There was also no sympathy to be had in this neck of the woods because everyone seemed to be suffering from what they referred to as the “crud”. Of course, the addition of the kidney stone did give me bragging rights, big whoop!

While all of this was going on I was in the end stages of putting together an art catalog with a printing deadline. Every time the phone would ring with new information for the catalog it almost brought me to tears as I didn’t know if I had the energy to do the job, but there is finally a proof from the printer and it should be printed today.

I was able to get a haircut yesterday so that has also helped to make me feel like a human being. And of course…spring is springing here in the North Carolina mountains. I have cherry blossoms galore and expect the dogwoods at anytime now. Today is a rainy day with some severe weather forecast, but with the drought we have been in any water from the sky is welcomed.

That’s the news from here and it is time to break open a new package of Dingo doggie bones for my two Bichon Frise’s, Bennie and Frankie. This will make their day and will have the added bonus of diverting their brains from wanting to play fetch ALL DAY LONG!

Oh, and what a dummy I was. I really thought Chris had switched back to Windows XP and was no longer Live Streaming. April FOOLS on me.

When I last saw Lake Nottingly it was a sad sight. It looked more like a large pothole with a bit of water in it. No boats in the water as it was just too shallow at the dock. As a matter of fact the dock was on dry land for part of the time. I was soooo happy yesterday when I drove by as the dock is in the water and there was actually a boat tied up to the dock. The Lake looked a whole lot better than it has for quite some time. It is still low, but it has definitely improved. I am hoping that we have a good wet spring this year and that the trout, stripers and bass begin to multiply. I am an avid fisherman (or is that fisherperson?) and would love to be able to head out to the lake and do some fishing.

The downside yesterday was having to stop and put gas in my Jeep Cherokee…$3.18 a gallon!! I told the gal at the bank that perhaps I would need to bank in North Carolina just to save on gas. Only kidding, I like this bank a whole lot. But the price of gas is really a hardship for a lot of folks across this country and I don’t think it is going to improve.

I imagine that spring is right around the corner as the daffodils are already blooming. They are always the first to stick their little heads up out of the ground. The cows in the pasture across the road are healthy and happy and we are hoping for an end to this drought we have had for several years. It is quite a chore to haul hay to the pasture each and every day.

I have recently acquired a brand new Dell Inspiron 1720 laptop and it is a pleasure to work on. If you are looking for a Windows based laptop at least give this machine a look. Support is through somewhere in India but the one support call I have had to make went very well and I spoke to someone knowledgeable. I considered going to a Mac, but much of my graphics work is done using Windows and I didn’t want to go through the process of having the printer switch over. He has been doing work for us for many years and has all of our layouts etc. so why rock the boat. Maybe someday!

I hope to update you more frequently on the goings on here in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina and throw in some personal as well as professional tidbits. You never know, I might even express a political view now and then and discuss my grandson who has Angelman Syndrome. This may be a good spot to bring some awareness to this rare genetic disorder.

Happy to be back and I hope I can add something to the conversation.

I have been testing the quickcam and I can say that it has performed flawlessly so far. The picture is great according to folks that have chatted with me and so is the sound. There are filters to correct the picture and the sound so both are very clear and realistic. I can move around in front of my computer and it keeps me within the viewing area with ease.

I am still trying to get Skype to work with my satellite Internet connection but I have a hunch that it just isn’t going to happen. The latency is just to much of a hurdle.

I did get word from my electric co-op that they are going to be coming into my area of the North Carolina Mountains and installing fiber optic to the house in order to provide broadband to their customers. They purchased the rights for this from Verizon so this is very exciting. They wrote that they plan to take orders in my area beginning in July…YIPPEE!!

I am very glad to have access via satellite but fiber optic access will be faster, cheaper and the latency will be a non issue. I have already fulfilled my contract with the satellite provider so as soon as my co-op is up and running I will be able to switch. I hope that more and more rural dwellers will get this opportunity. Even as these connections are rolled out I am sure there will always be plenty of folks that will need the satellite service to make that a worthwhile enterprise.

A few more days and I am off to California. I will attempt to blog about my experiences while I am there whenever I get an opportunity to plug in. I appreciate all of you for hanging in there as things will settle down soon and my blogs will be much more regular and hopefully informative about technology and my everyday experiences.

At the present time there is a large line of thunderstorms headed this way from Tennessee so I better turn this machine off and hunker down for the next few hours as it could get pretty active around here soon.

[tags]windows, webcam, Skype, satellite internet, California, fiber optic[/tags]

I am going to install the camera today and give it a whirl and see what I think about it…yeah, like I’m gonna hate it!! I am going into this with the assumption that installation will be quick and easy and I will be chatting it up in no time. It has a built in microphone so one less thing to plug in. Apparently it should work with Skype as well.

