Author: kunefke

New Season

A lot seems to have happened since my last post.  I’ll keep it short, though.
I started my new degree plan at LIT this semester.  I am studying for an Associates in Instrumentation Technology.  It should allow me to stay busy throughout my life.  So far, I’m doing very well in all three of my classes, and it doesn’t look like that will change.
Heroes started back up last week, and it looks very interesting.  Before that comes on, Chuck is pretty funny.  It just doesn’t look like it can last very long.  It looks like it has a low budget, but I don’t know if it will have the ratings to stay on.  It was funny to see the reference to “Oceanic 815” from LOST.  Apparently it was shot down.  That had to be a real part of LOST.  I don’t see how ABC could throw that in without it having some truth.  Journeyman, however, looks great.  I like the concept, and the realistic consequences of his time travel makes it even better.  The main character, Kevin McKidd, was in ROME, and is the perfect part for this character.  It’s amazing how much younger they can make him look.
Alaina began piano lessons last week, and she’s really enjoying it.  After only one lesson, it’s difficult to know how well she’ll do, but we’ll wait and see.  She started going to dance classes this week.  She is in Jazz, Ballet, and Tumbling.  She’s very excited about this because she is always dancing, and has always wanted a stage to do it on.  Now she can practice and perform in front of everyone at the end of the year.  Her teacher says she did very well for her first day.
I don’t remember if I’d posted this before, but I got an accoustic guitar back in May and I’ve been practicing a lot over the past month.  I’ve finally started developing some callouses on my left hand’s fingers from playing so much.  I’m starting to get the keys down right, and I’m pretty close to being able to play all the way through a few songs without messing up too much.
The Texas Rice Festival is this weekend, and I’m looking forward to seeing a few people I haven’t seen in years.  Usually this is the only time of the year that people from here come back home, and hang out in public for everyone else to visit with.  It should be a fun weekend.
I guess that sums it up better than I thought it would.

Humberto

Last night was really strange.  I went to bed thinking that Humberto was just a tropical storm.  I couldn’t sleep due to the noises the wind was causing my house to make. 
About two hours after I laid down, the power went out and came back on several times.  I heard a bang in the living room and went in there to find that my screen door was being banged around by the very strong winds.  It was banging up against the door, making an awful noise.  I would have opened the door and closed the screen door completely, but I didn’t want to risk a bodily accident by opening the door.  Then the power went out. 
I then noticed that the wind was driving rain into the living room window on the north side of the house.  It was coming in pretty quickly.  I put some towels on the window and tried to at least stop some of the water from coming in.  I didn’t seem to be making much of a difference.Christle called her mom to find out what the storm was up to, and that’s how we found out that Humberto was a hurricane.  We also found out about where the path was.

Hurricane Humberto Path

We live a few miles east of where I-10 turns N/E to go to Beaumont, and the storm was just south of us.  Basically, the only thing we could think to do was to pray, get dressed in case we had to leave the house, and wait it out. 
It took about an hour and a half before the wind started to die down, and another hour for power to be restored.  Before the power was restored, I was able to look out the kitchen window, because the screen had been blown off, and saw that water was standing over my driveway.  That’s the deepest I’ve ever seen the water level here.
I went outside and found that the screen door had been shattered, and glass was all over the porch.  Our swing set was folded over on itself.  Tree limbs were all over the place… I only specify ‘tree’ limbs, because there were no other type of limbs (separated from their host) anywhere on the property.  The water was flowing very swiftly because it appeared to really want to get off my property and away from all the limbs… maybe it was confused about what type of limbs they were.
I finally got to sleep sometime around 5:30am.  I got to work around noon.
This is where I have to explain the lesson I learned from this experience.  Ever since evacuating for Rita two years ago, I have held to the plan of staying around instead of evacuating for another hurricane.  I will not stay home, thanks to this experience.  Worrying about the safety of my wife and kids during this was too much to handle.  Given the choice, I’d much rather deal with traffic than to go through this again.

