Yeah!

I just pre-ordered the wireless bridge pictured below. We will be able to plug either of our laptops into it, with just a standard LAN cable, and be connected to the internet from anywhere in the house or yard. We don't have to install anything on our laptops for it to work either. It will look to the laptop like it is plugged into a port right off the back of our router. How cool is that? When we eventually get a third PC to place permanently in the front room, it will also get its connectivity from the wireless bridge. We will be able to print, share files, play MP3 files that are on the other PC's hard drives, etc. just like it was physically attached to the LAN.

Wireless bridge

This will be released on June 1. I think I will pre-order it from Amazon.com, and they will ship it to me as soon as they get it.

Sickness

Sheri is home sick today with what kept me home sick last Monday.

*** SARS Warning ***

This e-mail was just sent out to everyone in our company from our CAO:

As you may have seen in the announcement on the [corporate] homepage, all business travel to or from Hong Kong, Singapore, China (Guangdong Province) and Vietnam has been prohibited until April 13, 2003. For further information, see the Travel Risk Advisor homepage.

In addition, anyone returning from any of the countries named above, whether they have been travelling for business or holidays, will be required to spend a 10 DAY PERIOD OF QUARANTINE OUT OF THE OFFICE upon their return. Please ensure that any members of your teams who are currently travelling in these locations are notified of these requirements immediately.

As we approach the Easter holidays, employees should review any personal plans they may have to travel to any of the destinations above and take note of our business travel policy.

Please note that the list of countries is under constant review, as the situation continues to change daily, and updates will be issued as required. Further general information is available on the WHO website: http://www.who.int/en/

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact your HR CRM.

Last Semester

This was my professor last semester for international business.

Professor

This will be my professor for next semester, and this is a link to a page about her, what she has done, and where she has been published, and this is her 12 page vita.

Taxes

How cool! I just imported W-2's for both of us from the internet. I think I recall being prompted to do that last year, but I didn't do it because they wanted to charge me for it or maybe it didn't work. Anyway, I tried it this time and it was free, painless, and worked the first time.

Sunday morning

I drove down the street to the White Hen convenience store this morning. They always have good fresh coffee, and I had a coupon for a free muffin with the purchase of a 20 oz coffee. I picked out a big fresh bran muffin. Very good.

Sheri is not feeling well and is back in bed asleep. I am in the office with my muffin and coffee. I have the race on TV and I am going to pay a couple of bills and then start on our taxes.

I want to install this year's Turbo Tax on the new computer, but pull in last years Turbo Tax files from the old computer, but for the last week or two we couldn't get the two computers to see each other. So that has been the show stopper for me doing our taxes so far. This morning I sat down, determined to figure it out, and I did. I installed the excellent free firewall software, ZoneAlarm from Zone Labs, a couple of weeks ago. By default it doesn't let any other network devices see the computer it is on, and it doesn't let the computer it is on see any other network devices. I had to go to the configuration window and tell it that the old computer is trusted and that it can talk to it. (If you go to download ZoneAlarm, go to the Zone Labs web site, click on the "Download & Buy" button, and then scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the "Free Download" button. They have other products that are not free, like ZoneAlarm Pro and ZoneAlarm Plus, which are also excellent, but the free one does most of what the other ones do. Anyone connected to the internet should have this program installed! We have it installed in addition to our hardware firewall and our antivirus software. No excuses, just do it. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

I want to get our taxes done and out of the way before I start class on Tuesday.

I am thinking about picking up a Rug Doctor from Dominic's on the way home. I don't think I want to do the whole house, but just use it to spot clean where Goliath had some accidents.

Or I could go straight home, let the dog out and give him dinner, and then get a start on our taxes. Yeah, I will probably go with plan B.

Sheri has to work tonight until 9:00 PM. They are moving 70 servers to a new building.

I went to DePaul U. today to sell back my book from last semester. I paid $95 for it, but because no one is using it next semester I only got $27 for it. I also had to get an official grade report to submit at work for tuition reimbursement. They do not send out grade cards. It is all done on-line, so if you need an official grade report you have to request it specially. I was going to buy my book(s) for next semester, but the professor has not told the book store which book(s) she will be using.

I met Sheri at the Sears Tower after that and had lunch with her in the Mexican restaurant there. I had the carne asada. It was a very large and tender piece of flank steak that was marinated and grilled to order. It came with refried beans, seasoned rice, and a generous dollop of fresh guacamole. Very good.

FYI

In the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding, one of the crazy uncles thinks that Windex is the universal fix for anything. You have poison ivy? Windex. You have dandruff? Windex. Mosquitoes bothering you? Windex. Sheri is the same way with Pepto-Bismol.

Iraq War News Source

I think this is my favorite source of Iraq war news so far. It is a single blog that all of the reporters for the BBC contribute to. It is not formal, and most entries are just a paragraph or two. Highly recommended.

www.bbc.co.uk/reporters

Duh.

At my doctor appointment last weekend he said he wanted me to come in again in three months, so on my way out I stop at the registration desk to make my appointment. I tell the lady that he wants see me again in three months. She tippity taps on the computer and then looks up at me and says “Well that’s on a Sunday, and we are not open on Sundays.”

I was dumbfounded and didn’t know what to say. I just looked at her. I didn’t know if she was joking, or if she was just that stupid. Turns out she was just that stupid.

Goliath Update

I just got home with Goliath and he is doing great! He looks nothing like the half-dead dog we brought home last weekend. His eyes and face are not saggy and tired looking. He can eat hard food now without yelping. He is back mostly to his same old self.

The vet wants to see him in two weeks to remove his stitches, and I think he said maybe take a blood sample, and he wants to see him in three weeks for his next dose of chemo.

He said that dogs don't react nearly as badly to chemo as people do, so we shouldn't have to deal with too much, if any, hair loss, sickness, weight loss, appetite problems, etc. He said we will see the full effects of the chemo in about two weeks when it starts to really affect his bone marrow.

Before I went to pick him up, I checked the mail. There was a really nice card for Goliath from Marsha, Ray, Stephanie, and Hillary. Enclosed in the envelope was a really cool 9" long bone. I set it on the passenger seat next to me and went to pick him up. When I let Goliath in the van at the vet's, the first thing he did was take a big bite of the bone! That was a really good sign because just a few days ago he wouldn't have been able to eat a hard bone like that because of the enlarged lymph nodes behind his jaw that were causing him severe pain.

Sick

I am staying home today. I had sharp abdominal pains most of last night, and didn't sleep very well. I feel better now. I don't really feel pain right now, but it feels like someone slugged me really hard a day ago. I am just getting out of bed now.

