Treasures

My wife has been cleaning out everything. The drawers in the kitchen, the walk in closet in our bedroom, the kids' dresser. When I got home today, she tells me I've got to see what she found. One of the many things she found was my first drivers license, from back in the day before holograms and magnetic strips. Here's what I looked like at 16. There were a bunch of other little trinkets and mementos from years ago. My wife put it best, I think, when she said "I found all this stuff from the 80's!!!"

Accomplishment

Ahhhh, it sure is nice to have a few days off in a row!!! I managed to get several things done over the long weekend.

The thing I'm most pleased with is I got the TV that I scored almost a year ago set up. I had tried it out before, quite a while ago, and with the RCA plugs connected to for a DVD player the sound was scratchy. I had wanted to take it apart and see if there was a bad connection between the plugs and he board. Well, the DVD-VCR combo I picked up a few weeks ago doesn't use RCA imputs (well, it can, but it doesn't need to) so I moved things around and hooked it up. Now the sound didn't want to work at all. I opened it up and poked around a little (there sure isn't much in there, less than half the size of a computer motherboard I'd say) but everything looked OK. Oh well, I just ran it through the stereo, and it works and sounds great!!! It is huge compared to the last one (which was a not too shabby 27 inches)

I did a lot of cutting on the tree the other day. I had done a little repair on my chainsaw a few weeks ago, filled in an area of the plastic that had fallen apart with epoxy. It kind of worked, but the bar still is slanted to the side and the chain jumps off the top side. I'm thinking an aluminum backing plate with the bolts going through it might work better. Filled up all the greenery recycling bins, and made my clipper hand sore. It looks alot better, possibly compliant with the fire code!!! I also did quite a bit of weed eating.

I did a little bit of repair on the retaining walls around green palace. Cleaned out the dirt from between the stones and put fresh mortar in where the old had disintegrated away. I even taught my first born how to sling mortar, and he did some himself.

Managed to barbecue some yesterday. That's always fun.

Next thing to do, move the old TV down to the basement...

Memorial

Take time today to remember.


"We're gonna get you yet, Osama!!!"

Desperation

I was actually surprised that I was able to compose yesterday's post. It was rather late when I did so. I was up watching the adaptation of Stephen King's "Desperation" until 11:00. I read this story for the first time a bit over a year ago, and it was good enough that I read it again, and now I may yet again. I think a lot of the reason I had had a block on reading it before this was the way it came out when it was new. It was released at the same time as Richard Bachman's "The Regulators", and both stories had almost the same characters and some similar elements. For those of you that don't know, Richard Bachman was a pseudonym that Stephen King published five novels under before he died of the rare and deadly cancer of the pseudonym. I read and enjoyed these books after his death, but the release of yet another book, postmortem, with the release of Stephen King's latest was way too hokey and contrived for me to buy into. In retrospect, I should have been more open minded, I enjoy most everything either of them write.

There seemed to be very little fanfare to the airing of this movie. I was wondering how it would adapt to the small screen, some stories do fairly well, and others die a slow death. Of course, there is the matter of how to get in all the detail that was in the book in a three hour show (likely less than 2 ½ if you discount the commercials). I have to say, they did a great job!!! One of the best adaptations of a King story I've seen. Of course, not every little nuance made it in, I am fairly sure that one character was completely omitted, as well as many details. I'm going to have to go back to the book and check it out to see if I'm right, and what else was missed when I finish my current read (the protagonist in my current read reminds me in many ways of my freind Sammy, think I'll loan it to him when I'm done).

The thing I wonder about though, is there going to be an adaptation of "The Regulators" now that this one has been made into a movie??? I would love to see that, could use many of the same actors.... Might not be as easily done, though. A higher level of suspension of disbelief.

Before I purchased this book I was looking at it in a bookstore, reading the foreword, written by Stephen King. In his describing the two stories he made mention that "Desperation" was about God, and "The Regulators" was about television, so you could say that both were stories about higher powers. I hope he is appreciating the irony of this one having been made into a made for TV movie!!!

419, Anyone???

419 refers to the section of the Nigerian criminal code wherein people are typically conned out of their money by means of the promise of a big payoff. Over the weekend I received in the mail a letter informing me that I was the winner of $80,000 in unclaimed winnings. Yea, right. It informed me that to collect I should call a phone number that begins with a 950 prefix. Think that won't show as several dollars a minute on my phone bill??? I would have 48 hours in which to process this, and it is only valid until the 28th of this month. What a load, huh??? The letter originated out of the country, from Ontario, Canada. Didn't even have my name and address on the actual envelope, just on an adhesive label stuck to the front. If my spidey senses weren't tingling before, they sure were when I saw that. The whole thing seems hinkey and damned unlikely. I would have thrown it straight into the recycle bin if it wasn't for the kicker.

