Great McCain Photo

Check out this great post-debate photo of John McCain and Barack Obama. Does anyone feel like creating a caption for this photo? You can put one in the comments section if you would like.

Justin Timberlake Wants You to Vote In the Box

While not endorsing any particular candidate (unless you bother to check out his backdrop), Justin Timberlake would like you all to go out and vote in the box.

I have to admit that this video did remind me of another song Justin Timberlake sang about something in a box.

UPDATE: The video above appears to no longer be available. Perhaps the connection to the second video I linked to made it unsuitable to be on Obama's YouTube site.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Someone has reposted the Vote In the Box video, so the video player above should work once again.

Hate

Wow! This piece shows some of the extreme hatred that some McCain supporters show for Barack Obama.

The Last Presidential Debate

I was actually able to sit through the third presidential debate after finding the first two to be absolutely unwatchable, and quite boring! I thought both Barack Obama and John McCain came out of this debate without looking too bad. Of course, the debate did little to change my decision to vote for Obama on November 4.

While McCain tried to attack Obama on his "associations" during the debate, I felt that Obama's reply, explaining them, was very good. Hopefully Obama made this a non-issue for the remainder of the campaign, although I doubt that will be the case.

I found McCain's reaction to Obama saying that "Joe the Plumber" would pay zero fines if he did not provide health insurance for his employees to be priceless.

I think McCain has some good ideas, not enough to get me to vote for him though, but he also expressed an idea that I found a bit irritating. At about an hour and eighteen minutes in the debate, while discussing education and how crappy American schools are doing at educating children, in his opinion anyway, McCain said, "We need to encourage programs such as Teach for America and Troops to Teachers where people, after having served in the military, can go right to teaching and not have to take these examinations which -- or have the certification that some are required in some states." So, McCain's plan to improve education is to hire teachers who are not certified in the areas in which they will be teaching. I am sure these programs have done some good, but to think someone can be a good teacher simply because he or she served in the military is ludicrous!

He's an Arab, Don't Cha Know?

It seems that many people actually believe that Barrack Obama is an Arab, not that there's anything wrong with that. This includes Gayle Quinnell of Shakopee, Minnesota, who got lots of information at the library about Obama, including the "fact" that he is Arab. She even let John McCain know that his opponent is an Arab at a recent rally in Lakeville, Minnesota. In his defense, though, John McCain did correct Quinnell, incidating that Obama is not Arab, that he is "He's a decent family man." Hmmm, I didn't realize that the two were mutually exclusive.

Shameless

I saw this commercial from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee on TV last night. It attacks Minnesota Senator Norm Coleman on a couple of fronts. First, it alludes to the possibility that the suits he wears may have been a gift from a local businessman. And secondly, it points out the hypocrisy of his pledging to stop campaign attack ads since practically all of his ads to this point have been attack ads. I suppose he is doing this in an attempt to look good.

I suppose the reason for his calling attention to the stopping of the attack ads might be due to the recent publicity that one of Coleman's ads attacking DFL opponent Al Franken used a story Franken was telling about Paul Wellstone to make Franken look angry.

Happy Columbus Day 2008!

I hope everyone had a happy Columbus Day. I actually took part of the day off from work, not to celebrate today's "holiday," but to watch Emma since her daycare was closed for staff development today. The two of us had fun. We started the day at the Saturn dealership getting the SUV serviced. Then Emma got a haircut, although Mel tells me that I didn't get enough cut off. I guess her next haircut will come earlier than we had hoped for. After that, Emma and I went to the Lookout Ridge indoor playground in Woodbury since it was raining outside. Emma had fun playing there, but she seemed scared of the tube slides and of some of the other features. Maybe in six months or so, it will be somewhere more suitable for her to play. While Emma napped after lunch I was able to get some work done so I did not have to use a whole vacation day.

This past weekend, we found ourselves back in Cedar Rapids. A former coworker of Mel's was getting married. Their wedding had originally been scheduled for June 14 at Saint Patrick's Catholic Church in Cedar Rapids. As you may remember, that was at the height of this past summer's record-setting flooding in Cedar Rapids. The wedding ceremony had to be postponed. They actually got married on that date, in a very small ceremony, so we actually attended a blessing of their marriage. It had to be held at a different church, since Saint Pat's was damaged in the floods and won't be ready for quite some time yet.

The ceremony was nice, and not too long. We also had fun at the reception, although I managed to eat way too much. And because we got to sleep late the night before since Emma refused to go to sleep at a reasonable hour, we were tired and therefore left the reception at 8:30 to retire to our room.

Emma stayed at my mother's house for the weekend, and both my mom and Emma seemed to have a lot of fun.

Patriotic Drunk Redneck, Part 2

Here's more of the patriotic drunk redneck woman I posted a video of yesterday. She is still ranting on about how Barack Hussein Obama is an Arab, saying that while we are at war with Iraq and Iran (Hmm, I didn't realize we were at war with Iran. I guess this woman knows something I don't know.) we shouldn't elect someone from there as president. I may not be Obama's personal biographer, but I do not believe that he is from either Iraq nor Iran, nor has he ever lived there. Oh, and she claims that Obama's father is from somewhere around Saudi Arabia

She goes on to say that electing Barack Obama as president would be similar to us doing something such as hiring the Japanese president (Do they even have a president?) to be our president when WE (the United States) bombed Pearl Harbor! This woman should probably brush up on her history, as well as a little geography before she decides to show her ignorance before the videographer's camera.

Oh, and I like how she tries to get the dog to drink her beer.

The McCain-Palin Mob

In this video, people were interviewed outside a Sarah Palin rally in Strongville, Ohio, about their knowledge of Sarah Palin and whether they think that Barack Obama is a terrorist. I found it really scary the number of people, such as someone identifying herself as Mindy Green, who think that Obama is a terrorist simply because of his name. Ludicrous! And then there is the woman who thinks that there have been a lot more interviews with Sarah Palin then there has been with Barack Obama.

For All You Lab Techs Out There

Do you work in a lab and are tired of pipetting? Maybe you should put down your pipette and try epMotion. This music video states the benefits of epMotion.

OMG!

I caught this video online today about some drunk redneck woman from Kentucky talking about that "Arab" Barack Hussein Obama. She rambles on for over three minutes about how we shouldn't want someone with the name Barack Hussein Obama as president. Although to be fair, despite what one of her companions on the ATV says, her dislike for Obama has nothing to do with his being black. By the way, she was for Hillary Clinton. I just can't believe that there are people like this in this country! If she weren't serious about what she was talking about, this could be funny. I only hope that come November 4, she is too drunk to hop on her four-wheeler to make her way to vote.

