Sunlaker Journal

Stamping

2011-12-29T16:28:00.002-07:00

Hi, long time no post. I just visited my cousin's blog, Live Love, and Stamp . Take a look. She does some really great work stamping.

My Ride In a Duesenberg

2011-08-22T17:46:00.004-07:00

March 1959, and I was traveling as a passenger in a Duesenberg on a trip from Kansas City to Omaha to see a Classic Car Club show. A fraternity brother of mine at the University of Kansas invited me, and begged a ride for me with a friend of his who owned the Duesenberg. The car had been built in the mid-1930's and restored by its current owner. We drove on the highways (two lane, before the interstates), and my driver liked to push the speed limit. I remember one empty stretch of road in northeastern Kansas. No traffic and he opened up the car to a little over 70 mph. I asked him if the car could go faster, and his reply was, "Definitely, but these are the original tires so don't go fast anymore." (It had an 8 cylinder supercharged engine that could move.)

The car was a real eye-catcher on the drive up. As we traveled through the small towns, people would stare and follow the car as we passed. The fun part was the noise. If you look at the picture, it car has exhaust pipes coming out the hood, down through the fenders and into the mufflers toward the rear of the car. But the driver had modified his car so he could disconnect the headers below the fenders just prior to the bend to go toward the mufflers. And for this trip, the headers were off and the muffler was totally bypassed. The car was LOUD. The people on the sidewalks would hear what they thought was a large truck, and stare in astonishment when they saw the real source of the rumbling: a classic car they had probably never seen before cruising through their town.

It was an adventure of a lifetime, and I remember it like it was yesterday.

Note: photo credit goes to The Nethercutt Collection for their 1933 Duesenberg SJ. Thanks for the use.

Picasa 3 and Photoshop Elements 7

2008-11-06T22:50:00.000-07:00

The end of summer has come and gone. Daytime highs are now in the upper 70s and lower 80s. The 100s are past. Thank goodness. This photo was taken during the last of the humid season in early October, as the sun was starting to set.

I put this up here just to try out the new Picasa 3 Beta software. It works similarly to the older Picasa. I will have to dig and find out more of the differences. Apparently Picasa 3 has a viewer that we can use on the files we see in Windows Explorer. I will have to give that a try. Sounds nice.

Photoshop Elements 7 is out. I got my copy from Amazon.com: only $79 with another $20 rebate since I am upgrading from PE6. A pretty good bargin for Adobe software. Haven't used PE7 much. I hate their intro screenshot when you start the program. It is a blatent add for Photoshop.com, which is a hard sell to get you to pay a monthly fee to park your photos online with Adobe. Yes, there is a free service with very limited photo storage. Oh well, the program seems to work ok.

One of the new features I like about PE7 is the ability to change the old dark grey background with white lettering to get to a lighter background with black letters. I liked PE5, which had white background and black lettering on the menus. Then PE6 went to the photogrey background to have the color photos show up better. Well, the photos were nicer, but I teach Photoshop Elements and leading a class of people who can't hardly see the small white letters is tough. Even I have problems, and I know where the menu items are. So I welcome the change to allow the user to regain black lettering. I will have to see how it works in real life.

Summer In Arizona

2008-09-14T21:49:00.000-07:00

Summer in Arizona, where I live, is a different phenomena. It is like the inverse of living elsewhere. We hibernate in the summer, unless we can get out of town. We did not leave town for our normal break, and so we spent a lot of time indoors with the air conditioner pumped up running almost full blast. Summer in the desert is a bit warm. A cool day is when the high is under 105 deg. Lately the high has only risen to 97 deg, so Fall is almost upon us.

That's why I have worn long sleeve shirts most of the time. Doesn't make much sense does it? Until you understand that I live with a woman (my wife) who is experiencing the elevated normal temps of a woman later in life. I don't want to say menopause, because we have not bothered to define it medically. I just know that she likes the house at 74 and I get cold under 78. So our "compromise" is that she sets the air conditioner a degree or two above where she would like it, and I wear long sleeve shirts.

I am getting out more now that September is upon us. My computer club has started again, and I am taking two online courses in Photography. I am getting a little behind, but that's ok. At least I am up and going again. ttyl

Check 21

2008-06-25T15:21:00.000-07:00

Sometime in 2003, the Federal Government passed a new law which goes by the short name Check 21. It was designed to help banks transition into the 21st Century by allowing for electronic transfer of funds for normal checking, among other things. I ran into this headlong yesterday, and thought I would share this with you.

In the old days, I would write a check and mail it to the recipient to pay a bill. They, in turn, would endorse the check and mail it to their bank, or physically deposit it. Their bank would mail it to my bank and the funds would transfer from bank to bank and into the account of the recipient. The lag time between when I mailed the check and when it cleared my bank was what I called "float". Well, hang on gang, in the 21st Century that "float" time has nearly disappeared, even with a paper check.

I had mailed a check to my homeowners association company on June 4th, the day I wrote the check. They received the check on June 6, and processed it through some kind of electronic scanner which was electrically hooked to my bank and the funds were immediately credited to the homeowners association company account electronically. There was no lag time between when the company received my check and they got credit for the check.

I talked with my bank and they said that many companies now use Check 21 as a part of how they process paper checks. Apparently, as I understand from the info on the Federal Reserve site, checks may now, with the approval of the company and the banks, be processed immediately. All debit and credit transfers happen electronically, and are instantaneous.

Now the reason I ran into this headlong was that I use Quicken to keep up with my finances. And I always download my banks transactions into my Quicken account(s) on my computer. Normally when a check transaction occurs, the data about that transaction that gets downloaded from my bank includes the check number. That makes sense, doesn't it? But with Check 21 transactions, the check number did not get downloaded - just an indication that there had been an electronic transaction for a particular amount on that day to a certain party. No check number. When I saw this the first time, I thought I was going to run into a double payment for my homeowners fees: one for the electronic deduction and one for the check.

It took me 4 phone calls to my bank and the homeowners association company, but I finally figured it out. The homeowners association company had received my check for payment of my HOA fees and had processed it with my bank using the Check 21 capability. My bank showed in their records that my check, with the proper check number, was processed electronically. The fact that Quicken did not receive the check number with the downloaded transaction is a shortcoming of how Quicken communicates with my bank about checks that have undergone the Check 21 process. The bank records, which I was able to verify independently by going to my bank's web site and logging in, showed the right check number had been processed for the payment to my HOA company.

Mystery solved. Welcome to the world of the 21st Century.......

Life After Peanut

2008-06-25T15:07:00.000-07:00

Well, it has been a little time since our dog, Peanut, died and life moves onward. I still will glance down to the right on the floor as I sit at my computer in the evening, because that's where Peanut use to sit and stare at me - hoping for some lap time. And sometimes I think I see a quick shadow of movement, but when I look down of course there is nothing there. He is really gone.

We have been busy with doctor's appointments, running errands, and trying out a new Italian restaurant in the neighborhood. (Surprisingly, the food is great.) All the stuff of normal living. The heat has arrived in the Phoenix area for the summer. Daytime temperatures are now regularly climbing above 110 degrees (F). We dash from garage to parking lot with the car's air conditioning blasting full on, and then into the stores or offices where we are greeted by warm, hot or my word it is so cold that I wish I had brought a sweater kind of air. The offices, in particular, vary temperature enormously.

We are planning a trip this weekend to visit my wife's uncle who lives in California. It will be a nice short road trip, and we will spend a few days with him. He recently lost his wife to cancer, so we will support each other as part of our healing processes. He is a great guy, and we are looking forward to the trip.

Life marches on .........

Peanut - Our Connection

2008-06-12T13:37:00.000-07:00

Peanut and I had a special bond. There was a connection that he and I had, and I could feel it when he looked at me or when he would totally relax and fall asleep in my lap. Our pets can show us they love us, even at the end. I had a similar experience with Peanut. My wife and I were talking with the surgeon prior to the exploratory surgery. Peanut was lying in my lap along my arm with his head wearily placed in the crook of my elbow. He lifted his head only one time, and turned it almost backward to look me in the eye. Contact. He might have known he was in my arms, but he wanted contact with me through his eyes. That look went through to my soul, and I realized that might be the last time we saw each other. They took him shortly after that for the surgery, and he left buried in the towel they had wrapped him in after the ultrasound. I never saw him again. I was not able to be there when he passed on. He was still on the operating table, cold and hard as it was. It breaks my heart to realize that. But at least we had that one last look, intense, and eye to eye. Our connection to last for eternity.

