Happy Labor Day & Photos

As you know from my previous post I had forgotten my camera interface cable for downloading photos. I was able to get the $7.00 cable at Radio Shack for only $21.00! Here are some pictures starting from Friday when I left for the trip.

The dogs rode in their crates which filled up the whole back end of the Durango.

Going down the road pulling a 4,000 pound plus camper going 60 MPH. I let Buddy drive while I was taking pictures and videos. Glad no cops saw this!!

Settled in at the campground.

Ate lunch at Moe's with Sean and Brynne.

Stomp them "Gators".

Aislynn's birthday party.

I couldn't find one of the three books I gave Aislynn so I put a $10.00 bill in her birthday card. She looked at the bill and tossed it down with all of the other present wrapping trash. I guess in today's world we use too much plastic money. Pamella will take her to a store and show her the "Power" of CASH!

Grandpa and Kieran.

Aislynn acting silly at a hamburger joint.

Florida or Bust

I thought I would be able to post every day on the visit but it ain't working like that. Number one is I forgot my camera adapter cable so I am unable to download photos at this point. Hopefully I will find a cable today (Sunday).

I left Friday at 7am and arrived in PCB around 4 pm. It was a long trip pulling the camper and frequent stops for me and the dogs to do pottie stuff!!

I met with Brynne and Sean that evening and we went out to eat some Mexican Food. It was very good except one of the items on my plate was too "hot" for me.

Saturday Brynne, I and the dogs went to Santa Rosa Beach to visit Pamella, Shaun, Aislynn and my new grandson, Kieran. He is quite the "man". Aislynn had an early birthday party with some of her friends and she got the "Mother Load" of presents. It was probably better than any Christmas that I ever witnessed.

Brynne and I played "Hungry Hippo" with her and drove Pamella and Shaun crazy with the noise of those hungry hippos chomping for the food (marbles). If anyone remembers that game you know how loud it is. I think the inventor of the game must have been deaf as he would have never built the toy if he could have heard all of the racket!!

After eating sandwiches, salad and cake we all went out for Pizza! It worked out great because Saturday night is my normal pizza night. The only problem is I had to waste the pizza for a dinner rather than just a snack as I usually do! LOL

There is an apartment near Brynne's and Sean's that has a FL Gators mat by the door and we all stepped on it (in a bad way) as we walked back and forth. Sorry all you Gator fans (Andrew).

Hopefully my next blog will have some photos.

End of August

It is hard to believe that August is over. I have been very busy with work and other activities. This weekend I washed the camper in preparation for my Florida visit over Labor Day week. That sure is a lot of vehicle to wash. going up and down a ladder really stressed my knees and the left one is hurting pretty bad. I also learned that I should wash it more than just once a year.

I have also been experimenting with "Green Screen" video production. You know, like the weather person on TV and movie special effects. I downloaded a free 30day demo Video Production software application from Sony. It is the same package that Les Strood uses, who is the creator of "Survivor Man" on TV.

It is a very technical application and the learning curve is long. The demo will expire tomorrow (Sunday) so I had to finish up my project today. Doing "Green Screen" is very difficult as the screen has to be perfect and the lighting more than perfect to prevent shadows and artifacts from showing up in the final rendering of the video.

I probably have over 40-hours in this 8-minute video and I'm still not happy with it. I did the "Gardener" scene with my web cam and I didn't notice it was out of focus, plus the audio was terrible. The rest was done with my cannon photo/video camera.

It is called "The TV Interview". It was all "adlib" except the TV interviewer did have a list of questions to ask.

At some points you will hear the "Producer" talking in the background. Even though the quality is low, it is kind of funny. Please leave your comments about the video on the Blog.

You can view it in a small window by selecting it in the Video Bar on the right or select it in the My Stories and Links Panel to see it directly from YouTube in a larger format.

The dogs are doing great. I caught Buddy sleeping on his back one day.

And Max has a new spot next to me when I watch TV. He has become very attached to me and is like my shadow.

That's all for now!

Another Hot Weekend

I had planned on doing several outdoor things this weekend but it is just too darn hot.

Max and I finished his advanced obedience course and he did real good and learned a few more things. His dog aggression is easing but I have to watch him carefully and correct him when it happens. When I have time I will teach Buddy some of the new things that Max learned.

I wrote another short story called "The Potato Days". It is listed in the right hand panel under My Stories and Links. Check it out!

The Lights Out inquiries are starting to pick up now and I have showed the boat twice in the last week. They are interested so hope someone buys it soon.

I received an IRS notice yesterday concerning my 2007 taxes. It appears that one of the mortgage companies did not report (Form 1098) the interest I paid so the IRS indicated I owed and additional $2,321 in taxes and interest. Now I have to go through a lot of trouble proving the mortgage company screwed up, or maybe the IRS did. Maybe I can get the same deal as Tim Geithner, the Treasury Secretary got!

