Category Archives: News

News

Matt turns 17 and Harold turns 75

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We had a nice combined birthday party for Matt and my dad last night.  It went well, everyone had a lot of pizza, cake and ice cream, and had a good time.  I took a little video and photos of the event, and burned a DVD of it so Penny could see the party, and today Sandy, Kevin and I stopped up at the hospital to see her and watch the video and photos with her.  I think she enjoyed it.

Sandy and I got Matt driving lessons for his birthday, since he said that’s all he wanted was his license (and a car).  We’re taking him out driving several times a week, and he also has his driving school classes several times a week along with school, so he’s plenty busy these days.

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Making Modern Home Movies

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I have recently begun successfully creating DVD projects from start to finish. Previously the entire process was always bogged down at some point that I’d always get bored and quit “for now”, or I’d get errors somewhere along the line and not know how to continue on. I now feel pretty confident that I can complete an entire project in very little time, and the hurdles that I run into are easily jumped over. Here’s the process and software that has proven to be the most successful for me:

First I record the video of the event with my Sony MiniDV recorder. Usually I also have digital photos from the same event that Sandy has taken as well, so I’ll put these on the same DVD with the event video just to offer more options to the viewer.

Next I transfer the recorded video from tape to my PC digitally, using Firewire and Sony’s DVGate, a great video transfer utility that came with the camera. Normally I prefer to use a more full-featured application than those bundled with hardware, but in this case, for transferring digital video, I have found much more difficulty with every other option I tried. This one is simply the easiest and offers the best results. The main issue I kept running into was dropped frames. If the PC does just about anything else while transferring a video, frames are dropped at random points when the transfer couldn’t go as fast as the tape was playing. DVGate, however, is the only program I’ve found that includes “dropped frame recovery”, and I have yet to lose a single frame of video using this program. It does take longer to transfer though, since it analyzes the entire video first and then transfers it, each cut separately if desired, and breaks the resulting video files into 2GB chunks. Well worth the added time it takes though, in my opinion. 

After the video is transferred I bring it into Pinnacle Studio 8, which came with my video card. It’s also available separately, and they’re now on version 10, which is probably pretty sweet, but I haven’t been able to afford it yet, especially with version 8 still working so well for me. Anyway, I load all the files into Studio 8 and then assemble the video in the order I want, add any transitions I want, and also any beginning and ending title frames and/or credit screens. When I need these, I just create an image in Paint Shop Pro 10 at 1024×768 and add all the text and graphics I want, then save it as a JPG in the same folder as the digital photos I’ve taken of the same event. Note: I usually end up “punching up” the text I put on the title screens by adding bevel effects and/or drop shadow effects, otherwise all the text tends to look very flat on TV. 

Once the video is assembled, I have Studio 8 create a DVD-compatible MPEG file of the video. This creates a full-quality video with little or no compression loss. This part take a while to render, but since it’s not done in real time I usually just minimize it while it works and go on to other things. 

After the video is done I start a new project in Studio again, this time using the digital photos I’ve taken. Most of the time I re-use the same titling & credits images that I used in the video as well. The process in Studio is identical to the video process I described above, since you’re basically doing the same thing–creating another video–only this time you’re just using still photographs. I even add some transitions between most photos to kick it up a notch, just like the video itself. Once this is assembled it’s back to rendering again. Still photos usually render very quickly though, so this step will definitely go faster than the last one. 

When both MPEG files are created, I exit Studio 8. I’m done with it for this project. Next I load Nero Vision, a nice, simple DVD Maker. It comes free with Nero Burning ROM 6 and 7. Vision provides a step-by-step “wizard” that walks you through creating menu screens (some themes are even animated), titles, graphics, etc., until my layout is complete. I can change any text, colors, images, etc., to create totally custom menus, and there is very little I can’t customize in some way with this program, from what I can tell. Once I’m done tweaking the settings, I burn the DVD in Vision as my final step. 

I can then put the DVD in all of my players and verify that it works fine. What I also like to do at this point it extract a copy of it–usually with DVD Shrink or DVD Decrypter–and keep it on my hard drive so I can quickly burn more copies of it for relatives, etc., as needed, without needed the disc again. It’s also a handy way to keep a backup copy in case your dog decides your DVD makes a pretty good Frisbee Chew Toy.

News

Adventures in Printerland

I have recently been experimenting with a lot of different options in inkjet printers.  I currently have three of them, all from different manufacturers–Lexmark, Epson, and Canon.  We’ve also had a lot of need to print a lot of scanned and digital photos, so as you can imagine the ink consumption has been large.  Below are my experiences with each printer.

INK

First of all, let’s discuss the ink issue.  This can be the most expensive part about having an inkjet, but it can be minimized quite a bit more than you might think.  Up until a few months ago I was dead set against refilling ink cartridges, but due to my recent financial difficulties I’ve had to re-think a lot of expenses, and ink was one of them.  A customer of mine pointed me to Printpal, a great printer ink source on the web.  They sell name-brand ink cartridges for a few dollars less that the lowest store prices, normally, which didn’t impress me much, but what sold me was their “generic” compatible cartridges–they are often 1/2 the price of the name-brand equivalents and they’re exactly same–or supposedly better than the manufacturer’s cartridges, as far as ink goes.

Using generic ink cartridges on all three of my inkjet printers I saved a lot of money, and the print quality was identical as far as I could tell, to the name-brand cartridges I had always bought before.  I’ll definitely never buy name-brand ink cartridges again, as long as these generics exist.  This is a good option for ink, if you want to save a lot of money over time, but ink costs can still add up, so I kept looking to save more.

Next, I picked up a couple of “Universal” (that’s the brand name) refill kits from Walmart.  This, as I mentioned, is something I swore I’d never do, but now I’m actually open to it if it can work, save me a lot of money, and not permanently damage my printers.  I first attempted to refill my Epson Stylus CX4600’s ink cartridges.  The reference book that comes with each refill kit lists hundreds of printers and cartridges and provides instructions for each detailing how to open them up and/or access their refill holes, and in some cases even MAKE your own refill holes for those cartridges that are well-sealed.  All of the necessary tools are provided, however, including a hole-making tool.

But what they don’t tell you before you buy them is that some printers–and my Epson CX4600 is one of those–have ink cartridges that include “Smart Chips”.  These chips actually count the number of “microdots” each cartridge and color has printed, and this is supposed to allow them to accurately determine the remaining ink in the cartridge.  So in this case, refilling these cartridges would do absolutely no good.  The smart chip would still tell the printer that the ink was empty, and you still wouldn’t be able to print with it.  For these types of printers, the same company, Universal, sells a smart chip “resetter” for an additional fee.  This allows you to reset that microdot counter so you can reuse your cartridges.

