A good day
For me it doesn't get any better than having a tricky problem to solve, and then quickly solving it. The other evening I received the HOA's utility bill and the electricity was 230% of what it normally is. We don't use electricity for that much, so there was no way this made sense. Because we have "Smart" meters, I knew the usage per day, so I could see that the increase started suddenly one day and remained constant after that. My first thought was the work we had done on our sump pumps, but that finished five days before the increase.I went down into the laundry room and became familiar with the meter. It turns out it gives the current usage in watts. By playing around with our lights and circuit breakers, I discovered the building is always using about 22 watts, for things like emergency lights and smoke detectors and timers and the washer and dryer while they aren't turned on. But, at that point, there was an additional 777 watts of constant draw that I couldn't explain -- until I tracked it down to the sump pump circuit.
I then got the other set of keys, and a ladder, and went down to the basement and discovered the pump was running. Continuously apparently. I shut off the #1 pump (the one we just replaced) and the #2 pump switched on. I turned that one off too and called the boss at our pump repair contractor. Together (he on the phone), we tested everything we could on the control board and he came to the conclusion that the board itself must have failed. (I suggested the alternate conclusion that the floats were in some impossible-to-imagine tangle, but he pointed out that that would have triggered the alarm that goes off when both pumps are turned on at the same time.)
They are coming on Monday to replace the board. I will have questions about warranties and the condition of that pump that was stuck on for about a month, but at least we should have a functional system again. By luck, the only residents with plumbing that drains to that septic system are out of town this weekend, so the only people inconvenienced are anyone who was planning to use the washer, which is officially out-of-order for the weekend.
I so rock. And while being so modest!
Stanley Saitowitz
I think I've written about Saitowitz before, but I need to write in more depth now. Most of his residential projects are in SOMA -- he can thus be seen as a tool of gentrification for South of the Slot -- but there are exceptions. His earlier work dates from a period when architects had more creative freedom working in SOMA than in other neighborhoods, it was the only place here you could get away with building the kind of projects you might see in Japan, for example. And as both developer and architect he had even more freedom.I was originally familiar with him because I happened to work on the little street where he built his home/office and developed two small residential buildings.
As is so often the case when architects are driving, the buildings were visually interesting but, at least for me, un-livable (very little wall space for books or art). As his reputation grew, so did the size of his projects. The Folsom Lofts, also in SOMA,
...and 8 Octavia, just north of Market Street on the corner of Octavia, are both obviously his work.
But 1080 Sutter is not at all similar to the others. And yet that's the project I want to talk about.
I watched that building as it rose from a hole in the ground until it was completed, and never knew quite what to make of it. But today, as I was walking on Sutter on my way to pizza, I was finally struck by how well it fits on that street. On Natoma, in SOMA, he was creating an almost Japanese, anything goes, aesthetic. On Folsom and Octavia that modern look was made more sophisticated. But on Sutter he is, for once, creating a new look that blends with the existing, urban, look of the street.
And the building itself looks like something that could have started out École des Beaux-Arts and then Adolf Loos took a pass at striping it down to the basics. Not only does the fenestration match the granularity of the neighboring buildings, even the use of brick on the facade is consistent with building practices of the Tenderloin's Golden Age. (The brick is non-structural, of course, and I assume they took measures to insure it wont fall into the street during the next earthquake. The structure itself is steel reinforced concrete with the main structure several feet behind this facade.)
Welcome everything, push away nothing
From The Five Invitations
This is a concept I'm completely on board with. Did I learn it while my parents were dying, or did I just fall back on something I already knew? I think of hospitals as a special zone where you have no control over what's happening so you can only say "Yes" and deal with whatever comes your way.
But reading some of this reminds me of something else,
p82 Welcoming what is, as it is, we move toward reality. We may not like or agree with all that we encounter. However, when we argue with reality, we lose every time. We waste our energy and exhaust ourselves with the insistence that life be otherwise.
p83 In spite of what we have been led to believe, which is that destiny rests firmly in our own hands, we often have little control over the external circumstances of our lives. However, we have a great deal of choice about how we relate to and learn from the cards life deals us. We build resilience by allowing ourselves to experience what we are feeling in any given situation, whether it's good or bad. Until we come to accept life with all its madness and inspiration, we will feel cut off, separate, isolated. We will view the world around us as a dangerous and frightening place.
Clips from the old TV show "Kung Fu" have appeared in my YouTube feed recently, and I've rewatched several of them. The fighting style Caine exemplified was based on this same theory. Caine would often receive or deflect the blows of his foes without counter attacking. He would accept the negative energy and sometimes turn it against the other person.
This was also the secret behind Admiral Spruance's uncanny success in the Pacific War. Especially at Midway, the Japanese counted on him to respond to their night attack, but he just went back to bed. He did respond, unnecessarily, at the very end of the Battle of the Philippine Sea, but by that time his enemy's strength was totally spent and there was no risk -- except of his planes running out of fuel, which did happen.
Even Patton's "Rock Soup" is a variation on this passive approach to warfare, probe until you discover where the enemy is weak and attack his weakness rather than his strength.
No comments:
Post a Comment