I called the vet's just now and the receptionist just started her shift at noon and didn't know Goliath's status and there were no vets around. She said call back after 2:00 PM. I think I will shower up, swing by Best Buy to pick up a copy of Turbo Tax, and then stop by the vets on the way home and hopefully pick up Goliath.

Salami

This is article about mold cured salami. Enjoy!

There are official luxuries, like foie gras, then there is salami. Who hasn't stood in line at a deli and watched a gnarly chub with a moldy, white skin being placed on the slicing machine? As the slices tumble onto the open face of an awaiting baguette, silence falls and nostrils flare as an almost winelike aroma rises from the meat.

Salami does just as well in elegant settings, say on a charcuterie plate spread with ham and pate. You reach for the salami first. After the first pleasing tug against your teeth, a cascade of pungent, salty flavors floods from the meat. There is a pause, as the fermented tang lingers, then you have no choice: You must have another slice.

Salami like that tastes like it came from the old country, where it was made the old way. And in a way, it did, via San Francisco. That's where some of the best Italian salami sold in America is made.

A curious war made San Francisco the salami capital of America. From 1967 until 1970, a band of six determined Bay Area sausagemakers argued to the U.S. Department of Agriculture that they deserved the right to not only use Italian methods, but to call their product "Italian salami." They were direct descendants of salami-makers of Milan, Lucca, Parma and Modena. Around the turn of the last century, they had settled in a city whose temperate climate might be the only one in the United States perfectly suited for dry-curing salami. They even had the right strain of penicillin mold to give the links a classic white bloom.

Sure, the Italian-Americans wanted to keep a corner of meat processing to themselves, to prevent producers of cooked meat and fast-cured imitations from using the term.

But at the heart of the argument was pleasure. The San Franciscans were intent on saving a revered delicacy from a fate worse than baloney. Italian salami, they contended, is a food every bit as noble as cheese or wine.

Looking back, it seems obvious that the Bay Area salami-makers were Slow Foodists of their day. At the heart of their argument, they insisted that true salami could not be achieved quickly, or by cooking the sausages like hot dogs, or in a short hanging period, or by spiking the meat with special flavorings. In letter after letter to bleary USDA officials, they outlined the echt way to make it, the way, more or less, Italians had made it since the 5th Century B.C.

Salami must consist mainly of pork and fat, they said. This pork should come from the shoulder (haunches go to ham), with large chunks of fat that won't melt. This meat must be chopped, never pureed like a hot dog emulsion. It could be combined with wine, garlic, pepper, curing salts, maybe a touch of mace. A lactic acid starter was called for to start a slow fermentation that would dry-cook the product. Dried milk was permissible as a binding agent between the meat and fat. The meat could then be packed into either cellulose or pork-gut casing. These sausages were then hung, first in drip rooms, then in aging rooms, for weeks, or months, depending on the size of the chub.

The optimum range of curing temperatures, they stressed, was exactly the same as San Francisco's temperate climate. As the salami dried, the links fermented, and a change in acidity effectively cooked the meat, and produced the complex spectrum of flavors. As this happened, the sausages would also dry. The meat would lose roughly 30 percent of its water weight. A penicillin mold would form on the coat, checking exposure of the meat to air, and thus stopping oxidation and preventing rancid flavors.

To press their case, the San Franciscans hired a lawyer. They formed something called the Dry Salami Institute. They prepared elaborate family histories, paraded fair ribbons from salami competitions in Rome and bombarded bureaucrats with long letters with even longer appendixes as to the utter authenticity of their every salami-stuffing step.

Holding its own

And they prevailed. Find the words "Italian salami" or "Italian Dry Salami" on a California chub, and you are guaranteed a food that could hold its own in Italy.

But as they defended the "Italian salami" standard in the federal rule book, Rome burned.

In supermarkets, generic salami made from precooked meat hung in refrigerator cases, in cold cut sections. It came pre-sliced and shrink-wrapped, as odorless as Formica, as forlorn as baloney, and meted out in such mean portions that it seemed that there was more plastic than meat.

Frank Giorgi's great-grandfather, Pasquale Molinari, founded the first San Francisco Italian salami company P.G. Molinari in 1896. Giorgi now manages it.

"Instead of a staple, we became a gourmet item," he recalls. A proud one. The Molinari calendar carries a photograph of an Italian American child presenting the pontiff with a P.G. Molinari chub.

Molinari salami chubs are sold in Italian delicatessens.

In the early 1980s, Southern California supermarkets began to wake up and smell the salami. Mini-chubs of mold-ripened San Francisco salami, made by another Bay Area company, called Gallo, began appearing in some stores.

Trader Joe's recently began dedicating ever-larger chunks of its tightly packed floor space to ever-larger displays of what is arguably the leading Bay Area brand, Columbus salami. These are all mold-ripened, and the Italian Dry (or Salami Secchi) are made to the 1970 standard.

However, at first glance, they might disarm purists. They have been stripped of their moldy skins and vacuum-packed.

Columbus co-owner John Piccetti defends vacuum packing. Although the scent and appearance might be more pleasing from the traditional mold-coated chub, he says, salami left exposed to the air slowly keep losing moisture.

Vacuum packing after air-drying can protect it from losing too much water and becoming overly greasy and hard.

The greatest pitfall for the consumer, however, is that this is also the way other producers package really awful salami imitations that miss the 1970 Italian salami standard by a very wide mile.

To a lesser degree, the problem is simply with the packaging. The plastic might stop the salami from drying out, but it also arrests the heady aroma and makes the salami sweaty, detracting slightly from the texture. For purists, the only real salami is one sold with the mold on.

These chubs are usually displayed hung up, trussed in string and wrapped with a cigar-style paper ring, or in bright paper packaging. Crinkly, irregularly shaped links indicate that the salami were shaped in pork gut casings. This signals more complex flavor, Piccetti says. The fat in a natural casing will impart yet another layer of flavors. Double the skin to create a thicker casing, and you can slow fermentation and intensify the flavors yet more.

Natural casings

Normally, only delicatessens handle these, because the natural casings mean that they cannot be made to uniform sizes and will need to be weighed at checkout. Another typical casing for mold-ripened salami is cellulose-impregnated paper. These are excellent for curing meat, but unlike gut casing need peeling off in the kitchen.

The last important step before eating is slicing. Piccetti recommends the Italian rule: Slice large chubs thinly and thin ones relatively thickly.

Slices from large chubs should be cut thinly enough so that they roll up easily. Slices from smaller salami should be about the thickness of a silver dollar, just substantial enough to give pleasing resistance when you bite, but not put up a struggle.

Cutting them this way ensures the right amount of meat to spice on the tongue, and it reveals less fat to air, where it will quickly oxidize and create rancid flavors.

Chef and Los Angeles restaurateur Suzanne Goin has made the slicing of salami a kind of happening. She and her partners recently opened A.O.C., a chic restaurant.

