Comment from CounZil member Sternoff

Bob Sternoff is a pretty good and mostly reasonable guy, but reading a comment in today's Seattle Times sort of sets me back:
"You get to see big equipment and a house demolished, which you don't get to see every day," said Bob Sternoff, a Kirkland City Council member who viewed the demolition. "It kind of builds a sense of community."

Bob, that's EXACTLY what's wrong about Kirkland today. We see TOO MANY "big equipment" tearing down houses in our neighborhoods. A lot of the new construction is out of touch with the "look and feel" of Kirkland, sacrificing our green areas and trees in the process.

Been debated before, but we need more stringent rules as for when a house can be demolished and not. Many of the houses torn down are prime candidates for remodel, but it is easier/cheaper to just tear down.

That said, in the case surrounding this house, a tear down was in order, and the resident will be getting a brand-new home for FREE - thanks to "Extreme MakeOver - Home Edition".

Roads and TranZit Package

Wow, suddenly, just a few weeks ahead of the election, things that have been quiet starts to heat up. Not too late I hope.

On the November Ballot is a gigantic measure that is referred to as the "Roads and Transit Package", RTP. Depending on who you ask, it is either a $18 Billion package, a $28 Billion package, a $57 Billion package, or a $157 Billion package. In any case, even the lowest number is $18,000,000,000 (yes, nine zeroes). A lot of money.

The legislature owes the public a fair and true estimate, and clearly explain how the ballot numbers are derived. A "what, when, how, and how much" before people can make a fair and educated decision and cross off either "yes" or "no" on the ballot.

I'm all for light rail, lots of it, but not at the enormous cost, and the huge time for construction. Elsewhere (Europe, Asia) projects of this type are built FASTER and for MUCH LESS money. Why not here? Personally, I believe it is due to poor management and lack of skilled workers! The long project times has an awkward effect on the over all cost and drives financing costs why past the actual construction costs. Sort of backwards, isn't it?

Totally neglecting to utilize the existing BNSF corridor on the Eastside is further proof that who ever came up with the "package", does not understand, or care, for the cost imposed on the tax payers. We could have functioning rail service in a 40+ mile corridor, serving major Eastside downtown communities, for what it would cost to build just a few miles of light rail. And, it could be done in a few years, not a few decades. Read more on Eastside Rail Now's web page.

Finally, a "Roads and Transit Package" that fails to FULLY FUND the SR520 bridge as well as the Alaskan Way "tunnel" is foolish and short sighted. We need both, and we need them today, not 25 years out.

A number of good articles/opinions surfaced this week:
Ron Sims opposing RTP
King 5 presentation
Seattle Times - Why Sims turned against "Roads & Transit"

A few good sites to read more and form opinions:
"NO Movement"
"Yes Movement"

Computer IZZues Solved... - HyperThreading

In early summer I did a complete re-install of Windows on my "main" computer. I had started to get issues with external hard drives and recognition of USB devices in general. After a couple of years, the registry just holds on to too much information, much of it no longer relevant.

But, even though the re-install eventually went smooth, or relatively so, I have never been happy with the performance afterwards. Machine is has just been too slow, and certainly much more sluggish than before the "procedure" - and that was certainly not the objective!

I had sort of accepted it, but today I took some time to look in the Dell Support Forums and since I did not find anything relevant to my issue, I decided post a question. Low and behold, a "Peter" answered within a couple of minutes and asked what processor I had and if HyperThreading was on. Of course it was, it's always been on, but since I needed to double-verify the processor, I went into the BIOS to make sure that the info corresponded to what I had noted down fro mthe CPU casing (after I physically had it removed during cleaning). Sure enough, the info was correct and there was still a field that said "HyperThreading = Yes", followed by "These fields are for information only and can not be changed".

So, HyperThreading was there and on, but since it was a few month I dug through the BIOS, I decided to look through it again. For the upmteen time...

Low and behold: Under "Performance" there was a manual setting for "HyperThreading" and it was set to off. How could I have missed this one?

Turned it on, rebooted, Windows installed the additional software, rebooted again, and WHAT A DIFFERENCE! No longer is CPU tied up to 100% for menial tasks such as retrieving e-mail from a mail server, ripping a CD into mp3s, or simply scrolling through a long web page.

Who knew that little "feature" could make such a difference? I am happy again and not blaiming Dell for substandard hardware (even though they are using a weird combination of chipset SW sometime).

