Author: trinalin

Oktoberfest

Happy October, everyone!

Yesterday, dad and I received permission from mom (who had to work) to go have fun at Oktoberfest in Minster. Minster is near mom & dad’s cottage at the Lake, so we first headed there to drop off my old TV for use in the cottage. It was practically lunchtime then, so we headed to Minster for good eats.

The weather had claimed 80% chance of showers that day, but it only spat on us a little as we walked towards the park where the festival was held. We both knew what we wanted – brats with kraut. Yum! I added some onion & spicy mustard to mine. I had a Pepsi for drink and shared some spiral-cut fried potatoes with dad. We sat across from two ladies who had to youngin’s with ’em. I imagined they were a lesbian couple. And you know, they could have been. (OK, so probably less likely in Minster than in some other places.)

We wandered around the craft booths there, but neither of us found anything that we wanted. The lady who always has nice sweatshirts didn’t have any my size this time. (Her selection was down from previous years – maybe she’d had a productive sale at another festival.) The beer stein guy was there again. I looked (as always) but still didn’t buy any. They sure are pretty!

As we continued walking around the festival site, we passed through the gambling tent. That’s just so foreign to me. There was, at the dice rolling table, a bunch of high school aged boys with handfuls of dollar bills in their hands cheering and shouting as the game progressed. Just not something you see much in my home county.

For dessert, I got a funnel cake with powered sugar on it and dad went with the apple strudel and a coffee. Both desserts were yummy! And just before we left the site, I bought my Oktoberfest mug. I’ve got quite a collection now from the other times I’ve gone to the festival. And I don’t think they’ve changed the price in ages. Still $8 for a mug.

Oh, turns out it was good that I brought our note from mom telling us to have a good time. At one booth was the lady who works at our post office. She wondered where mom was and dad told her working. “Are you allowed to be here?” she asked, jokingly. So I showed her the note and she just laughed. Yup, we had permission! 🙂

Light the Night 2006

Tonight, Wolfgang’s Walkers and many other folks met at Fraze Pavilion to Light the Night for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Our team of six, thanks to generous donors (yay – thanks you generous donors!) managed to raise $1395! (We were tempted to toss a $5 bill in to get us to $1400, but we never actually did.) Linda, Jared’s mom, is currently in remission for Lymphoma and this year she was able to join us at the walk. Yay! It was fun walking with Jared, his wife, two friends, and mom. And his mom says “Thanks!” to you who donated. The society has been so beneficial to her and she, like many others, is appreciative of the donors.

With the folks in my flist and the others that elsaf, paygem and kiri_l found, I raised $320. That allowed me to get a t-shirt *and* a sweatshirt. Both of which came in handy this chilly night. And apparently I’ll get something else later, but that’ll be mailed to me or something. But the real reward was seeing Jared and his mom get to walk together. There were lots of folks with Red balloons (supporters) but still a fair number of white balloons (survivors). There were free concessions – subs, pizza, bagels, pop, and ice cream. Alas, no Chipotle burritos, but we decided to get some afterward anyhoo. Heh. Despite the threat of rain, the walk was rain free and pleasant (but chilly, as mentioned earlier). It’s about a 2 mile walk around the park and residential area. Linda said it was the most she’d walked since her treatment. She really had no words for the evening. It was such a nice time.

At Chipotle after, the six of us chatted and munched. No freebies tonight, but I still got 2 meals out of mine. Mmmm, leftover veggie burrito tomorrow! Yay!

If you were unable to donate earlier to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society but would still like to, you can do so. Click here to donate.

Happy Birthday, Phlege!

A big Happy Birthday (now probably belated) to phlegethon_vii!

I was looking around my extensive photo collection for something Sylvish, and found this odd little gem. Hope it gives you some joy. It certainly tickles me. Silly man!


Sylvester McCoy and his Amazing Rubber Face! I wish I knew where I found this one. Blame must be apportioned. 🙂

Visual Stimuli

Oh my goodness! My new TV is fucking fabulous. Now I know I don’t swear a lot in print (though I do swear a lot in real life) but that’s what it is. I’ve been watching season 1 of the new Doctor Who series on DVD and wow – simply wow! It fills the TV with Doctory goodness! No idea if the sound on the TV is any good cuz I use a surround sound system. But visually, the picture is superb. And so big!

When I watch something in regular 4:3 mode (like Lovejoy) the image is only 2″ more either way than my old set. (Yes, I measured it.) But watching something widescreen like Doctor Who? Wow, simply wow! 🙂

I’m taking it slow. I won’t get to something Sylvester McCoy oriented until the newness wears off a little, or I’d probably just melt into a pool of gibbering fangurlishness. Heck, I might do that anyway.

Anyhoo, back to my lovely TV and World War III. (Heh, “would you mind not farting while I’m saving the world?”)

Keeping up with the Judis

It’s not always easy to keep up with judiang in technology. But I always do my best to try. 🙂 So today I took another step in Keeping up with Judi by getting myself a new flatscreen TV.

