the T-files

Blog address change

2006-11-24T02:32:00.000-08:00

http://noroomthanks.blogspot.com/

I'll be here from time to time just to clean things up and maybe backdate a few photos, but the newer version of Blogger is a lot better, so I am starting anew over there.

Any changes here, I'll note over there. I don't plan on posting past this post unless Blogger Beta blows up on me. So far it has botched a photo post via Picasa.

Last Gazette

2006-11-23T08:59:00.000-08:00

I've had a good run here. My boss said I left the paper better than I had found it, which was about all I could ask for. It made me a better journalist for sure. The crew sent me off with several bags of chocolate coffee beans. Sweet.

I will miss some aspects of reporting. Gordon, my boss, uh, former-boss, said he thinks I will return to writing some day. I guess that means he sees that I like it somehow. Being part of the unfolding of a story over a long period of time and really getting to know the ins and outs is something I like. For instance, this issue has my last story on a controversial, cutting-edge land use policy that is about to be adopted. I've been writing stories about it for about a year and a half. I'm curious what will happen because this policy will change the scenic face of the county that is so beautiful.

I didn't get to write a farewell column, but I have threatened to write one on the road, possibly with a photo of me in front of a "Welcome to Georgia" sign. Seriously, though, I want to say goodbye to the readers in some way.

Hump day

2006-11-22T07:46:00.000-08:00

Last morning at the Gazette. Gotta get that paper out!

Yesterday was the last Tuesday writing deadline day, which I have griped about plenty of times on this blog. But it was fairly painless, other than this nausea I've had since Sunday. After the paper ships, I'll shore up some things and be gone by early afternoon.

We already have my replacement coming in for me to talk to! And the beat goes on . . . .

Moscow Food Co-op

2006-11-19T14:42:00.000-08:00

This is a lunch spot we'll surely miss. Good and good for you. Everytime I eat here, I feel like I gain another year of life.

Bye

2006-11-17T21:05:00.000-08:00

Veronica and Becky
Main Street, Moscow, Idaho

Cleaning out my desk

2006-11-16T07:55:00.000-08:00

I have a lot of crap on my desk that the newsroom is happy to see go I'm sure. I do not have the neatest workspace to most people's standards, although I know exactly where everything is. This photo is of the most well-kept section, a drawer of used notebooks. They aren't in any order of course. And these are just some that I had found a place to jam.

Even though I have not made one single photocopy from the county commission's office since around February, I had a full carboard box of paper to take to the recycling center.

I also started a box of junk to bring home, and it's only six inches full, mainly consisting of coffee mugs, travel mugs and legacy computer junk.

Kris wuz here

2006-11-16T07:42:00.000-08:00

Last night with Kris' camera at Rico's Pub, Pullman.

He "dropped by" after some business in Seattle, on the way back to Atlanta. This was his first visit to Pullman and is his second appearance on this blog. The first was the mystery photo post.

Open mike at Rico's

2006-11-13T07:58:00.000-08:00

I'm still planning on being at Rico's tonight. There will also be some bar hopping before that, I think.

Giddyup.

Nucoa

2006-11-13T07:43:00.000-08:00

I've been cooking with a non-dairy margarine called Nucoa lately. It tastes pretty good and it creams with sugar really easily. I've been using it in the breads I've been baking lately. I haven't used margarine in ages, so I can't remember if the softness is a margarine thing. I prefer butter over margarine, but this Nucoa has been a good sub.

Nucoa's good for some types of cooking because it does not burn at a low temperature like butter. I used it in my iron skillet for eggs in a frame this weekend, and it was awesome. I also put it on some mushrooms in the Foreman Grill, and they also were awesome.

It's OK for sauteing onions, but butter wins here for the lower frying temperature.

Pumpkin bread

2006-11-13T07:03:00.000-08:00

The loaf of banana bread left us too quickly. This weekend, it was pumpkin bread on the chopstick rack. This could become a weekend tradition - well, the throwing of something in the oven that smells good while housecleaning, not pumpkin bread every week.

I basically halved a recipe from allrecipes.com, but used 2 eggs, dark brown sugar instead of regular sugar and extra spice. The wife liked it more than the banana bread. I concur.

1/2 cup butter or margarine
1-1/2 cups sugar

1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

2 eggs
1/2 (16 ounce) can solid pack pumpkin (that's 8 ounces for the mathematically challenged)

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Cream butter and sugar. In a separate bowl, put all the dusty stuff together and mix well. Stir in eggs and pumpkin and mix well. Fold in the butter/sugar mix. Bake in a greased 9x5 loaf pan for 1 hour. Remove. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then place on cooling rack, until you cannot resist it any longer.

Final Pullman appearances

2006-11-09T07:19:00.000-08:00

. . . with a guitar, of course.

Old Post Office Wine Bar & Gallery - Friday, Nov. 10, 8 p.m.

Cafe Moro - Thursday, Nov. 16, 8 p.m.

The Moro show is the start of a second grand opening weekend for Moro with its new space and all. I'll miss that place. Best espresso in Pullman. Now there is room to mingle.

I am also planning on revisiting open mike night at Rico's Monday, Nov. 13. I haven't been there in a while, and I've always enjoyed it. It's where I started playing in the area and where I met pretty much everybody I ever hung out with here.

Cheers.

Passing the Rockies

2006-11-07T07:35:00.000-08:00

We're still trying to figure out this one for the last weekend in November.

Road conditions and the fact that we'll be in a U-Haul, probably with a small SUV in tow, are the main concerns.

One stop we have to make is at my brother's in Overland Park, Kans., which is in the Kansas City area.

Spokane-Billings-Sioux Falls is the route I've seen before, but that was a piece of cake in the summer. It's also the shorter route by about 150 miles.

My friend Brad in Salt Lake City says to go Boise-Salt Lake City-Cheyenne. That's the way I'm leaning right now using his winter experience.

For the Washington locals, the beginning of the Boise route maps us to the Tri-Cities area (Pasco), then south to I-84 in Oregon. Would it be better to cut off almost 60 miles by going through Dayton and Walla Walla?

Any other thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Chopsticks are superior

2006-11-06T08:00:00.000-08:00

Could you do this with forks?

I could probably dedicate an entire blog to the superiority of chopsticks. They're the most useful tools in my kitchen hands down.

Last night I had a steamy loaf of banana bread and no wire cooling rack. I had a eureka moment and rigged this really quick. I might use a cooling rack four or five times a year, so I don't care or think to keep one around.

When there's problem solving to be done in the kitchen, reach for the sticks.

WA wines: Drink 'em if you got 'em

2006-11-06T07:52:00.000-08:00

I'll miss getting local wines.

Photo from Saturday's grocery run.

Aliens among us

2006-11-03T20:45:00.000-08:00

Being a journalist, I've heard plenty of stories.

But today, I hit something way out. I spoke with a woman who had a vivid recollection of a UFO sighting. Absolutely fascinating conversation.

Amsterdam Cafe, Auburn

2006-11-03T07:53:00.000-08:00

This post is in regards to comments from this post.

I have not lived in Auburn since 2000, so I don't know what has changed. But last time I went through, I needed a quick fix, so I hit Chappy's Deli for a fried green tomato BLT. I had not been to this one, but I have been to Chappy's in Montgomery.

If I had more time, I would have revisited Amsterdam Cafe, my old hang out and probably my all-time favorite place to eat in Auburn. It began focusing more and more on its menu in my later years there, so I bet it is really good now, as it was good then. You used to be able to get half a French bread pizza and cup of soup for around five bucks.

Just the fact that it is still there says a lot. In my decade stint as an Auburn satellite, I saw many establishments come and go.

If you go there now, it probably doesn't look like a hang out, but it used to be THE hot spot for live, original music, which drew a more alternative crowd at night. 21 to buy a drink, 18 to beg your friends. And I mean everything from singer-songwriters to ska to rockabilly to full punk bands. Man or Astroman?, Quadrajets, 7-Foot Politic, Saturated-Phat. Then the local drug task force started really cracking down, and the demise of the cafe's music era began.

There also used to be shulbok tables in the back. Beer and shulbok. What more could you ask for. Oh, yeah, great music. I never made it on the "140" score plaque, but I wonder if it still hangs on the wall. I think I lucked out at a mid-130 score once, but you had to be a consistent 140 and above to get the honor.