The place to sit is the charcuterie bar, where salami is only cut to order. Goin then serves it with bread and butter.

There are few more indulgent rituals. First you generously slather a small piece -- bite-sized if possible, of fresh sourdough bread with sweet butter, then top it with a slice of salami. It's best eaten in small mouthfuls and swallowed whole, for you'll be coming back for more.

How cool! I just conferenced in Mom and Dad in Puerto Rico with Lisa in Toledo to hear how their first day of vacation went. I called MCI first to make sure that Puerto Rico would be a free call. Mom twisted her ankle a little bit, so today they went for a long drive around the island and had a nice dinner at a little Spanish restaurant. Tomorrow they are going horseback riding in the rain forest, and then go spend some time at the beach. We probably chatted on the phone for at least 30 minutes. How nice.

I don't normally open my birthday presents ahead of time, but I got a package today and the packing list was folded so I could see what it was. It was a yogurt maker from Mom and Dad. It takes 4 to 10 hours to make a batch of yogurt, so I am going to get a batch going right now and it will be ready for breakfast.

I also got a package from Tim, Lisa, and Shawn, and it was just a yellow mailing envelope so I thought it would be some clippings or something. Nope. Also a birthday package. They got me a year subscription to both U.S. News & World Reports and Arthur Frommer's Budget Travel magazine. (They put a copy of each in the envelope to hold me until my subscription starts.) A copy of The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. Some San Francisco mold cured hard salami, which is weird because I just read a big story in the Chicago Tribune about San Francisco salami and was really excited about trying it. We were going to go out to the gourmet food stores looking for it. They also tossed in some seasoned almonds and little chocolates. Yumm!

My plan tonight after I post this is to go downstairs and start the yogurt, brush my teeth, and then fall asleep reading U.S. News & World Reports. Yeah!

Question

If a person from Iraq is an Iraqi, is a person from Baghdad a Baghdadi?

We are both feeling better today. We didn’t talk about Goliath too much last night, but I was thinking about him a lot. When I got up to use the bathroom in the middle of the night I looked down to see if I was going to step on him like I always do. I am looking forward to picking him up tomorrow night.

We went to Chipotle’s for the second night in a row. They now have a burrito bowl. It is just a burrito without the tortilla in a bowl. I like that now because there are a lot less carbohydrates without the tortilla. Also, instead of getting rice I get the beans. A little less carbohydrates, and beans turn to blood sugar slower than white rice. We slipped back into fast food eating when Sheri was in the hospital because it was fast and easy. I need to get back on track. I also didn’t use the exercise bike all winter. I need to start that back up.

Just a stupid bit of useless Brad trivia: The wall calendar I have at work for 2003 has pictures of cows each month.

I talked to the vet and they want to keep Goliath overnight, and probably two nights. When they give him the initial dose of medicine it will break up the cancer cells very quickly. All of these dead cells get dumped into the blood stream and must be removed by the kidneys. Because of this he is pumping him up with liquids (I assume with an IV again) and wants to keep the liquids moving through him while his kidneys are handling the doulbe load of the dead cancer cells and the elevated calcium. The chemo treatments are $200 to $300 every three weeks.

We have decided to treat Goliath with doxorubicin.

Sheri is a mess and won't leave her desk. I am better and am going to bring some lunch back to my desk.

Goliath

Goliath’s biopsy results came back. His liver is cancerous, and somewhat developed, but not a solid mass yet. We are going to start the medium-aggressive treatment. If we get an extra six months to a year out of him we will be doing good. I can’t stop crying at work.

MCI Phone Bill

I just looked up our first phone bill on-line with the new MCI Neighborhood plan. We had 651 minutes of long distance! That is almost 11 hours. At 7¢ per minute that would have cost us almost $46 just for long distance.

Dinner

We are going to Chipotle's for dinner. It has been a long time since we have been there, and I am very hungry.

Maps

This week's issue of Newsweek just showed up in our mailbox, and it has a nice pullout map of Iraq and Baghdad. Iraq is on one side and several different maps of Baghdad are on the other. It is 15.75" wide and 20.5" tall. The map will be a handy reference next to the TV while watching CNN. Plus this weeks issue is pretty good.

Rose Smell

Shere has an appointment this morning with the doctor that makes sure her voice did not get damaged or changed from her surgery.

Plans

I think Goliath and I are going back to bed so he can convalesce and I can read today's paper.

Classmates.com

I signed up at classmates.com today. Neat! I saw some names I recognized from grade school, junior high, and high school. There were too many college names to go through.

Computers

I think we have decided that we like having two computers next to each other in our upstairs office. We are now talking about getting the cheapest possible laptop computer to use downstairs, on the patio, bathroom, kitchen, etc. just for web browsing. It doesn't have to have a fast processor or huge amounts of memory, because we are not going to use it for anything else other than browsing the internet. So far the cheapest new one I can find is about $800 for a Compaq Presario. I will check out used prices, but I feel a little nervous about a used laptop. They are much more delicate than a desktop, and the parts for a laptop are all proprietary, which means if something breaks I can't go to the local Best Buy to get a replacement part. Most of the parts are custom made for that laptop. We will probably make it a Christmas present for us. We still might experiment with the $200 Linux computer from Wal-Mart though. I have an old monitor, but I don't have a cable for it. Every monitor I have ever seen has the cable permanently attached to it. I have the one monitor in the world with a detachable cable, and I can't find it. I don't even know if it is a standard part I can buy, or if it was proprietary. Once I get a cable for it and confirm that it works, I will snatch up the $200 PC in a heartbeat.

Dear Raed

The blog of the Baghdad resident is back on-line. It was getting so much traffic that it kept crashing the servers that it was on. Google/Blogger made a mirror of the site to handle all of the traffic. The original site is www.dear_raed.blogspot.com and the mirror is dear_raed.blogspot.com. You will probably have better performance with the mirror site.

Dog day

I am going to stay home from work today because of Goliath. He is still "delicate". I would not feel comfortable dumping him off at the vets. He seems very nervous. It still hurts him to eat sometimes. He made through most of his breakfast this morning, and then he had the mouth pain, and was afraid of his food bowl after that. He wouldn't even look at it.

School

When I started class at DePaul in January I was a little intimidated. DePaul's part-time MBA program was rated number 4 in the nation by U.S. News & World Report, and here I was coming from a little unknown private school in Ohio. Who was I to come into their domain, especially at the end of the program. I felt like I would be outclassed by the best of the best from the Big City. When I saw my grade compared to the class average it felt really good.

Sunday Update

Goliath is doing better. His swollen paw has reduced in size almost to normal, and he can walk on it without limping, but it must still bother him because he still walks slowly.

