Friday, August 27, 2010

Moving on.

Location, Home, CA

I have not felt like posting this week. All my energy has been used in getting Craig out of here and on the road to Burning Man. Not that I was actively involved most of the time but his stuff was scattered all over the yard, garage, and back yard for days. He finally crammed the last item in the truck and trailer and left about 4 PM. As usual, he will drive all night. It doesn’t make me happy but the peace and quite are worth it. Too much negative energy when he is here.

I also need to get my act together for my trip to Wisconsin on Monday. I think I have most of it under control. I am trying to get by with as little as possible. However, I decided I needed to take my GPS and my Ipod. No computer on this trip. Clyda is using the Netbook most of the time now anyway.

I will be traveling all day as I leave at 6:30 AM and don’t arrive in Chicago until 5:45 PM after flying all around the country. So much for a FREE ticket! From Chicago I have about a 5 hour drive to Wausau, WI which puts me there about midnight.

I stripped most of the software off my old Dell notebook including McAfee Security System and several other software packages that reside on my other computers. I then installed Microsoft Security Essentials which is free, to do the things that McAfee was doing. Time will tell how this works out.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Hot August Nights

Location, Home, CA

I know I am way behind in posting but we had been gone most of the week. We went to Walnut Creek for “Hot August Nights”. No, not the car show by that name in Reno but 4 days at our friends Cindy and Gary’s house along with Don and Bev. Lots of pool time, too much good food and good conversation.

A few day trips to places like Korbel Champagne cellars on the Russian River, the Black Diamond Coal mine near Pittsburg, CA, and dinner at the Buckhorn Restaurant and a music show at the Palms Playhouse in Winters, CA. The band at the Palms was Antsy McLain and the Trailer Park Troubadours http://www.unhitched.com/. Antsy writes all the songs and the band comes up with the music. It is a great audience participation show and we thoroughly enjoyed all 3 hours of the music.

We drove to Paso Robles on Friday and spent the night with friends Dick and Connie. Dick and I had items to iron out for our fall trip. Saturday about noon we went to the Olive Festival in the city park. It was well attended. Clyda had been walking without her crutches for a day or so but we decided she would go in a wheel chair for this trip. Way too much walking for her other wise.

She is doing well but puts the nylon boot on when she walks around so she has more support. She did drive the car today so that is progress.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Same old, same old.

Location, Home, CA

Finally, sunshine when we woke up on Monday. It even lasted all day. Yesterday, back to the same oldroutine, overcast and drizzle with some sun later on the day. The temperature remains in the low 60’s for the most part. I hear that farmers in the central valley of California are complaining that it isn’t hot enough for fruit and vegetables to ripen. Weird weather.

Not much has changed here. Clyda is still on crutches but has a doctor’s appointment tomorrow. I doubt if he will give her the ok to abandon the crutches just yet.

I worked some more on the rain gutters today. Actually, I moved the collection barrels into place so I can work on the downspouts. It is a bigger job than I planned on. Aren’t they all?

I was sitting here trying to remember what I have done for the last 2 weeks. I drew sort of a blank for a while. Then I remembered that I had repaired a flat screen monitor that I had gotten from Budd and Brenda’s daughter Julie. A little internet browsing mentioned that a series of capacitors had been faulty and would likely be leaking. After I completely removed the circuit board I found that to be so, two leaking capacitors. I bought new ones at Radio Shack, replaced them and the monitor now works. I hooked it up to my old Dell laptop while I was scanning old slides to make sure it would work after warming up for several hours. Very nice picture and it also has 2 speakers built in.

I am also working on an HP printer from Julie. This one has been more work. I can’t get the driver software to install on my computer. Also, it won’t print so either the cartridges are dry or the ink is dried in the printer. I need to spend more time with it.