Almost Everyday in 2006

Are They Gone?

2006-05-03T10:04:00.000-04:00

"Hey... are they gone yet?"

"Yeah. Looks like it. I think that scheme of yours worked."

"Brilliant! Pretend like I forgot about this page... get people to stop checking it so often, and then I can really talk about the juicy stuff!"

"Good thinking, Boss!"

"I am a genius..."

[Posted from The Phoenix (Coffee House) in Canandaigua, NY.]

Sorry... This is Cheesy...

2006-04-25T22:12:00.000-04:00

I know, I know... but the events of the day are mostly detailed in another cool story, like yesterday.

Please visit my other blog.

More here soon... :-)

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

This Will Explain Today At Least...

2006-04-24T18:36:00.000-04:00

http://www.gregshead.net/2006/04/what-do-you-have-for-me-today-god.html

More to come from the weekend's events! It was GREAT!

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE on the PowerBook in Palmyra, NY.]

Two For One!

2006-04-21T12:37:00.000-04:00

Ha!!! Four days, 0 posts. One day, TWO POSTS! Nice.

Just needed to add a URL correction to the previous post. Please change the GregsAmazon.com bookmark that you made (if you did) to search.gregshead.net. I found out that it's a breech of my agreement with Amazon to use their name in any URL I have. :-) Oops!!

Well, it's been corrected, so please visit search.gregshead.net for all your online shopping needs. :-)

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

That Kinda Week...

2006-04-21T10:56:00.000-04:00

I guess you have figured out by now that it's been an interesting week. My prolonged absence here kinda gives that away. Most of it has been due to a bunch of work needing to be done this week (deadlines), but we're always pretty busy just having six people in the house! :-)

But the cool thing today is, I slept in till almost 10:30!!! The kids went to Grandma & Grandpa's house last night! We'll meet up with them there on Saturday morning. We were exhausted last night after they left, and Julia was having a really hard day, so last night I was not really able to enjoy the fullness of this gift from my mother-in-law. But today? Today I am enjoying the fullness!!! :-) I feel rested for the first time in a long time.

I told Jen that lots of businesses have "Casual Fridays", but I think I will implement "Sleep-in Fridays" for my business. ;-)

So today we're enjoying the quiet, and will have a nice evening out (with Julia) :-)

The rest of the week has been full of working on websites. I have several new clients this week. That's great! It's kind of overwhelming, as I have mentioned before, but it's really great. I am grateful to God for the constant influx of new stuff.

We also had a nice visit from some old friends, the Hochbrueckners. They brought us dinner and spent the evening at our house. It's always great to spend time with them. Unfortunately our kids were less than well behaved. But, overall, was a very nice evening.

I continue to import video from VHS to digital format. We're really loving our little Mac Mini home entertainment system! It's nice to have all our video accessible at the touch of a button. I've also been converting VHS to DVD this week for my parents (several home videos and such). That's been fun on several levels, as I have gotten to watch portions of these nostalgic videos while importing or editing. :-) Even made a couple copies for us, too. :-)

OK, you may have noticed that I am in a pretty good mood today (lots of smileys) :-) I need to get on to two big projects today.

OH! One more project I just completed... you can read about it here. Basically, it's a way you can start your shopping at Amazon, and I will be credited a commission for your purchase! Pretty cool, I think. :-)

Last night, while talking with Jen, we figured that GregsAmazon.com was easier to remember, so we'll be moving the site there. In fact, amazon.gregshead.net will redirect you to the new URL right now.

So, that's the past week in a very small nutshell.

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

The Weekend Past

2006-04-17T17:30:00.000-04:00

There's just really no chance of me getting to the computer to blog on the weekends. I just have to accept that. :-)

Saturday was pretty busy... lots of errands to run, and then in the evening I began my ProCare training at the apple store. That was fun. :-)

We woke up on Sunday to an easter basket per person and a houseful of chocolate eggs! The kids had fun hunting eggs, and then we had a nice breakfast --- Waffles! We watched the VeggieTales Easter DVD, and then we all sorta napped in the afternoon. (Except the boys, who watched another VeggieTales DVD while Dad slept...) Then we went out and cleaned up the yard in the evening. That was fun. Just dad and the boys. Raking up sticks and leaves... there's a big pile of that stuff out by the road waiting to be taken away now! :-)

Today I had a few meetings with clients, and got some good work done on several projects. Work is certainly busy these days!

I am also having fun converting all our VHS tapes to digital video. (Apple's iPod format, for playback on our Mac Mini home entertainment system.) The past couple days I have been doing VeggieTales tapes for the kids :-)

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

More To The Story

2006-04-14T12:01:00.000-04:00

I figured I have a bit of a breather right now, so I will elaborate on a couple recent stories.

Meeting Jim Kelly
So, we were all excited about the chance to go meet Jim Kelly, until our van died. It was already a busy day, and that just added to it. We were all quite frustrated, and then we did not have a van to get to the mall to see Jim. That was another frustration.

Well, as you know, our neighbors loaned us their vehicle, cause they're awesome like that, and we did get to go.

What you don't know is that while we were waiting in line (which was really very short, by the way!) we were talking with a few folks about Hunters Hope and just the Buffalo Bills in general. It was cool. I gave a Buffalo Bills Review business card to one of the guys helping out there.

All was going well until it was our turn to go talk with Jim, and Kirsten decided she didn't want to go. The boys and Julia and I began moving up to where Jim was, and Jen was trying to convince Kirstie to come with us. For whatever reason, she picked that moment to not comply, and when Jen grabbed hold of her hand to bring her up there, she fell down. This caused great cries of anguish to gush from her tiny mouth. She really didn't hurt herself, she was just already mad, and then the fall sent her over the edge. Now no one can hear anything but a screaming 2-yr-old, and Jim is trying to be nice, talking with the boys, high-fiving them and such. But I'm thinking... oh my. What great timing. :-(

I pick her up, still crying, and go up to say hello to Jim. I was looking forward to that, too. Kirstie was wearing a little Jim Kelly jersey, so we wanted to show it to him, and perhaps have him sign it. But she's still crying. Jim is looking slightly annoyed. He says, "You want me to sign it?" referring to Kirstie's jersey, and I said, "Yeah! That would be great!" At this point, as someone is writing on her back, Kirstie takes a break from her tirade. That was nice.