Peanut: 10/12/2000 - 6/9/2008

2008-06-10T18:22:00.000-07:00

I lost my little guy yesterday. He was my best little buddy and friend: Peanut, my 7 pound toy poodle. Peanut was only 7 years old, and was taken away by a fast acting growth inside his abdomen. None of us knew it was there. Not Peanut's vet, my wife, or I knew about it. Peanut knew something was wrong, but could not tell us how badly it hurt. None of us knew until yesterday, after an ultrasound found that there was something lurking inside that was probably preventing him from eating and drinking. The emergency exploratory surgery yesterday afternoon revealed a dark mass, attached to his major organs. The surgeon could not remove it, and thought it was probably pancreatic cancer. It would not have made any difference if we did a biopsy to confirm the cancer. Peanut could not live with it, and could not have survived if they tried to take it out. So my wife and I made the hardest decision we have ever had to make. We asked that Peanut not wake up from his surgery. That the vet allow him to die in peace. Damn, but that was - and is hard.

So this blog today is my tribute to Peanut, my little guy, who adopted me as his master after we brought him home. I will show three pictures of Peanut. The first was taken shortly after we brought him home in December, 2000. He is resting on my arm, a favorite position that we grew to know well over the years.

This next picture was taken three months ago, and shows how he grew into a mature dog who seemed to look to me to answer his questions. I was playing around with a new camera, and took this one of him, sitting on the floor trying to figure out what I was doing with that new black thing. I am so glad I have this photo, one of the last really good shots I have of him.

This third and final photo was taken as I sat on the floor next to him, three days ago. He was lying on his bed, with his eyes almost totally closed. I had a photo class assignment to shoot black and white pictures, and I captured this one of Peanut, never in a thousand years realizing that this would be my last shot of him alive.

He was a brave little guy, and I will miss him terribly. Rest in Peace......

Looking For a New Home

2008-05-19T23:04:00.000-07:00

Well, I am looking for a new home for my website, sunlaker.com. Things are coming together in a mini perfect-storm condition, and it is time to move to a new server and a new provider. I have been paying for the hosting of the web site with a credit card, and today my wonderful bank told me that they are closing this credit card and opening another for me in my name. The problem is that the new one will have a different number and expiration date from my old card.

Put that together with the fact that my web site "host" has disappeared from the internet. Their web site no longer exists! My sunlaker.com is continuing because my original host (that seems to have vanished) had actually resold the server space to me from another vendor. And that vendor is getting paid (I hope) by my credit card. And when my credit card disappears in a 45 days, the payments that keep my web site alive will vanish.

Fine, you say, just tell them the new credit card number. I might, but all contact has to go through the original host that is "selling" me the service. And he has disappeared.....

I contacted a new potential host on the internet today, and they were very nice. They can get my new site up and running in a matter of days. No problem. The web site name, sunlaker.com, is a different story. To change that to the new host company I have to get the old host company to make the change for the web site name. And since they have disappeared, I can't do that! So I have a great name, but can not move it. The web site name is also being paid by this soon to expire credit card, but that is not until October 2008. So that can't timeout until after that date.

So it looks like sunlaker.com and I will part company for a while, maybe forever. Too bad. I liked that name.

Books I Have Read

2008-05-05T11:46:00.000-07:00

I read fiction books to relax my mind, and to escape for a while. I mainly read in the late evenings as I try to turn off my mind from the day's activities. In the late 1990's, after I retired I wanted to conserve my money, but I needed to keep on reading. So I rediscovered the joy of the public library system. Since I normally only like to read a book one time, this was the perfect solution. I started by using the Chandler, AZ library, which had a large collection of books.

I developed my method of using a library. I would walk in and look at the New Books shelves. Chandler had normally two full book cases of new books. I would pick 2 or 3 to read and check them out. If I liked one of the authors, I would look for that author the next time. I branched from the New Books section to the stacks where the books were grouped by author. I would start with the author's oldest published book, and read that author two or three books at a time. If the author held my interest, I would continue until I exhausted the library's supply.

After a few years of reading 2-3 books per week, I realized that I could not always remember whether I had read a book when seeing it upon the library shelf. So I developed a system of tracking what I read using an Excel spread sheet on my home computer. That worked great for a while, until I got over 400 books on the list. So I decided to put the list online.

By this time, 2007, I had transitioned to the Maricopa County library system. The local library gives us access to the Internet so I could now access my list from the library. That way, if I saw a book or author I was not sure about, I could research my books read list and quickly decide if the author was interesting or the book a duplicate of what I had previously read.

I just updated my list today, and put the latest online. So I thought I would share it with you. You are welcome to take a look at my Books I Have Read, and see if there is anything there that interests you. I mainly like legal thrillers, mystery, and military history books. And sometime a good spy novel. Enjoy.

Google - Room with a View

2008-04-09T10:26:00.000-07:00

I gave an overview of Google software to my computer club recently. I concentrated on things I enjoy doing with Google products. The one product I like the most is Google Earth. The definition that Google has inserted into the views are amazing; especially the software's ability to render a 3-D view of the terrain. Google Earth is improved significantly from the old days, and if you don't have the latest version of Google Earth, go and download it right away.

Hidden inside Google Earth is a flight simulator, which you can access by typing Ctrl + Alt + A while in Google Earth. The software will transport you to one of many airports around the globe where you can fly either a propeller aircraft or a fighter jet. Check out the flight simulator's Help menu for flying instructions. The simulator uses Google Earth graphics to render the terrain below you, and you can transition from Earth to simulator and back again if you wish.

I tried to respect Google's admonitions on trademark restrictions, and did not include any definitive views of Google Maps or Google Earth in my write-up. But I wanted to post something that would allow our computer club members to sign up for these extra Google services and enjoy much of Google's free software. My write-up is posted as Google - Room with a View.

Computer Booters Album

2008-04-01T10:51:00.000-07:00

Ok, take a look at this album. Not great, but effective.

My View of Google

2008-03-28T18:02:00.000-07:00

This next week I give a presentation to our computer club on things I like that Google offers. Of course I use the Google search engine, but I also use Google's Image search engine. That can come in handy when trying to find a picture of something in particular. I just found out this week that Google will also let you search blogs. I haven't used that, but it may come in handy.

The other things I like about Google are it's Map and Google Earth. Those are great programs. All are free to download and run on your computer. I also use Google's Picasa, an image manipulation program that is pretty nice for people just getting started with digital cameras. You can clean up the pictures you took very easily.

I also use Google's Blogger, where I write my thoughts from time to time; such as I am doing now. Ok, what else? Oh, Gmail is teriffic. Everyone should have Gmail. Is is a great was to email notes/letters online when you are away from home. Also free. And ---- Google offers a free web site builder, which is also fairly easy. I have one of those web sites.

If you want to start conversations with other people, try looking up Google's Groups. That is a place where people post opinions and facts about most everything. I use that occasionally to find out things related to Quicken, a financial program I use.

There is plenty more, so take at look at google.com to see more.

Photoshop Brushes

2008-02-13T23:49:00.000-07:00

I gave a presentation at our Photoshop Elements meeting tonight. Had a nice sized group of 30 people. I talked about using brushes in Photoshop and Photoshop Elements. Used a very simple example to demonstrate how to use brushes to make a landscape (a very very simple one since my background is not in art, but in engineering). Showed how to add layers and name layers, and why. Showed how to vary the brush shape and opacity, and why. Photoshop Elements has some nice default brushes that can make the painter fairly creative. I also showed the group how to use Adobe Exchange to get free brushes, and where to put them on their computer. I'm not too sure how that part went, because I was tearing through that section fairly fast. Maybe some of them will try it.

I had fun, and was surprised by the applause at the end. I guess my efforts were appreciated. Everyone got (well almost everyone - I ran out of copies) a 5 page tutorial handout that covered most of what I presented. For anyone interested, you can find my Beginning Brushes tutorial at my web site.

I got a kick out of my son tonight. In the presentation, I use the club's projector hooked up to my notebook computer. The screen for the projector is around 8 x 8 ft, fairly large. So much to my surprise, while I am talking to this group of 30 people, my son posts me a text message via Skype and it pops up in the lower right hand corner of the screen. His message was "Hi, what's going on?" I explained to the group that the message was from my son, who was probably wanting to know if I was available for online gaming. I had been using our club's wireless connection during the meeting, so he saw that I was online and naturally sent me a note. He did not know that I was standing in front of a room of people, and that his message would be seen by all. I was a little surprised, to say the least. The internet can catch you that way, if you are not expecting it.

I contacted my son after the meeting to explain why I did not "talk" with him right away. He understood. He is in Texas and I live in Arizona, so Skype is a great free way to communicate - either via text or voice.