Apple Orchard

Last weekend, Mel's parents came to visit. While they we were here, we all went to McDougall's Apple Junction to pick out some pumpkins to carve for jack-o'-lanterns. We had a good time looking around. We ended up buying two pumpkins with a combined weight of 41 pounds. If only we had know we would get such big pumpkins, we probably would have grabbed a wagon with which to haul them back to the car before we ventured down to the pumpkin patch.

Luke's Parental Advisory

Since discovering Luther Campbell's new reality show, Luke's Parental Advisory, on VH1 yesterday, I have had the opportunity to view the first three episodes of the series. As I wrote yesterday, the series follows the daily life of former 2 Live Crew lead Luke as he raises his 17-year-old daughter and 15-year-old son, as well as preparing for his wedding and running his adult entertainment business.

The first episode basically just set up the premise for the series, which I wrote about in the previous paragraph. In the second episode, Luther finds out that his daughter, Lacresha, is going to have a party at his house. He learns this when his son, Luther Jr., snitches on his sister. Once Luuther learns of the party, he is going to have Lacresha un-invite everyone, but he relents and decides to let her go ahead with the party. Of course, Luther cancels his plans to be out of town so he can be at home to supervise. Luther discovers that the party seems kind of lame, so he tries to liven things up by playing some of his own music, much to Lacresha's embarrassment. None of the guests seem to care for the music, except for one boy who eventually gets out and dances to tunes such as the song "I Wanna Rock" from his solo album I Got S**t On My Mind. He then ends the party, causing everyone to leave earlier than Lacresha would have wanted. Later on in the episode, he comes home to find Lacresha and her "boyfriend," as well as another couple, in the hot tub. He decided that he should invite the boyfriend to a family get together at which Lacresha's relatives grill him about his intentions toward Lacresha.

In the third episode, Luther thinks that his 15-year-old son, Luther Jr., does not know how to talk to girls. So he begins by calling up a woman he knows on the phone then having Luther Jr. talk to her. That does not go well. So next, Luther takes his son to a bowling alley where he really finds out that Luther Jr. has no clue about talking to girls. It was at this point when Luther comes up with a plan. He has Luther Jr. carry one of the walkie-talkies his security guards use, wearing an earpiece. Luther can then give his son advice as to what to say from a distance. They go to Gameworks to try out the plan. Luther gets caught early on when one of the girls Luther Jr. is talking to asks why the guy in red, who Luther Jr. has identified as his dad, has a walkie-talkie. Later on, Luther Jr. talks to a couple of girls playing basketball, and does a bit better. Finally, Luther Jr. goes to a table with a couple of girls and talks to them, abandoning the script that his father gave him. He does well nonetheless, and even gets their phone numbers. Luther then tells his son that he has passed. All of this seemed to have the effect of boosting Luther Jr.'s confidence in talking with girls. At the end of the episode, Luther Jr. is outside playing with a couple of friends when he sees a couple of girls approaching walking a dog. He ends up going up to them and striking up a conversation.

Luther Campbell seems to be doing a fairly decent job of raising his kids, despite the fact that he seems to employ a bit of a double standard in their relationships. In one of the episodes, I do not remember which, Luther's fiancée finds a porn video in Luther Jr.'s room. When Luther discusses this with his son, and the son tries to use the excuse that it is what Luther does for a living, Luther comes back with the comment that what he produces is for adults, not for children, and his son can view these types of materials when he is older, but not now. Luther does separate his business life from his home life. His house is not full of strippers pole dancing.

So, while Luke's Parental Advisory is definitely not a TV show that is going to have any major cultural impact, I have found the first three episodes to be somewhat entertaining, and I will probably continue to watch it.

A Public Service Announcement

Those of you who have read my blog for some time, or who know me personally, know that I am a fan of "Weird Al" Yankovic. Well, within this morning I got an email from Mr. Yankovic himself informing me that he has a new single that is available for sale on iTunes. The song is titled "Whatever You Like" and is a parody of the song "Whatever You Like" by hip hop artist T.I. In T.I.'s original song, he talks about giving his girlfriend, or maybe it's just some girl he wants to hook up with, whatever she wants. Of course, he talks about giving her all sorts of extravagances. The Weird Al song is also about providing his female companion with whatever she wants, however the items he suggests take into account the current situation of the economy. They include such things as going out to dinner anywhere she pleases such as Burger King or Mickey D's, staying home and playing board games, splurging for the triple-ply toilet paper, and even buying day-old bagels.

I had not heard the T.I. song before listening to Weird Al's parody. I managed to find it on YouTube. I have to admit that listening to the original version of the song made me enjoy the parody even more.

WTF?

While watching a news story on the FOXNews website today, I learned that Luther Campbell, aka Luke Skyywalker, the former lead singer of 2 Live Crew has a reality show on VH1 called Luke's Parental Advisory. The show follows Mr. Campbell as he runs his business and plans his wedding, all while dealing with raising two teenage children.

Here's a clip of Luther Campbell on FOXNews's Red Eye.

By the way, full episodes of Luke's Parental Advisory are available for viewing on the VH1 website.

Enjoy These Clips

I don't have much time for original blogging today, so please enjoy these two video clips until I write something of substance.

The first gives John McCain's view on campaign attack ads, which he is focusing on at this point.

The second is some video of Sarah Palin from Late Night with David Letterman.

Credit Card Dispute

This morning I called one of my credit card companies to dispute a couple of charges. This is the first time I have ever had to dispute a charge. In August, I got a call from one of the major newspapers in the Minneapolis/Saint Paul area asking me if I would like to subscribe. I decided to go with their Thursday, Friday, Sunday subscription. After a couple of weeks, I still had not received any newspapers from them. I called the paper at the beginning of September to inquire about my subscription only to discover that they had no record of me. I was asked to fax to them a copy of the credit card statement that showed the charges. I did so and did not hear from them again. So on Monday of this week, I called again and eventually was told that they would have to send the issue to their accounting department as they had no record of the transaction or of me as a customer. I still have not heard back from them, nor have I received a newspaper. Because of this, I decided to call my credit card company to dispute the two charges; the newspaper charged my credit card, not once, but twice! My credit card company will be crediting the amounts to my bill and sending me the necessary paperwork. I do not think that the newspaper with which I was dealing can really stop the charges from being reversed as they have said themselves that they have no record of dealing with me. Needless to say, if I decided to subscribe to a newspaper here, it will not be the one with which I have had these issues!

Happy Rosh Hashanah

Ok, so Rosh Hashanah ended at sundown yesterday, but I thought I would share a Rosh Hashanah greeting from the presidential and vice presidential candidates with you.