We still are not sure if we are going to take him to the vet tomorrow morning to board him. He has been drinking a lot less water, and therefore peeing a lot less.

One weird thing, he yelps in pain when he tries to eat hard things. I gave him a dime sized piece of a cracker, and he yelped and dropped it out of his mouth. He won't can't eat his kibble. We thought he just wasn't hungry. Fortunately last night I thought serving his kibble moistened would help. I added ½ cup of hot water to 2 cups of dry kibble and stirred it up. He didn't stop eating until the bowl was finished! He was probably starving and we didn't know it. Glad I tried.

I tried looking in his mouth to see if I could see anything, but he yelped when I tried to open his mouth. My guess is that either they nicked his gums when they inserted the respirator tube or maybe tied his jaw open, or maybe they had his jaw forced open too wide and his jaw joint hurts to open wide or to put pressure on it. Also, maybe the muscles he uses to chew are somehow related to his neck muscles that were disturbed when they removed his lymph nodes.

I was able to keep it going for almost three hours last night of Dune. When I couldn't take it anymore, I went upstairs during an intermission and just started surfing the web for a while. This was around 8:00 PM. My eyes started to get tired, so I thought I would go watch a little CNN in the bedroom. I feel hard asleep until about 10:30 PM. By then everyone had left. Since I had a nice power nap, I was wide awake until about 5:00 AM.

Today we didn’t do much of anything. Slept in obviously. Watched CNN. Played on the computers. It is so nice to have the weekend free from worrying about writing a paper for school. I am enjoying and appreciating it fully.

Yesterday I finally did a water change on the aquarium. It has been several months. The tank always seems like it glows a bright blue right after a water change. I think we will buy a new fish soon since the tank is fresh again. We only have our huge plecostomus, one cichlid, three silver dollar fish, and one silver hatchet. I think we might try breeding guppies next. Maybe buy 20 of them and see how many babies we can get them to have. Not fancy guppies, so if the cichlid eats them, no big loss.

We always get a laugh from the commercials on TV for correspondence courses offering to teach people how to "do" computers. Maybe I will put that on my resume. "I can do computers."

Tonight is Drudge radio night at 9:00 PM Chicago time. I always look forward to that. I don't know if I will watch the Oscar's. My favorite is the red carpet stuff with Joan Rivers on the E! network, but they aren't having that tonight because of safety concerns.

Goliath

We left work early today and took the 1:30 PM train home to pick up Goliath for the weekend from the vet.

The bill was $1.058.44. That was in addition to the $300 that we paid last week for the x-rays, ultrasound, and thyroid blood test.

He is very tired. He didn’t touch any of his dog food in his bowl, but he did eat some Scooby snacks (albeit slowly).

They said to limit his water at first so that he doesn’t vomit. His normal bowl is fed by a 4 gallon water jug. To control his intake I closed off the room that is in, and put down a regular water bowl. At first he would drink all of the water that I would put in (about three or four cups at a time, spaced 30 minutes apart) but after about the third or fourth bowl he was done. He actually left water in the bowl! I think that is a good sign. Last week he would drink nonstop for five minutes.

One point of concern; they put an IV in his right front paw. That paw is now noticeably swollen. I might call the vet tomorrow if the swelling has not decreased. He limps on the leg a little bit.

We are having some people over tomorrow evening for movie night. I started a batch of tabouli, and Sheri made her chocolate éclair dessert. She also picked up some soft drinks, cheese, etc. from the store tonight. One of her friends is a big Dune fan. He felt that the two original Dune’s (1984 and 2000) each left things out, so he spliced the two movies together into what he feels is a complete work. I don’t know if I will be able to stay awake.

I have an early doctor appointment tomorrow morning. Just a routine diabetic follow-up.

Class grade

My grades were posted on the web today for my winter semester class. Here they are.

Date Added	Item	Score	Points Possible	Class Avg.
Jan 2, 2003	Ast.& C.P.1 (Assignment)	19	20	17.159090
Jan 28, 2003	Active C. P.& Ast II (Attendance)	19	20	17.613636
Jan 28, 2003	Test 1 (Essay)	29	30	26.840909
Feb 24, 2003	Test.II (Essay)	28	30	27.204545
	Total	95	100	88.818180

Another neat blog

This is the personal blog of CNN correspondent Kevin Sites in Iraq. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or funded by CNN.

Baghdad blog

This is a blog from a guy that actually lives in Baghdad. Pretty neat.

Goliath Update

The vet just called. He is done with Goliath’s surgery. When he opened up his abdomen he didn’t see anything that looked like a big cancerous lump. He took a little snip of the liver that looked a little different than the rest of the liver. He will send that out for a biopsy. He will also send the lymph node he removed from his neck out for a biopsy. I think he said he will be able to tell if it was just that particular node that is bad, or if the all of his lymph nodes are affected but just not showing any symptoms or enlargement yet. If the one node he took out is the sole cancer, he said we should start to see improvement in respect to his drinking and peeing in four or five days. I didn’t ask if we could stop by and see him tonight, but I think we will stop by, and if they are still open stop in to see him. I didn’t want to make them stay just for us. I didn’t ask how much this is going to cost.

Goliath update

The vet just called, and the thyroid test came back negative, which means cancer. He felt around his collar bone some more and found a lymph node that didn’t feel right. He did a fine needle aspiration into the lymph node, and it tested positive for cancer.

He is going to operate on him today to remove the lymph node, and while he is under anesthesia he is also going to open up his abdomen and have a look at his liver (recall that the front of it looked different than the rest of his liver on the ultrasound our x-rays) and see if there is any other cancers trying to hide.

They will keep him overnight, and then we will pick him up Friday after work if there are no complications. He said that this won’t immediately cure his excessive drinking and peeing problem, so he said he will probably want bring him back on Monday to be boarded again. He said they will probably give him a treatment or two chemo after the surgery.

He said this type of cancer is fairly treatable and said his chances are very good.

Fast!

Wow!

Baghdad

Here is a neat satellite picture of downtown Baghdad. That is the Tigris river in the photo.

Anti-Thyroid Surgery

If anyone is getting tired of their boring old thyroid and want to have it removed, it will only cost you $15,899.98.

Pharmacy	488
IV Solutions	49
Surgical supplies	423
Sterile supplies	713
Lab work	870
Pathology lab	572
Operating room services	4,773
Anesthesia	5,455
Pulmonary functions	78
Recovery room	1,655
Observation room	825

Dog

The vet is still waiting from Goliath’s thyroid blood test to come back. He said most labs only do this test once a week, and that we must have caught them right between cycles. The lab is at Michigan State. He expects that the results will be back by Friday.

In the mean time we have a dog that has turned our house into his own personal toilet. At first we thought we would just tough it out; keep a mop on hand; rent a steam cleaner once he is better. But last night was the last straw when I laid down in bed on a nice wet spot.