Digital Cameras - a New Look

2008-01-29T11:22:00.000-07:00

I thought I knew a lot about digital cameras. I have been taking digital photos for years, and even teaching Photoshop and Photoshop Elements, which process digital pictures. But I am learning some limitations of digital cameras while taking the Digital Darkroom course from Ron Lacey. I never realized how limited my pictures were before.

I have been using a Canon G1 and then a Canon G6, and while these cameras will take pretty good snapshots, they are far from detailed landscape cameras. The lens is the limitation. They have zoom lenses, and that is nice. But the f stop range is only adequate for simpler photos. I have had occasion, in the course I am taking, to want to view photos in a zoomed in condition - say 100 to 300%. And I have found that my pictures do not have a great range of focus. While the photo, for the most part, is in focus there are portions of my shots which always seem to be out of focus. And frankly, I am getting tired of that.

Ron takes pictures with multiple cameras and lenses, including a Canon D40 and a Canon 5D (the top of the line). And the detail in his pictures is amazing. Now I know what detail can look like. And by comparison, my photos are sorely lacking.

In the old days, when I used SLR film cameras (35 mm) I would get excellent range of focus. My best lens had a capability of f1.4 to f16, and at the higher f stops everything was in focus. The problem I had with film cameras was the cost of processing the film and the prints. I just could not afford what I wanted. So when the transition came to digital cameras, I eagerly converted - buying my first Canon G1. And I found I loved the developing cost = one software package (Photoshop Elements) for an all you can develop price. Great.

But now I am beginning to realize that sheer volume of megapixels is not the total answer. My G6 can take photos with 7 megapixels of info in the shot. So my color variation is very good. However, I am discovering that the clarity of my images is limited by the range of the f stop on my camera: f2 to f8. I am also discovering that my older age is a limit. My hands tend to be a tad unsteady when I snap the shots. It also does not help that digital cameras seem to have a longer "keep it steady" time built in as part of capturing the shot.

Ok, this sounds like a bitch session. But really it is just part of my internal process in deciding what kind of digital camera to buy next. I had thought that I wanted the small Canon G9. It is lightweight, portable and has a 12 megapixel photo capture. It also has an image stabilization (is) function, and that is a minimum requirement for my next camera. I had thought the "is" would be enough, but now I am beginning to wonder about the lens capability. I will have to see what I do next. More research, probably.

Digital Darkroom

2008-01-20T13:19:00.000-07:00

I am taking an online course from LVSonline.com, called Digital Darkroom with Photoshop. I have taught Photoshop in the past, and thought I was fairly up to speed on how to do things. But I am learning tons from a guy named Ron Lacey, a photographer who lives in Canada. In the first three lessons Ron has shown us how to use Adobe Camera Raw software that is the front end preprocessor for Photoshop CS3. I never realized how powerful ACR can be. It has an amazing number of built in tools to correct photos before the photo is opened in Photoshop.

I am also struck by how many people have been living with "dull" photos that come from their digital cameras. Wow, if only they knew how to brighten them up. Here is a photo taken by one of my classmates during a balloon festival in Iowa.

After I make some adjustments in Photoshop, the image is brightened considerably.

If only they knew how, it would be so easy. Perhaps our instructor will get to that later. I hope so.

Root Canal Anyone?

2008-01-09T21:51:00.000-07:00

I had a root canal yesterday. It was an upper rear tooth (#14), and the sucker had four humongous roots. Each one of them had to be reamed out thoroughly. I am a little sore today, and perhaps I will survive. We will see.

I had a previous root canal on the right side last spring, and outside of my panic at having the rubber dam installed blocking off my ability to breathe through my mouth, I was fine. The recovery was no problem. The rubber dam thing was some kind of fear of suffocation. You might not understand unless you are like me with tons of allergies and your nose blocked most of the time. Translation: I rarely breathe through my nose. So when someone blocks my mouth under a rubber dam, I tend to panic. Last time they had to give me 1/2 of some kind of pill and wait 30 minutes for the pill to take effect and calm me down.

So this time I elected for the nitrous oxide, which my wife had for one of her root canals. She said she was so relaxed, she almost slept through the procedure. That sounded good to me, so I tried it. I soon found out that this was the wrong approach for me.

Apparently I have weak nostrils. The doctor placed the breathing apparatus over my nose for the gas after he laid me back in his operating chair. The thing was a heavy plastic nose piece with tubes running into it. Since the doctor wanted me to tilt my head to the right, the gas apparatus slid down toward the right side of my nose (gravity at work). This forced my left nostril into a nearly closed position, leaving my right nostril the only vehicle for the nitrous oxide and that other thing we frail people need: oxygen (aka air). I tried to endure it thinking that the gas would make me woozy and I would not give a damn. The problem was that I wanted to keep on living.

So I fought that mask for an hour and a half; most of the time a hairs breadth away from the panic of not being able to breathe. I felt like I was underwater and trying to breathe through one nostril with one of those reed tubes you find on the side of ponds/lakes. I have seen it done in the movies where people breathe through the reed and their mouths. But I have never seen the reed trick using only one nostril.

After 90 minutes of near panic, I finally asked the doctor to take the gas nose piece off. It was a relief to be able to breathe again. By this time my left nostril was totally closed, but my right continued to work overtime to supply me with office air. Thirty minutes later the doc was done with my tooth. All in all, not one of my better root canals.

If any of you all have one, I hope yours goes better.

Post Holiday Storage - Ugh

2008-01-04T15:31:00.000-07:00

I like the holiday season. It looks very festive with all the Christmas lights and wreaths on all the houses. I put mine up this year, at the encouragement of my wife. I installed cup hanger hooks many years ago for hanging lights on the fascia of the house. It makes it easy to hang the string of lights, and even easier to take them down. I jury-rigged some duct tape at the end of an extension pole so the tape forms a little crook. Now all I have to do is use the pole to lift the lights off the hooks and lower the string of lights one hook at a time. And I don't have to climb any ladders to take them down. I do live in a single story house, so I can get away with lowering everything from the ground.

The major problem is always storing the decorations. We live in a retirement community where the people are intended to play golf and drive their golf carts. People are assumed to have rid themselves of all worldly possessions except for golf clubs before they move here. There was no intention to allow people to store anything in the house. Yes we have closets for clothes, but we have no basements, and the only area for storage of large things like boxes is in a crawl space over the garage. Crawl means very little clearance. No standing up. Sitting or hands and knees only. And the only way to reach some of the area is to crawl over and then under the air conditioning tubes that carry the hot/cold fluid from the external heat exchangers to the blower units. The first tube runs parallel to the crawl space floor around 6 inches off the floor. So I crawl over that one. The next air conditioning tube was hung around 14 inches over the floor, so I have to lie on my belly and scoot under that (assuming I have already lifted the boxes over the tube and placed them to the side).

Anyway, it is a pain. I have to use a 15 foot step ladder to get up into the crawl apace. So all boxes are carried up one at a time on the ladder. I had to rig up a pulley on one of the rafters years ago so I could haul up book boxes. So I use the pulley now for heavy stuff.

Well, all is stored now for another year. I will wait until next holiday season to see if I hang lights again.

Photoshop Elements Tutorials

2008-01-01T17:11:00.000-07:00

My new Photoshop Elements tutorials are now up on my web site. I have over 20 tutorials, and they are divided according to the skill level of the user. Hopefully this will help someone out there with their Photoshop Elements program. The tutorials are aimed at helping people clean up their digital pictures that they have captured with their digital cameras (or scanned into the computer).

There really is a lack of tutorials online for Photoshop Elements where you don't have to sign up for a course or a book or some "special" offer. My tutorials are all free to use for your personal learning. Enjoy. In time, I will be adding more to the site.

And for you Photoshop users, most of this will be easy to replicate with your program, if you want to give it a try. You might even discover some new uses for masks. That's right. Photoshop Elements adjustment layers and clipping capability can be used to create masking techniques similar to Photoshop.

For those of you that are yearning for lessons in Photoshop (the full up program), take a look at the myjanee.com site. We will start teaching some new courses in January 2008, and by my calendar that's this month. Watch for coming announcements.

Time Is The Root Of All Evil

2007-12-20T11:57:00.000-07:00

Weird title, isn't it? But during this holiday season, I wonder if people aren't getting a little crazy about their time. The newscasters on TV report how people have less money to spend, and that causes stress during the holidays. I think it is more the lack of time than the lack of money that is driving people crazy.

