I like my high-tech toys, so it won’t surprise you to know that I had to try the Black & Decker 18V Cordless Trimmer, instead of going with a gas powered trimmer or corded model. I’m not excited about the idea of pulling a 50 foot extension cord all around my yard, nor about the idea of mixing fuel and oil for a gas trimmer. This is where the 18V Cordless Trimmer enters the picture. I had debated this for quite a while, and finally bit the bullet. It was $99.99 at Home Depot (Down from $120) and came with a $20 mail in rebate. I took it home and hooked up both batteries to charge overnight. It comes with two batteries, but only one charger… Luckily, it takes the same batteries as my 18V cordless drill, so I was able to charge them both at the same time! Having cordless tools that take the same battery is extremely useful… you can have batteries charging while you are working, and never run out of power! The trimmer features a “No-Bump” feed system, that automatically feeds the line out without banging the front on the ground. It also features a pivoting head, so you can turn it around for doing edging. Finally, the shaft can be adjusted longer or shorter, which is great for me… I need that thing all the way out to reach the ground!

The next morning (Saturday) I looked outside, and was happy to see that the sun was shining and the grass was dry! I mowed the grass, and then proceeded to use the trimmer. It’s easy to start… You hold down a safety button on the top, and then you can pull the trigger in. The trigger is easy to hold down… My hands didn’t get sore at all using it. Many of the posters on epinion.com mentioned that they got sore after holding it for a while… I found that if you held down the safety button while you are using it this would happen… I then realized that once the trigger is held down there is no need to keep holding the safety button. So how did it work? AMAZING! It cut just about everything I threw at it! The only thing it couldn’t handle were some really thick weeds, with hard stalks. I trimmed for about half an hour, maybe 45 minutes, and it was going strong the whole time. I was IMPRESSED with this thing. I was expecting the worst! After I finished, I checked the spool to see how much line it “Automatically” ate up… And was impressed again! It barely used any line, which is either a result of a well built trimmer, or some incredible trimming skills. Probably not the latter. I didn’t have the “buzz” in my hands that you get from using a gas trimmer… I didn’t have to mix any fuel… I didn’t have to roll up a cord after I was done, or drag the cord around my yard… When I was done trimming, I was really DONE. I highly recommend this trimmer! I will continue to use it after each time I mow, and keep you updated on how well it works! (Bored readers, feel free to skip my reviews!)

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My computer was in the basement, which meant that it was going to have to move, otherwise I’m sure it would be a “Casualty of Construction”. Unfortunately, the spare bedroom upstairs did not have a network hookup, so that was our goal for the evening. Colin came over, and we tried to drill a hole behind the baseboard down into the basement. Sure enough, there was a double joist right below the wall! I went downstairs, and drilled up at an angle through the floor and into the wall. Perfect! Colin cut the hole out for the wall box while I went downstairs and fed two cables up into the wall, and stapled them along the joists. I made the mistake of not marking them for the first one, so I had to use my multimeter to figure out which cable was which. We put two into each box, knowing that it’d be ready for a phone hookup in the future! After installing the box in the first room, repeated the same in Chantale’s office behind her desk. With fancy new network cables in place, we grabbed the modem and router, and proceded to the basement (Stopping for some supper halfway there! Corn and Hot Dogs, Laurie would be proud!) We then installed the power strip, router, and modem as seen in this picture, and tidied everything up. We left the cables hanging for the phone system, to be determined later where they would be placed. We asked Chantale to check to see if her internet was working… and the answer was “No.” What the? Thinking maybe it needed some time to initialize the modem, we cleaned off my desk downstairs and carried upstairs. When we arrived there, I thought to myself “Wait, we didn’t put a cable from the wall box to her computer! Duh!” As soon as we hooked that up, it worked perfectly! Finally, we carried up all the pieces of my computer and hooked it up, with similar results! Next on the list was to check and make sure the wireless on my laptop would still work with the router down in the basement, and sure enough it was just fine! A successful install, which called for a celebration (Drinking Beer, followed by going to a movie… The Benchwarmers… Read the entry below about that one!)