I took advantage of that to tell Jim about our podcast, and ask if he'd be willing to come on our show sometime. "If I have the time." Was his initial response. I mentioned that it's a podcast, and we've had some other players on there. I said he should go check it out and listen to the interviews, to see what we're asking him to do. I handed him the business card and he said, "I don't even know how to turn a computer on." He did laugh, but it also seemed like, "Please get the crying baby out of here... move along now..."

That was dissapointing. Strange timing for the little Kirstie incident. I came back after the rest of the family was in the Apple Store and talked with the head of Jim's foundation. I felt a lot better about the whole thing after that. And, hopefully we'll get to talk with Jim in the future. We'll see.

Van Trouble
We thought it was the alternator, not charging the battery. It turned out to be the battery. That was nice. A pretty easy and cheap repair. It was nice that Jen managed to get to that auto repair place, too. Pretty lucky... *wink, wink* :-) She had asked God to get her home, or somewhere else, if he had a cooler story in mind. So, perhaps that was it, or perhaps we've made a new friend? Whatever the coolness of it, I'm glad it worked out the way it did. :-)

Today many of my clients are off, so I am getting a bit more work done! I am completely amazed at the sheer volume of new work that has come in this week. I can't wait to see how I can keep up!! :-) I am grateful to God for his provision, and at the same time overwhelmed and amazed. Very cool.

OK... gotta get back to work! We're heading to our friends' house tonight for a DUKE FEST!!! We're going to watch some Dukes of Hazzard, and play the Dukes card game, and probably play with the little matchbox cars we have (The General Lee, Boss Hogg's car, Rosco's car, and Cooter's truck.) Should be a fun night! :-)

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

It's Here

2006-04-12T15:34:00.000-04:00

I waited outside until around 3:00pm, and my wait was finally rewarded with my new iMac G5 2.1Ghz 20" computer!!! Wow!!! It's amazing. It's big, but it's small. It's only 2" thick, but the screen is enormous and beautiful! Just amazing.

So, I spent the ENTIRE day (until 3am... so, 12 hours!) moving the old computer, setting everything up on the network, etc. I installed software, transfered files. Oh! The firewire HD came back yesterday as well. LaCie replaced it for me. That was nice of them. So, I got that up and running, and have everything synced up and ready to back up every day again. That's nice.

I have two copies of every file - sometimes more. Won't lose data again!

Now as for the computer... it's a hum dinger! And, since it came with a monitor.. I am currently employing my somewhat suspect older computer as a video editing studio. My G3 will still be my audio studio. So we're hooked up here!!!

It was fun putting everything together. Then this morning I had a meeting with a client, then went over to some friends' house to help them put together an iPhoto book of their 12 week old son! :-)

--=-=---=--
The blog ended abruptly yesterday, as several things happened
-=-=-=----=-

The afternoon was a bit hectic as our friends were over for lunch, and then Jen took the troops (Well, just the boys, actually) to Salvation Army for their big Wednesday sale. When she tried to start up the van, it didn't. So, after getting a jump from Leah who was with her, she did go a little farther, ending up in stalling out at an auto repair shop! Leah brought her and the boys home from there.

Long, long story short, the place that the van stalled ended up fixing it for us, and I found out today (the 13th) that it was just a dead battery.

That put a damper on our evening though, as the repair was going to cost us money we didn't want to spend, and we were supposed to go up to the mall to meet Jim Kelly! He was there signing autographs.

Well, our awesome neighbors let us borrow their van, and we got to go meet him. It was nice. He signed lots of our stuff. I talked real briefly with him about our bills podcast too. We'll see where that goes.

After the Jim Kelly thing, we hung out at the Apple Store for the rest of the evening. Also got to pick up our photos from Sears. So, it turned out to be a nice night. :-)

Here we are today, and I still feel like I'm just trying to catch up!

More later perhaps...

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

Movie Night!

2006-04-11T10:33:00.000-04:00

We went to see our first movie as a family of six last night! Actually, it was Kirstie's first theater movie, also. We don't go to the theater very much... :-)

Monday nights at this theater in Brighton are 50 cent nights! So we all got in for $2.50!!! (They very kindly did not charge us for Julia's ticket.) But, since we spent so little on the tickets, I thought it would be fun to get some popcorn and stuff! Well, the best deal by far is the tub o' corn. It was $5.75. Ouch. And then, you can't have popcorn without a drink (well, I can.. but that's cause I'm weird...) so, I got one large drink for the whole family, $3.25. Ouch again. And, when I was a kid, I always got Milk Duds whenever we went to a movie, so... I figured I'd splurge and get some Milk Duds. $3.25. Ow.

$2.50 for the movie. $12.25 for the snacks. Hmmm. Clever marketing scheme.

But, they do offer a refill of the popcorn tub for only $.25! So, we did take advantage of that, thanks to our super popcorn-eating little boys! We didn't eat very much of the refill... but we brought it home! :-)

We had a lot of fun. Watched Curious George, and the kids all loved it. We'll have to do that again, perhaps without the snacks next time.

Today I await the arrival of my new desktop computer. You'd think I wouldn't be excited, but actually, I have not had a new desktop since Christmas of 2000. That's a long time ago. :-) So I'm excited. In fact, I started writing this from the front porch! I've set up a temporary office out there while I wait for Mr. FedEx. :-) I had to come in to get my power cord (low battery) and some tea (cause I like it).

Time to go back outside! It's a beautiful day!

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE (and the front porch) in Palmyra, NY.]

