Homing pigeon, really dead, head problems
So yesterday I get a text from Cindy saying that when she opened the garage door to take in groceries from the car a bird once again flew inside. Not just any bird, the same bird that we spent 20 minutes getting out the night before. Why in the world this bird felt the need to come back in the garage when it was obviously freaked out from the prior day’s escapades is beyond me. I told Cindy to just leave the garage door open in the hope the bird would be smarter this time and fly back out. Evidently the bird is still pretty dumb.
When I pulled up the garage door was still open. I did a quick visual scan for the bird and didn’t see it. Cool, maybe he left? Well when we hit the button to close the garage door the noise scared the bird, who was apparently quietly hanging in some corner. It felt like groundhog day as Cindy and I made futile effort after futile effort to get the bird once again out of the garage. I was finally successful using the fish net but in a different manner than the day before.
This time I was able to get the net on top of him as he sat on top of my volleyball bag. I then used a towel to cap the opening of the net, pinning the bird safely inside. This time I decided to release him far away from the front of the house, hoping he will take a hint. I had a pointless one way discussion with the bird as I walked to the rear fence line, letting him know everything was ok but he needed to find somewhere else to hang out. When I opened the net he immediately flew up onto one of the bushes growing in the fill pit and stayed there. Hopefully he finally realizes my garage has a permanent no vacancy sign.
I then turned my focus to bringing my dead SSR back to life. I had Cindy sit in the drivers seat while I pushed it out of the garage to get it in a better position to be jump started. I pulled the Tacoma in front of it, hooked up the cables and then told Cindy to hop in the Toyota to increase the RPM’s to give me some juice. I hopped in the SSR and turned the key which resulted in a couple weak half turns of the starter, not enough to bring the 6.0 L motor roaring to life. I tried cleaning the battery terminals and adjusting the jumper cables, hoping to provide some additional current but I was still unsuccessful. I at least was able to put the power windows up while connected to the Tacoma.
I disconnected the jumper cables and retrieved my battery charger from the small shed. I was hoping if I pump juice into the battery for a bit I may have a better result. I set the charger at the higher 6 amp charge rate and went back inside to eat dinner. After eating I headed back out and tried again with no jumper cables attached. The motor turned over a bit more but not fast enough to start, damn it. I reattached the charger with the plan to try one more time before bed.
Around 9:30 I headed back outside. After removing the charger I reattached the jumper cables to the Tacoma. I was hoping the combo of the time on the stand alone charger with an assist from the Tacoma would be enough to fire the SSR back up. I got lucky, the SSR finally started up. I figured I should take it on a short drive to dump more juice into the battery. I dropped the top and took a short but enjoyable 12 or 13 mile spin east on Immokalee Road. I couldn’t help but punch the SSR well above the speed limit for brief periods of time.
When I rolled back into the garage I turned the truck off and back on to see if it would start. It did but you could tell the battery was still weak. I hooked the battery charger back up to the SSR and let it run all night at the lower 2 amp charge rate. Before leaving for work today I tried the truck one more time. This time the start sounded normal, hopefully the lifespan of the battery has not been cut short from being completely drained. I showed Cindy how to tell if the truck is in the correct off position and how easy it is to accidentally leave it in the battery draining accessory detente.
For the past week or so I have had what I assumed to be ear wax issues in my right ear. When I would take a shower and wash my ears the right one would immediately become water logged, like the opening is constricted. The odd thing was when I would clean the ear I wasn’t really getting a significant amount of wax out of it. I have used some ear wax removal drops and straight hydrogen peroxide to try to address the problem and had no success. I am not getting much of anything out of the ear, despite it feeling constricted.
Well sometime on Monday I noticed my right eye was starting to get red. Last night it was more red and sore to the touch. This morning I woke up and it was even worse. This eye pain/redness is something I have had happen before. The first time it happened I went to the doctor and then the eye doctor with no official diagnosis given. If I remember correctly I was just given some generic antibiotic drops and it eventually went away. Since then when it happened again I just rode it out.
The additional wildcard is that I swam a 1/4 mile in the gulf on Sunday. Despite wearing ear plugs, I am sure some of the nasty sea water found it’s way into my head. With my life long history of ear infection issues, sea water is asking for trouble. Part of what is going on could be tied into my swim. I’m not sure. I am going to stop by the free employee clinic this afternoon to have them take a look. I am hoping two things occur, they can tell me if my right ear is indeed clogged by wax or not and hopefully give me some drops to wipe out whatever is making my right eye look like a pale cherry.