Almost a grandpa

Posted on September 29, 2006 by Kirk M

I am happy to announce that I became an (almost) grandfather today. Just minutes after midnight this morning, my lady’s youngest son and his girlfriend had a bouncing 10+ lb baby boy. It’s been a touch and go thing over the past few months because of health problems but everything turned out just fine and it’s been a relief as well as joyful that mother and son are well and should be coming home today or tomorrow.

Life is good.

I say almost a grandfather since…well, you know what the law says about being legally married and all that but it’s good to feel the way no matter what. I never did have any kids of my own. It doesn’t really bother me since I must have taken care of a 100 or so over the years but it just wasn’t in the cards for me to carry on the family name. I’ll just have to leave that up to my sister and her beautiful daughter (my wonderful, not so little anymore, niece).

Sorry…no pics yet as mother and son are still at the hospital in Burlington (around 2 hours away) and my zoom lens isn’t quite that good.

I wish them all the best.

A dream come true

Posted on September 27, 2006 by Kirk M

Like many others, I’ve been closely following Anousheh Ansari’s blog that she has been writing starting with her training as an astronaut, her journey to the ISS and now during her nine day stay at the station where she is conducting testis and doing routine maintenace and operations. Not exactly living up to the definition of “space tourist” she is a working member of crew during her time there and during the flights to and from the space station.

In case you’re wondering about or if the name Ansari rings a bell, she and her family are the title sponsors of the “Ansari X-prize” that was won 2 years ago when SpaceShipOne flew to the edges of space and back in the first private endeavor to build and fly a privately funded spacecraft to near orbit and land successfully and do it more than once in a given time period.

This woman is currently living the peak of her dream with her flight to the International Space Station after long years of hard work and study. A pioneer and entrepreneur in the truest sense of the word and obviously very well thought of to boot which, unfortunately, seems to becoming a rare thing these days. Since there is so much interesting info on this woman and her endeavors, I’ll let you folks hit the links above and find out for yourself.

I recommend checking out her Flickr photos some of which she has taken during her stay on the ISS.

May the younger folks out there pay heed to this amazing women and perhaps follow in her footsteps to their own dream someday.

Technorati tags: ISS, space, spaceflight, Ansari, X prize, Space shuttle, SpaceShipOne, X prize foundation

Off to the VA yet again

Posted on September 25, 2006 by Kirk M

Just to let anyone who happens to stop by wondering what the heck I'm going to think up next, I'm off to Boston yet again for the second follow-up for the surgery I had three weeks ago. I had some bothersome complications set in that I have been working to get rid of and I must go down to see how I've done and all that.

In that light I may be back by tomorrow night or the end of the week for all I know. Ya' never know until they give the word.

See ya' soon…

Convalescing: Idleness is next to what???

Posted on September 23, 2006 by Kirk M

I'm beginning to realize that convalescing is equal to brain death hence my lack of finding interesting items to post. I fairly certain that I've already lost at least 45% of my mind's working ~~capaciti~~ ~~cpasity~~ ~~copacitee~~ capacity.

See what I mean?

OK, maybe not that bad but being stuck in the house with the restrictions of absolutely no lifting tends to massively whittle down the list of interesting and productive things to do.

Like all of them.

I actually managed to empty the various trash cans we have about the house and even put in a load of laundry. The problem lies in the fact that trash wise, once I add the big bag of kitchen trash I have exceeded the weight limit that I'm allowed to pick up and carry so carting said trash outside to our little trash dumpster was right out. Same with the laundry. I can take the unwashed ~~heathen~~ clothes down to the cellar and load them into the washer and once clean, I can even haul the clothes out again (one piece at a time mind you) and put them back into the clothes basket.

Then I can look at the clothes basket with the wet clothes inside.

And then I can look some more.

Sorry, the left over moisture from the washing has just, once again, exceeded the imposed weight limit I'm allowed to lift (##@@$%!!).

The author apologizes for swearing and won't do it again on pain of being sacked.

I think the current weight I am actually allowed to lift is somewhere around the neighborhood of a large dehydrated grasshopper. As you might have guessed from the above remarks…it's becoming extremely(!) frustrating.

And so…I believe I shall attempt to water the rest of the plants that I did not do yesterday. Usually, I can get all 104 or so done in about 30 minutes. However, under my current limitations, attempting to satisfy the thirst of that many plants using nothing but a couple of thimbles or perhaps one half of a plastic egg to cart the water in just adds hours to the process as you might guess.

Or perhaps I overstate a bit.

Either way, I can't wait to get back to "normal" and back to work and back to feeling useful once again.

Have a healthy day!

Autumn and I’m not ready

Posted on September 21, 2006 by Kirk M

Autumn is making it’s way to the Kingdom and already the leaves are beginning to turn color and the wind has a touch of impending frost upon it’s breath. The late blooming flowers are in their full regalia and the sunflowers are nodding their acquaintance to the sun as it travels across the sky. Above, leaves are once again leaping from the trees to bounce and float in the breeze on their way to the ground where they will swirl and dance among monster’s, ghost’s and faerie’s feet as they travel from home to home begging candy and treats.

School’s back in session and yellow beasts again prowl the streets in the early morning sunshine and the afternoon rain. All too soon will they don chains upon their feet as the rain turns to snow and the roads turn slippery but not yet for the green is still upon the trees and the grass will probably need a trim or two yet but no more than that.

So out come the light jackets and the rumbling around the closets to find the heavy jackets and coats that were put away when spring had finally pushed old man winter out the door one more time a very short (or so it seems) summer ago.