President’s Poll Numbers Escalate

For the second poll in a row, the President’s poll numbers have come up.  This poll saw the President’s approval rating rise from 29% to 34%.  When you factor in the margin of error, and the fact that the poll questions are always skewed against favoring the President, I’d say his approval rating is somewhere between 45 and 50%.
The primary reason that his numbers are going up is most probably the fact that the troop surge in Iraq has been getting some good results that are apparently too good for the reporters to ignore.  The surge has only just recently begun, and the reports have been that more troops have made a tremendous impact.  The number of troop deaths per day has decreased with the surge as well.  Troop morale has made a shocking increase, and it looks as if that will continue.
One other reason that the President’s approval rating has increased is probably due to the number of presidential candidate debates on both sides of the aisle.  They all seem like the same words in different physical locations.  These candidates are doing nothing but making people lose consciousness in the boredom.  They make President Bush look wonderful.
I like the fact that these liberal dummies will have to stop using poll numbers to make their points once the numbers have increased.  The fact that they have used them so much has really been annoying.  What’s even worse, is when the senate had the lowest approval ratings in it’s history after a vote that supposedly let the administration know that they “wanted out of Iraq”.  I think they jumped to the wrong conclusion.  What America voted for was change.  We want to win this war on terror, and what our government was doing then was not getting the job done.  Once they were elected, the new senators did nothing to help the war.  That’s why they are so unpopular.
Somebody needs to let them know that we are not against the war, but we’re against losing the war.

Cheap Laptop

Asus is apparently building a laptop that will be cheap and make computer ownership as low as $200. This laptop looks like a good deal. It’s known as the EeePC and it should be available this fall.
It will have a 4GB flash hard drive and 512MB of RAM. With 802.11g wireless card installed as well as built-in web cam and microphone. Part of the reason that it is so cheap is because it is preloaded with a Linux OS.
More information can be found at Engadget.

Recent Weather

Well, it looks like the rain has finally subsided. I’m glad that the rain has finally stopped, I just wish that it was January and I didn’t have to deal with the heat. I’ve heard a lot of talk about the heat recently, and I have a problem with the way people are reporting the temperature now.
I’ve noticed that when people at work talk about the temperature outside, they always say that the temperature is what the heat index is. For those that don’t know, the heat index is the temperature + what humidity makes the temperature feel like.
The problem with this is that by changing the language to say that it’s the “heat index” without mentioning that it’s the heat index, gives people the invisible “ammo” to suggest that it is actually hotter than it was last year. The only reason that this has changed in the past year is that there is apparently a decrease in temperature, but the people in charge want to keep the “global warming” hoax going.
I admit that over the past century that the average global temperature has increased by .7 degrees Celsius. The problem with this is that scientists around the globe have found that the temperature fluctuates. There has recently been a finding in Antarctica of a plant that could have only survived in a warmer climate. Findings such as this have found that the temperature has been at least 25 degrees Celsius higher than it is currently.
This leads me to wonder who would consider themselves smart enough to say that an average global temperature .7 degrees Celsius colder than the current temperature is the absolute perfect temperature for this planet to thrive. How do they know that an average temperature of 1 degree Celsius or 98 degrees Celsius is not perfect for this miraculous planet?
I don’t think that mankind is affecting the planetary ecosystem enough to change the climate. I am positive that 10 years of time will prove that this entire push for the fight against global warming will be looked upon by everyone as a political tool as well as a joke.

Sopranos Finale

I know it’s a little late, but I felt this since a few days after the finale.  I haven’t posted it yet because I haven’t … typed it until now.
There’s been a lot of talk by a lot of loud people about how much disappointment they felt from the finale.  I don’t understand how so many people who have little to no creative cell can criticize a show you’ve been raving about for years.  Sure, there’ve been a few lame seasons, but if they were really all that lame, why’d you keep watching?
I admit, there were a few seasons that didn’t meet the expectations that were created in the first few.  I kept watching because I saw that there was a story being laid out before me.  It is not the writers of ANY show to make “everyone” happy.  If it ended the way that everyone wanted or expected it to happen, what would have been the point of anyone purchasing a subscription to HBO and tuning in?
The last episode had me on the edge of my seat feeling like I was about to have a panic attack.  I realized later, that Mr. Chase was giving me the same feeling that Tony Soprano always has.  Tony Soprano started having panic attacks because he never knows when the end is going to happen.  Watching Meadow try to park made my panic mode rise even higher.
The good part of watching the finale is that I get to go on living my life without wondering how Sopranos is going to continue.  The bad thing for Tony Soprano is that he has to live the rest of his life in a near state of panic.  The suspense will not end until it happens.
Beautiful work, Mr. Chase.

