Tom's Diary

Today’s Activities

• Shower. DONE.
• Cat duty.  DONE.
• Wash (2) loads of pending laundry for Mom.  DONE.  103 loads done in the washer now.

Log

08:00 AM: I’m up.

12:30 PM: Spent the morning configuring and playing with my new computer.

01:00 PM: Discovered that the new computer also does not recognize my music drives; just like my Dell Inspiron 9100 laptop.  So I’ll spend the rest of today investigating.

03:00 PM: Made sure the chipset drivers for my new computer’s motherboard were up-to-date.  This did not solve the USB device not recognized problem however.

05:00 PM: Spent a couple hours Googling around for answers to this.  Nothing definite found, but I did harvest lots of great suggestions to try.

06:00 PM: Washed laundry throughout today.

11:00 PM: Talked with   [Emmy].  We wathed tonight’s rerun epoisode of   Hawaii Five-0, although I just listened while continued working the USB device not recognized problem.

11:10 PM: One fellow said that instead of connecting his USB storage device to his computer directly, that he connected it through a USB hub.  This he said, solved his problem, and his computer recognized his drive immediately.  He hinted that changing cables around might have solved his trouble.  So I thought I’d give that a try.  I had been using some cheaper USB cables I had purchased online a while back.  So I replaced one such cable with one that originally came with my Seagate FreeAgent external hard drives.  Immediately my problem disappeared from my new computer (the Dell XPS 8300)!   So, I tried the original cable on the laptop where I first noticed this error.  The cable switch fixed the error there as well.

12:00 AM: With my music drives now working correctly on the new computer, I set Winamp’s Media Library piece to index my collection on the new computer.  That went very well; no errors or hangs whatsoever.  Terrific!

12:05 AM: Reviewed the daily traffic stats from yesterday for my blogs.  The monthly keyword hit count rose once again, and now stands at 1773; up from 1745 the last time I checked this a couple days ago.  The record high for this dimension is now 1773.  The next goal: 2000.

03:00 AM: As a sort of reward to myself for getting the external drives going on Windows 7 (with much help from the Internet I must say), I spent a few hours perusing some of the new 2011 music I recently added to my music library.  I found perhaps 60 great dance and rock tunes to add to my Walking 2011 playlist.

03:15 AM: Now, finally, I’m pooped.  The adreneline joy rush of solving the USB device not recognized problem is slowing way down, and has left me extremely sleepy and tired.  Of course the fact that it’s well past three AM probably is more to blame for this than anything.  So I’m off to bed.  Good night.  Take care, and do come back later as my life saga continues.  See you.

Tom Hesley

Received Mail and Shipments

• Bed Bath & Beyond catalog.
• Balance transfer offer from Chase Freedom.  No thanks.
• Another offer from our electricity company to “lock in” our electricity supply rates for the next two years.  No thanks.
• Kohl’s $10 gift card.  Thanks very much!

Related Posts and Links

• Today’s Diet: 2011-07-11

Today’s Activities

• Shower. DONE.
• Cat duty.  DONE.

Log

09:00 AM: I’m up.

12:30 PM: Spent the morning configuring and playing with my new computer.  Love it. It’s significantly faster than that 2 Ghz. machine I’d been using up until now.

12:45 PM: Leaving now for sister Christine’s place to spend most of the rest of today.  I’m taking my laptop and music drive with me, in case they want me to play.  Back later.

03:00 PM: Nap time, in Christine’s garage, with hits from the 70s playing in the background.

10:30 PM: I’m back home.  Discovered problems playing music on the Dell Inspiron 9100 laptop.  Interesting that this same computer with the same drive, same power supplies, same cables, and the same software worked great last week.   Now, it does not recognize the music drive when I connect it, and displays an error message balloon in the notification area.  Hmm.  Will have to investigate that.

11:00 PM: Talked with   [Emmy].

11:15 PM: Bed time.  More tomorrow.  Good night.

Tom Hesley

Received Mail and Shipments

None today.

Related Posts and Links

• Today’s Diet: 2011-07-10

Today’s Activities

• Shower. DONE.
• Cat duty.  DONE.
• Wash (2) loads of pending laundry.  DONE.  92 loads done in the washer now.