I have a Satellite internet connection through WildBlue so latency is definitely an issue so it will be interesting to see how Skype performs. I will post regular updates so that you can all follow along while I test this thing out.

[tags]Logitech, quickcam, chat, microphone, Skype, WildBlue, satellite, Vista[/tags]

But I’m back and I’m well and I have posted a rant on startup programs for Windows Fanatics. If you get a chance give it a read and let me hear from you. I am heading out to California in the middle of June and will be spending a lot of time removing startup programs and useless junk from my mother’s new computer. She is in her 80s, just wants to look at pictures of her grandkids and email, why, oh, why hassle the woman with a bunch of crapware?

As I mentioned in my post for Windows Fanatics, wouldn’t it be nice if our new machines came nice and clean and we chose what programs we wanted to run and which ones we wanted to run at startup? Such a simple request.

[tags]Lockergnome, Windows Fanatics, biopsy, startup, Atlanta[/tags]

Things began to change and before long we were emailing large files, getting information via CD or DVD and then the jump drives. Even when setting up a web site I used Front Page which would publish directly to the site.

Recently I have been working with a group that provides a snail mailed newsletter. Upon finishing the newsletter it had to get to the printer and he received all of his jobs via FTP. Uh-Oh, time for a refresher!

I checked around with some of my friends that were still using FTP for one reason or another and one of them recommended FlashFXP by Inicom Networks.
It worked great. Even after not using such software in ages, it was very intuitive and certainly full featured. It frankly has more features than I will need for my purposes but should I ever need to use other functions this program covers all of them as far as I can tell.

It is advertised as Designed for Windows XP, but I used it on my Windows Vista machine and had no problems forwarding my files and folders to the proper location. If you need a full featured FTP program give this one a look. It has a free trial period so you can run it through its paces before plunking down cold hard cash. Personally…I’m very happy with my purchase.

[tags]FTP, windows, XP, Vista, [/tags]

I just finished a project for someone that required a list of supplies for about 10 different arts and crafts workshops. It was so nice to have the lists supplied by the artists on one screen and the Word document open on the other. There were plenty of opportunities to do a copy and paste rather than having to recopy the material that had been provided. Doing that with only one monitor would create a situation of minimize and maximize to the point of complete confusion for me. A task that might have taken me several hours to complete took only about one hour to compile and send via email. What a timesaver!

If you have not moved to using more than one monitor and have the opportunity to do so I highly recommend it. It is very easy to get used to but beware; you may never want to go back to using only one monitor.

[tags]windows, monitors, word[/tags]

Athena, Smart Card Solutions appears to have what I have been looking for. The reader is called the ASE Drive IIIe USB V2 Smart Card Reader. It states in the specs that it has the “Working With Vista” logo for Windows Vista and Windows Vista 4-bit. The Smart Card Reader firmware is flash upgradeable for future unlimited upgrades and the cost when purchasing from 1 to 9 units is $36 each. The cost drops as you purchase in bulk so my assumption is that this firm caters to large businesses. That unit price is pretty much in line with the average cost of these readers and it reads more than just the Smart Media Card.

I have not run across this company in the past but it appears that they specialize in this type of product. I hope that other companies begin to make it clear on their websites that their products “work With Vista”.

[tags]windows, smart media, card reader, Vista[/tags]

A few years after purchasing my first computer, after Atari etc., a new antivirus company named McAfee started up, or perhaps I just became aware of them. I was using AOL at the time and there was a free trial for McAfee antivirus at their site. I downloaded the program onto a floppy…yes a floppy, code was a little bit tighter in those days!

I ran a McAfee scan on my computer and it immediately advised me that I had a boot virus. In order to remove this virus I would need to spring for a paid version of the program.

Well, suspicious me, I was convinced that McAfee had placed that virus on my computer so that I would purchase their product. No way was I going to buy it.

I went out and bought an antivirus program by a guy named Norton, placed it on the computer, scanned and was informed that my computer was free of any viral activity. As irrational as it sounds to some I have never used a McAfee product since then. My choice regarding McAfee is based on incomplete and most likely incorrect information but it is burned into my mind and I cannot cross that threshold.

Norton was purchased by Symantec and I used their products for many years. Then one day I realized how many of my resources it was hijacking and the absolute misery of trying to uninstall a Symantec product. For that reason I will no longer use their product either.

I relate the above to illustrate how we develop likes and dislikes when it comes to the products we use. Microsoft is vilified by some and others feel it can do no wrong. I land in the middle on that one. To read my posts regarding OneCare meander over to this link.

[tags]windows, lockergnome, onecare, microsoft, mcafee, symantec, virus[/tags]