Drving Friendly

Traffic drives me crazy! At least crazier than I already am.

When I go to work I I like to get on the road and move. What happened yesterday morning? I went down our road and made it to the access road. That's where the fun began.

Traffic was backed up. Really backed up. Since the construction began on the highway by the house things are beginning to get interesting. In order to help facilitate traffic flow by the Pilot Travel Center, Pilot has reworked their traffic flow pattern. Trucks are not allowed to enter the fueling area from the access road any more. They must turn at the light and enter in the rear of the center. Now, instead of blocking traffic on the access road by waiting to turn in the trucks block traffic on the access road because they are all trying to funnel to the rear and now get stacked up at the intersection and backing up down the access road.

That's what happened yesterday. Trucks and other traffic was stacked up from the light past the car entrance, the truck exit, and the exit ramp from the highway. I had to stopped several cars before the exit ramp and wait. Traffic at the light was moving. I wasn't. I was having to wait for vehicles exiting. When there were no more vehicles exiting, the light was red and traffic was stopped again. That just drives me crazy.

Another thing that drives me crazy is when the vehicle in front of me on the highway doesn't go the speed limit. So I decide to pass them but I can't. Why? Because every vehicle behind me is pulling out in turn to pass me. Frustrating!

Be careful when you drive. That big red truck in your rear view mirror might just be me.

© 2008 Barry T Horst


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You Can't Beat That

Some time back one of Julie's cats jumped up on her laptop and knocked it over. In the process of the tumble to the floor the screen hinges were broken. Actually, it wasn't the tumble to the floor that broke the hinges. What broke the hinges was the contact with the floor after tumbling. Because the screen was not working properly she wasn't sure if the computer still worked so she just put it away and started to use mine. Well that was fine, as long as I wasn't using it.

A few days ago she decided that she was going to see about fixing it. She asked me take her to Goodwill's Computer Works so she could look at what they had. Her idea was to get some cheap parts just to see what she could do. We went down and she looked at used cases, monitors, and various other items. After looking at things and getting ideas we went back home and rested.

No actually we went home to see if the laptop still worked. First we attached an RGB cable to the laptop and then connected it to the TV. This way we bypassed her laptop screen and we would be able to see if the laptop at least still worked. Julie turned on the computer and the display on the TV screen came on. And then went off.

Hmmmm!

She turned it on again and got into the setup screen. Now she tried to get XP to boot. It started to boot and then promptly stopped.

Hmmmm!

Now she turned the computer on a third time and had the computer to boot to it's most recent back up.

SUCCESS!!! The laptop works and has a 42" screen no less. Looks good.

Yesterday Julie started making plans to buy a monitor so she can use her laptop in her room. Enter Scott, her brother. He just happened to have a monitor laying around his house collecting dust. Seriously! He brought it over for her so all she needed were a set of RGB cables. We headed to Computer Works and picked up a set for $2.00 and also picked up some speakers for $4.00.

Not bad. Instead of spending a few hundred on a new laptop Julie got hers up and running for under $10.

You can't beat that with a stick; and if you do...YOU'RE GOING TO FIX IT.

© 2008 Barry T Horst


This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Please visit the Giveaway of the Day near the bottom of the left sidebar for free software downloads daily.

Give Me A Break

I went to more summer training yesterday. My training yesterday started at the WISD Playhouse on I-35 by Baylor. The purpose of the training this time was to acquaint the elementary teachers with the new math textbook adoption. The morning training focused on the textbook itself and the various components.

The publisher of our adoption is Macmillan/McGraw-Hill. The presenter started by going into detail about the company and the name. As she was telling some fact about McGraw-Hill the following exchange took place:

Me, "Is Quickdraw still with the company?"

I get a blank stare.

Then she asks,"Who?"

Me, "Quickdraw!"

She, "Quickdraw?"

Me, "Yes! Quickdraw! Quickdraw McGraw.

"Someone in the audience, "He teaches Kindergarten!"

