Sunday, December 31, 2017

Happy New Years Eve.

With todays win, the Patriots have sealed home field advantage during the AFC playoffs. This is important only because, hey, who doesn't like to play on their home field.


I didn't do anything with the network hard drive today because I didn't feel like messing with it.

Well, that, and I spent some time trying to shovel off my mother-in-law's driveway. I lost all feeling in my hands, toes and brain, which made me want to do nothing but sit on my couch and recover my senses.

Besides, the Patriots were on at 1:00. Ain't no one got time to work on no hard drive when the Patriots are on.

I'll probably work on it tomorrow.


I'm going to eat some horsed overies and watch some of the Twilight Zone marathon while I try to stay awake long enough to see the New Year arrive.

Maybe I'll just pretend I'm Australian where the New Year arrived at 8:00am EST.

Here are some links:

Saturday, December 30, 2017

Close but no cigar.

I have discovered that the router does not like to use a USB connection for large drives. It keeps timing out. Fortunately, both the drive and the router support sata so I switched over to that.

I am currently at a point where the router says, "Hey! There is a 3TB drive hoked up to me but no one can access it because you screwed up the security!'

So next step is to reformat the drive with correct configuration & settings and it should work fine. Once I see the drive and can map it on my mac, I can make the mac believe it's a TimeMachine drive and it should work.

The operative word in that last sentence is "should".


Here are some links you might find interesting:

Friday, December 29, 2017

Busy evening.

I purchased a network drive from Pat this afternoon and I've been working on getting it set up on my network. So far, it's being pretty damned particular because I'm forcing it to be something it's not meant to do.

Apple provides backup software called Time Machine on all Mac's but it only works with a special Apple router/hard drive called...

...get ready for it...

...a Time Machine!

And since Apple wants about $400 for their special Time Machine, I figured trying to do what I want to do using a standard networked hard drive is worthwhile. I've managed to find several helpful websites and things are looking good but it's a lot of work.

So what I'm saying is I'm busy and I don't have a lot of time.

Here are a couple of links to lighten your day:

Thursday, December 28, 2017

I hate novocain

I had an old filling that cracked on me a couple of weeks ago and when I went for my semi-annual cleaning last week, I made an appointment to get it taken care of. That appointment was for 7:45 this morning.

After getting shot up with a bit of novocain, the dentist waited a while, then jabbed my gum with one of his medieval-looking tools and asked if I felt it.  I told him it was a sharp little jab so he decided I needed more novocain.

Five hours later I finaly regained feeling on the right side of my head...

I was also able to eat & drink without having food & beverages all over my shirt.


Here are a few links you can visit while I digest the chinese food we had for dinner:

Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Good day for flying with my instructor

It's been a year since I got my pilots license and all of my flying during that time has been mainly sightseeing. I always do two or three landings before venturing off to stare at the world from 3,000 feet but that's about it.

Today I went up with my instructor to practice some things that I haven't done because, well, I'm a cautious coward and didn't want to kill myself by trying them alone.

We did some steep turns, some slow flight, some approach (simulated landing) stalls and some departure (simulated takeoff) stalls. Then we did five touch & go landings.

It was a good workout and I throughly enjoyed it.

Also, I did all of those things in a larger, more powerful plane than I learned in so I am now certified to fly that slightly faster plane. This means I am on longer restricted to the golf cart of planes, I can now fly the family sedan of planes.

I told him I want to schedule a night flight with him before the clocks change so one day in the next few weeks I'll schedule something and we'll do a circuit of the airports in the upper valley one evening.

Have I mentioned that I really like flying. Even when my instructor makes me work hard and I find that I have sore arms in the evening, I still love doing it.


Here are some links you can visit if you want:

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

I need a nap

It appears I have not gotten enough sleep lately because every day right around 4:00, I need a nap.

Then again, I'm old and maybe I'm getting plenty of sleep, I just need naps.


I have a webinar to attend this evening on the latest equipment being installed in GA aircraft so this will be short.

While I listen to the FAA talk about AHRS (Atitude & Heading Reference System) and ADS-B (Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast), you can click on these few links:

Monday, December 25, 2017

Merry Christmas Everybody

And I do mean everybody.

If you are offended by my saying Merry Christmas to everyone, including people that don't practice the Christian faith then screw you, you anal-retentive douche-bag. No one cares about your feelings.

So once again, let me say Merry Christmas Everybody!

Maybe I'll do an update later today.

Maybe not.

We'll see.

I'm Back!


I have returned my mother-in-law safely back to her homestead and I am now comfortably ensconced on my websurfing couch.

Once again, I have eaten way too much food and I needed to get into my stretchy sweat pants.

In other words, it was the perfect Christmas.


Here are a couple of links:

Sunday, December 24, 2017

Today is the day!!!

