Sunday, October 5, 2008

Credit Cards, Cell Phones, Trojans, and Parting Gifts from Cats

Hi! Sure has been awhile hasn't it?

Where to begin...well my previous entry was me bitching about money and credit cards and cell phone bills. I'll start there...

Well, long story short the cards are maxed out and the phones were shut off. One card will not be renewed when it expires(d) so I moved it way down in priority. Another one I've fallen way behind in and it seems hopeless but I haven't lost hope yet. The rest I think I can catch up with as soon as things settle down. The cell phones were shut off, so I got me a prepaid with another carrier. Then I sent them an offer of a payment plan. After doing that they contacted me and we worked out a plan to get me caught up with the bill. Part of the deal was to convert our phones to prepaids, so we could keep our numbers until we could get turned back on. Well, of the 4 on the family share plan, one had gotten a prepaid a while back, and one switched to another family member's account. So I had four prepaid cell phones, gave Eric his phone back (so now he has 2 prepaids cuz he did what I did when we were shut off). So how I have three but am letting the one I bought run out, so I'll just have the two for awhile. My car loan is now paid off so having that money available will help, once I get back on track.

OK...boooooring.

Between 8 - 10 years ago one of my cats, Sam, got very sick and to make a long, sad story short he died. I felt bad because I couldn't afford to bring him to the vet but I don't think they really could have helped him. The thing is, I was feeling very bad about it. The next day I was at work...it was a Saturday and I was covering a "bazaar" (like a flea market) at my building. Well, of course, with everything going on I snapped out of my sadness but off and on I would remember and be down again. After the event, everybody was gone and I was getting ready to clean up. I almost stepped on something gold colored mixed in the debris so I picked it up and it was a pin - you know the kind with the back, I can't remember what they're called - it was a pin shaped like a cat, with wings and a halo. An angel cat. I felt like that was a sign and so I felt much better. Someone I told about it suggested it was a sign from Sam, maybe saying goodbye and that everythings cool.

Fast forward to almost a month ago, September 12 actually. The last hold-out from the family pet days, Raffi, at approximately 20 years old, passed away. Well, he was really the coolest cat I've ever known and I think a lot of people felt the same way, and many people liked him regardless if they thought he was the coolest. He earned a lot of love and respect over so many years. So for that reason, I sent out an email, informing select people of his passing and I inserted a picture of him (from his healthier days) in the email. I was sad of course, but felt he had lived a long and happy life.

Well, a couple days later, my friend - who I've only been back in touch with for a couple, maybe 3 years after about 20 years of no contact - and I, were chatting online and she said something like I lost that picture of Raffi, can you send it again?. Well, I knew she was up to something, she's very crafty and actually makes a living with crafts. Besides, she may have liked Raffi, but not enough to fret over a picture of him. lol. Oh yeah, actually she then told me she was going to make a keychain with his picture on it for me. Aww, I thought that was nice. She dropped by a couple days or so later with two keychains and two pins. Wow, they look great! Thank you Darlene. A few days later though, I remembered about Sam's pin. She never knew the story about Sam. I love coincidences...it was a coincidence...right? Makes me wonder...

I spent most of this weekend researching and learning how to eliminate the trojans I was bombarded with. No...get your mind out of the gutter. The computer virus kinda trojans. That sucked. I kept getting false virus alerts, not just on the www but on my computer (offline). So even though they were fake virus alerts, they were telling me the truth. Kind of ironic. It got me to download (but was suspicious enough by then not to install) an antivirus presumably to solve the problem, when the antivirus actually WAS a virus (or more trojans - I'm genaralizing here). I finally found a write-up from someone at AVG's message boards that was very helpful. After running a bazillion scans from a bazillion scanners, it was more than one trojan...several I think. All seems to be well now though. Yaaay! I have to go back to that article and thank the author.

Well, I guess that's enough for now. Peace!