To me it was the best of both worlds. Great food, drink and cafe atmosphere by day - alternative music venue at night, bands and sweaty crowds lit only by the moody orange glow of the neon "open" sign in the front window.

Anyway, that was trip down memory lane. It's different now, but check it out.

South by Northwest

2006-11-01T22:33:00.000-08:00

The word is out. Today, we told folks at our respective workplaces that we are moving. Friday, I accepted a photo gig north of Atlanta. Yup, back South. Family calls. I start Dec. 4.

I'll have more to say about this as time goes on, but right now, it's still sinking in. I know I will miss the Palouse and the Northwest. That's what happened with all things Southern when I drove up here more than three years ago.

Now, having tasted both ends of the country, it's hard to pick either one. The Northwest is awesome. We love it up here, so this has been a difficult decision for us.

It's just hard to convince our families to all move here. My mom thinks it's too cold, and my dad thinks there are grizzly bears roaming the streets. I tell him "Moose, Dad. No grizzlies . . . . Yes, moose are big, and they can hurt you, but usually they don't."

So we're going home. Home. That word just made my chest do something funny.

Visitors

2006-10-30T08:06:00.000-08:00

James & Kristin stopped by our apartment Saturday on their weekend visit from Corvallis, Ore. They just moved back from New Zealand. Dr. James is now a wine researcher at Oregon State University. And Kristin is about ready for childbirth. December. Exciting stuff.

It's always great to see great people. And I just have to note James has lost any American accent he once had, in my ears at least.

Jeanine came over, too, and we hung out over bun cha gio after James and Kristin had to leave. Then Veronica and Pepe stopped by later for drinks.

It was a fun day of visitors, our first since we moved to this apartment in August.

White sauce fish dip

2006-10-28T01:18:00.000-07:00

I totally made this up, but it rocks. I just ate some. That's why I'm posting at this hour.

The sauce:

Mayonnaise
Ranch dressing
Fresh lime juice
Cumin

I have been using this on my fish tacos and as fried fish dip lately, and I have to say, it's a keeper. The amounts vary all the time, but my cooking style is "use as much as you can stand."

Well, it might not be original. I didn't look it up or anything, so I don't know. Did I mention I like it?

And cumin. Cumin has become my white fish herb/spice of choice lately. I use lots.

Enjoy.

2006-10-27T23:18:00.000-07:00

Fun gig tonight at Cafe Moro.

The new space is really nice and just live enough to be its own monitor without being prone to feedback. When I can hear myself, it makes a huge difference on my confidence, and I think I played my heart out tonight.

Some pictures were taken, but I'm not messing with those now. After my gigs, my friends are pretty much done for the night because, well, it was their leisure time.

I, on the other hand, was working hard on putting on a good show.

I am just now off the clock.

I need a drink. Or two. Or three.

Photo update:

Cafe Moro, Pullman, Wash., Oct. 27.
Photo by Becky

Birthday photo

2006-10-27T18:43:00.000-07:00

My cake last Saturday, courtesy of Kim and Tad, back at their place in Grant Park, Atlanta. Yet another photo of me leaning over food.

Photo by Tad.

I rendered it black and white to remove my red, travel/wine eyes.

2006-10-27T14:10:00.000-07:00

Mobile post. I just set in motion that which was inevitable.

Music: Same place, new space

2006-10-26T08:25:00.000-07:00

I'm playing at Cafe Moro tomorrow night, Friday, Oct. 27 from 8-10 p.m.

Since last time, the owners completed the expansion, so I think I'll be playing in the new section. Check it out.

It's groovy.

Back in the Northwest

2006-10-26T07:33:00.000-07:00

I was treated to a very frosty car yesterday morning. I set my coffee on the roof and scraped the windshield with a credit card. So unprepared.

Winterhook, by Redhook brewery, founded in Seatte. Yesterday afternooon, tired from travel, I just needed to wind down with a good Northwest brew at Rico's Pub. From the time we left Buckhead Atlanta to the time we got to our apartment in Pullman, 13.5 hours had elapsed.

Swank Bank

2006-10-26T07:15:00.000-07:00

Once a bank, now a hip pizza joint called piebar. No Washington state wines yet though, so it has still has a little hip factor to go. We had dinner here in Atlanta Monday night. Service and food was really good.

Becky and Kim outside.

Becky, Kim and Tad at the bar. I had a Numbers Ale, a local beer.

Tad, Kim and the pizza

A downstairs nook next to the restrooms and lower level exit.

2006-10-24T06:57:00.000-07:00

I need to get a worthy pocket camera. I had my SLR camera on me last night, so I'll have a few pics to post later.

Apple mouse, Windows laptop

2006-10-23T04:21:00.000-07:00

I'm still having self-induced Apple-PC switching weirdness.

My post yesterday was the first from our new PC laptop running Windows, a good mobile unit I got off my brother so that he could get a faster one.

The laptop has a Windows keyboard, but plugged in is an Apple Pro mouse, which is more strange than it sounds.

I really like the feel of the Apple mouse, but, of course, it has only one click, which becomes the left click using Windows. I use the right click button on the laptop mouse pad to access that needed feature. Nice to have, but a little weird for the right click button to be disconnected from the mouse.

And the keyboard has no corresponding "Apple" button. This is part of the switching weirdness I sort of already experience in addition to the feel of the keyboard. At work I use an Apple keyboard with an Apple computer, and at home I use an Apple keyboard with a Windows machine.

Many of the "Apple" commands on an Apple move to the "Control" button on a Windows machine. When I am using Windows, I must remember to use Control-T to open another tab in the Firefox browser or Control-L to adjust "Levels" in Photoshop instead of Apple-T or Apple-L Those are just two examples, but there are many more - select all, copy, paste, etc.

This gets even more weird on Windows at home. With the Apple keyboard at my fingertips, I have to resist using the "Apple" button because it does nothing.

Now I am actually using a Windows keyboard on a Windows machine, and I have to resist using an "Apple" button that does not exist. Wait, that's not switching. That is correct! But it feels weird now.

Atlanta eatin'

2006-10-22T19:14:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I ate fried catfish Wisteria. Kim and Tad took us out to dinner for my birthday, which was Friday.

Today I ate fried chicken at Horseradish Grill.

Not your neighborhood holes in the wall.

iBook G3 stinks

2006-10-18T07:27:00.000-07:00

Not sucks. This is hilarious.

If you are into tinkering with old computers, which apparently I am, think twice about an iBook G3 500MHz-900 MHz.

It will reek of human B.O. I wonder if a little Speed Stick would work.

I read about it at LowEndMac.com, one of my frequented sites. The article links to a thread at the Apple discussion board on this iBook phenomenon. The thread is four years old and still strong, no pun intended.

Article | Thread

Ubuntu on slot loading iMac G3

2006-10-15T15:54:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd give it a go today, and Ubuntu worked! Not like last time where I used the wrong hack.

I found the info I needed in this thread.

But for my reference, here's what I did.

1) Boot Ubuntu Live CD by holding 'c' on the keyboard during boot
2) At boot prompt, hit Enter
3) When screen goes blank, Control-Alt-F1 to drop to command line
4) Type sudo killall gdm
5) Type sudo pico /etc/X11/xorg.conf
6) Scroll down and make the following changes

In Section "Modules," put a # sign before Load "DRI" so that it looks like

# Load "dri"

In Section "Monitor," change HorizSync and VertRefresh values to reflect

HorizSync 60-60
VertRefresh 43-117

Control-o to write changes, Control-x to quit

7) Type sudo /etc/init.d/gdm restart

8) Enjoy Ubuntu Live

Now I will try to intall it to the hard drive. Watch me kill a good thing.

Clearwire sucks

2006-10-14T23:19:00.000-07:00

Clearwire, my Internet "provider," in Pullman crippled my service when I started downloading Linux distributions via torrents last month. I did not know this until today. Originally I thought my service got bogged down when the college students came back for the semester.

But now I know Clearwire is evil.

I have never been so sick at a corporation for its blatant misrepresentation of service capabilities. Clearwire bags itself as an alternative to cable or DSL. Clearly, it is not.

My bandwidth test results tonight from speakeasy.net.

