Jury duty, again?

I have to start playing the lottery. I have been called up for jury duty 3 times since 1999. I served on 9/9/99, was called again in April of 2004 and I asked for a delay until October because of our Anniversary cruise. So I had to report on 10/15/04, but the pool was cancelled. Now I had to report again on 12/5/06. I was going to try to get out but decided to go ahead with it. I guess a cancelled pool does not count as having served.

I was called to talk to the lawyers for one trial but I had an out, because they were going to go until the 22nd before breaking for the holidays and we are going on vacation before that. I had my laptop with me but they have no Internet access. I was able to get a week signal from Meeker Hardware (ssid=meeker), but it was encrypted (smart). I had some data to work with so I was able to keep myself busy, but the clerk said something about techs being able to "work from here" and "use their cellphones" but with no Internet connection the first was out and I you cannot bring in a cellphone with a camera in it.

After we were released I asked the clerk who I should send a note to about the possibility of getting Internet access installed there. I think that business people would be more willing to serve if they knew they could get access to email and other work resources while waiting in the jury room for 8 hours. Maybe CM/IT could get the contract.

Suckin' up the backyard leaves.

Geotagging Revisited

I have discovered that you can automatically tag a photo if you have a GPS receiver turned on while you are taking your photos and the time signatures on the photos and the GPS track are in synch, and then have an application which can match them up and put the longitude and latitude into the EXIF data. Then, when the photo is posted on an online service like Flickr, it can be located on a map.

I am using the USPhotoMaps program to download the GPS data and create the .gpx file and the WWMX Location Stamper to match up the track data and the photos and stamp the geotag data into them.

End of an Era?

I really can't believe it myself but I think I may be reaching the end of my fanatic ways with NASCAR. I decided this year that I would not be as diligent in watching every race, every lap, and instead watch whole races only when I had the time. As it turned out, toward the end of the season, I had very little time. I missed the second Talladega race, I totally forgot about the second Charlotte race being at night, and I nearly missed the Homestead finale. I saw only about the last 40 laps when I caught the fact that it was still on when in Stew Leonards.

I guess that when I wrenched myself away from it, I found it somewhat liberating and I started to lose interest, believe it or not. I guess with Mark Martin retiring, I have finally lost most of the people who were in it when I started getting really interested back in 1989. I watched the races I could see with relish when I was a kid, lost touch during the Navy and college years, when I really watched very little TV, and did not pursue it when I had the time, in the 80's until I discovered that they carried nearly every race of the season on cable.


The first one I remember seeing was the finale race of 1989, when Rusty Wallace won the Cup. I started in watching the races regularly the next season, when Dale Earnhardt started his rise, winning in '90, '91, '93, and '94. Then Jeff Gordon came along and started his streak, winning 3 of the last 4 in the 90's. In the 2000's, Winston went away and Nextel came into the picture. Next year, Toyota enters the series and in 2008 the "Car of Tomorrow" will be used.


I will probably not stop watching completely, and might even change my mind completely by next February, but I think it may really be the end of an era.

More political cartoon high-jinks

These showed up back-to-back in on my cartoon page this morning.

Filmloop

This is pretty cool.

I gave out a Flickr Minicard

I gave out one of my Flickr cards yesterday to a customer who was considering getting a digital camera. I pointed out how digital photography is so much fun and how you can post your photos online for friends and family to see. I am carrying them with me now. I missed a chance last week to give one out. When my free ones are gone, I will probably order some.

Political cartoon update

Tom Toles posted the first cartoon on 10/29 and the second one today, 11/9. Pretty funny. (Click on image to enlarge)

Nerd comics

Would anyone other than a complete computer nerd get this comic? (Click on it to see it bigger)

Katamari Ball!

I just saw this Traveler's Insurance ad on TV and thought "Katamari". I love what they can do these days with computer generated images.

Cannibal pumpkin

Cannibal pumpkin
Originally uploaded by Plutor.

Our daughter-in-law came up with this excellent Jack O' Lantern for this Halloween. Very creative.

(Update, 11/9/06) Maureen 'fessed up that she had gotten the idea for this jack'o'lantern from this pic she saw online.