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Stimulus Shmimulus

Economic Stimulus my ass. I used mine to pay my credit card down a little because I used my credit card to stimulate the gas company's economy. Now I've run the CC up again buying more gas - oh and paying our cell phone bills. Now I have a cell phone bill that's overdue but I don't have the ability to pay it, so I'm thinking once again of shutting the fucking things off...or rather, letting the company shut them off and me not paying the $15 per line to turn them back on again after paying the bill if I do.
There's your fucking economic stimulus!
As for gas, I have been thinking of getting a motorcycle - but of course, that costs money too. I'll be paying my car loan off soon so I might be able to get financing, but since I'm overextended with credit cards, there's also a chance I might not.
Stupid fucking world we live in. I'm about to give up.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

RIP Garfield - a question and warning for aquarium owners

So I'm sitting here at the computer Saturday night and I hear a strange sound and the lights go dim for a second. Since I was editing a video I quickly saved my project, thankful that the power didn't just go out completely and so I had the chance to save it. Then I went to investigate. \
In the hall the first thing I saw was Garfield, my Corydora catfish upside down in the fish tank and there was a slight electrical smell. Then I noticed the filter wasn't running. I unplugged the heater and filter and planned to investigate further in awhile. After doing so I saw the two neons swimming around.
Later, it dawned on me that the filter has no electrical parts in the water so it must be the heater. Looking in the tank I could see a crack in it right down the front. When I went to pull it out of the water it broke right in half.
This cory was the biggest one I'd ever seen, probably close to 3 inches long. I've had him/her a long time. So that's sad, at least for the fact that it didn't end up being old age that killed him.
I don't know why the heater went poof, other than it took in water obviously. I do know that a couple days before that, I had my hands in the water, cleaning the glass and stuff (no, I went nowhere near the heater). That kind of scares me. I don't know if I'll get a heater for a fish tank again, but if I do, I guess I'll just unplug it before I work in the water. I assume this could have been bad...anybody know more about this kind of thing?
Summer is almost here so I guess the water will stay warm enough for the neons while I think about it.
I guess they've been recharged. :)
TTFN

Saturday, April 19, 2008

Camera


Well, I backed off a bit from the DSLR (EOS Digital Rebel). Why? Bills bills bills! But that's ok for now. I got a Canon S5IS and am happy with it so far. I was leary of a couple things at first but upon further reading into the manual I got at least one of them figured out and so I guess that will happen here and there until I get it all figured out.
Here are some of the pics I took testing it out. I did do some minor post-processing and of course, resized them. I think I'm going to enjoy this camera.


Some tree that grows like a weed out back. Very pretty this time of year though. This is one of the few that I let continue to grow.

Sage

Birdhouse. Duh. lol

I had pizza for supper. Buffalo Chicken. Mmmmm.
So there's a few. There will be more but right now I'm just playing around and getting to know my new camera.
I'd be interested in knowing if anyone reads my blogs. I don't think anyone does anymore. Please take a moment and leave a message so I'll know. Thanks. TTFN.
~dswv~

Friday, January 4, 2008

A new picture

Click the pic for my MySpace picture albums.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

January Tooth, Toothousand-Eight - Dreaming is Free

Waynes new camera
Lately I've been obsessing about a new camera. I get all excited thinking about it as if it's absolutely going to happen, but of course it's not written in stone. I feel it's time though. Before I went digital, my film cameras were (are) SLR's and now it's time for me to get back to that, only in digital. I have my eye on a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTi, but as I research, that could change too. That's what I'm leaning toward though. It doesn't do video but I'm not sure any of them do. Also I found out the LCD is only for viewing pics you've taken, not for when you're actually taking one. But that's a minor thing I think I could get used to. Those are the only cons I've seen so far. Anybody have one or know someone who does?
Well Happy New Year everyone (like anyone reads these blogs. lol). There will be a lot of positive changes this year. That's my prediction...oh ok, it's my wish. Let's hope it comes true though.
I'm taking a week off from work next week. No special plans yet. I hope for one thing, to get my Hell hole cleaned up and bring it's status at least up to Heck hole. Maybe even better.
Went to the beach this past weekend. It was nice weather for Dec. 29. It gets dark so early these days. I took some pictures but I want to fix them up a little before I upload them. Oops I just looked and I already did upload them. So keep in mind some of them might need some fixing up...unless I already did that too. I don't remember. Now you see why I'm taking a vacation next week. lol. I do remember I deleted a lot of bad ones. Here's the album  (Thanks again Fotki. You really suck! ed; 7/21/2013). Check out all my pics there if you want.
Well, TTFN. Keep on rockin'!