Monday, Monday

2006-04-10T12:16:00.000-04:00

Whoa. It sure is hard to get started on Mondays! Not so much because I'm tired from the weekend or whatever... just that there is so much to do!!!

Let's do a quick weekend recap:

Saturday April 8th:
Saturday's highlight was a visit from Grandma Walker! She came over for a few hours in the afternoon. That was fun. :-) Then in the evening, we went out to see a friend perform at a local coffee house. We hadn't seen him or his family in a while, so it was nice to catch up with them. :-)

Sunday April 9th:
After sleeping in a bit (thanks to some tired chitlins) we got busy! It was a very nice day, so we played outside - a lot! In fact, I got a sunburn!! (I know it was at BEST in the low 50s, but there was still a lot of sun!) Our oldest niece, Karis (20), came over for a visit. She got to tell us that she was accepted at Wheaton College and will be heading there in the fall! Nice! After Karis went home, we actually went out to her house! We did some errands and then stopped by Jen's brother's house for a while! That was very nice, since we very rarely get to see them - even though they only live about 25 minutes away from us.

After we put the kids to bed last night, we watched Pirates Of Silicon Valley, a movie about Steve Jobs and Bill Gates and the start of the computer revolution. Interesting. Told kinda like a documentary. We both thought it was really cool.

Funniest line of the movie was when Steve Jobs realized that Bill Gates had stolen their operating system, and branded it as their own, he confronted him in a losing battle. With nothing more to say, Jobs said to Gates as Gates was leaving, "You know we're better than you. Our stuff is better." To which Gates replied, "You don't GET IT! That doesn't matter!!!"

That is just too funny! And very true. Both guys were right. Apple is way better, but that doesn't matter. And Gates has proven that. You don't actually need to have any original thinking or even a decent product. You just have to create demand for your product, and then meet the demand.

Fascinating movie.

And now we get to Monday. It's been a day of answering emails, making lists, and setting up appointments for the week! That's so crazy. It always feels more productive when I can actually get right into design work on Monday mornings, but often that doesn't happen. :-)

There's your weekend recap... more later.

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

Missing Days

2006-04-07T22:12:00.000-04:00

If I miss a day recently, it's because it was packed FAR TOO FULL of craziness for me to even get a chance to write about it!!! So, here are the past two days.

APRIL 6th
Thursday morning I don't recall anything totally out of the ordinary. The day went pretty OK, until the afternoon. Oh yeah. Jen had something scheduled where she needed to leave some kids with me, and I had some pretty big, intense projects I was working on, so it was not looking that great, but I really wanted to keep as many kids as possible so she could enjoy herself. It was a homeschool clothes trading event. Things she really loves. So, I really wanted her to do it.

So she took Ian (7) and Julia (3 weeks) and I kept a sleeping Kirstie (2) and a computer playing Alex (4). Alex did OK, except that he was in my office, and I got to hear about every shot he made in Gopher Golf, or every accomplishment in any other game he was playing. That was slightly better than when he went downstairs to play on his computer, though. Because then there were just long moments of silence. Alex knows how to get in some pretty good trouble, so silence is not usually good. :-) So, I had to frequently check to make sure all was OK.

About an hour and half before Jen got home, Kirstie woke up. I let her play in her room with Alex for about 30 min, then went to get her. (Remember, I'm working on some intense, and more difficult than usual projects while all of this is going on...) So I got Kirstie out of her crib, and thinking Jen would be home in about 30 minutes said, "Daddy still has to work, you play this computer while Alex plays his." (We have a lot of computers.) She said, "Uh huh..." So all was good. I instructed Alex to make sure Kirstie didn't leave. I was not too excited about his slow head non while his eyes did not part from the Backyard Basketball game, but I had some things I really needed to get done in the office... so I left them.

Not too much later, Kirstie comes ambling up the stairs with her Nuk, and slowly peeked around the corner with a cute little wave saying, "Hi Daddy!" :-) She wanders around a bit before getting into EVERYTHING she should not be getting into in Daddy's office... so I pick her up and take her back downstairs. We do that a few more times before she finally decides to stay down on the second floor with Alex. She kept shutting the door to my office so I could not hear them, so I would go down and open it again.

(Remember, I have some intense, more difficult than usual projects that I am working on...)

Finally, after about 10 minutes of quiet, I notice that there has been 10 minutes of quiet. That's not a good thing with a four and two year old on the loose. So I call downstairs... no answer. I walk downstairs... Alex is playing his computer, Kirstie is I forget where, but not where she should have been.

Needless to say, when Jen got home at five, I was quite relieved.

Unfortunately, I was not done yet, nor did I feel like I was making any progress at all. I ended up emailing the client after another hour trying to make it work and said, "It's not going to work." So, the afternoon had a very incomplete, almost wasted feel to it.

I think Alex and Kirstie had fun, though. :-)

We had a nice breakfast meal for dinner. Pancakes, eggs, meats and all the good stuff. Was nice. I like it when Jen cooks. :-)

APRIL 7th
The day began at 8am, when my alarm was supposed to go off, but I beat it to awakeness. I woke up about one minute before it went off. I had a meeting with a client this morning up at the local coffee house at nine, so I was up to get my shower and get some things in order before taking off.

As I stepped into the shower that had been running for about a minute or so, I noticed that my foot was really not warm at all in the running water. I checked with my hand... definitely not warm. So I turned the faucet all the way to hot. Definitely not warm. Argh. I figured one of the kids had bumped the hot water heater thermostat again. So, I got dressed again and went down to the basement to turn the thermostat back up again.

Have I mentioned how much I don't like early mornings?

When I reached the water heater, I noticed that the thermostat was on the correct setting. That was bad. So, in my still sleepy stupor, I got down on the floor to check the pilot light. Out. Argh. I went upstairs to get some matches, and attempted to re-light the pilot. No luck. I dismantled the front of the water heater a bit more and checked in there... definitely out. So, I got a few more tools, and read the instructions on the side of the tank and tried to get it started. No luck. Three times. No luck. "Bad thermal coupler..." I thought to myself, being the true handyman that I am.