I'm syncing over Bluetooth

I finally got my Tungsten T3 syncing with Palm Desktop on my Win XP laptop over Bluetooth. I had been trying to do it and finally found a post on the web about creating a profile on the PDA for the Bluetooth which worked and to select "Modem" on the PC and to select a pseudo COM port created to use the Bluetooth connection. Now if I could just charge the battery wirelessly, I'd be all set.

I've found geotagging

Pretty punkins all in a row
Originally uploaded by GeoffNascar.

I have found that you can geotag a photo in Flickr to show where it was taken. I love this. I was actually thinking recently that putting GPS into a digital camera would allow you to do this automatically. I also see that Flickr will detect geotagging data in EXIF data in a photo which was tagged somewhere else. So it makes sense that a camera should be able to do this.

Breakfast in Ogunquit

Breakfast
Originally uploaded by GeoffNascar.

Pieter and Nicole came to America this week and we went on a tour of New England with them. We had great weather until the last day, when it clouded up and rained a bit. Ellyn and I got to do some kayaking and the kayaks were great storage for bringing back the loot from shopping.

Conservatives only think with half their brains.

Find the money? For crying out loud, we HAD the money before the numb-nuts Republicans got into office and tossed it to the four winds with rebates and tax cuts. We had the budget and the deficit under control under Clinton and all that was shit-canned in 2000. We would also have a lot more money if we were not throwing it by the truck-loads down the rathole known as "Bushes Dirty War". If we want to "vote all these things in", we have to first vote all the Republicans OUT!

(Update: 11/9/06) DONE! YAY!

Yom Kippur in Boston

We are spending the High Holy Days in the Boston area at Temple Shir Tikva. Rabbi Gold is much more inspiring to us than anything we could get in Danbury. Plus, we get to worship with Brian.

History Lesson?

Not a good post title but here goes. On Thursday I was working at the home of one of our business clients who owns an insurance agency. We had done some work on his office machines and he hired us (CM/IT, specifically me) to fix his daughter's laptop (severely hijacked) and his Vaio minitower. I was sitting at the kitchen table and his two younger kids were getting ready to go outside and I commented to his youngest daughter about the logo on her shirt, which had the shape of a famous ice cream company but it said "Frozen-Assets" with to dots (a german umlaut) over the "o". She said it was the name of her Nanna's boat. I mentioned how it looked like the Haagen-Dazs logo and she and her brother both said "Yeah, our Great-grandfather founded Haagen-Dazs". "Eh?", I retorted. "Yeah and I was named after him", said the brother, Reuben. "But he sold it to Pillsbury". "For a lot of money, I bet". "Yeah".

I mentioned it to their Mother later and it was her Grandfather, Reuben Mattus, who founded Haagen-Dazs. I meet some interesting people in this job.

Job crisis

So I suddenly got a job offer from a company I interviewed with last winter called and offered me a fulltime, 2 month contract job at Praxair in Danbury. Although the hourly rate was less than I was getting at CM/IT, it would be a guaranteed 40 hours/week for 2 months with a possibility of an extension beyond that, and, if it was not extended, there was an 80% chance the hiring company would pull me back into their organization. I would have a choice of full or part time then. Sounded pretty good, especially since I had not been getting very many hours with CM/IT lately.

When I talked with Sandra about it, she started talking about different projects she could put me into and started offering not only more hours, but a guaranteed 20 hours/week. Guess she thought I was valuable. Truth is, I like working for CM/IT and have created a relationship with my clientele so I decided to stay. Pretty dumb, huh?

I also wanted to keep some flexibility in my daily schedule. I will have to book some office time when I am not scheduled for any clients to make up the 20 weekly hours but I don't mind that.

T. M. X. Elmo

Ten years after "Tickle-me Elmo", the latest incarnation does acrobatics. We saw this guy on GMA this morning and everyone was really laughing at him. He sits down, bangs his hand on the floor, lies on his back, lies on his stomach, and, at the end of his fit, stands back up on his feet.

Star Trek TOS Updated!

Wow! They are returning TOS to TV with new digitally mastered special effects. I have got to see this. I checked it out on the TiVo and found two episodes on G4 on Saturday but not sure if they are the updated ones. Guess I will find out.