Log

05:30 AM: I’m up.

05:40 AM: Found that the CHKDSK operation I began on this computer last night also hung.  So this hard drive is apparently beginning to fail, and CHKDSK cannot repair it.  Thus, I’ll look into replacing it in the coming days.  I think I’ll go SATA this time; this motherboard supports SATA but the current drive is still IDE.  This faulty drive will likely be among the last IDE drives I employ for my computing.

05:50 AM: Got caught up on my blogging in the   Tom’s Diary   blog.

07:50 AM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> How Blind Men Find Women Attractive   piece.

08:40 AM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> Radio Shack NOAA Weather Radio Cube 12-500 (12500) Review   piece.

09:35 AM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> Radio Shack Composite AB Selector Switch 15-312 (15312) Review   piece.

11:10 AM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> Less Quid Pro Quo, More Unconditional Love, Please!   piece.

11:55 PM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> Against NFB’s Self Sufficiency Philosophy   piece.

01.55 PM: Purchased a nine-year renewal for the wpsbc-alumni.org domain.  Cost: $55.36.

04:00 PM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> What Is Sound Check in iTunes and iPods?   piece.

04:30 PM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> How To Copy Songs From Multiple iPods Into iTunes Library   piece.

05:00 PM: Baked some fish fillets for supper.

06:00 PM: Watched the 2011-06-10 and 2011-06 12 episodes of   NBC’s Nightly News   broadcast via the DVR.

06:50 PM: Watched today’s episode of   The Young and the Restless   via the DVR.

07:15 PM: Leaving for walk 25 of 100 for 2011, over to Logan Valley cemetery.  Back later.

08:00 PM: I’m back home.  Nice walk.  Partly sunny and a bit hazy.  Warm, but not overly so.  Still, I broke a healthy sweat.  Yep.  At my age, walking indeed makes me break sweats. 

08:45 PM: iPodded for a half-hour or so on the east porch.

08:50 PM: Ouch.  Rocking perpendicular to those widely-spaced porch slats makes for quite the bumpy ride.  Grrrrr.  I feel like I just got off of a bull.  Time to lay some plywood, for sure. 

09:40 PM: Today and tomorrow are the longest days of the year.  Yet it’s barely 9:30, and it’s almost dark here.  Must be all those darn clouds.  I remember when I lived in Dayton, at the extreme western edge of EST, that you could see the last remnants of daylight in the western skies as late as 10:30 PM.  But I’m too far east for that here.

11:00 PM: Talked with   [Emmy] and we watched tonight’s rerun episode of   Hawaii Five-0   live on CBS.  In some cases, I enjoy the reruns more than the first runs.

12:05 AM: Reviewed the daily traffic stats from yesterday for my blogs.  The monthly keyword hit count moved way up this time, and now stands at  1414; up from 1359 yesterday.  The new record high is now 1414 key phrases therefore.  Next goal: 1500.

01:00 AM: iPodded and Facebooked simultaneously.  Hmmm.  I guess that makes me a true multi-tasker.

01:05 AM: Bed time.  More tomorrow.  Good night.

Tom Hesley

Received Mail and Shipments

None yet.

Related Posts and Links

• Today’s Diet: 2011-06-20
• Tom’s Views –> Against NFB’s Self Sufficiency Philosophy
• Tom’s Views –> How Blind Men Find Women Attractive
• Tom’s Views –> How To Copy Songs From Multiple iPods Into iTunes Library
• Tom’s Views –> Less Quid Pro Quo, More Unconditional Love, Please!
• Tom’s Views –> Radio Shack Composite AB Selector Switch 15-312 (15312) Review
• Tom’s Views –> Radio Shack NOAA Weather Radio Cube 12-500 (12500) Review
• Tom’s Views –> What Is Sound Check in iTunes and iPods?

Today’s Activities

• Shower. DONE.
• Cat duty.  Sister Jojo is taking care of my cats this week.

Log

04:00 AM: I’m up.   

05:30 AM: Got caught up on my blogging in the   Tom’s Diary   blog.  I was a bit lax yesterday.

07:30 AM: Posted the   Tom’s Views –> Chef’s Choice Cordless Electric Kettle 677-2 (6772) Review   piece.