Turns out, I was right... but that's for later in the day.

So, it's now 8:30am, and I still have not showered, nor was I going to it seemed. I left the water tank undone, and made a mental note to return to that mess later in the day. I ate some breakfast on my way back upstairs to get dressed, and then got my laptop and headed out the door at 8:50am.

My client was already at the coffee shop at about 8:53am when I got there. He bought me a chai. That was cool. We chatted about our various endeavors and families and then got to business. He's a very busy guy, so at one point he had to excuse himself to join a conference call meeting on his cell phone! That was funny. So, I just chatted with the coffee house folks. They know me well. (I like coffee houses.)

After our meeting, I headed across the street to pick up the chairs I had dropped off at the furniture store on Monday. They were not able to repair them, but I was going to save the one that had not been broken. Well, it was broken. Argh. No chairs to claim. A piece of Walker family history... lost. That was too bad, but kind of expected. So, I chatted with them about future furniture purchases, and after pondering the staggering figures for a moment, said I'd have to do that at a later date.

As I headed out the door, I thought... "Dude, I could do a webpage for them in exchange for some furniture..." :-) So I went back in and proposed the idea. It was very well received, so we'll see what comes of that.

So at 11am, I already have new business for an old client, a new project for that same old client, and a potential new client. We're doing pretty well today...

I headed to the grocery to get a few things for tonight's dinner with friends. Went in and quickly got what I needed. That all went very well. Nothing spectacular to report there.

Got home and relayed the days happenings up to that point to Jen. Everything seemed to be pretty OK with the family, so I headed upstairs to take care of some more business that I needed to cover that morning. BUT, before I could do that, I had to get TWO packages ready to mail back. TWO things I had purchased recently were not the right things. Not what I wanted at least (my fault...) so I had to package them up to send back. Things to print, people to call... done, and ready to go.

I think I spent actually all day on the phone.

As I was calling people, sending things back... I got the crazy idea that because of the new Boot Camp software for Intel Macs, I should return my iMac G5 that I just ordered last week, and get an Intel iMac, since I now had Adobe Creative Suite 2. Long story, but... I got the iMac G5, even though it's the older computer, because the new Intel based iMacs do not support the older Mac software (OS 9). ALL of my web design software (the Adobe Design Collection) is OS 9 still. SO... I had to get the G5. BUT NOW, since I had the CS2 (OS X) version, I could get an Intel one... AND, I could test pages in Windows with the cool Boot Camp feature - that only works on an Intel Mac.

All of that made sense, so I called Apple and got a return authorization from them for the iMac G5. Too bad, but a good move overall.

Not even a couple hours later, I realized that the software I would use the most on the Intel Mac was the Adobe stuff, which is NOT Universal yet (which means it would run very slowly on the Intel Mac, since it is not written to be used on an Intel processor. Kind of confusing, but you can check out apple.com/rosetta for more on what I am talking about.)

So I call Apple up again and say, "Uh... Hi. I'd like to cancel my SECOND order today and uncancel my first cancel." No can do. Already shipped. So, they issue a RMA. Now there are TWO iMacs heading my way. I spent an hour probably calling several friends whom I knew were thinking of purchasing a Mac to see if they wanted to purchase one of these computers instead of sending it back to the Apple store. No luck. Looks like I'm sending one back.

Too bad. :-)

So in the midst of all this, I'm working on two other clients sites while three new potential jobs came in via a few phone calls today. It was a CRAZY day.

In the middle of all THAT, I was making bread for our dinner tonight!!! I made two loaves of French bread to use in French toast! Oh my!!!!! It was fantastic.

At 5pm or so, I headed downstairs to start prepping to make dinner tonight. We were doing another breakfast meal. This time, custom-to-order omelets and the extra cool french toast! Wow was it good! ALL of it!!! Our friends came over with their baby boy at about 7pm and we had a nice evening talking while taking care of 5 small people. :-) It was nice. We showed off our new toy, the Mac Mini. It was a fun night.

After cleaning up, we got the kids in bed and I came up to write this.

The end. For now.

:-)

More, much more... later.

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

4-5-6

2006-04-05T10:45:00.000-04:00

Today is the 5th of April in the year 2006. 4-5-6. Neat.

The Mac Mini continues to be awesome. :-) We had fun playing with it last night, and the kids have enjoyed using it so far as well.

The crazyiest thing about the past 7 days or so? I have purchased two computers. Yes, 2. T-W-O. The Mac Mini which we had been planning for, and now a 20" iMac G5... which we had not been planning for. I was going to upgrade to a G5 tower because of the recent issues with my computer, when I noticed that for about $400 less, I could get the same computer (less processor power, and expandability, but more hard drive space and a 20" flat panel screen!) Seemed like a good deal to me - less money for a computer that should do just fine for several years (and will be a significant improvement over the current one, like, it won't just randomly shut off...

So, I bought it.

So now we have lots of computers in the house. I mean lots.

But each has a purpose. Well, mostly at least.

I played basketball this morning - two weeks after the big ankle sprain. Well, I didn't play - but I did go shoot around. That was nice.

Gotta get some web projects done today. More later...

[Posted from the Living Room on the PowerBook in Palmyra, NY.]

I Always Lose Track When A Computer Shows Up...

2006-04-04T21:50:00.000-04:00

Well it finally got here, and so I have been setting up a new member of the family. NO, we didn't have another baby... we got a new computer. :-)

Our Mac Mini came. Nuff said. Monday night was spent returning the TV we just got for a similarly priced (I mean within a few cents) one that had better connectors for our Mini. We also stopped at the Apple Store and KMart for some cables and connectors. By late Mon night we were in business!

Mostly. Today I spent a good chunk of time getting all the computers in snyc with each other. It's a fun little system. Perhaps I will detail it here sometime.

