Subtitle: in which I improve the government’s records
Allow me to introduce to you the 2012 SFS Baby Name List. That baby name list is the place to go in case you are wondering what are the most popular baby names in 2012 regardless of how they are spelled. The Social Security baby name list does not adjust the rankings based on alternate spellings (like Catherine/Katherine), but SFS does.
For yet another year, Jacob is NOT the most popular boy’s name in the US – Aiden is. Rather, the name that is pronounced the same as Aiden is the most popular boy’s name in 2012.
Some Stats
- The top 4 names for the boys are the same as 2011, but not the same order except for Aiden at the top spot (what the government said was the most popular name was actually fourth).
- The top 2 names for the girls are the same as 2011, and places 3 and 4 just switched spots (the government got the first and fourth places correct, and switched spots 2 and 3).
- I don’t remember making any name predictions like I did last time, so I have no updates on that.
- Ethan is the highest-ranked boy’s name that has no spelling variations, passing Noah, which passed William from last year. This means that the boy name ‘Ethen’ has dropped off the rolls.
- Girl names still have more spelling variations than boy names (301/1000 vs. 214/1000 alternates)
- The boys still have the name with the highest number of alternate spellings (Aiden with 9 vs. Hailey with 8)
- There were more Sophias and Emmas this year, but fewer Isabellas and Olivias.
- Emma is the highest-ranked girl’s name that has no spelling variations, same as last year. It’s simple enough that it’s hard to vary it.
Click on the link above and peruse to your heart’s content!
Two sons were born to Eber; the name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.
Genesis 10:25
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Thanks to the magazine Machine Design, I have a design to prevent you from ever sleeping past your alarm again:
Whoever tries it first, please let me know how it goes. Remember to arm the snooze button before going to sleep.
Give no sleep to your eyes, Nor slumber to your eyelids;
Proverbs 6:4
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Here is a project for you, if you are unable to think of a good jack-o-lantern design. I’m not saying this one is necessarily good – just that it is a design.
In case your phone is having trouble with the QR code, here is the plain image:
If you do decide to use this design I recommend stretching the corners, rather than fitting the paper to the pumpkin directly, so that the image appears square when viewed through one’s phone. Otherwise the QR reader might not work with the distortion from the spherical shape.
Then You frighten me with dreams
And terrify me by visions;
Job 7:14
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Some of you may be wondering, as I was last week, “Can I stack Trofast?” or “Can you flip the stair-step storage things from IKEA?”
If you are trying to do what we were trying to do, then the answer is this: you can stack them as long as you do not flip them.
TROFAST is a series of organizational furniture from IKEA. There are tall shelves and wide shelves and shelves that resemble a piece from Tetris:
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Subtitle: in which I improve the government’s records
Allow me to introduce to you the 2011 SFS Baby Name List. Some of you may recall that I like to take the Social Security baby name list and reorganize it so that a name is counted only once even if it is spelled different ways. It is that time again, this time it’s the names from 2011.
For yet another year, Jacob is NOT the most popular boy’s name in the US – Aiden is. Rather, the name that is pronounced the same as Aiden is the most popular boy’s name in 2011.
Some Stats
- The top 4 names for the boys are the same as 2010 (the government got the top two names wrong).
- The top 3 names for the girls are the same as 2010 (the government got the top two names right).
- William went up in popularity, as I predicted last year.
- Same thing with Catherine/Katherine. More people spell it with a ‘K’, but the Duchess of Cambridge spells hers with a ‘C’. Both variations increased by about the same amount.
- William is the highest-ranked boy’s name that has no spelling variations.
- Girl names still have more spelling variations than boy names (319/1000 vs. 229/1000 alternates)
- The boys still have the name with the highest number of alternate spellings (Jayden/Aiden with 9 vs. Hailey/Carly with 8)
- The girls had more new variations added this year. For example: Braelyn/Braelynn, Samiya/Samiyah, and Sloan/Sloane for the girls. Also for example: Bentlee was new, as was Johan/Johann for the boys.
Click on the link above and peruse to your heart’s content!
He brought his household near man by man; and Achan, son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, from the tribe of Judah, was taken.
Joshua 7:18
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Before I start this recap of how I installed my ROFL, I should inform you that ROFL stands for Reverse Osmosis FiLter.
Some of you may recall that we had an iron filter installed several weeks ago. That improved the general quality of the water, but I wanted to ensure that I wouldn’t need to buy bottled water anymore.
So I bought a reverse osmosis filter.
The whole system was about $170. Since bottled water is $5 per case of 24 and we went through about a case a week, it will take 34 weeks to break even. Plus I won’t have to lug those cases home from the store, and I won’t have to take the recycling out every week.
The installation is easy, in theory. When you’re dealing with an old house, nothing goes quite as simply as you hope.
On to the tutorial:
This post will tell you how to install a reverse osmosis filter. Or rather, how I installed mine.
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Intro to Our Water Problems
Our water softener was hurting. It still worked, kind of. It was going through salt like normal, but the water was tasting worse and worse. Salty-ish, in fact.
My wife refused to drink the water, so we were going through dozens of cases of bottled water from Costco. It finally got to me too. When you have to spit out any water that gets in your mouth during your shower, you know something’s not right. So I talked to some people, and got referred to my local hardware store.
I filled up an empty water bottle (we had lots of those available) with our hose water (from before the softener) and took it to the store. The manager guy took it in the back to test it. It took him quite a while.
When he finally came back, he told me that he tested it twice because the numbers were off the chart and he didn’t believe the first test.
Fixing Our Water
For those who are interested: our water has an iron content of 3.5 and a hardness level of 67. I forget the units on those numbers, but I think the hardness involved grains.
The store manager said they had an iron filter that would help, but he wanted the water treatment specialist (and installer) guy to look at our system in person so he could make sure nothing else was wrong. Maybe he thought we connected the water softener backwards or something.
The water treatment guy came out and tested our water. He hadn’t believed the store manager’s results either. Sure enough, he got the same result. Our well was fine and the rest of our system was fine. It’s just the groundwater in our area is very hard. Based on his assessment, we got an iron filter from the store and he installed it.
It cost around $700, but it was well worth it.
Get it? Well worth it…
Ahem.
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This is Alpha, the first-born, when he was 2YO.
This is Beta, the second-born, when he was about 2YO.
This is Gamma, the third-born, when he was about 18MO.