Lesson learned: When you checked everything umpteen times, check again...

DeZign Change

After discussions over the weekend, we did put up the following plan for early Monday morning:
- Get Contractor's input
- Talk to the City
And if both parties OK, proceed to architect and ask him for opinion and when he can have drawings modified.

Since everyone was very accommodating, we had an addtional chat at home and in late afternoon gave the "go ahead" to the architect.

Not bad going from a semi-meltdown on late Friday afternoon, to a revised (and possible better) design three days later.

But once again, there's is never "too many times" when it comes to reviewing drawings.

For more on this story, click here.

Sunday and SunZhine!

Today was one of those days when Seattle is just unbeatable. It has to be enjoyed and can hardly be described, but I'll list a few items here below just to give an idea.

Wife and I went biking around the lake to the Pancake Breakfast at Swedish Cultural Center (SCC). A good 20 miles there in just perfect conditions. After loading up on pancakes and "accroutements" we passed through downtown, over Capitol hill, stopped at Karen's and Kent's and then back over the I-90 bridge and up along the Eastside. A total tour of just over 40 miles.

- Perfect weather, bone dry northerly light breeze.
- Temperature in the 80ies, but a fresh cold morning
- Not a cloud, deep blue skies
- Cute chicks out biking and walking the dogs (one is still allowed to look...)
- Lake Washington filled with sailboats and a few power boats
- Tons of boats on Lake Union and the ship canal, just out browsing
- Town is "alive" and has a good vibe in the basking sun
- Cafes and coffeeshops lined with people enjoying the weather
- Mt Rainer very majestic and statuesque to the south
- A snow capped Mt Baker in the far distance to the north
- A rare Mt Stuart to the east
- Olympic Mountains as a nice "prop" for an even better sunset

A very enjoyable bike ride, some 40 miles all together.

Can never review too many timeZ

Wife and I have reveiwed drawings for remodel for well over 18 months. A number of sessions at the architect's office, as well as evenings at home.

But today after excavator had been here and loaded up on concrete and taken off to dump it, she asks "why are we digging that deep?"

Anser is given, "There's where the entrance is supposed to be, at slab level".

"No, it'll look stupid, no one wants to walk into a basement!" And so on...

So, despite having gone over this umpteen times, the three dimensional "feel" was not there and wife really had no idea of the "ingress" part. She still envisoned the entrance to be at the platform level (split-level) as today, just puled out a bit further.

My stomach almost fell to the floor, and sort of quit and went inside to take a shower and prepare for the Crawfish party later tonight. No more of this right now.

I guess we'll have some heavy reviewing to do tomorrow since there is NO perfect design, they all have compromises. I just thought we really had worked them through. Excavator and General Contractor will be here early Monday morning and they need guidance.

Maybe it is time to go back to military days; you explained, you asked if there were any questions, and then you asked the soldiers to repeat what you just had explained. Just to be sure the information actually had been properly received...

In any case, I'm now heading to the Crawfish party...

Girl iZ named Emma!

Have not yet talked to my brother (time difference and he is understandably busy, working as well as commuting to the hospital) but have updates from other family members.

Mama and "Emma" are doing fine but still at the hospital due to some blood loss during the delivery and also that Emma has not been gaining weight as "planned".

Latest I heard tonight (from a proud maternal grandmother baby sitting the boys) is that they are all coming home tomorrow, a day later than planned.

BTW, due to Sweden's excellent healthcare system, you cannot have a delivery of a baby at the fairly large hospital in Alingås. That "function" has for the county been centralized to the very boring (but larger) town of Borås, about 25 miles away. Go figure...

Dinner and FriendZ

Got mail last week from an old customer and (still) good friend. Have not seen him in over two years, but he was to pass Seattle on his way to Olympia for a meeting with the Public Utilities Commission.

Given the opportunity we met up tonight for a meal and few drinks. Always good to meet up with old friends after some time has passed. Lot of stuff to tell. In his case, he's recently gotten married and just looked happy. Life is good!

Just have to post this great wedding photo he sent me...

New addiZion to the family

Got a brief e-mail from my brother. He just got a GIRL! Wow, a girl! I know they were hoping for one (after two boys) but did not know "what to expect".

In any case, here's a picture of the new arrival (51 cm och 2,380 grams, or about 20 inches and 5.2 lbs). Will talk to him first thing tomorrow morning to get the full scope.