At 8:00 this evening, the best 24 hours of the year begins when TBS launches 24 hours of A Christmas Story!

Thats right folks, 24 hours of The Scott Farkus Incident and You'll Shoot Your Eye Out Kid.

It's a great movie.

🎅

I noticed this image a couple of weeks ago when the sun hit my back window just right.

If you are having trouble figuring it out, here's a little help:

I'm betting that hurt a bit.

🎅

While we were waiting the start of A Christmas Story, we implemented stage two of our Christmas celebration.

We spent an enjoyable few hours hanging out with another set of relatives. It was a good time and once again, I ate way too much food.

One of these days I need to stop eating way too much food....

🎅

While I get ready to watch A Christmas Story, you can visit these links:

Saturday, December 23, 2017

Like I said....

Yesterday was the start of our Christmas when we all gathered over at my brothers house for pizza and fun.

Tonight there is no celebration, just baking and cleaning.

Hey, sometimes you need a break from the celebrating.

🎄

I managed to finish my Christmas shopping today and I don't feel too bad about being last minute. I ran into a friend of mine who is a retired trooper, with the operative word being "retired", and he was doing his Christmas shopping as well.

I figure if the retired guys are last minute, us working stiffs are excused.

🎄

Here are a few links for you to click upon:

Friday, December 22, 2017

And I'm on vacation.....

I left my office at 1:00 this afternoon and I won't be returning there until January 2nd. I also won't be using a single minute of vacation time.

Have I mentioned that I really like working there.


The festivities have begun so I don't have a lot of webernet surfing time.

The few that I have found are here:

Thursday, December 21, 2017

I still haven't done my Christmas shopping.

I'm really hoping to have a free two hours on Saturday so I can at least pick up something for my wife.

If not, I'll just have to draw her a picture with a popsicle stick / macaroni picture frame.

🎄

I'm going to watch some bad TV and then fall asleep.

You can click on these:

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

We've had a movement

My wife has successfully moved her mom out of her house into a place where she will be taken care of and be far better off. It's a very nice place and my mother-in-law will do well there. No stairs to navigate, people to spend time with and staff who can take care of her if she needs something.

Hell, after walking around the place the other day, having lunch and checking out the amenities, I'd like to move in there.


I have been to several office holiday parties this week and each one involved a lot of food. My doctor has suggested that I try and lose some weight.

With all the eating I'm doing at these little celebrations, I don't think that's gonna happen in the near future.


Here are some links that you should consider clicking on:

Tuesday, December 19, 2017

I better do some Christmas shopping soon.

It has occurred to me that if I don't go Christmas shopping soon, my wife is not going to have much in the way of presents on Christmas morning.

Better do something about that.


The small emergency backup dog likes to watch me type this stuff up:


She doesn't just watch, she takes an active part by using her nose to poke keys and use the touch bar thing.

It's a little annoying but she's cute as hell so I put up with it.


You can click on these links if you want:

Monday, December 18, 2017

I'm a healthy guy.

I had my annual physical the other day and I took a picture of the chairs in the exam room.


I guess fat people need medical care too.


So my doctor, who is a very funny guy by the way, says I'm healthy. He says my blood pressure is good, my eyesight is good and my reflexes are good. He also said I've put on several pounds. I blamed the three pound Merrill hiking boots I was wearing and he said, "Now we just need to figure out where the other seven pounds come from..."

I work with a couple of women who live to bake. They are constantly bringing in cookies, cakes, donuts, muffins, candy, etc... and I can't help myself. Besides, it would be rude of me to not partake of their fine epicurean delights.

So I blame them for my extra poundage.


So the Patriots managed to pull last night football game out of their ass and you can bet I heard from the relatives in Pittsburgh. My cousin Paddy is particularly unhappy with the way things went and she let me know it.

I told her that I'm sure the Steelers will play the Patriots again and maybe the Steelers will win that game.

I don't think she was happy with that answer.


You can click on these links:

Sunday, December 17, 2017

And she's home

Our daughter and her little traveling companion, the small emergency backup dog, arrived home from Iowa this afternoon. Their first flight from Des Moines to Chicago was nice but the secdon flight from Chicago to Hartford was fantastic.

The flight attendants immediately fell in love with the dog and told my daughter that the last row was empty, if she wanted to move there. My daughter, being a smart young lady, said yes and she had all three seats to herself and her little dog.. Then, all during the flight, they kept checking in, offering water or ice cubes, petting the dog, getting kisses from her and generally having a good time with the little angel.

She is a charming little dog.

So now that they are home, everyone is happy. The large main dog is happy to have his little buddy home, mom and dad are happy to have their little girl home and my little girl is glad to be home where she doesn't have to open a book for at least 3 weeks.