1,000th Post

I began this blog on August 18, 2004, and in that time I have written 999 blog entries prior to this one. And now, for my one thousandth blog posting I thought I would share with you this video. For quite some time now, I have been convinced that I would be voting for Barack Obama this November. However, this video gave me several compelling reasons to switch my vote to John McCain.

Neighbors, Part 1

When we lived in Cedar Rapids, we lived in a terrific neighborhood. Everyone was really nice and looked out for each other. The neighborhood we live in now seems nice as well. It has been fairly quiet.

Last Saturday morning, before we left for the Renaissance Festival, I heard the noise from power tools coming from the yard behind ours. That yard had a small, homemade, wooden play structure in it, so I figured that they were adding on to it. Sunday morning, I discovered I was wrong. It looks like the neighbors behind us are adding a two-story structure to the rear of their back yard. From what I can see over the fence from our yard, I am guessing that they are going to use the ground floor of this structure as a garage or something of that kind. I am not sure what the top floor will be used for. I guess the view from the rear of our house will be forever changed.

Funny Commercials

I saw a link to one of these three commercials a few weeks ago. They are ads for Caterer.com, a hospitality job website in the UK. These are pretty funny, but may not be appropriate for work. The kid in the ads, Little Gordon, is supposed to be a child version of chef Gordon Ramsay.

One of My Fish Is Missing

This past weekend, when I was cleaning the aquarium, I noticed that I was missing a fish. I do not recall what type of fish it was, and somehow I forgot to mention it in my blog entry on August 15 when I mentioned the new fish. It was sliver with a slight bluish tint and had black vertical stripes.

Anyway, I figured the fish was in trouble when I got back from my business trip at the beginning of this month and noticed that the back half of the fish had turned a black color. Over the next couple of weeks, the fish turned black over more of its body. Then when I cleaned the tank last Friday, I could not find the fish at all. I looked in all of the aquarium decorations, but it was nowhere to be found. I can only assume that it died and was then consumed by the other fish in the aquarium.

The remaining fish, which number seven with the addition of a plecostomus earlier this month, all appear to be doing fine. Well there is one exception to that statement. The bottom fin of one of my three tiger barbs appears to have been nibbled on by another fish. That does give the tiger barb some difficulty in swimming, but it seems to be surviving anyway.

Fun Weekend

We had a fun, and busy, weekend! It all started Friday night when Mel, Emma, and I went to the Mall of America to do a little shopping and for dinner. Emma needed a few more pairs of long pants, and we had a coupon for Carter's, so we got her a few pairs of pants there. Afterwards, we went to the Rainforest Cafe for dinner. I thought the food was a bit pricey for what it was. I guess we were paying for the atmosphere. And my sandwich was good, but not great. I thought it needed more sauce on it.

On Saturday, my sister came over to ride with us to the Minnesota Renaissance Festival. We only live less than ten miles from her, but we hadn't seen her for quite some time. Anyway, we had an enjoyable time. Even Emma seemed to enjoy herself. We saw several performances--mostly comedy acts and then the jousting as well. A couple of the comedy groups we saw were The Mud Show and Puke and Snot. Both shows were good, but I thought Puke and Snot was hilarious, although I was surprised at how many of their jokes dealt with politics. It was funny nonetheless!

As if seeing my sister on Saturday was not enough, we got together with her again yesterday to go to the Minnesota Twins game. That was a fun game to go to. The Twins beat the Kansas City Royals to maintain their half game lead in the American League Central division. Now if the Chicago White Sox lose to the Detroit Lions in their makeup game today, the Twins will have the division title and head to the playoffs. Of course if the White Sox win, then they will have to play the Twins in a one game playoff for the title. Hopefully it doesn't come down to that.

Seriously?

I can't believe that Sarah Palin, who could possibly become the President of the United States some time in the next four years actually believes that Alaska's close proximity to Russia translates into foreign policy experience. Give me a break!

I Spoke Too Soon

I guess the bailout plan has hit a few bumps, so unless there is an agreement and if McCain follows through on his word, there may be no debate tonight. Seriously though, can't McCain take a few hours off this evening to fly his private jet to Mississippi for the debate?

Let the Campaigning Resume...

Now that there's a plan, it looks like the campaign may be back on schedule.

A Publicity Stunt?

Yesterday John McCain announced that he is going to suspend his presidential campaign because he needed to head back to Washington to work on the Wall Street bailout. I agree that both he and Barack Obama should be doing their actual jobs as members of the United States Senate while campaigning for president, but does McCain really need to suspend his campaign so he can work on something else? I understand cancelling any appearances to get back to Washington, but then cancelling one TV appearance for another seems a bit dishonest of him. And why is it that he feels the need to suspend his TV advertising? It's not as if he can not be working hard on the bailout plan while his TV commercials are still airing! Does he not have any staff to work on such things?

Then for the issue of tomorrow's scheduled debate between McCain and Obama. I do not know why the two can not work on legislation during the day, then head to Mississippi in the afternoon for the debate. From what I've read, McCain wants to push the debate back to October 2, the scheduled date for the debate between vice presidential candidates Joe Biden and Sarah Palin, if the bailout plan is not approved by tomorrow. I don't suppose he is trying to keep that debate from taking place so he can avoid the public seeing Biden wipe the floor with Palin.

Oh well, there are just forty days of campaigning left until the election. Actually I suppose there are fewer since McCain isn't campaigning at the moment.

For your viewing pleasure, here's David Letterman's reaction to John McCain's suspension of his campaign.

Last Weekend

It's been a while since I have blogged anything of any substance. I've mostly resorted to posting videos lately. Part of that is because I haven't had much to blog about, but also I have been both busy and lazy. Anyway, I meant to blog about the weekend some time on Monday, but I just didn't get to it.

Our weekend was quite full of activities. On Saturday, we all went to Mel's grandmother's house to help with the painting of the house's exterior. We hadn't seen Mel's parents in a while, so it was good to see them. The painting wasn't too bad either, even though painting exteriors of houses is not among my favorite things to do. It does make me glad that we have vinyl siding on our house now. However, the trim will need to be repainted some time soon, but that's not as bad as painting the entire house.

On Sunday, we went to the Minnesota Zoo with my mother. We had a good time checking out the animals there, although we did skip a couple of sections of the zoo.

This coming weekend will be full again as we are going to the Minnesota Renaissance Festival with my sister on Saturday, and then on Sunday we are going to a Twins game with my sister as well.

John McCain's Economic Plan for a Struggling Nation

From America's Finest News Source, here is McCain's economic plan for the nation:

Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day Everyone!

Ahoy me hearties, today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. The video below from the founders of this fins holiday gives some tips on how to talk like a pirate.

