a fresh new hell

Alrighty then - let's see where we stand on our resolutions from last year:

First - Take care of this mental state. If I don't, no one else will.

I declare #1 to be a success. I feel like myself and I look like myself and that seems good.

Second - Change the windshield wipers on my car. They suck.

I did this.

Third - Take a walk or a hike.

I did this with hambone the oversized fleabag.

Fourth - I'd like to serve Thanksgiving dinner to other people somewhere...I have to look into who needs volunteers for that and I think my Sister-In-Law would like to do that too.

Fail. I did not look into this at all.

So, what's up for the next year?? I think first I'm going to comment on how my life has changed this year.

I started a part-time thing to help people with their computer problems and have done pretty well. I've taken up both crochet and knitting. I've completed two ponchos and three scarfs. The better part of these things is that I COMPLETED them. I cleaned out my bedroom. There aren't things hiding in the corners...they're leaning against the wall in my living room. I learned how to cook crab legs. I learned that I can have too many crab legs. I've given up going gambling because I'm bored. It's a very expensive - er - habit. This, was a very good year.

So, for next year?

I will...

1. Not eat a million pounds of crab legs.
2. Save more of my PTO.
3. Not use a credit card unless absolutely necessary.
4. Be thankful for what I have.
5. Finish what I start.

So there ya are. New Year's Resolutions for 2010.

I may even keep a few!

There are very few things that make you feel as good as a clean house. Sometimes you clean and don't do it all - just the surface stuff - and there are others when you take the time to do the whole kit and kaboodle.

Well, I threw away stuff that didn't work or I didn't use. I scrubbed floors and furniture. I washed the bedding, towels, and shower curtain. Now I just need to finish the kitchen and living room and the rest of my weekend is free! The other good thing is that the Fall cleaning is just about done...almost in time to get things ready for Christmas.

I purchased a pair of the darn Crocs Shoes on my way to Milwaukee. They ave this wooly inside and they are both comfy and warm. I'm not big on slippers because they're hard to get off, they're too warm, or they've got something on the bottom that's grippy. I don't like grippy slippers.

I love the darn Crocs that I just bought. They're the ugliest things that I've ever owned but very nice to walk in and if my feet don't hurt when I walk in them? I'm happy.

Just in case you're wondering, I just re-subscribed for my...er...6th year with this blog. I haven't been very good at writing lately, but I still believe there are things worth writing about, so, hey, I'm here for at least one more year!

Let the games begin!

Mom and Dad have been here from Florida and we've been having a good time. However, I don't normally drink too much but tonight I decided "what the heck" and threw caution to the wind and had a couple or several glasses of wine. Mom thought that I needed a ride home - and nah, I didn't - Dad thought I was just fine.

Well, Dad thought I was just fine until I let the dog into the bathroom while he was inside - you see, Captain LOVES toilet paper! He LOVES it! Dad didn't know that I'm a bit of a shit when I've been drinking! Oh well, live and learn!

We all had a really nice time! They're coming to my house for pizza on Sunday night...isn't that nice?!? People don't invite themselves over and my sister-in-law did! It's really nice to have a sister like that! Oh well, I'm gonna have a good night!!

OK, so today was the day that I received the replacement screen for the IBM Thinkpad R32. I had taken most of the computer apart already and was only slightly hesitant to start on this job. Well...I started.

There are lots of screws associated with laptops and they are always small. Keep track of the buggers. I took the thing apart from the backside (that's where they hide all of the screws!) and managed to take the keyboard off before I was even slightly puzzled. It all came down to one wire that was not attached to the replacement but was attached to the current one...where does that thing connect to and why? Well, it controls a little light that tells someone that the wifi is attached...I took it off - and then I took the built in wifi card off too. It's encryption standard was from the stone age! HA! Take THAT MR. WIRE!

The actual replacement was stunningly easy. I even managed to keep all of the plastic bits in original shape before I put them back...along with all of the screws! Every time I do something like this it reminds me of putting puzzles together with my Dad. We loved doing puzzles. It looks like I still do!

Lately, I've been on a computer fixing kick. I like helping people with their computers - so I decided, what the heck, I should have the people that I know recommend me to people that I don't know. I'd be able to charge them for my services.

So, I bit the bullet and ordered some business cards to give to friends and others who want to get in contact with me for tech help.

I went to New Prague the other day to help someone solve problems on their computer - like why her printer doesn't work anymore, and how do you get music in your iPod, and oh yea get the malware off of her machine. She, in return, made me a really nice dinner and gave me her old laptop that seems to work perfectly fine. The battery, however, is toast - so, for $41 off of ebay, no worries, new battery!