Here's the kicker: Also enclosed in the envelope was a completely legitimate looking cashier's check for $3900, to be used for the processing fees.

I'm thinking I'll just cash that and call that good enough.

The Half-Chicken Sandwich

We took the family out to Burger King for lunch today. When I got my chicken sandwich, I took a look inside and thought it was a bit odd that for half of my eating, all I'd be getting would be bread!!!
I took it back to the counter, and they exchanged it for one that did a better job of filling its buns!!! No explanation or anything... I could be leaving feedback for them!!!





Of course, one of the major draws there is the play yard. I think the younger had more fun than ever on it this time, he's more confident climbing and such these days. The older thought they should install a rock climbing wall to make more money. He could be right about that...

Hey, someone forgot to take their drink off the roof before they drove off!!! LMAO, I was seconds away from getting an action shot of the cup falling off in an explosion of ice and lemonade!!!



From there we headed over to Toys R Us for the oldest to spend one of his Birthday gift cards. He looked at quite a variety of things, but settled on a couple of Lego sets. I haven't seen him in almost an hour now, it must be good!!!

A day with my Camera

I got up today and got ready to go and pick up the new radiator. My youngest wanted to come along. OK, lets go boy!!! But first, let me grab my camera!!!


You can call him "Hollywood"
I wasn't planning on it on the way out, but the boy did need a haircut. The radiator place is just a little bit from the place that I usually get my hair cut. After missing the turn for the radiator place, I decided to head on and see if they were open at that hour of the morning. The weren't.
After picking up the radiator, we went to the bank. I knew there was a barbers just a couple of doors down from there, but I'd never been there. We walked down to check it out. There was a storefront under construction between the bank and there, and the pigeons were using it as a roost.
I don't know what this apparent bag of water was doing over the door there, perhaps a low-tech security system???

Jessie the barber did a great job, and the boy was cooperative. He looks quite handsome, if not a little surprised by his new look!!!
After the barbers, we went to the dollar store. I did not know they carried octopus there!!! I think I'll pass... Last time I ate octopus, I found it rather chewy and not very flavorful!!!
The hollyhocks are in full bloom. I guess they don't require much water at all!!!

Heartbreak

There was going to be a baby shower for my sister this coming Saturday. I got a message from my father today. Apparently my sister has been sick, and is now in the hospital with pneumonia. Prior to that, she had gotten dizzy and fallen and hurt herself. Her baby died before it was ever born.

God does have his reasons and ways.

Still, it breaks my heart.

Moonshadows

Last Thursday night while I was checking out what Naomi had done to the car, there was a nice full moon. When I first saw it, it was
nicely framed between the bottoms of two trees.
I made a note of it, it looked like a great shot!!! By the time I finished with the car, it had risen past that point, but I got my camera out anyway, and practiced with the settings. The results are pretty decent, I think!!!

Well, that mockingbird's gonna sail away,
We're gonna forget it.
That big, fat moon is gonna shine like a spoon,
But we're gonna let it,
You won't regret it.

Bob Dylan

Wasted Energy

Last Thursday when I got into work, Sammy was complaining about some stupid thing one of the machine operators had done. Just after that I read his horoscope, and THIS was the ending part of it!!! It fits so many things at work so well that I made up this image and printed it out for him to hang in his area.

Today at work, they wanted me to make a tool pretty much backwards to the way it should be done. I discussed with all the other machinists, and even the ones who don't know much about plastics forming agreed it was a pretty stupid idea!!! I printed one out and hung it up in my area. Feel free to do the same, or set this image as your wallpaper on your work computer!!! I can picture it, someone comes up to your desk with their stupid idea, you hit the windows and "D" key, and point to your monitor!!!

Speaking of wallpaper, I finally managed to update my wallpaper page. First time in a while that I've done that. I was updating my cake page with a picture of my firstborn's cake, and figured I could do that easily. I used a great picture of a sunset my dad took in Africa. One of these days I'll update my garage page, my dad got some paint on my car, and its looking GREAT!!!

Ten Years After

Today was the observance of my son's 10th birthday. It was incredibly noisy and chaotic. In other words, a smashing success!!!
He was elated by the gifts we got for him, a couple of Lego Viking sets.

His cousin was able to make it, too, which he was glad for.

Perhaps in the next few days I'll update my cake page and have a picture of his cake. He wanted his Runescape character on it, and it came out pretty good.

He's Back!!!