I didn’t feel like it was worth it to order the chip resetter for the extra fee, so I decided to skip trying to refill the Epson’s ink and I moved on to my Lexmark X5150.  I would have preferred to do it on the Epson, since it has four separate inks cartridges.  You can only refill one color at a time with the kit anyway (unless you buy multiple kits), since the syringe needs to be rinsed, cleaned and dried before being reused on another color, so separate inks would have been easier, but no such luck.  The Lexmark X5150 has one 3-color cartridge and one black cartridge.  But it doesn’t have a smart chip, so it’s good for an easy refill.  The top of the cartrdge was also fairly easy to remove, using the instructions provided in the refill kit’s book.  Using a pen-knife you simply pop off the top, which reveals the refill holes.  The book shows a diagram as well, detailing exactly which refill holes to use for each color.  This is where the separate cartridges would have come in handy.  But it’s easy enough to orient the cartridge properly with the photo in the book and use the appropriate hole to refill the necessary color.

The refill kits can become a bit messy, so if you use them I’d have a lot of napkins or disposable towels handy, and make sure your layers of them are very thick in your immediate work area.  A few drops of this ink can and will seep through a 5 or 6 napkin stack with ease, so pile it on, or use something that doesn’t absorb so well.  It can also stain your hands quite well, so be careful.  But in the end, unless you totally screw up this refill process, it works quite well.  I was surprised at first, but now it’s fairly routine, and I no longer get the least bit disturbed when my Lexmark runs out of a color.  I simply pull out the refill kit and go to work refilling.  It ends up saving me a LOT of money, so I think it’s well worth it.

One additional note while I’m talking about the refill kits–The colors themselves, while within their transparent bottles, look like they should–Magenta looks pink, Cyan looks blue and black looks black–but yellow is the exception to the rule, and it confused me a bit.  Yellow looks pink in the bottle, very close the the magenta.  And a few drops on a napkin look orange.  But when used in an ink cartridge it is definitely yellow, so this is apparently normal.

PRINTERS

Let’s start with the worst one:  The Epson Stylus CX4600.  FIrst of all, I got this printer for free from a customer who just didn’t like it.  It was brand new too.  My customer had another CX4600 that was defective, and it was returned and exchanged for another identical one, but in the end they just didn’t like this model, so they gave it to me.  It worked great at first, probably for about a month.  The scanner is excellent, and very quiet when scanning.  The scan quality as well as the print quality was very good, and the multi-card reader also worked great.  This printer seemed great, as I said–for about a month.

First I ran into the smart chip issue, so that’s one minus.  That wasn’t so bad though, just more of an inconvenience.  I bought a few spare generic cartridges from PrintPal for about $6.95 each, just to have them onhand.  But next, a color stopping working.  The ink warning showed it still half full, and I took it out and shook it and could feel and hear that there was still a lot of ink left in it, so I assumed clogged nozzles.  This seemed odd though, since everything looked clean and clear, and it even splashed out ink when I tapped it on a napkin.  The CX4600’s nozzles are internal though, and not on the cartridge, so they could still be clogged.  I ran several cleanings with no luck.  Not a drop of that color (cyan) would come out at all.  I googled this printer model and problem and found several other people with the same issue.  Apparently it’s common for a pump in this model to fail, causing this problem.  Great, no more cyan.  I have a paperweight as far as printing goes.

I didn’t give up just yet though.  I kept trying to print, time and time again, to no avail.  In fact, after a few more days of trying, another color died, again with ink still left in it and a smart chip that was now as dumb as a door knob.  Two down, two to go.  Within a few days the last two colors died as well, and I can now print awesome pages of our most-recent snow storm with ease–solid white pages are all I ever get.  And just for the heck of it I even threw in 4 brand new cartridges.  Again, just white pages.  This printer is now only good for scanning and media card reading and nothing else.

The next printer I’ll discuss is the Lexmark X5150.  I’ve had just the opposite experience with this one.  It has performed flawlessly for quite some time.  It is also–like the Epson was–an all-in-one Printer/Copier/Scanner.  Plus, I’ve been refilling the ink cartridges on this one with ease, and it’s been going great.  This printer has just worked wonders for me, and I once felt that the one 3-color cartridge was a bad thing, but since I can now refill individual colors on it this is no longer an issue.  Plus, this printer’s cartridges have the nozzles built into the cartridges.  So if they should dry out you can pop the cartridge out and clean off the nozzles, or if they are completely dried closed you can just buy a new cartridge instead of an entirely new printer.  This “nozzles-on-the-cartridge” type of ink system costs more when buying cartridges, but when you consider the savings you get through PrintPal or by simply refilling them compared to ending up with a total paperweight when your printer-internal nozzles completely dry up, it’s well worth it.  That’s about it for the Lexmark–it’s by far my favorite inkjet model yet.

The last printer I have is the Canon S300.  This is one of those “throw-in” printers that come with an entire computer system.  Separately they sell for about $49.  Just a basic inkjet (or in this case I think they call it a bubble jet), with nothing special.  But it’s still printing, so as a printer it certainly beats my Epson CX4600!  It has also sat for about 6 months in my basement, but was recently put back into action on my stepson’s computer, and it has “come back” very nicely.  Several clogged nozzles at first, but a set of new cartridges and printing about 20 multi-colored pages restored it’s printing ability to as good as it was when I first got it.  Not bad for a bottom-of-the-line printer.

FINAL THOUGHTS

So in the end, here are my recommendations if you’re in the market for a new printer:

Make sure the ink cartridges include the nozzles, and not just big ink holes.
If possible, get a printer with separate, individual inks–if they still have the nozzles on the cartridges.
Be careful of the printer model you get. Find a model you like and google it for problems before buying.
Get what you need–if you don’t need an all-in-one you can probably get a really nice print-only model.
Refilling works, and does save you a lot of money, but it can be messy.  If you’re careful though, it’s not bad.
Seriously consider PrintPal or another supplier that sells generic cartridges.  They work well, and it’s just not worth it to pay full price just for a brand name.

News

SuperValu Letter Follow-up

The Spiegelhoff’s (the owners of SuperValu) have distributed this letter as a rebuttal to the union letter that everyone received last week.  In it they explain the TRUTH about the situation between them, the union and the employees.  I only hope they have access to the same mailing list that the union has though.  This letter was obtained from their store, and we haven’t received it in the mail yet.  We’re a little concerned that many people may only get the first letter and only have one side of the story, which may result in the loss of customers.  If you shop at SuperValu or know someone who does, please make them aware of both of these letters.