My Sarah Palin Baby Name

My sister sent me a link a website which determines what your name would be had you been born to Sarah Palin, and according to the website, my name would be Drill Swollen Palin.

To the Doctor

This past weekend, actually since Friday, I have been feeling like crap! At first I thought I just had a cold, but I seemed to be missing some typical cold symptoms, and my throat hurt much more than it normally does when I have a cold. So after seeing that I had a fever of slightly over 100 degrees Fahrenheit Sunday night, Mel told me that I needed to see a doctor the next day. I haven't bothered to find a doctor yet since moving to Minnesota, so I wanted to find a clinic where I could just walk in without an appointment. After doing some searching on my health insurance manager's website, I found that there was a walk-in medical clinic at one of the grocery stores which is located near our house. I was a bit apprehensive at first about going to the grocery store to see a doctor, but I was impressed with the service I received. There was no waiting, and both the nurse and doctor were very professional and friendly. Within half an hour of arriving I left with a prescription and knowing that I have both an ear infection and a sinus infection. Hopefully I feel better soon.

Trip to the Aquarium

Yesterday we took a trip to the Mall of America to visit the Underwater Adventures Aquarium, the world's largest underwater aquarium. We had a good time. Emma seemed especially pleased with out choice to go there. She enjoyed looking at all of the fish and turtles before we entered the tunnel. When we were in the tunnel, she was really excited by all of the fish swimming around us.

After touring the aquarium, we strolled around the first floor of the mall. It was very crowded as there was a scapbooking event taking place all around the first floor. That also explained why parking was such a pain. We had to go all the way to the top of the parking ramp. Despite those issues though, we had a good afternoon out.

Pigs and Lipstick

I guess the big news of the day was Barack Obama's recent use of the expression "you can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig." At least you would think this was big news if you looked at the Fox News website, which has had something related to the story at the top of its page the entire day, or if you asked the McCain campaign. So Obama used this common expression, and because Sarah Palin made a joke in her speech at the RNC about the difference between a pit bull and a hockey mom being that the hockey mom wears lipstick, the right wingers are saying that Obama called Palin a pig. He did not call her a pig. His comment was in reference to the idea that a McCain presidency would be the same as the past eight years of George W. Bush's presidency. Besides, I guess Sarah Palin thinks that she's a dog, afterall the only difference between her and a pit bull is the lipstick. Does that mean she goes out into the yard to take a crap?

Oh, and Obama isn't the only politician to use this expression recently.

At least one prominent Republican doesn't think the lipstick-on-a-pig remark is a big deal. Here's Mike Huckabee discussing this issue with Sean Hannity.

New iPods

I have had a second generation iPod nano since November 2005. Since that time, I have listened to it for most of the workday almost every workday. This changed when I started working from home in July as I can now listen to my music directly through iTunes using my computer's speakers instead of the earphones. However, I still like to use my iPod when travelling for work or while driving in the car. Unfortunately, the battery life on my nano has decreased significantly. It's now to the point where I am lucky to get even five hours of listening time out of it.

Recently, I have been considering my options. While I could send it into Apple for a battery replacement, I could go ahead and spend a little more money and just get a new iPod. My birthday is coming up next month, so I may get some money as gifts with which I could make such a purchase. I had been thinking that the iPod classic would be the way to go as its 120 GB (about 30,000 songs) capacity would enable it to hold my entire music collection with plenty of room to spare. However, while that would be great, I do like the small size of the nano. It's small enough to fit in my pocket.

Well today I discovered that Apple has released a fourth generation iPod nano, the nano-chromatic. Not only does this nano have improved battery life, a bigger display than my nano, and a greater storage capacity of 16 GB, four times that of my nano. It also comes in nine different colors, looks awesome, plays video (which mine does not), and is less expensive than the iPod classic. While I do not know yet if I will go ahead and replace my iPod nano with a new iPod, it looks like I will have more options to choose from.

Primary Election Day

Today is primary election day in Minnesota, and on our way to her daycare, Emma and I stopped to vote. Well, I voted, she watched and helped to push the ballot into the machine. This was my first time voting in Minnesota. When I registered to vote a month ago, I was a bit confused since the voter registration form did not include a space to indicate party affiliation. I was wondering how this would work for the primary election as every other state in which I have lived asked for a party when registering. Well here everyone gets the same ballot. One side has the partisan elections in which the candidates are listed in three separate columns, one for each party - Independence (former governor Jesse Ventura's party), Republican, Democrat-Farmer-Labor. I could choose any one column in which to vote. Now it is less than two months until the general election. I wonder if the attack ads between Norm Coleman and Al Franken will heat up even more if Franken wins the DFL nomination. At least there are less than two months until the general election.

Livening Up the RNC

This certainly would have made John McCain's speech at the Republican National Convention in Saint Paul more interesting...

RNC

I flew out of the Minneapolis - St. Paul Airport to get to Chicago for a week of meetings for work. With the Republican National Convention being in Saint Paul this week, all of the stores were well prepared for an influx of GOP members. Most of the stores were decked out with signs welcoming the Republicans to town, and as I walked through the mall area of the airport, I felt completely surrounded by Republican and McCain/Palin swag. They had T-shirts, polo shirts, water bottles, and even red, white, and blue, stuffed elephants. Ugh.

Anyway after dinner tonight I returned to the hotel and caught Joe Lieberman's speech at the RNC. I have to say that I found the speech much less than inspiring. He kept harping on the theme of putting our country ahead of our political party. That all sounds good and fine, but John McCain and Sarah Palin's view of what this country should be does not fit with my view. Anyway, I suppose that nothing I could possibly hear in the RNC coverage would change my mind about my support for Barack Obama in November's election. If anything, McCain's pick for his vice presidential running mate has only cemented my decision to vote for Obama in just over two months.

Heading to Chicago

I'm about to take off for a business trip in Chicago for the remainder of the week. As I depart, here's a video of the grizzly bears at the Minnesota Zoo that I shot Sunday while Emma, Mel, and I were there. I'll try to find some time to blog once I make it to the Windy City.

Go Miniman Go

Here's a short video celebrating the 30th birthday of the LEGO miniman.

Fox News Covers Protesters in Denver

Apparently some of the protesters at the Democratic National Convention in Denver do not care for Fox News, and they have no problems with letting them know it.

Sold!

As of last Friday afternoon, we are the proud owners of just one house with the sale of our house in Cedar Rapids closing around 5:30 that day. It actually came pretty close to not closing as I got a call from our Realtor early in the afternoon. Apparently there had been a disconnect in how we and our Realtor read the purchase agreement and how the buyers and their agent intended for it to be understood. It turned out that the buyers thought they were getting $4,000 more from us for closing costs and down payment assistance than we thought we were providing. Eventually everything got worked out, although we did up contributing a bit more money than we had originally anticipated. I am just glad that the sale was completed before we will have to make another house payment. I didn't care for the idea of making two different house payments for a second month.

