Season's greetings

Happy Holidays!

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/community/promotions/elfcard/?eyes=4&body=6&hat=5&message=2

Click the link above or copy and paste it into your browser.

What I Love About Sorting In Microsoft Office

I have emails.  Some I have read, some I have not.  I want all the Unread emails at the top.

Let's put the Read field in the header.

Right click on Subject or other header and select Field Chooser

 

Drag and drop the Read field to your header.  You should now have this nice little Envelope field.

 

Now, Hover over the Icon and Microsoft will give you this great tooltip "Sort by: Read" SWEET…

 

Now CLICK IT.  Yes, sort your emails by Read vs. Unread.

 

 

PWND by Microsoft!

Forgive me, for I have Sp@mmed.

I cannot take it anymore.

This is not something I read, nor was it forwarded to me.  My newly registered Democratic "elitist" mind came up with it all by myself, so excuse any grammatical or errors of passion.

If you like it, forward it to all your friends.  If you don't, just remember Republican voting day is on November 5th (I'M KIDDING)

If you want to flame me, do it in the comments.

http://www.marriedgeeks.com/2008/10/keating-five-for-president-08.html

Greg

McCains Gonna Pay For His Plan How??

GR2008061200193.gif (GIF Image, 624x447 pixels)

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Free FTP Storage @ DriveHQ.com

Warning: This blog is a blatant plug for a site I have a referral link to.

I will not lie to you. If you use the link here to access DriveHQ.com you are being referred. Why should you care? You shouldn't, you should be thanking me for referring you.

I found this service over labor day weekend while looking for a place for my IP Kamera to FTP images to so I could create an image sequence with them. Strangely, it will let you capture single snapshots and store them to your local network drive, but it will not do the same for timed image capture (i.e. every 30 seconds).

So I was looking for a cheap or free location to have my camera upload its images via FTP and I came across DriveHQ almost by accident. I have to say I almost didn't stay with them but let me explain why.

When you create an account with DriveHQ if you do not read carefully enough, you will get the free AND LIMITED version that lets you expose your published locations for 20 minutes at a time.   This is exactly what I did and I almost went straight to Google to look for another free service (yes, I am cheap). Useless, right? If you use an email address that is a corporate (i.e. paid ISP) NOT free like GMail or Hotmail, you get 1gb of free FTP, a basic website publishing folder, etc, etc. Really a whole lot of cool stuff for free.

I was really impressed with their interface AND if you do need to purchase additional services you will find their prices really reasonable. At the time of this writing $3 a month for 2gb of online file storage. If you are only storing image albums of course Picasa or Flickr or such things are the better solution but if you want FTP access and need a location to store large files, their service seems to be pretty cheap and works well. They even have a free FTP client that shows bandwidth usage so you can predict if or when you will exceed your free service boundaries.

What they offer:

Online Storage & Sharing

Store, access and share files online from anywhere at anytime. Includes explorer-like web interface and the state-of-the-art FileManager 4.0. Supports any browsers on PC/Mac. Supports group/sub-group file sharing with read-write access.

Online Backup Files & Emails

Includes DriveHQ Online Backup 4.0 automatic backup software, optimized for business and enterprise users. Backup is never so easy, secure and reliable! No device needed, works anywhere. Even if you have local backup, you need offsite backup to prepare for major disasters!

FTP Server Hosting & Software

Includes FTP Client, Server & Hosting. You cannot find any other FTP hosting service that has as many features as ours, and for a price as low as FTP client software! Works on PC/Mac/Linux; supports any number of users, groups & sub-groups.

SMTP/POP3 Email Server Hosting

Includes email server software, hardware & hosting. Designed for businesses, works on PC & Mac. Supports: multiple accounts, private domain, SMTP/POP3, Outlook, alias, auto-reply, auto-forward, mailing list, private discussion group, etc.

I like em. I think they are great so far and am really impressed with what they offer for free. Take a look and let me know what you think. I would love to hear from others who may be using them, or have used them in the past.  I think they will hook me with the free offerings and I will probably pay as my needs grow.