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To shop or not to shop

I received this letter in the mail yesterday from a food workers union. It’s about the changes that have occurred at SuperValu on 80th Street since the new owners purchased it in 2005. The letter explains how all of the employees were terminated and had to re-apply for their jobs. Most were hired back, however, and even received raises, although their health insurance plan was changed, which resulted in those who were enrolled in it paying more for the same coverage. The letter ends by asking everyone to stop shopping at SuperValu until a new contract is accepted that provides for good jobs and affordable health care for all employees.

This is a very confusing letter to me. My first thought was that this union wants to put SuperValu out of business, which leaves all of these people unemployed. If everyone stops shopping at SuperValu, that’s exactly what will happen. How does the union benefit from this? And how do the employees themselves feel about this letter from the union that supposedly supports them? I was curious enough to ask, so I did.

I talked to a SuperValu employee, and this employee told me that they haven’t even paid union dues for months! Considering that, the union really doesn’t seem to have anything to lose if these employees all end up without jobs. But have they really been fighting for a new contract all this time? This employee went on to explain that their last union contract had also been expired for over a year prior to the new owners even buying the store–because the old owner only wanted to sell, and didn’t want to negotiate a new contract. It sounds to me like this is a non-union store, and it has been for some time. So why can’t the union just give up this store instead of possibly causing many people to become unemployed?

I’m not sure about anyone else, but if I were working there, I’d be glad to have a job these days, and I wouldn’t be too happy about this letter from a union supposedly supporting me, by telling everyone to stop patronizing the store I earn my living from.

Please excuse me now, I have to go shopping for a few things….AT SUPERVALU!

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Photography

Kevin’s birthday is this week! We’re having his party at one of his favorite restaurants, so he’s quite excited about it. He wants a Plasma Ball and a Darth Vader Voice Changer, among other things. It should be a great party, I’ll take lots of photos.

Mahirose, Kevin and I are planning to go to the Snow Sculpting Championships in Lake Geneva on Saturday. We’re really looking forward to it. I’ll be sure to take lots of pictures there as well.

Mahirose and I also recently joined the PhotoKenosha Club “Kenosha’s Very Own Shutterbugs”. We haven’t been to a meeting or outing yet, but it should be fun. The club is pretty new, from what I hear, so it’s just starting out and still has a pretty small membership. It’s totally free though, so you can’t beat the price! If you’re into photography, whether it’s digital or not, and you’re in or around Kenosha, why not consider joining! Check out the website for more information.

And since this posting seems to be all about pictures, I might as well explain my recent dilemma. I’ve been trimming down the photo gallery lately. We’ve been getting dangerously close to using up all of our 2 GB of space lately. I managed to whittle it down a few times previously, but apparently the cache is just eating it back up as users view the photos. I empty the cache again, but that’s only very temporary relief.

So far though, I’ve managed to not have to remove any of my own photos or other users’ photos. I had hundreds of stock photos of sunsets, animals, space, etc., which I removed first. This helped quite a bit. As a second step I’ve been resizing and compressing the remaining albums. Since I started using photo gallery I tended to keep my photos large, usually at least 1280×1024. Everyone else seemed to only have small images 640×480 or less on their sites, and I figured why not off some better quality? Well, now I’ve learned my lesson. Gallery 2 makes it fairly easy to trim down entire albums of photos though, so it’s not a big deal. I just end up with smaller images on my website.

So if you happen to see a photo you like on the site, like a sunset or something else, but it’s too small to use as you wallpaper or for developing, feel free to contact me directly and I’ll be glad to send you a full-sized version of the photo you want. Keep in mind, however, that I don’t have larger-sized versions of any images in the humor galleries and other user galleries, only the photos I’ve taken myself.

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Snow Storm Last Night

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Good morning!  We had a big snow storm last night.  It was nice and tidy though, it didn’t stick around and linger.  We had good warning yesterday morning, including an advisory on the scanner to all public service personnel that there will be a storm between 4:00pm and midnight.  It came pretty much right on schedule.  I’m not sure how long it stayed, but it was gone in the morning and the animated radar map showed that it looked to be a few hours East of us already, with nothing left behind.

It looks like we got about 6 to 8 inches here.  I shoveled Sandy out so she could get to work this morning, and then Kevin and I went over to do Mahirose’s driveway and sidewalk for her.  When we got back our neighbor was snowblowing our sidewalk and offered to do our driveway as well!  This saved me a bunch more shoveling, so it was a big relief.  I took a few photos, and one of them is today’s photo of the day.  Which, in case you missed it, is now REALLY a “photo of the day” album.  I started on January 15th, and I plan to post at least one photo in there every single day.  Sometimes they may not be MY photos, but they’re certainly all favorites of mine, whether they’re stock photographs, my own photos, or a work of digital art, so make sure you stop in there frequently if you don’t happen to visit the site every day and see it on the main page.

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Police Scanner Technology

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I recently acquired a new “toy” that I have been playing with a lot lately. It’s the Radio Shack PRO-97 Handheld Scanner. This isn’t a scanner in the computer sense, it’s a “Police Scanner.” I have been a scanner enthusiast since I was a kid. My dad has also been one since the first models were introduced many years ago when I was a kid. I remember our family owning many scanners having as little as 8 channels, each one requiring the purchase of a “crystal” costing $5 – $15 each which contained a specific frequency for whatever particular service (Police, Fire, Weather, etc.) you wanted for your listening area. There was an LED for each channel, and the scanner would blink them in sequence as it scanned the 8 channels. Later on, crystal scanners were phased out for programmable models. Now you could just punch in the frequency you wanted and save it into a memory location in the scanner and there it was, at no extra cost. Early models had limited band coverage and as little as 10 to 50 channels.

The one I began looking at closely was the Radio Shack PRO-95. It was advertised at $149 back in November. With 1,000 channels, all the bands, and a PC interface, it looked really sweet and made me almost drool. So I began saving. Eventually I knew I’d have this hot little scanner in my hand with all of its cool features.

I researched everything I could about the Radio Shack PRO-95 when its price recently became amazingly affordable at $99. After I had convinced myself that I just couldn’t wait any longer (I hadn’t bought a new scanner in many years, after all) I started my search. It didn’t take long for me to learn that the PRO-95 had been discontinued and was no longer available anywhere. Radio Shack’s website showed that it was available at only 1 store in this area–the Zion Radio Shack. So I went there on a mission to find it. As you can imagine, they didn’t have it, even though the web said they did. They confirmed that it was shown to be in stock–1 unit–at their store, and then said that it must be an inventory miscount, because they don’t have one. They did, however, have its replacement model–the PRO-97–which had just come in this week. It was a much better scanner with many more features. The price was $149–the same price that the PRO-95 was in November. After thinking about it and researching the additional features, I took the plunge. 

