morrowlife

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Five hard at work a couple of months ago. It turns out she really likes preparing taxes, and she’s quite good at it. She and Loyal Reader Number Six may end up buying the franchise.

Wonders of Blogger today. It’s actually early Friday morning now. Wednesday evening was too busy to blog, and our internets were busted Thursday night. Actually, all day Thursday. Hopefully, it will heal itself sometime today. Or maybe it already did. Actually, the fact that I can now see the blog from the train may mean the home connection is back in business. I hope so – how can the family survive without their email lifeline?

The new iPod arrived! I ordered it on Sunday, as I may have mentioned, and it arrived Thursday morning while I was home getting ready to go to the dentist (my teeth are clean and ready for another six months of abuse, thanks). It’s the 80 gigabyte model – the best one they make for at least the next few days – in black. It’s a thing of beauty, a joy forever (or at least until the screen gets scratched and the battery dies), and a great entertainment device. I loaded every single song and every single video on my computer, and it’s still not even halfway filled up. I love it.

The new Bose in-ear headphones also showed up at our doorstep yesterday, but nobody was home, so they’ll be dropping them off today. I’m looking forward to trying them out too.

Loyal Reader Numbers Two and Twenty-one and I are going camping tonight. We don’t know where we’re going, but we’re tenting it, so pretty much any forest service campground will do. I’m going to have to depend on them to prepare everything, as I have to work all day, but you can’t really go far wrong in the packing department when you’re only spending one night.

Time to start watching videos on my beautiful new iPod. Looking at it realistically, it’s doubtful that there will be time for blogging tonight. Maybe I’ll go with the Wonders of Blogger on Saturday afternoon – check back! See you then.

Here’s another look at that waterfall from the other day, this time with Loyal Reader Number One standing in front of it. I still can’t figure out whether I was holding the camera straight or not. On the one hand, the water appears to be leaning to the left. On the other hand, the trees appear to be leaning to the right. On the other hand, LRN1 appears to be pretty much straight up and down. So I guess I got it right. That place was kind of like a giant outdoor funhouse.

Slightly crowded train this afternoon. I swear I can’t figure out where all these people come from. They’re not on the morning train. I guess they just pop into existence sometime during the day. Every day. Or something.

Interviewed a really good candidate from Denver today. We’re going to make him an offer. The only problem is that I already hired somebody under the requisition he applied for, so I opened another requisition yesterday. It turns out a requisition has to be open for a week before you can hire somebody, so I can’t get him an offer until next Tuesday. I’ll let him know what we’re doing and hope for the best. We’re making an offer to a local guy as well. I think we have a fairly good chance of getting him. My boss is very anxious for me to get people in, so these possible acceptances are a Real Good Thing.

Didn’t get much else done today, in between interviewing and offering. I attended a few meetings, ate lunch, and … umm … answered email. Yikes. Must get people hired and get back to working.

The FedEx person tried to deliver my new iPod’s docking station today, but the Loyal Readers were in the back yard when he or she rang the doorbell. They’ll make another attempt tomorrow, and I’ll be leaving a signed note on the door this time. So if there are any Loyal Readers out there inclined to travel to Saindouxville and steal a thirty-dollar docking station, tomorrow’s the day. While you’re here, stop in for dinner.

The new iPod should be here next Monday or so, and the new headphones may be here as early as Thursday. I was amazed that Apple didn’t put everything together in a single package to save on shipping, since they’re paying for it. Then I noticed where the various things are coming from: the iPod was shipped yesterday from the factory in Shanghai, the docking station came from Sacramento yesterday, and the headphones shipped from Pennsylvania last week. I guess that decentralization must save them money somehow, but it sure doesn’t seem like it on the surface.

The other package I’m waiting for is the box with the remaining parts for Mousey the Junkbot. I really should have bought two sets of parts, since I want to make a Mark II version with an Arduino controlling it after I get the first one working. Instead, I’ll just have to Upgrade MtJ v.1 at some point. I spent a little time over the weekend experimenting with simple filters for Junkey to use to efficiently Go Towards the Light. Should be an interesting project.

Many thanks to Loyal Reader Number Sixteen for weighing in on the blog during the past few days. Those Gratituous Baby Pictures do the trick every time.

Time to start watching videos. See you tomorrow.

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Twelve looking a little more satisfied. By the way, the last three works of Great Art are courtesy of Loyal Reader Number Five. Send some more, LRN5!

Good Monday. Rode the train, which was a good thing. I heard 580 was down to two lanes somewhere again today. No problem.

