That is a tough call. We all have doubts about decisions and once the decision button is hit... more doubts. First and foremost, you have chosen a lovely stove top. My cast iron griddle is almost 90% out and on two burners or the center big single. I've gone back to basics the past few years...chop by hand, toast, and no longer use countertop appliances. It is my therapy to cook with good ingredients and fresh. I do often have 4 burners going because i multi-task and enjoy prepping for the week and making stocks and sauces. Panini i just put a heavy enameled pot on top. It does become intuitive for any love of cooking. French top? Not sure. I actually think i have one in my summer home. Maybe? It is a wood fired stove with a solid thick iron top and i slide pots over and away and such a fun way to cook. Adjusts with this and that to give air flow over different parts of the top. I do like the slide around of the heat. On a flat surface. Under your possible french top would be a single burner? Still has a slide ability to reduce a strong simmer to a very low heat. But you could do that on a grate top, 6 burner with a griddle. Not all restaurant trained chefs actually know how to cook BTW. Judging by many mediocre meals i have had out in NYC. No love and a bit like robots. An old friend of mine was on Iron Chef and won but that is an exception. To truely love what you are doing and are passionate about cooking, you will know what you need and work with what you decide.

Interesting thoughts -- we could all improve on paperwork storage in our homes. Two things I think I'm doing well that differ from the above mentioned Script, and someone else might find some ideas in my methods: Taxes. Yes, like Script, I am scrupulous about maintaining records for my taxes. About a dozen years ago I went to the office supply and bought two big boxes of BRIGHT GREEN folders (green like money). I labeled them Taxes 2000 ... Taxes 2001 ... Taxes 2002 ... Taxes 2003 ... and so on. Given my family's typical lifespan, I made enough green folders to take me to age 110 -- probably more than I'll need, but I'm ready! They're all stored in my file cabinet, taking up very little space. Now when I receive anything tax-related -- a charitable receipt, an end-of-the-year bank statement, whatever -- I have a place to file it. In April, I have a place to file a copy of my taxes, and I can go back and see previous tax years. For the rest of my life, this system is in place. Death folder. Ours is a notebook. Two identical notebooks, actually, since we have two children. Our girls are young adults now, but they've never dealt with an estate -- even if they don't open it 'til they're old, it'll be useful to them. It contains a lot of stuff: - A personal letter to the two of them - A list of our wishes about funeral and items we'd like donated to various family members or charities - A list of things they must do immediately; it starts with going to our house and taking possession of the dog, but it also includes small details like canceling our voting registration and destroying any medicines in the house. At every turn this list includes addresses and phone numbers, including the lawyer we suggest for probate, the funeral home our family's always used, and family members who should be contacted. - A copy our will; they know what's in it -- everything split between the two of them - A list of our financial assets -- bank accounts, investments, insurance, deeds/maps of real estate ... when our youngest became a legal adult, we made the two girls co-beneficiaries of every account; note that this was done before either was married, so our two kids -- not future son-in-laws -- will own these items. - A list of the bills we pay each month -- electricity, phone, even the guy who cuts our grass. - Official copies of our birth certificates, our marriage certificates, and the girls' birth certificates -- they might not be needed, but the girls won't have to scramble to find them - A flashdrive with all of the above in digital format plus photographs that might be useful in putting together the funeral Our rule: We keep two years of tax returns in the notebooks ... the reason being that someday an accountant will file our final estate tax return, and he or she will want our last two years of returns -- so every April we pull out the notebook, discard one old return and insert the newest ... so our rule is that every April we look over the notebook and update anything that's changed. For example, last year we changed bank accounts, and someday we hope to add items concerning grandchildren to the book. Our girls know that the notebooks are stored in the safe, and they know where the key to the safe is hidden, and they know it's labeled with a misleading name so that a thief wouldn't look at it twice. Last thought on this notebook: Though this project took us the better part of a year --- we kept remembering one more thing, one more thing that really should be included -- we didn't find it difficult emotionally. I suspect that if we were older and/or one of us were in poor health, it might've been different.

