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• Ameliorations 1.0 > In A Word
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I’ve never seen the movie The Bucket list, but that didn’t stop Teeni from tagging me for a meme based on its theme.  A character in the movie who is dying of a terminal illness composes the titular list, containing all the things he wants to do before he “kicks the bucket”.  Here’s my version:

1. Travel more of the world.  My wife and I used to travel to a lot of places together– then came children.
2. See our children find meaning in their lives.  This is a hard one, because there isn’t much that I can do about it other than to let them know that their lives have meaning to me.
3. Play with my grandkids.  Another one where I have to rely on my children.  But no hurry, kids!
4. Write a book.  I love to write, and I love books.  So I should write a book.  Maybe more than one.
5. Read every book I own.  I’ve read less than half of the several hundred books on my shelves.  Maybe I’ll skip The Three-Legged Hooch Dancer — never mind, I already read that one.
6. Invent something that lots of people will find useful.
7. Get to where I don’t need the money.  Then I could work on only the projects that interest me.
8. Find out what number 8 is.

Now to tag (why these are in eights, I do not know), in no particular order:  Joseph, Haizum, Robert, Danielle, Chad, Morgetron, Joanna, and Randy.

• InfoWorld – The 2008 InfoWorld Geek IQ Test
  I scored 76. via the Code Project.
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  This title just had me LMAO. I scored 39.
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  Randy should do a great job with this.
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• Stu Savory’s Blog – Amateur Crastination
  Stu's not ready to turn pro yet… maybe later.
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• Do IT consultants need legal protection from competition? | IT Consultant | TechRepublic.com – Only if they're literally trying to snuff you.
• How To Upgrade WordPress Using Subversion – (knocks forehead in the style of a V-8 ad) my next upgrade just got easier
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• Binary Code » You’re Doing it Wrong If – … you don't "get" any of these.
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It happened again. The “check engine” light illuminated, and never went out. For a couple of weeks we’d been noticing an uncomfortably familiar hesitation when stepping on the gas to pull out into traffic, but we could reasonably convince ourselves that it was just our imagination until that little yellow light that looks like a starship being hit by lightning illuminated our denial and struck all doubt.

It had been less than a month since this had happened before.  I took the van into the same shop to have it fixed again.  The cause was identical, but the shop was not to blame.

Mice.

They built a nest in the air filter housing.  Twice.

The mechanic showed me the dense conglomerate of materials he had pulled from the housing.

“How can I stop them?” I asked.

He didn’t have any good suggestions, so I decided to consult the Great Google.  Apparently this is a very common problem, especially in rural areas.  Especially when the weather is cooler and rainier.  The little fellows are attracted to the heat of the engine and they think that the concealed space would make a great place for a nest.  Here are some suggestions I found for dealing with them:

1. Traps.  Where, inside the car?  Around the tires?  Gotta remember to remove them before driving off.  Besides, there are so many of these little critters around that once you trap them, more mice just take their place.  We’ve trapped them inside the house many times, and they just keep coming.
2. Poison.  Same problems as with traps, only worse.  You have to worry that a child or other animal might eat the poison, or that it might contaminate your own space.
3. Peppermint oil and/or Spearmint oil.  I’ll have to give this a try, though one commenter said that after putting some peppermint oil on cotton balls, the mice just played with the balls like they were toys.
4. Moth balls.  They stink, and they’re highly toxic.
5. Dryer sheets like Bounce.  Another maybe.  Must try this one.
6. Block their point of entry with mesh or steel wool.  The mechanic said this is virtually impossible, because there are too many entry points in the automobile, and the mice only need an opening the size of a dime.  Besides, they can chew through most materials. 
7. Build a barrier all around the vehicle instead.   A bit extreme.
8. Introduce a predator.  Sorry, we have a cat dander allergy in our family, and if we let the dogs get close to the van, they’d probably do more damage than the mice.  And I hate snakes.  Cougars, definitely out.
9. Ultra sonic deterrent.  Hmm.  I wonder if that has any unknown effect on humans.
10. Set fire to the car.  That would definitely solve that problem, but only by introducing another one.
11. Charge them rent.  If only I could collect from the little buggers.  Besides, I wouldn’t want to bestow any tenants’ rights.
12. “Try to see if you and the mice have any common interests.”  I don’t think they appreciate closures.

Have you tried any of these?  Did they work?  Do you have any other suggestions?

Robert Hruzek is back to his old tricks again, with a new “What I Learned From…” writing project.  This time, you’re supposed to think of a metaphor for life, and explain how you learned something from that metaphor.  So here’s mine:

Life is a metaphor

Besides the geeky satisfaction I get from answering the question self-referentially, there actually is something to be learned from this metaphor metaphor.

What is a metaphor?  It’s an assertion that something is something it isn’t in order to draw notice to qualities that the two have in common, to some degree.  Life is the concept that a group of separate events form the single timeline of experiences for an individual entity:  me (my life), you (your life), or someone else (their life).  It’s really much more complex than that, but we call it an individual thing because that’s easier for us to grok.

Of course, life isn’t actually a metaphor — I was using “metaphor” metaphorically, after all.

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• Calvin and Jobs
  Pretty good imitation of Bill Watterson's style, too.
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