With everything we put into our house in Cedar Rapids, I hope the new owners manage to take care of it. I especially hope they don't lose the house to foreclosure. That could hurt the neighborhood, and we had some terrific neighbors there on Sheridan Drive in Cedar Rapids. I am concerned though because the buyers were participating in a down payment assistance program in which we, the sellers, provided some of the money for their down payment. If they didn't have the money for the down payment, I don't know how they can afford the house. I guess time will show if they make things work out.

Picnic

Today Mel, Emma, and I went to Mel's company's company picnic at Como Park in Saint Paul. With the state fair going on a short distance away, we decided to head over early to find a place to park. We got to the park early enough that we decided to check out the zoo first. It was fun walking through the zoo. Emma really liked to watch the California sea lions swimming around in their pool.

After checking out the zoo, we went to the pavilion where the picnic was being help. I was able to meet several of Mel's coworkers, and we had some good food. Emma even enjoyed sliding down the inflatable slide that they had set up in the park.

The Great Minnesota Get-Together

As we had planned, Mel, Emma, and I went to the Minnesota State Fair today. This is actually the first state fair that I have ever been to. In the thirty-four summers I lived in Iowa, I never attended the Iowa State Fair, but the very first summer I lived in Minnesota, I ended up becoming a fair goer.

Mostly, we just wandered around looking at the various exhibits. The first thing we did was to go to the Miracle of Birth Center. There we saw a newborn lamb and its mother. We also saw a cow that was starting to go into labor. However, Emma grew a bit impatient as we watched the cow, so we had to leave before the calf was born.

In all, we spent about four or five hours wandering around the fairgrounds. This gave us the opportunity to try a wide variety of the foods that were offered at the fair.

We had some deep fried cheese curds. They were very good, although Mel told me that at her Weight Watchers meeting last week they learned that just three of the cheese curds would be 11 Weight Watchers Points.

I also tried the hot dish on a stick. It was alright, but not my favorite of the foods I had at the fair.

We all had some mini doughnuts. Emma really liked them.

Mel and I also had some pepperoni pizza on a stick. It was pretty tasty as well.

It seemed that everywhere we turned at the fair, there was some other food being offered on a stick. One other food that was not on a stick that we felt we had to try was Sweet Martha's Cookies. We had heard from multiple sources that the chocolate chip cookies there were absolutely wonderful, so we had to check them out for ourselves. We ended up buying the tub of cookies. Now they fill this cookie tub significantly past its top, so it was good that Mel thought to bring along a Ziploc bag in which to put the overflow cookies so we could close the lid on the tub. I suppose we could have eaten the pile of fresh-from-the-oven chocolate chip cookies down to the top of the tub, but that probably would have been a bad idea. I think it is better that we savor the cookies over the next several days, if not longer.

Next year when Emma is a bit older, maybe we will have to take her on some of the rides, such as the giant slide. I guess we'll have to wait until next summer for that though.

2:37 A.M.

This morning at around 2:35, I heard Emma making noises in her room. So I got up to check on her. As I was walking through the living room to her room, I heard the text message notification sound from my cell phone which was sitting on the desk in the office. I went to check the text message to learn that Joe Biden is Barack Obama's vice presidential running mate. I was expecting the text message to come some time today, but definitely not at 2:37 in the morning!

Welcome to Minneapolis/St. Paul

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart has erected a billboard in Minneapolis to welcome visitors to the Republican National Convention here in Minneapolis/St. Paul with the phrase "Welcome, rich white oligarchs!" When I received the email informing me of this, I first thought it surely must just be a joke, and that someone photoshopped this. I may have to see if I can actually find the billboard. According to my sources, it

is supposed to be located near Interstate 494 and Highway 77. I'll be sure to look for it the next time I am in that area.

Mall Walking

Mel's engagement ring was due for its regular cleaning, so after she got Emma from daycare today, the three of us headed over to the Mall of America. After getting the ring checked out, we had dinner and walked around the mall a bit. We didn't buy much--just some air fresheners from Yankee Candle Company, and some greeting cards from The Afternoon. However, it did give us a chance to do some walking. Since I have begun to work from home, I do not get nearly as much walking in each day as I did when I worked in the office. Tomorrow though, I should be able to get a considerable amount of walking in as we are currently planning on going to the Minnesota State Fair. Of course, that could change depending on how Emma is feeling and behaving tomorrow.

More Fun Videos

Ok, maybe I shouldn't spend my lunch break viewing videos on the web, but here are a couple more I found today.

This first one is The Muppet Show's Beaker performing Beethoven's Ode to Joy.

The other video is titled "Where in Iowa is Jeff?" It shows a man, named Jeff, dancing in various locations in Iowa. I first saw this video on the blog Law & Disorder.

Cute Video

Check out this cute video of a kid dancing to techno music.

Recap of the Past Week

Last Saturday morning, Mel, Emma, and I headed back to Iowa for the weekend. Saturday was my grandmother's eighty-ninth birthday, so we went to her house for dinner to celebrate. Also at her house were my cousin and his wife who live about an hour or so away from us. I find it a bit ironic that we have to drive several hours to Keystone, Iowa, to see family that lives relatively close to us. Maybe we can get together sometime up here in the cities. As I expected, I ate way too much at my grandmother's house.

We spent the evening at my mother's house along with my sister. Then on Sunday, we stopped at Mel's grandmother's house which was on our way home from Waterloo, where my mother lives. We spent a few hours there. We had brought KFC chicken and biscuits with us, so once again I ate a bit too much. However, when I checked my weight for my weekly weigh-in on Wednesday, I had actually lost 0.6 pound since the previous Wednesday.

With my weight hovering around 205 pounds for the past several months, I decided I am going to change my goal with Weight Watchers to maintain this current weight rather than trying to lose any additional weight. I think it would be nice to get my weight down to 195 pounds, but I do not feel unhealthy at my current weight, and my clothes fit, for the most part.

Not much else eventful happened this week. Well, I guess I could mention the hour or so I spent at a Verizon location to get my cell phone replaced as it had broken last weekend. Fortunately, the Verizon employee replaced it under the phone's warranty. The outer plastic of the phone cracked by the hinge, causing the flip part to have difficulties staying closed. They could have said that the crack was because of misuse, but the rest of the phone looked good, so he considered to have just failed. So I now have a new, although identical to my previous one, cell phone. However, I did lose the ringtones I downloaded.