We watched the Knight Rider (our first Season purchase from iTunes) tonight. The Mac Mini is cool!

I worked on my books some more this afternoon. Got both covers done. Just waiting on the books to be proof read by my proof readers, and then I will submit to the publisher! Well, after I do the final layout! We're getting there...

Time for a snack...

[Posted from Jen's eMac in our Kitchen in Palmyra, NY.]

Weekend Review

2006-04-02T18:29:00.000-04:00

I forget where I left off, so, here's the whole weekend in review.

Friday we had to recover from a CRAZY Thursday. We were out late. Kids were tired. I was tired. And so was my ankle. I think it was Thursday morning that I woke up thinking, "Wow, that feels pretty good..." and then Friday morning when I wondered where the aspirin was. So Friday was a recovery day in many ways.

It was also a very frustrating day with the computer. It looks like I might be replacing my main computer after all. We had mostly decided not to, since we were planning to "upgrade" our van (to the bigger model, for the bigger family). Looks like we might have to do both.

While the strange power issue is happening with the old G4, I am experiencing a frustrating issue with the LaCie hard drive I bought. It just quit working. Right after I transfered a bunch of old files to an archives folder on there (and subsequently deleted them from my other hard drive. Ugh.) So, that's been annoying too since I am now using the PowerBook as an emergency back up, which limits its capacity. I am still hopeful I can salvage some of the data from that external drive. I will be calling LaCie in the morning.

So, yesterday was great also! We woke up to a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Walker! They came and we made and ate a late breakfast! It was a very nice time. I worked on my two books then while they hung out with the family. I completed the rough drafts of both books, so it was a very productive afternoon.

In the evening, we called up our friends the LaBarges and they came over around 9pm or so. They are late night folks!! :-) We hung out for a while and played a new game - LRC? (Left Right Center?) Fun dice and chips game. Quick and brainless. They hung around till 1am (on the new time, we set our clocks ahead just before they left) :-) They're great. :-)

This morning we all slept in till 10:30!!! Even Julia slept until 6:00 I think! So it was a pretty restful night on the night we lost an hour. That was nice.

We went for a walk after our late breakfast and ended up staying out for a couple hours I think! We walked first to the bank to get some cash. Then we went to the candy shop to visit our friends (the owners) the Thomases. We picked up some goodies (for us, as well as a gift or two) and then headed up to the coffee house for a few special treats while we played LRC. CLR? LCR? Whatever. We had a blast.

Afterwards we walked across the street to the furniture store. We need new kitchen table chairs. They are seriously falling apart. They were closed, but there were some people in the office, so we knocked. Turned out to be a guy we knew from Cross Creek (a local church). He let us in to shop if we'd like. That was nice. We found out they can probably fix our chairs, so we're going to go that (cheaper) route first (before buying a new table/chairs.) We'll take the chairs up tomorrow morning.

We spent the rest of the afternoon watching Superman IV, and eating Skyline Chili and just enjoying a nice relaxing day off. Might go outside again before the sun goes down. Nice day today.

Now I am posting a few blog thoughts while the boys play some Nintendo NES games. I'm glad they like those. :-)

More later...

[Posted from the BASEMENT on the PowerBook in Palmyra, NY.]

Computer Trouble Again?!

2006-03-31T22:03:00.000-05:00

You'd think I had a Windows computer or something!! (Just kidding.)

Remember that issue I had a little while ago, where my computer just shut down with no warning? Well, it came back. Yesterday, and then two times again today!!! Last time we attributed it to a possible faulty hard drive. I lost an old drive that had been making some noise. But, apparently (since that drive is gone now) that was not the case. My next best guess now is a problem in the power chain. The power supply, the logic board, or something like that. Whatever it is, it's annoying. BUT, it is VERY VERY COOL that I did not lose anything on the main hard drive in the computer.

So, I have been spending lots of hours rebuilding files and things that I lose when the computer shuts down. That's been my past two days.

That, and:

1) We got the kids photos at Sears Portrait studio last night
2) We went to the Apple store on both ends of that photo shoot :-)
3) Kids did great, so they got a treat. After the Apple store closed, we stopped at Friendly's on the way out for some ice cream. :-)

4) Slept in today (Cause I was up late last night watching Kingdom Of Heaven. Pretty good movie. Just crazy. Lots of killing. Over religious places and fervor. Crazy.)
5) Took Julia to the doctor today. New doctor place. That was fun.

We had a nice dinner, then Jen went to Staples to get ink cartridges. The four kids and I watched an A-Team with some ice cream. :-) Then we went to bed.

More tomorrow...

[Posted from the PowerBook in our bedroom in Palmyra, NY.]

Kids! Lots of Kids!

2006-03-30T10:48:00.000-05:00

Last night I got a call - around 4:15pm or so - from a friend who has three daughters. His youngest was having some trouble with an ear infection or two, and he needed to take her to the hospital. He wondered if we could take his other two daughters for the night, and I said we certainly could.

So, at 5:30 or so, the two girls arrive, having already eaten dinner. (At 5:30, we haven't even really thought about what we'll even be making for dinner...) :-) So now there are 6 kids in our house. Fun! We all got to having a good time, and Mrs. Campbell was going to head outside to play with everyone while I got dinner ready.

As I was about to do that, the phone rang. It was another friend from a couple blocks over who wanted to bring us some clothes for our kids. Very cool. So, she was going to head over with three of her four kids. In the mean time, our next door neighbors came outside, and their two kids joined our 5 who were outside (Julia was sleeping.) So, once the other friends arrived, we had 8 kids and 5 adults in our tiny little back yard! :-)

Fun! :-)

It was a nice night. And, our ear-infected little friend was ok as well. They got her some stronger medicine, and hopefully that will help.