08:00 AM: Purr meow.  P-M-U-E-R-O-R-W!   I love when cats meow at the same time they’re purring, like they’re not sure which they really want to do.  So, they do both.  The purring modulates the meow with a shaking, shivery sound, and the meow gives the purring a squeaky, happy edge that always seems to make me smile.  Neat.

11:30 AM: Leaving now for the Pittsburgh Amtrak train station to head back to Altoona from   [Emmy's]   this afternoon. 

12:00 PM: Arrived at the train station and got some Reese’s peanut butter cups for lunch. 

01:00 PM: Borded the train.  Pretty crowded today.  But I still got my window seat in the middle of the Altoona car. 

01:20 PM: The train departed on time. 

03:00 PM: I thought I’d be more tired since I got relatively little sleep last night.  But I found myself wide awake for all but about twenty minutes of the trip so far.  So I mostly iPodded and peered out my window at “houses, farms, and fields” whizzing by, not to mention cities, towns, and forests.

03:50 PM: The train arrived in Altoona, on time. 

04:30 PM: I’m home once again.

04:45 PM: All unpacking is done and suitcase put away.  I’ll have a couple loads of laundry to do this week.   

07:00 PM: Started a CHKDSK operation on this, my home computer, to look for and repair potential problems on my primary hard drive; problems that may have caused this computer to hang while I was copying folders around from    [Emmy's]   place last week. 

09:30 PM: Skimmed the 2011-06-05, 2011-06-12, and 2011-06-19 rerun episodes of CBS’s   60 Minutes   weekly news show via the DVR, and also deleted all the shows recorded during my absence that I’ve seen already while visiting   [Emmy].

10:40 PM: Talked with   [Emmy].  I think I’ll lay down now, until the daily stats come in from my blogs.  Good night. 

12:05 AM: Reviewed the daily traffic stats from yesterday for my blogs.  The monthly keyword hit count is down a bit again, and now stands at  1359; down from 1367 yesterday.  The record high remains 1388 key phrases therefore.  Next goal: 1500. 

12:15 AM: Bed time.  More tomorrow.  Good night.

Tom Hesley 

Received Mail and Shipments

• None today

Related Posts and Links

• Today’s Diet: 2011-06-19
•  Tom’s Views –> Chef’s Choice Cordless Electric Kettle 677-2 (6772) Review

Today’s Activities

• Shower.  DONE.
• Cat duty.  DONE.

Log

10:00 AM: We’re all up.   Today, now that I’ve got all the new music I have in my music library, I’m syncing all hard drives and performing final computer tests to make sure that the   DJ Gig: 2010-12-31  gig tonight goes without any glitches.      

01:00 PM: I went over to Sheetz and bought us all foot-long steak subs and hot chocolate for lunch.  We thought we’d fill up on some relatively decent food before going to the party tonight, so that we’re less apt to eat a lot of junk there.

03:30 PM: All music hard drives have now been populated with the new music except for one.  This drive, upon connection, started this rhythmic clicking noise, and my computer would not read it.  I think this Seagate unit is still under warranty.  But I’ll check on that next week.  Hopefully, they’ll send me a new one for free. 

05:30 PM: We’re leaving now with nephew Grant for the New Years party.  Back later.

07:00 PM:  The    DJ Gig: 2010-12-31   gig is under way.  I experienced some Winamp Media Library configuration issues that scared me a little.  When double-clicking on single songs in the library, instead of just one song being copied to the play list editor, all the songs in the library view were copied.  This made it difficult to manage the play list and to find the song I wanted to play next, as I had to scroll through lots of “noise” songs in the play list first.  But fortunately, close examination of Winamp’s Media Library settings revealed some values that had changed when I installed the latest version of Winamp a couple days ago.  I changed these back to my preferred settings and the above problem disappeared.  *Phew!*

09:00 PM: The dance floor began to fill with mostly younger folk, but curiously, they did not request as much music this year as last.  Still though, there was plenty of dancing by all.  The adults hung out in the kitchen for the most part, and it seemed that everyone had a camera.  All my sisters stopped by the “DJ Booth” to make sure that [Emmy] and [Mentat} had plenty to eat and drink, and to chat a little.  Very nice. 

