If The Fridge Don't Fit You Must Acquit

As the delivery date of my new refrigerator got closer and closer I became less and less confident that it was actually going to fit.
As it was, in making the measurements I’d neglected to take into account the baseboard, though I did realize that on Sunday when I was buying the refrigerator and picked up a pry bar to remove the baseboard.
(I ended up removing more than I’d intended when I did so, but that’s neither here nor there.)
Still, I’d measured the opening as being something over 35 inches wide, and the refrigerator was 35 and some fraction of an inch, so I thought I was safe.
In subsequent post-purchase measuring, though, I found the opening to be exactly 35 inches.
D’oh.
Turns out I wasn’t the only one who was wrong; despite what the sticker said (I believe it was 36 and three eighths or something like that), it was exactly 36 inches wide.
I told the delivery guy that I’d “figure something out” and to just hook it up and leave it where it was, as, after all, while it stuck out like a sore thumb, there was still plenty of room to maneuver around it and I could live with it in the meantime.
The meantime ended up not being very long, as in the afternoon I stopped and picked up a circular saw and set to work on shaving off an inch or so of the countertop.
Amazingly enough I didn’t cut off any fingers or anything (and the only damage I did to the countertop – hey, something bad had to happen; I am Jon, after all – was easy to cover up), and, after cleaning up the sawdust I was able to slide the refrigerator into place.
Mostly.
Not everything in the house is as even as it ought to be, so while at the top of the refrigerator there’s a gap between it and the wall, on the other side the top is getting caught on the edge of the cabinet.
(Having one of us tilt it while the other pushes it further into the opening is likely to be our next project when Scott gets back.)
Still, it’s much less obtrusive than it had been, so overall I’m pleased.
Here are some pics:




You can see where the top catches on the edge of the cabinet in the back. You can also see my recipe box covering up the damage I did to the countertop. Meh; I'm going to get new countertops eventually anyway.


So the inside is a little on the barren side, but in fairness it has a much higher capacity than my old one, and I haven't actually gone grocery shopping this week.


I want to push it back in a little further, but even as it is it isn't too much of a sore thumb.

Update: I did it! I pulled it out slightly, then tilted it it and gave it a shove.*

*Yes, I know how dirty that sounds.

The Surest Way To Get Me To NOT Buy Something

Flipping through the channels yesterday I stumbled about Giada's latest show Giada at Home on Food Network, and she was in the midst of making what looked like an interesting meat loaf from ground turkey.
It looked pretty good, so I decided that I'd try it out, planning to stop somewhere on the way home from work today to pick up what I needed.
All I needed to get was the ground turkey, Feta cheese, sun-dried tomatoes, bread crumbs, and eggs.
I didn't realize that buying this handful of items would take almost an hour and involve going to two different grocery stores.
The road I used to take to get home is closed for some construction work until September. Driving on Route 7 in the afternoon is out of the question, and taking the Greenway to and from work is way too expensive, so I decided that what I would do is take 7 in to work in the morning when it's not quite as congested - though it's still pretty bad; objectively, it only adds about ten minutes to my commute, but subjectively it feels like an eternity - and take the Greenway home.
The exit I take off of the Greenway brings me past a grocery store, so, since it's on the way, I decided to stop there rather than going to Super Target or Shoppers.
I ended up spending nearly a half an hour in an only partially successful search for these items.
Eventually I had everything I needed except the sun-dried tomatoes. I looked all over for them, but couldn't find them in any of the places I thought them likely to be found.
Finally, I was about to ask an employee where they were, but before I could another customer came up to ask him where he could find...sun-dried tomatoes.
(See? It wasn't just me being incompetent; either they were well-hidden or the other customer was also incompetent.)
Eventually I found where they ought to have been, but apparently they had none in stock, so I ended up having to go to another store to get them (and upon finding them there had to wait for some obnoxious lady to get the hell out of my way).
I got home and set to work on mixing the ingredients when I heard someone at the door.
It turned out to be some kid doing door-to-door sales of some security system.
I listened to his pitch, but given that the surest way to get me to not buy something is to try to sell it to me, I ultimately opted to say no. It actually seemed like a pretty good deal, but there was something that just seemed hinky about the whole thing, and seriously, the fact that it was a door-to-door sales pitch threw up a big red flag.
Of course, now that the sales guy's had a chance to case the joint I'm sure I'll end up getting "coincidentally" robbed like the people in the anecdotes he told about people who passed up on the system.
Oh well.
What made it all seem so fishy was the disingenuous nature of the pitch. They weren't trying to sell me something, rather, they were offering me an opportunity. They just want to get their name out there, so in exchange for me displaying their sign prominently in my front yard they would "compensate" me by giving me all of this free equipment and a "reduced" monthly fee.
Again, maybe it really was a good deal, but the whole pantomime of him calling in to "qualify" me and being "amazed" upon being informed that I qualified for the "B" package, which hardly ever happens, and calling his manager to get me the alarm control key fob - a $100 value - for free...no. Just no.
Then there was the way he was hitting all of the points he was instructed to hit in his training, like constantly using my name, complimenting me on my house, and continually saying "you guys," even though I'd told him I was the sole occupant, since he was clearly trained to deal with couples and families, which just annoyed the hell out of me.
I've worked in customer service. I know all about using "power words" and trying to form a connection through constant repetition of the customer's name. I've done that crap, and I'm keenly aware when it's being done to me.
After he left I finally got back to making dinner. It actually turned out pretty well, despite the fact that I added too much salt and that it actually fell apart when I was trying to get it out of the pan.
In any case, that was the excitement for today.