Download Speed: 65 kbps (8.1 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 14 kbps (1.8 KB/sec transfer rate)

That is horrible. That is not much better than dialup. My service is supposed to be up to 768 kbps down and 256 kpbs up. My lousy upload speeds are the reason I have not posted many pictures on this blog in the last month. And I could live if downloads were around 500 kbps, but 65? That is theft.

By the way, the 24/7 customer support line is a joke. The CSRs don't know anything. The first one I talked to thought that if I had double the dialup download speed, I was doing GOOD.

Last week, I brought in my modem to a Clearwire customer service guy in Moscow, Idaho. He tested it and said it was no good. He gave me a new one. He was very friendly, knowledgeable and helpful.

Everything worked fine. Speed tests were in the 500-700 kbps range. Until I went back to my Linux work and downloaded a torrent file. I brought the modem back in today, and a different customer service guy helped me, or more correctly, did not help me. He was not very customer-oriented and seemed somewhat nervous, as though he expected me to rip his head off.

He looked at my account and said, "I know what's wrong," but he had to call someone else. That person was not available.

He gave me the phone number of this other person, "Steve" - maybe his boss, who would not be available until Monday.

So I asked him - if he knew what was wrong, then what was it?

"I just know that customers aren't allowed to do excessive downloading," he said.

(I found a paper and pen to write down his direct quotes. Journalist's habit.)

I was stunned. I do not do excessive downloading. I download an ISO every once in a while and listen to Internet radio on occasion.

I told him I downloaded one regular file just fine. Then I downloaded a torrent, and speeds went south.

"You're not allowed to download torrents," he said.

I was stunned again.

BitTorrent is a legitimate way to disseminate information on the Internet. If Clearwire doesn't like this use on their network, they can slow it down to limit it. I'm actually not too bugged about that, but the company should at least state it in their terms of service, which is written vaguely in order to cover everything.

But all of my uses are crippled, including regular web surfing. That is a damn crime.

We'll see what this Steve guy says Monday.

New specs

2006-10-14T10:45:00.000-07:00

I can rub my eyes again.

My contacts were bugging me, so I got some glasses. Usually when I take my contacts out, my eyes feel worse, and the only thing that makes them feel better is putting my contacts back in.

That is messed up somehow.

I bought these specs online at eyebuydirect.com. For a decent, cheap pair of glasses, I recommend them. This was my first time doing this for glasses, and I am pleased so far. I paid around $50 total for the frame and the lenses with UV and anti-glare coatings. Good construction, and the optical coatings are all right.

I placed the order on Sunday night, and the glasses were in my mailbox yesterday. There was another pair at a local shop that I really liked, but it's hard to get there during the day when it is open.

Only thing is they feel a little strong compared to how I see through my contacts, so I might send them back for a redo. My eyes feel so much better, though.

I shot a football game last night with them on. Glare is much reduced compared to my old glasses, which were not coated. Stadium lights and all, and they didn't bother me.

Barbecue, at last

2006-10-07T10:01:00.000-07:00

Somebody with a real iron smoker opened up a barbecue joint yesterday across the street from my office in Colfax. It's about time!!!!!

The place was packed yesterday. Go figure.

I had a pulled pork sandwich, slaw and beans - the trinity of barbecue.

Verdict: I will be eating there a lot.

My order was a delayed a few minutes because they had to get some more side item containers from the back. They apologized, but I said I've been waiting for three years for this sandwich, so I could wait a few minutes.

My friend Dusty in Auburn, Ala., called me just as I had finished pouring the slaw over the pork. I hadn't heard from him in half a year or so. He didn't sound like he was in crisis, so I told him I'd call him back later because I had so sink my teeth into this momentous sandwich. He understood because he had just had one for lunch, too.

The last time I had really good barbecue in the Northwest was when Becky imported it from Alabama. That's what I'm celebrating in my profile photo, by the way.

Lucero and barbecue in the same week! What could possibly be next?

I wanna rock

2006-10-05T21:26:00.000-07:00

You can take the Vietnamese guy out of the South, but you can't take the South out of the Vietnamese guy.

Today I was sporting my Lucero shirt to show my appreciation for the Memphis rockers who came to Spokane for the first time last night. I had not seen them since a show at The Chucker in Tuscaloosa back when I was living in Montgomery.

And to all you Lucero fans down South, lead singer Ben Nichols told me if we were going to be back home for Thanksgiving, the band is working on playing a show with the Drive-By Truckers in Birmingham that Saturday. It was not confirmed, yet, but stay tuned.

My friend Josh in Athens, Ga., said it best when I gave him the scoop the next morning: "Lucero AND DBT?!! I won't recover from that one for a week!"

Wait, according to the buzz on the Lucero message board this afternoon and the latest show schedule for DBT, they will be rocking the Alabama Theatre on Nov. 25. Damn. What a show that will be. The Alabama Theatre is a gorgeous venue to rock. I just hope it doesn't burst into flames.

The real bonus from last night was chatting it up with Ben before the show at the Mayflower Cafe, a gritty bar kitty-corner from the venue, The Big Dipper. Having just left another, grittier bar up the street called Judi's Place, we saw Ben inside the Mayflower Cafe, so we went inside for a drink with him. He was sitting at the bar by himself while the other band members were nearby at a pool table.

Becky smoothly paid for his whiskey Coke and ordered us a round of Bud Lights while I simply thanked him for coming up here.

I think he was pleased to see some folks who had heard of the band. Although Lucero was the headliner, most folks were there to see Rocky Votolato from Seattle, who was then onstage. We missed William Elliot Whitmore's set, but it's recorded for your listening at Spokane7's streaming concerts page.

I told him we were from Alabama, fans from the South. My first Lucero show was at The Nick in Birmingham. He and bassist John Stubblefield expressed much love for that hole beneath the U.S. Highway 280 overpass, recalling some 4 a.m. shows.

I said The Nick show, although late and crazy, hooked me with "I'll Just Fall," still one of my favorite Lucero ballads. He was very appreciative and went on about its origin. He told a story about how he came to own a 101st Airborne figurine with a mohawk. His grandfather fought in World War II, so that had to do with it, plus he is somehow drawn to mohawks. Since the figurine had both elements, he had to have it. It might have looked something like this.

Anyway, he was working on a song one day, and the figurine ("Well, it's a fucking doll, that's what it is," he said) fell over. He'd set it straight again, but it kept falling over, hence the origin of the lyrics:

Now I'm just a little bit tired, that's all
Don't make me get back up, cause I'll just fall.

In another part of the conversation, I asked him about how he keeps his voice going. His speaking voice sounds like he eats rocks and razor blades for breakfast, but its not cut or broken or anything - more on the side of two trombones droning in fifths. He said he abuses his voice and doesn't do anything to help it other than sing into it. The whiskey and the cigarettes make it worse. Morning radio spots are bad because he usually chokes the first few notes.

We finished up our beers and went over to catch some of Rocky Votolato's set. Another bonus was access to the "band members only section," a loft overlooking the stage at stage left. This was thanks to Katie, whom we know as a barista at Cafe Moro. We met up with her and her friends at the club. She's also the only person here who recognizes my occasional Lucero covers. She knew the layout of the club and led us up the side ladder and through a mini door.

As cool as this seating was, for most of the Lucero show, I rocked out at the foot of the stage, toppeling into the stage monitor at one point, due to the expected and welcome rowdiness of the crowd.

Nuge needs a good show every now and then to keep the blood in the veins moving.

Top photo: self-portrait at PV Hooper railroad three miles east of Colfax, Wash.

2006-10-01T23:54:00.000-07:00

Best name for a Linux distribution goes to:

KillBill Edition from Slax.

I need not spell out its dual meaning.

Working success

2006-09-30T23:50:00.000-07:00

I am successfully running Puppy Linux 2.10 on the old scrap laptop. A bit slow, but not bad. Heck, I'm just excited it works at all!

And just in time. I took the laptop to work Thursday to prep it for entering election data into the spreadsheet program, Gnumeric. I will be using it Monday at the elections office. Normally I would either copy the results by hand or request paper copies. In this primary election, precinct results are hundreds of pages, and I prefer to save the trees.