Most people have enough money to find presents for their relatives and friends. Yes, perhaps they would like more money to buy more elaborate gifts, but it is the compression of so many tasks into so little time that is causing the most grief. I don't know about your area, but people are driving very fast around my city. The speed limit seems to be a law that is not even used as a guidline. In fact, the police report through the newscasters that their photo camera's are targeted to the speed limit plus 11 mph. So most people drive 5 -10 mph over the limit. Those in a "hurry" don't even seem to recognize any speed limit.

Perhaps time is money, as they say. Apparently, time is to be filled with events. And the more events people can cram into their available time, the better off they think they are. People nowadays have so many responsibilities: work to earn an income, parenting to raise the children, relaxation pastimes to clear the mind, exercise to keep healthy and live longer, civic projects because we want to feel a part of the community, club memberships to be with other specific groups of people like us; and the list goes on ---- endlessly for some people. No wonder we feel like the most precious commodity we don't have enough of is time. Money we can earn. But time is evasive.

So perhaps we have unknowingly drifted to much toward the concept that "Time is the Root of All Evil". We would do well to relearn our childhood capability to just sit and dream. Let our minds wander. Just "be" with friends doing unstructured things. Oh, if we could only calm down, and be a little more peaceful. Then the world would be right again. I know it would be for me.

Transition Time

2007-12-03T21:15:00.001-07:00

I like to call this time of the year in Phoenix transition time. I have my own definition for that. In the summer months they (the local weather forecasters) define the start of the Monsoon season as the time when we have over 5 days in a row with the dew point at 55 degrees or over. Generally it is so arid out here that the humidity stays low with a low dew point. But as the summer months roll by the dew point rises as the humidity increases until we have 5 days over 55 degrees dew point. Then the Monsoon season "officially" starts. And then later we have rain. Usually in mid July through August, with a tad more in September. Then things dry up again as the seasonal flow of moisture from the Gulf of Mexico stops its summer flow up to Arizona.

I have just reached Transition Time in my household. I like to define that as 5 consecutive days where my wife does not run the air conditioner at some point during the day. And as of today, we have not had the air conditioner on for 5 days. That means it is cool enough to rely only on the heat cycle of our heat pumps. No more air; winter has officially started in my household. Time to put up the Christmas lights. I need to do that tomorrow. See you around the block.

In Passing

2007-10-21T14:58:00.000-07:00

My wife's mother passed away last Friday, October 19, 2007. She died in the arms of her son in a hospital in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She fought a valiant 2-year battle against dementia, but in the end it was her heart that gave out. Madge was a gracious wife, mother, grandmother, and most importantly (to me) a gracious mother-in-law.

She loved family get-togethers, especially on Thanksgiving and Christmas. She always wanted to host the family meals at her home, and she never complained about cooking for the dozen or so people that would attend. She was a proud mother, and loved her children dearly.

We will all miss her, but we know that at last she has found some peace from her last years of confusion. She can rest now, and know that we all loved her.

Class of 57 Reunion

2007-10-15T23:26:00.000-07:00

I graduated from Shawnee Mission High School, Merriam, Kansas in 1957. This September we had our 50th Anniversary Class Reunion and I went back to Kansas City to attend. We had a graduating class of a little over 600, and we had approximately 350 classmates attend the reunion. I think most of us that attended we were celebrating that we were still alive. I know I was. My wife and I flew in from Phoenix to join the crowd.

The reunion was well organized, including it's own web site. We had events galore, including an outdoor barbecue on Friday night and a dinner/dance at a country club on Saturday. The people who attended went so far as to organize reunions for each of the major grade schools that fed the high school. I went to the Prairie Grade School gathering on Friday morning (class of '53), and it included a guided tour of the grade school by the current principal. I had one teacher run out into the hall and introduce herself (after the principal had passed). She went to Shawnee Mission a couple of years after us and wanted to see if there was anyone in the group that she knew. Nope.

This is a photo of Don Mason, Hugh Myers, Sigrid Myers, and Jim Hixon. Don and Jim were on the basketball team at Prairie. Don went on to become a therapist (counselor), Hugh went into Mechanical Engineering and designed some of the biggest trucks in the world, Sigrid was a nurse, and Jim - well I have no idea what he did. Never did get around to finding out.

The grade school had been rebuilt after burning down in a fire in the 1980's. One of the graduates in our group was on the fund raising committee that helped with the rebuild. The committee donated enough to provide a hardwood floor for the gymnasium. What interested me during the tour was seeing the bank of 20 computers in a computer lab and all the students hard at work with their exercises. Nice facility. And the kids hardly noticed us as we streamed behind them. I think they were forewarned.

This is a group shot of some of my classmates from Prairie Grade School. I went there in the 7th and 8th grades. But was then dragged off to Van Nuys, California by my parents when my dad went to work in LA. He later was transferred back to Kansas City, where I rejoined the students as a Junior at Shawnee Mission.

My classmates at the reunion surprised me by looking old. We have all aged: most are broader of beam and thinner on the top. It was a kick to have people say hi, and to not recognize them right away. And then to see that one facial feature that gave them away (of course, we all had name tags). With one guy, it was his nose. With another, I remembered his smile. Some people, I did not know from Adam. Not even their names. But it was great to say high to all my old friends.

The biggest bonus of the reunion was spending some time with our daughter while we were in the area. She is an attorney in Olathe, Kansas and loves her job. So we got to see her home and office, and dine out a few times. Frankly, I had more fun laughing with her than I did at the reunion. She was a real joy to see.

So, am I glad we went to the Reunion? Yes. Did I have a great time? No, not really. The popular kids from that day and age started up their cliques again at the reunion. And those of that were late to join in high school (started my Junior year, of a 4 year school), were still sitting with our smaller group of friends. I may have done more with my life in terms of accomplishments, but I was reminded of all those lonely hours of high school life as I struggled to make sense out of the world as I knew it. Maybe that's why we go to reunions. We have to discover that we can not reinvent the past. We just learn to be thankful for what we made of our lives after we graduated. At least, that's what I learned.

Photoshop Elements

2007-10-15T23:10:00.000-07:00

Photoshop Elements (PE) is not suppose to be that hard. I started with PE so long ago that I don't remember which version I bought first. I now have PE 5, and will buy PE 6 shortly. I am leading a computer club group that uses PE to work on digital pictures. So I get to buy a new version each year to keep up with what is going on. At this rate, Adobe should support me.

I also buy Photoshop regularly since I help teach some online Photoshop courses at myjanee.com. And I thought that, teaching Photoshop, I would understand Photoshop Elements without much effort. Well the joke is on me. I learned the photo editing part of Photoshop (and PE) fairly well, but my education was lacking with Adobe's Bridge and with the Organizer. So I have spent the last three weeks getting more familiar with PE's Organizer.

I use to think it was fairly worthless, but now that I have hundreds of photos on my hard drives (right - that's plural), I need better organization. So I am getting started with Bridge (for Photoshop) and Organizer (for PE): tagging and keywording the pictures.

I gave a presentation on October 10th to our computer group on how to use PE to build photo albums and get them online so friends can view them. The meeting felt to me like a bust. I had been so revved up, but I lost my energy 2/3 of the way through the meeting. Ever stand in front of a group of people, look into their faces, and see mostly blank stares? I started to pause the meeting and ask them to stand up. But they did not seem to hear my invitation, so I went ahead with my presentation. I should have just sat down. They would have noticed that. Oh well, better luck next time.

Mountain Cabin

2007-05-09T19:52:00.000-07:00

This photo was uploaded during a demonstration for our Computer Booters club in Sun Lakes, AZ. I located the image on my computer using Picasa, and then used the Picasa link to Blogger to upload this to my personal blog. It takes no time at all, and shows how advanced Google is becoming with the interlinking of their software.

The photo shown here is of a modular home, located at approximately 8,000 feet altitude in the Colorado Rockies, just South of Leadville, Colorado. The mountain in the background is approximately 14,000 feet altitude and a part of the Continental Divide. Great country for a view, and some good trout fishing also.

Sun Lakes

2007-05-07T19:25:00.000-07:00

Sun Lakes is a retirement community, located within the Phoenix, Arizona metropolitan area. It is a lovely place to live, and has many activities for everyone.

The community offers swimming at one of its many outdoor pools.

Golfing is one of the most popular wintertime activities in our community.

Great place to live, and an even more fun place to visit.

These photos were uploaded using Picasa and it's Blogger link. This was my first upload using Picasa, and I opted for the 1600 pixel default upload "speed". Unfortunately, the base picture files were in RAW (which Picasa handled easily), and the photos uploaded as very large JPG files. Although the thumbnail images in the blog look small, you will see how truly large the pictures are if you click on any of the thumbnails. Don't forget -- I warned you.