While I watch the rest of this football game, you can click on these links:

Saturday, December 16, 2017

A lot got done today

We started the process of moving my mother-in-law today. She hasn't moved yet but we spent some time setting up some stuff at her new place and chatting with the staff. My wife and I like where she is going and we like the staff.

Doing this kind of thing at any time of the year is difficult at best. Doing this kind of thing during the run up to Christmas is a freakin' nightmare.

Suffice to say that some things are going to suffer this year.


The Red Sox don't seem to be doing anything to improve themselves this off season. I'm hoping it's because Trade 'Em Away Dave is working on a big deal and we're all going to be shocked when it happens.

They need someone who can hit the ball. Hard. And far. They have guys who can get on base, they need someone to drive them home because as I always like to point out, the winning team is the one who steps on home plate the most.


While I contemplate the fate of the Red Sox, you can contemplate these links:

Friday, December 15, 2017

I don't have a cold.

Thanks for asking.


It has occurred to me that now that the webernets isn't neutral anymore, I can charge you to read my musings!

Then again, who in their right mind would pay money to read this crap.


You can visit these links while I watch Gold Rush:

Thursday, December 14, 2017

Not much to cover today.

Apparently the only thing that happened today was something about the interwebsnet no longer being neutral.

Trust me folks, the drama and horror being expressed over this is way out of line. No one really knows what is going to happen so I recommend everyone chill out a bit and wait to see how things go.

While you are waiting to see how things go, you can go look at these non-neutral websites:

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

I think I'm getting a cold. Again.

I have a sinus headache and my nose is running.

I think I'm going to blame a guy I work with who was sick last week.


Here are some important dates:


I have a quick little computer script that I wrote that shows me that every day. It's a nice reminder of what's to come.


I'm going to go take some aspirin and then watch bad television.

While I do that, you can do these:

Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Lunch with friends

I had lunch with two friends from my previous life and it was enlightening.

One friend is retired and loving his life. He essentially hangs around with friends all day while his wife goes to work. The other friend is still at my old employer and she hates it there. She says it has gotten very stressful and petty. For some reason, this makes me happy.

I'm not happy that my friend hates her job and is stressing out. I'm happy that I'm not there anymore.


Here are a few links that you can click on:

Monday, December 11, 2017

The democrats have gone to hell in a handbasket

I've been watching the senate race in Alabama and one thought keeps going through my head: How screwed up are the democrats when they can't even find a candidate who can win against a alleged pedophile.

This guy has been accused of everything from molesting a 14 year old girl to playing grab ass with high school girls when he was in his 30s yet his opponent can't rally enough people to give him the votes needed to win the election.

That's bad.


Southern California is burning to the ground and everyone is shocked.

Don't be shocked, be amazed that people live there.

It's a freakin' desert and every so often, it burst into flame.

Here's a prediction: Now that all of the vegetation planted by man has burned to the ground, they should expect landslides and floods in February or March.

It's what happens in the desert.


Here are some links you can give a click on:

Sunday, December 10, 2017

New network.

I have a new router and that means I have a new network. So far I have managed to get everything hooked up to it and it seems to be working just fine.

My old network consisted of two Netgear WNR2000 wireless routers with one serving as the internet router and serving wireless to the main part of the house and the other acting simply as a wireless access point for the family room and porch.

About a month ago, I noticed that my laptop was having trouble staying connected while in the family room so I started watching the network connection. It worked fine for a bit and then suddenly the access point would disappear and then pop back on. This caused my laptop to break it's connection and fail over to the other wireless network served by the router.

My new router is a pretty heavy-duty gadget and it appears to be serving my entire house without any problems. This means I can eliminate the access point and have only one network instead of the two I ha previously.

The new router also has two USB ports. I can plug two hard drives into those ports and share them out over the network. This means my wife and I can use these drives as backup devices and not worry so much about losing data.

After what my wife went through last month when her hard drive died, having a facility where her laptop can do scheduled backups would be a very good thing.


While I read up on this Apple Time Machine thing, you can visit these links:

Saturday, December 9, 2017

Christmas party tonight

Tonight was the annual neighborhood Christmas party and we had a good time.

You however, can have a good time visiting a couple of links:


Friday, December 8, 2017

Presentations

My boss is all excited because I decided it was time to start giving presentations. Seems that my giving presentations is something they were hoping I would do when I started this process and they have been hinting for the last 5 months.

So when I told him I thought it was time, he immediately sent out an email and a signup sheet. Within a few minutes, there were more than a few people who signed up. He's thinking we'll fill the room and have to schedule a second one. I'm a bit more realistic and I expect that maybe 10 people will show up.

Hey, at least I'm making the boss happy and that's really all that counts.


Here are some links you can visit and who knows, maybe you'll even enjoy them:

Thursday, December 7, 2017

Jury Duty

Yesterday I neglected to tell you about my exciting day of jury duty.