10:00 PM: Noticed that music searches take noticeably longer at this gig than at previous ones; probably due to all the extra audio files I have in my collection these days.   I now have just over 92040 files, and the Winamp Media Library search engine appears to be bogging down.  Searches now take several to ten seconds to complete.  I'm used to them taking  less than a second on this computer.  Oh well, I suppose I'll have to bite the bullet in the new year and switch from Media Library over to Windows Search.  That seems much faster.  However doing this will involve writing an updated search filter DLL file that follows Windows Search communication protocols.  Unfortunately, the filter I wrote several years back for the Windows Indexing Service is not compatible with Windows Search.  The bigger my media collection becomes, the more necessary will be this effort to complete.  In the meantime however, I'll narrow the selection of watch folders I include in my Media Library index so as to exclude my old time radio shows or audio books.  I never play these at gigs anyhow, and this should shrink the number of indexed files considerably and therefore, reduce search times commensurately.   This will be especially helpful on my older and thus, slower laptop computers that I use at the gigs. 

11:50 PM: I ended the formal part of the gig with a couple slow dances and finished up with Hanson's Silent Night Medley piece.  This drew many onto the dance floor that had not been there before, although I can't take all the credit for this as people had started to gather in the dance area to watch the ball fall in Times Square. 

12:00 AM: 2011 is here! 

12:20 AM: I began an informal music session, where I took requests from mostly the adults in the room.  These mostly consisted of classic and modern rock tunes.  No more dancing though. 

01:35 AM: Mom called from the hospital to wish us all a happy new year.  She sounds better than yesterday but we still don't know much about how long they'll keep her, or if she's even going to be able to come right home after discharge.  She may have to return to the nursing facility to build back up her upper body strength. 

01:45 AM: We're all running out of steam.  So I ended all music and packed up my equipment and headed to the kitchen to socialize a little and to get one last bite of holiday food. 

02:15 AM: Well, the New Year celebration is over and we're back home.  Sister Christine and her husband drove the three of us  ([Mentat],  [Emmy],   and myself) back home.  I am very tired.   

02:45 AM: We talked fondly of the celebration that just ended.  But sleepiness is getting the best of us.  So we’re off to bed.  Happy New Year to all, and check back often, as I hope to write much more into these blogs in 2011.  Good night. 

Tom Hesley

Received Mail and Shipments

None today.

Related Posts

• DJ Gig: 2010-12-31
• Today’s Diet: 2010-12-31
• Weight Loss: 2010

This year, as I’ve done every year since 2002-12-31, I’m DJing a New Years celebration party at Richard and Christine’s garage, in Sinking Valley.  I do not charge them, because this is my way of paying them back some, for all they do for me during the rest of the year.  Besides, it’s my way of ringing in the New Year, Hesley-style, with lots and lots of great-sounding   Tommy’s Tunes. 

In this post and the attached comments, I’ll mention all that I do over the next several weeks to prepare for this gig; everything from getting the computers ready and testing the sound and lighting equipment, to assuring that my hard drive-based library contains all the latest hits I’ve purchased this year. 

This will show that there’s a lot more involved with DJing a party than just sitting down, turning on the lights, and playing music when the get-together begins.  It’s not as simple as it looks.

So, enjoy. 

Tom Hesley

Related Posts

• Projects Page
• Today’s Business: 2010-11-16
• Today’s Business: 2011-01-26

Today’s Activities

• Shower.  DONE.
• Cat duty.  DONE.

Log

08:00 AM: I’m up.

08:30 AM: Facebooked a while this morning.  Friend count is now 206.

09:45 PM: Added more content to  the   Gulf Oil Spill Thoughts: 2010-06-23   piece to the   Tom’s Views   blog.

10:45 AM: Added the   Therapy   category to the   Tom’s Love Quest   blog.  Posts in this group detail my experiences with and impressions of the therapy I sought through the years, to aid me in winning my love quest.

01:05 PM: Posted the   Our Government: 2010-06-24    piece to the   Tom’s Views   blog.

02:00 PM: Watched today’s episode of   The Young and the Restless   on the DVR.  Sharon came face-to-face with Adam.  Victor is forced to fly back home to testify in Nick’s trial.  Sky comes face-t0-face with Victor at the poker table.