I'd been looking for a used laptop for my Aunt Marilyn, so I reformatted the hard drive, and put some faster RAM in, put the OS on again, and am now in the middle of installing all of the updates for Windows XP. THAT's going to take a million years.

While I was off grabbing the RAM, I found a new mouse for $5 AND a refurbished all-in-one printer/scanner/copier for $27.

So, all told, by the time I'm done with the thing it'll be faster - and ready to roll for $130. Not bad at all.

Thank you very much for the machine! I know my Aunt will appreciate it and use it well!

Health care reform is being attacked from the right NOT by a spontaneous grassroots movement but by the FOR PROFIT Health Care Industry. Lobbyists for the Health Care Industry have been spending BILLIONS of dollars to block the reform of the Insurance Industry in America.

Be aware that the groups out there are not being honest. They are whipped up ultra-conservative peeps being paid by lobbyists. If you encounter one of these peeps, ask them a couple of questions:

1. Do you have health care?
2. Do you believe that Medicare and Medicade are publicly funded?
3. If you were sick can your health care provider drop you?
4. If you lose your job can you afford to purchase health insurance?
5. In 10 years, how expensive do you believe your health insurance will be without reform?

Yes, we need health care reform.

It's been that long since I logged in and wrote a little something?? Wow. What can I say, I've been busy, well, mostly busy.

I've been concentrating on getting to bed during the work week at about 10:00 or so and that isn't easy for me. It does help that I haven't been taking any naps after work. I believe that I've finally broken through the cycle of sleep deprivation and that took a long time.

For some reason, everything is cheaper on EBay. I purchased a bike carrier for my car that goes into the receiver hitch for $48 and that's with shipping. I also got a lock for the carrier so people don't just take the whole kit and caboodle off of the car...$10 total. I'm pleased with the purchase. This way, I can hook my bike to the back of the car and not have to tote it up and down the stairs all summer long. The carrier also folds down so you can get into the back of the car.

I've been looking at them online and the cheapest I'd found was around $80 at Walmart Online. OK, that's one thing out of the way...well, actually two because my dad wanted me to get the hitch lock. I'm waiting for the end of season bike sale to get one of my own. Dana's is nice, but you never want anything to happen to someone else's stuff. Not that I'm not careful, it just isn't a good thing.

The last thing I have to do is look up the bike paths around the area. Perhaps I'll save that for tomorrow.

I'm typing on the clamshell and it's not as fast as I'd hoped, but, then again, it's not so bad either. It's got the new battery all charged up and happy! So, I guess next weekend would be a good time to head myself to the wilds of Wisconsin and see if anyone would want this lovely machine for a little while.

To tell you the truth, I should probably sell the thing. It's just so freaking cool looking that I'm having a hard time with that little fact.

This weekend I slept late, did the laundry, went to the grocery store, got hollered on by my dad...and then un-hollered on by dad...um, watched a bit of TV and finally figured out that I've got to get out of the house more than I am. I like my house, I just don't have to stay in it all day, every day.

I had a meet-n-greet on Wednesday night. Seems like a nice person. Tomorrow night I'm going to see Chris Isaac at the Mystic Showroom where Linda and I are planning on drooling all over ourselves. I should remember to bring my camera! You know, I don't think I know much of his music, just that he's nice to look at. What a great reason for going to a concert!

It's pretty cool inside tonight, thank GOD. I've been avoiding caffeine like the plague and it seems like tonight I'm getting a little bit sleepy. Hopefully, I won't be staring up at the ceiling for a long time. Well, even if I do, at least the sheets are clean and smell good.

I keep thinking that Twitter and Facebook will be replacing my blog, but I don't write much on Facebook, and I've only entered a contest on Twitter. I really do think I enjoy writing all of my complete nonsense right here in a more anonymous way. You don't need to know me to know how big of a geek I am. Nor do you need to...HOLY CRAP! I just pulled the keyboard right up from this computer. HOW COOL IS THAT?!?

oops.

Anyway, to conclude, I think I shall be able to sleep.

There are times when I realize that I'm a complete freakin' idiot. Today is one of them.

I spent last night making sure that my iTunes library was hooked up on the Mac and then I couldn't move any music from the iTunes store to the portable hard drive. The phrase that comes to mind is WTF?!? I can hook up the hard drive, OS X recognizes all of the files and and I can open them, but I cannot write to the volume.