Also yesterday I had some fun with an old Sega NHL Hockey game. You can create players in that game, so for a while I have had myself in the game - my created NHL persona is quite a player, really - and a friend from high school (Kevyn Adams) who really does play in the NHL (currently for the Carolina Hurricanes). (I enhanced his abilities a bit as well.) :-) Well, I got the crazy idea to reassmble the old Sabres teams I remember. So, I made trades to get Pierre Turgeon, Benoit Hogue, Christian Ruutu, Uwe Kruup, Phil Housley and a few other players who all formerly donned the Blue and Gold. Even cooler than that, I created players who had retired by 1996, when that game was made. I created guys like Mike Ramsey, Mike Foligno, Rick Vaive. Cool! So, after the kids went to bed, I had some fun playing with that for a while. :-)

The ankle continues to improve. I took some aspirin before bed last night and I'd say the swelling has significantly gone down. That's good.

I also just finished editing the content for the second book. I plan to write another chapter, and an introduction and some closing remarks. But other than that it's done! We're getting there!

Now I have to get to some other stuff.

More later...

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

Apple, Ankle, Another Angle

2006-03-29T15:18:00.000-05:00

Just a quick update for the everydayness of this blog.

I got word yesterday that the Apple store does not need my limited availability. :-) While that was sad in a way, it's also probably really good. I don't have the time for it right now, but I was going to suck it up cause I know I'd love it, and there's a great employee discount! :-)

My ankle is less bruised today, but still BIG. And big means it don't bend just right. And that means it's uncomfortable. And actually, right now it's sorta painful. So I am taking a break to elevate it while I work on my book.

I have mentioned my books. One is complete, and has been proof-read once, and is in the hands of the master proof reader now, our sister-in-law Connie. She is a master grammatician. So, I'm kinda scared to get it back, but it will be very well written once I make her suggested corrections. :-) My other book is going to be slightly more controversial... or not. I can't figure it out. It's essentially presenting the church from another angle. One that we all agree is true, but don't necessarily live out. I feel like people won't really disagree with what I am saying in the books, but will probably say they don't come to the same conclusions. But see... that's the different angle. I think we have a disconnect that we're not even noticing.

You'll have to read my book to know what I'm talking about. :-)

It will be called (Something like) "There's The Steeple... Here's The Church: Selected Thoughts on the Various Manifestations of The Church"

Something like that.

Stay tuned...

[Posted from the PowerBook in my comfy chair in the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

Almost Lunch Time

2006-03-28T12:50:00.000-05:00

I forgot how much stuff I do.

It was kinda nice for a little while to think that all I had to do was be a Dad. Now, don't get me wrong... there were times where I thought, "AAAAHHHHH!!!!!", or something to that effect. It can be overwhelming to take care of three tiny people all day long. With no breaks. Definitely. But it was nice to not be all of the things listed in my Newsvine header.

I got through all my emails yesterday. That was really cool. Had about 65 I needed to reply to. (That was already thinned out each night during the two weeks. The 65 were ones that took some time to reply to.) Got that done, and now today I have been making lists in between uploading and moving and renaming files for our Buffalo Bills podcast. There have been issues with the host over there, so I decided to move ALL of the shows to my basicmm.com host. It can handle it much better. So... thats done.

But that's where I'm noticing... the lists I am making continue to be quite spread out. Buffalo Bills Review, various web clients, my books, basic stuff, etc, etc. And don't forget that I applied for ANOTHER job at the Apple Store. Whoopeee! :-) Ha. I guess I just can't sit still, eh?

Well, it's time for lunch now. The afternoon will be filled with actually getting stuff done now! (Not just making lists or answering emails.) :-)

More tomorrow.

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

March, In A Nutshell

2006-03-27T11:30:00.000-05:00

I'm going to try and pick this up again. And, in order to do that, I figure a recap is in order.