The first exciting revelation I had with this new scanner was the ability to connect it to a PC and program it via the computer! This required the additional purchase of a PC interface cable (serial port connection) and transfer software–which Radio Shack employees themselves seem to be clueless about. I learned everything from the web before purchasing, so I had a pretty good idea of what it was capable of. There are several different applications available for interfacing this scanner with a PC, and after some testing I found Starrsoft Win97 (specific for the PRO-97 scanner) to be the best by far. It amazingly allows loading and saving of virtually every single feature on the PRO-97, including not only saving the 1,000 channel frequencies it will hold, but also all the “little things” like how long you want the backlight to stay lit when you turn it on, whether you want it to automatically turn on the backlight whenever you press a key, whether the “Priority” feature is on or off, etc., and many of these features aren’t even programmable without the software!

You don’t know what a relief it is to be able to automatically save or load the entire scanner contents like this though. I can remember spending hours and hours programming mine and my dad’s handheld and desktop scanners after their batteries have died and we lost 100 or so channels from the memory banks. Sheesh, what a pain. Imagine having to do that with the THOUSAND channels this scanner now has! It takes less than a minute to transfer the entire scanner to the PC or vice versa. So basically it’s no sweat at all. Program it ONCE and I never have to do it again. And you also not only program a frequency into each memory location but also a text description of what it is. So whenever that channel talks on the scanner you see exactly what channel it is–in English–on the display.

And as the commercials always put it: But wait–There’s more! After manually programming the 100 or so local frequencies I had, I did another web search and actually found a site dedicated to scanner enthusiasts (RadioReference.com), and it includes the ability to let you transfer entire categories from their database directly into your scanner! A little more searching verified that this particular scanner was indeed compatible with it, so I was golden. I joined the website, and was then asked to donate a small fee to enable the ability to interface with their database (and also enable several other site features). So I paid them a few dollars and I could instantly connect to the site directly through StarrSoft’s Win97 and transfer entire frequency groups.

One thing I like about this is that I don’t even have to program the text descriptions into each channel now. The descriptions are transferred to each channel with the frequencies themselves. But imagine the possibilities here: Since you narrow your search by country, by state, then by city, you can instantly choose any new city–for example Milwaukee–and transfer all of their frequencies into a single bank of your scanner. This is awesome, very fast, and simple to do with Win97. You can even specify which Bank to transfer the frequencies to (the PRO-97 has 10 banks of 100 channels each), and name each Bank with a text description. So now my PRO-97 has a “Milwaukee Area” bank, a “Racine Area” bank, and two “Kenosha Area” banks, and I still have over 600 channels unused. Scanners have certainly come a long way, and I’m really having fun with this new one.  Now all I need to do is get my dad to buy one and I can instantly program his with no effort whatsoever!

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King Kong – The Movie, The Puzzle, and The Obsession

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Kevin and I went to see King Kong on New Year’s Day. It was surprisingly uncrowded. It was showing on 2 screens though, which probably evened out the numbers. I thought it was a great movie–excellent special effects, well-told, and a very cool period piece. It was amazing to see how they recreated New York City from the 1930’s…and then to watch King Kong totally demolish it near the end of the picture!

I’ve heard people say that it was too long, running around 180 minutes. But Kevin and I really didn’t notice. I would have expected him to get bored or fall asleep at some point if he didn’t like it in some way, but he was glued to it the whole time. There was a bit of a slow part as the movie started, which may have been why he stayed alert. He was waiting in anticipation of seeing the dinosaurs and King Kong, so he stayed patient and waited through it. He wasn’t disappointed either. There were plenty of dinosaurs and lots of King Kong scenes to keep him amazed. I even caught him covering his eyes during a couple parts that were a bit gruesome. Overall he loved it though, and had a great time.

Today he even rented the 1976 version of King Kong and watched it in the car on our trip to Union Grove, so he’s still on his ‘Kong Kick’. He also had just finished assembling his King Kong jigsaw puzzle the night before seeing the movie, so he was really excited to finally get to see King Kong “for real.” That’s Kevin’s pattern though–he’ll find a particular movie or subject that interests him and just dive into it for days studying every aspect of it, learning all he can from it, watching every movie he can about it, etc. I think it says a lot about him, and hopefully it’ll serve him well in the future.  I think I’ll be starting another obsession of my own real soon–A couple of Simpsons Photomosaics should be at my door in a few days…uhoh.

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Photo Mosaics

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Ever since I created that Christmas Calendar Cover Page that I mentioned earlier (and put in the downloads section) I have been seeing “photo mosaics” everywhere.  Photo Mosaics are large photographs that–when viewed up close–consist of hundreds (and sometimes thousands) of smaller images arranged by overall shade and color to represent a “pixel” in the large photo.  If you squint or view the large image from afar, it looks like a normal photograph, but the closer you get the more detail you can see in the hundreds of tinier images.  I saw a large poster of a president at Kevin’s school that was a photomosaic, and when Christmas shopping I also saw a photomosaic jigsaw puzzle from Disney which consisted of a large cel from a Disney cartoon, and all of the smaller images were each inividual frames from other Disney movies–over 1,000 cels in all.  It’s fascinating to me.

So over the last few days I’ve been researching and trying out the free programs that create these Photomosaic images.  I tried several shareware programs, none of which gave me the kind of resolution I’d like in their “free” versions.  If you pay for the “full” or “professional” version of the program you presumably get the high-resolution mosaics that I was looking for.  Sometimes, depending on the program, this could be $25, or $50, sometimes even $100 or more for the “full” version.  That is, until I found a program called “Centarsia.”  Centarsia is a freeware mosaic program that does exactly what I want it to, nothing more, nothing less.  A lot of the other programs had many more features, but as I said, you have to pay for them to get all of the features (and the high-resolution mosaics).  This one appears to have been originally written to be a commerical application (there’s even a “Pricing” link on the website), but when you click on it it tells you it’s a free program, and then gives you a username (“webuser”) and a serial number (“09765-44986-1205716296”) to enter into the program to “register” it.  This is important information too, because just like the other programs, without “registering” it you’re limited to low-resolution mosaics. Once registered with this generic user info though, it works great and you can have unlimited mosaics with unlimited photo “block” images for it to choose its “pixels” from.

So far I’ve created only one big mosaic.  They take a while to create, since they access so many different photographs to compose an image, but it’s pretty fun to watch as it progresses.  Keep in mind, if you try this yourself, that you need a pretty wide variety of images for it to choose from to make halfway decent mosaics.  For my first one, which you can view with the link below, I used over 4,000 photos consisting of every digital photo I took in 2005.  I found a decent online “viewer” for them too, so this should make it pretty easy for you to get a good idea of exactly what a photomosaic is, in case you haven’t heard of them before.  Click here to take a look (or click on the thumbnail above).  Use the “+” and “-” controls at the bottom of the image to zoom in and out.  Once you zoom in all the way, drag the image around and look at all the photos close-up.  Let me know what you think.  Remember, it’s only my first attempt.