RG- Sorry for spreading the "only time will tell" bug. Good comments regarding the VF pump. Having the ability to adjust to a precise flow and maintain that flow probably has some value for some customers and installers, but this is a niche market. For all the other applications, Ive always been an advocate of applying the right size pump/filter for the application and applying proper piping to the system for the flow desired with routine maintenance on the filter to avoid system inefficiency. The fact remains that VF will increase speed and power to overcome these system shortfalls and this will cost the homeowner money. At what point does the homeowner get a warning that the system needs maintenance. With a non-variable flow pump, the answer is system pressure. With a variable flow pump, when is the signal sent to the homeowner that something is wrong and how much money has this cost the homeowner due to a system that is not operating efficiently. If the answer is system pressure also, then what is the value of having a variable flow technology when a variable speed (VS or 2-speed) or even a 1 speed will do the same for the homeowner. Kelly- Although the goal of achieving 2 speed pricing with improved efficiency sounds good, the reality of variable speed technology cost will prevent this from happening. Rare earth permanent magnet motors coupled with variable frequency drives is an expensive combination. To cut costs, the rare earth magnets will have to go and then we are back to the good ole PSC technology which is what we have in 2 speed pumps today. There may be some cost opportunity on the drive side of the design, as the current drive is a Cadillac when a Yugo will do for these pool applications, unless the VF market takes off, which will require the Cadillac drive and require the higher cost as a result. My guess is this will remain a niche market. The reality is variable speed technology is expensive and from my HVAC experience, has always fallen short on value offered vs. price. On the other hand, there may be market for a de-featured multi-speed pump with a "yugo" variable speed drive and a high efficiency PSC motor that will fall at the same price point of todays 2 speed, with the advantage of having more than 2 speeds. I could see this being a very real product in the near future with recent technology advances in drives. But, todays VF and VS offerings cost too much and fall short on the value they offer over a 2 speed, in my opinion. Kinda related..I have not been able to find anything from Jandy on their variable speed product. Have you seen anything yet? Maybe their offering has the lower price point (less expensive drive) and better efficiency at higher rpm with the Jandy impeller. Just curious, because obviously Jandy is not spending much money on advertising or marketing for their variable speed product. Tres- Good idea on comparisons between VS/VF and 2-speed/1-speed. This type of testing would have to be done on the same pool system to take piping size and hydraulics out of the equation and look at true power consumption differences between the technologies. Then on top of that, you will find that each technology will have a sweet spot on efficiency. The 1 speeds and 2 speeds will perform better at higher flow applications, the variable speeds with permanent magnet motors will perform better at low flow applications. So the results would have to be reported at different daily duty cycles.example, daily power consumed at X hours of high flow and Y hours of low flow, high flow only applications, low flow only applications, etc. Maybe this is the data that RG is referring to..I hope so and will be waiting to see this comparison data also. I have not seen a significant increase in my electricity bill either with my two 2 speed pumps and two 1 speed pumps, but as you indicate, all other appliances and loads on those appliances mask the true energy consumed by just the pool itself. I have 3 AC units that are running a lot during these dog days of summer along with the pool pumps getting a lot more daily use this time of year (especially the 3HP slide pump), so it really becomes convoluted. During the winter, our electricy bills are very low, less than $40/month. This is because the two one speed pumps are winterized and the two 2-speeds only run a few hours a day at low speed. We have gas heat so the only electricity demand for HVAC is the small indoor fan motors. We really like our winter electricity bills! Subl1002- Right on.apples to oranges comparisons that are misleading. I think Pentair should do themselves a favor and take their energy calculator off their site or at least give an option for a 2 speed comparison. Also, think the energy companies should focus on proper plumbing and pipe size standards for the pool industry rather than focusing on the pump efficiency. The pump will only consume as much power at the system demands, so why not focus on ways to minimize the demand. Im really surprised what RG said related to oversizing pumps in California. I would have thought they would have been early adopters of properly sizing pumps, filters and piping before any one elseoh well.so much for logic. This is the problem with power companies and government officials.they dont always see the big picture and always go to the component suppliers and burden them with improved efficiency but at a higher price. Case in point, in 2006, all AC units had to have 13 SEER minimum efficiency level. The HVAC industry lobbied hard for 12 SEER (which is slightly lower efficiency but at a much better cost) but our government with heavy California CEC influence passed the higher effiency 13 SEER requirement. Well, guess what.now consumers are buying a lot more window units due to cost of the 13 SEER equipment which is now burdening the power companies with higher demand because these window units are terribly inefficient. We showed this trend data to CEC officials recently and they said "Oh my.this is not what we intended at all".yep and thats what happens when you dont balance cost vs value and lose sight of the big picture. In the case of pool pumps, if the CEC ever mandates the Pentair pumps then the power companies will see a higher power demand as a result because these pumps are so inefficient at higher speeds. Hopefully the power companies realize this and are working with the CEC to mold their policies. Colt 357- YeahI thought the same thing.180K units sold per year..thats a lot. I am very surpised that your price point was lowered considering copper, steel and aluminum commodities have increased by 50% just in the last year. This is having a major impact on our HVAC pricing these days and there is a lot of copper, steel and aluminum in these pool pumps also. I dont think this version of variable speed is the future. I do, however think that a low cost variation of this technology with a few speed options will do well. This whole VF value story is not very sound in my opinion and the current VS pump is technology overkill for most pools in my opinion with the only value being replacing multiple pumps with one pump that will save some initial investment. Whew.I need to go rest my typing fingers and do some beverage curling at poolside now.

I thank each of you for all the lovely comments, but that lower left center section drives me beserk. I can "see" the misalignment from 12 feet away. Since the paper is still firmly attached to the back of the block, and as my next "project," I'm going to pick the stitches out of that section and see if I can realign it and set it in properly. Of course, I stitched the pieces together with about 247 stitches to the inch. If the fix works I'll post a photo. If it doesn't...I'll have a colourful dust cloth. (Not really; it will become a throw pillow cover no matter what.) So, I'm officially a member of this group. I have a "project" for the month of April; let's see if I get it finished. Of course, I didn't specify which April. LOL