morrowlife

Here’s the view from the top of the Clark’s Fork waterfall.

Merry Christmas Eve! It’s been a beautiful day here in Lardville – about 60 degrees and sunny all day. Well, the Weather Channel says it’s actually 56 degrees right now, but it’s getting late.

No post on Friday. It was my first day off work and it seemed like Saturday. So I forgot. Thanks to my old pal Anon for noticing.

We’re back from our Christmas Eve museum visit. This year we went to the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento. It’s a really nice museum. There are lots of cool locomotives and several other cars in a beautiful setting. One of my favorites was the Pullman car you can walk through. They have the back of the car set up for daytime seating and the front for sleeping. It’s beautifully restored, and the presentation is really cool. They have lights and sound outside of the car and something that shakes the whole car. It really feels like it’s moving. Very cool.

They also have a dining car you can walk through. Those things were really elegant – much nicer than the dining cars I’ve frequented on Amtrak. MUCH nicer. Loyal Reader Number Four read something that said those dining cars always lost money; the railroads used them as advertisement and competed heavily with each other for the best food and service. Those were the days. The ACE train isn’t quite that nice. But it gets me there and gets me back.

Otherwise, it’s been a pleasant weekend. Loyal Readers Numbers Three, Five, Six, Twelve, and Fifteen are staying with us and we’re having a great time. LRN5, LRN6, and LRN12 have to leave either Christmas night or very early the next day – the demands of employment, alas. We’ve baked cookies, had a nice day at church, done some last-minute shopping, and hung around a bunch. A good time is being had by all.

And we’re ready for Christmas! Except that Loyal Readers Numbers Five and Fifteen are out shopping again. Maybe they’re buying something for me. The world can only hope.

Time for Lasagna (link note: try not to pay attention to the first sentence of the second paragraph – yuck) and our annual Very Special Home Evening. So have a great night and I’ll see you on Christmas.

Here’s a Sequoia among some of its shorter cousins. Sequoia is the only word I can think of right now that contains all the vowels, not to mention that it has only two consonants. Can any of my Loyal Readers come up with any other all-vowel words?

The work year is over! I got home this afternoon at about 2:00 and have enjoyed the start of the Christmas break. I’ve already gotten a couple of little things done, as suggested by Loyal Reader Number Four. We took down and put away the crib and set up the new inflatable bed in the game/sewing/exercise room, and we fixed the white chair.

Part of the chair’s frame had broken, rendering it pretty much useless as a place to sit, even if it superficially didn’t look any worse than before. The springs were attached to this part, making it difficult to just replace. Instead, we made another piece, which we glued and bolted to the broken one. Then we screwed the whole thing back into its original position. It seems pretty solid and we think it’s back to normal. I don’t recommend my Loyal Readers jump on it, though.

I managed to escape from the chair job with only a cut on one fingertip, a puncture wound on the back of the same finger, and a knuckle rubbed raw. Not bad.

I’ve also ripped three of the remaining twelve Home Improvement DVDs. Gotta get those things done before their owner is ready to take them back home, which will happen in just a few days.

We have a new Loyal Reader! Welcome to Tom, our good friend and Loyal Reader Number Twenty-Four’s dad. Your new identity is Loyal Reader Number Twenty-Six. Check out your very own name over there on the right on the actual Internet! Wow.

And check out the web page LRN26 pointed to in yesterday’s comment. We have one of their switches controlling our outside lights – it’s a programmable timer that turns off a predetermined time after you turn it on (you can also turn it off whenever you choose, of course). It’s high-quality, easy to install and program, and perfect for our outdoor lighting. Highly recommended. Loyal Reader Number Four has some indoor applications in mind and I didn’t know about the indoor switches shown on LRN26’s Friends and Family website. We’re going to have to order a few of them. Thanks for letting my Loyal Readers in on the great deal, LRN26! Very cool products.

I have a couple of ideas for games to write for Android. Remember the card games called War and Crazy Eights? Neither one seems too difficult to write, and the great thing about War is that the computer could play it entirely by itself. Thus saving a lot of time. Loyal Reader Number One is busily working on an SMS application, which is a bit more practical but not much more fun, if you ask me. I think he’ll have something running long before I do. But maybe not.

No more tonight. Lots going on tomorrow. See you then.

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Twelve in Loyal Pet Number One’s bed. She really takes over. Drives the dog nuts. Photo courtesy of the exclusive RAZR-cam.

Greetings from home! I felt like taking the sports car this morning and the train tomorrow, so that’s what I did. There was no rain after all on either leg of the voyage, so it went quickly. I’m off the train again tomorrow too – need to take Fluffy’s old home to work so somebody can take a look with the idea of buying it. The Fluffinator has grown so much she needed a new home, which she received as an early Christmas present. Hence, the old one has to go.