March 12: We were sent home from the hospital (at our request) on Sunday afternoon, and had a nice day at home with the grandparents. Jen's parents and my parents were there to meet the baby and help out however they could. It was a great first day with Julia at home! But, we were tired at the end of it for sure!
March 13: Our niece Sammy's birthday (she's 14 today, and her cousin Julia is 2 days) :-) It was my first day of being fully responsible for three kids, a recovering wife and a house that really needed some help. Somehow we made it through - even with several errands to run. We even made our regular trip to the library... just, later than we hoped to! :-) Alex got to join the pre-school reading group that night. We were tired at the end of that day.
March 14: Ian had a piano lesson. The days are beginning to blur together. They are all a jumbled mess of kids, meals, laundry, taking meals up to Jen in bed and various and sundry errands. We also had some visits from friends, to see the new baby. I was tired at the end of this day.
March 15: I did not play basketball as I usually do on this Wednesday. I was too tired, and didn't really want to leave Jen alone with all the kids, even if they were all sleeping. So, I didn't go. But the kids and I went up to the gym after we all had breakfast. That was fun. We called Mr. Stupin to wish him a happy birthday, but found out that Mar 15 was the day he picked for JULIA to be born. Her birthday, not his. That was funny. We are also enjoying the new walkie talkies we got for easier communication with Mom. :-) It was a nice day, but I was pretty tired at the end of it.
March 16: My Dad's birthday. On his birthdays he's 25 years older than whatever I am. We called and wished him a happy birthday. Sent him a cool Amazon gift certificate too. We're so "e". :-) I really don't remember anything else about that day. I think we were just trying to survive still. :-) I do know that at the end of the day, I was quite tired.
March 17: St Patty's Day! We all wore green! It was great! Michigan State played their first (and last) tournament game that night. We watched on our neighbor's laptop, since it wasn't on TV, nor were they smart enough to use a CROSS PLATFORM VIDEO FORMAT. (That angered me.) It was also the first day Chill and Grill (our favorite local eatery) opened - so we went up there for lunch. It was Julia's first offcial outing. And, ours as a family of six. I got the one-pound hamburger. With everything. Wondrous. Such a great day. As I recall, though... I was still quite tired at the end of it. See, what I did that entire week was, take care of kids all day, then clean the house and do dishes, laundry, check my work emails, and other stuff I needed to do from about 11pm till 2 or 3 am. That made me tired.
March 18: Saturday. We did mostly the same routine... wake up, read the bible with the boys, get everyone dressed, get breakfast, clean up after breakfast, do some morning activity, a few household chores, get ready for lunch, eat lunch, clean up after lunch, do some quick thing before Kirstie takes a nap, me and the boys do something while Kirstie naps (it might have been a Superman movie - we watched Superman I, II, and III over the past week), get kirstie up, do something fun with everyone, get dinner ready, eat dinner, clean up after dinner, do some fun evening activity (sometimes Jen and Julia would join us at this point), 9pm head upstairs to get ready for bed (which might include bathtime/computer time), I'd get Kirstie dressed for bed, read her a book, then the boys and I would read something together, pray together, then I leave their room at 10pm. After that, I would check email for the day, answer anything I needed to, and then clean up the house before going to bed to do it again the next day! Crazy, eh?
March 19: According to my financial records, we went to Wegmans this day. Out shopping as a family. And since we were out near lunch time... we also ate at McDonalds. As I recall, that was fairly enjoyable. :-) Nothing really spectacular other than that on this day. I do recall that at the end of the day, I was tired. :-)
March 20: A friend of ours offered to take our kids while I got to take Jen out for lunch (along with Julia, of course) and get her out of her mom role for a time. That was nice. Except I was sick. Real bad. (That phrase made me think of Mr T for some reason...) We did have a nice lunch (other than that) at Wegmans Cafe. They have great subs. After lunch we got the kids, and went up to the Apple Store for fun. Kirstie had been asking to go all week. I'M SERIOUS. Every time we would go near our coats or shoes, she'd point outside and excitedly say, "APPLE!!!" She really likes the Apple Store. :-) So we went, and then came home and spent the rest of the day recovering from so much activity! Oh... we did get out to Chill and Grill, too, though. :-) I was VERY tired at the end of this day (I was also sick, so that's probably why I added the "very".)
March 21: Ian had another piano lesson this day. I was recovering from being sick. The two middle kids were sick. Not too bad, but definitely "off their game". I'm not really sure when but, somewhere in these two weeks, Chris and the Stupin girls came over for Skyline and the new VeggieTales video - I think it was this night. We'll just say it was. I went to bed that night not as tired as other nights - but still tired.
March 22: Ouch. I went to play basketball at 8am on this day and... sprained my ankle. Real bad. I pity the fool. It was quite swollen. And painful. So, I went to the hospital with the boys to see if it was broken. Not broken. That was good. But, it still hurt. Since we were in Canandaigua at the hospital, and it was lunch time, we went to Taco Bell to get some food (we don't have one close to us). And since we were there, we went to Aldis to get some groceries (we don't have one close to us.) That was quite a site. Dad with a freshly sprained ankle hobbling through the grocery store, loading up the cart and trying to verbally restrain to small boys. Spent the rest of the day icing it and elevating it. We watched a Superman movie. Actually, I think that's when we watched the first one. I slept for some ... no... most of it. :-) I was tired. OH! Funny part of the day was our friends were to bring us dinner - which was good timing with the ankle injury - but they FORGOT! Ha! :-) They ended up bringing it out (and I think making it!) late that night! It was quite alright... we had lots of other food... but it was definitely a funny story! :-)
March 23: A recovery day. An errand day. A full day. We also bought a new TV. It went in our living room. The TV that was there went up to our bedroom. The TV that was there went down to our basement, where the Nintendo NES and Sega Genesis systems are. That was a lot of stairs and carrying on a bum ankle. Jen thought I was dumb. (Perhaps I was, but it was a fun project.) :-) Our babysitter and friend Kristin Anderson brought us dinner that she cooked. She's 14 I think. Very nice. And... as I recall... I was quite tired at the end of that day.
March 24: My sister and her family came to visit. They have three girls who are 4 years old and younger. Needless to say, it was chaotic. But, we had a great time. Went to our local pizzeria with them - all 11 of us. Quite overwhelming, I am sure. And loud! Argh! :-) They left about 8pm, and I was tired, so we did not go to the hockey game I was hoping to go to with the kids. Instead, I took the three older kids to the local coffee shop - Coffee Creek. Nice place. We got some hot chocolate and chocolate chai and played Pass The Pigs and the Dukes of Hazzard card game. We had a blast. Then we went to sleep. :-)
March 25: Grandma Walker came over to make lots of food, and bring lots of food and she even kept the three older kids so Jen and I could go out shopping for MORE food. Oh my. It was a very nice day though. We watched some basketball and ate chicken pot pie. My ankle also continued to improve. I was also starting to get sad that my days with the kids would soon end. I think I was less tired at the end of this day.
March 26: Jen's brother Andy and family came to visit from Buffalo. They bought us pizza and wings (and a sub for Jen.) We watched some hoops and just chatted. Aunt Connie loves little babies, so she just held the baby. :-) We had a great time again, and when that was done, I recorded a Buffalo Bills Review. So I was up kinda late already - and decided to spend my last day away from the office by watching Pirates Of The Carribean, which I had borrowed weeks ago from a friend, but had not yet seen. Fun movie. But at the end of the day...

I was tired. :-)

So, now you're caught up... and I'll try and do this daily as was my original plan. When I came up with this idea, I wasn't counting on the COMPLETE change of life that the new baby (And me taking time to be Mr Mom) would have on me. It was all quite nice though - so, I'm not complaining. :-)

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

Whoa... This Is Quite a Glitch

2006-03-16T02:46:00.000-05:00

Well...

Not sure this can be called the "Everyday" blog anymore, eh?

I might get back to posting here, but can't hardly keep up with one blog these days. I am being Mr. Mom. Check out the main blog for a few more details.

[Posted from the Living Room couch on the PowerBook in Palmyra, NY.]

Julia Gayle

2006-03-11T13:14:00.000-05:00

All that you need to know about today is here.