I got there at 8:00, sat around until 9:15 when the judge came in and said, "Hey, things are going along pretty well. Looks like we'll be doing things around 10:30 or so. You guys can tale a break but be back here by 10:00"

I went over to McDonalds to get some bad breakfast and was back in the jury room by 9:50.

At 10:30, they took us all (There were 18 of us) into the court room, had us raise our right hands and swear that we would be good jurors. Well, the words were a bit different than that but that's the gist.

After we swore to God about how good we were going to jurify, we all sat down and they called us up to meet the judge & the two attorneys (prosecutor and defense) at "side bar". I was excited by the prospect of going to a bar with the judge and the attorneys so you can imagine my disappointment when I discovered that "side bar" meant standing to the side of the judges desk.

So anyways, they all had the questionnaires we had filled out explaining about what we did and who we knew and where we hung out and they asked me questions about what I had written. They were specially interested in the fact I had attended the Mass Sate Police academy and spent three years on the WENC Campus Police Dept.

After they asked me their questions and we all had a good chortle at something the judge said, I was told I was Juror Number One!!! and I that should take a seat over there in the jury box in Seat Number One!!!

After they had seated seven of us (the jury is six members and one alternate), the long-haired hippie looking defense attorney went back to his goatee & man-bun sportin' client to confer with him. They were mumbling about things & looking at our questionnaires and I knew they were talking about me because I heard my first name get mumbled a couple of times.

After about 30 seconds of mumbling and head shaking, the defense attorney said to the clerk, "Number One".

With those two words, I was relegated back to my previous status of non-juror, told by the judge that the commonwealth appreciated my service and then sent on my way.

I'd like to say that I enjoyed serving my civic duty of being a jury of someones peers but I can't because to be honest with you, it was boring as hell and I'm glad I don't have to go again for another three years.


While I savor my 10 minutes of jury glory, you can click on these links:

Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Three years

I had jury duty today. That means I won't have it again for at least three years.

I'm good with that.


Here are some links:

Tuesday, December 5, 2017

I'm contributing to the annual report

The President of the university I work at asked me to contribute my accomplishments to the 2017 annual report.

My previous employer wouldn't even let me read the annual report, never mind contribute to it.

I really like this job.


Todays links are here:

Monday, December 4, 2017

Busy day

It was a busy day at work.

Who am I kidding.

This place is no where near as stressful or busy as my old job. A busy day at this place is what used to be call "lunch" at my old place.

So I had several meetings to cover phase two of my plan and I gotta admit, it's pretty damned nice working at an organization that not only appreciates me, they also respect my opinions.

I made the right decision when I said I was never going back to work at a large corporation.


Enjoy these links:

Sunday, December 3, 2017

We have lights

We managed to get some of our traditional outdoor Christmas lights up today.

I also took care of the back yard and did some things for my mother-in-law.

Then it was time to watch the Patriots defeat the Bills with the occasional brief nap.

Life, my friends, is good.


Here are some links for you:

Saturday, December 2, 2017

Computers and leaves.

Today I replaced my mother-in-law's computer with a new one. This is a good thing for me because her old computer was running Windows Vista and that is out of support. That meant she was getting popups all the time from Microsoft telling her that her computer wasn't secure.

She would call me and tell me, "Charter is trying to do something to my computer." and I would tell her to just leave it until I could come over and look at it.

Now, the popups are gone and she seems happy.

Unfortunately, it came with Windows 10 and I kinda had to mickey mouse it a bit to make it look exactly like her old one. The toughest part was shutting it down. Vista still had the old button that would simply shut the machine down while Windows 10 has a multi-click process that she found difficult.

I installed a shortcut toe shutdown.exe on her desktop that with one click shuts the computer down.

I'm a freakin' genius.

After that, I was able to get my lawn cleared of all leaves so that I can put up the Christmas lights tomorrow.


Here are a few links that you might enjoy:

Friday, December 1, 2017

Friend of mine retired today

My friend Bill retired today so I spent time with him and a bunch of folks consuming adult beverages.

That means I have nothing for you.

Enjoy!

Thursday, November 30, 2017

The stock market is beginning to worry me

The DJIA closed at 24,272 today, up over 4,500 points since the first of the year. That's a lot of points in one year and I'm thinking it might be due for a collapse.

This makes me nervous but since I'm gainfully employed and my retirement account is strong enough to take a small hit, just not too much of a hit, I'm not terrified, just worried.

It might be time to give my finance guy a call and have a little conversation about things.


I've been watching the MLB free agent market and man, there are some seriously good ball players out there. I'm hoping the Red Sox are smart enough to stay out of the Giancarlo Stanton talks and instead are looking at who is available as a free agent.