I started the restoration project using Damn Small Linux, but then ended up using Puppy because of the software package that includes a better, capable word processor and spreadsheet. And as noted earlier, I can play music CDs on it. Though my desk speakers, it sounds great.

I am running Puppy from a hard drive installation, not the Live CD. My CD drive was goofy, as I mentioned in the comments to the earlier post, but I managed to copy the files to another partition and install from those files. I was able to boot the Live CD using its boot floppy and start the installation procedure. When it asked me where the Puppy files were, I pointed it to the hard drive partition instead of the CD, which had consistently failed during installation.

I also have a frugal install of Damn Small Linux on a 55 MB partition, just in case. I boot it using a DSL boot floppy. Once I reconfigure the boot loader (Grub) on the hard disk, I won't need the floppy anymore.

I still don't know what's wrong with the CD drive. It plays music CDs just fine, and I can mount it and copy files from it, but it doesn't like being used for running an operating system.

No Internet yet, as I have not purchased a suitable ethernet or wifi PC card. A.W.S. was kind enough to send me an ethernet card, but it was of the CardBus type, which I learned, doesn't fit in my laptop. That will go in my next project . . . .

Anyway, I've learned a bit of Linux over the last few weeks, just enough to frustrate me.

Things I would have done differently:

I would not have . . .

. . . spent time hunting down the Windows driver for the CD drive and incorporating it into a Windows 95 boot floppy, although it is nice to have if I want to boot to a DOS prompt. But now I don't, so it doesn't matter.

. . . spent the time to track down the right diagnostics/setup tools from a not very straight forward HP/Compaq support site. This was actually very time consuming because I had to download many of them and try them out before I landed on the right combination of files. They are pretty useless, except maybe to set the system clock.

. . . done a hard install of Damn Small Linux. This took some changes in my partition scheme and some other tweaking, and I found little benefit.

I would have . . .

. . . gone straight to the Puppy Live CD and a boot floppy, with the help manuals handy for partitioning and formatting using Linux.

Microwave ovens for insomniacs

2006-09-26T04:22:00.000-07:00

I woke up and can't go back to sleep, so I've been lingering around for an hour or so. I quietly ate a banana and an oatmeal cookie. But then I wanted something warm, so I threw two leftover biscuits in the microwave oven.

clank (open), whoomp (close)

[TIME], [1], [7], [START] = BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

. . . .whhrrrrr. . . .

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

clank, whoomp.

Beeps are great for day use, but the microwave is the universal buddy of nighttime snackers. And the bane of those in bed.

My microwave has a lot of features. I especially like the REHEAT button, which usually nails the dish temperature.

But I haven't found the STFU Mode yet.

the music me

2006-09-22T15:41:00.000-07:00

I'm playing at Cafe Moro in Pullman tonight at 8 p.m. I'll leave the computer at home. And maybe my headache, too.

Computers for low income folks

2006-09-18T23:45:00.000-07:00

This little project I've been working on makes me think about what open source, free software and second-hand computers can do for the world of people with low income. It can bring them into the modern age of the Internet without them dumping money into something new and expensive. The Internet is a path to a wealth of information and knowledge, so access to it is an equalizer of sorts.

The latest and greatest isn't always affordable, such as with a car or a pair of shoes, so you might go second-hand. But what happens when you can't afford a new computer? Sure, you can go to your local library to take advantage of certain programs or printers, but being able to at least surf the web at home or a local hotspot is important for anyone.

At my local library, you can sign up for 30-minute time slots at a computer. I think you can get two in a row for one hour if no one is waiting. This is great and all, but if the computer is to be a learning tool, there should be no limits. And the only way to get rid of the limit is to have your own computer. Even if the library doubled its computers, you might only get two hours.

To me, Internet access is more important than television. The so-called "digital divide" between the haves and have-nots, should be called the "information divide."

So you might buy a second-hand computer if you can't afford a new one, but you end up running old software if you are not too savvy with what is available. You might shy away from a computer all together, which would be a tragedy, because you don't know how to set up a second-hand computer for your own needs. What if your second-hand computer doesn't come with software? Your computer might not be able to run the latest Windows, even if you could afford to buy it separately. You could run all pirated software, but that's a different road.

There are still Linux distributions/operating systems being developed that work on old computers. These free distributions have a slew of modern, free, open source programs that will run under them.

This combination has the potential to address some social, ethical and moral dilemmas.

Some of the software setup can be pretty hard to understand, even if you are somewhat of a geek. That is the part that kills this potential. If you are in the low income bracket and are looking at a used computer, it might even be your first computer, so you might not even be familiar with what formatting a hard drive means. So installing a Linux distribution would be pretty daunting.

What to do? I don't know. I'm just thinking out loud here. Projects like Ubuntu.com bridge some of the gap and seem to have good support. But how does someone with low Internet use learn about them, or learn the possibility of owning a cheap, modern machine?

Bored?

2006-09-14T09:34:00.000-07:00

Bored of the computer talk? The wife tells me I am losing my fan base.

Eating the top tier

2006-09-10T23:37:00.000-07:00

Becky surprised me with this small butter cream cake by the same baker of our wedding cake. This is the way to go; don't eat the year-old one in your freezer.

And this is the only photo I took this weekend because we were too busy having fun and doing stuff.

We revisited some of the places surrounding our wedding in Spokane for our first anniversary. We stayed at the Davenport, the hotel where our families and friends gathered for the reception, and went to church at the Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes where we exchanged vows and rings.

That was a good day, good in the Biblical sense.

Cheers, laughs and tears.

Compaq Armada 4131T

2006-09-04T17:06:00.000-07:00

This is the beast I am attempting to revive. Here, I'm running a utility I got from the HP support web site.

Pentium R 133 Mhz
256 K Level 2 cache
48 MB RAM
16-bit sound
1 Mb video memory
4.1 GB hard disk
3.5" floppy drive
8x CD-ROM on included dockstation

This thing is a dinosaur by today's standards, but it was a workhorse in its heyday. And now it shall live again to do my bidding.

A $20 surplus buy. Everything's been wiped on it, and I can't even get into the setup utility. The battery doesn't hold charge, so it's a tethered terminal, for now. The main thing now is getting it to boot off the CD-ROM, so I can put an operating system on it.

Another stupid Nuge project. But, hey, $20 is buying me a lot of entertainment so far. That's how I look at it. You can't get anything this fun for 20 bucks these days.

2006-09-04T01:53:00.000-07:00

So I've been in geek mode lately. Messing with the virtual operating systems as A.W.S. suggested. I think DSL (Damn Small Linux) is cool. But in my first Ubuntu foray, I somehow botched my main boot thingy. Not really, I just haven't done the research on stopping/reconfiguring the dual boot program (GRUB) to boot directly to Windows now that I have yanked the drive with Ubuntu on it. Fortunately I have various drive partitions with Windows, so I can at least boot from backup drives and get to the data.

I have to stop messing with my computer.

I think it's time to get one soon that works and that I leave alone. The latter is the most important. I still need one I can experiment with, but it shouldn't be my main computer.

Now, if I could just get this old Pentium 133Mhz laptop to work . . .

Ubuntu screenshot

2006-08-28T02:54:00.000-07:00

Sweet. A 25-minute install, and I am kickin' it in Ubuntu on my PC. Graphical look is clean and simple. Graphical movement is slightly choppy, but that could be my slow-ass computer. A very worthy work environment nevertheless.

Also notice the four workspace squares at the bottom right. My Firefox web browser is open in the first workspace, while the screenshot is of second workspace. Open here is GIMP photo editor, OpenOffice.org and a calculator.

OK, enough of this. It's 3 a.m. again.

Geek stuff

2006-08-27T23:42:00.000-07:00

"What's going on here?"

Computer case off, hard disks and wires lying around.

"Geek stuff."

Some might consider the computer desk a nice place to visit to do certain tasks like write loved ones via e-mail or check financial statements or read a little news. With a similar mindset, if I were to journal with a pen, I might sit in a soft couch under a yellow lamp with a cup of coffee.

My computer desk, to me, is a shop bench, complete with tools and sawdust. Not only is it a tool itself to help me do certain tasks, it's also a tool that I can learn more about and enhance. So I'm always tinkering with this and that. Then there's times when the tool just needs a good cleaning, or a lube job, to keep thing working smoothly.