Acronis Backup-What is your problem?

Some time back, I bought Acronis Backup due to its apparently large feature set and ease of use.  For the few times I used it to backup specific items like my pictures folder and such to a DVD, it worked perfectly.  Since I set it up for an automated backup procedure with my Drobo as my backup storage location its begun causing me a headache that I just don’t think I should have to suffer through.

During each backup I now receive this dreaded error.

Can someone tell me why an automated backup procedure should prompt me and NOT tell me why it cannot backup the particular file.  I find that for the backup to complete on the remaining files I have to click Ignore several times to get beyond the files that it cannot backup.  It seems that a scheduled backup should log the failures and notify me upon completion.

I have searched and cannot seem to find a solution.  Anyone have any ideas?

#1 in MSN Search Results

Thats right. GeekOutOfTheBox.com is #1 in the MSN search results.

There is one small caveat. We are number 1 in the search results for "pictures of mother in law xxx". Can you say ewe?

Ok, I know you are all wondering why I would be searching for "pictures of mother in law xxx". Seriously do you need to ask. Search for yourself, obviously, you arent the only one searching for it. And you will find the search results ABSOLUTLELY relevant. Really.

I discovered this while I was reviewing all the really relevant statistical information for all of the 3 people who read my blog yesterday and how they got to my site, and found the I am the tops in familial porn searches. See dad, I told you I would amount to something.

New Blog MarriedGeeks.com Goes Live

Many moons ago my wife and I discussed starting a blog where we posted opinions, differing or not. I actually created a site, but at the time blogging software was just not where it is today and a CMS just wasn't cutting it for ease of use for her.

Well, finally she has been bit by the blogging bug and the site is now a reality.

I think I will be keeping this blog and changing its focus (i.e. simply removing family related items) and make it strictly more geek and technical.

Check out MarriedGeeks.com

Terror Turns To Angel

This post has been relocated to my family blog MarriedGeeks: He Said/She Said.

 

More Than One Reason MySpace Sucks

1. Its just kinda lame unless you are a teen or tween.
2. They delete accounts under pressure from Christian groups.
3. A messaging system that emails me I have a message and I have to visit the site to read it(what?) lame.
4. Deleting your account doesn't delete all your account info.

I created an account on a slow day at work when it everyone was "MySpacin". Hardly used it, hated the messaging system and decided to delete it when I found out they apparently coddle bullies, pedophiles, but repeatedly delete atheist group accounts. Also lame.

Today I got an email from MySpace. What? I deleted my account and they still send me emails. I can't "unsubscribe" because I don't have an account.

I posted a message to their contact us page (which asks for your password btw?? lame also). I will post their response.

UPDATE 8-9-08: Never heard back. MySpace sucks. plain and simple.

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Terror Turns To Angel

This morning my daughter woke up screaming for mommy. Her mommy was out garage sale shopping is as her usual Saturday morning ritual. Her time away with friends and adults.

When I went into my daughters room to get her up (she never leaves her room of her own accord) she screamed at me "NO, I want mommy". I replied "Mommy is not here, so you can just stay in bed until she gets back."

I stormed out of the room, waiting to get just out of sight to hear my daughter beg for me to return. Instead I hear her yell "SHUT MY DOOR!!", as simple and demanding as that. Remember, she is three. Well, rather than get upset about it. I did. What the hell. If she wants to lay in bed and wait for mommy. More power to her.

I left her in her room for over half an hour, and thought perhaps she had fallen back asleep. When I poked my head in again to check on her she said sweetly and pleasantly. "I want to get up".

She was sweet for all of the fifteen minutes as she drank her morning sippy and watched an episode of Caillou and it was back to being a little snot.

Doesn't want to eat, doesn't want to get dressed, a closed fist punch to her brothers face when she didn't like what he was saying. Like the title says, a Terror (yes, it deserves a capital T). She is not like this often. This is the exception and not the rule, but it was enough to start my day off on the wrong foot.