I think they would be better served to spend money on a free agent like J.D. Martinez instead of giving away minor league prospects on a trade for Stanton.

I know I'm not the guy that makes those decisions but if Trade 'Em Away Dave wants to get ahold of me and get my advice, I'm available.


While I worry about the market and prepare to offer my sage advice to the Red Sox, you can click on these:

Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Seems like some guys can't keep their hands to themselves.

NBC fired Matt Lauer this morning and NPR made Garrison Keillor persona non grata this afternoon. Last week, CBS fired Charlie Rose and several months ago FOX fired Bill O'Reilly.

I keep waiting for ABC to fire that Muir guy.

Speaking of creepy old guys who can't keep their hands to themselves, John Conyers is under heat to retire or face the wrath of Psycho Nancy.

It's only a matter of time before she turns her pinched up face towards Loopy Franken.

Gentlemen, please, for the sake of all concerned, control your god-damned urges and leave the ladies alone fer cripes sake.

One woman says that during sessions on the floor, Conyers would walk over to her, bend down to whisper something in ear and run his hand up her dress.

And Franken, well he obviously likes to wait until his victims are asleep before he fondles them.

Jesus, what a couple of slimy assholes.


Here are a few links to click on:

Tuesday, November 28, 2017

I don't understand President Trump

I don't like most politicians because they all think they know what's best for me but I usually understand them. For instance, those of you that have been following this treatise since the beginning know that I hated Willard Romney for his health care laws, his increases in fees and his inability to appreciate what it was like to be a middle-class guy with three kids and lots of bills.

Despite my inability to "like" politicians, I do understand why they do what they do.

Accept for this guy.

I have no idea why he does what he does.

For instance, can someone give me one good reason why he had to bring up Elizabeth Warren at a ceremony for WWII vets?

I don't get it.


You can click on these:

Monday, November 27, 2017

Two hundred and forty two years equals twelve score and two years.

Twelve score and two years ago, our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that "we don't give a shit about the royal family anymore"!

I was watching the news and they devoted at least 10 minutes of the broadcast to the fact that Prince Harry has decided to get married.

For the record, I think Harry and his brother, good old whats-his-name, are a couple of decent guys who aren't quite as stiff or arrogant as the rest of the family.

Having said that, why do our news people think that whenever something happens to the British royal family, they have to talk about over and over again? Who really gives a shit?

I know I don't give a shit.
Do you give a shit?
No, I didn't think you gave a shit.


See if you can find anything entertaining here:

Sunday, November 26, 2017

Is it just me or....

....are their fewer leaves on the ground this year?

I picked up my leaves yesterday using my lawn mower and today I see that very few leaves have fallen. Considering the winds we've been experiencing, I find this unusual because most years I would do the leaves and the next day my entire lawn would be covered again.

Maybe it's because my neighbor has decided to pick up his leaves this year. Usually, the idiot leaves them down all fall and they blow over everyone's lawn.

Maybe this is a sign that he's actually started thinking about his neighbors.

Bah, who am I kidding. He doesn't care about anyone but himself. This is a guy with a two car garage and a six car driveway who insists on parking two of his three cars in the street overnight like this was Springfield.

He's what is known in some circles as a "douche bag".


Here are some links that you can visit if you want:

Saturday, November 25, 2017

I guess I picked the best day

I did my leaves today and I couldn't help but notice that it was a bit windy.

I'm sure glad I flew yesterday and not today.


We delivered our daughter and her little pup to the airport at 5:30 this morning. They took off at 7:30 and were safely back in her apartment before noon.

That means I'll be in bed, snoring, before 9:00 tonight.


I'm going to find some bad television to watch.

You should look into these links:

Friday, November 24, 2017

Outstanding day to fly.

One of my friends wanted to go flying so he joined me at noon today.

I gave him the scary talk on the way to the airport about how the air is like water with currents and waves. I explained that a commercial jet is like an 2000-passenger ocean liner on the water and the plane we were about to fly in is like a two-man rowboat on the water.

I also told him that we would take off, turn around and land in a few minutes so that he would have a chance to say, "I don't like this. let me out."

I did my pre-flight, started the aircraft and then taxi'd over to the runway. We took off just about noon and flew the pattern with three other aircraft. He did his part by pointing out the other aircraft as we made our trip around the pattern. I had an excellent smooth as glass landing and as we were taxiing back, I said, "So, how's it going? You still want to do this?" He said, "That was great! Let's do this!"

So we did.

We took off and headed east. I took him out over Belchertown so he could take pictures of his brothers house and then we flew up the center of Quabbin. Then it was over to Montague and down the river to land back at Northampton.

We had picked up a crosswind by the time we got back to the airport so my second landing involved a bit of a right crab onto the runway with some fancy footwork to get us straight as the wheels touched down. It was still a pretty damned good landing even with the crosswind.