As obsessive as I am about my computer filing/nomenclature system, I realized this weekend I had not backed up my data in a very long time. I was doing some other geeks stuff that made me realize this.

I was up till 3 a.m. this morning trying install Ubuntu on my slot-loading iMac G3, which did not go very well. The G3 is technically not supported by this operating system, but some people have overridden the glitches in some G3s, including the Beige and the Blue & White G3s, so I figured the iMac wouldn't be so hard.

Before I go on, if you are reading this to figure out how to install Ubuntu on a slot-loading iMac G3, you won't find it here. I'm not that smart yet.

I tried to follow the workarounds for the installation from the forums with a combination of suggestions for the Blue & White G3 and iMac G3 DV, but the install got really flaky and half-way worked. I got half the graphics to show up on portions of the screen and all garbled up. Cool. It was kind of exciting to boot an OS that I'd never seen before, even if it didn't work completely. Getting the boot music was nifty enough.

So OS X Panther is looking really nice about now because seeing 3 a.m. on the clock kind of sucks. Ubuntu is free, so I thought I'd give it a go. Panther is going for about $50 on eBay right now.

The idea is to test Ubuntu on my G3 because there's a server edition that might do what I need for the server at work that I am setting up on a G4. So I was messing with the desktop version.

Today I booted an Ubuntu Live CD on my PC, and that was totally cool. The concept of having a working operating system with all the basic applications available on an install CD just kicks ass. I mean, I was going through the installer, WHILE browsing the Internet with the included Firefox browser for help. Amazing. If you need help during a Windows install, and that's your only computer, you are shit out of luck.

I was getting ready to install Ubuntu on a 4GB partition I already had with Windows XP installed on it for backup/program testing/spyware & adware shield, but I was a bit confused on the partition manager/selection. I have never installed a GNU/Linux operating system before. It said I needed a root partition and another partition for "swap space," whatever that is. Anyways, I wasn't so sure my selection would repartition the 4GB partition into two or affect the whole 120GB drive, which has lots of data on it.

I was just about ready to hit the confirm install button, with a certain amount of geek confidence, but I had just enough fear to chicken out. At this time, the wife heard a few outbursts of the word "scary" (I tend to blurt out my thoughts when I am in fear. This is also why I do not like to watch horror flicks in theaters because I scream four-letter words involuntarily.) That's when I decided to back up my data and use a clean hard disk.

I started posting this waiting for the last bit of backup to finish, which it now has, so here goes Ubuntu. I'll report back later if my computer doesn't blow up.

Mo' music

2006-08-23T17:21:00.000-07:00

I'm performing at Cafe Moro in Pullman this Saturday, Aug. 26, at 8 p.m.

Come check out their new digs.

Hammer time

2006-08-23T16:51:00.000-07:00

We were driving around Spokane a few weeks ago and noticed we were at the Thomas Hammer Coffee Company. It's my favorite coffee, by the way.

Photo by Becky, Aug. 12, Pacific Avenue, Spokane.

Monster Huge Sun Chip Crumb!!!

2006-08-18T23:55:00.000-07:00

Holy moly! It's so big it deserves a name. Becky almost ate this Sun Chip crumb, being so focused on our Scrabble game this evening, but she noticed it in time. That could have been a salty, sandy bite (with hints of sour cream and onion).

I got a good kick out of it, so I took a few pictures of it to share. Certainly Nugeworthy. It is a mighty, awesome crumb indeed. Maybe I'm sheltered, but I've never seen anything like it up close.

But it made Becky lose interest in the rest of the bag.

"I don't want anymore. That grossed me out so bad."

"Can we throw these away? They're probably radioactive."

She also insisted we toss our new little pet, but I want to keep it around long enough to maybe list it on eBay. Fine, she said, but she wants it out of sight because "I don't want it greeting me."

iMac on my desk

2006-08-16T23:43:00.000-07:00

I have an iMacG3. It's fun to mess around with. "Snow" white version. Looks pretty slick even though it is about five years old. It's what I've been using at home since our recent move, since my PC has been not been hooked up (myPC monitor is at work). This is also why I haven't uploaded photos to this blog in a while.

I don't know if I'm going to keep the iMac, though. It has OS 9.2 on it right now, and I eventually want to upgrade it to OS X 10.2 or higher for use with some of the latest software. But I bought it mainly for the wife to have an Internet terminal/word processor, and she's never used a Mac before, so she'd have to get used to OS 9.2, then switch to OS X when I upgrade.

I use OS X at work. But I run mostly OS 9 applications on it, so I am switching environments every 30 seconds. No big deal, but they are very different environments. So I might bag this whole idea for now and take the iMac to work.

But the idea of having a Mac at home is new and fun. Even though I've used them at work for more than a decade, I'm more of a PC guy from a family of PC nerds. It's sort of like switching football alliances, well not quite, but it feels almost forbidden.

Contacts, take 2

2006-08-10T09:18:00.000-07:00

So, my doc gave me another a pair yesterday. I told her my originals always felt like they were going to pop out. In fact, the one in my left popped out twice at work.

These new ones are bigger and thinner, and they feel so much better. Bigger as in larger diameter, which are little tougher to squeeze in my eye, but I'm getting better at it.

On the vision front, I'm still trying to get used to seeing WORSE. With my old prescription, I was seeing at least 20/15. Now, I am "normal" at 20/20, which seems blurry to me.

I haven't decided on the glasses, yet. All the frames I really like - my shopping companion doesn't. I might have to assert my individual fashion sense on this one.

Clearwire

2006-08-09T18:27:00.000-07:00

I'm using this new Internet service provider right now. No wires. No tech. Just plug it in, and it works. It's true! And you can move around with it in the service area like a mobile phone, except you need a power outlet to plug in the modem.

Technology is sweet.

Wine bar gig

2006-08-04T08:44:00.000-07:00

I'm entertaining at the Old Post Office Wine Bar and Gallery in Pullman tomorrow starting at 8 p.m. Please come!

Eyeballing it

2006-08-02T19:09:00.000-07:00

I'm wearing contact lenses right now, trying them out for the first time today. I can see better, but guess I'm supposed to get used to these foreign objects on my eyeballs. And the overall brightness. I bought a pair of regular sunglasses, too, which I haven't done since middle school.

I haven't picked up my camera yet, so I don't know what that's going to be like.

But cheers to having eyesight in general.

True Nerd

2006-08-01T22:27:00.000-07:00

Look closely and see the tape that is holding my glasses together. That stereotypical nerd persona with tape at the bridge? Puh-leeze. So unrealistic!

I've worn glasses for more than 20 years, and the problem has always been at the temples.

Eat your heart out, Mrs. Elrod.

SLR self portrait techniques

2006-08-01T22:05:00.000-07:00

In regards to a previous comment on holding an SLR for a self portrait, I shall now reveal my coveted secrets!!!

My palm and fingers support most of the body weight (as they should when shooting normally). With the 17-35mm lens shown here (nice and wide for grabbing a self portrait) I get extra support with the lens barrel resting on my thumb-area palm. This obviously does not work for rotating front elements.

And to get super-fancy, my pinky is free to make zoom adjustments, sort of like the way we oldschoolers used to flip the aperture ring with our ring finger. The thumb is in a natural position to fire the shutter.

Welcome to enlightenment. Go crazy.

2006-07-31T22:27:00.000-07:00

Drama last nite.Feme on another boat choked on bite of steak. Greg did CPR.Meds came, got pulse.W/o O2 for too long.Needs miracle if alive.

Puget Sound trip synopsis

2006-07-28T01:20:00.000-07:00

The last two of my mobile posts didn't go through last weekend, so I copied them from my phone's 'sent' mailbox. It was an eventfull trip for sure. It's difficult to respond simply to the usual how-was-your-trip question.

The simple part of it is that we went boating with Greg and Jill and their son Alex in the Puget Sound around Elliot Bay and anchored Saturday night on the west side of Blake Island. Their boat is called "No Worries."

Some of the fun, some of the drama last weekend:

Friday

A stop at an overlook at the Columbia River off I-90.

Thai food on Broadway, Capital Hill, Seattle.

Saturday

We met up with Greg, Jill and Alex at the boat. One of the first things we did was set the crab traps.

Crab bait. Apparently not wife bait.