New Fish

Tonight we finally got some fish for the aquarium. I had only intended on starting out with two or three fish, but we ended up buying seven of them. We got three tiger barbs (Puntius tetrazona), an albino tiger barb which is shown in the photo on the right, a red-tail tinfoil barb (Barbonymus schwanenfeldii), and one more fish which is abbreviated on my receipt at lep. fasciatum (I don't remember its name). All seven of the fish seem to be adapting quite nicely to their new home. I just hope they don't decide to start eating each other, but the employee who helped us at PetSmart said that they should all get along just fine in the same aquarium.

Update: Thanks to some research by my brother-in-law, the unknown fish has been identified as a black-banded leporinus (Leporinus fasciatus).

Back to the Science Museum

Yesterday, Emma and I returned to the Science Museum of Minnesota to see the Star Wars exhibit. This time Mel was able to come along. It wasn't quite as crowded as it had been the previous Saturday, and Emma was in a better mood since it wasn't near her nap time. We had a good time checking out the exhibit again. There were not as many costumed characters walking around though this time. We saw Boba Fett (shown below) and a GNK power droid walking around.

Also at the Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination, we saw a model of the landspeeder from Star Wars that was used for far away shots. Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi kind of look like Ken dolls.

Below is a photo of me with the C-3PO costume from Revenge of the Sith.

And finally, here's a photo of the head of the Tusken Raider (aka Sand Person) costume.

A New Crib

Tonight Emma got a new crib. She has been without one since the beginning of July, before we moved to Minnesota. The crib she had, a Jaradine crib, was recalled due to the possibility of breakage of the wooden crib slats. I don't think it would have happened, but we decided we'd rather be safe than sorry. Once we got our belongings delivered to us at our new house, I had to dissemble the crib and send the hardware back to the company so they would send us a voucher with which could buy a new crib. Unfortunately the package with the hardware got misplaced by UPS, so after contacting the company again, we finally got the voucher. Once we got the voucher last week, we went to Babies 'R' Us and picked out a new crib, one by babi italia. However, the crib we wanted was not in stock, so finally had to order it. It came in today, and it is now assembled. Emma is now sleeping in her crib. Hopefully she has a good night's sleep.

I'm Batman. No, I'm Batman.

CNN is reporting that both Barack Obama and John McCain like, and want to be, Batman. It's really good to know that the two agree on something. At least Hillary Clinton hasn't seemed to weigh in on this issue. I suppose she would have to be Batgirl, or maybe Wonder Woman, but neither of them wear pantsuits.

Taking the Test

I took an hour away from work today to drive to the driver's license center in Hastings so I could take the test to get my Minnesota driver's license. My original plan was to study the drivers' manual completely before taking the knowledge test, but I decided that I would give it a shot before finishing the book. It wasn't as if I couldn't take the test again if I failed. I admit, when I missed my sixth question out of forty, I was getting nervous, but I managed to pass the test. Now I just have to wait about six weeks for my new Minnesota driver's license to arrive in the mail.

Star Wars at the Science Museum

On Saturday, Emma and I went to the Science Museum of Minnesota to see the Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination exhibit. Mel would have come along, but her brother was in town and asked if we could watch their kids for the afternoon and overnight. The younger of their two children, who is five months old, stayed at our house with Mel, and my other nephew, who is two, came along with us to the museum. At the museum we met up with my mother, my sister, and another friend of ours.

I enjoyed the Star Wars exhibit, and there were a lot of interactive activities to do. Unfortunately, since I was with a one-year-old and a two-year-old, it was hard to do many of the activities. Also it was very busy at the museum and that made it even harder to try everything out. Nevertheless, there were a lot of neat things to look at, including many models and costumes used in the various Star Wars movies.

The following are a couple of photos from the exhibit. The first photo shows Luke Skywalker’s landspeeder from A New Hope.

And this photo shows Emma and me with a stormtrooper. I tried to get my nephew’s photo with a stormtrooper as well, but he seemed to be scared of them.

Restocking the Aquarium

I have had a fish aquarium for the past several years. When we listed our house in Cedar Rapids for sale though, we got rid of the fish. With the aquarium in the living room, the room just seemed too crowded. Now that we are settled into our new house in Minnesota, I decided it was time to get the aquarium going again.

Several months ago, the pump that came with the aquarium broke and our local pet store didn't have a replacement, so I replaced it with a different pump. The replacement pump worked, but it didn't fit in the aquarium well and it made cleaning it more difficult. So earlier this week, I looked online and found the parts that I needed to put a pump like the original one in the aquarium. The parts arrived today and I was looking forward to getting the aquarium set up tonight so I could get some fish in a few days. However, I just discovered that the company I ordered the parts from sent the wrong pump. It looks like they sent the pump for an Eclipse 6 system when I have an Eclipse 2. There is no way this pump will work. I will call them up tomorrow to speak with them about sending the pump back and getting the correct one. Hopefully it can arrive soon as I would like to have some fish in my office to keep me company during the day when I am working.

Getting Things Together

The past couple of days I really feel that I have been getting things done to straighten up the house, doing my part to make it more livable. When we decided to buy the house we are now living in, we thought we would make the largest of the three bedrooms upstairs our bedroom. However, once we moved in, we soon realized that the room would be way to crowded once the king-size waterbed was set up in it, so we decided to make the main living area of the basement into our bedroom. There was one problem with this in that there was no closet in the basement in which to hang our clothes. So for the past few weeks, most of our clothes have been lying on the basement floor. We bought a closet organizer to install in the room that is right off our bedroom, but I soon encountered a problem with that. The only wall on which it could be installed was an exterior wall of the house and the concrete foundation was too close to the drywall to properly anchor the closet organizer to the wall, and I could not drill into the concrete in order to anchor it to that. The backup plan was to move the closet organizer to a different room in the basement. I started installing it there earlier this week, but I ran into the problem that the standards on which the shelves hang were too long for the height of the room. Tonight I remedied that situation by cutting the bottom few inches off some of the standards so it would fit. About half an hour ago, I finally got the closet organizer hung! Now let’s just hope there is room for my clothes once Mel has her clothes on it. Otherwise I may need to install additional organizers for my clothes.


Last night I got a couple other things accomplished that make the house nicer. The bathroom in the house had no towel bars in it whatsoever. It didn’t even have a toilet paper holder. I got both of those installed last night. Now there are a few other things to fix up with the bathroom, but that makes it nicer. Also I hung some shelving and a closet rod in the previously shelf- and rod-free closet in the living room. Now the closet just needs to have a door installed, but we will get to that sooner or later.