Speaking of our government, I am so glad I am able to help so many people buy new cars with my tax money ($4500 Cash for Clunkers Program). I wish they would at least buy American Made cars! Too bad I can't take advantage of that program. Oh well, you know how "Spreading the Wealth" works.

I am just sharing some of my thoughts about our government here. Hmmm, maybe that is why I am being audited? Maybe my political emails have caught up with me! LOL

I finally finished Season 4 (the last One) of Battlestar Galactica. Thank you Phillip, for introducing me to the Series. I got hooked on it and enjoyed the entire series.

That's about it for now.

Talk About a Mission

I woke up Saturday with a mission. I washed "Lights Out" and then took her out for a run on the river to clean the bottom and make sure everything still worked. Then I went to the pet store, auto parts store, two grocery stores and stopped for gas. This was all done by NOON!

I watched a very good movie Saturday night called "Flash of Genius". It was a true story about an inventor who went up against the giants of the auto industry (Detroit) for patent infringement. A very inspiring moving and another reason to keep "Never Give Up" fresh in your mind. You need to see it.

As some of you know, I had "Lights Out" sold but the buyer backed out at the last moment. Anticipating the sale, I was not ready to give up cruising on the water so I found a 25 foot pontoon boat that was a great deal and I thought it would be good for taking little jaunts on the water. Plus it is all one level and very easy on my knees compared to the steps on Lights Out.

Also, it can hold up to 12 people so it would be good for when I have family visiting to take a little cruise on the water or go to the bat cave and watch the bats come out.

It even has a wireless remote controlled trolling motor so I can even use it for fishing and as a replacement for the bass boat if it ever wears out.

I decided to purchase it and then pay off the small loan when I received the proceeds from "Lights Out". When the buyer back out I was very disappointed and now I have 3 boats. Good Lord, what have I done? Since I decided to work until I am 66 (another year) I will be financially OK but I really want to sell Lights Out. Hopefully, there is another buyer out there somewhere.

Here are a few photos of the pontoon boat:

It even has a pop-up changing room that can also have a porta-pottie. When completely open there is a drop-down curtain for privacy. Not as convient as the head on Lights Out but when you gota go you gota go and convenience is not a concern. LOL

It's Been a While

It has been a while since I have posted on the blog. I have been pretty busy with "stuff" lately. My latest project is for work. The company decided they wanted to migrate all of the various software programs into one modularized package.

The programming environment has changed to Visual Studio 8 .NET. Therefore I will have to migrate my 3 applications from VB6 (which has been obsoleted several years ago) to the new .NET VB 2008. I will have to start all over and learn a lot of new things. Here is an 8-inch stack of books I need to read. A total of 3,819 pages.

A Microsoft tool estimates 9-months of time for me to convert and migrate all of the software. Yes, there is that much code that needs to change. This should be a fun and very challenging project. It should keep my brain sharp for a while longer.

The dogs graduated from obedience training a few weeks ago and are doing good.

Otherwise I have been fishing off and on and doing a little boating on the river. Here are a few photos of me and the dogs checking out some sail boats.

Happy Father's Day

Today is Father' Day and I have heard from most of my children by now. It was great talking to them and I sure miss all of them. I received a card and a special shirt from Kaitlin and Anna. It says "Grandpa has Gone Fish'n".

Max decided to jump up and read the shirt. He must need glasses if he needs to be that close to read it. (LOL)

I cooked a special Father's Day dinner which included a 6-oz. Filet Mignon, Corn on the cob and of course french fries. Yum-Yum.

For desert I had "Chocolate Lovers Cake". more Yum-Yum.

I didn't eat the entire missing piece. I've been working on it for a few days.

Actually a week ago I saw a Father's Day special from Omaha Steaks where you could get $173.00 worth of steaks, chicken, pork chops, burgers, stuffed potatoes, etc for $59.00. Sounded like a good deal and I am a Father so I ordered the package. They threw in the cake, some franks and a few extra burgers for free. What a deal, it comes out to about $4.50 a meal. The steaks are so tender since the beef has been aged for at least 21 days.

My Pizza freezer had to make room for all the frozen food.

It comes in a nice re-usable cooler and there is a small amount of dry-ice to keep it all frozen. In fact when UPS dropped it off they didn't ring the door bell to let me know it was there and it sat out in the sun for a few hours. Everything was still frozen and it actually took the dry-ice another whole day laying in the sink to finally evaporate.

Omaha Steaks have quite a system for delivering the food. You should look into it. They have deals running all the time. Their web site is http://www.omahasteaks.com/.

You won't find beef like this in the grocery store. Yes Andrew, even at Publics.

Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there!