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Christmas Highlights

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Our Christmas section for 2005 is now complete.  I added a bunch of highlight photos this morning.  We took a ton of them though, so I only posted a few.  Click on the thumbnail to view them.

Interesting highlights from this year included:

  • The puzzle Matt had to solve to get his gift card.  It’s called Bilz Obstacle, and Ginger got it for Matt to make his gift more than just a “get and forget” gift card.  It worked well, and actually took Matt a little while to solve.
  • Nice to see everyone in the family “going digital” (Beth and George) – Except old-fashioned Penny.
  • Kevin loves his new Roboraptor and Mini Roboraptor.

The Bears/Packers rivalry was in full swing this Christmas, even more so because the rivalry game itself was played on Christmas.  Yes, we watched it, and Sandy managed to plan the festivities around it pretty well so as not to force anyone to have to leave early.  There’s a really interesting mix of Packers and Bears fans in the family, so things get quite amusing to say the least.  I’m neutral, but Sandy’s a Packers fan.  The Bears won this one, but she wasn’t too disappointed.  Christmas turned out being pretty good, and that’s what really mattered.

Socks also got along very well with all of our guests, which was a surprise.  We thought we’d have trouble with him, especially after the way he acted when I tried to bring him over to my dad’s a few weeks ago to play with Tiny.  He was constantly agressive and kept trying to attack Tiny.  I ended up bring him back home and going back alone.  He was a bit nervous each time a new guest arrived on Christmas, but he came around quickly and cozied up to each of them for some petting a little while after each of them arrived.

Overall it was a very nice Christmas!

News

Goodbye Peanut

We have been struggling for a couple years with problems with Peanut, our tan chihuahua. As you’ve probably read in a couple previous articles, we’ve been through a lot with him, including having him get lost in a strange neighborhood for a few days in the freezing cold. Well, our problems began after that incident in the cold, and they never really improved after stuggling day after day to try to get him to behave properly (he always hated Sandy, growling and snapping whenever she got close to him or he to her) and he continued to pee and mark everything in the house even after being fixed, training with training pads, using “Stay-Off” spray, and everything else we could think of.

As a result of his continued “marking” issues, we’re pretty sure this is what caused my leg infection twice, both of which were very serious, extremely painful, and costly in both lost work time and medical fees. The leg infections cleared up, but I recently got an arm infection that no one can explain, so we’re assuming it is somehow connected with the previous leg infections. Anyway, we had been seriously considering our options for Peanut for the past few weeks, and thought it would be better for him in a new home. He just doesn’t–and isn’t ever–going to get along with us and learn to behave properly. We also have Socks, our black and white chihuahua, and he is the total opposite of Peanut. He has learned to tell us when he needs to go outside, in emergencies he uses his pad to do his business, and he’s very friendly to the entire family. Neighbors and outside family members are another story, but that’s just a chihuahua trait in general.

So before doing anything else with Peanut, we called our good friends who gave him to us originally, who still owns Peanut’s father, mother, and even a sibling. They agreed to take him back, which was a tremendous relief for us. It’s bad enough having to give up a pet you’ve been with for years, but at least we know he’s with a good family, and has other playmates to live with. They picked him up last night, so he’s gone now. Socks is adjusting already. He’ll get all of our attention, just like he’s always wanted, so he’ll be fine.

We just felt we couldn’t afford to have any more of my infection problems, and thought we needed to do something before anything else was destroyed in the house. He has wrecked numerous CDs, DVDs, boxes, shoes, and basically everything we’ve left on or near floor level. He would even get so angry whenever one of us left the house that, after attacking the door we walked out of, he would run around and pee on two or three things. Yes, we had already previously tried to bring him outside at these points, when we could, but it didn’t help the situation at all. And even when we crated both dogs each time all of us left the house, Socks would go willingly into his cage, sit down and be calm, while Peanut would throw a tantrum, snap, growl, and bark, while we nudged him into his cage and locked it. Even after years of this he never came around and grew into the routine.

So he’s gone now, but he’s still in town and we can visit him and his family whenever we want, so we’ll see what happens. We’re hoping he adjusts and does well in his new environment.  You can see more photos of Peanut if you’d like by clicking on the thumbnail.  That will take you to Peanut’s Photo Album.

News

A new Incredimail complaint

I did a lot of research in the last few days, and boy am I ticked off now–once again. Many of you might recall my previous complaints about Incredimail. If not, click here to catch up. Yes, Incredimail took content that was free before and put a price tag on it, even for the faithful users who bought their program. I feel that this was wrong, and to get right to the point, they’ve done it AGAIN very recently. Remember their Junk Mail filtering feature built into Incredimail? Well, I just learned that they removed it and now call it “Junk Filter Plus” and charge a fee for it. And on top of that, it’s an ANNUAL fee!! This is horrible, and certainly tells you what you can expect from them. It’s all about the money. Gotta keep the machine running. I wouldn’t be surprised if at some point in the near future we see a “PLATINUM” gallery appear, which would contain content even BETTER than their “Gold Content” and cost yet another–completely separate–fee, most likely annual.

That’s not all though–they’ve done one more thing that really sucks. They wrote an “Outlook Addon” for Incredimail some time ago, over a year ago. This add-on is really the only reason I still used Incredimail. I use Outlook for my e-mail, so I get the huge benefits of all of Outlook’s features (contact management, excellent calendaring, sophisticated e-mail features, etc.) yet I can still use Incredimail stationery, animations, e-cards, etc., when I want, at the click of a button.

So, when I thought about it I began to wonder if there have been any updates to the Incredimail Outlook Add-on. I went to Incredimail’s site and was shocked to find no mention of it whatsoever! It’s been completely removed from their site, and even all of the links right from the Outlook Addon itself that go to Incredimail’s site–like Help, Tips, and FAQ’s–give me an error! The pages don’t exist at all any more! So my fear was that they discontinued this product because people using it don’t constantly see the annoying  “Junk Filter Plus” folder that nags you to buy it every time you click on it.

In an initial attempt to try to determine what they’re doing, I sent a VIP support message to them and told them I use the Outlook Add-on and I reformatted my PC and reinstalled everything, but I don’t have a copy of the Addon any more, so I need to reinstall it. I asked them where I can get it because I can’t find it on their site any more. Here’s the response I got:

Hello, I apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced, however we no longer provide support for IncrediMail for Office Outlook Add-On and it is no longer available for download.

Please let me know if you have any further questions.

