Two of their windows were cracked, and I've decided to try reglazing them myself. I figured it was easiest to work with them by removing them from the window (Which also lets me replace the sash cords), and safer, they're chock full of old lead paint. A few hours of gently scraping, wet sanding and chiseling and I have two empty window frames (and a garbage can full of broken glass and a plastic groundcloth encasing dust and wallcandy). They're being painted too, with the glazing planned for later this week.

In the meantime, we've wetsanded the frames and Mrs. Ha has continued peeling off wall paper.

In other weekend news, eleven year old's school gave a presentation at the Underground Railroad Conference on Saturday. We couldn't watch, there wasn't enough room. Later that Saturday, Irish_girl stopped over, her older daughter was selling candy door to door and she figured our neighborhood was good pickings.

I mentioned getting a few books at the ABVI a few weeks ago (we ran into Irish_sister there, that's her current workplace). One of the books I found was On to Berlin, the wartime memoirs of General James Gavin of the 82nd Airborne. I found this to be a great read, the author writes very well (considering he dropped out of school in seventh grade), and he was in the midst of many crucial World War II battles (there's no safe place behind the lines when you jump into battle). His description of the Kall Valley at the end of the Battle for the Huertgen forest is particularly haunting. His personality and biases are there too, I think he really restrained himself describing Montgomery.

Six year old is very into the Magic Treehouse series, which eleven year old worked through (without my help) a few years ago. They're pretty thin and formulaic, we can knock one off in two nights. The formula is that two siblings from Frog Creek Pennsylvania (Jack and Annie) use a magic treehouse full of books to travel time and space for the future of mankind.

In Pirates past noon Jack and Annie travel to the Caribbean and get confronted by pirates. The alternative lifestyle of the pirates is presented in a tasteful and understated manner. Oen pirate is named Pinkie (his bosun is named Stinkie), and when they arrive on the ship, there is dancing, fighting and singing going on. Eventually they escape and get back to Pennsylvania.

In Mummies in the morning, Jack and Annie travel to ancient Egypt, help a mummy find her book of the dead, and get lost in a pyramid. Eventually they escape and get back to Pennsylvania.

My beer is coming along well, it's not my best, but certainly drinkable. For a little while I was afraid I had tap problems, the beerstream kept getting smaller and smaller. I finally figured out I hadn't screwed in the tap enough, no CO2 was coming in.

This weekend I'm taking extra time off, we're going camping in the Bristol Hills for Columbus Day. Most likely we'll just stay one night, the girls and my parents will probably stay three. we can use the other nights to continue with the room redecoration.

I haven't found any local Slashdot 10th anniversary parties, and I'm not sure I want to plan my own. what are your plans?