Transition Time

2007-02-15T19:31:00.000-07:00

This time of year, in the Phoenix area, we are between seasons. The chill of January is past, where we had freezing spells and the last leaves on the trees and bushes were frost bitten. Now is a temperate time, when the daytime highs reach the high 60s to the low 80s. We had some rain yesterday evening, so the plants and trees will start to grow again pretty soon. In fact, Valentines Day is a scheduled day to fertilize citrus trees in this part of the state. I am out of that kind of fertilizer, so it may be a day or two more. The heat will begin to rise in March, with April temps starting to drive away the snowbirds that came for the winter. By the time mid May rolls around, the winter folks are long gone and it is just us regulars and the normal 100 plus temperatures. But now is the transition time, when the days are balmy and the evenings are still cool enough to sleep under a blanket or two. Wonderful weather.

Another transition for me is that I just finished an online course I was taking in Dreamweaver, a web site design program. This was the last in a series of three courses on Dreamweaver. Now I know enough to learn more on my own. Applying what I know to web sites may take a little longer.

I gave a presentation last night in Photoshop Elements to one of our local computer club groups. The subject was fairly intense and somewhat complicated. I am afraid I lost some the the audience last night. But a number of people hung in there with me, and seemed to be pleased with what I shared. What I am discovering is that many of the techniques that I have learned to apply with Photoshop also work equally as well with Photoshop Elements. One of these days I will publish what I have presented, and put it on my website. At this time, my notes are just kept on our computer club's web site.

Had a really good meal at Garcias restaurant this afternoon. Now that we are retired, we (my wife and I) seem to end up at restaurants during the mid-afternoon lull. The crowds are gone from the noontime rush, and it is too early for dinner. So we get good seats and hot food at lunchtime prices. And by the time our normal dinnertime runs around, we are still too full to eat any more. So it is a late (7:30 p.m.) snack and we are done for the day. That's the way it goes for retirees. A nice way to be. See ya.....

Photo Loading Test

2007-01-27T19:03:00.000-07:00

I need to do a test to see how and in what order photos load into this blog. Both were added after I typed the first sentence. The bottom photo was loaded first, center position, small. The upper photo was added second, center position, small. It is hard to tell the order unless there is a clearer explanation.

I will try again, with marigolds. The initial picture has marigolds in the foreground, and trees in the background. I will add the photo and click and drag the photo to below this sentence.

After I have positioned that one, I will add the finished marigold graphic, which has a gradient added to the photo to reduce the opacity of the trees at the upper portion of the picture.
This is a tedious process, but it seems to be necessary to have the photos say what I want. Too bad. It is a challenge to drag these photos down the drafted page, since Google allows a limited view of the scrolling preview.

Chinese Satellite Intercept

2007-01-21T23:46:00.000-07:00

The Los Angeles Times and Aviation Week and Space Technology reported that the Chinese government launched a satellite intercept system in January 2007 using a ground based missile, and hit one of their own, aging, weather satellites. The satellite was in an inclined, polar type orbit, at over 500 miles altitude.

Av Week described the incident as a "test" of a satellite intercept system, which would probably mean that the interceptor had on-board sensing capability, navigation, and a course correction maneuvering system. The description of the intercept was depicted as a hit-to-kill impact, which would have meant no on-board explosives. On the other hand, a satellite intercept requires a precise sensor and course correction capability on the interceptor to make a direct hit. Space is a big thing and a hit-to-kill is challenging (although done before by the US some time ago).

The LA Times made it sound like the Chinese "took out" their satellite, which implies possible larger than hit-to-kill impact. The destruction would depend on the closing velocity of the interceptor. I suspect the LA Times was using exaggeration just a little. Past analysis shows that the interceptor will damage a satellite through the kinetic energy of the impact. The US will now use it's space surveillance system to document and track the pieces of the satellite and interceptor after the impact.

Of primary concern is the debris field created by the impact. This altitude region, termed low earth orbit, contains many other satellites from many nations. Any impact on these satellites by the debris could be critical. Over time, the debris will re-enter the earth's atmosphere. But that could take years. The Space Shuttle, flying at a much lower altitude, ran into a paint chip (that was the analysis) and it created a crack in the windshield of the Shuttle. A tiny particle hitting a very solid Mach 20 capable windshield. The bottom line is that small particles can cause serious damage if they hit other satellites with significant velocity.

The other concern is the Chinese have now demonstrated satellite hit-to-kill capability. This potentially puts every low orbit satellite at hostage to the Chinese capability. This includes communication satellites (such as cell phone companies), weather satellites, intelligence gathering satellites, and satellites with other missions. That is potentially a very risky thing for the U.S.

We will have to see what transpires in the months ahead. I do know that the Chinese now have the full attention of the U.S. space planners.

East Valley Tribune Recovers

2007-01-09T11:33:00.000-07:00

On Monday, January 8, 2007, my world was turned upside down - comically speaking. Our local paper, the East Valley Tribune, totally changed the comics page on Monday. They deleted something like 18 of our old comic strips, kept 4, and added 12 strips. Most of the strips they added were ones that I stopped viewing in the 1950's. I sent a letter (via email) to the Editor complaining about the change.

The paper must have received a ton of complaints, because on Tuesday not only did they publish all the "old favorite" comic strips, but they also printed a second page with the comics they failed to publish on Monday. So today I had two full pages of comics to enjoy. I spent a lot of time reading many of them aloud to my wife, who also likes to have a laugh or two in the morning. We are both happy now that our comic strip world has returned to normal.

Dreamweaver and Comics - Nightmares

2007-01-08T18:16:00.000-07:00

Well, I got my notebook computer to the repair people today. They said they would have it fixed in two days. Yeah, I will believe it when I get the call to come and pick it up. lol

I dug into my first lesson of Dreamweaver today with gusto, only to discover that the two prior courses I took in DW did not prepare me for this lesson. I think the material was written by another instructor entirely, rather than the one that taught the first two courses. I will probably try this lesson again another time, but for today I decided that life is too short to worry about understanding it and doing the homework. I may have a PhD, but this lesson was beyond me.

AND - my daily newspaper, the East Valley Tribune, pulled a fast one on its readers today. They totally changed the page with the comic strips. They deleted 18 comic strips, kept 4, and added 12 more. And the ones they added were straight out of the 1950's. Alley Oop, Gasoline Alley, Rex Morgan, M.D., to name a few. And the really bad news is that they dumped all of my favorites, like Pearls Before Swine. They even dumped a strip that they just introduced 4 days ago. It looks like a money driven decision. Fewer comics to pay for, and older comic strips that inherently cost less. I send in my letter to the Editor already. Oh yeah, they used the extra space from the 6 fewer comics to insert a very large print crossword puzzle. We already have 3 crossword puzzles. Who needed more???

That's enough for today. Hope tomorrow gets better.

Progress - of sorts

2007-01-07T22:35:00.000-07:00

Well, my notebook computer went south. I got all my data copied from it onto an external hard drive. Then I tried a clean install of Windows XP; the kind where it reformats the hard drive. Only got 62% done with the reformatting and I got another error message that said it was having problems with the hard drive and had to stop. Now I get nothing out of my notebook. I plan on taking it to the tech support people tomorrow.

The good news is that, since the notebook died, I have been able to do my write up for the Photoshop Elements group that I lead next Wednesday. This month I describe how to create a Valentine's heart out of wood, complete with arrow and Valentines message. The finished product looks like this.

My course started Saturday. It is the third in a series of three courses on Dreamweaver, a web site design and construction course. It is mainly about the code, and how to properly use Dreamweaver software to build a web site. This last course is 6 weeks long, and we post our work online.

Did I tell you that my online web site, sunlaker.com, went kaput in mid-December? Well they finally got it back up, but for the address only. They lost all the data when their server crashed and burned. All I have posted so far is my home page, but absolutely no other pages. I had 37 Mb of pages before, so this will take some time to reload; if I even decide to try. We'll see.

Like I said, "Progress - of sorts."

Error Message ... Error Message

2007-01-05T21:50:00.000-07:00

My notebook computer started acting up a couple of days ago. It did not want to boot-up properly, and started giving me some nasty error messages which either meant that my keyboard had a loose wire or I needed to reload/repair some files in my Windows XP operating system. I did the Win XP repair cycle which only took a couple of hours (ugh). Now the computer is running smoother, but I can't get the wireless antenna to turn on. (do you think it could be my Firewall?) Tech Support says I now need to reinstall the operating system from scratch. And you know what that means. All the data goes bye-bye.

