Thanks guys. My siblings were laughing off my mom's antics, but I am not around here so often, and I found the whole thing upsetting. Though, to be fair, it was mostly over the top worrying about our safety, which was always her norm. Now she's imagining actual imaginary bad people to worry about.

---

Today's highlight so far: Somebody called me back that I didn't expect to.

---

Thanks, scrappy. I'm pretty sure it's too much for my hand strength, but the problem is getting someone here to care enough about it to do something. Which is another reason I let the water pile up to measure. The effect on the water bill might get through to them. The other thing is that these are faucets for a tub/shower so I'm not absolutely positive they're washer type. I'm a little afraid to look in case I can't put back when I undid.

Checked my solar cake and it's done. Yay!

The gardeners are gone so it's time to go skinnydipping!

---

re: the highway sign--what's the alphabet game? Did I grow up in some mega-isolated community that wasn't tied in to the game-zeitgeist of America?

Apparently! Or you never went on family road trips. Of course, I just learned a new version of the alphabet game recently. The way my family played it was that you, as a collective, were looking for words that began with each letter of the alphabet in order (with an exception for X because come on). The way I learned recently was a competition to find the letters of the alphabet, period, in order.

---

NO EXCEPTIONS!

Ahem.

We do it in order, taking turns. So if I start with A you have to get B and so on.

---

We played Geography on road trips. One person names a place, then the next person has to name a place starting with the last letter of the first place, and so on. After a while, you usually get stuck in A for a while, until someone remembers Amsterdam. And you can't repeat places that someone else already said.

---

Yeah, we go in order. It's always a bummer when we pass Quincy too early...

Oh, Sue. Sorry.

In fun news, I was idly considering going to get something bad for dinner, when someone on the street handed me a thing of Pringles! Pickle-flavored Pringles. They're pretty good, actually. And totally satisfy "something bad for dinner."

---

Or you never went on family road trips

We went on tons of road trips, but we all had books--except Daddy, who drove, of course. Oh, we did spot license plates, trying to get all the states. The state you were in at the time didn't count. Alaska needed independent confirmation.

---

Is it the kind you just screw in like a lightbulb?

YEP! and the new fuse fixed the AC. WOOT. I'm still thinking of moving Grace back into the bedroom so we only need to air condition one room.

---

Nice! The only problem with those fuses is having them on hand -- the actual changing is easy. As you know.

---