Greg steered us over to the docks.

We had some great views of Seattle. This photo above turned out nice, methinks. To me, it shows how beautiful this city is in the summer. I can't stop looking at it. I want to be there now.

These cargo vessels are huge.

We snared some crabs. Greg showed me how to rip the shell off a live one, snap it in two and sling its guts into the sea.

Becky likes live crabs, especially the big ones.

That evening Greg got on another boat to help with CPR on a woman. Her teenage boy on the radio called for help and the ranger and the police took a long time to respond. The radio traffic was terrible to hear.

Alex went missing on the inflatable looking for Greg. His motor had died, and he was found rowing on the other side of the island about an hour later.

This is the view from where we were anchored, looking for Alex.

Sunset behind the Olympic Mountains.

We had a fine crab boil for dinner. And watched "Sweet Home Alabama." The water was all luminescent under the boat that night, and the sky was clear.

Sunday

I went water skiing for the first time. I didn't know my lungs could take in so much water and that I could just breathe the water back out with no problem. I got up on the skis few times, but not for very long. Becky looked like a pro compared to me. It was tough to move Monday night.

That's Becky.

That's me. Photo by Becky.

A family riding in an inflatable had lost its boat, which apparently was not anchored well. We went on a search and rescue. We found that boat and towed it back to them.

During the rescue, kelp and all kinds of sea junk clogged something, and the engines of "No Worries" over-heated. So our trip back to the marina was at a slow pace.

But the slow ride gave us more time on the water, great views of the Seattle skyline and Mt. Rainier in the late afternoon light. We also could see Mt. Baker to the north.

I still can not get over how big Rainier is everytime I see it. The sky was a clear enough to expose it, but a little haze made the mountain appear to float. I wish I had taken pictures of it when we went to Edgewood a few weeks ago when the air was as clear as I had ever seen it.

2006-07-23T10:57:00.000-07:00

Gorgeous morn. Not one cloud. Olympics at west. Rainier, south. Water so calm, smooth last nite. Constellations clearly reflected.

2006-07-23T09:24:00.000-07:00

Drama last nite.Feme an another boat choked on bite of steak. Greg did CPR.Meds came, got pulse.W/o O2 for too long.Needs miracle if alive.

2006-07-22T18:18:00.000-07:00

Living the good life. We're anchored off Blake Island in the Puget Sound. Fresh crabs on ice - and tonight's menu.

Scary icon

2006-07-20T08:10:00.000-07:00

This weather icon on my browser is a good icon for Hell.

I use a nifty weather extension for Firefox called Forecastfox, which uses little weather icons and grabs weather from AccuWeather.com.

Lately the icon has been a sun, sometimes with a cloud in it. Friday's icon is a red thermometer with red steam undulating from it, and the mouse-over reads "Very hot with blazing sunshine, 98 F."

I'll have to find it and post it.

Elk Creek/Elk River, Idaho

2006-07-16T23:45:00.000-07:00

We took a little excursion this afternoon to Elk Creek/Elk River, Idaho, about 55 miles east of Pullman. The hiking was pretty short and easy, but it was good to stretch out the legs a little. We tooled around for about two hours along the river trails.

Becky had taken me here before, but I did not remember it until we drove into the parking lot. All I could recall from the previous trip was eating Huckleberry ice cream in the town of Elk River. That was a puzzle for some time (until the parking lot epiphany) because Elk River is not really on the way to any place we have gone, so we wouldn't have come just for the ice cream. And apparently I have no photos from the previous trip because Becky recalled I had exposed my undeveloped film to sunlight. So that is how my memory must have disintegrated.

Oh, yeah, on the gravel road to the parking lot we saw a little black bear cub climb up the ledge on the left side of the road, dart across the road and hurry up the hill on the right. It was so fuzzy and cute with its little body and fat, stocky legs. At first when it appeared it was a moving, black blob at the roadside, and I thought it was a cougar. It was Becky's first time to see a bear in the wild, so that was exciting. We stopped to wait for its mother, but she was a no-show.

The previous posts were done in reverse order for viewing in sequence top-to-bottom.

Elk Creek, Idaho, Upper Falls

2006-07-16T23:37:00.000-07:00

View of the Upper Falls area from a switchback trail going down to the water. There is a series of a few short falls here with shallow pools. There was someone swimming in one of them when we got down there.

Photo by Becky

Photo by Becky

Elk Creek, Idaho, Middle Falls

2006-07-16T23:22:00.000-07:00

We took a rocky little trail that went along the slope by the Middle Falls area. A little ways into it I figured it wasn't a legit path because it had gotten so small and steep. But it had some good views of the creek canyon and the nearby hills.

You can barely see her, but Becky's standing near the trail and waving her arms in the right third of the photo.

Steep! That's Becky on all fours at the top.

That's the Middle Falls looking back the way we had just hiked. Look closely and you can see some of the trail on the left.

So when we got to the shade, there was an overlook area with a nice little caution sign.

Elk Creek, Idaho, Lower Falls

2006-07-16T23:14:00.000-07:00

Bottom photo by some guy from Calgary. This time we stayed behind the barrier.

Elk River, Idaho

2006-07-16T23:08:00.000-07:00

For some twisted reason, Becky thought I looked cute behind bars.
Photo by Becky

Huckleberry soft serve ice cream hit the spot after the hike at Elk Creek.

Elk River Lodge and General Store, where we got the ice cream.

Don't see one of these too often nowadays.

We spotted this joint as we were heading out of town. Apparently it has the "#1 Best Burger 2006." We weren't hungry.

Snoqualmie Falls

2006-07-15T10:04:00.000-07:00

Ben and I trekked to the falls from Salish Lodge last Saturday after the memorial. We stayed there with Jeanine and him.

Ben took a little time by himself and got close to the falls. Ben said the rush of the water drowed all the chatter from the other people around.

That's the lodge at the top. It was used for exterior shots of the Great Northern Hotel in the series "Twin Peaks."

DaleBuilt.com

2006-07-15T08:52:00.000-07:00

This is Ben's dad.

We attended his memorial at his Edgewood, Wash., home last Saturday. I had only met Dale once, so I did not know him well, but he obviously touched a lot of people from all walks of life in a positive way. We were there to support Ben and his mother Jeanine. It's been emotional for them, to say the least, since Dale was killed suddenly in a car accident. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer ran a story on him.

And on that Saturday, the clouds parted on the west side of the Cascades, and Mt. Rainier shined so big and white. It jutted into the blue sky and towered over the evergreen Cascades, bright like a beacon signaling his friends and family. We saw it driving over the grade past Vantage, probably 80 miles by the way the crow flies. I didn't know it was even possible to see Rainier from there.

Dale loved the outdoors, and Jeanine said Mt. Rainier always reminds her of Dale and the hikes they took there. So it was also fitting that we had a breathtaking, clear view of Rainier from his front lawn in Edgewood.

A few photos from Dale's house:

This is Radar, right, telling stories about Dale. Dale had permitted Radar, who needed a place to stay, to live in a little camper in his backyard next to the wood shop for the last few years. (By the way, that's Jeanine at center-left. She appears on this blog from time to time.)

This is Ben in his dad's wood shop, where he made frames for is projects.

Music tonight

2006-07-07T08:37:00.000-07:00

I'll be strummin' and singin' tonight at Cafe Moro in Pullman from 8-10 p.m. Looks like it'll be nice enough for an outside gig.

Fireworks shot, cool mistake

2006-07-05T03:41:00.000-07:00

I am intrigued by this photo, the way the explosion spread pattern is all geometric-like.

And it might have been a total mistake. During the shot, I was cursing my tripod (WTF!) because it made a short, fast rotation on the z-axis (the plane parallel to the ground) during this hand-triggered bulb exposure.

In my haste to change my camera from shooting inverted from between the tripod legs to shooting top-side, I had failed to fasten the center column, and there was a little bit of play that caused the slip. I lost some valuable seconds trying to figure this out and was totally annoyed.

And I'm not really sure if this is what caused the wild pattern because the people aren't so shifted. Maybe it's because their forms were illuminated only during the launch, and the shift happened during the dimmer explosion. I don't know, but none of my other shots look like this.

Sunnyside Park, Pullman, Wash. ISO 400, bulb, 2 seconds, f/8.