What about Daddy?

This is so cute! I would be tempted to buy it just to see what they put in it. Actually there are some sample pages. Hits the Conservatives right where they live. I can't imagine what a similar book called "Why Daddy is a Republican" would contain. But here is a possible list for them to start with.

Able and Baker

This comic is very funny. Thanks to Brian for putting me on to it.

Manbag?

So I got tired of having to chase all over for all my stuff before leaving the house to go on a job. Cell phone, Bluetooth earpiece, GPS, XM radio, iPod, PDA, headphones, I was always forgetting something. So I dug around in the attic and found this discarded leather bag of Ellyn's which didn't look too "girly" and was a good size to hold everything. Is it too "hip" for a 57-year-old? Am I too late for this trend? Has it already passed?

Woo-hoo! Free PDA!

Tungsten T3. A nice perk for an IT job well done.

So I was working at a business here in Danbury which I had worked at before, fixing some problems they had and configuring some new software. I had seen that they had a couple of PDAs around and had heard that they were unused. They currently only used the desktop software for keeping schedules and contact lists and they wanted to view the same DB from the two computers. While I was working I asked the owner if he ever used the Tungsten. I had already checked and seen that the battery was dead. He said he bought them but never used them. I also asked if he had the sync cord. He said it might be around somewhere. So I asked him if he would be willing to sell it. I had been thinking of getting a new one, since I had been using Ellyn's old IBM Workpad for several years now.

So I asked what he wanted for it. He wasn't sure how much he paid for it or what it would be worth. I checked on eBay and they covered a pretty wide spectrum of prices. I told him I would give him $30 and he seemed hesitant, so I tried $50. He told me to haggle it out with his secretary.

So after he was gone and I was ready to leave, I gave my card to the secretary and have her charge me the $40 we had finally settled on. She started, then gave me back the card and said to just take it, that I had done a lot of work for them and he would never miss it.

It is missing its sync cable but they can be had pretty inexpensively plus it works in Ellyn's Zire cradle, which is how I charged it and synched over my Workpad data.

Our anniversary party

The 20th anniversary living in Danbury party went over very well. Everyone did not come at once but spaced out very nicely over the day and the weather cooperated very well. After several days of rain, it broken Sunday morning and the sun was actually out for a lot of the day. There seemed to be plenty of food for everyone and there was a lot of schmoozing and visiting going on. We even got to meet a few of our neighbors. Logan and Brian were here from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning. We got a great picture to supplement the one we took 20 years ago in front of our new (at that time) house.

If only

Surprising Covers

Today on XM radio, I heard Neil Diamond's Kentucky Woman covered by Deep Purple. Ouch!

Guess I'll have to get one

How did we get so lucky

For the second time recently, I heard about one of our friends whose kids have, for the most part, disowned them, or visa versa. Neither Ellyn nor I can believe that they have accepted this. We are relatively close to our kids, and also to our siblings and parents, for the most part, and if we were not, it would be very tragic. I am not sure what it is that we did right during "the dark years" of Logan and Brian's up-bringing (just kidding of course, which might be it), but we certainly have not disowned them and, I think, they not us, and we are very interested in everything that is going on in their lives and are always glad to see them or hear from them when we get the chance.

I gave my Dad a call on Friday because it was his 81st birthday and I think he was glad to hear from me. We didn't have much to talk about because I just saw him last month, but it was a nice call and I will do it again sometime before the end of the year.

Kick-ass rock guitarists - Robin Trower

robin trower lyrics

a - z LYRICS

Speaking of back to school...

...how about this shot from 1990 of Logan and Brian heading back to school?


by geoff0522

Back to School

I'm glad we don't have to go through the "back to school" drill any more.

Hard work

Well, I have finished pouring the floor to our new shower, and it looks pretty good, if I do say so myself. I need to get the tile guy in to take a look and let me know if I need to correct any possible problems before they come in on 8/23 to start setting tile.

Good product naming

Assos Women's H F.I. Lady Cycling Shorts

I was a baaaaad boy.