So I had to get out of the house, change the environment and perhaps the mood. We got pancakes and hash browns and Micky D's. Of course Braedyn threw a tantrum because he wanted to eat in the "Lunch house" and play on their play structure. Oh joy. The Micky D's play structure where the noise level exceeds OSHA standards for a safe environment. Thats what I want to do on Saturday morning when I am already in a funk. But I persevered and we drove to the new park and ate breakfast in the car in the parking lot. Then the the children transformed.

They were outside. They were playing with other kids. They were having a great time. It was windy as hell. Braedyn didn't care, but Emily sure hated the mist being blown on us by the sprinklers.

Mom met up with us so it was less stressful to track the kids in a park the size of Yankee Stadium and on this day seemingly as many people.

I sat at the bottom level of the play structure and Emily began running back and forth to me, giving me very wet kisses. Sweet and adorable and then she hid behind the pole and played peek-a-boo. Just twice. Just long enough for me to get this shot which melts my heart and makes it all worth while.

My little Terror is growing up. I love you Emily.

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Allegra’s Memorial Webpage Found

In another post I mentioned our Dog Allegra who passed away last March.  We were hosting her memorial page on an webserver I was running here at home.  I took that server down some time ago.

In reviewing all the content I moved to my Drobo I found the webserver folder and the memorial page.  This was written by my wife Susanne, and I am posting it here for a more permanent location.

Allegra’s Journey, May 2001 – March 1, 2007
(More Photos Here)

Allegra was born around May 2001. Around the end of June, Greg, Jacob and I were sitting on the stoop at the Lake Street House visiting friends after an afternoon downtown at the Blues, Brews, and BBQ festival. A young man who was staying downstairs at his brother’s apartment walked up with the most adorable little puppy. He told the story of how someone was giving away puppies in front of Winco, and he didn’t have the heart NOT to take the little pup in his arms. He continued by telling us he had no idea what he was going to do with her because his apartment complex didn’t allow dogs. He wanted to find a nice place for her to live. As if in the same nanosecond those words exited his mouth, both Jacob and Greg looked at me with, ironically enough, puppy eyes, eyes that were begging and pleading with me to say we’d provide her that nice place to live. I was secretly excited, but I had to play tough, getting Greg to convince me that he would be okay with her because of his allergies to dogs. Greg said he’d do whatever it took to keep her, and so our journey with our new family addition began.

What’s in a name? We looked through our friend’s baby name book right then and there and decided upon the name Allegra. It was both funny and fitting for this little pup. It means “quick, with a happy air” as well as being the name of the allergy medicine Greg would have to take to keep her. How appropriate for this lively little one.

She was so tiny, that is all except her ears. We were up at Galena Forest with her during her first winter, and these two snow-shoe guys were walking down the hill. They had to have been 50 yards away when we heard them holler “Check out the ears on that dog!”

Even though she was tiny, I had a HUGE adjustment to make. I was the type of person who would grab onto Greg’s arm in a parking lot when I heard keys jingle because I thought for sure it was the sound of a collar on a huge dog just waiting to chase and chomp me. So, with this new tiny addition to our family chasing and nipping at my heals, I found myself in tears. Greg even asked me if I wanted to get rid of her.

I said no, convinced that I could get past my fear of dogs. And that I did. Allegra turned me into a dog person, and she was an integral part of our family.

On Saturday Allegra became ill. After a rough night, we took her to the emergency room on Sunday where they kept her on fluids all night. We took her to our regular vet on Monday morning, where her x-rays, blood work, and exams gave nothing conclusive as the source of the problem. She couldn’t keep anything down, and a Berium (sic?) series indicated some sort of problem with her stomach. On Tuesday, they operated on her and found a piece of mesentery wrapped around and tying off part of her bowel. Part of the bowel had died, so the doctor removed the bad portion and sewed her back up. Allegra did okay with this surgery but still could not keep anything down. She continued to get ill. The only option was to go in and see if there was a second issue in the stomach. On Thursday afternoon, the doctor had a two-hour surgery with her. This surgery was a very difficult surgery for the doctor. He found that since the first surgery a huge section of her small intestines had died. He removed this dead section of her small intestines, and she almost didn’t make it off of the operating table. Greg and I saw her that evening. She was zonked out on pain meds, but we got to give her loves. We were hopeful that she would make it through this, but it was all too much for our beloved dog. She passed away in the night.