04:45 PM: Watched today’s rerun episode of   Dr. Phil;   pertaining to Moms who drink and the problems this causes for their children and anyone who must coexist with them really.

06:00 PM: Facebooked for the past couple hours, and told my friends about Mom’s need to go to the hospital.  I’ve received numerous well-wishes.  That’s nice.

07:20 PM: Watched tonight’s episode of   NBC’s Nightly News   on the DVR.

07:45 PM: Watered all of Mom’s plants outside per her request while she’s away.

09:00 PM: iPodded at the pavilion for the past hour.  The new iOS 4.0 does work better.  Should play be interrupted by a weak WiFi signal, the AOL Radio app recovers now.  Before the station would stop playing, but not start again even after the signal strength rose until you pressed the play button again.  But now, it automatically restarts when I walk into a strong portion of the WiFi bubble.  Cool.  The Touch seems a bit more sluggish than before; I get some long pauses when touching the screen to switch to different stations.  But perhaps this is something they’ll work out in a maintenance release soon. I do hope so.

10:00 PM: Bought a late supper at Sheets, during    tonight’s shopping trip.

10:30 PM: Tried calling [Emmy] tonight.  But there was no answer.  She’s been getting tired earlier in the evening these days.  So she probably just went to bed.  I’ll catch her tomorrow.

10:58 PM: Watched tonight’s episode of    CNN’s AC 360   live.

11:00 PM: Looked for some older pictures that I was sure I’d stored on this computer.  But a whole folder was missing.  I checked my backups from as far back as a year ago, and apparently the folder has been gone at least that long.  So, fortunately, I was able to find many of those pics in my older email files; I’d sent them to numerous folks and saved copies of all my sent email.  Still though, I’m curious about what could have happened to that folder.  Hmmm.

01:00 AM: Facebooked a while.  Friend count is up to 215.

01:05 AM: Well, I’m going to pull out of here for the night.  Have a good one yourself, and I’ll be back out here again in under ten hours.  Good night.

Tom Hesley

Received Mail and Shipments

• Coupon card from   Papa John’s   pizza.  No thanks.  I’m on a diet at present. 
• Notice from Mom’s medical insurance company of coverage they’re providing for a blood-glucose test she had run recently.
• Credit card offer from BankAmericard.  Hmmm.  Haven’t heard that name in three decades.  Aren’t they what turned into today’s VISA?  Well, it looks like someone is resurrecting that old name these days.   But the longer I live, the more against credit cards for toy purchase I become.  So no thanks, but thanks anyway for the offer though.

Related Posts

• Facebook Tid Bits: 2010-06-24
• Mom’s Status: 2010-06-24
• Quest Revisions: 2010-06-24
• Shopping Trip: 2010-06-24
• Today’s Diet: 2010-06-24
• Tom’s Views –> Gulf Oil Spill Thoughts: 2010-06-23
• Weight Loss: 2010

So, my nephew Grant complained on Friday that his IBM ThinkPad (Lenovo R60) laptop computer runs too slowly, and he asked if I could restore it to normal operation for him.  So, I took on the project; starting work on it this morning. 

11:20 AM: Verified that the ThinkPad does run quite slow; I observed nearly constant hard disk activity and slow screen drawing of windows and text.  Also, several warning messages popped up, saying that the machine has multiple viruses.  Yep, a drive-reformatting and complete re install of Windows XP should fix things up for him. 

11:30 AM: The computer would not boot from the first copy of the XP CD ROM I inserted.  So I played with the device boot order in the BIOS settings, placing the CD ROM drive as the first boot device.  Still though it wouldn’t boot from the CD ROM.

11:40 AM: So I tried a different copy of the XP CD ROM.  This solved the boot issue, and booting from CD finally worked. 

11:45 AM: I chose to delete the existing drive partition (there was only one, so no recovery partition to utilize).  Then, I created a new partition out of the entire free space available on the drive (roughly 38 GB). 

11:49 AM: The computer is now formatting the new partition to NTFS.  I did not choose the quick formatting option. So this could take a little while.

12:02 PM: Reformatting just finished.  It’s now copying the installation files to the freshly partitioned hard drive from the CD ROM.