So I have spent the last few hours with an external hard drive plugged into one of the notebook's USB ports backing up my data files. Ever try to figure out where all your data is on a computer? It can be a challenge. I was doing OK with the back up using a click-and-drag technique, until I ran into my video files. Wow. Copying 27 Gigs of videos takes some time. My Adobe Premiere Elements had stuffed all the video files in a Digital Video directory. My back-up is still running with 12 minutes to go. It is late Friday night, so I will probably delay the XP installation until tomorrow. I need a clearer head and lots of patience when I start my reinstall.

The timing on this problem sucks, since I need the notebook to present a lesson next Wednesday at our Computer Club. So - here I am working on this nightmare when I should be preparing the lesson for next week. Plus, I am taking an online class which starts tomorrow. More about that in another blog posting.

Jury Dury - Phoenix Style

2006-12-07T10:58:00.000-07:00

In November, I served on a Jury in Maricopa County, Arizona. The most surprising thing was how many people it took to fill the jury pool for the trials that were scheduled to begin on that particular Monday. 700 people. That's how many people were called up by the county as prospective jurors for that day. And I mean - all 700 had to show up at the Maricopa County Superior Court assembly area in the courthouse by 8:00 a.m. that day. The juror assembly area only had seating for around 400 people, so many just stood or sat on the floor.

The people were assembled into pools, by a computerized random draw, and escorted to the individual court rooms by the judges bailiffs. For trials where the final jury size was to be 8, the jury pool was 35 people. I was selected for two separate jury pools of 35 people each. Not picked for the first trial, but selected as one of the 8 jurors for a second trial. For larger jury sizes, I saw groups of 50 being led out of the jury assembly areas. I assumed these were for trials where they needed 12 jurors.

My particular trial lasted 3 days, and fortunately all the other jurors were open minded and fair when considering the testimonies and the charges. The jury verdict was irrelevant to my comments here. What impressed me the most were the organizational skills required by the Clerk of the Court in Maricopa County (and that office) to run this kind of pool selection process day after day.

I asked later if they only did jury selection on Mondays, and was told that it is an everyday thing, Monday through Friday. The normal juror pool was around 400 new people each day, reporting to the downtown Phoenix courthouse.

I never realized how large a legal system we have to support jury trials. And I never realized how our litigious society is impacting our ordinary law abiding citizens. The newspapers only cover the major, sensational cases, and the TV news shows use the best footage for their 20 second coverage. That is a very small part of what transpires each day of the week in our legal courtrooms. What rides far under the surface of this teaming river of justice are all the families that are impacted just to support our legal system. At 400 people a day, just the downtown location for the Superior Court takes as many as 8,000 people a month away from their work and homes for at least a day. And for those selected to serve on a jury it is many days more.

So just remember the next time an issue comes up on the ballot to modify our legal system, that getting "tougher" on crime will also impact the ordinary citizen when it comes time to serve on a jury. This is not "all for free". There are impacts, and these personal impacts must be traded off against improving our communities while trying for "safer" streets. And you could be the one sitting on the floor of the jury assembly area with 700 other people, while waiting to see if you will be selected for a jury trial that will extend into days, weeks, or months.

This was an interesting lesson in community service.

Dreaming of Dreamweaver

2006-11-30T16:02:00.000-07:00

I am in the middle of my second online course in Dreamweaver, learning about how to put web pages together using Dreamweaver software. It is a challenge, and although Dreamweaver is a tool that can be used to create visual layouts, we spend a lot of time looking at the underlying code of whatever we try to create. I am learning a lot this way. At least I think I am. Only time will tell.

I redid my home page for my sunlaker.com web site. It is now more compact, and I reduced some of the wordiness on the entry page. I keep thinking that I will redesign the other pages sometime, but I really doubt it. I will do new pages and those will have new looks. That would be more fun.

For anyone interested in learning Dreamweaver, take a look at LVS Online. Althea Fox is the instructor and she is very knowledgeable. She teaches a series of 3 six-week courses on Dreamweaver.

Time Flies

2006-09-07T14:03:00.000-07:00

Wow, time sure does fly. Got the new TV. Works great. Problem is - it is so good that now we want to get another one for the family room. But I can not afford that yet.

Started teaching online again. Janee opened a new session on her myjanee.com site, where we are giving instruction in four different classes in Photoshop. Drop in and take a look, if you are interested in learning more about Photoshop. So a busy time has started.

I am also taking an online course in Dreamweaver, a web creation program. That should be fun.

Having a problem on my notebook computer. McAfee related. I was running two older programs from Oct 2005; a virus checker and a firewall. Then McAfee offered me a free upgrade to their new Security Suite. I accepted, and now I can not get my Firefox Browser to open. So I had to uninstall the Security Suite. Got the browser back. That's what I am using for this blog. I now have to do a reinstall on the original programs and see when it hangs up. More work. Ughhh.

That's it for now. Got to go into debug mode.

New TV on Order

2006-08-13T10:41:00.000-07:00

Our old bedroom TV gave out the other day, and I have been researching new TVs online. I talked with my brother-in-law, who is the family expert on HDTV, and he gave me some tips. He bought a DLP HDTV, and has regretted his choice since it comes with a cooling fan that gives out a lot of ambient noise. He has tried to change out the fan on his TV, but the replacement fan is just as loud. The picture is great, but the noise is really irritating.

I was thinking of either a plasma or an LCD TV, and was swayed to the LCD version because it does not have burn in problems. The store salesperson I talked with told me how the newer plasmas have minimized the burn in problem, and I should not have to worry about it. However, he does not suffer from the screen displays that pop up on my TVs at home, reminding us that scheduled programs are available for selection. The pop up has a bright red bar, which would glow for a long time on a plasma in our house. So we have ordered a 40" Samsung LCD HDTV. Since this is for the bedroom, and needs to go against a particular wall, we were limited to no greater than 42".

The TV will be delivered next Wednesday. I know, you are thinking "why didn't he just pay for it and cart it home." "The new LCDs are not that heavy." Right. But by getting them to deliver this new TV, I can also get them to haul away the old cabinet based 35" CRT monster which is now dead. The donating agencies, like Goodwill, only accept TVs that are in working condition.

I also bought a new cabinet, which will be used to carry the new HDTV. The cabinet was built by Bush, which has done an amazing job with their pre-drilled holes and alignment. I brought that home and assembled it over a few days time. I think it took something like 4 dozen screws and wood glue. The store would have charged $50 to assemble any cabinet, and now I know why. It takes so much time and effort.

I will see what the TV is like next Wednesday.

Busy Week

2006-08-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

This has been a busy week. Monday was our anniversary, and I had planned on taking out my wife for dinner. I called the best restaurant in the area for reservations, and was told that they are closed for supper on Sunday and Monday nights. I told the receptionist that next time I would schedule our anniversary for another day. But we went to a fine Italian restaurant, and totally stuffed ourselves. My wife has been on a diet, and so both of us have been downsizing our meal portions. The dinner Monday was humongous. We had a large take-home bag after the meal. Incidently, the food tasted great.

I took in the SUV yesterday morning and had the oil changed, and the tires rotated and balanced. While they were working on the SUV I took a rental car and ran to my doctor's office and picked up my allergy drops. Cool stuff. You don't have to get shots. Just put a few drops in your mouth twice a week.

Yesterday afternoon the cable tech guy came and helped set up my new cable modem. He also gave us a new control and got it working for a second TV. We had to change out the TV the other day when the old TV went kaput.

This morning the air conditioning guy is suppose to come and fix the drain on one of our air conditioning air handlers. It is humid now, during the monsoon season, and we get a lot of moisture dripping off the condensers. There are plastic pipes that are suppose to take the water outside and drip on the ground. But one of the pipes is stopped up and the water is running out of the base of the air handler and down into the air chamber where the unit picks up the air to circulate through the house. So the AC guy will have to cut into the dry wall and replumb the tubing. How do I know? Well, he had to do the same thing last year. I think the remodeling we did this last fall caused enough dust to make the problem happen again. Ugh....

Tomorrow morning the Termite inspector comes for his yearly walk-around. If he sees any signs of termites on the exterior of the house, he will spray again. It is a sweet deal for the bug company. Then the regular monthly bug spray guy will come at noon and spray the house inside and the stones outside (I can't say grass, since this is the Phoenix area and we don't do grass except on golf courses.)

Tomorrow afternoon the Sears guy is scheduled to come and fix our icemaker on the new refrigerator. It keeps getting stuck on the cubes and won't pop them out of the tray.

Friday is scheduled as a day of rest. Thank goodness we are retired, because this is too much to handle if we were working. LOL.....

