Trip to Switzerland

At a young age of 19 I went with my family to primarily Switzerland and Germany, where we stayed with distant relatives that my father met during his Genealogy research. To this day they still consistently speak and work to create the family tree, which has become amazingly large by now.

Here is a link to my Dad's recollection of the trip. Bear in my he's recalling his memories .. ours were full of things that we still laugh about today ... german cows and killer weiner dogs .. makes me smile even now... good people, a good trip, and a great time .. :o)

Google .. again ...

First of all, I royally stink at coming up with 'titles' so do ignore them.

Besides there's never one subject .. there's usually 20 and they go on and on and on .. lol


(1) I want to publicly thank Lele for the damn Google Reader addiction. As if I didn't have Googlte hooked up via I.V. as it was, now it's ten times worse. I have iGoogle up all day long and 9 times out of 10 I have to open up a second instance of iGoogle because I refuse to lose view of all my details.

So sad...

(2) I don't know that I have a 2 or more... I don't have much to say as I'm sitting here further customizing this damn reader. I'm such a techy person as it is ... I've always stayed away from the feeds thinking that ignorance is bliss in my case. Bad bad bad.


I send out emails often enough giving Google free advertisement on all of their web based options. I just love it .. I should move out there and get a job. Actually I should have bought stock years ago when I wanted to because I am guessing it's worth a lot more these days.

Ok .. I don't have much else .. :o)

Trying to be more green

Ok .. for the past few years now I've been making a serious effort on being more 'green,' especially as far as my house and the resources it's spending.

I woke up about a month ago and got pretty 'upset' thinking I need to do more. It's one thing to live green, but it's something else to help support the cause. I need to promote it more, tell people more, and help do my part along with the rest of the world to help the cause.

So ... I've now started a few recycling ideas / efforts at work. I'm preparing to go into our staff meeting tomorrow and declare in the meeting that I want to form a 'green team' for the company, if one does not already exist. We, as consultants, need to practice what we promote, and we as humans can always improve on our green efforts.

Wish me luck .. I'm sure they'll be positive about it .. but it takes a force to make a change .. I want to be that force.

I've decided to get a series of dry erase boards (seeing as paper wastes paper) to hang around the office and write Green tips.... in the kitchen, the copier room, etc. and then change them frequently. I think there are a few other green people myself and I believe that we can do little things to be better occupants of this planet because, in the end, every little detail helps.

Ok .. I know I ramble so without going into any more details .. my head is exploding with ideas and excitement about this.

I'm taking a class to incorporate this into my engineering career and I've already decided that I want to obtain my LEED certification. So I can live a greener life and build a greener world! Maybe my move last year was ultimately to get me where I'm at now because for once I want to do something like this with all of my heart and soul. I'm all about being in front of technological curve and this is both that and it's a passion of mine. So maybe the saying is true .. everything happens for a reason. We'll see...


I posted a topic on the Louisville Flickr boards as well, trying to spread the knowledge. I did not ramble off my 10000 suggestion because most people won't read them, but I gave a few.

Here is just a cut and paste of that ..



Long story short .. it's one thing to live a 'greener' life yourself but there's no point in keeping it to yourself.

Here are a few things.. feel free to add to this.

Simple Ways to be More Green:

1.) Get rid of the coffee stirs!! Pour in the cream and sugar first, then pour in the coffee. This will mix everything for you perfectly!

Why not just use a spoon? Because it requires either water to clean it or a towel to wipe it off. This option requires nothing .. :o)


2.) Turn them off or put them to sleep! Are your computers on all the time? Either switch them off when you're not using them or set them to auto-hibernate after a few minutes.

It takes a computer a second or two to 'wake up' from hibernation and that saves our resources and your pocketbook.

3.) Save on your heating and cooling bills! Are you heating or cooling the entire house but you live in just a few rooms? Try lowering your temperature a couple of degrees and use supplemental sources (space heaters) to warm the rooms that you're in. Why pay to heat areas that are not in use?

Another alternative is to use a time intelligent thermostat which adjusts the temperature based on pre-set settings, so when you're at home the house is more comfortable but when you're out it saving resources and your money. Price them at the store, they're cheaper than you think!