12:06 PM: The file copying just finished and the ThinkPad is now rebooting.

12:07 PM: Now, it’s  preparing the installation. 

12:08 PM: Now, it’s  installing windows.

12:11 PM: Now it’s asking for Regional and Language Options.

12:12 PM: Entering the product key.

12:15 PM: It’s installing the network software now.

12:18 PM: It’s installing the   start menu items.

12:19 PM: Now, it’s   registering components.

12:21 PM: Saving settings.

12:24 PM: Rebooting.

12:26 PM: Created two users on this machine (Grant and his mother).

12:28 PM: Windows XP installation complete.  Next, I need to install the drivers for sound and Ethernet access.  But I’ll do that after lunch.  Stand by… 

12:50 PM: Located the drivers on the Lenovo site.  Burning them to CD ROM now. 

01:15 PM: Installed the Ethernet driver and network connectivity has been successfully established.   Now, I’m applying all XP service packs and updates, becuase the wireless driver will not install without a later XP service pack installed first. 

01:20 PM: Windows update, latest components just installed. Now rebooting…

01:24 PM: Now installing the XP Service Pack 2 update…

02:25 PM: XP Service Pack 2 just finished installing successfully.  Now installing XP Service Pack 3…  

03:30 PM: XP Service Pack 3 just finished installing successfully.  Now, I’m applying the remaining updates…

06:10 PM: All updates applied successfully. 

06:20 PM: Installed the WiFi adapter driver software. 

06:25 PM: Successfully installed the audio driver (this is the one that failed before upgrading to XP Service Pack 3).

06:40 PM: Successfully installed the Intel chip set drivers and programs from the Lenovo web site. 

07:00 PM: All work on this project is complete, and everything seems to be functioning properly except one   Unknown Device   that’s showing up in the Device Manager under  Other Devices.  This may be normal for this particular machine, and since the Ethernet, wireless Ethernet, HDD, video device, CD ROM, keyboard, and pointing device (all the important devices) are all working properly, I’m not going to bother tracking down this unknown device. 

I’ll let this computer run all night to “burn it in,” and if no problems surface, sister Christine will pick it up either tomorrow or Tuesday.

Tom Hesley

Related Posts

• Garrett’s Computer Problen
• Pink’s PC Problems
• Projects Page
• Today’s Business: 2010-04-11

Today’s Activities

• Shower.  DONE.
• Cat duty. DONE.
• Help Pink restore some data she’s still missing this evening.  DONE.
• Pay all (2) pending bills.

Log

10:00 AM: I’m up. My weight stayed the same as yesterday, at 175.0 Lbs.    See   here for a summary of the progress on this goal so far in 2010.

10:03 AM: I woke up with yet   another cold!  Yep, I’m definitely getting those blood tests in June to make sure nothing’s amiss with my immune system.

10:05 AM: Overnight, I attempted to read more of the   Team of Rivals   book, but kept falling asleep.  I’ll try chapter twenty-four again today. 

11:00 AM: [Emmy] called to remind me that   The Young and the Restless will not air today due to some basketball game (having to do with “March Madness”) I guess.  Of all the popular sports in the US, basketball is one that I know the least about; never found it interesting. 

01:10 PM: Worked outside the past couple hours.  When the snow plow operator cleared our driveway throughout the winter, he pushed some of the shale from the driveway, way out into the yard.  Grrrrrrrrr!   So this morning, I raked and shoveled it all back to where it belongs.  Now, I have two little blisters; one on each hand.  Oh well.  At least I can still type. 

A beautiful, sunny day so far.  When I headed out, it was 50 degrees.  Now, it’s 59.  We could see the mid 60s this afternoon, making this day the second pavilion day of the year. 

03:30 PM: Uploaded the following audio journal episodes to the computer:

• AJE-2002-01-06-21-47
• AJE-2002-01-05-17-01
• AJE-2002-01-05-12-39
• AJE-2002-01-05-02-20

03:40 PM: Nap time.

04:10 PM: I’m back up again.  63 degrees outside.  Wonderful!

04:30 PM: Read more of the   Team of Rivals   book.  Finished chapter twenty-four. 