Those of you who knew Allegra know how amazing she was with children, how playful she was with other dogs, and how puppy-like she was regardless of any time that had passed. She was loved, and she will be missed.

Allegra eating doggy ice cream.

MOTHER-IN-LAWS TUTORIAL TO CREATE A PICASA ALBUM

This is Part 2 in a series of tutorials I made for my mother-in-law. Part One was how to get pictures off your memory card. Part 3 (to come) explains how to burn a CD.

1. Click on the first picture in a group that you want to be in an album.

2. Scroll to the last picture in the same group, press the SHIFT key and click again. If you wish to select images from other folder groups you will need to use the CTRL key and click on each additional image.

3. The pictures you have selected will show in the bottom left of the Picasa window as shown here.

4. Click the Add To button and select New Album

5. A box will pop up asking you to add a date, description and location. Fill out the information and click OK.

6. You now will have an album that shows in the upper left of Picasa that holds only your chosen photos. Click on the name to see the pictures in that album. In this example the new album Snakes and Bugs is highlighted.

Coming Soon – Part 3 Copying Pictures To A CD From Picassa

Password Generator

I saw a post on CNET that talked about passwords.  I posted a method that I use.

 

Create your own method of generating a password that will not make sense to the average viewer but can easily be remembered without writing it down.
My method:
A) Pick a sentence from your favorite book, one that you can easily remember. 
B) Then pick a split point (a comma or junction for example) that makes a great break point. 
C) Now create something to insert at that point that you consistently use from each site, how about the first two characters of the url (other than ww from www). 
D) Then say, add the first two numbers of your birthday to add to the end (or month and year or other combination). 1/12/24 would be 13.
So...from Stephen Kings Firestarter...
"He looked at her and saw how pale her face was."
becomes the password on this site (news.cnet.com) 
Hlahaneshphfw13
the NE in the middle being the first two characters of the url in this page.  Now, each password for each site you visit is
1) easy to remember
2) unique to the site you have visited
3) not easily figured out for other sites, should one be breached (ie if you use the same password on all)
4) easy to remember once you have created the method in your head, you will know how to create a new one or remember one for each site you visit.

Our Dog Allegra

Allegra passed away unexpectedly last summer (we had a tribute to her online, but I seem to have broken that, working on fixing it).  Anyway, I was working on getting UPnP Fuppes working on my Drobo with the newly released SDK and apps and I ran across this video recently.  This just epitomizes her spunk  and the joy she brought to our family.  I truly miss her.

For The Love Of FSM - It's A KILT

My wife is glowing. I'm a pretty proud dad as well. Our 4 year old son made us both happy today. Some of the simplest things in life can bring such joy!!!

Greg Moyle
Sent via Blackberry

----- Original Message -----
From: Susanne Moyle
To: Moyle.Greg
Sent: Thu Jun 26 16:14:48 2008
Subject: proud mama!

Hey, quick note... We were playing with flashcards. I showed Braedyn a pumpkin, and he said "pumpkin!" I said yes! Do you know what letter the word pumpkin starts with? He paused for a second and said, "p!". I was so proud! :-)

Love you. See you soon! Hooray!

[Re: IOGEAR Technical Support - Ticket 239597]

Some screenshots of my setup.

As you can see, my vista machine recognizes the iogear and western digital drive correctly.


The iogear webpage shows that my laptop is connected...


but explorer does not recognize it.
I have uninstalled anydvd, disabled antivirus and shutdown all third party apps.


UPDATE: I received a very quick response today. Sadly it appears as though there is a very large language barrier in their tech support. Screenshot 2 CLEARLY shows that the laptop is connected to the device (i.e. gregs-laptop).

The response reads:

Greg,

What I was not sure of in your screen shots is if you were trying to connect to the hard drive. Meaning in the network window did you try to right click on the hard drive and select connect?

