morrowlife

Here’s my beloved iPhone booting up for the very first time. Last June. Did I mention I really like my iPhone? I know you’re supposed to charge it up before you turn it on for the first time, but I really couldn’t wait. Charged it right after this, though – there wasn’t enough juice to get it initialized yet. Part of my famous Machinery series. Rare cameo appearance of the Loyal Blogger. Well, my hand, anyway.

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! I’ve taken a few days off, as Anon noticed yesterday. Thanks, Anon!

Anyway. The holiday has been great. I’ve gotten a lot of things done, have exercised every day possible, and have gotten lots of rest and relaxation. I can’t exactly say I’m ready to get back to work on Monday, but that’ll come. Probably. Maybe. Possibly. We’ll see.

Anyway. We got our Christmas decorations taken down today and the house looks totally normal again, which is nice. We didn’t get the decorations up extremely early this year, so we hadn’t gotten sick of them, but it’s still nice to get things squared away.

Had a nice Christmas. LRN4 forgot all about a couple of the presents I had bought myself over the last couple of months, and so did I until about the 27th. Suddenly, I realized I never received either my Space pen or my Spanish Bible, so LRN4 gave them to me a little late. We still think we might have some additional Christmas presents on the way. LRN4’s sister accidentally bought gifts for the wrong family this year, and I thought she said they were sending something to us a little late. Nothing has come, though, so maybe they thought better of it. I can’t imagine anything we need anyway.

One very thoughtful thing LRN4 did for me for Christmas was to get the broken boot snap on the Miata fixed. I was delighted to hear about it! Sadly, it doesn’t seem to work exactly right, so she’ll have to take it back to get it fixed right, but I’m delighted just the same. How thoughtful!

I also received an automotive diagnostic scanner for Christmas. I bought it myself, so I was sure I would like it. I do. All of the cars are running just fine now, but LRN1 and I went out and tested it on the Sable and the Honda, and it’s pretty cool. You can get real-time data, including engine parameters and speed, coolant temperature, and about 96 other things, a few of which I actually know what they are. I can hardly wait for the Suburban to break again! But don’t be in too much of a hurry, Suburban…

LRN5 and LRN12 were here today, and LRN24 dropped by for a little while too. It was nice having everybody over.

LRN1, LRN2, and I are going on our annual Christmas Holiday Shooting Adventure early tomorrow morning, possibly preempting exercising. Although we could always go exercise a little later. The weather should be a little chilly – in the mid-40’s. Ought to be just perfect for a little bit of plunking with the .22.

I ordered and received a new battery for the little laptop LRN1 gave me. As my Loyal Readers will recall, one of his student associates decided it was no longer working, so he gave it to LRN1. He’s leaving on his mission soon, so he gave it to me. It’s actually not a bad machine, and appears to work great with the new battery. It has a 1.5 GHz processor, 802.11G Wifi, 512 MB of memory, and a 40 GB hard drive. Not thoroughly modern specs, but plenty powerful to run Windows XP, and on par with modern netbooks. Which is how I’m using it, so that’s perfect. It’s small and light too, just like a netbook. I love it. Thanks, LRN1!

We’ve been working on the recurring networking problem here at the Secret Undisclosed Location. It appears to me to be a bad Ethernet socket in the loft. I’m planning to buy a new one tomorrow and replace it. It’s been pretty aggravating for a while, with the internet connection at my desk going in and out, particularly as people sit on the couch. Which is directly in front of the socket. So it wiggles it a little when you sit down or move around. Which often kills the internet connection. Which is aggravating. So LRN1 and I are fixing it tomorrow.

Time for bed. More next week. See you Monday.

Here’s a boat in Alaska. Apparently, the owner is hoping for a very high tide. Part of my famous Machinery series.

No post yesterday – got too busy and went to bed fairly early. Sorry about that, Loyal Readers. Fortunately, Anon hasn’t been here lately.

Went to the program’s Christmas luncheon for managers this afternoon. They didn’t plan until a bit too late, so our meal was supposed to go from 3:00 to 4:30. I had to leave at 4:45 to catch my train, and they had just barely served the entree. The food was fine and I enjoyed the company. Didn’t get much done today, though.

I’m thinking of taking a couple more days of vacation next week, giving me the entire week off, resulting in a two-week holiday. I don’t really have anything I need or want to do, but the office is going to be totally dead those days and the more time off the merrier, generally. I plan to decide for sure tomorrow.

LRN1’s been taking his finals this week and he reports that he’s done fairly well. I’m looking forward to having him home again this weekend. Also to having my truck home.

That’s about it for today. Today’s shocking food violence is even more shocking than usual, in that the violence was done to the actual food. Oh, the humanity. Or rather, the foodosity. Or something like that.

See you tomorrow.

Here’s a . . . umm . . . contraption. Found it in an empty lot in Haines, Alaska. Our ship is in the background there.

Here’s LRN4’s new car. I have no idea what kind of car it was, but I like it. A lot. I want one. Picture taken in Victoria, BC, during our cruise. Part of my famous Machinery series.

Pretty good day. It’s gotten pretty cool around here, but was way up in the fifties when I left this morning, although it only went up to about 63. Brrr! Even cooler weather is on the way next week.

Nothing much else new today. LRN5 is over for the evening, which is nice for LRN12. I have no idea how long she’s staying.

We’ll finish with today’s food violence news: a taco-tossing son. Bad son! Bad son!

Here’s an oncoming train. Picture taken at the Santa Clara ACE/Amtrak platform. This particular train was an Amtrak, which I do not ride. I do photograph it, however. Great Art courtesy of the exclusive iPhone-cam and part of my famous Machinery and Train series.

I think the sky was kind of pretty that day.

Extreme Short Shrift. It’s late and I’m sleepy. My Mac updated itself this evening and never started back up. Had to force-quit it and give it another try. Worked perfectly that time. But I wasted a lot of time waiting the first time. And did I mention I’m sleepy?

Nice weekend. It was great visiting with LRN9. And everything else we did. Whatever that was. Oh, yeah – LRN5 was here for a few days too, which was great, especially for LRN12, who was truly happy to be with her mom. LRN5’s coming over again on Thursday.

LRN12 and LRN2 have both been suffering with cold symptoms. Get well soon, Loyal Readers! I’m not sure if I’m coming down with it too. I’m feeling a wee bit feverish, possibly, and just kind of achy and uncomfortable. But maybe that’s just the way I am. Time will tell. Stay well, Loyal Blogger!

I’ll end today with what I think is an entirely reasonable malady – vegetable panic. I think I may have it, in fact.

See you tomorrow.