05:55 PM: Just returned from Pink’s.  Her QuickBooks data has been restored correctly.  She had it backed up to one of those PassPort smart drives.  When you plug such a drive to the computer, there’s an application that must be run, that presumably is responsible for decrypting (unlocking) the drive.  Without starting this program, the contents of the locked partition of the drive are not visible.  In her situation, she was not running this program first, so that when she looked in QuickBooks for the backup data she wished to restore, it did not appear, though they did show up once I manually ran this program.  So I configured her computer to automaticallyexecute this SmartDrive program when she connects that PassPort drive, hoping to head off future, similar problems. 

06:40 PM:  Posted the   Windows 7: My First Brief Look   piece.

10:20 PM: Talked with [Emmy] on the phone.  As per usual during the winter months, we listened to the Penguins hockey game on her Internet radio.  They won tonight, 3 to 0!  Now, back to the   Team of Rivals   book.

01:00 AM: Bed time again.  Catch you tomorrow. 

Tom

Received Mail and Shipments

•  Offer for Pace / Pacenet prescription drug coverage for Mom.  No thanks.

Related Posts

• Book: Team of Rivals
• Common Cold: 2010-03
• Diary Revisions: 2010-03-18
• Storm Cleanup: 2010-03-13
• Today’s Diet: 2010-03-18
• Weight Loss: 2010
• Windows 7: My First Brief Look

Today’s Chores

• Cat duty.  DONE.
• Dispensing Mom’s meds.  DONE.
• Shower.  DONE.
• Take garbage out.  DONE.
• Send out five pending memorial checks for the   WPSBC Alumni Association.

Log 

10:30 AM: I’m up.

12:00 PM:  Posted the    iPod Charge-Only Cables   piece.

12:30 PM: Watched KDKA TV News at noon.

12:55 PM: Watched yesterday’s episode of   NBC Nightly News   with Brian Williams   on the DVR.

01:45 PM: Tested out [Emmy]‘s new cordless phone.  All three handsets, all batteries, all chargers, and the base unit appear to work properly.  However, re-packaging it precisely as it was before, I did not do; too difficult.  But it’s packed well enough to survive the trip to Pittsburgh later today.

02:30 PM: Received items from the US mail and UPS:

• External USB FreeAgent hard drive by Seagate (3).
• Credit card offer from Discover.
• Coupons from Lowe’s. 

 02:30 PM: Withdrew some spending money at Sheetz. 

02:45 PM: Watched today’s episode of   The Young and the Restless   on the DVR.

04:10 PM: We’re leaving now, to take   [Emmy]   to the train; she’s headed home.

06:00 PM: Just got home.  Boy, the place already seems quiet.  But actually, though it’s true that [Emmy] is gone, Mom is also out somewhere; probably playing trivia with her friends.

07:00 PM: Watched today’s episode of   Dr. Phil   on the DVR.  He announced today that his show has been renewed through 2014.  Nap time. 

10:00 PM: Worked the   Hard Drive Upgrades: 2010   project.  The new Seagate external USB hard drives I ordered last week arrived today.  I’m in the process of syncing my DJ music library to them.  The first of the three is done, and the second of the three is in progress.  It currently takes roughly six hours to  copy my entire library of recordings. 

10:30 PM: Talked with [Emmy].  She made it home, an hour or so late due to train delays.  She tried out the new Panasonic cordless phones I gave her for Christmas. They sounded pretty good and she likes having more phones in more places that you can move around the entire apartment with, without the burden of tangled cords. 

12:25 AM: Posted the list of added and revised documents today for this blog,    here. 

01:15 AM: Rooted around in the basement, looking for old power connectors that fit my new hard drives; I found three.  I also located three working supplies that provide the correct power for these drives.  So I can assemble a few spare power supplies for them, by soldering these connectors to these supplies.  

01:25 AM: Also, I found some new supplies on the web for under $10 apiece.  So I may order a few of them as well.  I love the added security I feel for having extra supplies  around.

02:10 AM: So ends another living day, and I’m certainly ready to hit the hay.  So, take care.  Catch you back here soon.

Tom Hesley

Related Posts

• Diary Revisions: 2010-01-05
• Hard Drive Upgrades: 2010
• iPod Charge-Only Cables
• Mom’s Status: 2010-01-05