Best regards,
Ronen
IncrediMail Support

This was an annoying short response to my request, and since Ronen told me to let him know if I have any more questions, I replied with a few more:

Ronen,

Yes, actually I do have more questions. First of all, the only reason I still used Incredimail’s content and features is because of the Outlook Add-On. I was never happy with the Incredimail Program itself, it was too feature-limited for my needs. Outlook 2003 has everything I need, and with the Incredimail Add-On for it I was very happy. My next question is therefore: Has another company taken over support and development of the Add-On, or has it been scrapped altogether?

Another question I have is why? Why would you abandon an entire group of Incredimail users like this by dropping a very useful program like this?

Lastly, I just wanted to comment on the growing trend I have seen with Incredimail over the years that saddens me. I have used Incredimail from the beginning when I bought the Premium version of the program and enjoyed the entire Gallery and the “Download Entire Album” feature and many other advantages. Then I was disappointed to see a lot of that content literally taken away from me when you add the “Gold Gallery” feature. A lot of the the previously-free content was now in the Gold Gallery and inaccessible to me. I watched for months and months as the gold gallery grew, and eventually I took the plunge and purchased a lifetime membership. During this same period you developed the nice Junkmail filtering features into Incredimail, and I was sure glad I had the premium version so I could reap the benefits of it. Then it happened again–The Junkmail features were mysteriously taken away from me in one update and now you wanted more money–this time ANNUALLY–to provide features that were previously included in the Premium version I paid for!! Then this last problem with you dumping the Outlook Add-On completely–I just can’t figure out how your company can stay in business this way. You seem to constantly disappoint your loyal, paying customers, continuously asking for more and more money as you take away more and more features. It’s like you’re holding features of your own software and gallery hostage. I just don’t get it. I can see a company needing a decent regular inflow of cash, but at what point is enough enough? When does the greed stop and Customer Support begin?? I, for one, am probably done with Incredimail now, after having purchased the Premium & Letter Creator Bundle and the Lifetime Gold License. What a waste. But I won’t give up Outlook 2003 and go back to using the limited Incredimail program. If the add-on isn’t available anywhere else I will be looking to other options for HTML e-mail creation, stationery, and notifiers.

So when can we expect the “Platinum Gallery” to be unveiled? I guess it will have even better quality letters, notifiers and skins…? But at what price?

–Jim T

I don’t expect a satisfactory response to my questions, if I get anything at all, but I’ll be sure to post any response I get. So I’m beginning to look at alternatives once again, only this time there’s a difference. I’m still using Outlook for my e-mail, contacts, appointments, calendar, etc., so that won’t change. It’s an excellent program with tons of features. Microsoft–And every other respectable software company I’ve seen before–Doesn’t have a policy of routinely removing program features and content and charging a fee for them, so I don’t think I have to worry about losing features in Outlook that I value, so I’ll stick with it. I would just like to find a source for nice, quality stationery. I’m open to suggestions.

Update: 12/13/05 – I received two e-mails from Ronen this morning.  Here’s the first one:

In regards to the IncrediMail for Office – Outlook Add-on, is was not taken by another company, at the moment, we no longer provide support for this product and therefore, it is no longer available for download. We may consider adding it again in the future. Thank you for your feedback. We are always happy to receive suggestions that may help us improve IncrediMail and our service.

Best regards,
Ronen
IncrediMail Support

And the second one:

Hello,

I would like to apologize for the inconvenience that you experienced.

I understand your point of view and your claim that when you first downloaded and began to use IncrediMail, JunkFilter was available to all users free of charge.

The basic JunkFilter was previously available to all IncrediMail users, be it IncrediMail Premium members or users of the free version. This should clarify that the basic JunkFilter was not a part of any IncrediMail package previously offered – it was offered to all our users for free.

Please keep in mind that the basic JunkFilter that you previously enjoyed is no longer available. We have replaced the basic JunkFilter with an improved and much more powerful anti-spam tool – the JunkFilter Plus.

Since JunkFilter Plus is a major upgrade to the basic JunkFilter that was previously offered, it is subscription-based. It is important for me to re-emphasize and for you to recognize that the JunkFilter was not part of the Premium package that you purchased.

We certainly did not remove ANY features that were and still are a part of the Premium package that our users purchased. I hope you can recognize that new offerings simply cannot be included as added features in packages that our users purchased in the past.

As an IncrediMail Premium user, it is important for me that you remain a satisfied user, and I would therefore like to offer you a $20 discount coupon for the first year of the JunkFilter Plus yearly subscription. Let me know if you wish to take advantage of this offer and I will send you a coupon.

Best regards,
Ronen
IncrediMail Support

So basically he told me everything I already knew, and I knew the JunkFilter was part of the basic Incredimail program as well as the Premium, but it was still removed!  They DID remove features, but they’d rather talk their way around it by telling us we didn’t pay for them.  But if JunkFilter Plus is so much better than JunkFilter, why did they even HAVE to remove JunkFilter?  Why leave all of your existing users totally unprotected when you once helped them control their JunkMail, even if only a little bit?  It just doesn’t seem right to me.

The discount offer was pretty much what I expected.  If it gets me into their annual subscription system, sure, why wouldn’t they give me money off up-front?

Well, I’ve had it.  I am finally throwing in the towel and giving up.  There are no refunds on their Premium program or Gold Gallery, and I have Lifetime Licenses for both, so I’m out the money, but it was a lesson well learned.

All I can say is “More Power To Open Source!”  And I hope to see an awesome program of this nature in the future.  Thunderbird is sure a far-superior open-source e-mail client already, and it’s been out for quite some time.  It just needs more add-ons to offer templating abilities similar too (and hopefully much better) than Incredimail does.

I hope this posting helps others in some small way, whether you’re searching for a nice e-mail client, having your own troubles with Incedimail, or just looking for something better.  Learn from my mistakes.

News

Christmas Tree Lighting

We attended Kenosha’s Christmas Tree Lighting tonight at the Museum.  The weather was pretty rough though–blizzard conditions!  Kevin, Matt and I toughed it out though, and sat in the cold on a bench in front of the tree outside the museum for about 45 minutes for the ceremony.  I took a few photos, and Matt even managed to capture the entire audio of the ceremony with my Olympus DS-2 Digital Recorder.  Thanks, Matt!

Kevin froze most of the time, and got mad when I called him Rudolph because he had a red nose.  He just kept asking to go home.  I kept reminding him that it wouldn’t be long and that we’d go to Christmas Lane and see the Christmas Train afterward, but he said he just wanted to go home.  After the ceremony we warmed up in the car, got nice and toasty and we headed over to Christmas Lane feeling much better.  Matt took some more photos and Kevin talked to Santa and got a couple of gifts from him at the Christmas Train House.  They even served cookies, treats and popcorn!  We stood around a fire pit they had set up and kept warm while we drank hot cider, hot chocolate, and had a few snacks.  It was a very nice evening all around and we had a nice, Christmastime night, even if it was a bit early.