Two years, 489 posts

2006-07-04T12:36:00.000-07:00

Today is two years on this silly hobby of blogging and serving my egoism.

Sunset

2006-07-03T23:48:00.000-07:00

From Steptoe Butte, 8:38 p.m.

From Steptoe Butte 8:45 p.m.

Canola and me

2006-07-03T23:31:00.000-07:00

That's my shadow on the right of me holding the camera above my head. Steptoe Butte is the dark brown bump in the horizon.

Canola field, U.S. Highway 195, Cashup Flats area, 7:52 p.m.

100 degrees Fahrenheit

2006-07-03T23:27:00.000-07:00

Actually, I think this reading is bogus by about 4 degrees, but you get the idea - it's hot.

But not as hot as, say, 75 degrees in HotLanta.

Today I wore jeans and a long sleeve shirt, and I didn't break a sweat walking around Colfax.

Rocket science

2006-06-27T23:22:00.000-07:00

I called the G on the cell at around 8:45 p.m. PST, and we talked for half a minute before he said he needed to go because he was in the middle of a launch (he's a rocket man in the Los Angeles area). Then I talked to my brother Toan about 20 minutes later who is right now north of L.A., and he said while he was out and about some 20 minutes prior, he saw something wicked launch.

Here is the photo from his cell phone:

So, G, is this your doing?

As a side note, I think people, in general, need to learn to not answer cell phone calls from their friends while they are conducting rocket launches.

Good

2006-06-25T23:19:00.000-07:00

Good, as in good to be back and as in I had a good visit.

Lots of things were great about the trip, especially spending time with my family and friends, but sometimes those interactions happen so quickly that I don't get to appreciate them fully until I think back.

So one of my favorite events in the trip was one that happened slowly and over a period of time that I could really soak up then and there: a good ol' thunder and lightning downpour. I haven't seen once since I left the South. The sky doesn't make 'em right out here.

Our very last night, Saturday night, the sky just fell out. And it was about time. All week the air had been pregnant with humidity. I grabbed a glass of red wine and sat on the porch and just watched and listened and smelled. Smelled that sweet, earthy smell of rainwater wafting onto the porch, the breeze coming from millions of fat droplets coming down hard and loud, splitting the air, rippling together in sheets. Seemed like the stormed roared for about an hour.

The flash-boom lightning lit the neighborhood like a big strobe and froze every single raindrop in mid-air, a sight long forgotten, but instantly familiar. Sometimes the ground-shaking thunder made me jump when it came so fast and close. And I mean close. When it seems like the thunder beats the flash, it's close.

I was all happy inside. So weird, the things you miss.

2006-06-25T03:25:00.000-07:00

All aboard. Goodbye Atlanta.

Kudzu!

2006-06-23T21:43:00.000-07:00

The Chia Pet of the South

I have a confession

2006-06-23T07:15:00.000-07:00

I am still listening to "Rent."

The other day when I stopped in Auburn, I was feeling a little lonely. And I knew singing would lift my spirits, but my favorite sing-a-long CD was in another time zone, so I hit Hastings on Glenn after my BLT order at Chappy's.

I bought the two-disc movie soundtrack this time. Not the "Selections" like I did last time by mistake. It rocks, of course. This adds to the Broadway cast recording I already have. Um, and the DVD movie, too.

Classic Thinh

2006-06-22T22:33:00.000-07:00

Half price show tickets, and I didn't have to pay for event parking either. My friend Jamie calls it "classic Thinh."

So here is the full scoop on my previous mobile post. I met Jamie, Karen and Mama Savoie for dinner at Baraonda tonight. It's on the block just north of the Fox Theatre where they were going to see "Chicago." The food was delicious, by the way. Ooh, the tirimisu. The company was invigorating, it goes without saying. I haven't seen them in years.

Anyway, when dinner was over, instead of saying goodbye at the corner and crossing the street east to my car, I kept talking to Jamie and crossed the street south with him, headed to the Fox. Don't worry, I'm going somewhere with this. So I left the group at the Fox entrance and continued on to the end of block, figuring I'd cross there and circle back.

Here, at the corner of Peachtree Street and Ponce de Leon Avenue, a woman asked me if I wanted to see the show for half price. And she didn't look like a pro. What luck.

"What's half price? I wasn't planning on seeing the show. I'm just walking to my car."

"$35"

"I dunno."

I've heard of those fake ticket scalpers, and I didn't want to be a sucker. Meanwhile, she was trying to get other people to buy them, too. Apparently, three or four people in her group could not make it, so she was trying to recoup some losses. I wanted to believe her. If she was acting, she was so good, she deserved to take me. She wasn't getting anywhere with anyone else because everyone already had tickets. Apparently the show was sold out.

"How are the seats?"

She took me into the bar where her friends were and showed me the ticket. Orchestra NN. Seemed like that meant it was on the floor.

"$30 and it's yours."

When would I get to see a show like this for $30? Cash exchange. Small grin.

But I wasn't home free yet. I had to pass the barcode guy at the door.

Beep.

So five minutes ago I was thinking about my driving route back to Tad's, and now I was in the lobby of the Fox about to see "Chicago."

Big toothy grin.

The show was great and fun to watch, but this isn't a review, so I'll continue with my tale of good fortune.

In the garage where I parked, event parking was $12, but Jamie said I could get validation from Baraonda there. I got a ticket from the parking attendent, who told me to make sure to get it stamped from the restaurant. The stamp covered two hours. I parked for about four and a half. Since I had gone to the show, I thought somehow I might have to fork out 12 bucks. But then I realized at that hour, everyone was being waived out because the event parking was prepaid.

I didn't pay up front. Score another one for Nuge.

2006-06-22T18:31:00.000-07:00

Sweet. Scored cheap tickets to Chicago at Fox theater. Was walking to my car when someone had extras. Now I am waiting for Act 2.

I love Atlanta

2006-06-22T15:08:00.000-07:00

2006-06-20T16:34:00.000-07:00

In Atlanta. Eight lanes of brake lights.

2006-06-20T09:12:00.000-07:00

It is hot in Auburn for some reason, too. . . . Getting a fried green tomato BLT.

Photo update from my stop at my alma mater:

College Street, Auburn, Ala.

This hit the spot.

Toan & Wendy

2006-06-18T16:47:00.000-07:00

The reason for my trip was to see this:

2006-06-17T21:32:00.000-07:00

Alabama is hot, too.

Gracious hosts, Atlanta

2006-06-17T05:35:00.000-07:00

Insomnia and sleeping

2006-06-17T02:30:00.000-07:00

Can't sleep, but everyone else can, so I am blogging. It's 5:30 Eastern Standard Time. I've been up since 3:30 trying to go back to sleep. I finally got out of bed about a half hour ago and ate a few egg rolls I made last night. They're still pretty good right out of the fridge. Maybe it was the wine and egg rolls at dinner. This three-hour time change didn't help for sure.

Because I need to be up in two hours, I decided to just get up because I don't have the time to get in a good sleep cycle.

I have observed a sleep cycle in me that is about three hours long. I went to bed shortly after midnight, so I woke up at a natural time. I feel totally refreshed right now, but I know I will lose some steam later if I don't take measures to stay active.

On the sleep cycle, basically the idea is that if I wake up before a cycle is over, I feel like garbage. If I wake up when I am set to, I feel great. And the longer my sleep time is, the shorter the cycle gets somehow.

How did I figure this out? Just by observing myself after being curious about why I felt like crap sometimes and why I didn't at others even though the hours were fewer. To start, every time I woke up in the middle of the night, I checked the clock. There emerged a pattern!

Three hours was one cycle and about five and a half hours was two cycles. After that, it got kind of fuzzy - somewhere between seven and eight hours for three cycles. Then I put my hypothesis to the test, and it worked! When I thought I would, I felt golden. Similarly, when I predicted, I felt like total ass. Superb! Score one for the scientific method.

It's good to know because if I don't have time to sleep full cycles, I'll set my alarm back to the nearest full cycle, or abort like I just did. If I am awakened after two hours, I''ll feel like crap, obviously, but if I set my alarm for about four and a half, I'll feel just as lousy.

