Isn't it a wonderful world! The sun is streaming into the house. My tummy is full of sausage and eggs.. and a lot of delicious Gevalia coffee. On the radio, I'm listening to the Diane Rheem Show interviewing a Duke University neurologist who has done experiments with rhesus monkeys that show that thoughts can create motion outside of the body! He has great hopes that his research will help trigger rehabilitation therapy (cures?) for victims of Parkinsons, and also for persons who suffer paralysis, and other neurological ailments. His name is Miguel Nicolelis and he has written a book that I can't wait to read: Beyond Boundaries.
A Beautiful Night, with no Hope for the Continuously Hopeless
Last night, my son and his beautiful wife treated Elaine and me to a great feast at the Texas Roadhouse. Steak and salmon and ribs.. done just the way we all wanted them to be cooked. Lots of peanuts to eat.. lots of peanut hulls on the floor. Lots of fun.
Of course, everyone had to put up with my weird antics. At one point, I was telling about my laptop recovery activity and as I showed them how I pushed down on the computer's F8 key, I, instead, pushed down on the edge of my fork and thrust it off into the stratosphere, much to the amazement and amusement of everyone in the vicinity. Luckily, nobody was stabbed.
In an attempt to regain my composure, I asked the waitress to bring me a frosty mug for my beer. (Apparently, I am the only person in the U.S. that doesn't drink their beer directly out of the bottle.) As I casually poured my beer into the mug, it overflowed before I could do Elaine's trick of sticking a finger in the froth to stop the flow. Now that I had inundated the table and napkins with Sam Adams Winter Ale, after conducting a physics experiment with my fork, everyone could relax and enjoy their meals.
Computer Stuff.. skip it if you don't give a damn
I am typing this on that laptop that I mentioned. I love the way it works for me.. usually. But it has this tendency to not recognise certain codes that are generated and passed from module to module. The first time this happened, I sent the laptop back to Dell and they returned it in workable condition.
A few months later, it happened again and I found that if I tried the reboot option 20 or more times, it would apparently say to itself: "The poor chump has given it 20 tries, lets give him a break this time," and the laptop would start working again. This happened a few times more.
After a year or so of quiescence, recently, it started its antics again. But this time, no matter how many times I tried to reboot, it still did not recognise the codes necessary to continue properly. So I tried any number of tests that could be done, including a 12 hour check of all memory and components, with no success. I even went into "command mode", but could not remember the DOS commands that would be of any help.
Finally, I began to concentrate on the computer's F8 key. I hoped that this would get me into what us old computer types call "Safe Mode", although I didn't know what that would do. I tried every combination of F8 pressure.. except one.. with no success. Finally, in exasperation, I tried the last resort.. I pressed the F8 key and held it down before and during the pressing of the restart button. It worked! Now I am back in business and can take a look at the 892 email messages that have built up while I was "computer-less."
OK.. OK.. for those who know me.. yes, I do have other computers. I have the desktop that I use as the base for my internal network, I have a small notebook computer, I have a clone of the first portable computer ever made, and I have two cracked screen laptops. They all work.
If you haven't heard the story of how one of the laptops got its cracked screen, let me know. It's a great story. I've told the story somewhere in one of my blogs.
Fly me to the Moon
My son and one of my sons-in-law showed me a remarkable feature on their DROIDs. Since I also have a DROID, I, of course, wanted that feature. Besides it is free. It's called GOOGLE SKY, and my wonderful relatives downloaded the APP (application) for me. Now, whenever I want to know what that bright light is way up there in the heavens, I can hold my DROID up, pointed to the object, and it will let me know if it is Jupiter, or Saturn, or the Moon, or Sky-Lab.
It also shows the outlines of the sky features, such as the Big Dipper (Ursa Major) or Cassiopeia. This is the fantastic product of an amazing computer programmer! How he or she did this bends my mind. I love it!
My hour is up.. see ya!
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