The Heart of Summer via Animoto

This video is viewable on it’s animoto page for browsers that do not support flash. All of my photos can be viewed on flickr; videos are on animoto and YouTube.

Image: Francesco Marino / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Just because I like complaining about the water/sewer rates in Grand Rapids I’ll post the mail box findings from today.

Water is now at $31.92 + $1.82 per HCF

Sewer is now at $40.99 + $3.33 per HCF

The over all increase from last quarter is not drastic; Base rates of $70.65, water $1.752, sewer $3.238, but it is still and increase.

Our usage stayed the same from last quarter, but due to the rate increases I owe the city more money. I would have to dig a little to confirm this, but every quarter the rates have gone up since we moved in in December of 2004.

I know that I’m just complaining to complain, but this is starting to get a bit out of hand.

Our May was filled with visiting Great Grandma and Grandpa Holzhausen, the beach at Millennium Park, camping with Grandma and Grandpa Klein, and Drake running around with my camera. I’ll let you guess which photos are his.

All of my past Animoto videos can be found on my Videos page, or on my YouTube channel. One thing that does bother me about Animoto is that there is no public page that displays all of my creations.

If you are interested in creating your own video slide shows visit animoto.com, were you can create free short 30 second videos. For full length videos you can get a discount of $5 off the yearly cost by using my animoto referral link. You’ll be able to get the All-Access pass for $25 per year for the life of your account.

Phineas and Ferb ©Disney Channel

“I know what we are going to do today.”

Drake has managed to get me watching Disney’s Phineas and Ferb. The basics of the show are two kids on summer vacation that create and do crazy things in their back yard . Like… building a rocket, fighting a mummy, climbing up the Eiffel Tower, discovering something that doesn’t exist, giving a monkey a shower, surfing tidal waves, or creating nanobots.

Drake’s love of all things Phineas and Ferb has gotten to the point where he calls members of his family names of the characters. He is Phineas, Theresa is Ferb, I am Perry (the platypus), and Garrett is baby Perry; occasionally grandma gets referred to as Candice . It’s odd that Garrett is baby Perry as there is not a baby Perry on the show, but there are plenty of other characters.

If you don’t know the show, Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz is an evil doctor and Perry is a secret agent that is charged with stopping his plans. This is one of the subplots that goes on in every episode. No on knows that Perry is a secret agent, unless he puts his hat on.

Now that I’ve been watching the show for weeks and there are plenty of episodes saved on the TiVo, I do have grown to like it. I’ve gotten the show so stuck in my head I have now changed some notification tones on my phone.  Perry has a one liner that gets played in the background whenever he is found out by Doofenshmirtz. The Perry line plays on my phone whenever I get an email. The other tone is for txt messages, Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated.

If  you have kids and let them watch TV, I would have to recommend giving Phineas and Ferb a look. Disney Channel has some episodes right online for sampling. Phineas an Ferb on Disney Channel

I have worked elections for the city for the past few years and am just amazed at the low turnout. In the precinct that I was working there were three things on the ballot. 1) A school board race 2) The income tax hike 3) A vote to remove the city charter requirement that a work day must be 8 hours. The school board race was hit or miss, since I am sure not everyone knew, myself included, every name on the ballot. The income tax hike failed 91 No to 72 Yes. The charter rule removal passed with a wide margin. To quantify the turn out, we processed 163 ballots for 1066 registered voters, or about 15%.

I really thought that city voters would come out in droves because of the income tax hike. Unlike property taxes, the city income tax effects every resident that has any form of income. However the city leaders are not stupid, and they know that the low turnout in May coupled with the ultimatum they gave would work in their favor.

“City officials are clear about one thing — without the additional revenue, as many as 35 police officers and firefighters would be among a new round of cuts. Some services, like parks and recreation, would go away all together.” WOOD TV

The city is estimating they will raise $7.5 million with the tax increase, however they are only dedicating $2.5 million to the police and fire departments. I guess one way to bully a yes vote is to threaten to fire 35 public safety persons.

Yes I know they were asking for this money to help fund the parks department. Yes I know the hike is officially only for 5 years. This does remind me of a time when the school district where I grew up asked for and received a property tax millage to build and renovate. The millage was written to automatically expire after a set number of years. However, when that deadline grew near the district asked to extend the millage. They promoted this as “Your taxes will not go up at all from their current level.” I don’t remember if that millage extension passed, or if it was eventually removed. I can’t help but think that in four years the City of Grand Rapids is going to ask residents to approve making the 1.5% tax rate permanent.