So it might sound crazy, but if it's close to midnight, and I have to be up by 4:30, I'll try to get up at 3 a.m. I've been using this theory for at about six or seven years, and it has served me very well. I can function for several days on three hours of sleep each night if I have to, with 30 min power naps (legs elevated above the head - for some reason this turns the power nap into a super-power nap).

Then my cycles go to shit.

2006-06-15T15:31:00.000-07:00

Touchdown ATL. It is hot in this mug.

Wine: Gordon Brothers 2003 Merlot

2006-06-08T23:27:00.000-07:00

Columbia Valley, Washington. I drank a glass of this tonight at the wine bar. Highly recommended.

Just wanted to note it somewhere. There are so many wines I drink that I like, but I don't write them down. I need to start doing that.

Wine bar, tonight

2006-06-08T18:23:00.000-07:00

Sorry for short notice. Tonight at 8 p.m. will be doing my guitar thingy.

Thursday, trash day

2006-06-08T17:25:00.000-07:00

The difference between living in a house and an apartment: the race to the dumpster

At the house, we emptied out the inside garbage on the morning of the curbside pick up and usually tossed out any fridge stuff the night before. At the apartment we're going to have to get used to rushing to the dumpster as soon as it is emptied, after the pickup.

Getting space in a dumpster is like staking real estate.

Scooter fun

2006-06-07T23:27:00.000-07:00

This is just someone who looks like me.

Photo taken June 2003.

Gay marriage ban

2006-06-07T01:06:00.000-07:00

I don't blog too much on my social and political persuasions much, but I am really disappointed in Alabama's overwhelming support (4 to 1) on the primary ballot for an amendment to the state constitution banning same-sex marriages. I figured it would pass, but not by 80 percent.

I keep thinking Alabama is moving forward, and I keep thinking I want to move back someday. But I do not feel that way today. I just wish the most homophobic landscape didn't have a monopoly on the best barbecue.

On a lighter note, worth linking to, is this post I ran across on How Banning Gay Marriage Will Destroy the Family. The final paragraph rings true to me, and I could not agree with it more.

M-m-m-my Corolla

2006-06-05T23:06:00.000-07:00

is SOLD.

My informal Palouse auction picked up $267.47. Sweet. It's been sitting in the garage for a year and a half with no working brakes. A guy in Palouse bought it for his son to tinker with. I threw in the snow chains for whenever it has to go over Snoqualmie Pass in the winter. That was a joke. I also included the CD player sans faceplate, which some punk in Montgomery stole while too high on crack to figure out how to rip the rest of it out.

Getting rid of a car brings back a lot of thoughts of the roads it has seen.

I drove that little 5-speed all over Alabama and the South before driving it to Washington state. (Photos are from my 2003 road trip.) It was once a New Orleans car, bought by my sister-in-law before being passed to my dad, then to me.

I explored the country with it and got to know this county in it. Not without a little pain along the way, though. I once had three blowouts in about six months. The third one made me late for a photo gig, and I was cussing up a storm. Then there was the previously mentioned break-in that cost me $140 for two tiny windows (because the punk came back four days later and still could not get the piece of shit $50 stereo out).

The muffler had huge holes in it, so it produced a hypnotic hum on the interstate at 70 mph. Or maybe the hypnotic effect came from carbon monoxide, I don't know. The air conditioner gave out my last summer in Alabama. Boy, did that suck. Add to that the driver-side interior climate control (window roller) got tough, and the glass did the old-car-shift-forward thingy, which made driving though Chik-Fil-A even a pain.

Brake master cylinder problems sidelined it before my cross-country trip. The same problems arose again, predictably, so I put some cash into a different car instead of the brakes.

But it was road worthy and got me where I needed to go, most of the time, with a little coaxing and an occasional talking to.

The only times it did not serve me, I'm fortunate, was when I had been drinking, where I then whipped out the foot scooter I kept in the trunk back when I lived in Old Cloverdale. There were a number of days I ran out the door on the way to work to an empty drive way and freaked out, thinking my car had been stolen, only to turn around to see my foot scooter thrown slapdash by the door. Ah yes, the scoot of shame, wearing a navy blazer and khakis. But those stories are for another time. Sorry for the digression.

Old junk and treasures

2006-06-02T00:25:00.000-07:00

I'm getting rid of a lot of clothes and junk because I've been keeping some pretty ugly stuff. I don't have a lot of clothes to begin with, but the donation pile is probably half. Funny, most of what I am keeping is the worthless second-hand stuff. The 25-cent snaps and the 50-cent boots. Except for one of my favorite winter coats. It has pen marks on it, now - one of the hazards of being a reporter. I figure, I have a way of finding treasures, so I am sure to find something just as cool or cooler. I think I paid only $4 for it anyhow, and it's not worth dry cleaning.

I wasn't able to part with my Zeppelin the Robert Plant T-shirts, though. I wore them around the house when I was cleaning. The Plant T-shirt had the concert date 9/24 Nashville - that was 1993. Anyone remember that one?

And I also found my "Cliff Dwellers" T-shirt from Cliff Ellis' first basketball coaching season with the Auburn Tigers.

I need to not keep so much junk in general. I've gone to the opposite extreme of my purge 10 years ago, where I tossed or hocked everything I hadn't touched in six monhts. I've become either too nostalgic or too obsessive. I even have a IBM 486 processor chip and a 5.25-inch floppy drive lying around just for kicks, not to mention my silly typewriters.

Oh, I did clean out my car last week. That was on my things to do list at the turn of the new year. I think I filled a 30-gallon trash can in the process. And I felt bad because most of it was paper. We recycle everything we can out here usually, but I lost my patience that day and just tossed everything.

Going through stuff is kind of fun. You get to jog your memory with that little something - the Star Wars toothbrush your friend gave you because you forgot yours on a visit but then only used a few times because, well, it was a Star Wars toothbrush, or that Beck "Loser" cassette single with the "Alcohol" B-side that looped endlessly in your car tape deck. You think about it one last time with the thing in your hand, and you hope that's enough for you to recall the memory on your own on some other day. But part of you knows you probably won't.

Moving

2006-06-01T23:36:00.000-07:00

Almost finished. The going back and forth is getting a little old. We haven't slept at the old place since the pipe incident. By the way, the issue still has not been resolved. Whatever, we are out of there. Despite the absolute lack of down-time since then, we've been in pretty good spirits, for which I am very thankful.

New old music

2006-05-26T08:12:00.000-07:00

I can listen to Internet radio again! I have listened to almost no new music since I have lived in Palouse. And really, now that I think about it, I've been at an artistic standstill for most of that duration.

The new place is wired with broadband Internet, which is a luxury for my rural living the past three years. So I gotta catch up on my tunes when I can.

Any suggested Internet radio stations?

Current listening: Twang on AccuRadio: "I Was Drunk" - Alejandro Escovedo, Bourbonitis Blues, Bloodshot Records

Gigs

2006-05-26T07:53:00.000-07:00

Saturday, May 27, 8 p.m. - Old Post Office Wine Bar and Gallery, Pullman
Friday, June 2, 8 p.m. - Cafe Moro, Pullman

Not much, you?

2006-05-24T23:03:00.000-07:00

I haven't been blogging lately. Been really busy. I fired off a few posts from my mobile phone, but there's a 145 character limit on my text messages, so the posts have to be succint.

We were in the Tri-Cities (Richland, Pasco, Kennewick) area last weekend for a little getaway for the Wife's birthday, which was officially yesterday. It was cool to get out of town with her. About a 2.5-hour drive easy. We had some hard laughs despite the Blue Moon restaurant disaster. Boy, that was awful. And GROSSLY overpriced. We could have gotten better food at Applebees, which I'm not a huge fan of.

But we had some really good wine at the tasting room at Bookwalter Winery in Richland. That was fun. And the place is hip and down to earth like the staff. Came home with a few bottles. Preston Premium winery was OK, but the staff was not cool. They made fun of their customers.

So this week we are cleaning up a lot getting ready to move to Pullman. Add to that- a pipe broke in the basement, and a bunch of our stuff is wet. The water is off, so we have no water until it gets fixed, which will be slow around here. Very annoying. Can't do anything without water. We are camping out at our Pullman apartment these days, going back and forth to Palouse cleaning up and packing.

By the way, the landlords are kicking us out because I am so rude to my neighbors. Just kidding.