All in all, it was a good time for all concerned. I got to fly for an hour+ and do two full stop landings and he got to experience his first flight in a small plane.

 As we were driving home he asked when he could go again so I guess he enjoyed it.


We had a very successful Thanksgiving with 2 of our 3 children joining us. We also had my wife's mom with us and it appears we all ate way too much food.

So while I continue to eat, and then digest, massive amounts of Thanksgiving leftovers, you should visit these:

Thursday, November 23, 2017

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Well, except for all you spammers that keep visiting this treatise from Italy, India and the Ukraine, trying to post your spammy viagra comments.

You can kiss my ass.

🦃

So for all you fer'ners' that keep reading my blather, let me enlighten you.

Thanksgiving is a celebration of a successful harvest and a commemoration of the day our ancestors got the hell out of Europe and took over the continent known as North America which eventually became Canada and the United States.

Canada has it's own Thanksgiving day but ours is better because, well, it's ours and everything we do is the best.

🦃

Here are a couple of links you can click on while I gorge myself on turkey:

Wednesday, November 22, 2017

I think we are prepared.

I worked a half day today and when I got home, I found my wife and daughter deeply involved in meal preparation. They got everything prepared and ready to go except for the turkey. That gets done tomorrow morning.

I am a fan of Thanksgiving because I like food. Maybe a little too much....


Here are some links for you to visit:

Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Friday is looking pretty good.

The weather is predicted to be sunny and the wind at or about 6 knots. That is pretty good flying weather. I was able to reserve a plane in the early afternoon and my plan is to get at least one hour, possibly two, in the pattern.

Hopefully the weather holds as predicted and my plan comes together nicely.


Seems to be an awful lot of rich, powerful men out there who can't keep their hands to themselves.

My problem with all of this is I can't help but wonder if some of this is over-reaction.

I realize it's probably not a popular position to take but what if some of these "sexual assaults" being reported are really nothing more than some idiot thinking that a woman is interested in him so he made a move only to find out he was wrong.

In my opinion, that's not really sexual assault, that's miscommunication.

Don't misunderstand, I think what if some man attempts to use his position to force a woman into a situation she doesn't want, he is a pig who needs to be removed from his position immediately.

I'm just not sure every one of these accusations is on the up-an-up.

And that, my friends, is a damned shame because when someone makes these things up, they water-down the severity of the real ones.

I guess only time will tell.

In the meantime, I'm just hoping no one comes forward and accuses Fred Rogers or someone like that because that would ruin my day.


Here are todays links:

Monday, November 20, 2017

Windy and cold.

It's beginning to look like this windy stretch is going to continue through the weekend. That means no flying for me. I won't fly when the wind is about 12 knots an it's predicted to be above that on both Saturday and Sunday.

Friday looks promising so maybe I can squeeze and hour in then.

I'll make that decision on Wednesday.


I heard a great new conspiracy today:
    The pictures of the moon landing are staged.
    Not because we didn't go to the moon but because when we got there, something happened that the government doesn't want us to know about.
Some people spend too much time thinking shit up.


Here are some links that you might like:

Sunday, November 19, 2017

These windy weekends suck for flying.

The last time I flew was October 21st. I had planned on putting an hour into the pattern this weekend but the wind and rain made that a bad idea.

Next weekend doesn't look great either.

Sunday may be a possibility but since that's a week away, it's just a guess. And it's not even a good guess. It's more of a wild-assed guess.

Wild-ass guesses rarely work out well but every once in a while, one does.

I'm hoping this is the one.


It's not baseball season here but it is in Australia.

The Australian Baseball League is a small collection of ball teams sponsored by Australian Baseball Federation, the American MLB and the Australian Federal Government.

You would think that since the league is sponsored by the MLB, the MLB network would carry some of the games. They used to carry them but about that was a few years ago.

Maybe they decided that showing the games being played by a league you sponsor is a bad idea.


Since the internet is closed on Sundays, I don't have much for you.

What I do have is here:

Saturday, November 18, 2017

And she's home

We spent some time at Bradley Airport waiting for my daughters flight from school. Turned out that Chicago had quite the wind storm and they were experiencing delays of about 1 hour so her layover was longer than she planned.

Her flight eventually arrive, we got our hugs from our daughter and face licks from the small emergency backup dog and were safely back at home way past my bedtime.

The little dog has a great memory. Every time she walks into this house it's like she never left. She knows exactly where the treats are kept, she remembers there is a dog door her size on the porch and she remembers where her, "Hey! I want to go out! Right freakin' now!" bell is. She rings it vigorously when she needs to go out.

It's annoying but not as annoying as barking.

She also remembers to talk to me in the mornings until I give her one of the aforementioned treats.