I called the vet this morning to see if they could board him until he is better, and they said no problem. I am going to leave work early today so I can get home and take him to the vet’s before they close.

Sheri seemed sad when I told her this. I will be too, but I can’t live like that any longer.

I just found out today that our department will be moving two floors down in a couple of weeks.

World Opinion

Now you don't have to wonder how the Germans feel about us.

Yeah!

The paper is done and submitted! Time to get a little fun time in with the Train Simulator!

Wireless Bridge

This is what I will be buying as soon as it is released. It is the WET54G Wireless Bridge from Linksys. It will connect a computer(s) wirelessly downstairs to the wireless router and fast internet connection upstairs.

My Train Simulator game arrived today, but I have my paper to finish up tonight! I left the game downstairs because I know if I brought it up I would be tempted to install it. I hope it will be good incentive for me to stay focused and get it done so I can play a little bit this evening. Wish me luck.

Summer Time

I have fond memories from my childhood and my high school years of eating dinner in the summer time on weeknights. When I smell that fresh summer smell, like I did a little bit over the weekend, I get images of iced tea, steamed asparagus, corn on the cob, grilled flank steak, grilled chicken parts, and sliced tomatoes. (Not necessarily all at the same meal. These were just traditional summer time foods for us.) I also have fond memories of being given a few dollars before dinner to ride my bike a couple of blocks down to the neighborhood fruit stand to pick up fresh corn for dinner, and then shucking it on the front porch or patio. We always cooked the corn in the mysterious hissing pressure cooker.

Mom always thought it was important to have family dinners together because it was the only time we were all together. I guess she was right.

Cleaning Lady

A photocopied note was left rolled up in our front door handle when we got back from running some errands today. I have typed it below exactly as it was on the note (except I X'd out her phone number.)

Cleaning Lady

Dear Mr. And Mrs.:

I will like to help you in your daily house duties. I am cleaning person and I am 32 years old, I am marriage and I have one daughter. I am honest, conscientious and industrious. I make all the cleaning work by myself. I give all necessary materials. I don’t have unlimited time for cleaning your house. I guarantee professional job.

My phone number is xxx-xxx-xxxx.

Please leave the massage on the massage machine and I will call you back.

Anna

I want to hire her just to find out about this massage machine that you can leave massages on. I could store them up for when I am really tense.

New Religion

We have been kicking around the idea of changing religions, and this one has been kind of appealing to us.

Shiite Muslim men cut their heads with swords during the annual ritual to mark Ashoura Day in the southern Lebanese town of Nabatiyeh, on Thursday March 13, 2003. Hundreds of Shiites in south Lebanon marked the 7th century killing of their most revered saint Imam Hussein, by slashing their heads with blades on the occasion known as Ashoura. Al Hussein was a grandson of Islam's Prophet Mohammed and is a symbol of martydrom for Shiite Muslims. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)

WalMart Computer

This is a $200 computer from WalMart. It doesn't have a modem, but it does have a network card so you can just plug it in on your LAN. It doesn't include a monitor. I think I have an old 15" one in the basement. Maybe we will get this for a second PC in the upstairs office, and move our old one downstairs once I get the wirelass LAN card for it.

U.S. officials told CNN Wednesday that "secret surrender" negotiations have begun with key Iraqi military officials in hopes some military units will not fight U.S. and coalition forces should there be a war.

New Yorker

Office Chair

We bought another office chair tonight (pictured to the left) now that we have two computers at home. It was a display model for $135. The normal price was $170. The foam in the seat is much thicker than our existing office chair. It is a Samsonite chair made by OCM.

We went out after I got home from work and picked it up at Office Max, and then went to dinner at Chili's. I had a grilled tuna steak which was good, but it was cooked all the way through. I was hoping for a medium or medium-rare piece, but I guess it was Chili's and not Spago's. Sheri had a burger and fries.

I called the help desk at work today and asked if it was possible to plug my work laptop into our router at home and connect to the Bank's network directly. It is! I brought it home, had a little trouble at first, but after just a few minutes was able to see all of the network drives, e-mail, etc. just like I was at work. The speed was about the same, maybe just a little bit slower because of the overhead from the security softare and VPN (Virtual Private Network) I had to connect through, but it was still fast enough for me to open up a server based database and run some queries just like I was at my desk at work.

Another Goliath Update

The vet just called back, and we know what is making him drink excessively, and thus pee in the house excessively. He has a high blood calcium level. It should be less than 12, but his was between 14.5 and 15.2.

There are a number of things that can cause an increased calcium level, but the two that they have not been able to eliminate are cancer, and a thyroid problem.

Sheri is going to drop him off tomorrow morning for half a day so they can run a series of tests on him. It sounds like the first thing they will do is take a couple of x-rays to look for cancer. If that comes back negative then they will do some blood work for his thyroid.

That’s what I know so far. I will keep you posted.

Goliath Update

Goliath is still peeing all over the house, and we noticed that he is drinking a lot more water than normal (2 or 3 times normal?). Sheri just got back from taking him to the vet again. This time they drew blood and will check it for problems with his liver, kidneys, and diabetes. We will know by late today.

Funny

This is funny. Some Iraqi soldiers already surrendered. They heard some British troops testing their weapons and thought the war had started!

Whistle

Sheri has had a sore throat since leaving the hospital, and also seems to have developed a touch of laryngitis. I tied a string to a little Cracker Jack whistle and put it around her neck. She can toot two for yes, once for no to questions I might yell from upstairs, or if she needs to get my attention for something from another room.

More Trains

This is another cool screen shot from the Train Simulator program. You can click here for a bunch more. I feel like a big kid.

Train Simulator

I read an old news story on-line last night that the Union Pacific railroad was planning on suing Microsoft to not release the Train Simulator that I ordered. The reason is that the simulator is so realistic that they were concerned someone might take one of their trains for a joyride or hijack a train. Cool. I can hardly wait to get it now. Microsoft couldn't have asked for better advertising.

Iraq and Baghdad Maps

I just ordered two maps from Amazon.com. One is a city map of Baghdad, and the other is the entire country of Iraq. Below is a sample image from each map. The publisher is International Travel Maps & Books. They also use the abbreviation ITMB.

It was cheaper to order from Amazon than it was directly from ITMB or from Rand McNally.com.

When I was completing my purchase, Amazon gave me an option to enter friend's e-mail addresses that might also be interested in these maps. If you were one of them you will get an e-mail from Amazon letting you purchase one and/or both of the maps for 10% off. Not a bad deal.

My order would qualify for free shipping if I purchased just $8.10 more. I was planning on buying Train Simulator anyway, so I went ahead and added that to my order as well. I know. I am a big dorky geek.