[Posted from Crosswinds in Canandaigua, NY.]

Come Out, Come Out Wherever You Are!

2006-03-10T15:52:00.000-05:00

Still no baby. Jen's getting tired of telling people that I think. :-)

We went to the doctor today. A little progress, but not much. Doc says no way she's letting Jen go past next week though (the real due date is 3/17). I'd say we'll go here in the next couple days. But what do I know? :-)

Working on my book still. Actually, after careful thought, it is now TWO books. :-) Two 150-200 page books is better than one 350 page book, according to most experts. (I made that last part up.) So, one book will be much like my last one, A Journey Shared. We'll call that one Life In The Rear-View Mirror. The other book will be focused on the church, and what we have been pondering in that arena over the past year. No title just yet. Some ideas, but nothing solid.

Got to finish a few web things... who knows, might be going to the hospital today? (You can always hope...)

:-)

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]

No Baby Yet (is there any other appropriate title?)

2006-03-09T13:53:00.000-05:00

Really, I think that might be most of what we are thinking about at the moment in the Campbell household. :-)

So, no baby yet, but it's coming soon. I am taking some time today to try and finish my rough draft of the next book, and if I can do that, then the baby can come. Maybe that's what he's been waiting for... :-)

I slept in a bit today, in part due to some advice from my Dad, and in part due to two different dreams that I had last night that just made me question my recent priorities. So, I slept until the rest of the family awoke, and then went to work. It was nice.

We have been following with some interest a few evolution/creation debates at Newsvine, and now the response on a parenting forum to the EzzoTruth.com site that I was able to help get online. I am just fascinated at how people are so eager to squash opposing view points? Crazy. I posted an article to newsvine about that today. Check it out at my newsvine column.

I have to get working on my book!

More later...

[Posted from Coffee Creek in Palmyra, NY.]

Toe Surgery

2006-03-08T08:27:00.000-05:00

Well, I don't know if it qualifies for "surgery" but, yesterday I had a section of my toe nail removed from the big toe on my left foot. About an 1/8" section! I had an ingrown toe nail that had gotten quite irritated and now infected, and I could not reach it, so I found a podiatrist, and he injected me with some numbing stuff and in just about a minute, had removed all of the stuff casusing me toe pain.

He wrapped it up in a bandage, and gave me instructions for toe care over the next week or so (involving lots of soaking in cool water mixed with vinegar) and we were off. (In fact, as I type this to you, my foot is in cool water with vinegar...) :-)

We had a little less than an hour before the next appointment (wtih our dentist) so the boys and I headed over to the gym at Crosswinds to run around and play with the balls real quick. Our friend John Gallagher was there, so he and I chatted while the boys were busy being athletic. (Ian was hitting several of his shots from the free throw line... quite impressive!)

We headed out and got to the dentist at just the right time, and got our teeth cleaned - good as new! And then, as is our custom, we picked up the Velasquez girls (this time Ellie got to come, too) and headed to McDonalds for a Dentist Day lunch. :-) Let me tell you... this started when it was two older kids (Ian and Hannah), but now that it's me versus four kids, including a 3 and 4 year old... that's a different dynamic! :-) But it was fun! We're already looking forward to our date in September. :-)

The rest of the day seems like a blur for some reason. I am still inexplicably tired. Really. I have tried to get some sleep, but I am just worn out by the end of the days these days. (And I don't mean MY end of the days. I mean by 9:00 or 10:00pm!! I usually press on, but I am already tired by then.)

I continue to do analog to digital conversions. I did a couple more movies yesterday, and simultaneously, I have been converting the Preparation For Parenting audio tape series from the Ezzos to a digital format for our iPod on my G3. I told Jen yesterday that I could be regularly employing about 5 computers upstairs. I use two for web and graphic design (one to create, one to test) and one for video conversion, one for audio conversion, and I could probably use a Windows box for checking certain web pages I design (for compatibility with those of you who insist on using Internet Explorer for Windows XP. It is quite flawed, I tell you. Please check out FireFox. You will be much happier. (Even if you didn't know you weren't happy now.)

So, we don't have the money at the moment to get another computer, but I could definitely put it to work if we did. :-)

I think my foot has sufficiently soaked. Time to take a shower and start the day.

[Posted from the PowerBook in our Kitchen in Palmyra, NY.]

Absence

2006-03-07T07:57:00.000-05:00

I think the unprecedented absence from this blog should give you some insight into this season of our life. BUSY. And tired. Normal life continues to go on while Jen slows way down - growing more and more weary of carrying the baby on the inside - and I grow more and more weary from trying to prepare for taking two weeks off when the baby arrives. What I do is cram that two weeks worth of stuff into the week or two prior to the birth of the new baby. So, I end up living twice as many weeks in the short time leading up to the baby's arrival.

Not sure that's a smart thing to do.

But, the family needs me more, so I am doing a good deal more of the house work (though Jen is hangin in there! she just can't do a lot of it anymore!) The kids are a bit restless as Mom is no fun to play with anymore. :-) (Nor is it easy for her to help keep them disciplined during the day, so they do get a bit unruly...) And that's just added on top of my normal work load, and now I have taken on my book project (I am making progress there!)

Like I said... the absence in the blog world is a good indication of the activity in the real world. :-)

So today we're going to get fixed up. First, I have an appointment with a podiatrist to fix my toe. It's a "simple procedure" they assure me, but we'll see about that! Second, the boys and I have another dentist teeth cleaning appointment. We actually look forward to those. The boys love it, and I tolerate it. Then we take the Velasquez girls out for lunch at McDonalds after our appointment! (That's the fun part) :-)

So, I won't get to my office till about 1:30 today! That's not really going to help anything at all....

No baby yet - but we're only 10 days away from the due date, so we're really, REALLY close!! :-) :-)

OK, gotta go wake up the kiddos.

[Posted from the HOME OFFICE in Palmyra, NY.]