She, "Oh! I fell right into that one. They normally ask if Tim or Faith are there.

Fast forward to the afternoon session.

I arrive at Brook (That's the school I teach at, Brook Avenue Elementary) and am met with several police cars in the staff parking lot. Something has obviously happened and I had my suspicions.

I headed into the building and sure enough I learned that several vehicle windows were broken.

During the school year our parking lot is locked up during the day to keep folks out. However, during summer training with so many people coming and going the lot has been left unlocked.

Enter the folks that have nothing better to do during the day. Then add to that seemingly intelligent people leaving their valuables in their vehicle in plain sight.

Now I know that many of these people are not accustomed to this neighborhood, but gee whiz! Take your valuables with you; or at least hide them so that folks are not tempted.

Give me a break! And Charlie too. He had to clean up all the mess and it was terribly hot today.

© 2008 Barry T Horst


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Please visit the Giveaway of the Day near the bottom of the left sidebar for free software downloads daily.

Something New

Julie and I went to the Waco-McLennan County Library on Saturday. We both checked out some books to supplement our summertime reading. Julie wanted to watch a movie over the weekend. You know, something light and entertaining. The movie she got was "War & Peace". Oh well, it doesn't really matter.

After we left the library we were driving along Austin Avenue going towards the "Square". As we passed The Waco Hippodrome Theatre Julie saw an advertising poster for "Tuna Does Vegas". Julie was excited and said she wanted to see it because she thinks Greater Tuna is funny.

Yesterday in the mail we received a brochure in the mail from the Hippodrome for their upcoming productions/presentations. As we were looking at it Julie noted the various Donor Levels for membership in the Waco Performing Arts Center. The Donor Levels are Directors ($2000+); Benefactor ($1000-$1999); Producer ($500-$999); Premiere Patron ($250-$499); Patron ($150-$249); and Friend ($50-$149).

I would like to suggest these additional levels: Casual Acquaintance ($25-$49); Just A Nodding Acquaintance ($5-$24.99); and Excuse Me! Do I Know You? ($4.99 or less).
© 2008 Barry T Horst


This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Please visit the Giveaway of the Day near the bottom of the left sidebar for free software downloads daily.

Picture Monday, July 14, 2008

Ahhh, to be a kid again. The pictures below are pictures of Chris's dad. Yes, that's right, my father-in-law. These pictures were taken at a much simpler time when it was certainly fun to be a kid at least. I'm sure that these pictures were taken at the local park in Nevada, Missouri which was his hometown.

Look how the kiddos are dressed. Was it a Sunday afternoon some years ago? Maybe the boys just dressed a lot better in 1930's when they went to play in the park. It looks as if it must have been a shirt and tie affair.

Looks like the girls dressed up to play in the park also. One of them even donned a hat for the occasion.

© 2008 Barry T Horst

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Please visit the Giveaway of the Day near the bottom of the left sidebar for free software downloads daily.

Forgetful or Just Plain Sidetracked-I Just Don't Know

Oh my goodness! I forgot to get to the blog today. I don't know what to write about but here goes anyway.The other day we were out driving around and went to a couple of stores. One of the stores we went to was a half price book store. We stopped and looked around for a while. I bought a couple of paper back books. The books were some vintage MAD Magazine Spy vs Spy and Dave Berg books. Brought 'em home and read them yesterday and last night.

Meanwhile, Chris started rummaging around here at the house. After a short time she comes into the bedroom with about 100 different cartoon paper back books. Among the books she found were Hagar, the Horrible; Tumbleweeds; Peanuts; MAD Magazine; Beetle Bailey and a host of others.

I started looking at some of the paper backs earlier today and decided I would try to put some on eBay. I got started on that and then time got away from me and all of a sudden I realized I spent time doing eBay and not the blog.

Oh well, maybe I'll get some money from them instead of a bunch of dust.

By the way, why do things collect dust when it just sits?

© 2008 Barry T Horst


This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Please visit the Giveaway of the Day near the bottom of the left sidebar for free software downloads daily.