Just a sample of one of the screen shots from the Train Simulator.

FYI

The pictures in the previous post are hosted on our new ISP. Old pictures from previous posts will not show up in the next day or two because I will be canceling that account. We will save the pictures that were hosted on our old site, but will probably not go back to older posts and update the links. Sorry for any inconvenience. If you are reading through old posts and want to see a picture that doesn't show up any more, just let one of us know and we can retrieve the picture for you.

Catch up pics

This picture was taken at about 6:00 AM when Sheri first got to the hospital on Monday morning. It was on the first floor by the registration desk. They gave her a gown to change into after being there just 15 minutes! I walked her street clothes back to the car, and by the time I got back it was time to wheel her up to the operating room. Very efficient.


I was the second person in the surgical waiting room Monday morning. Another guy was clear across the room on the other side and was falling asleep or deep in thought. The morning local news was on the TV and I was very happy to be able to watch it because I usually don't. So I had the TV to myself and a fresh newspaper to read. Then this guy walks in, and within a minute or two of being there asks me if I am watching the TV. I was reading the paper but listening to the news. I said I was just listening to it. He took this as a "No I am not watching." and proceded to turn to some B movie on the TNT network. He also turned the volume up really loud. So loud that I had to move across the room so I could concentrate on reading my paper. He left after about 45 minutes and I jumped up and turned it to CNN. It was on CNN the rest of the day and as long as I was there on Tuesday. I don't know if he was looking at me taking his picture, or just happened to be looking in my direction. He was probably about 10 yards away. I had the camera resting on my crossed knee and looking at the screen on the back of the camera.


This is a picture of Sheri using the headset I got her for our cordless phone. We love it. The sound quality is good, both what we hear and what the caller on the other end hears. It is comfortable. And clipping the phone to my belt and walking around the house while doing other stuff is really cool.


I wanted to take more hospital pictures, but I forgot about it after a while.

School work. Hah!

Well, I have not started on my paper yet today, but I have got a lot of web surfing done! ;-)

I guess it was kind of an unrealistic expectation given that I have all of these new toys to play with. (PC, router, cable modem) I might still be able to put in an hour or two today, but not right now. My back, neck, and posterior hurt from sitting on a card table chair. We need to buy another office chair now.

Good Web Sites

This is PC Magazine's top 200 sites of the year. You will find some great sites that you have never seen before.

Review

This is an article from PC Magazine about the router we just bought, if you are interested. The review the three latest ones. We got the Linksys one.

Cable Modem!

We have our cable modem hooked up through our router, we are both surfing the net at the same time, and everything has worked perfectly the first time! The connection is way faster than the internet connection that we have at work! It is obviously faster than at work. It's not just like "Yeah it looks like these pages might load a couple of seconds faster." It is more like you click on a page and it just appears on the screen with no delay.

I also went to the Gibson Research web site to see how secure I have the router set up. You can go to this page and click the "Test My Shields!" and "Probe My Ports!" buttons. It will then check to see how much of your PC is exposed to the internet. Ours was completely invisible and all ports are in stealth mode. You should give it a try to see how vulnerable your PC is. If it says you are vulnerable, you can download the free and excellent firewall program ZoneAlarm and/or, if you have a cable modem or DSL connection, buy a router. You can get a non-wireless router for under $50 now. I had been running the free ZoneAlarm program for years. You would be surprised how many times a hacker "knocks" on your door looking for ways into your computer. Even over our dial-up connection. Something like two or three times per hour! ZoneAlarm keeps a log of those attempts so you can see who and how often.

Sheri drove Greta back to the airport this morning while I waited for the cable modem installer. Their policy is for their technicians to only connect the cable modem to a computer. You have to configure your router yourself. I was able to get the technician in and out and then configure the router for the internet on both computers by the time Sheri got back. She was a sweetheart and brought back breakfast from White Castle. White Castle has changed their coffee. It now tastes closer to Starbucks or Tim Horton's coffee. It is closer to tasting like Tim Horton's coffee. Very good. I was impressed.

I am sitting in a card table chair and am starting to feel my neck and shoulders stiffen up. We need to get another office chair.

Sheri received a single white orchid yesterday from friends from my current work and friends from my previous work. It is a rooted plant, not just a cut flower. It is beautiful. I hope we don't kill it. I am sure Sheri will post a picture of that too.

We think Goliath might have more wrong with him than just a week bladder. He is drinking a lot of water.

I am going to clean up, do a couple of things, and then begin researching my TWO papers that are due on Tuesday.

(If any of the links above don't work for you, please let me know.)

Our Home LAN

I fixed the old PC last night, got the software to support its new Ethernet successfully installed, and then successfully hooked it up to the router and was able to immediately have both computers see each other on the network! I almost did a little victory dance. Just as a test, I copied almost two gigabytes of files from my old PC to the new one. It only took about five or six minutes.

Thyroid

If you are interested in what your thyroid looks like and where it is, then this is for you.

LAN Status

I couldn’t wait yesterday to set up the new computer on our new LAN. I got the new PC to connect to the router with no problem, but after I installed the Ethernet card in the old computer it wouldn’t boot up. I was getting panicky because all of my school research is on there, as well as Quicken, account numbers, etc.

I wrote the error message down and did a Google search when I got to work this morning. The answer popped right up. It said that Zone Alarm can cause this error under three specific conditions. Sure enough, we have Zone Alarm installed, and one of the conditions happened.

I called Sheri and had her uninstall Zone Alarm and then reboot. When she rebooted she was finally able to start Windows successfully, but all of a sudden the Zone Alarm window popped up and the PC crashed again. So Zone Alarm is being launched from somewhere else. Tonight I will hunt down all references to Zone Alarm and delete it. I will look in .bat files and .sys files. That is probably where it is being called from.

Once I do that I should be able to finish loading the drivers for the new Ethernet card and then connect the old PC to router. At that point we will be able to copy files from the old computer to the new computer just by pointing and clicking. We won’t need to copy files to floppy disks or tape or anything.

I picked the Ethernet card up at Radio Shack for just $20. I ran out while we were waiting for the pizza to be delivered. I installed the card on the family room floor while we were eating our pizza.

Right now both PC’s are on the same table in the office and physically connected to the router with cables. Once I get a wireless Ethernet card for the old PC, I will be able to move it downstairs to the front room. Our front room connects to the family room. I think we are going to buy another six foot folding table just like the one we use in the office now.

That is going to be so cool when watching a movie or TV show downstairs and an unfamiliar term, historical event, movie review, etc. appears. I can just hop up, do a quick Google search, and know the answer in seconds.