Posting

I seem to have had a lag in my writing over the past two months.  I am not really sure why that is, I just know that I want to pick it back up. 
My mid-year resolution is to post more frequently.  Maybe even do some video posts.  We’re getting a new camera this week.  I’ll post about it when it comes in and I have a little time to play with it.

iPod Hard Drive Replacement

I recently had the misfortune of losing the hard drive in my iPod.  It was about 1 year and two weeks old, so the warranty was expired when it first started giving me problems.  I ran some hard drive utilities, such as SpinRite, and got it back in good enough shape to work.  Then it got worse and worse, until the thing wouldn’t sync at all.  I even tried some other programs, in the hope that iTunes was the culprit.  It wasn’t, so I started doing research.
I bought a tool kit with instructions online.  The instructions came through email, so I had those that day, but the tools took 9 days to arrive.  The day after I ordered the tools, I found a hard drive for under $90 that had the recommended model #, and ordered it with ground shipping.  I received the drive in 7 days, but the tools weren’t here yet, so I sent the guy I purchased the tools from an email asking if they had been sent yet.
The next morning I was too excited to wait for the tools.  I knew that using a metal screwdriver would ruin the finish on the iPod, so I tried my thumbnail.  I got my nail between the front and back panels in the top left corner of the device, and used my other thumbnail between them too.  I slid my nail down the left side and across the top and made my way all the way around.  It just took a very little bit of pressure to separate the two panels.  You can’t yank too hard, though, because they’re connected with cables that could be damaged if yanked out.
It was relatively easy to see what to do.  If you look hard enough you can find the instructions on the Internet for free.  You only have to separate one cable to split the two panels apart.  When you lift up on the hard drive there is a ribbon connection.  That connector was tricky and it would have been damaged if I hadn’t read the instructions and seen a picture of how to loosen the connection.
If you have experience with taking things apart, the only thing the instructions add is that one connector.  Although, I really think I could have figured it out with a little bit of time.
If you have a small plastic screwdriver or if your thumbnail is long enough and strong enough, the tools are a waste of time as well.  Mine were just about at the length when I usually clip them.  My nail got a little scraped from the separation, but I clipped them shortly after I changed out the hard drive and verified that it worked.
I should have taken pictures, but if anyone asks, I’ll take it apart again just to get the shots.  I received the tools in the mail later that day, so they’re in my cabinet if anyone has weak or short nails.
The one thing I looked for when looking for a hard drive, was to only purchase one that was advertised as new.  I would be wary of any that are refurbished, as those would normally come from another iPod, and might have the same type of problem my iPod problems started with.

A Night at Days Inn

First off, I have to say that Days Inn has been a nice place to stay in the past.  I have had problems in the past, but that was due to local travel taxes that didn’t have anything to do with Days Inn business decisions.
I checked in this afternoon to a Days Inn that looked like it needed some maintenance and cleaning done to the outside of the property.  We dropped off some of our luggage to a room that smelled like a smoking room when I clearly asked for a non-smoking room.  The room was non-smoking, but I’ll explain my hypothesis on the smell later.  We went ahead and left to participate in the evening’s activities.
When we returned, I turned on the television about 15 minutes later to find that every channel except one would black out after being on for 15 seconds.  I called the front desk, and she reacted as if she knew about the problem, and that they “couldn’t figure out the parental control code that a previous customer had set up.”
They relocated us and the television worked, and the smell is better than the previous room, but it still smells like smoke.  We found that some ants were in the sink area about 30 minutes after we had already made ourselves comfortable, and decided to just deal with it until tomorrow, since we luckily had already had reservations at a higher quality hotel.
Christle tried to give the girls a bath, but the tub wouldn’t stop the water, so she ended up helping them take a shower, which was pretty difficult for her to do.  When I got out of my shower a little while later, I grabbed the last of our three towels that were thin and couldn’t have held much more water than one of our washrags that we have at home, when I noticed the reason for the smoke smell.
They don’t keep the smoking and non-smoking sheets and towels separated here!  The smell has penetrated the fibers of these fabrics and cause the entire facility to smell absolutely disgusting.
The only good thing I have to say about this place is that the wireless connection I’m using to post this was the easiest to set up out of every hotel/motel/inn I’ve ever stayed in.  Although, I’m not entirely sure that that is such a good thing.