I’ve been doing a good job saving my money lately and decided I’d splurge on a new TV. My old one can go to mom & dad’s cottage at the Lake. I researched LCD & Plasma screen TVs because I knew very little about plasma. And it looked like LCD was the way to go. (Less fragile, lighter, similar response time & quality, etc.) So I visited the Evil Empire Club (AKA Sam’s Club) and checked out their offerings. They had a 37″ Vizio LCD Television for $999.99. Ooooooh! That was even under my price range. The TV is 10″ bigger (diagonally) than my old TV. And it’s so thin!

Getting it into the car was a breeze – two employees of the store put it in the trunk for me. (I’d measured the box & my trunk already to make sure it would fit.) Getting it out once I got home was a slow (and gentle) process. But I managed it just fine. And now I have a lovely 37″ LCD TV in my living room. Lovejoy & Co looked so BIG! The kitties liked it too. They sat and watched Lovejoy with me. (Lucy on the sofa back, Linus in my lap.) I think we’re going to enjoy this new piece of technology!

Generosity Abounds!

Wow – my friends list is full of generous folks (of course, you knew this already!) Thank you to the many folks who’ve already donated to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society through my Light the Night Walk donation page! An extra special thanks goes out to elsaf for advertising for me (thanks Elsa! You’re wonderful!) I’ve hit my goal and then some. And best of all, that means Elsa will need to post about the Seventh Doctor/Ace dream she had the other night. It’s a win-win situation for all! (And I see paygem has followed suit! Thanks, hon! And kiri_l as well! You folks rock!)

Best of all, there’s still time to donate! We walk on Thursday, September 28, so feel free to keep donating until then. Heck, you can even donate after then – the money is still for a great cause. I dunno about you, but today was my payday, so I finally contributed to my own cause (and a few others – heh). If today wasn’t your payday, maybe next Friday will be. Give if you can! As little or as much as you’re able! And thank you so much donors & advertisers!

KittyPicSpam!

My little babies are growing so fast! So much so that I keep forgetting to get pictures as they grow. I decided to rectify that by taking a few photos yesterday. The pair were in reclining mode.


The kitties recline in the gold chair.

The gold chair sits in my den. Originally that was just going to be a temporary place for it before I tried to sell it (or give it away) at a garage sale. But you know, it fits perfectly in my den and is a good place for kitties, cats, and trinas to sit.


Linus reclines.

Linus was sleeping on the chair while Lucy had moved over to the drawers beside the chair. Taking the photo of Linus woke her up, so her photo has her awake, but still relaxed.


Lucy reclines.

Aren’t they so cute? And they’re getting so big! Well, they’ll probably never get as big as Leo, but still! My babies are growing up!

Oh, and just a reminder: Don’t forget to Give from the Bottom of your Hearts to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and help support me on the Light the Night Walk! Give, give until it hurts!

Here with my hat out…

So, I cut down on my posting, and then when I finally DO post, it’s to ask y’all to donate some money!

Last year around this time, I asked for donations for the Light the Night Walk for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Well, I enjoyed the walk so much last year (and had many generous donors) that I’m doing it again this year. You don’t have to donate much. Heck, you don’t have to donate at all (that’s what’s so nice about “donate” versus “at gunpoint”). But if you can contribute a little, it will certainly help the cause! To donate, go to this page and you can specify the amount you’re able to contribute. (I, for one, like the “other” box – lets you really decide what you can afford.)

Once again, if you can, head on over to this page and send some money along to help fight Leukemia and Lymphoma!

Labor Day Weekend

We had a lovely labor day weekend because Amy & Rachel decided to visit us. They arrived Wednesday night and we spent Saturday-Monday at the folks’ cottage at the Lake. It was fun hanging with the girls and the parental units. Amy’s friend Alissa (pronounced a-lEEsa) and Alissa’s boyfriend Jon joined us for some of the weekend. And Aunt Becky came up some last evening for supper & card games. It was great seeing my sister & Rachel (who’s practically my sister too) again and I hope they had a pleasant flight home & have a great day relaxing with Früvous (their cat) tomorrow.

I’d write more details, but I’m too sleepy (and have a cold – which started up about 4 hours before the girls were supposed to arrive on Wednesday – bleh!) so I’m off to bed. Hope you all have a lovely Tuesday!

Lots of Stuff

Lots of times this week I’ve wanted to write about things in my LJ, but never did. I’ll see if I can remember them all now.