Click here for the audio from the Tree Lighting Ceremony, and click here for the photos we took.  And as an added bonus, click here for an awesome display now showing at the museum:  David Valentine Holmes: The Mystical Mechanical Menagerie.  When viewing the images in this gallery, be sure to view them FULL SIZE.  The detail is amazing on all of them, and I left the original images quite large to show the detail.

News

Armageddon Better!

My arm feels pretty good now.  I saw the doctor yesterday, and he drained it, cleaned it up and re-dressed it and had me make another appointment in a week, but said I could cancel it if keeps getting better.  I sure wish I had known I could have gotten better this quickly before I went through the whole 2-day hospital stay with all the IV’s.

Anyway, there was an inch of snow on the ground this morning, but it melted by late afternoon.  And it’s supposed to be in the 50’s tomorrow, so we’re going to have a heat wave!  Kevin and I ran a few errands today and tried to stop at Menards because I needed a few things.  I circled the parking lot twice and couldn’t find a single open spot, so we gave up and went home.  Sheesh, how do they manage to get everyone to shop on the same day every year?  Aren’t there many people out there like me, who hate the long lines enough to try to avoid any kind on shopping on Thanksgiving weekend?  Are the sales just that good??  And who are these people that actually GET any of the items on sale??  I gave it one chance–Yesterday I tried to pick up one big-ticket Christmas gift at Target.  I got there early in the morning, actually found a parking spot, and wedged my way through the crowds to the proper department.  When I finally got some help I was told that they sold out of the item just after opening the store.  I should have known.  I went home and that was it for me.

News

Thanksgiving

This year has been a real roller coaster for me. I’ve lost what I thought was a stable job, was on unemployment for a while, and then ended up getting a great job as a PC Tech at a big hospital, then losing THAT job after three months. Both terminations were totally unexpected, of no fault of my own, and were both due to cutbacks and “downsizing.”

In addition to that, I’ve suffered another battle with a leg infection, which I had just recently won. But alas, a totally new infection has attacked my left arm, throwing me back into the same world of pain, hospitalization, doctor appointments, and antibiotics, both oral and intravenous. This time, however, I had to see a specialist (today), and he had to go in and dig out a hunk of infection from my arm (sorry to those who might be squeamish). It feels a bit better already though, and he said without cleaning it out I would have went through a never-ending series of IV antibiotics only to have the infection return again over and over.

So here I am, unemployed and in a great deal of pain, with the holidays fast approaching. Thanksgiving is tomorrow (actually it’s today, since it is now after midnight) and I’m just hoping that all of the tryptophan I consume tomorrow will help to ease the pain in my arm a little. But I’ll be fine though. I’m alive. And Thankful. For many things. And just to remind everyone of what the season’s all about, I’d like to post the lyrics to a Christmas song that came out a few years ago, which I really like:

The Christmas Shoes

It was almost Christmas time, there I stood in another line
Tryin’ to buy that last gift or two, not really in the Christmas mood
Standing right in front of me was a little boy waiting anxiously
Pacing ’round like little boys do And in his hands he held a pair of shoes

His clothes were worn and old, he was dirty from head to toe
And when it came his time to pay I couldn’t believe what I heard him say
Sir, I want to buy these shoes for my Mama, please
It’s Christmas Eve and these shoes are just her size

Could you hurry, sir, Daddy says there’s not much time
You see she’s been sick for quite a while
And I know these shoes would make her smile
And I want her to look beautiful if Mama meets Jesus tonight

He counted pennies for what seemed like years
Then the cashier said, “Son, there’s not enough here”
He searched his pockets frantically Then he turned and he looked at me
He said Mama made Christmas good at our house
Though most years she just did without
Tell me Sir, what am I going to do,
Somehow I’ve got to buy her these Christmas shoes

So I laid the money down, I just had to help him out
I’ll never forget the look on his face when he said Mama’s gonna look so great
Sir, I want to buy these shoes for my Mama, please
It’s Christmas Eve and these shoes are just her size

Could you hurry, sir, Daddy says there’s not much time
You see she’s been sick for quite a while
And I know these shoes would make her smile
And I want her to look beautiful if Mama meets Jesus tonight

I knew I’d caught a glimpse of heaven’s love
As he thanked me and ran out
I knew that God had sent that little boy
To remind me just what Christmas is all about

News

Bad move for Sony

I’m sure by now everyone is aware of the whole uproar about Sony’s automatic installation of a “rootkit” on your PC when you insert one of their music CDs into your PC’s CD-ROM drive.  But let’s assume you’ve been under a rock for the past few weeks.  This new “feature” of Sony BMG’s music CDs basically installs an autoloading program on your computer that notes whenever you play one of their Cds and “phones home” that information to a Sony server.  It does other things as well, and has the potential to do much more, all at Sony’s will.

As expected, the discovery of this has caused an uproar of huge proportions.   The best article I’ve read on the issue so far is actually an Open Letter to Sony BMG from the Electronic Frontier Foundation.  Click here to give it a read.  I’m very curious how much of this Sony will actually implement.

As for me, I’m very disappointed with Sony.  And I’m a big fan of theirs.  I’ve had a Sony Vaio PC for a few years now, and it’s the most reliable PC I’ve ever owned–I haven’t had a single problem with it.  I also have a Sony DSC-P90 Digital Camera that I love, which I’ve also had for a few years without any problems.  I know there’s little connection between the different divisions of Sony, but it’s still a brand name and I’m sorry to see the name tarnished this way.  Hopefully they’ll see the light quickly and come to their senses.

News

Kemper Haunted House

We went to the Kemper Haunted House tonight. We haven’t done much of anything this year for the Halloween season because Sandy and I have both been so busy with our jobs, helping my dad, and my leg problems, and I just felt like doing something fun with Kevin. So Sandy and I took him to a haunted house. It was pretty neat, except Kevin never made it further than the front door.

We assured him over and over before we even left the house and when we got there that none of it was real, there’s no real monsters and it’s all for fun, and he seemed to accept it very well. From just after we got out of the car though, things changed. If you haven’t been there before, The Kemper Center seems to be the perfect place for a haunted house. It’s a very very old structure, several floors, lots of trees around it, and it’s just perfect for a scary setting at night. So when we got out of the car, we immediately noticed darkly dressed people wandering slowly through the parking lot, lawn, and all around the area. They would even walk up to you (or SNEAK up to you, if they could) and just stand perfectly silent and stare. They were usually dressed all in black, and most of them were covered in blood and injuries. One that stood out quite well still had a huge chunk of glass sticking out of his face. I figured he was an auto accident victim. Nice effect.  The top floor of the building had flashing strobes in most of the rooms, and when they flashed you could make out figures in the rooms and windows.