Wednesday at home update

When I initially decided to take Wednesday off, I planned it because I figured I would be worn down from the hospital and would just be a rest day. It started at 7:00 AM. Sheri and I lugged the snow blower upstairs from the basement. I did our driveway and the neighbor's driveway across the street. Her husband is out of town and she just had surgery and she was out trying to shovel 5" of snow. She looked pathetic.

My fingers were so cold that they hurt. I even changed into a new set gloves from inside the house half way through.

I showered up, dried my hair, and then laid down for a little nap. Just as I was getting to sleep I had to get up and drive to the airport to get Greta. Just a fun fact, it is a 51 mile roundtrip from our house to Midway, and a 59 mile roundtrip between our house and O'Hare.

We got back home and I finally had something to eat, and then took a nap from about noon until 2:00 PM. Then I had to take Goliath to the veterinarians. His urine sample came out completely normal, and the doctor felt his kidneys, lymph nodes, doodle, etc. and nothing seemed wrong. She said sometimes dogs just go through a phase, or sometimes it is because of stress, and sometimes dogs become incontinent with old age. She gave us a month's worth of pills that tightens up his sphincter muscles. She said if it fixes the problem, and then after a month he is back to normal, then we are set, don't bother coming back. If it fixes it for a month, and then when the pills run out he loses control again, come back and she can put him on it permanently, and it is not an unusual thing.

I laid on the couch for a little bit, watched TV, and rested my back. I am upstairs now doing a little catch-up on e-mail, my blog, and then I am going to try and do a little research for my paper.

As I was just logging on to the computer the door bell rang. It was the UPS guy with our computer. I wasn’t expecting it until Friday. If you can believe it, the boxes are sitting unopened in our kitchen. I knew if I started playing with it I wouldn't get any homework done tonight. I think once I am too tired to do anymore homework I will bring them upstairs and set them up. I think I am just going to wipe all of the crap (papers) from the top of our computer table and just leave the two monitors and the printer. I also have a mountain of paper growing under the desk. I am going to do the same with that; just move it somewhere else and then sort through it and either file it or shred it. It is just going to be too cluttered under there with cables from two computers.

I need to go to the store and buy an Ethernet card for the old computer. This will let me connect the old PC and the new PC together to transfer files. They have a card that will work at Radio Shack for only $20. I don't want to spend a lot because I am going to take the card out once I find a wireless card to go in the PC. Then I will move the old PC downstairs.

Sheri is ordering pizzas from Lou Malnati's for dinner. When I got back from the veterinarian's I snacked on some yogurt, and nuts that Greta brought us from Krema Nuts. (Did I say that they have the freshest nuts I have ever tasted?) I am on my second cup of coffee to wake me up. Because of my snack and coffee I am not starving, but by about 7:00 PM, or so, I should be ready for some pizza.

I am going back to work tomorrow. I am dreading it a little bit because I think I am going to be swamped with work to close out the month of February. I could be wrong, but I always dread finding out what's waiting for me at work after being away for more than a day or two.

But on the brighter side, my new watch should be delivered for me at work tomorrow.

By back still hurts. Doing two driveways didn't help. The handle is low so I have to slouch way over. It is a whole lot better than if I didn't have the snow blower though.

Before I pass out...

I am almost too exhausted to write this. Sheri is doing good. Probably better than me. She got to sleep all day. No complications. She told me to leave around 5:00 PM because all she wanted to do was sleep. General anesthesia always makes her sick. She threw up in the recovery room, and felt nausous the two or three times she sat or stood up in the room. Didn't vomit in the room though. All of the staff was very nice. Throat is sore when she swallows because of the drying air from the resperator. The incision site is a little sore too, but they would only give her Tylonal. Her O2 was 100% right after surgery. Blood pressure was perfect. She had a few sips of water and a few sips of tepid tea. Liquid diet tonight until the nausea goes away.

I stopped at CompUSA and bought the router I have been talking about.

Goliath didn't poop in the house. I am so tired I probably would have just left it if he did. (I am only half kidding.)

I am going to brush my teeth and pass out in bed.

Hospital Update

None of my cell phone updates came through. I made about five or six. Drats! The reception was weak in the waiting room. Maybe that was the problem.

I am at home now for a break and to let the dog out. Good thing because he pooped as soon as I let him out.

We got to the hospital on time at 5:30 AM. We only had to wait five minutes and then they led us back to a bed. They told her to provide a urine sample (to make sure she is not pregnant) and gave her a gown to change into.

I ran her coat and the clothes she wore in out to the car.

They then wheeled her to the surgery area and pointed me to the surgery waiting area.

Her surgery was the doctor's first of the day and was scheduled for 7:45 AM.

The nurse told me it is a three hour surgery, but the volunteer hostess in the surgery waiting room said her print out shows it as a 4.5 hour surgery. The hostess also said that they have been keeping patients in the recovery room for two to three hours because of lack of beds. Whatever.

One of the nurses that was assisting Sheri this morning said that her doctor was the best, and that he even took out her thyroid less than a year ago. I guess that is as good as endorsement as any; she knew his work and choose him operate on her. It seems everyone that knows him says he's the best.

We were both in good spirits this morning. I was cracking wise cracks and she was laughing good hearty laughs. I told her I was going to make choo-choo noises as they wheeled her bed down the hall. It was funny at 5:00 AM in the morning!

The waiting room is nice enough. It had cable TV. I of course switched to CNN. The hostess made a big institutional sized pot of regular and decaf coffee. Surprisingly good. She also had a box of Dolly Madison donuts. I had one because I forgot to have breakfast and was starving. I had a frozen burrito and some tabouli when I got home.

I was going to go and find the cafeteria, but I thought I would take the time to let the dog out. I don't know how long I will be there tonight, so I thought I would use the opportunity.

I am really mad that the cell phone updates are not coming through. I bet it will be one of those things where they will all suddenly appear at once 10 hours from now.

I only got about four hours of sleep last night. I felt wide awake just laying in bed so I got up and got on the computer and watched some TV.

I think I will hang on the inversion table for a couple of minutes, use the restroom, maybe lay down for a 15 minute power-nap, and then head back to the hospital.

That is about all I have to relate to you right now. I will still try to do some cell phone updates, but I will try it from outside the hospital next time, so keep checking.

Iraq Update

There are rumors that the U.S. led coalition will begin the attack on Iraq on Thursday, March 13.

GasPriceWatch.com

I have fun with the site GasPriceWatch.com. People across the country enter gas prices from their local gas stations. When I think of it I will jot down a couple of gas prices I see when we are out on errands and then update the site when I get back. You can do search by your area to find the station with the best price of gas near you.

If there is a station not listed, you can enter the name and address of the station and they will add it.

Gasoline Price

This is a link to AAA's daily average gasoline price research. It is intended for the news media to use, but as a faithful reader of this blog, you can use the site too.