Didja miss me??? I didn't think so :Þ

What an ordeal the last few days has been!!! I'm in the process of switching my ISP, because the one year introduction price has finished up, and they were wanting more than double!!! Of course, I could get the same rate I had been getting ($14.99) by signing up for an additional $12 worth of services!!! The company I'm changing to is offering the same service for $12.99. On their site, they advertised easy change over, cancel with your current ISP the day after theirs becomes active, and there should be no break in service. Of course, as you may have gathered, that didn't happen. Every day its been the same thing, call tech support, wait on hold for far too long, they say it will be working within the hour... call back when it doesn't, and they say "by the end of the day... at midnight it should be working." Of course, it doesn't. "Oh, its the phone company's fault, they haven't cleared the line". Call them up, and of course they say there is no problem, ect, ect. Now they are saying its probably a physical problem with the line, can they authorize the phone company to send out a technician??? Its a $60 fee to dispatch them, plus $35 per half hour for fixing any problem on the inside lines ifthat'ss where the problem is. I hooked a line to the box on the outside of the house and tried it like that, and guess what??? Doesn't work there, either. Come on, we've had two different providers on these same lines with no problem, now all a sudden there's a problem??? STFU.

Good news and bad news has been the theme of the day. I don't think 512 day should be so. Bad news is its going to be until next Wednesday before a tech comes out and verifies that there is nothing wrong with the lines (or claims there is.... if he does that, OK run a line from the outside box to the modem and show me connection, THEN we'll talk), good news is they gave me a free dial up to get me through until then. In case you don't know or remember, dial up sucks. Like two tin cans and a string, says Aye. I had to dig out my old hub (Netgear, coolest looking piece of networking hardware I've ever owned) and set up a network like that. Oh yea, now my original ISP says they have a plan at the same rate, I just needed to cancel and re order. Thanks a lot.

Bad news, my car developed a hole in the radiator. Pulled that sucker out this morning and took it to the radiator shop. They declared it unfixable. Low quality workmanship, only 32 years and its already falling apart!!! I ordered a replacement, but it won't be in until Monday. Between the new radiator and the new front tires and lifetime alignment I got for it last Friday, I'm within about $100 of my original purchase price!!! Oh yea, the good news, the radiator shop threw in a free radiator cap. Whoooo hoooo.

Bad news, my VCR quit again. I swear, no one makes a reliable VCR anymore!!! I've had almost half a dozen such incidents since I started buying 'em in January of last year. I did get a two year warranty, but when I took it back this time, they said they couldn't fix it. The purchase price was applied to the replacement I was forced to buy. They had a Panasonic for close to what I'd paid, but I've had such negative experience with them and Sony that I'd never buy their products again. Ended up spending another $25 and getting a combination VCR-DVD. So, what was the good news there??? Oh yea, I got a new unit, and didn't have to wait the 6 weeks it usually takes to get service.

Seeing Stars

We only walked a couple blocks down Hollywood Boulevard, and saw several names we knew. What a great reminder of the history of entertainment.
Everybody’s a dreamer and everybody’s a star,
And everybody’s in movies, it doesn’t matter who you are.

There are stars in every city,
In every house and on every street,
And if you walk down Hollywood Boulevard
Their names are written in concrete!

Don’t step on Greta Garbo as you walk down the boulevard,
She looks so weak and fragile that’s why she tried to be so hard

But they turned her into a princess
And they sat her on a throne,
But she turned her back on stardom,
Because she "Vanted to be alone".

You can see all the stars as you walk down hollywood boulevard,
Some that you recognise, some that you’ve hardly even heard of,

People who worked and suffered and struggled for fame,
Some who succeeded and some who suffered in vain.

Rudolph Valentino, looks very much alive,
And he looks up ladies’ dresses as they sadly pass him by.

Avoid stepping on Bela Lugosi
’cos he’s liable to turn and bite,
But stand close by Bette Davis
Because hers was such a lonely life.

If you covered him with garbage,
George Sanders would still have style,
And if you stamped on Mickey Rooney
He would still turn round and smile,

But please don’t tread on dearest Marilyn
’cos she’s not very tough,
She should have been made of iron or steel,
But she was only made of flesh and blood.

Everybody’s a dreamer and everybody’s a star
And everybody’s in show biz, it doesn’t matter who you are.

And those who are successful,
Be always on your guard,
Success walks hand in hand with failure
Along Hollywood Boulevard.

I wish my life was a non-stop hollywood movie show,
A fantasy world of celluloid villains and heroes,

Because celluloid heroes never feel any pain
And celluloid heroes never really die.

Lyrics by The Kinks