Thank you,

Nathan

Customer Advocacy

I can say, the device works wonderfully under XP. Vista users beware.

Update 6-25-08: I received another response from iogear.

Greg,

From here it looks like you are doing everything correct and you should see your hard drive in My Computer. Depending on the size of the attached hard drive it can take a few minutes for the hard drive to be seen by the computer. I am also going to forward your email to the product manager for the GUIP201 and see if he can offer any further help.

Thank you,
Nathan

Update 7-01-08: Have not heard a word. Not a peep. Not a damn thing.

IOGEAR rolls out USB-sharing Net ShareStation - Engadget

When I first read about iogears new Net ShareStation, I thought "For $50 bucks on Provantage.com how could it hurt to check it out."

So far, I am a little disappointed.

IOGEAR rolls out USB-sharing Net ShareStation - Engadget

I have tried two webcams (both apparently have the same Logitech internals). A Labtec 2200 and a Logitech QuickCam Deluxe for Notebooks. I could get the Logitech to work locally, but although windows Vista would see it and allow be to connect to it, the Logitech does not recognize the camera when connected via the iogear. I also tried my Patriot Extreme Performance 2gb USB key, which once again, Vista saw it in my network devices, would connect, but I was unable to see it in My Computer explorer window.

To note, I can successfully connect the Logitech and Patriot USB devices directly to my laptop and they function with no issues.

I will try more devices, and post again later.

UPDATE 6-20-08: I tried my WesternDigital MyBook and could not connect from my Windows Vista laptop. For giggles I installed the software on my wife's Windows XP laptop and tried to connect. Lo and behold, it connects and works exactly as advertised. So, it appears to be a Windows Vista problem.

Update 6-22-08: I have emailed iogear's tech support to see if they have a solution.

Update 6-23-08: I received a response from iogear concerning this device. I don't believe they actually even read my email. This ain't my first time to the rodeo my friends. Every suggestion that they make I already covered in my initial email to their tech support. The only issue that we aren't on the same page about is that it works under Vista. If anybody has successfully used any of the devices I mentioned here in Vista, please, let me know.

Greg,

When first installing this device in Windows Vista make sure your software has been successfully installed. Once that is done when you go into your network make sure that network discovery and file sharing is turned on. Once that is done you should see an icon that looks like a white box, at that point you should be able to right click on that icon and and select install. Once the software has been installed the icon should change to picture of our server. If this happens then the netshare software has been installed. Once a device is connected to the netshare station then it will show up in your network windows and at that point you should be able to right click on the icon of the device and select connect. Since we know the GUIP201 is working correctly on Windows XP you will want to make sure that there is nothing blocking the GUIP201 on your Vista computer. All the internal testing we have done with Windows Vista has shown this device to function correctly. If you require further assistance concerning this matter: Please contact Service Support (toll free)866.946.4327 available 24x7. Please reference ticket # 239597.

http://www.iogear.com/support/faq/id/10208

Thank you,

Customer Support

My response was brief to try to simplify and ease any language barrier:

Your FAQ link is dead.
Again:
Firewall disabled
Discovery is on.
Driver properly installed
Able to connect devices
Windows Explorer does not see drives (western digital mybook, or 2gb usb drive)
webcam software does not see cameras
All devices function correctly when connected to the iogear on XP.

Any software conflicts that you are aware of? Any applications or drivers that may cause issue?

Have you tested with a system running AnyDVD by any chance (an application that I have on the Vista machine, but not on the XP machine).

Greg

Yes, I should uninstall AnyDVD and try it without. I will do that. They also fixed the FAQ Link.

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AACK SPIDER

Went into our pantry to get dog food, and saw this critter crawling along the floor.  I am just floored by the size of the spider.  That's a silver dollar its sitting on!

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My Composter Arrived

My Enviro-Cycle Composter arrived this week. Although I had issues with my credit card being flagged as fraud from Drobo delaying the shipping from Outdoordecor.com (best price on the net), it arrived floating loosely (i.e. no peanuts!) in a large cardboard box with no packaging. I am for the most part very impressed with the quality of the product.