I got home a full two hours tonight before my Wednesday evening meeting starts. Plenty of time for a leisurely dinner and a little blogging. The boys are out caroling as this month’s YM/YW combined activity. Sounds like fun. They’re finishing up at the amazingly-decorated house in town. Loyal Reader Number One and I went to look at it on Sunday evening while the boys were at Loyal Reader Number Twenty-Four’s birthday get-together. It’s pretty cool. LRN4 told me the backstory of the house is that the guy’s wife was criticizing him for being something of a grinch, so he decided to reform in a big way. Mission accomplished.

Plans are firming up for the holiday break. Here’s a brief list:

– Finish the mousebot.

– Finish the Android tutorials and maybe try to make something interesting.

– Install the garage door insulation purchased today by LRN4.

– Do all the things on the Christmas calendar (museums, film festivals, cookie baking, etc.).

– Maybe help Loyal Readers Numbers Five, Six, and Twelve move (the place by the cemetery isn’t working out for them).

– Replace the Miata’s headrest speakers.

– Do some reading.

– Finish ripping all the Home Improvement DVDs for my iPod.

– Maybe make something fun with the Arduino (mousebot v.2?).

– Play with my toys!

Only one more work day left!

As you can see, I’m out of material tonight. See you tomorrow.

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Twelve opening her enormous pile of birthday presents a month ago. I found the birthday pictures on my camera yesterday. Oops.

Rainy day again today, so Greetings from the Train. It rained all night and much of the day, but appeared to be clearing when I walked out the door this afternoon. I still think we’re expecting rain the rest of the week. I’ll be on the train a lot. And glad to be there.

The train was pretty empty this morning, but seems quite full this afternoon. Where did all these people come from? The other strange thing is that enough people got off the lightly-populated train this morning to entirely fill our shuttle bus, with one person (my friend and co-worker Dan, as it turns out) standing in the aisle. Strange.

It was also raining hard enough for water to be pouring in through the two roof vents on the bus, which is an old Hertz shuttle they maintain just enough to keep it from falling completely apart on the freeway. Most of the parts appear to still be there, but they don’t necessarily work. The only good thing it has going for it is that it’s big enough that when it eventually careens out of control, we’ll probably squish all the other cars without getting hurt ourselves. Thank heaven for that.

Anyway, it was raining inside the bus this morning almost as hard as outside.

I’m working short days this week to burn up my remaining comp hours, which are now down to about three. I especially want to go home early on Thursday, of course. If I’m on the train, though, I can’t really leave earlier than about 3:00, so that will have to be good enough. I don’t even want to think about trying to drive home on Thursday afternoon in the rain with the holiday traffic getting out of town. So it’s the train for me.

Nothing else significant to report today. See you tomorrow.

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Two sticking his head through a hole in a tree. Those two just can’t seem to get enough of sticking their heads through holes in trees. It guess it’s better to have a head in a hole than a hole in your head. Har har.

I need to get a little more Blog Fodder again. Fortunately, the holidays are coming up, the family members are coming to town, and work is closing for several days. Plenty of photo opportunities, no doubt.

Stupidly, I forgot to bring my camera to a few recent events that would probably have resulted in something blog-worthy. Such as Loyal Reader Number Two’s organ concert (did I mention he was the highlight of the show?) and possibly the ward Christmas party. Sigh. My Loyal Readers expect better.

Well, let’s cheer back up and see how the weekend went. First, the success/failure list:

Ward party and turkey: check, sort of. We watched the time carefully on Saturday and made sure we were home in plenty of time to put the turkey in the oven so it would finish cooking in plenty of time. No problem. Strangely, though, Loyal Reader Number Four discovered about an hour and a half before we were supposed to be at the party with a cooked turkey that somebody had turned off the oven at an unknown time. We had no idea how cooked or uncooked the bird was. She immediately turned it back on and we took it out of the oven at about our scheduled departure time. We did a little exploratory slicing and it looked done all the way through, so we sliced it up and took it to church – only about half an hour late. It all worked out and, as far as we know, nobody has died from eating it. In fact, most people weren’t even sick the next day. So all’s well.

Christmas shopping: check. We’re either done or essentially done. Phew.

Miata headrest speakers: no check. Never even looked at it. I need to find some speakers of the appropriate size, power rating, and price online and get them ordered. Then we can talk about installation. In the meantime, the buzz continues.

Robot, Android tutorials, and DVD ripping: no check, no check, and no check. They were just too low on the priority list. Maybe next weekend. The DVDs will have to be ripped no later than then; I want to return them to Loyal Reader Number Six when they’re here for Christmas.

Cold water faucet: check. Actually, LRN4 did it for me before the weekend ever started. I just hadn’t noticed it yet when Friday’s blog was written. Thanks, LRN4!

Sunday School lesson: check. I did it after all. My friend Jim had a serious relapse, and I got a call on Sunday morning. Prepared it, gave it, had a good time. Next week, I have to teach Gospel Principles, so there’s more preparation to do. Fortunately, I enjoy doing it. A lot.

Financial juggernaut update: I’m up to 26 cents and one click! Many thanks to whoever clicked. Nothing can stop me now! Riches! Power! Et cetera!

We had some rain overnight, and the morning commute showed it. It was dry the rest of the day, but they’re predicting rain just about every day until Christmas. Sigh.

See you tomorrow.