4.) Buy local! There are so many farmer's markets around town now and so much promotion of local products that there are options now to buy local and not spend the gas and resources to get food from the other side of the country. And .. the local stuff tastes great!!

5.) Turn your car off, I can't breathe! (I had to!!) Are you sitting idle in your car for a few minutes? Consider turning it off while you're not moving, even if it's only 5 minutes. An idling car is still consistently spending our hard earned money and gas and we're also contributing to the air pollution problem.

6.) RECYCLE!!

7.) Save your water!! When you're brushing your teeth in the morning does the faucet stay on the whole time? If it does put a cup in the sink and 'capture' how much water you're normally just sending down the drain unused. You'll be amazed how much you're paying for that's being wasted. It takes two seconds to turn the faucet off and on.

Also, consider adjusting the pressure of the weather when you don't need it coming out at full flow. These two things will save you a lot on your next water bill!!


Ok ... I'll stop for now, but if one person reads this and finds one suggestion useful, then I've done good .. :o) Every little detail helps!!

Louisville .. Then and Now

I'm currently drooling over the photos that are in the Library of Congress archives. As I find comparisons I'm going to 'try' to add them here .. try being the key word.


Central Park:


Year Unknown -
















2006:

I Caved .. .. .. ....

Blame it on my parents this time.

Well, I'm trying but it's not working.

My father is the reason I'm a tech whore... lol. He's either almost as bad as me or pretty close. Had he grown up in my generation he'd be much much worse. MUCH MUCH WORSE .. he made a career as a full time computer programmer, while I only do it part time .. lol

He carried a regular phone up until 3 or 4 months ago when he changed jobs. Now he's gone and bought himself one of the Treos and that has now turned into the most recent PDA he obsesses over (there have been about 6 over the past 5 years). I don't even come close to him as far as over-using my cell phone or any PDA for that matter. OMG he has a PDA IV in or something because he can't carry on a conversation without consulting the PDA for something! It's funny ... but like I said, I know exactly where I got it from. When we were kids we were the first people I knew to have a computer.. by the time the other kids saw one, we were on our third Apple.

OK .. I'm denying the obvious ...

I text my Dad last night (yes with the purchase of this Treo my Dad 'discovered' text messaging and is following suite as another text whore in the family .. lol) and tell him to google the Lifebook and check it out (he is so techy that he pays the $40 a month for internet on his phone, while I do not). His reply a bit later was not anything negative ... I got something like that's a great deal. Well damn ... I was looking for someone to bully me out of it and no one did ..

So .. I did what I always do.. put it in the cart and argued with myself for about an hour over buying it or not buying it. Finally I decided that my time is worth more than this and I know me and I WILL end up getting the damn thing anyway because I need it and I have not bought a computer in years now (and I KNOW ME), so instead of wasting even more time (it's already been since November and probably 30 hours of research and obsessing) just buy the damn thing.

So that's what I did.

Tech whore ...

But .. at the same time I found out that he was shopping himself and looking at a Sony UMPC (like daughter like father). Seeing as he was considering the massive price tag for that, I put a little bug in his ear about buying the HTC Shift instead. So while I may not be buying it for myself .. :o( .. maybe I'll be able to touch it and drool over it if it's at his house .. :o)


UPDATE .. storm sucks, almost as bad as my DSL internet connection. I whined for hours waiting on my internet to start working again so I could fix a typo on this page. Clearly I have issues... Ok not just that, but to continue to stalk Best Buy's website for my UMPC .. :o)

Post Holiday Check In

Ok .. sometimes the holidays are never long enough. I wish we were off like a month for the holidays .. then, maybe I'd start enjoying Christmas a bit more .. :)

Oh well .. back to 'normal' life .. .. .. or as close as I'm willing to get I suppose ..

1.) Last Thursday at around 9 or 10 AM the temperature was still below 10 degrees. Today I rolled all the windows down as I was leaving work .. it was in the 70s at least by mid day .. heck I think it just now got into the upper 60s.

Ok .. I'll be right back .. I'm going to email Mother Nature (if you can instant message Santa Claus I'm sure she has email by now .. LMAO) and remind her that it's WINTER here in the states .. and that means jackets and a few flurries in my sad little part of the world ...

