Todd Stowell Online

Well, so much for sticking to my guns and coming back here to post on the happenings of my birthday. In all honesty, the birthday was a bit of a disappointment. Let me preface that by saying that I was very surprised and pleased with all of the gifts that I received. No, this disappointment came in the way of a $1200 bill after being informed that the new fireplace destined to be installed in my basement would additionally need a new gas line and all new venting pipe. You see, apparently, along with a lot of other items in this house that were / seem out of code, the fireplace itself wasn't the only item that was truly in poor shape.

The reason for the new fireplace to begin with had to do more with safety then anything. This unit, apparently the first generation from a company, was pushing out about 200,000 cubic inches of carbon monoxide. The normal should be less then 40. To make matters worse, the piping connecting the fireplace to outside of the house was also built in the stone age, and no longer up to code. Tack on a gas line that was frighteningly too close to the heat exhaust and there you have it.

The birthday itself was fine. Outside of being very annoyed, I did receive some wonderful gifts including this huge, kick ass power tool from Kate, some wrapping paper from my mom, and a donation to the "Todd needs power tools so he can repair his out of date (and apparently out of code) home."

Kate, my brother and I were able to go out and enjoy a meal that someone else had created. I rather enjoyed the baked potato soup, the tasty Caesar salad and the fantastic beef product, which I so readily consumed.

So that is the birthday.