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After several hours of moving stuff out of the basement on Sunday afternoon, I finally got to start swinging the hammer and crowbar! The result is what you see here… everything is gone! (Gone in the sense that it no longer makes up the walls of the basement, not in the sense that it’s not piled up EVERYWHERE in the basement, in a nightmarish mess of 2×4’s, cieling tiles, and wallboard that’s going to be nearly impossible to haul out…) This week, I will spend time moving the 2×4’s out to the garage so I can start pulling all the nails out of them. Can’t use them for mulch/firewood/benches if they are full of nails!

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Well, tonight, we decided to go see The Benchwarmers at the Rainbow (Cheap theater, only $4!). This movie was well worth the $4 entrance fee… I would even go so far as to say it’s one of the best movies I’ve seen this year! Rob Schneider, David Spade, and Jon Heder put on a great performance that kept us (Chantale, Colin and Myself) laughing through the entire show. What’s it about? The three of them were losers as kids, so now they are playing baseball (Yeah, a team of three, go figure) to beat all the teams of bully kids that pick on other kids. I know, it sounds stupid, but go see it. You will not stop laughing, I PROMISE!

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That’s right, as several sources are reporting, Futurama will be coming back with 13 new episodes in 2008! All of the original voice actors have signed new contracts for the new episodes. It’s looking to be a good day! For those of you who are unaware, Futurama originally aired 4 seasons worth of episodes (52 in total) over 5 seasons on Fox. Fox continually screwed them around, moving them to random show times to put on rediculous things (like football games of all things!) After a huge fan following on Adult Swim and amazing sales results on the 4 season DVD box sets, I bet Fox is kicking themselves now! But I don’t feel bad for them at all… Not even a bit!

BACK TO THE ‘FUTURAMA’ By DON KAPLAN - New York Post Online

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So, when I got home today, I found that the huge pile had magically disappeared:



Yeah, right. I wish. Actually, I started sorting it into more manageable piles. This pile is all the longer pieces of lumber. I plan to maybe use a mulcher/chipper to shred this up to use around our trees:



This next pile (stack?) is all the cieling tiles, and all the wallboard. It looks a lot less… big… now that it’s stacked neatly:



And this last pile, which I would like to call the “Dumpster Potentials” is full of pieces I would consider small enough to sneak into the communal dumpster out in the alley… Slowly, surely, I will fill that dumpster with all our garbage! (I’m surprised nobody said anything about the 10 bags of pine needles I threw in there last week!)

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Here’s another nice time waster… This game is fairly simple… You’re a ball. Actually, you can be different balls, once you EARN them. You hold down the ’s’ key to bounce your ball higher. The levels are incredibly addicting, however the game seems a little short. Let me know what you think of it! This game is download only. The author claims to be working on the next version of the game, which will feature less balls (but more exotic materials), longer levels, and more of a story. I can’t wait!

Within a Deep Forest

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This game is AMAZING… well worth every penny (It’s free)! It’s kind of like the old game lode-runner, but with physics! You can wall jump, wall slide, and… well, that’s about it, but it’s incredibly addicting! The game physics are so fun, you’ll want to beat all 500 levels in the original game! (Good luck with that…) Once you finish (or get tired of) the included levels, you can download user created levels and give them a try! There is no end to the madness. You will find yourself screaming at your computer as you do some levels over and over, because you JUST ABOUT made it!

N by Metanet Software

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This game is surprisingly addicting! Give it a shot… There’s 30 levels, and once you’ve finished a level, you can go back to it anytime, even if you close the browser! The mechanics are a little different… You use the mouse to “grab” the playing field and rotate it… As it tilts back and forth, the Roly Poly creature moves around… Your goal is to get him to the finish line in each level!

Nitrome - Roly Poly

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Tomorrow, I’d better find out what it takes to rent a dumpster, because this is an incredibly HUGE pile of garbage. Even after I take out all the wood I’m going to keep, I’m sure it’ll fill a large dumpster.

      

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