Besides showing off my handyman skills by using the drill and screwdriver as I have with these past tasks, I have also gotten the office area cleaned up a bit. There is still some clutter lying around the room, but it is becoming a much better work environment than it was a couple of weeks ago. Of course Mel has helped with this as well as she unpacked some of the boxes that had previously been stacked up in the office.

Hopefully we will soon get a lot of the boxes out of the garage so we can park our cars in it. Now that the closet organizer is up in the basement, we can get the clothes up which will allow us to proceed with adding additional shelving in the room for storage of some of the items we do not use as frequently as others.

Earthquake vs. Judge Judy

Taping of Judge Judy was interrupted today by the earthquake that struck the Los Angeles area. This video shows everyone scrambling for the door when the earthquake. Everyone, that is, except for the plaintiff.

Another video I have seen of this, on CNN's website, shows Judge Judy herself fleeing the courtroom.

RAGBRAI XXXVI

This year’s RAGBRAI is now over, and has been for a few days. I had a good time riding this year, even though I was a bit worried at first since I had ridden my bike a grand total of 23 miles prior to the beginning of RAGBRAI last Sunday. And, for the second year, Mel joined me on RAGBRAI. She did a really good job as well.

Last Friday, Mel, Emma, and I headed back to Iowa where we first dropped Emma off with her Aunt at a truck stop on Interstate 35. We then proceeded to Waterloo where we stayed with my mom for the night before joining the Superior Hawgs, our team, in Evansdale on Saturday.

The ride to Missouri Valley was uneventful until we were partway across the western half of Iowa. All of a sudden, the bus came to a sudden, but controlled, stop as the traffic in front of us had screeched to a standstill due to an accident ahead of us in a construction zone. Since traffic wasn’t moving well, and several people needed a potty break, we stopped at a rest area for half an hour or so.

Once we arrived in Missouri Valley, Mel and I set up our tent then headed to the expo to check out the bike shops and to find some food. Unfortunately we were about as far from the expo as we could possibly have been. It was quite hot, and by the time we got there we needed some water. We did a little shopping for RAGBRAI T-shirts and for water bottles, since I had forgotten them at home. After eating we returned to our campsite.

Day 1

It was fairly hot and humid on the first day of the ride, but we made it through just fine. We stopped at Mama Rafael’s for breakfast. I had never stopped for Mama Rafael’s before, but it was very good. There was a buffet where customers created their own breakfast burritos, and there were a few other options as well. After eating we continued down the road.

When we arrived in Pottawattamie County we were greeted by signs alerting us to the fact that the roads in Pottawattamie County were designed and maintained for motor vehicular traffic and that we should proceed at our own risk. The roads were actually in very good condition. I suppose they were trying to shield themselves from possible lawsuits such as the one that prompted nearby Crawford County to ban future RAGBRAIs from the county. Pottawattamie County also put up some bike crossing signs, including one on the bike route itself, despite the fact that we were not crossing the road, but rather traveling along it.

Our night in Harlan was nice, until around 2:00 in the morning when a fire truck started driving around our campground warning us via its loudspeaker that there was a severe thunderstorm approaching at that we should take immediate shelter. We were camping in a city park, where there was no shelter, but a woman from across the street came out and let us into her house. We stayed there for about an hour before the all-clear was sounded. No thunderstorm ever made it to Harlan that night, but I suppose it was better to be safe than sorry.

Day 2

As we did not get a good night’s sleep, and the fact that we had each ridden significantly further on Sunday that we had previously ridden so far this year, Mel and I both decided to sit out on riding on Monday, resorting to traveling to Jefferson, Iowa, by motor vehicle rather than bicycle.

In Jefferson we camped in someone’s yard. Unfortunately, the yard was a block and a half away from some railroad tracks on which 75 trains pass each day. They had to be going by at least every half hour all night, sounding their loud horns each time they passed. I do not know how I managed to get any sleep at all.

Day 3

Despite the poor sleeping conditions due to the trains, we both set out on our bikes on Tuesday. We both had a really good ride riding to Ames. There were not too many hills. The biggest hill had to be the one right before Boone where we had to climb out of the Des Moines River valley. It was a long hill, but not too steep. It didn’t bother me too much.

Tuesday night in Ames was an adventure though. Our bus driver had stopped at the grounds of an abandoned middle school at which there was some remodeling going on. After we all got our tents set up, and when the bus driver was away, an official came to us and told us that we would have to move as no camping was allowed there. This was a major inconvenience as several people were gone. We called those we could and they returned so we could pack everything up. We then moved to an official campground about a quarter of a mile down the road. This entire situation really upset a new group of riders who were traveling with us for the week so much so that they left. We did not see them again.

We did have a good dinner Tuesday night as Mel has a friend who is currently living in Ames. She and her husband picked us up and we went to the Olde Main Brewing Company for dinner. It had really good food, and there wasn’t much of a wait.

Day 4

Wednesday’s ride started out alright, but the headwinds really began to pick up. Mel wasn’t feeling really well, so she called the day short partway through the morning. After riding a short while, I kind of regretted not doing so as well, but I made it the 75 miles to Tama/Toledo.

We went to downtown Toledo for dinner, taking the shuttle bus. However the bus ended up taking almost an hour to get to our destination as it seemed to take us on a tour of the entire area before going to downtown Toledo.

Day 5

As we woke up Thursday morning, it was chilly and raining. Mel still wasn’t feeling all that well, and I didn’t feel that I really needed to ride in the rain, so we both rode the team bus to North Liberty. We had a good time once we got to North Liberty. We met a former coworker of mine who tool us to the Coral Ridge Mall where we bought sweatshirts since it was cold. We then had lunch at Iguana’s Grill in North Liberty. It was good food, although Mel’s portion was kind of small.

Later in the evening, Mel’s friend Penny from Cedar Rapids came down to see us. We went to Carlos O’Kelly’s in Iowa City for dinner. As it was Thursday, they were having their weekly half-price margarita special.

Day 6

On Friday, both Mel and I woke up around 5:00 as we had been all week and prepared to set out on our ride to Tipton. On the ride today, we stopped in Martelle where we got our picture taken with a pig.

We also stopped in Morley which seemed a little messed up as they were welcoming RAGBRAI XXXVIII. I guess they are being optimistic about RAGBRAI passing through in 2010.

As we were arriving in Mechanicsville, the final pass-through town of the day, I broke a spoke on my rear wheel. The bike mechanic who was set up there did not have the type of spoke I needed, so I had to ride the remaining 15 miles with a missing spoke. I was able to get it repaired Friday night in Tipton though, so everything worked out alright.

Day 7

Our final day of RAGBRAI for 2008 was a very good day. We were arrived in Le Claire around 11:30 and were not the last to arrive at the Superior Hawgs bus.

