h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Happy PaperKid and Notepad

Posted May 1, 2015

As I said in my last journal, I've not had success with this clutch of fertile eggs. So, since I had what I need to raise chicks, I bought chicks at the feed store this morning, while the girls were at school. All preparations had been done while they were asleep, and then I set the brooder up as soon as the girls left this morning (no adults were surprised for this production). I get home from school before the girls do, so I was waiting with my phone to take a video when they walked in, and here it is... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA5s-WZx50g&feature=youtu.be (It's the same video that I shared on FB, so if you saw it there, feel free to ignore.)

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Latest reply: May 1, 2015

It's been a while...

Posted Apr 24, 2015

...but not because nothing's been happening, for a change.

One of the things that happened is a direct cause of my being a bit quieter online (unless you know me on FB--then again, if you notice, not much of what's been on there consists of my own words...), not that I'm exactly a chatterbox anyway, except, of course, for when I am.

Anyway...

My laptop has been having problems with the power jack for years. Falling down multiple times does tend to cause physical damage to several things, after all. The annoying symptom being the fact that the power cord had to be in just the right position for power to flow enough to run the laptop. If jostled, immediate shutdown (the battery's been carp for even longer). I know it's the jack and not the infinitely-easier-and-cheaper-to-find-and-replace power cord 'cause the cord end can't be inserted more than about a third of the way, and its distressingly easy to almost lose the end of the jack inside the laptop--the hole surrounding it's big enough to dig in with a fingernail when needed, though We finally took it in to be looked at sometime before midMarch, in case there was anything else wrong (after all, I've had it almost as long as Notepad's been out in the world, and there've been multiple floor-impact incidents). Well, something must've been knocked loose(r), because I've not been able to get the light that indicates that there's power flowing to come on, much less the laptop itself, no matter how I jiggle the cord or position my tongue (hush, you--everyone knows that sticking your tongue out correctly makes fixing things easier). Now, J is the friend-of-a-friend, and Tom knows him a bit better, so I'd been having Tom do all the communicating, on the strength of Tom having J's mobile number, though I could've gotten the shop number from online fairly easily. Anyway, from what I understood, I'd thought that J had ordered the part and was simply waiting for it, and would contact Tom when it was in, and would fix the laptop, and we'd give him money, and that'd be that. Turned out that J was awaiting our decision on how to proceed (either spend a bit more--part+fitting+fixing the hole and cracks in the casing of the laptop--or get a battery so that the immediate shutdown bit didn't happen--though I'm not certain I was getting enough power flow to actually charge a battery), so the part just got ordered last week and arrived this week. The laptop will got in this weekend, and I'll have it early next week. So I've been using my phone all this time, and will have quite an archive binge on Girl Genius, Darths and Droids, Order of the Stick (though it's possible that there's no new OotS pages), Schlock Mercenary, Selkie (PaperKid's been trying for the last week or so to get me to *not* wait for my laptop, so there must be stuff going on she's dying to discuss--Selkie being something I introduced her to), Freefall, Sue and Kathryn, Square Root of Minus Garfield, Questionable Content, Gunnerdring Court, and Earthsong. I *think* that's everything that's still updating, anyway. I've also got some blogs to catch up on, Kidding Herself being one.

My yearly online scoring job began Sodit. While Tom's laptop is older than mine, it's able to handle the scoring, in a pinch, at least until my laptop's up again. Only problem is, when I went to start training, Tom's laptop was naught but a paperweight. Once I managed to get ahold of a Vista boot CD, the codes I got after the laptop was repaired enough to return a BSoD upon booting indicate a hard drive problem I'm hoping we'll be able to get all the ministry files and photos and Tom's music (though I'm pretty sure that the good mixes are on mine, not that I can check to be sure right now...) and all the other vital stuff off there. Tom's laptop is going in when mine does. So, after 2 days of behind-the-scenes attempts to get things working, we decided to go ahead and get a new laptop *now* so I could start the job. Our original plan had been to wait until my first paycheck, get Tom a laptop to replace his (which he's had since 2006 or 2007), mine would be fixed and fine, the only problem being the power thing, and pass Tom's old laptop to PaperKid, so the plan simply got moved forward a couple of weeks, with PaperKid maybe losing out if the oldest laptop can't be revived. (Didn't help my mood any that one of the classroom computers decided to have boot problems on Sodit as well, though that's completely unrelated.)

Training and scoring's been going well yesterday and today, though 'twould've been nice to have started earning money 2 days sooner.

On a non-technological front, Frieda, the chicken that raised some chicks for me last fall (that we had to get rid of, since they all turned out to be males, which we can't have here) went broody midFebruary, and I'd been talking with someone who has chickens I want for months. His hens had been laying well over the winter, and I was all set to get eggs shipped from him (and he was all set to send them). So, of course, chickens being living things that can be nearly as contrary as cats, his hens (only of the breed I wanted, of course) went on a short laying break. 'Twas short, too--only a couple of weeks. Once they started laying again, my friend sent me the eggs, and I placed them under Frieda. Unfortunately, by that point, Frieda had been setting for nearly a month (chicken incubation is 21 days). She did set the fertile eggs she'd finally gotten for 10 days, but it seems her hormones ebbed, and she abandoned the nest. After some scrambling around (unfortunate pun not intended), I did manage to borrow an incubator, and got the eggs in after they'd been cold for around 40 hours. Luckily, chicken embryos go into stasis once cooled to a certain point, so they *should* be OK, but there's no way to know until the chicks hatch or not. On top of that, on the day that Frieda left the nest and thus the eggs unguarded, the finally figured out where eggs come from--I caught her with one of the eggs I'd been sent--she'd cracked it, and was lapping up the insides. Fortunately, from what I could see, it didn't appear that that particular egg was developing anyway (the post office can be hard on eggs). I caught her with another egg later, but she'd not cracked it far enough to eat anything. There may have been micro cracks, though--a few days later one of the eggs was seeping.

I had more to say, but I've been typing off and on for a bit, and can't remember what I was going to say.

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Latest reply: Apr 24, 2015

Happy Birthday, Dad

Posted Mar 4, 2015

You would've been 67 today.

I miss you. 49 was far too young.

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Latest reply: Mar 4, 2015

If insanity...

Posted Jan 25, 2015

...is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results...

Then I've gone around the bend tonight.

Y'see, Tom asked me to add a couple of slides to a powerpoint for a presentation tomorrow (well, just over 8 hours from now, actually...) I found some other photos to add, as well. No problem with those--I've got adding-photos-to-slides-on-the-tablet (which is the only device that we can do this with) down. Do the changes, save onto the microSD card so we can get the presentation onto another computer. 3 blank slides. Including, of course, THE ONE PHOTO that Tom had specifically requested be included. I did get one of the 3 slides to display correctly, but not *the one*. For over an hour (closer to 2) I tried everything. Downloading and redownloading. Saving and resaving. Deleting photos in the download folder in case the program just didn't want to pull photos from further back in the queue (don't look at me like that--it was well after 1am, and I was first made aware of the missing slides at midnight). Downloading again. Very carefully *not* throwing the tablet across the room...

If it turns out it was just a glitch in the display when Tom does the presentation tomorrow, I may have to be fitted for a jacket with really long sleeves...

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Latest reply: Jan 25, 2015

Merry Christmas!

Posted Dec 25, 2014

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Latest reply: Dec 25, 2014