So the good news is that our 11-year-old van with 165,000 miles on it, which I have been somewhat lax about keeping up to date on its maintenance, passed its CT emissions test. Whew! Now we can renew its registration. The bad news is, it will be due again in about 1 1/2 years, since I was about 6 months delinquent in getting it tested. Oops. Now we will probably also have to cough up another $20 in fines for doing it late.

Fix ups

After 20 years, we have new garage doors. The old ones had started rotting out. I had painted them twice and took out glass windows (after Brian put his hand through one while playing hockey in the driveway), put in wood, then took out the wood and put in plexiglass. I also backed Ellyn's car into one of them from the inside. So it was time for some nice, new, tightly sealed and insulated doors. They look nice. And they will never need painting.




Now I just have to fix the broken siding from the hockey playing in the driveway.

Bang, Pow, Bam!

So I'm working on Wednesday in an industrial part of Georgetown and the power goes out. The person there says it has been happening a lot because there is some construction going on. She checks with the CL&P guy outside and he turns it right back on. Then, about 15 minutes later, it goes off again. But this time we also hear some banging sounds in the outside wall. We listen for a while and then realize they are coming from outside the window. We look and there is an electrical wire hanging down in the street doing St. Vitus' dance in the street, with sparks shooting all over the place. Luckily (ha!) there is a CL&P truck right down the street, with its cherry picker...um...up. Hmm. So we run into the next office and look up the side of the building to where the wired used to attach. there is a flaming stub of wire where the dummy in the truck (allegedly) sheered it off. Oops. So I guess my job there was over and everyone else's, for a while at least. As I left the CL&P guy was in his truck talking with someone, I guess to order more wire.

I started my second blog

I am trying an experiment. I am going to use my new blog, "Blog This!", to post stuff that angers me each day. I am hoping it will work as an outlet for my anger. Not that I get angry all that often but I'll bet there is at least one thing I see, hear, or experience each day that will warrant a post.

Fallout

Well, maybe we have some fallout from Ellyn's laptop dousing. The fan that cools her processor has died.



I sent for a new one. Hope it comes fast. The laptop will not start up without it.

Fun with Supermarkets

I love to walk around in Chinese or Japanese supermarkets, not because I like the food, that is Ellyn, but because I like to look for the unusual food items that I would not THINK of eating. I had our digital camera yesterday when we were in Super 88 Market in Boston and got some pictures of beef pizzle, aloe vera soda, and some others. Look on Flickr to see them.

In search of the perfect headphones

I love my iPod. Well, ok, so I lost my iPod shuffle and now have an iPod nano, but I love it. However, the earbud earphones do not love me. I cannot keep them in my ears. I bought some EarJams add-on parts to get them further into the ear canals but they still would slip out when my ears got sweaty. I have a pair of behind-the-head Radio Shack phones which work really well. I have also tried the ones with wires that pass over the ears but it seems they never keep the earpiece close enough and they feel like they are falling out.



Now I have learned about a Logitech set of wireless Bluetooth headsets. They are also behind-the-head and there is a Bluetooth transmitter you attach to the iPod, They make one specifically for the iPod but they are only for the full size one, not the nano, mini, or shuffle. The others are for all MP3 players.

So I sent for a pair for just $50. I hope they come soon. I love new gadgets.

Oops!

Ellyn suddenly exclaimed "Shit, I just spilled water on my laptop". I jumped. I flipped it over on its keyboard and grabbed a can of compressed air and blew as much water out as I could. Ellyn unplugged it and I pulled the battery. I then pulled the keyboard, disk drive, CD drive, memory cards, and wireless network card. I blew and dabbed out as much liquid as I could reach and then baked the parts in the oven heated to 170 and then turned off. I left it in there for about an hour then put it all back together. It is working fine. Hopefully it will be ok.

CBYD, damn it!

This affected Logan and Maureen's condo last night, as well as BUMC the next day. D'oh!

More shopping automation

Our local Stop & Shop has put in the Shopping Buddy. It is a little computer which you put on your cart and a scanner wand to scan your items as you pick them up. Then you pull up to a checkout stand and pay for them. Very slick. Probably adds a little time to the actual shopping time but, if you get your bags first, or bring your own, you do not have to unload the cart except into your car. Technology is fun!