The one component that I am not sure will hold up to use is the small flimsy latch that holds the lid closed. Time will tell.

I am EXTREMELY pleased with the quality of the product otherwise and am pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to spin when empty. In fact, if you gave it a gently tug, it would continue to spin freely.

I now have my first load of kitchen waste, shredded paper and grass clippings in it. It is about 1/4 full and still spins quite easily.

So far I am very pleased with my purchase. The black model gets extremely hot here in the Nevada desert sun, which I hope will help encourage a rapid compost process.

As this one gets closer to being full, I plan on purchasing a second unit to allow this one to fully compost without additional waste being added.

More to come....

Emily In Times Square!

My wife sent me this email, and rather than retype it, here it is. Thats our daughter Emily big and smiley in Times Square
______
Hi all,

Greg and I thought this was really cool and wanted to share. Our friends Gary & Carley up in Oregon submitted a picture of Emily to "Everyday Smiles in Times Square". Go to http://yoursmiles.reuters.streamuk.com/upload/thumbGallery.php?preview=3466 (dead link 6-18-08 see update below) to see Emily on the billboard!

Love,
Susanne

----
Update 06/19/2008. The link above has since stopped working, so here is the big bad photo inline.

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Are Wireless Companies, Blizzard and Others Encouraging Theft?

Technology reigns supreme over our society so why is it so hard to stop theft of certain devices or reduce theft of others. In short, its not, it's just more profitable NOT to.

In early December my debit card data was stolen from Geeks.com. The most frightening part about it is that Geeks.com was storing not only credit card numbers along with personal information, but they also store the CVS number from the back of the credit card.

I do not know if geeks.com has changed their data retention policy or not but its a great reason NOT to save your credit card information at ANY retailer. Online or not.

When hackers broke into their database in early December and stole my credit card data. I was completely exposed as were presumably thousands of users. The losers used my card to purchase $600 in World Of Warcraft subscriptions. We were able to stop the bleeding only because I logged onto our account and noticed the unusual charges.

So, if Blizzard, the company that runs World Of Warcraft, knows a stolen card was used in those purchases, why can't the gift cards (they are all serialized) be canceled for being purchased with stolen money. They can, they just won't. Why would they. It's revenue for them and actually, recurring revenue, because credit card theft continues to happen and continues to benefit them.

My friend Eddy's wife's iPhone was stolen last month. Now in both cases I believe this should fall under the Receipt Of Stolen Property laws as they (Blizzard and ATT) are knowingly "concealing" the stolen property by the mere fact that they allow the stolen iPhone or WoW Gift Card to be registered by the thief (or unsupecting buyer of said items), no questions asked.

The fact that the phone companies, Blizzard and other companies HAVE the technologies (serialized phones, serialized gift cards etc) AND they do nothing to prevent the use of stolen items, is nothing less than racketeering. Are there any lawyers out there who want to take on a class action lawsuit. I bet there is enough damning evidence in their databases to hit these companies pretty hard.

How difficult do you think it would be to pull from their records all the phones that were reported stolen, and to check to see how many of those phones are in use. It would be damning information I am sure.

If these companies refused to allow the use of stolen items on their networks don't you think the theft of serialized and easily tracked items would slow dramatically if not stop altogether?

A MOTHER-IN-LAWS GUIDE TO IMPORTING PICTURES INTO GOOGLE PICASA

My mother-in-law needed a lesson on getting her pictures from her new digital camera. I wrote this tutorial for her. Her instructions were much more specific to her computers process but I have changed them here to be more generic. I hope they are helpful to someone.

Part 1 of 3 in my Picasa Tutorials

1. Insert memory card (this is the small card that you put into your camera) into card reader or appropriate slot in computer.

2. If you are using a separate card reader, plug into computer now.

3. You may have more than one thing happen at this point, depending on your computer. A) Nothing, in which case you must manually open windows B) Windows pops up a dialog asking you what program you want to use to open the files. Choose Picasa. If Picasa is not an option, close it an open Picasa manually. If it opens automatically, go to step 7.