2.) As we here in the great (HA) state of Kentucky know, then Louisville Cardinals basketball team .. well they spanked UK pretty nicely this past weekend. Here's the best part, or parts I should say ...

• UK was completely healthy so the poor sport UK fans can't say 'if only [insert name] was healthy we would have beat you all. Nope, they were scratchy throat free but off course left the game with some bird prints on the their backs from being stomped on .. :o)
• We were missing one of our BEST players, Earl Clark, due to a one game suspension (which I've yet to search the net to find out what the reason was). If anything, we were down an incredible player and still put the cat in its cage. ..
• The final score was 89-75 so there's no way the fans can say you got lucky or they were one wrong play away from the game. Nope .. you lost .. that's all there is to it :o)

Ok .. enough gloating, but to be honest it's a toss up for me .. I enjoy the more competitive games and the end of that was just kinda boring for me. But ... I enjoy that we took away every UK excuse. Now ... guess what they'll do .. blame the new coach.

I'm sure the fire Gillispie are already on the internet now. Poor guy ... if in three years their still struggling start yelling, but like Kragthorpe, who tanked the Cardinal football reputation, you have to give him a chance to play his ball with his team. So .. we wait. ..

3.) I am / have been discussing (with my alter ego) the idea of buying an UMPC for some time now. (A) I want to use it in class as, thanks to that stupid wreck, my handwriting is worse than a left handed person's should be and after so long my wrist gets sore and it gets even worse and (B) something like that is the only way I'll ever get organized and I need to get organized. I am fabulous about using my cell phone for organization but anything longer than so many letters and it turns into a pain in the butt. My laptop is perfectly up to speed with technology so I refuse to replace it, but I need something more portable than my laptop but more productive than my cell phone. Hence .. the UMPC.

I know .. tech whore .. yea I hear it all the time. But ..... ... the last computer I bought was 3 years ago and it was my $400 desktop. My laptop is actually and amazingly almost 4 years old but the specs are still comparable to today and I've upgraded what needed to be upgraded. So .. considering that while I've had my 2 computer for 3-4 years now and my father has bought AT LEAST 3 or 4 (between laptops and desktops) I think I can justify the purchase. Ok ... obviously I'm trying to justify it to myself still .. lol.

Anyway .. I'm looking to get the Fujitsu Lifebook U810 because it's (A) small and (B) sports a decent size keyboard which should accommodate my wrists when they hurt. They're coming out with a model in March that adds the cell phone compatibility and while I'm tempted to hold out for that, here's the deal ... while I'm a tech whore I don't pay for internet service on my phone because the internet just doesn't do it for me and I'd rather not spend $40 a month on something I don't really use or need. So .. I don't think I care about the compatibility and if I do down the road I guess I will buy a card or something.

I thought about getting that $400 Asus Eee PC but it's not a tablet pc so that was a buzz kill for me.

I also debated between getting the HTC Shift and the HTC Advantage, which is still very tempting for me. My cell phones have been nothing but HTC's now for 3 + years and I am a loyal loving follower of anything they make. But here's my self - arguing case ... (A) the HTC Advantage operated on Windows Mobile and I want something that I can install a decent number of 'regular' programs on it and not be limited by mobile programs ... I may as well keep using my cell phone if that's the case, (B) the HTC Shift is going to be about $1500 and can I justify paying the extra $500 because I like the name?? (C) the keyboard is similar to my cell phone keyboard and I'm suspected it will be more of a thumb based pecking / typing and I'm hoping the Lifebook is a keyboard you can type more normally on... again if I'm pecking I'll keep my cell phone.

Anyway I have been shopping since November and while I always want to cave, I haven't yet. I'm just having a harder time justifying it to myself when I just pissed away a good chunk of change over the holidays on things that, unlike this, I wanted but really couldn't justify the consistent use of them like I can with this. So .. we'll see...

I know .. blah blah boring .. it's only interesting to me .. I know that and I'm ok with that too ... :o)



Ok .. I'm off to the gym in a bit to work off my 3 holiday pounds that I think I added (although I hope I'm just paranoid). I guess three are coming off whether they were already there or if they paid me a holiday visit.