Cable Modem Problem Resolved

2006-08-02T10:51:00.000-07:00

The Tech from our cable company came out yesterday, and fixed my cable modem problem. He hooked up my new Linksys Cable Modem with my Linksys Wireless Router, and got everything running again. He even helped to be sure my notebook connected wirelessly with the router. It took a little adjustment, and now things are fine.

I use to have the cable modem hookup drop out on me at least sometime during the day for the last few weeks. But since my new modem was installed I haven't had (knock on wood) any drop outs. Frankly, I think the problem was that the firmware in my old Motorola modem was not up to date. (I have had that modem for at least 4 years.) The Tech showed me how to update the firmware on my router using the linksys.com site. I did that last night. Here's hoping the connection lasts.

Picture = 1K Words

2006-07-30T19:40:00.000-07:00

You all deserve to see the rat's nest of wiring I created in trying to resolve my cable modem problem. So that is why I am using this picture. The old modem is the Motorola and the new one is the Linksys. I also have a Linksys Wireless Router to use with my notebook computer. I will probably try tomorrow to see if my ISP can use the MAC address for my new modem so I can hook up to the Internet. Right now I am using the old Motorola. Takes a licking and keeps on ticking. That's why I am tentative about the change out.

Cable Modem Problems

2006-07-28T18:06:00.000-07:00

I have been chasing cable modem problems for the past week or so. (I have high speed cable modem access to the Internet.) I kept getting dropped out of the online game I was playing. At first I believed that it was the game server getting overloaded. And that probably happened some of the time. But not many times. The rest of the time I figured it had something to do with the cable modem hook up. I have had this modem working for several years now, so the connections are well established.

I called my cable company's tech support. You know, the kind where you get this call center and you don't really know what country they are in. The first time I talked with tech support, we did the normal things. Uplugged the modem. Power off, Ethernet out, cable coax disconnect. He thought it might be the power strip, so I replaced the strip with another. Plugged everything back in again. The cable modem did not work. Still no indication of a constant cable connection.

Last night, I went to a local computer store and bought two new ethernet cables and a new cable modem. This morning I replaced the ethernet cables and tried the old cable modem again. Things worked fine. For a couple of hours. Then I lost the link again. The cable modem dropped the link.

So I replaced my old Motorola modem with the new Linksys that I bought last night. Never could get that to work. Called the cable company's tech support again. He had me unplug the modem and then plug it in again. I replaced the cable coax with a new coax, and totally bypassed the power strip by plugging the power into the wall socket direct. Nah. That did not work either. I took the Wireless router out of the link, and that did not work either. Still no line activity to the internet.

I took a break for dinner. Went back to the computer, and hooked up my old Motorola modem. Of course, it works. I have been on the internet for a while now, using the old modem. It did drop out once. I powered it off and recycled it. It reacquired.

I will keep with the old modem until things go bad again. Then I will try another call to tech support. The saga is, no doubt, ongoing..........

118 Degrees

2006-07-23T21:17:00.000-07:00

Couple of days ago we set a new record high for this date of 118 degrees in Phoenix. The day after it cooled down to a balmy 116 deg. Just kidding. This is the hot time of the year, where we have normal highs of around 105 to 108 deg. Tomorrow it is suppose to get down to normal. That will be a nice break. Tonight, as I enter this, it is raining. Thunder and lightning. Part of our monsoon season.

Today was my wife's birthday. She got the normal birthday calls, and I was able to surprise her with my gift. I cooked steak on the grill tonight. I waited until it was a cool 108 deg before I started. I don't like to cook when it is too hot. ;)

Wacom Game Tablet

2006-07-19T12:05:00.000-07:00

Most Wacom tablets are bought for use with drawing programs, like Photoshop. That's why I bought mine. I have one of the higher level tablets, with all the buttons for control of the drawing features. Some people never use theirs. But I have discovered that they also make the greatest game boards.
I have mapped the Ctrl, Shift, F1 and F2 keys to the controls on the left side of my tablet. Now I can use them specifically for game maneuvering. I am playing Conquer, an online RPG, and the game lets you map game functions onto keyboard keys. So I am working with two mappings, and it really does a good job. Now I can avoid the problems that can develop from repetitive mouse use over time. At least this way I can switch back and forth to minimize the strain. Oh, and by the way - the game is fun.

Illness Update

2006-07-19T12:01:00.000-07:00

Good news. My wife is a little better today. The antibiotics seem to be working and she does not seem to be getting worse. Hopefully today will be a day of rest, and her body can begin to heal itself from the pneumonia. Wow, what a long haul for her. Almost a week now, and it really takes it's toll. At least (knock on wood) she has remained outside the hospital this time.

Pneumonia

2006-07-18T11:01:00.000-07:00

Well, it is official now. My wife has pneumonia. She came down with an upper respiratory problem five days ago. Four days ago we saw a PA, who put her on a general antibiotic. She got worse over the weekend, so we saw her doctor yesterday. He gave her a breathing treatment and a shot of antibiotics. Changed her to a more powerful antibiotic, and a medrol pack. Today we got her in for an x-ray, and sure enough it has crept into one of her lungs. Now officially pneumonia. Back home now. Humidifier, expectorant, continuing the medrol pack and the strong antibiotic. Hope that keeps it at bay. She could end up in the hospital if it gets worse. Although all they can do in the hospital is put her on a drip system with the antiobiotic and fluids. We will see what happens.

Cleaning the Water Feature

2006-07-15T10:33:00.000-07:00

I finished my morning coffee, dressed up in my sun protection clothes, put on my mask, kneepads, gloves and large brimmed hat and cleaned up our water feature this morning. Our water feature is an 8 ft long waterfall followed by a 28 ft run under a crossover bridge. I had drained it last week and it was totally dry today. I swept up the sand, dirt, and plant material that had accumulated in the bottom over the last year or so. Then I hosed it down again to wash off the remaining dirt. I have a guy coming out next week to fix my water leveler and I don't want him to go into a long lecture on how to keep my pool clean. Ugh. I don't need the critique. Besides, I cleaned out the filter when I drained the pool, so this was the finishing touch.

I did get it done before the temperature reached 100 deg. Today we are suppose to hit 115 deg. But tomorrow we should experience a cooling trend. It will only get to 110 deg. lol Then we go back down on Monday to our normal daytime highs of 105 deg. Compared to today that will almost be chilly.

Getting Warmer

2006-07-14T10:59:00.000-07:00

Here in Phoenix, it is all about survival during the summer. We do minimal landscaping and have everything on a drip system to conserve water. We grow more rocks than plants. Most people have rocks in their yards and no grass. The temperatures here are climbing, with a forecasted high today of 115 degrees. It is getting so hot here that the weather bureau is forecasting a record overnight low high of 98 degrees. Some people will say that the high temps in Phoenix are ok, since it is a dry heat. Well that might work up to 105 deg, but by the time it hits 115 deg, it is downright HOT. Try breathing the air after getting into your car that has stood outside on a blacktop parking lot for an hour or more and you will understand what 115 deg really means.

But Phoenix relies on the tourist trade, so the local stations tend to play down the weather. For example, the local NBC station was showing its five day forecast the other day, and under the days when the temperature was forecasted to be over 110 deg, they showed the word WARM. They don't want to scare anyone away by saying the weather is actually hot. But we locals know differently. Other stations showed the same days in their forecasts as HOT.

Conquer Online Gaming`

2006-07-13T19:39:00.000-07:00

I have been playing an online game that my son introduced me to a few days ago. The game is named Conquer and it is a free RPG. It is played in real time, and the graphics are very good. You can find more info about it at http://www.conqueronline.com/ . They have links to download the program. I recommend downloading from the Site 2 (FTP) server, rather than the Site 1 server. The Site 1 server used BitComet which speeds the download and is probably necessary if you are on dial-up. But BitComet uses a PTP protocol which gives others access to your computer so they in turn can speed their download. But with the all the concern about PTP sharing, I just used the FTP link and it went fast enough (I have a cable modem) .

It is easy to play, and addictive. You can team with other players to take on the bad guys, and the winnings are shared among the teammates. I teamed with my son last night, and we played for an hour and a half. The great part is that he was on a business trip on South Carolina playing on his laptop at the hotel, and I was in Phoenix. But we played real time, and had a lot of fun.

I think I have found the youth of America. They are online playing games like this. Yesterday I teamed with a couple of players who said they were 14 years old. When asked how old I was, I replied "over 30". I figured that would be ancient enough to them, so I sluffed a few years off my real age. And that figure is still private. :)

Animation Day

2006-07-12T15:32:00.000-07:00

Today is animation day. I just made this gif file for one of Janee's classes. Let's see if it works. If it is like Janee's example, you will probably have to click on the first image to get it to animate.