When we got to Le Claire though, we did have to ride a few miles to find the bus. It was parked next to an entrance ramp to Interstate 80, so when we were ready to head home, we didn’t have to drive through the throngs of bike riders.

As with my past several RAGBRAIs, when I began the week, I was thinking that I may need to make this year’s ride my last, but I once again had such a good time that I hope I will be back for RAGBRAI XXXVII in 2009!

Away on RAGBRAI

As I write this, I am sitting in an Iowa Telecom trailer in Harlan, Iowa. Harlan is the first overnight stop on this year's RAGBRAI. Last year I blogged several days during the week while I was on RAGBRAI, but this year I think I will wait until Mel and I get back home to Minnesota on Sunday. So I will be back in a few days.

Neglecting the Blog

I don't want everyone to think that I have been neglecting my blog lately, it's just that I have been really busy with unpacking boxes, and trying to find places to store the things that were in those boxes. Also, I have been struggling the past couple of days to try to figure out how in the world I am going to hang a closet organizer on the wall of one of the rooms in our basement. It would seem pretty straightforward, except for the fact that the brick foundation of the house lies just over an inch and a half behind the drywall that covers it. I think I came up with a solution tonight. Hopefully it will work. Anyway, I need to get to bed, because while I do not actually have to go anywhere to work, I do need to work. Of course, I don't have to look good since I work from home, although I do have to take my daughter to daycare. I'd hate to look crappy for that.

We've Moved to Minnesota!

Emma and I are finally living in Minnesota with Mel. On Thursday, July 3, the moving company came to our house to load up all of our belongings. Unfortunately, they were unable to load the waterbed mattress because, even though I drained it all day, it still had too much water in it; at least that’s what they said. Anyway, once everything was loaded onto the moving truck, I found Mel’s cat, which was hiding under the stairs, and proceeded to drug him in order to make the trip to Minnesota more pleasant for both him and me.

After loading the last few things into the car, I headed to Emma’s daycare to pick her up from there for the last time. I am going to miss our former daycare provider. She was really good with Emma. And Emma liked going there and playing with the other kids as well. Then Emma, Ike (the cat), and I headed up to the Twin Cities. Because it was a hot day and I had the cat in the car, we couldn’t stop for very long. That meant that we had to eat dinner in the car. Not stopping for very long—we did stop once for a restroom break and to change Emma’s diaper—meant that we got to our destination fairly quickly.

Getting Emma to settle into her new home was quite challenging the first night. Mel and I tried to calm her down and to get her to go to sleep by driving her around town. That calmed her down as long as she was in the car, but she did not go to sleep. I ended up taking her out for a drive two more times that night with the last time happening around 1:45 in the morning! Eventually she got some sleep, but not nearly enough.

Because the movers wouldn’t take the waterbed, and because there were a few other things left in our Cedar Rapids house, we all took Mel’s truck back to our old house to pack up our remaining belongings. Unfortunately, I underestimated the amount of stuff that remained and it wouldn’t all fit in the truck. So Mel had to return to Cedar Rapids again on Monday.

While Mel was driving to Iowa and back on Monday, I tried to get some things done around the house, although it was tough to get some of it done with Emma being around. I did almost manage to get one room painted as she took a nap, but I didn’t get it done.

On Monday I also made an effort to find suitable daycare for Emma. After calling five or six in-home daycare providers and learning that they were each full at least until the school year starts, I drove to a daycare center that is located near our house. I had intended on just getting some information, but the director gave Emma and me a tour of their toddler area. While we were there, Emma even had a snack with the other kids, and she seemed to get along with them well. So when Mel returned home, we all went back to the daycare center so she could check it out as well.

On Tuesday we took Emma to this daycare center for a free trial day. She did really well there, although when I dropped her off this morning, she cried and didn’t want me to leave. However, she seemed to do well for most of the day. The daycare center’s director told me that she had been a bit sad a few times when they were outside, but she cheered up once they went back in. The daycare we have Emma going to now is a bit more expensive than what we had been paying before, but I think the experiences she will have there will make it worth it.

While Emma was at daycare yesterday, and while Mel was at work, I worked at painting Emma’s room and another room of the house. I also had to stick around for the entire day so I could meet with the carpet salesperson, the DIRECTV installer, and the exterminator who we called take care of the ant issue in the garage.

Today the cable installer came to install our Internet and telephone service. Once that was done, I was finally able to actually get to work, although I had to work sitting on the office floor as the movers haven’t yet delivered out belongings. They are scheduled to arrive on Friday. Had I known they would take full advantage of their delivery window, I probably would have gone with the other mover from whom I received an estimate. Oh well, at least I don’t have to worry about the furniture as I paint.

One More Day

I have one more day to finish getting the house packed up for our big move to Cottage Grove, Minnesota. I feel that most of it is under control with the exception of a couple of areas. First of all, I need to get the garage packed up. I also have a couple more boxes of things to pack from the kitchen, and probably another box of odds and ends from around the house. The thing that is frustrating me the most right now is getting the water drained from the waterbed. I simply could not get more than half the water out. And in trying to get the water out, I created some more problems for myself. I had the hose from the waterbed connected to the faucet in the back of the house. Because it was running too long, water leaked into the basement from outside. Fortunately it was clean water and I caught it before it spread much beyond the laundry room. I cleaned up as much as I could. Hopefully the rest of the water evaporates by tomorrow. Unfortunately, the garage flood also got wet from the faucet outside. If it doesn't dry up by tomorrow afternoon, I do not know where I will put the boxes I pack there.

I had to stop for the evening because I ran out of boxes. I will resume the packing tomorrow evening, or maybe even in the afternoon if I complete everything I need to get done at work early enought. My mom was nice enough to come down to help out tonight. If any of my readers who actually know me want to come over tomorrow to help out, please feel free to do so. Anyway, this will be my last blog posting until at least Wednesday of next week. I simply will not have enough time tomorrow, and the Internet will not be installed at our new house until July 9.

Put Out Those Cigarettes

Iowa's ban on smoking in bar, restaurants, and myriad other places went into effect at midnight this morning. Now I will be able to go to out to eat in Iowa and not have to specify that I want to sit in the no smoking section. Also, I will be able to go to an Iowa bar without leaving smelling like smoke. Of course, I am moving to Minnesota, which already has such a ban, on Thursday, so I guess I will not benefit from this much. It will make going to a bar during RAGBRAI nicer though, although I am not sure how will the law will be enforced then. It seems like the great number of RAGBRAI participants far outnumber the number of law enforcement personnel around. I hope they do enforce the law, but I have seen numerous other laws broken during RAGBRAI, so I guess we will just have to see.