The worst case scenario I hear for gas prices is over $3.00 per gallon. That is if everything in Iraq goes to s%*t. I have also heard that it could go under $1.00 if certain conditions are met. Talk about uncertainty.

A girl in my group at school just bought a hummer last week. She said she was getting something like 8 mpg, and it has a 65 gallon gas tank. She said it costs $100 to fill it up, and she has to fill it up every week. I wonder how long she will keep it.

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed

This is Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, Osama bin Laden's number two guy that was captured yesterday, and was responsible for planning the September 11 attacks. Is that some hard core chest and shoulder hair or what.

Breaking New from the Drudge Report

"Terrorists aim at Pearl Harbor; Plan to hijack airliners, fly them into nuclear subs." This is per Bill Gertz from The Washington Times.

I love listening to the Drudge Report on the radio Sunday nights.

He is on at 9 PM - Midnight Central / 10 PM - 1 AM Eastern

Chicago WLS-AM 890
Columbus WTVN-AM 610
Toledo WSPD-AM 1370

Mechanical Pencil

This is the best mechanical pencil I have ever used. It has a metal sleeve that covers the lead and lets you press as hard as you want without breaking the lead. The sleave retracts, though, along with the lead as the lead is worn away as you write. I have been using one for years and have yet to find anything better. I prefer using it to pens.

At $10 to $12 it is more expensive than a lot of the cheapee plastic mechanical pencils you will see in the writing instrument isle at your local office supply store, but it is well worth it. It has a very nice well-made feel to it. If you get one, though, be forewarned that you will never want to use any other kind of pencil again.

Mildly Interesting

Something for tomorrow's (Monday) water cooler break:

March 3, 2003, 3:03:03 AM and PM = 3/3/03 3:03:03

My grandfather on my dad's side liked these kinds of things.

Still awake

Can't sleep. I had a headache so I took an Excedrin which has caffeine in it. That might be doing it. I might go downstairs and see if I can fall asleep on the couch davenport watching CNN.

My eyes feel sleepy, but just laying in bed I feel restless. Sheri is sleeping soundly.

Between getting our new computer, broadband internet, and a router to build our home network, I think I am the most excited about the router so I can teach myself more about networking, TCP/IP, hubs, routers, wireless, ports, etc. I want to set up an FTP server on our PC. We will be able to put files into a password-protected folder (MP3 music files, etc.) and then let friends know the password. They can download files whenever they want then. Or I can put files there that I might need at work, when traveling, etc. They would always be available to me wherever I am.

Sunday Night

We are going to get up around 4:00 AM so that we can be at the hospital by 5:30 AM. I am finishing up paying a couple of bills and submitting my draft paper to my professor. We each took a melatonin to make sure we get a good night's sleep.

I packed a crash-bag with anything I might need tomorrow: Walkman, paper and pencil, tissues, headache tablets, gum, etc.

We got a Papa John's pizza for dinner tonight. We have not been eating as good lately. Hopefully it is just the distraction of tomorrow.

I don't know what it is, but ever since we decided to get a broadband internet connection, our dial-up connection seems to be very slow. Hmmmm......

The melatonin is making my eye lids heavy, and I can't think of anything else to say. I will wrap up here, brush my teeth, and go to bed. Talk to you tomorrow.

College Days

This a picture of me 18 years ago when I was a brand new freshman in college. This is what Jake had on the front of the card he sent to Sheri.

Wonder Mop

Sheri picked up a deck mop for us. I have been wanting one for quick clean-up of winter slush and salt that gets tracked into the laundry room and kitchen.

The wringing mechanism works surprisingly well. The more you twist as you push down the more water is squeezes out. I can control exactly how wet the mop will be. I leave it very wet on the first couple of passes, and then use a drier mop as I am finishing the job.

I know you probably think it is weird that I get excited over a new mop, but that's what makes me me.

Saturday so far

We went out to breakfast this morning. We tried a new place (to us) called Granny's Pancake House. When we drive by after work it always looks like it is closed down. Well, we found out why: it is only open from 6:00 AM until 3:00 PM. It was good. Not as good as Nick's in Toledo, but good. I had the Athenian omelet with gyro meat, tomatoes, onions, spinach, and feta cheese. Sheri had the vegetable skillet.

After that we went to Best Buy and bought this hands-free headset for our cordless phone. Sheri wants to make a lot of phone calls when she gets home from the hospital to update family and friends, and I thought this would make it easier for long calls. She can just lay the phone down on the bed and talk with both hands free. It is a great headset made by Plantronics. I had a Plantronics head set at my job in Columbus as well as my current job.

After that we mailed the box and magazine at the post office.

Finally on the way home we stopped so I could get a haircut. Sheri is at the grocery store getting a few things, and I am going to take a shower to get the hair clippings out, and start the research for my paper. I also tested out the new headset by talking to Dad for half an hour.

Tom from Columbus called us this morning to offer reassuring words to Sheri prior to her surgery.

Sheri also got a really nice card and a CD from Sheri's wish list, for Sheri to listen too while she is recovering, from Jake. All of our family and friends have been so thoughtful and reassuring during this crisis. Thanks everyone. It helps and is appreciated.

Our soon-to-be network diagram

Our security and network friend that I mentioned last night set up a wireless network for his in-laws. This is the network diagram of that network and is what ours will probably look like, except that the Ethernet-connected computer will be upstairs and the wireless-connected computer will be downstairs.

Friday Night and Handy

Last night after work we stopped by the video store and picked up The Four Feathers. After that we went to Loco Burrito for dinner. I had the pastor burrito and Sheri had the loco nachos. We have not been then for a long time. Very good.

By the time we got home we were not in the mood to watch a movie, so Sheri cleaned up the kitchen a little bit and got into bed to watch TV. I played on the computer too late, mostly researching wireless routers. We will watch the movie early this evening.

We are going to go out for some breakfast, and then stop by the post office to mail a package to a friend of Sheri's in Florida, and a Puerto Rico magazine to Mom and Dad.

After that I need to spend some time on-line doing some initial research for the draft of my new paper that is due on Monday. I need to submit it by Sunday night, though, because I will be at the hospital most of the day on Monday.

PC

I was starting to get buyer's remorse about the PC because it ended up costing more than I originally intended. (With tax and shipping it was $2,400.) But then I realized that it was not all PC. I ordered Microsoft Office XP Professional which added about $350 to the price. I splurged and got 1 gigabyte of memory which added an extra $300 over the 512 megabytes that was initially going to get. And I got the hot rod video card which was about $150 over the one I was going to get.

So totaled up that is $800 more than I had in mind, but take away the $350 from the MS Office and it is only $450 more than I was thinking. I would need to get Office regardless of what type of PC I got.

So there, I feel better.

Words

Growing up, our family called a couchs and sofas davenports. You don't hear that word any more.