Merry 1st Christmas Phillip!

I must say that most of my Christmas experiances had left me feeling a little weary at best, and generally frustrated with the family at worst.... Then this little guy came along. Suddenly the notion of high airfares, baggage with a greater sense of adventure than indicated by my tickets, inattentive relatives and dollar store gifts became too insignificant to notice.

Yeah, I still had to wonder how my suitcase wound up in Chicago and why my flight to Tampa had a two hour layover in North Carolina. The annual acting out of the thoroughly rehearsed performance of, "Gee wow, that's a nice pen! Thanks Mom!" with all the sincerity of Shakesperian Drama came too.

But it was all worth it to meet my nephew for the first time....... and I didn't even have to set up the TV jammer, as (as was seemingly never before) we actually interacted as a family: All together and all smiles we worked as a team to constantly entertain this amazing bundle of giggling, slobbering ever inquisitive joy as he and we experianced Christmas in a wonderful new way. We shared stories, we connected and we conversed too!

One day I'll have to thank the little dude, he acomplished something that a wide spectrum frequency shifting ocillator coupled with a 100watt class "A" RF amplifier never could in my wildest dreams! Hope you had a Merry one too!

F.C.C. rules and regulations and family time.

The Holiday season is upon us, and once again I find myself faced with a impending trip home to spend quality time with the family that I rarely see and sometimes wish to know better.

After several events last time I was with them for a precious few days last October and last Christmas in which they went as far as to actually SEPARATE into DIFFERENT rooms to compulsively watch their favorite television programs in a partially comatose state punctuated with shushing and shifting, I found the determination to work on my latest project.

F.C.C. rules and regulations subpart C
1 - Electronic devices must not create harmful interference
2 - (my favorite part) Devices must accept interference, including that which may cause undesired operation.

My only fears are that it might require an explaination in the screening line at the airport ........and that the lack of TV might bring about something other than "togetherness".

It's Alive!

Got the home machine back up today, after having to use the one at work for a while.
Never thought I would miss a computer so much, man. I still can't believe that I almost went a whole 5 years without one before I got the one have now (thanks to Rush).
The days seemed to drag past as slowly as the machine at work. But now it's all good.
And I have installed some kickass auto-updating antivirus software as well, just in case something like this tries to happen again.

Sunday's Adventure

For some years now I have been invited by the most loyal client of my home-based business (as well as his willing minions) to go on the annual trip he sponsors for his friends and associates, and I have always politely declined citing the following reasons:

1)It's a chartered bus trip to a major casino
2)My uncanny (and, I believe genetically endowed) tendacy to be very, very unlucky.

But this time I said yes, went, and dammit I had a good time.
I actually came out ahead, not by luck though, but by calculation.

How? It would seem that the casino, in an attempt to cater to those that it hopes to make regular customers "comps" first time visitors on the buffet (quite tasty and all-you-can-eat) and on drinks; moderation being key, but even so, a man can down a quite a few over a 6 hour foray and barely keep get a buzz given the free chow.

Here's the math:
Buffett ............................................ $13.50 (comp.)
Black coffee w/shot of Wild turkey (energy drink)... $ 5.00 (comp.)
Beer (Budwieser, of course)..................... 8 @ $ 3.00 (comp.)
Live band performance in lounge(based on local shows) $ 5.00 (comp.)
Watching the pit bosses swarm about nervously as my esteemed client and his buddies run the blackjack table out of $1000.00 chips, twice.
................ Priceless
---------------- total complementary stuff... $47.50
total gaming losses......... $40.00
----------------
Net gains ....... $ 7.50

Woo hoo!

Even if one doesn't count the band, I still came out ahead, had a fun day away from the usual drudgery, and got to watch what I swear to be the luckiest S.O.B. on Earth in action!
Not to mention the fact that I gave myself over 100 chances to come home a jackpot winner.... Yeah, right! Like that could happen!

It's 12:30 am, Do you know where your mouse cursor is?

I don't!

It would seem that some kind of ultrasneaky malware has stolen my little arrow of joy leaving me to depend solely on keyboard shortcuts to navigate windows and the web. No scan has yet caught the sneaky bugger, but I 'm getting better at working mouseless. Now off to search for a new driver!