4. If you have to manually open Picasa, click the IMPORT button in the top left corner.

5. You will need to select the device under the SELECT DEVICE BUTTON in the top left. As soon as you choose the correct device, Picasa will begin loading the pictures from the device.

6. Once Picassa is open and importing it will take a moment for it to read all of the pictures. Look in the bottom left and you will see it says “Reading XX of XX files” the XX’s are numbers and will be different every time you do this. Then it will read “Copying XX of XX files”. THIS DOES NOT MEAN IT IS COPYING THESE TO YOUR COMPUTER.
    

7. Wait until it is no longer counting up. It should say “Aquired XXX files”.

8. Now we will actually copy them to your computer. Click the IMPORT ALL button.
    

9. When we click the IMPORT ALL, a box will come up that asks what you want to name the Album. You can also add a description if you like, location, etc. Check the SAFE DELETE circle at the bottom.
    

10. Click the FINISH button when you have filled out the information.
     

11. A box will ask you if you are SURE you want to delete the pictures. This will ONLY happen if you chose Safe Delete or Wipe The Card in the box in step 8. Click YES.
     

12. It will now say “Aquiring XX of XX files” in the bottom left again.

13. Picassa will return you to the folder of all the pictures you just imported and your memory card is ready for use in your camera again. You can remove the memory card and reader from the computer.

Continue to Part 2 – How to create an Album

Solar Tubes Going In

Yes, weeks into the project, and the final touches to our tandem car garage conversion to a new "playroom" is almost complete.

Originally there were supposed to be two solartubes in the playroom, but because the heating unit is over half of it, it would not work. In swoops our contractor Doug (insert last name here later) who suggests we put one in the kitchen. What a great idea.

Thanks to Doug (xxx) and Jeff Broline of Broline Integrated Systems (for the electrical and alarm system) for such a great job. It has turned out better than expected.

More pictures of the playroom to come!

Moral Question Of The Day

My wife started checking childrens movies out from the library. Great thing about this, is they are FREE and we can keep them for much longer than the usual couple of days you would get from Blockbuster or Netflix.

Thanks to our friends Gary and Carley who suggested it.

So I check out a movie from the library, and I return it. Neither the library nor the movie industry makes a penny off of it.

So, here is the moral question:
If I check a movie out from the library, and I copy it for my own use, then return the movie, have I stolen anything????

Nobody loses revenue, and the library actually now has that movie available for more people to check out. Hmmmmm.....

Scanning Some Old Memories

I borrowed my friend Eddy's scanner to try scanning my old Operation Raleigh Expedition 11f slides from the Torres Strait to see how it worked.  The slides are in pretty bad shape as they all drowned in the flood of 97 in Reno.  Here is one I pulled at random to test.  I think thats Dr. Neil on the left, next to Claire from the UK.  The next one is killing me, because I cannot remember her name.  I do remember she was a vegetarian from Seattle if memory serves.  The dork on the right in the Short Shorts is me.  We were all pretty dirty after a days work.  The tank behind us is a water collection tank.

I plan on purchasing the scanner and scanning the rest of my photos.  I also spent some time tonight looking for those on the expedition with me.  I found Mark Walsingham online.  Recognized his face immediately, even after all these years. Looks like he has become quite the fisherman.  I was kinda sad because I couldn't find his contact info.  I owe him another apology for splitting his forehead underwater with a rock.  Another story for another day. 

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Celebrity Morph by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Celebrity Morph - Dynasty - Family sites

Reminisce

I was purging my garage and found these old t-shirts from the days I worked at the UNR Sagebrush student newspaper.  There are some funny quotes on the backs which are also documented in the pics. 

Susanne (my beautiful wife) suggested I photograph them, then I could get rid of them.  Which is an even cooler idea than I originally thought because I can share them here and on flickr, picasa etc to a much larger audience than just myself.

Click the pic to see the detail photos.