From this point on, Kevin was very nervous, requiring us to hold his hand the entire time. We bought our tickets and got in line. The line formed between two buildings, lined appropriately with tombstones, lots of fog, and the walking dead. They’d stand with you in line and stare just to be intimidating. Kevin was thoroughly spooked. There was even a young girl, she seemed about Kevin’s age, who appeared to be walking dead, holding a teddy bear and just standing in the fog where it came out of the ground, near a couple of tiki torches lining the entrance. By the time we got through the line and up to the entrance Kevin was freaked. We were greeted by our tour guide and invited into the house�she was dressed in white, holding a large knife, and covered in blood. Kevin said I don’t wanna do this! I don’t wanna do this! We nudged him, but he refused. A nice lady at the entrance (not in costume) offered to keep him with her until we got back, so he became her helper and Sandy and I reluctantly went in without him. It was kind of a disappointment, since we mainly went for him, but we had already paid and they had a no refund policy.

It was a bit short, but fun nonetheless. Our guide took us into various rooms that with scary surprises, including the girl from The Ring, Lizzy Borden killing her mother, etc.. Various high-pitched screams, some very close most of the time, were really effective. A pitch-black maze topped things off, and contain weird-feeling things hanging around, on the walls, and a strangely textured floor in some places. Afterward we ended where we had started, and Kevin was helping the lady at the entrance and was glad to see that we had survived the experience unscathed.

All in all it was pretty fun and I enjoyed myself. I only wish Kevin would have taken the plunge. I think he would have come out feeling pretty good at having made it and he’d have something to tell his friends afterward. Oh well, maybe next year.

Oh, I did bring the camera, but everything was so dark I didn’t think much would turn out. I took one photo near the entrance that I really like. It’s pretty spooky, take a look.  That’s the little girl I mentioned at the entrance, just standing there.  You can also see a portion of a headstone to the right.

News

Lillian Vernon Fiasco

Back in early September (September 10th to be exact) Kevin found a really neat costume set for Halloween from a catalog we received in the mail.  It was a Lillian Vernon catalog.  I checked them out online and they sounded legit, so we decided to order the costume for Kevin.  It was a Harry Potter costume, complete with magic wand, tattoos for the forehead scar and others, and of course, the robe along with a few other things.

We ordered the costume that day, 9/10/05, and we were assured shortly after that it would be delivered no later than 9/28/05 — in plenty of time for Halloween.  Well, you can guess the rest, but I’ll give you all the painful details.  A couple weeks after we ordered the costume we got a postcard informing us that it was now on backorder and there would be a delay in shipment.  We were called on the phone by someone at Lillian Vernon and asked if we still wanted the item, which they assured us would still be shipped in plenty of time for Halloween.  Since we were assured to get it in time, naturally we said we’d still take it, so they kept the order going.

Now here’s where it gets bizarre.  Last week we received a postcard in the mail telling us that our order has shipped, and to please allow 5-7 days for delivery.  Excellent, we thought!  So we waited, checking the mail every day, waiting for the package, until it got well over 7 days and into this week.  Today we got another postcard in the mail that says “SORRY, BUT WE CANNOT FILL YOUR ORDER AS REQUESTED.  We are unable to deliver the items listed as they are sold out.  YOU WILL NOT BE CHARGED FOR THESE ITEMS.

BUT IT SHIPPED!?!?!?! How can a company simply LIE like that?!?! And what would be the point?? To keep us from cancelling while they try to find a costume for us?? This is rediculous!  So Sandy called their Customer Service number on today’s postcard to complain.  She explained to the customer service rep and asked what the heck was going on, and they checked on what had happened.  The lady apologizes and then says that the system shows that they now have the costume available for immediate delivery, and that we could have it here by Friday is we would like to order it.

We were thoroughly confused at that point, and very frustrated at having been spun around so many times we were now dizzy.  Sandy gave me the phone and had her explain it to me.  Once she did, I was very angry and no longer willing to trust them at all.  But I had one more question for her first.  She had a heavy accent, and I wanted to confirm what I already thought: That this was just some outsourced “Customer Service” Service located overseas, like every other company is doing these days, and she really knows nothing about the actual company at all, but is just following a written (or computer-based) procedure.  She admitted that yes, she is located in the Phillipines.  I then told her that I would NOT like to order it any longer, and told her we no longer trusted this company, and would not be ordering from them in the future, and I hung up frustrated.  Needless to say, I also removed their link from our Bookmark section on this site.  We’re no longer willing to support or recommend them.

Sandy went out searching for a costume solution for Kevin after this call today, and I think she did a nice job.  It’s totally different than what Kevin originally wanted, but she must know what he likes, because after we explained the situation to him and showed him his new costume he really liked it.  We told him that if he still wanted to be Harry Potter instead, we would return this one and look for Harry Potter, which we had even seen recently at Toys R Us.  He said no, he’d keep this one, and was very excited about it.

I’ll save the “Shock and Awe” of what his new costume is for when we post the Halloween photos, but this sentence is enough of a clue in itself, so there ya go.  😉

News

A Scary October!

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Wow, have I been out of it.  I worked last Saturday night and began to feel like I had the flu at work.  I made it through my shift, but felt pretty wiped out and every bones in my body ached.  I drove home and went to bed, assuming I had the flu.  Sandy even bought me some flu medicine, and I called in sick to work Sunday.  Sunday night I awoke with a very sore leg and a fever of 103F.  I had a nasty redness forming on my left leg, which was hot to the touch, and along with the fever I knew this was not good.  Sandy took my to the E.R. that morning, and I have Cellulitis of the leg.  Very painful, and very serious if left untreated.  I was prescribed an oral antibiotic, pain meds, and sent home with instructions to keep my leg elevated, use hot compresses, and stay home  from work for at least 2 days, and follow up with my doctor the following day.

My doctor prescribed a second oral antibiotic  to go along  with the first one, along with more pain meds. He also said I need to stay off my feet and out of work for the rest of the week.  So here I sit, in front of the computer, leg elevated (on top of a tower PC on the floor).  For the first few days I was pretty out of it.  There was a lot of pain, so I rested most of the time, alternating between the bed and my recliner in the living room.  On the bright side though, I was able to watch the entire 15-hour mini-series of Kingdom Hospital in 2 days!  Now if that doesn’t scare me away from wanting to go back to work at a large hospital, nothing will!

I’m feeling much better now.  There’s not much pain today, mostly major itching where the redness is (which is also much less than before).  But I just wanted to let everyone know what’s been going on.  I’ve missed many phone calls and messages this week, so I’m just now trying to get back to everyone and get caught up with things again.

So basically, with watching Kingdom Hospital and having this big health scare, this is turning out to be a pretty scary Halloween season!  It’s time to get out to a haunted house or two, visit a few pumpkin farms, and do some carving to get in the mood!