Category Archives: Home & Family

July 26, 2012 · 9:01 pm

Safe Disposal of Old Medicine

This week, San Francisco Bay Area’s Alameda became the first US county to pass a “Safe Drug Disposal Ordinance” requiring producers of drugs sold or distributed in the county to pay for the safe collection and disposal of unused medications. I noticed this news story because I just took a bag of such medicines to the drop box at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation (795 El Camino Real, Palo Alto). About once a year, I go through the medicines in our house, check the expiration date, and put old stuff in a bag for disposal. I have written about challenges Disposing of Toxics when clearing my parents’ house for sale earlier this year. I was pleased to find the PAMF drop box as a safe and easy solution to this ongoing problem. Information on other Bay Area disposal sites is available from the Regional Water Quality Control Plant “cleanbay.org” web site.

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Filed under Home & Family, News & Reviews

Tagged as Eleanor, San Francisco, Wade

July 24, 2012 · 8:51 pm

New Baseboards

Ten years ago, we took out the (horrible pink) wall-to-wall carpet in our 1930 house in Willow Glen and had the floors refinished. Like many home improvement efforts, we got 90% done and then stopped. The carpet came out but the baseboards never got installed. I have heard it said that it is hardest to pay someone else to do work that you know how to do well yourself. Baseboards are not very difficult but they are fussy and take time to get right, so we never got around to them. We finally decided to bring in the professionals.

The upper hall was easy – it is almost empty. However, our bedroom is fully furnished and everything was in the way. Paul and I helped the contractors to move stuff around. It is surprising how much dust settles under an armoire in ten years and how many books had migrated into our room from where they should have been. I am happy with the results and especially happy to be done with that project, finally.

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Tagged as House Work, Paul, Willow Glen

July 24, 2012 · 9:10 am

John’s Trip Home

My husband John Plocher is flying home from his most recent two week trip to China, on business for Huawei. I have received an interesting series of text message emails as he worked his way through the weather and mess of a typhoon from ShenZhen to the Hong Kong airport. So far, his flight is about two hours late.

On way to airport – roads flooded, slow traffic, not worried – looking forward to seeing you SOON!!
Typhoon coming in to south of us in morning… More info as I find out,,,
Coming->came…
Only 1 route to hk open, ferry closed, shekou bridge closed, luohu closed, trees down across only road open.. Glad we have several hours b4 plane leaves
At hk airport
Flight delayed (no surprise).checked in ok
On board! Good seat

Later… John arrived home safely despite Typhoon Vicente, only two hours late.

Non-Travel Diary 4

While my husband John is in China on business for Huawei, I am keeping a non-travel diary. This has been a relatively quiet week. In addition to working full-time at Huawei:

There was a small amount of progress on our home construction projects. The painter spent a half day painting the wrong color stain on the baseboards. When I pointed out the error, he spent about the same amount of time sanding that color off and re-staining. Nobody was happy.
Thursday, I joined the monthly Board meeting of the Santa Maria Urban Ministry. We said an appreciative goodbye to our summer intern. The SMUM Tech Team (of which John and I are members) was assigned some new projects by the Board.
My newly-assigned 2012 TechWomen mentee from Lebanon and I made first contact. We exchanged introductory emails and are starting to make preparations for her visit to the Silicon Valley in September. Her background is impressive – I very much look forward to working with her in person. TechWomen is an initiative of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA).
I communicated with the 2011 TechWomen mentees with whom I am presenting a panel at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in October 2012 (Baltimore, MD). I am the moderator of the panel called “Technical Women in the Arab Region: Challenges vs. Aspirations”. We have travel funding confirmed for three of the panelists and we are working on support for our fourth. The ladies are traveling from Algeria, Palestine, Egypt, and Lebanon for GHC12. I am very eager to see them again!
Paul and I took our Wood Shop basic safety and equipment introduction at TechShop San Jose last night. We enjoyed learning to use the miter saw, table saw, band saw, electric sander, and drill press. The scroll saw is being repaired so we will learn how to use that later. I made a heart for John and Paul started work on an infinity symbol using the band saw. One of the other students laser-engraved the heart for me. I want to take a TechShop laser class next!
This morning, we had a community yard sale. Despite being on Craigslist and putting signs up on nearby corners, it was very poorly attended. However, it was fun to hang out with the neighbors. Our neighborhood apparently has 7 boys and 1 girl aged between 6 and 12 years old – who spent the morning rocketing from sale to sale comparing stuff and giving updates.
John comes home Tuesday morning!

San Jose Airport Hands

We drive the the San Jose airport several times a month to drop off or pick up my mother on her trips to visit my brother in Southern California. I am always charmed by the huge “Hands” mural by Christian Moeller (2010) which wraps around the seven story parking structure. It is elegant, cleverly executed, and never gets old.

Thanks to Pierluigi Oliverio – Fire Hydrant in Willow Glen

In working with the City of San Jose, California, to arrange for building permits, I have been informed that our neighborhood of Willow Glen not only has very poor water pressure but also relatively few fire hydrants. A fire hydrant helps firefighters tap into the municipal water supply to help extinguish a fire. About a month ago, Willow glen ended up with one fewer hydrants when someone’s car ran over one of only two near our house.

As a native of San Francisco, I know that the destruction of the city in 1906 was started by a major earthquake but that the subsequent fires did most of the damage. Our area of Willow Glen being reliant on just one fire hydrant (located more than 400 feet from our house) made me nervous.

For a while after our local fire hydrant disappeared, I thought that the city would fix it on their own. After a month, I failed to find any information about fire hydrants on the San Jose website. So, I sent email to our local San Jose Councilman Pierluigi Oliverio to ask for his support.

I have met the energetic and intelligent Pierluigi at a variety of local and civic events over the years. He has met with our Willow Glen Lions club several times. Whenever I send him email, even very late at night, Pierluigi gets back to me very promptly. He asked his staff member Melrose to look into the missing fire hydrant. Over the course of about week, Melrose called the Fire Department, Transportation Department, and Water Department to try to figure out who was in charge of this. She finally was able to get a fix scheduled by the Water Department and we now have a replacement. Thanks, Pierluigi (and Melrose)!

31 August 2012 update – this week, the city replaced the asphalt around our new fire hydrant with concrete:

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Tagged as San Jose, Willow Glen

July 15, 2012 · 11:11 pm

Non-Travel Diary 3

While my husband John is in China on business for Huawei, I am keeping a non-travel diary. This weekend has been packed with activities:

Saturday morning, my mother and I picked up our new glasses from Visual Eyes Optometry in Willow Glen (San Jose CA). She was fitted with her new lenses and frames (and I got new lenses for my sunglasses).
Saturday afternoon, my son Paul and I went to the amazing Palo Alto Clay & Glass Festival, then took an evening class from Jeanne Fishback at TechShop San Jose on the wood lathe. We had a great time – and will take a second TechShop wood class this coming Friday night.
This morning at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Rev. Channing Smith announced that next week is Backpack Sunday – we will collect school supplies and backpacks for the children of Santa Maria Urban Ministry (no red or blue – gang colors).
Paul and I went to the Clay & Glass Festival again this afternoon. In the last two years, he has taken most of the ceramics classes offered by the excellent Foothill College art program. So, Paul was fascinated to see the finished work of so many superb creative potters. The artists also had fun talking to Paul – many of them know his teachers at Foothill. I bought some amazing pots. After seeing the art, we went to see the latest Ice Age animated movie.