GRRRRRRRRR

Turns out that OS X and Windows Vista don't play nicely together. The best plan is to erase the hard drive, reformat it under Mac's OS X and use a third party utility to access it under Windows.

THAT means I transfer all of my music and all of my photos that are stored on the darn portable and that takes a million years - reformat the thing and THEN? MOVE EM BACK.

I'm a complete freakin' idiot.

It's taken me 40 years, but I've finally done what the rest of my family is known to do after work. I've had the beer. It's not even a real beer, it's a MGD 64 - and the reason I'm telling you this is that it went straight to my head.

I'm sure that I've only had 3 sips or so.

The whole family would tell you that I'm not much of a drinker, and there's nothing wrong with that. But, for some reason, it felt absolutely right to do this tonight. I need to be so tired and sleepy at 10:00 that I will just fall into bed and stay there.

Now I just need to find the chips.

I have now invested $184 in an obsolete iMac Clamshell because it looks cool. Is there a better reason for doing anything? Yes. However, I believe the money is recoverable.

It now has all working parts - battery, charger, wifi, all of it's keys, optical drive and operating system. Because it's equipped with firewire, there's no reason to upgrade the hard drive - all it needs is some external storage and there ya go.

Now, do I let it go and sell it to someone, OR do I send it to my Aunt Marilyn? I don't know if she knows how to use a Mac. In the meantime, I can take back the old system she has and do a complete referb on it and return it to her. THEN sell the Mac to a friend.

That may be a good solution. Lets go with that!

I received my Planex IEEE802.11n Draft2.0/g/b Compatible Wireless LAN micro USB Adapter in the mail today and with a bit of self-inflicted frustration, finally managed to have it appear on the iMac.

If you happen to have an older Mac -- like I just purchased -- without an airport card, this is a perfect solution. You don't have to open the case (lots of people would be freaked out by this), it eventually installs, and you've got a great wireless machine.

A friend of mine wants it as a starter machine, and was completely bummed out when I told him that it didn't have a wifi connection. This was a great solution as far as I was concerned.

Now all I have to do is figure out how to upgrade the hard drive. That's going to involve money again, isn't it? Crap. Oh well, you only live once.

I think I rode my sister-in-law's bike for about 3 miles and hauled the bike up into my condo. I'm huffing and puffing just like the big bad wolf and sweating like one of the little pigs. I knew that I was out of shape, but you've got to be kidding me! The bike seat is a problem. I have to be able to sit on the seat AND be able to touch the ground and extend my leg when I pedal. Is that too much to ask??

The biggest problem is hauling the bike up the stairs. I thought it would be easier than it was - or perhaps my sister-in-law's bike is incredibly heavy??

I'm STILL panting.

Holy Freakin' Hannah!

I've been trying to see exactly what the difference is between the two iBook computers and my Windows based systems. Here are a few things I have discovered so far:

1. The Close, Minimize and Expand buttons are on the top LEFT of the Apple computers and on the top RIGHT of the PC's

2. I'm not fond of the Finder. OK, I need to find something, I know, I'll look for it in Finder. Geesh.

3. Everyone says that the Mac is so intuitive, I'm expecting things to open and close - ok, mainly close when I close them. They don't close, they seem to think when you exit a program you're going to need them again right away. Crazy.

4. The Apple doesn't seem to be bogged down by anything. The - iBook 386 (I think?) G3 performs just as quickly as the iBook G4. My Windows systems seem to have all of these other programs running in the background you never know when one of them will act up - and it takes a lot of patience to figure out just what each of them is doing. Score one for Apple.

5. They both work with Microsoft Office (I have it installed on both systems) and files can be shared across platforms. Yay!

6. The lack of virus software on the Apples are a HUGE plus.

With me just scratching the tip of the iceberg, that's all I've come up with as of yet. I'm currently typing on the Acer Aspire One. It has a solid state hard-drive that seems to bog down a bit because of scratch-file issues. The memory doesn't release very well. It still my go-to computer in my bedroom because the clamshell doesn't have wifi...er...yet.

I purchased a Planex IEEE802.11n Draft2.0/g/b Compatible Wireless LAN micro USB Adapter - GW-USMICRON from eCost.com it's compatible with USB 1.1 and 2.0 - and works on either a Mac or PC. It's way cheaper than installing an Airport Card. So, wifi will no longer be an issue. I believe I'll either sell the one (it's in great condition!) or give it to my Aunt Marilyn and tell her that at least for now, it's a good solution for her. Heck it even has a handle!

I should go tucky-tuck.