Really, Google News?

Recommendations are based on what you have searched for and clicked on in the past, and they will improve over time as you use Google News.

Really, Google News? They will improve over time? Are we talking in geological terms, or something on more of a human scale, because I'm really not seeing the improvement...
On my customized Google News page there's a section featuring links to stories recommended specifically for me.
These stories are based on my Google News activities, such as the stories I click on in the other sections (US, Sci/Tech, etc.) and on the searches I make within Google News.
This is why I find it so puzzling that since Thursday it has exclusively recommended stories related to the deaths of Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett, as I have never once clicked on a link about or done a search on those topics.
I think part of the problem is that the recommendation process is weighted to favor entertainment news, and, of course, the majority of stories in that category are going to be about those particular topics until something equally newsworthy (for some value of "worthy") occurs, as my recommended stories are almost always entertainment news, despite the fact that 90% of the time (at least) I'm clicking on Sci/Tech stories.
Even when I've managed to get the recommended stories more in line with my interests - which involves a lot of clicking on Sci/Tech stories - clicking on one entertainment story will reset the results to all entertainment recommendations.
What really bothers me about the whole thing, though, is that the problem with Google's recommendation engine is that there's no way to actively refine it in the way that you can with, for example, Amazon's recommendation engine. There's no way to tell Google News that I'm not interested in anything involving American Idol, or the Hills, or Paris Hilton, other than by steadfastly avoiding clicking on anything even remotely linked to those topics, and even that is no guarantee, and all of your efforts can be destroyed by an errant mis-click or by clicking on something that you actually are interested in that has even the slightest connection to those topics.
It seems like it would be fairly simple to implement some kind of "I'm not interested" check box, or, at the very least, a rating system for stories that would let you indicate how interested or uninterested you are in stories of that type.
Just a thought/rant.

Megan Fox and the Rose Kid update:
Looks like the kid didn't get his chance to meet up with Ms. Fox: Disaster

Big Exciting Sunday

I headed out to Home Depot today to do some more refrigerator shopping now that I’m (reasonably) sure that I have room for a new one.
After looking at what was available I’d narrowed it down to two choices: a fairly nice but basic stainless steel model from GE, and a larger, nicer, more full-featured stainless steel model from Amana.
What I liked about the GE was that it was relatively inexpensive.
Of course, that’s “relative” to the ridiculously expensive nature of such things. Seriously, there have been big developments in the field of keeping stuff cold that necessitate passing along R&D costs to the consumers? It’s a fucking refrigerator. There’s no justification for having a price tag comparable to a high-end PC or an HDTV or something.
Anyway, what I liked about the Amana was that it was larger, had the freezer on the bottom, and hat all kinds of cool little storage options, like a shelf designed specifically for deli trays, or, as it would have been used for in my case, pizza boxes.
I didn’t like the higher price tag, or the fact that, bafflingly, per the Home Depot associate, it was not Energy Star compliant.
Still, I kept going back to it, and looked inside and saw that, in fact, it was Energy Star compliant, despite the lack of a sticker on the outside.
So I decided to go with that one, but was informed that despite the fact that it said “Free delivery and haul away” on the sticker, that service wasn’t actually available, as it was a clearance item.
It was possible for me to get that service, but to do so I would have to order a new one and pay the full price (the sale price was 10% off), and given that it was already over $400 more than the GE – which did have free delivery and haul away – I wasn’t willing to pay another $150.
So I went with the less fancy – but still an upgrade over my old apartment-grade refrigerator – GE, which will be delivered on Friday.
While I was at it I decided to pick up a Bissel carpet cleaner, as I’ve been meaning to get one for a while.
And that’s pretty much been my big exciting Sunday.