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Composting Research

Ok, for the last few weeks I have been doing a lot of reading on composters.  The soil here sucks and I watch how much food I throw in the trash with 2 kids.  My wife is a good liberal ;) and wants to save the earth, so I figure what the hell, lets compost.


Wow, who thought it could be so complicated.  Open compost piles are prone to attracting animals and mice and must be manually "turned".

Initially, I looked at barrel type tumblers, and instructions and videos on how to create them from salvaged barrels and such.  The problem with these type of composters is that once they are half full, they are very heavy to flip over as all the weight is at the bottom and must be almost completely inverted before the compost tumbles and shifts the weight.

Since I want two batches of compost going, a dual unit appeals to me.  I found this one really and thought it was the bomb till I realized two things.  It's huge AND because its metal, it has to be emptied every winter in freezing climates.

So, then I started looking at plastic models that do not have to be emptied (and do not have rust issues which can happen in metal versions). So I called the local garden shop and we went down to Moana nursery to look at this model.


It seemed a bit pricey when I realized that to really do composting right, you need two batches (so we would either need two, or I would need to put in a partition).  One that you are allowing to fully compost, and another location you can keep throwing your stuff in.  Some people put it in a deep freezer or other composting bin.  I figure, just put it in another tumbler.

We finally settled on the Envirocycle model shown here:


This is a smaller unit, and will allow us to put two of them in a small space as well as being (supposedly) easy to turn.

The best price that I can find is $139 at outdoordecor.com.  They have the best pricing on shipping as well.  So, we are going to get a couple of these and we will let you know how it goes from there.

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Animoto and blogging

Ok, vera cool. From animoto I can post the vids right to my blog. The post below was pushed right from animotos site.

Fishing Day

Ok, my friend Eddy sent me a link to this really cool music video website. The short of it is, you upload your pictures (and they can be ported from flickr, facebook, picasa, smugmug and photobucket) and then select music from their library (or upload your own). The app then analyzes your images, creates a music video. A 30 second video is free or you can pay $3 each, or $30 a year for unlimited videos. They say that no two videos are ever the same. I have not tested that out, but do I really care, because the videos are really fun.

You can see a quick one I threw together.
Fishing Day

Really slick. I think I will convince my wife we need the annual subscription.

Rescuing Charmin

Yes, we are crazy. Last weekend I suggested we go the the Super Animal Rescue at the livestock events center. Yes, I knew my family would find another animal they just couldn't live without. "Hey honey, its a free event where the kids can look at animals. There will be face painting and music. A fun day out." What was I thinking?

Well we did, actually Susanne did if you can believe it. The woman who used to be terrified of dogs.

We talked about it for a week while we waited for our meet and greet to bring Koko to see if they got along (of course as I type this, they are fighting over chew toys). We actually discussed the pros and cons and didn't rush into it this time. I think we all knew that we just enjoy dogs very much, and the idea of rescuing an animal from a high kill shelter added to the fuzzy feel good sensation.

So, we brought her home after the meet and greet, bathed her and bought all the additional accessories required (new leash, kennel, etc).

She is a 5 month old shepard mix, and other than a few scuffles with Koko (to be expected I spose) they are getting along very well and she is melding into the family quite nicely.

I'm sure the rest of my family will freak. 41 years old and still know that my family sometimes thinks I don't think things through. sigh.

Meet Charmin

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Dean Heller's Constituant Phone Call

Tonight, the kids were in the bathtub, and I was sitting on the floor with the laptop as I usually do when they are splashing each other and screaming. when the phone rang. I picked it up to see a Maryland number, so I didn't answer it. If its important, they'll call back.

The answering machine picks it up and its an automated system for Dean Heller about connecting with his constituents or a town hall or something alltogether meaningful as my children throw water at each other as they both scream "she did this...", "he did that...", "waaaa". Yup. Town Hall meetings are my top priority.

Anyway, later that night it occurred to me that a man who claims to be representing the needs of Nevadans couldn't find a Nevada based business to make his phone calls? I can already hear some saying "you don't know the whole story". Do I even need to, really.

Genetic Relation?

As difficult as it is to tell. The fact is, we are related.

Seriously.

Greg