  • Windows XP on a Windows NT4 network with Clean Slate running has proven to be a real PAIN IN THE ASS. I’ve been working my butt off at work getting student accounts out to them, and finally on Friday, most kids had their accounts. The business lab was returned to Windows XP (we’d put Win98 on it last year because I wasn’t ready for the transition. We’re only going to XP because the newest machines cannot run Win98 at all. Blech) this summer. And when the students logged on Friday? Microsoft Word didn’t work (wasn’t “installed”), they couldn’t get out to the Internet, their Quick Launch bar didn’t display, and load of other issues popped up. I had removed all of these problems with my test account before I set up the student accounts. So of course, they didn’t work as planned. When I thought I finally had the fix, it worked with one student but not another. I left on Friday angry with Windows XP (and Clean Slate, but for another XP-related issue that still isn’t resolved). So today I popped into the school to try again. I discovered that Clean Slate had prevented Windows from clearing out the local profiles (copied from their network profiles) and that second student had originally logged on with the bad profile. Once I deleted the profiles, they worked! So I pointed all of the students to that profile folder and tested another random student. It worked – yay!

  • Clean Slate is a program by Fortres Grand Corporation that erases any changes made to a computer when someone logs off or restarts. It’s been a godsend for preventing spyware & adware and viruses from filling up our PCs. I don’t have to reinstall Winders part-way through the school year anymore. However, it still has issues. We’ve cleared up most of the Win98 issues (except for the Daylight Savings Time bug – so I’m now telling Win98 machines to not change at DST – they get their time from our server anyhoo). But now with version 4, we’re experiencing all the bugs with WinXP. The main problem? When students log off, it locks up. Sits at the “saving settings” portion. Why it’s even hanging up then, I’ve no idea. I’ve already told XP to NOT save settings back to the remote profile folder. I’ve got the developers working on the problem – we’ve still got some testing to do. Until then, students will have to hold the power button in 10 seconds until it turns off. Thanks Clean Slate.

  • The kitties are growing. They’re so damn cute! I don’t have any recent photos of them, however. But now when I sit to watch Lovejoy (currently in season 3), Linus climbs onto my chest or shoulders and Lucy sits at my feet. They love to play with each other and with me (sometimes when I’m trying to play City of Heroes/Villains – often to judiang‘s dismay. They’re last check up had them both still healthy (fewer ear mites) and growing nicely. Linus was 2.2lb and Lucy was 2.3lb. Considering Linus always tries to prevent Lucy from eating, it’s good to see she’s holding her own and then some. 🙂

  • It looks like it’s going to be a good year with my students. I’ve been having fun so far (and I hope they have too). I hope I don’t keep channeling Monty Python while I’m teaching physics, however. Thankfully a few of them knew what I was alluding to. I hope I can get a handle on the tech job so that I can work on improving my science curriculum. I wanna do some new stuff and want to find out where I can speed up some topics (or maybe even cut some) in order to cover more material.

  • With regards to the tech job in general… Each year, I get a little more behind. There just isn’t enough time for me to do the job in 3 periods a day and 200 hours in the summer. And as such, I’ve been getting more behind each year. This year is the year I’ve hit the wall. I’m just so frustrated with being behind and getting behinder. I love doing the tech work, but the frustration is disguising that fact from me far too often lately.

  • Yesterday I helped mom’s cousin with her laptop and printer. Using some floppies and a USB floppy drive (from school – heh) I was able to transfer her fonts from her old machine (Win95) to her new laptop (no floppy drive). She has a brother printer, which I’ve never worked with before. After finding the Quick Setup Guide (on the disc, not on paper) I was finally able to get it working with her laptop. I didn’t get to stay there as long as I needed to (she had some more questions that I need to help her with), but I needed to get home. After all, the folks and I had two weddings to go to.

  • The first wedding was a cousin on my mom’s side. His second attempt. She’s Catholic, so the wedding was held at the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Chapel at Lehman Catholic High School. Definitely the first time I’ve been to a wedding in a high school. It was a very pretty chapel and the service was only 25 minutes long, which was greatly appreciated. I hope Gregg and his wife have many happy years together. L’chaim!

  • After the wedding, we tried to find the reception at the Sidney Airport (no, that’s not a typo – Sidney in Ohio), but couldn’t find the road the airport was on. Well, I couldn’t find it on the map. Would have been interesting going to a wedding reception in an airplane hangar, I must admit. A short trip to Kohl’s so I could get a wedding gift for the next wedding (the one I was actually invited to), and then the folks and I had supper at Applebee’s. Very tasty meal. And I had an amaretto sour.

  • The next wedding was a cousin on my dad’s side. His second attempt too. This wedding took place at her sister’s house in the spacious backyard. Dad was disappointed no one fell in the pool the whole time we were there (he’s such an optimist). The ceremony was shorter here, but I was actually able to hear it (Gregg’s was harder to hear). We stayed for the reception there and had some yummy food (Greek pastries with cheese, meatballs, chicken salad, Pepsi). Then we hung around for the cake, but they kept putting it off to have people dance. Well, watching the hokey pokey and some of the Greek dancing (she’s from a Greek family, aparently) was entertaining, but I wanted cake! The cake was yummy and full of wonderful sugar. With the 2 cans of Pepsi that sugar kept me awake until after 3am. Heh. I hope Mick and his wife have many happy years together. Nozdrovye!

Well, that’s the stuff that I can remember that I wanted to say. Hopefully I’ll not store stuff up for the next time. 🙂