initial purchase price. I’m even cheaper about usage fees. Sure, it would be fun to have, but I’m not quite sure how I can justify $30 per month on top of the initial purchase price. Besides, I’d have to sell my iPod Touch.

Out of sheer curiosity, I called the AT&T store by my house. Many people in our neighborhood are conservative about money for the most part, so I thought, no problem getting one. First, the stores are opening at 8 a.m. on the day of the launch and second, the sales rep told me they sold out of the iPhones within 45 minutes last year. Yep. The iPhone is out.

My husband is going to stand in line with one of his friends for an iPhone. They were thinking about arriving around midnight. I advised him that he might consider going right after dinner on the 10th, if not earlier. I’m an experienced line person (Nintendo Wii, Black Friday, after Christmas sales), so I know the ropes.

So, what on Earth should I get in this world of expensive phones or cheap ones that break within days? Perhaps I’ll just go back to the old tin can standby or simply go phone-less.

If you Can’t Stand the Heat, Get Back in the Kitchen.

This is funny.  Truman said this in reference to women in male dominated careers.  This is interesting, as his atomic bomb project employed many women due to their attention to detail in handling experiments.  Other female physicists worked on the projects developing the theories behind ‘fat man’ and ‘little boy’.  (Read:  The Making of the Atomic Bomb)

An article in the Chronicle of Higher Education prompted this post.  “Reasons Why Women Leave Science and Technology Careers” from the Chronicle‘s June 18, 2008 edition has sparked quite the debate.  The article communicates that the reasons are similar to ‘the women can’t stand the heat’.  With quotes like, “women leave science and technology careers in droves because of “hostile macho cultures” and risk-taking incentives, among other reasons”, how can we expect to evolve as a society with such stereo-types?!

I have a degree in astrophysics.  I can code.  I do all things ‘anti-female’ and female.  I lost my research position that worked with NASA and several colleagues in Chile in 2002 because an incoming student (male) expressed interest in working with the project.  I then was given another assistantship – polishing telescope mirrors.  Out of anger, and assisted by the fact that one of my majors was being dropped, I left and finished my degree at another university.  Needless to say, my name is nowhere to be found on the paper published in 2005.

I cannot believe that the stereo-types women faced in the early 1940s while working on the atomic bomb project are still prevalent today.  Sure, not all women are golden, but not all of us are weak, lazy or incompetent.  We’re never going to get anywhere with society and education if this stereo-type remains.

I Need my People…NOW.

I just caught myself saying, “This email just takes so long!”  Sure, university email does take a little longer than typical email, but I didn’t always email.  I wrote letters to friends and such, but I have grown so accustomed to instant communication provided by email, text messages, cell phones and instant messaging.  How on Earth did we ever coordinate meeting somewhere without cell phones and text messaging.  Now there are instant messages and email you can take with you?!  Don’t get me wrong, I still love rotary style phones, but I love communicating – and instantly.  I need to communicate to my people.  I feel lost if my laptop isn’t with me or my cell phone dies (which in its old age of 2 years, it does quite frequently at this point).

Wow.  I now understand the theory behind Google’s ‘conversation’ style email.  My students email me in an instant message style of emailing.  We will snap brief, sometimes broken sentences back and forth within a few minutes.  Links, abbreviations and everything except formal letter format clutter our conversation.  Don’t get me wrong, we of this generation do have the ability to write formal correspondence, but where appropriate, we save time.

Off to check on that email I sent 5 minutes ago…

Hello World!

We’re back up and running!  We moved from doteasy to Bluehost.  Amen!  I’ll tweak tomorrow night since tonight I’m dancing to the rockin’ stylings of Abba (Mama Mia).  So, hang on – all will be pretty and techno-lovely Saturday morn.

New features to come:  Talkr or podcasting blog entries – I haven’t decided, but we’ll see.  I’d love to get this stuff podcasted since my posts aren’t the same without my intonation!  Also, WWDC is Monday, so I will be posting my thoughts and Chris and I may even use my new toy to podcast our reactions to the keynote!