The Devil Wears Prada

2006-07-01T09:13:00.000-07:00

Well, today is the day we march off to the local movie theater complex and join the mad weekend rush to see The Devil Wears Prada. My wife is just dying to see this movie, and has been working hard on her diet for a couple of months. So this is a reward for all that hard time that she has put into her effort. She loves clothes, so this is the movie for her. She and Coldwater Creek have bonded, and her closet proves it. I don't know about the movie today. Perhaps I will wear my hearing aids and just leave them turned off. They do help to deaden the audio onslaught somewhat. We will see how it goes. See you all later.

Big Sleep Tonight

2006-06-27T19:56:00.000-07:00

I was dreading this day, but it turned out ok. I had some outpatient surgery a few weeks ago under the hands of my urologist to help alleviate a byproduct of my prostate cancer surgery, which I had some 7 years ago. The procedure this time was good, but it apparently stirred up some pain in my groin area. So today I visited my doctor to see what was causing the discomfort. I wanted to rule out infection and a possible hernia. The good news is that he believes I am just having some muscle spasms which can be alleviated using ibuprophen, heat, and Valium. I am not a big prescription drug fan, so I am approaching the valium with some hesitation. However, my wife assures me that I will sleep very soundly tonight. We will see how it goes. I just would like the pain to go away. The Doc assures me that it should be gone in a week or so.

Google's Terms of Service

2006-06-26T12:19:00.000-07:00

Sometimes organizations take their terms of service to an extreme, but I have never seen it phrased quite like Google did for their new Picasa Photos on the Web service. I thought you might get a kick out of this. Google's terms of service included the following.

"Upon the termination of your use of Picasa Web Albums, including upon receipt of a certificate or other legal document confirming your death, Google will close your account and you will no longer be able to retrieve content contained in that account."

So there. If you are dead, you will not be allowed to retrieve your photos. Google won't let you, even if you try. My wife also pointed out that apparently you are also expected to notify Google if you die. LOL big time.........

Google Web Photos

2006-06-26T12:04:00.000-07:00

Google is in a Beta test phase with their latest creation, Picasa Web Albums. I was fortunate to be selected as a Beta tester, and downloaded their new Picasa program yesterday. I am impressed with what they have put together.

Picasa, as most of you know, is a free download that scans your computer and finds all the image files including all your digital photos. Picasa then shows you thumbnails of all your photos in its organizer mode. The great new addition to this softward lets you select any of the photos, and have them uploaded to a Web Photo Album that you can name yourself. It is your photo album and you can have your friends alerted via email so they can go see your new photos.

The photo sharing works a lot like Flickr, but the huge added benefit here is that it also helps you find your photos on your computer visually. You don't have to "remember" which folders you stored them in, like Flickr. You just see, click, and upload. And presto, you have a new photo album online.

If you are interested, check out Picasa Web Albums.

Photoshopping a Photo

2006-06-22T23:59:00.000-07:00

Tonight I worked on a photo I took a few years ago of my son and grandson in San Diego. It was a good shot of the two of them looking at each other. But the background was really cluttered. I had done some work on it a year ago when I was just learning Photoshop, and I got a fair-to-middlin creation where I replaced the people and landscaping in the background with a nice shot of the sky with some floating clouds. But I have learned a lot in the past year, and I realized that my old techniques were pretty crude. So I opened the original on my computer tonight and totally redid the photo. I used masking to remove the background, and some new brush techniques to paint back in the strands of hair over their heads so it really looks like the sky belongs there after I slip the sky in on a lower layer. I did some other things, adjusted the overall contrast, and recropped the picture to a better size. It turned out pretty good, but I am going to leave it alone now and take another look at it tomorrow. I have discovered that sometimes the wonderful things I think I have done at night don't always look so spectacular the next day. We will see. LOL This is my draft. Click on it to view the larger picture.

Quicken Help

2006-06-22T23:53:00.000-07:00

I helped one of the ladies from our local computer club with some Quicken problems today. Spent a couple of hours on her computer figuring out how to clean up some checkbook balance problems. It took some time, but in the end we were able to get her accounts reconciled with her bank statements. Also walked her through backing up her data externally. Had a good session, and she was very thankful. She is traveling to Michigan next week and wanted it all wrapped up before she left. Glad I was able to help her out. That makes for a good day.

Computerized Emissions Test

2006-06-22T23:44:00.000-07:00

I had a great experience today. I took my car to the Emissions Testing facility, and they ran the car through it's paces. The car passed ok, as I thought it would. The big surprise was when I discovered that the state registration people have the output of the emissions test digitized and sent to their central server automatically. So I was able to get online when I got home, and renew my registration for the car. I did not have to mail in a thing to prove that the car passed emissions testing. My new license and registration should arrive next week. Boy, do I love operating online.

Working myjanee.com

2006-06-17T11:19:00.000-07:00

Well, yesterday I spent a lot of time working with students on myjanee.com. Janee offers many courses from her web site, and currently we are running four classes this session. I am one of Janee's three instructors, and support the students by helping them post to the web and evaluating their work.

Yesterday we had an interesting example of how difficult it can be for students to put up pictures and comments on web sites. One of our students had tried to post his homework graphics on Kodak's EasyShare site. He got the graphics posted ok, but he could not figure out a way to share the viewing of his photos with the general public. I even opened a separate account on EasyShare, but I could never find a way to share photos posted there without emailing an invitation to make the sharing work. Sometimes sites will let you share with the public in general, but we could not find a way to do that with EasyShare. What our students need is a web site where they can post the URL of their gallery or album with their photos. That does not seem to work with Kodak's site.

Our student moved to Smugmug and that is working very well. Other students have successfully opened accounts at Flickr , which also works fine. Some of our students have even opened Blogs using Blogger, and that has also worked great. Flickr and Blogger offer free posting, and Smugmug charges a nominal yearly fee. Both Smugmug and Blogger are ad-free.

Today my wife and I are going to our friendly eyeglass place to fix a pair of eyeglasses. That doesn't sound too exciting, does it? However, put that experience on top of a day when the temperature is suppose to hover around 105 deg and it gets a little more interesting. It is suppose to get up to 111 deg by Monday, so we need to go out today while it is still cool. Ha!

PE SIG Demo

2006-06-14T19:21:00.000-07:00

This is a demo for the PE SIG. I will post a photo next. It is a shot of Sedona.

Now will post another photo of a rose. This one is very nice, and it is one that I gave my wife for Valentines Day.That's the end of this demo.

Windows Professional Photography

2006-06-13T20:36:00.000-07:00

Anyone out there running a Windows XP machine, and would like to be able to view thumbnails of RAW photo files on your computer - just like you can do today with JPEG files? You can do it with Microsoft's new software for RAW Image Viewing . If you go to this page, you can download a free version that will run on your Windows XP operating system. With this software installed, you can view thumbnails of RAW images using your Windows Explorer or MyComputer. I have run it on my machine for a month, and it works well.

Demo for Photoshop Elements

2006-06-11T19:07:00.000-07:00

I am working on my write up for the Photoshop Elements session next Wednesday. This is part of the example on how to use the Dashboard for posting information. The picture shown here is a example of the kind of graphics that can be uploaded as images.

Blogging Alterations

2006-06-11T15:19:00.000-07:00

Today I tried to change my blog and add some personal information. I still can't figure out how to get in onto my main page, but I will keep trying.

Later today, I plan on doing a write up on signing up for blogger.com, and adding a section on how to use Photoshop Elements to create post cards. We will see how it goes. I am preparing for a class on Wednesday night.

Saturday, June 10, 2006

2006-06-10T23:13:00.000-07:00

Finding a way to post information on the web is getting easier all the time. Google offers blogspot.com, and I am trying it out to see what it can do for posting pictures and text. This should be fun. Looking forward to doing more of this.

Today I spent some time cleaning a water feature we have in our back yard. We live in the Phoenix, Arizona area and summer temperatures have started to climb well over 100 degrees. So the little waterfall and its pond get a pretty fast buildup of alge. Today I dumped some chemicals into the water, and brushed down the sides of the pond. The water feature runs around 30 feet after the waterfall, under a footbridge and into a recirculating area. It is very pretty, but requires continuing upkeep.

Tonight I spent a couple of hours trying to find some photos that I took last November of the red rocks around Sedona, Arizona. I could not find them on my desktop, but after some extensive searching using the Photo Organizer in Photoshop Elements 4, I found the pictures on my notebook computer. I am including a little postcard I made up using Photoshop CS and the Sedona pictures.

Well, this blogging looks like it can be some fun. See you all around.