I have no problem letting everyone know that I voted no. I don’t like higher taxes. I don’t like city leaders that think they can bully people for more money. I don’t like that the city leaders think five years of higher taxes while they get their act together with the budget is okay.

Last night while I was watching the Red Wings beat the Coyotes I had another mouse incident. I saw it run behind the TV stand, then I went nuts. I pulled out all of the books and things on the bottom shelf, the mouse ran under one of the couches. As I pulled up the skirt of the couch it ran under the other couch, then I lost sight of it.

My crazy continued; I picked up everything from the floor and moved it into the other room. I flipped one couch over to see if it was hiding under there, no dice. I started looking behind and under everything in the room with flashlights just trying to find the damn thing. This lead me to the two DVD racks in the room. I tilted one of them forward and bingo. It was back there. As I started moving the rack out I once again lost sight of the mouse.

So now everything in that room is away from the wall a little bit for easy viewing if I spot it again.

Now, the dream I had right before I woke up this morning was all sorts of mouse oriented. We were watching TV in a house that was mine, but it wasn’t this house. Theresa, Mom, Dad, Megan, Brooke, and Dax Shepard were all there. I spotted was was a gigantic beetle under one of the tables. I immediately jumped into action to find something to catch this foot long black beetle.

After a second I came across a pink plastic bucket and tried to trap it. After the bucket was over it there were claws coming up from the sided scratching the hell out of my hands. The beetle eventually broke free and darted into another room and behind a grandfather clock. My Dad and I started moving things out as he was mumbling something about “this damn old house.”

We didn’t find the beetle, but we did scare the crap out of a large mouse, which took off running into Megan’s room. I started tearing into the room and must have lost sight of it. The dream ended with dad, Dax, and myself searching with flashlights for holes and other places the intruders could have gone. My Dad was having a conversation with Dax about “this damn old house” as I woke up.

Update: On Sunday the 24th there were no mouse sightings. However, I can hear at least one in the wall between the kitchen and office. After work today I’ll have to do some more investigating.

The “Readiness to Serve Charge” has gone up another 8.2% from $65.29 to $70.65.

Water Rate last year: $1.591 per HCF. This quarter the rate is $1.752 per HCF for an increase of 10.1%.

Sewer Rate last year: $2.898 per HCF of water use. This quarter the rate is $3.238 per HCF of water use for an increase of 11.7%.

I’m just bitching to bitch. Our usage has gone down, but our overall cost has gone up. One year later we are using 7 HCF less of water, down to 11 HCF from 18, but paying about 10% more.

Now I’ve been told that some communities on the GR water/sewer system are getting much higher bills then we are in the city. I guess this might be one good thing of living out of town and just needed to pay for the electricity to pump water.

I have looked at the Moxi DVR before and last night I did some more looking. I have not pulled the trigger on Moxi because of all of the time and money I have invested with TiVo. My original unit is a S2 with lifetime that currently serves as a cartoon box for the toddler. Our big screen TV has a S3 with lifetime hooked up to it, and in the bedroom there is a HD with $6.95/month service.

The current UI does not bother me at all, it’s been around forever and I’m used to it. Now I’m sure if I all of a sudden had a new UI I’d like that one too, but the UI alone is not a reason for me to upgrade. This whole Premiere unit feels like a face lift and spec update.

In it’s current state I would take a Premiere, but I won’t buy a Premiere.

I really like what I am reading about Moxi and the Mate. I’m going to patiently wait for Dave Zatz’s new review of Moxi. Maybe he’ll have a TiVo vs Moxi comparison.

Update: TiVo could have at least made it possible to set up WishLists and manual recordings online.

One really useful thing is that I can see in almost real time what suggestions STiVo, BiVo, and DiVo are recording. I’ve already been able to see a show that I am going to actually want to watch.

If you’re interested the three of them Titter here: http://twitter.com/STiVoHD

Drake browsing for some entertainment

Originally uploaded by xdreamwalker

He was looking for something to do. He would take something down, look it over then put it back. He was being so cute.