My family gave me a very nice leather rolling briefcase for my birthday yesterday. Hooray! It’s exactly what I wanted. It’s a little wider than my old roller, I think, and everything fits in there quite comfortably. It looks elegant and works great. Thanks, Loyal Readers One, Two, and Four!

I also received a very nice and very unexpected monetary gift from my father. I used it to order a new iPod, which I hope to receive as early as this week. I can stop moving podcast videos to my computer now. I also plan to rip a few movies and get them on there. I have a few Blackadder and MXC rips already, just waiting to be converted to iPod-compatible format. And there’s more where they came from – old movies galore! I can hardly wait to get started.

I was pleased to learn that James Lileks got the gig he wanted. He’s one of my very favorite columnists and pretty much the only blog I read. I was sad when he decided to quit writing his excellent Newhouse column. When the morons at the Minneapolis “Red” Star-Tribune dumped his column (which, truth be told, I very rarely read, but still), I was distressed and worried about the future of the Bleat (which I read religiously). Now he’s running the Red Star’s blog, though, which is a good thing for entertainment purposes but still not for commentary, at which he excels. At least the Bleat, the Diner, and all the other elements of his excellent website are safe.

The Loyal Readers had a nice time in Utah and appear to be glad to be back home. I know I’m glad they’re here. LRN1 and LRN2 each have a friend staying the week with us. I’m hoping to turn them both into Loyal Readers. Maybe I’ll finally get over that twenty-reader hump. How about it, Lee and Jay? Are you up to the Morrowlife challenge?

LRN1 added a comment to a recent post accusing me of making some sort of grammatical error. That’s so unbelievable I don’t even need to respond. Ridiculous. Ludicrous. Far-fetched. Et cetera. Oh sure, there may be some grammatical inaccuracies here and there, but they’re there for a Really Good Reason.

And I’m through for the day. See you tomorrow.

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Twelve getting worked up for something big. I don’t want to be around about ten seconds from the time this picture was taken.

Well, I’m half a century old (happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear Loyal Writer Number One, happy birthday to me!). Strangely, I don’t feel much different from yesterday. At least I’ve lived a full life. I got phone calls today from my mom, Loyal Readers Numbers Three, Four, and Five, and both of my brothers. Just finished a nice long chat with LRN3, in fact. It was nice to hear from them all.

My Standard Happy Birthday Protocol was followed today, with one minor exception. Instead of bring cupcakes to work, I opted to buy donuts instead. I got lots of signatures on my card, though, so it appears again this year as if I have a lot of friends.

I took myself out for sushi this evening and enjoyed it. I’m looking forward to the family’s return home tomorrow so we can have our real dinner and small celebration together on Sunday.

Otherwise, the day was fairly standard. I participated in a job fair this morning. There were about 70 people from Northrup Grumman looking for work. Their company has decided to close their bay-area facility and move the work and some of the people to Chicago. Most people don’t want to go, so they’re looking. I talked to several highly-qualified people (maybe more highly qualified than I’m actually looking for, in fact) and have some followup to do next week.

This trying to hire people is really wearing me out. I probably spend as much time working on hiring as on anything else, and I only have one acceptance to show for it so far.

It’s sleepy-time. See you on Monday.

Here’s Loyal Reader Number Twelve just before last Christmas, staying warm in downtown San Francisco. Photo courtesy of Loyal Reader Number Five. This particular photo published in honor of Loyal Reader Number Sixteen, whose comment on yesterday’s post was most welcome.

Also a shout out to Loyal Reader Number Three, who commented a couple of days ago on the 30 May post. He’s doing well in school this summer and enjoying it, which I’m delighted to hear. And I have no idea who that 70’s guy was. Only that he was a pretty good musician. And that he has Big Hair.

Long ride to work today. I decided to sleep in and drive, as I wanted to be able to stay a little late at work this afternoon. Big mistake. It turns out there was a pretty big accident in Livermore quite early that closed down half of the freeway lanes in my direction. It took four hours to get to the office, which seems a little excessive. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen again tomorrow.

Otherwise, a fine day. I’m still feeling sorry for Loyal Pet Number One, who is cooped up in her kennel all day. Just one more day to go, LPN1! Although I seriously doubt she reads the blog very often.

The Happiest Day of the Year is tomorrow. I don’t have any cupcakes to bring to work, so I’m buying donuts tomorrow morning on the way in. My birthday card is ready and nothing could possibly go wrong now.

See you then.