She's quite the conversationalist.

So anyways, everyone is settled in and they will be with us for the week. Then it will be back to school for one more month when they will get their end-of-semester break and be home for a month.


And now I'm going to watch Wonder Woman.

You can click on these while I do:

Friday, November 17, 2017

Busy evening

Not a lot of free time this evening so how about we just get to the links:

Thursday, November 16, 2017

I'm a wizard

So I managed to configure the email reader on my wife's computer.

Seems that Apple is trying to make things easy and they automatically assume that your email provider uses standard IMAP ports. Unfortunately the only way you can change the ports is to first configure the email and let it fail. Even more unfortunate is that Apple says, "Oh, this failed! I'm going to keep on trying anyways!"

So in order to configure it and then change the ports, I lied to it. It failed immediately but created the account.

I was then able to go into the account and modify it with the correct ports and she was up & running.

She doesn't want to admit it but I'm her hero.


I have a webinar to sit through this evening so I'm going to finish this up and log in.

While I listen to Patty Wagstaff (Go ahead, google her. I'll wait.) tell me how to not lose control while I'm flying around, you can visit these links:

Wednesday, November 15, 2017

Apple sucks at configuration parameters

Now that my wife has a reloaded computer, we had to reconfigure her email reader.  I followed the instructions and click the "sign in" button and all I got was this window:


Note the little spinning object next to the Back button because that's all I got no matter what I did.

I believe the problem is that Charter / Spectrum wants us to change the ports for incoming and outgoing to something other than the defaults and the Mac doesn't give us that option.

I'm thinking we need to go back to the Apple store and ask them to please configure this thing for us.


So right now I am beyond frustrated and I'm calling it a night.

Here is a couple of links for you to enjoy:

Tuesday, November 14, 2017

The furnace saga continues

My furnace guy says he can fix the furnace but he also says it's time for us to think about upgrading to a more efficient model. I told him fix the one we have and next summer we'll look into an upgrade.


The MLB GM meetings are going on and this is when the negotiations take place for potential trades. It's also a time for agents to shop their available players to the GMs.

I'm kind of hoping that Trade 'em away Dave doesn't give the farm away but I also hope he gets a bat or two that can help push the Red Sox over the hump. They were kind of successful the last two seasons but came up just short because they kept leaving men on base.

They need that hitter who they can rely on to drive runners in.

Personally, I'm hoping they make J.D. Martinez an offer. That man knows how to hit a baseball.


Here are some links for you:

Monday, November 13, 2017

Nothing broke today

I neglected to inform you that I did not need a new furnace.  He was able to repair it so there's three or four grand I didn't need to spend.

I like not spending thousands of dollars.


Here's a shock - the media is lying to us again.

There are big headlines all over that say "Trump says he believes Putin instead of US Intelligence"

The problem is Trump never said he believes Putin.

What he said was,
    "Every time he sees me, he says, 'I didn't do that', And I believe, I really believe, that when he tells me that, he means it. I think he is very insulted by it. I can't stand there and argue with him, I'd rather have him get out of Syria, to be honest with you. I'd rather have him, you know, work with him on the Ukraine than standing and arguing."

No where in that statement does Trump say, "I believe him".

I am not a Trump supporter so it doesn't bother me because of Trump. I'm telling this because it bothers that they would lie like that.

If they are looking for sensational headlines about Trump, all they have to do is wait a few minutes. The man says dumb stuff every day, ten times a day. They certainly don't have to make shit up.


You can visit these links while I contemplate my role in this universe:

Sunday, November 12, 2017

The Mac is back

My wife's computer is once again computing and she is a happy kid.

I however, am a little concerned that this will happen again and her data loss will be substantially worse than it was. She is a professor with a lot of documents so her loss would effect her ability to perform her work.

That would be bad.

So I'm considering the purchase of a n Apple router called a Time Machine.

It's basically a router with a 2 terrabyte hard drive that will allow us to do automatic backups of our phones, our iPads and our Macs without worrying about plugging in thumb drives or external hard drives.

I'm a large fan of automatic backups.

Besides, I've also noticed that our six year old first floor router has begun dropping out every once in a while so it might be time to replace it.

If the time machine router is extremely expensive, I've also discovered how to create my own time machine using basic and inexpensive equipment.

Either way, at some point in the very near future, I want these machines backing themselves up as needed.

I don't want her to go through that stress-filled event again.


I'm gonna make soem of my famous pizza.

While I do that, here are some links for you to visit:

Saturday, November 11, 2017

Long day

Today was an interesting day.

My wife tried to install the recommended Macbook OS/X update from Apple and it things did not go well. Her Mac decided to stop working and when I did some interwebgoogling, I found out that the recommended solution to her problem was to bring it to a Apple store and have them fix it.