It causes me to wonder if I’m ready yet to not be able to walk outside with what I have on but instead, have to take the time to throw a heavy jacket on my back, throw a scarf around my neck and don gloves that make my fingers stiff and clumsy. But it’s late and I’m tired and there is still much to do so life may not look quite as wonderful as it really is. It happens sometimes.

And so to the rain locker I go to care for things the good surgeon says I should take care of and then to a warm bed and rest (perchance to dream?).

‘night all….

A bit of stained glass

Posted on September 20, 2006 by Kirk M

I’m always amazed how much my lady can accomplish in just a relatively short period of time. Once she tunes in on something she wants to do, stand back and watch things happen and so it has been with her new addition of stained glass items to her Long Meadow Farms quilt shop and website.

I was planning on throwing some more pics of her newest creations here but I realized it would be all that easier (and efficient) just to add a link to her new stained glass page she added to her Long Meadow Farms website (must be gettin’ lazy in my old age or smarter. I can’t tell).

More quilts have been coming out of her workshop as well. How she does all these things and maintains the high standards and quality that she insists upon is beyond me but, I swear, she makes it look easy, but I’ve been around long enough to know that there’s a lot of effort put forth.

The only drawback of all her hard work is that the host for her website keeps complaining that she’s using up too much space with all her images and needs to upgrade to her storage.

Well, someone always has to complain don’t they?

Technorati Tags: quilts, quilting, vermont quilts, stained glass, vermont, vermont products

Firefox 2 theme updated

Posted on September 20, 2006 by Kirk M

Which fox to use I say.

I have a number of foxes that reside on my desktop these days. Somehow I just can’t get away from my past of which beta testing was one of my favorite things to do. I no longer do that type of testing professionally but there are more than enough ways to satisfy my craving that exist in the good ol’ virtual world and one of them is the up and coming Firefox 2 release (sometime in October I believe).

Hence my different foxes.

Along with the current 1.5.0.7 release I also have Firefox 2 beta 2 set as my default browser and the latest Bon Echo 2 beta 2 nightlies as well for keeping tabs on new developments in the browser on a daily basis each one with it’s own separate profile. Having the “nightlies” on board allows me the enjoyment of watching my current FX2 B2 extensions and themes work and not work, send feedback, get updated and work again, then Bon echo is updated the next day and things may work or not work again etc, etc. Such fun.

While banging around the Internet this am after installing the latest nightly update into Bon Echo I noticed something different about the highly complained about, not-so-great-looking default theme for FX2 (FX means Firefox). It looked better! Actually it looks a lot like the MacFox theme that is available on the Mozilla add-on site.

Now, I don’t really know how long this new theme has been part of the Bon Echo 2 nightlies since I have been running a different theme (I didn’t like the new default theme either) but this new update is a very acceptable change for the better so I thought I would do a couple of “snippets” and show you the difference.

Original theme

Updated Theme

Now, if they’ll only put my Email button back in (!!), I’ll be happy.

Now of course, for those of you who are using IE, thias post is completely redundent.

Technorati : Firefox, IE, beta 2, bon echo, firefox 2, internet explorer, mozilla, themes

Of turkey and hernias

Posted on September 15, 2006 by Kirk M

My wife and I have several things in common and one of them is our love for roast turkey.

Because of this, Thanksgiving around our house usually comes two or three times a year along with the occasional “turkey parts” supper when such “pieces/parts” are available at the market. (“…and we had another Thanksgiving dinner that just couldn’t be beat”)

So what does this have to do with hernias you may ask? Well I’ll tell you.

In the last few posts I’ve mentioned that I recently had surgery that repaired not one but four separate hernias all during the same operation and I am under strict orders that for the first couple-three weeks I’m not to lift anything heavier than a milk carton…Period!

So…

Last Sunday, my lady made us a wonderful roast turkey dinner with all the trimmin’s which of course provided us with not only a bountiful repast but plenty of leftovers as well which of course, was fine with us. So the next day, still stuck at home for the initial recovery period, lunch time rolled around and drooling helplessly, I headed to the refrigerator and the roast turkey that resided within only to find out that I absolutely could not lift the pan upon which my beloved turkey carcass rested, out of the fridge. We don’t tend to go for small turkeys when we buy (we like lots of leftovers) so no matter what I tried, my lunch stubbornly stayed outside of my grasp. Such torture I cannot describe!!!

I had a badly made tuna fish sandwich instead (it was hard to see through the tears in my eyes) and and spent the rest of the afternoon fighting a bad case of “lack-a-turkey” syndrome.

The next day, (after finally breaking down and sobbing for an hour on my wife’s shoulder when she came home from her quilt shop that evening before) upon opening the refrigerator door, I found a large plastic container filled to the brim with sliced roast turkey! I stood there in awed wonder…How lucky am I, I thought, to have such a wonderful, thoughtful lady in my life! No man has ever had it better. It’s not every man’s wife who would offer sliced turkey I tell you!

I’m still sitting at home waiting to heal sufficiently to point I can wear pants again and, hopefully, return to work soon but while I’m waiting, I can rest at ease knowing that as long as the turkey lasts, I’ll always be able to open that refrigerator door and take out all the turkey I want without fear of damaging any of my surgeon’s fine work thanks to my wonderful, thoughtful lady.

Life is good!

Technorati Tags: hernia, surgery, turkey, roasted turkey, thanksgiving, arlo guthrie, love, lunch