A week without a blog entry...

...is like a week without sunshine.

So what has been happening? Not a whole hell of a lot. Work is the same. I have been working on some V5R4 education for new iSeries printing functions, but that's about it. I got lost in the blue buildings last week trying to find my developer, and when I found him, his computer didn't work and he couldn't get me the right information. I did talk to another developer who was showing me how he encoded part of a poem by Robert Service into a barcode, in order to test some new functions.

The Cremation of Sam McGee
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.

The developer didn't know who had written it, but I remembered it because a friend of mine had that poem memorized and used to recite it on odd occassions. Small literary world I guess.

Alex has started walking more. He used to be quite a high maintenance child but he has transitioned into a little boy who can play by himself for extended periods, and is generally very happy. Owen and Alex seem to play together pretty well, but they like to grab things from each other and often squabble about the funniest things. Yesterday they were grabbing a push broom from each other, and at one point ALex wanted to being it inside. Just imagine a little kid trying to drag a push broom through a door he is unable to keep open and you will see the humor. When I finally took it away from him he fell apart.

Sandy and I have been watching the LOST episodes on DVD. That series is excellent and yesterday they won an Emmy for best drama. The only problem with our DVD watching lately is that:

1. We don't have a working DVD player.
2. We do not have a DVD burner.

So when we get the DVD's from NetFlix I use DVD Shrink to copy them to my PC and then send the DVDs back. So when we get a DVD player, it will slow down our DVD watching because we will not be able to copy them (because I wouldn't need to use a PC). I am thinking of getting an external DVD burner so that we don't have the problem. We shall see. An external DVD burner is about $150 as of this writing.

On the NFLPOOL front, I may win the pool again but it is unlikely. . .Mike called me to tell me that I was in last place and then within 2 refreshes of the scores I was on top again and stayed there. Last time I looked I was second place. The Packer loss was my highest rated win speculation, which cost me a lot of points. The Vikings losing was good for me though. Monday night football will settle the scores this week.

Oh, and I found the name of the guy that sold me my Atala - DOMINIC PETIT. He still lives in Green Bay and I left him a VM requesting some info on my bike. I have decided that I am going to rebuild my wheels using Mavic Open Pro rims when I can afford it. My friend Alex Marquis bought a Park dishing tool and he said that he will rebuild my wheels for me. I trust him where bike stuff is concerned.