We had an appointment at an assisted living center for my mother-in-law so we packed her and my wife's Mac up in the car and went to see this place. We took the grand tour, stayed for lunch, which was pretty damned good, and spent some time talking to the manager. In the end, a deposit was placed and now we wait.

After returning my mother-in-law to back to her house, my wife and I ran up to the Apple store in Holyoke where we explained her problem and got an appointment to have someone look at her computer. The clerk said it would be 4 hours before they could look at it so we headed home.

Once at home, two of my brothers showed up and picked up one of our old couches for another brother. We also managed to get a few things done that needed doing before heading back up to the Holyoke Mall.

Once there, we managed to get my wife's glasses fixed, buy some new furniture covers and generally wander around for about 20 minutes before we got the text that said it was time for us to have the Mac looked at.

Turns out they need to keep it over night so looks like I'll be heading back up to Holyoke tomorrow.


Here are some links that I managed to find for you:

Friday, November 10, 2017

Still getting spammed.

There were 32 new comments this afternoon. That means it's time to shut off commenting.

I don't have time to deal with this crap so no more commenting. I changed the blog so only registered users can comment.

Not entirely sure that will solve the problem but if I no longer have to deal with 32 messages each evening. I'll be happy guy.


Here are some links:

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Spam is rampant

I had 17 new spam comments this afternoon. Most of them were boring but a few were pretty entertaining.

First up we have Hungry Man:
    Right away I am going away to do my breakfast, after having my breakfast coming over again to read additional news.
He was followed by The Shmoozer:
    Thanks for some other wonderful post. Where else may just anyone get that type of info in such an ideal means of writing? I've a presentation next week, and I am at the look for such info.
Not be outdone, here is The Moocher:
    An impressive share! I have just forwarded this onto a colleague who had been conducting a little research on this. And he in fact ordered me lunch because I found it for him...
    lol. So let me reword this.... Thanks for the meal!!
    But yeah, thanks for spending some time to discuss this subject here on your web site.

Finally, we have My Newest Friend:
    You, my pal, ROCK! I found just the info I already searched all over the place and just could not come across.
    What an ideal website.

I get the best spam.


Here are some links:

Wednesday, November 8, 2017

I think I need a new furnace

My furnace started leaking from the pressure expansion valve a couple of weeks ago. Not much, just a drip that came to about a gallon in a 24 hour period. Then it started getting worse and yesterday, I noticed that when the furnace is running, the pressure goes up to almost 35psi. The expansion valve is set to go off at 30psi.

I sent this information off to my furnace guy, who is coming on Friday to check things out, and the reply I got was,
    "Ok, so the relief valve is doing its job. It's only a 30psi valve. So either the boiler is over filling itself or, hopefully not, the coil could have a pinhole in it"
I didn't hear anymore from him but I assume that "the coil may have a pinhole" thing is bad and probably not repairable.

I'm praying for an easy, low cost repair but I'm planning on buying a new furnace.


Here are todays links:

Tuesday, November 7, 2017

I've worked with an unstable guy

His name was Chris and man, was he screwed up. He was paranoid, he was depressed, he was a little psychotic and he was angry all the time. He swore that there were terrorists on the Connecticut river and he wanted to get a boat, mount a gun on it and patrol the river.

Oh, and he had guns. A lot of guns. He also may have been in possession of a fully automatic weapon that he kept calling his "M-16".

Basically, this guy was full tilt bozos. And when I talked to my boss about him, I suggested that I was going to bring it up to company security because I did not want to end up as a chalk outline under my desk. My boss told me that I shouldn't do that because it would cause a lot of trouble for the guy.

To this day I still think I should have talked to someone about this guy.

He was eventually let go by the company and he drifted away from my world. I learned later that he got himself some help and seemed to be fairly stable but he still had all those guns.

In light of what happened in Texas, I can't help but think how close we came to a situation that could have gone very badly.

People like that should not have guns.

Hell, people like that should not have cars.


Here are some links that I found:

Monday, November 6, 2017

I'm tired

I dislike these time changes.

I managed to stay awake until 9:30 last night and I'm goign to force myself to do it again tonight but my body thinks it's 10:30.

10:30 is way past my bedtime.


Our furnace developed a slight leak from the pressure relief valve about a week ago. My furnace guy, Bobby, will be here later this week to fix it and make sure all is well with the furnace.

As things stand right now, that furnace tuneup will be the last major winter readiness task here at the Daily News© World Headquarters.

I changed the oil on The Beast yesterday and I changed the oil on the generator the other day. I took the roof rake out of the garage rafters so it's available when needed.

The last thing that needs to happen to make my winter life complete is I need to go buy a couple of new snow shovels. The ones I have are worn out.

Ain't nobody got time for worn out snow shovels.


Here are some links you can click on if you want to: