Jim's Occasional Journal of Sorts

Movie question for Meredith’s benefit:

Sun, 27 Dec 2009 00:58:58 GMT

Mere, who recently saw YOUNG SHERLOCK HOLMES and really dug it, has really wanted to see the new SHERLOCK HOLMES movie with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law. Everyone else in the house wants to see it, but we’re not sure as to whether it’s really appropriate for the little mystery junkie.

Same situation with AVATAR in regard to not-sure-if-appropriate-but-everyone-wants-to-see-it.

Post your thoughts, ESPECIALLY if you saw either of the movies, as to whether you thing either one would be something she could deal with.

Christmas 2009, part 2:

Sun, 27 Dec 2009 00:54:21 GMT

The typewriter turned out to be broken; the carriage does NOT advance when a key is struck – you have to keep hand pressure on the thing to move it with each key. Everything else is in good shape.

Anyone who has a good idea of where in the Chicago area I might get this thing look at / fixed and back into service?

More in a later post. She’s still fascinated with the typer and using it constantly – WITH the hand work, but jeeze, I don’t want her to be stuck doing that.

Housekeeping note: commenting

Sat, 26 Dec 2009 14:29:49 GMT

I’ve switched things around on the Wordpress site to make commenting easier; hopefully, my desire to keep down the spam isn’t cutting off commenting, but we will see.

Christmas 2009, part 1:

Sat, 26 Dec 2009 14:22:11 GMT

Christmas Eve is usually the day we spend with Susan’s aunt and mom at Susan’s aunt’s house in the northwestern suburbs of Chicago; dinner is followed by passing out the presents (a small child is usually too excited to sit through dinner in any sort of relaxed fashion, and is the elf who supervises the distribution and opening of the presents). This is the first year that we pretty much dispensed with Santa as a gift giver, and so there were only a couple of presents to distribute under the tree at home the next morning…

Usually, Connie (my MIL) would stay overnight at her sister’s house and leave there in the morning to go see Susan’s brother Doug and his family over the Christmas-New Year’s period, but there’s a terrible blizzard in South Dakota this year – high winds and over two feet of snow – so she’s staying here until the weather clears up, probably till Monday.

The big presents had already been handed out for the household earlier in the month; the house got a new HD TV setup in the living room. Susan had needed a new pair of boots early, so the Ugg boots I bought for her went out a few days earlier – it was a necessity, but I didn’t like passing out presents early. (She also got a very nice pair of lambskin mittens, via her mom, and a couple of other things from me.)

My personal presents were probably the smallest; I got a pair of VERY nice gloves from my MIL, and a set of four skeins of yarn from Susan – she’s knitting me a new (badly needed) winter hat. (My old ones went over to her, as my MIL had essentially felted the things by running them through the washer and dryer without thinking hard as to how to do it without the things shrinking.)

Susan’s aunt Marlyce and her longtime pal and roomie Carol were VERY generous this year; they gave Mere a middling sized HDTV, and gave Susan and I a set of Japanese-inspired dishes – a nice blue and beige eight-place-setting set. Both of those are still at Marlyce’s house, because the SUV was overloaded with Stuff Connie Is Taking Back To South Dakota, and there was no room to put all that in there.

Mere also got a sheepskin cover for her seatbelt shoulder strap; actually, everyone but me got one of those. There’s a really nice store called The Complete Sheep Shoppe outside of DeKalb, Illinois, and it has a ton of really nice sheepskin and fleece stuff, and that’s where Susan and Connie did a lot of shopping.

The standout stuff went to Mere, as usual. She cleaned up, as usual, and got things like an O Henry collection for kids (Kurt and John), a knotwork thing that is hard to describe (Sissy and company) and two DVD sets – a Walking With Dinosaurs collection and the first season of the Canadian girl’s series EMILY OF NEW MOON – which she said was an interesting display of the different sides of her personality.

She got the TV, as mentioned earlier, and she was sent on a mystery-clue mission throughout the house with various cryptic cards scattered up and downstairs that she had to then reassemble and use the first words of each to get the final clue as to where the present actually was.

Carol and Marlyce are becoming big fans of recorded books and MP3 music, and bought themselves twin iTouch PDA/MP3 players and the stuff that goes with (chargers, speaker stations, etc.) and ran across an unheard of deal for an 8 Gig iTouch – $50. Meredith had been taking it upon herself to figure out the iTouches and show the aunties how they worked (the aunties are VERY untechnical) and in the process was lusting deep and strong for the things. Oh, how she tried to figure out a way to get us to get her one. Oh, how she steamed at the bit to go up to the aunties’ place and putz around with the iTouches.

And of course, she had no idea that we had already bought the cheap iTouch for her (her MP3 player had died last summer in Alabama due to being accidentally dunked with soda) and realized quite to her speechless astonishment that the thing at the end of the series of clues was HER iTouch (Susan had put up a graphic that said ‘yes, it’s yours’ when the iTouch came on – nice touch.)

Quite speechless, which is a feat for Miss Endlessly Gabby. She got the thing set up to work with the wireless at the aunties’ house and at our house, and has had her head stuck in that a good deal since.

The second big standout for her (one of the under the tree presents) was a 1966 era Smith Corona Galazie portable mechanical typewriter; she’s had a jones to be Girl Reporter like Kit Kittredge, and once she got the thing on Christmas Morning, she plunged into that bit of retro-tech and spent a lot of the day with it.

There was a problem with it, though. More on that and Christmas dinner in the next post.

Reasonable Accommodations:

Fri, 25 Dec 2009 09:48:45 GMT

As some of you may have sussed out, since November of 2007, I’ve been working 99% of the time out of my basement office…with a huge long line of doctor’s excuses, bases on either my non-healing foot wound, or my weak response to infections casing raging problems on and off. The office finally said that they couldn’t do this as a temporary thing any more, and that I’d have to file for a ‘reasonable accommodation’ – i.e, a permanent excuse to work from home, giving me the right to get work to supply certain work-related things that I would need to do this.

The first step was the gathering of enough medical stuff to prove my case, which ended with me almost sending them around 300 pages of medical results from the last ten years.

The second step was in defining what I would need to work from home that the office would provide, and I was told to ask for whatever I legitimately needed. This resulted in me asking for a work PC, with all the necesary web-crafting software, a color laser, various office supplies, and an office chair.

I haven’t had a proper office chair down here for a while. Part of the problem is my weight, part my height and width and so on. The office chair I had at the office was around $900, and I can’t justify that – but when you spend a LOT of time in it, as I do, you need something that is comfortable and works. (Right now, I have a sturdy chair from the dining room, but it’s not built for the use levels.)

The problem now is getting all this stuff to actually get here, and that’s turning into more of a mess than I dreamed, as various people are doing a it’s-their-deal thing of tossing around the responsibilities of getting these items going. Amazing bureaucratic nonsense, and I’ve been a bureaucrat for 26 years as of today and seen a lot of silliness in my time.

Another tricky element is the PC; since there were a flurry of situations a few years ago about government workers who were being schmucks leaving laptops around with a lot of personal staff info or patient info – the federal government has been on a bender on security issues.

Bruce Schneier can speak more to this than I can, but the powers that be seem to be going to considerable lengths on internal security issues, from the apparent concept of There’s No Such Thing As Going Overboard. A lot of it seems to be more ways of getting things checked off of a checklist and getting gold stars from the Powers That Be that they were diligent than whether the measures taken are worthwhile or work.

So I have to get a mountain of paperwork and approvals for anything that goes on that machine, including software that the agency bought for me three years ago – and that’s just the start of it all. At this rate, I’ll be lucky to get it here and working by March.

Dead trees:

Fri, 25 Dec 2009 08:59:33 GMT

I’ve gotten over whatever the heck I was dealing with, but Susan and Mere have been miserable for the last few weeks on and off with what looks to be an allergy to the Christmas Tree. Susan thinks it’s the tree as allergen, her mom thinks it’s something that was sprayed on it, but in either case, the thing’s presence is messing up half the household in unpleasant ways. Since we had problems last year and this, we VERY reluctantly will be investing in an artificial Christmas tree for next year.

Signs of the Apocalypse:

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 11:45:22 GMT

Clarification:

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 11:35:06 GMT

I was feeling rocky all Sunday and really rocky all day Monday. It was obvious Sunday night that Mere wouldn't make it to the show, and I was sad about that, but I didn't expect *me* not to make it there. However, I was getting Not Much Accomplished on Monday because I felt like crap, and by the end of the business day, I was debating - should I drive down or take the train - and realized that the reason that I hadn't been out earlier that day to retrieve my cell phone from the theatre I lost it in last Friday night was because I Didn't Feel Like Leaving The House And Driving Over. As in I was that tired, that sick. And I had no business driving to the Loop.

Soon after, Susan gave me a lift to the train station, and while we were waiting there, Susan was asking me various things that added up to 'are you sure you're up for this?' - and I realized that no, I really wasn't, but that I was loathe to admit it. Or to give up on the event. And when I'm being stupid-mulish like that, I'm getting myself into trouble.

So I gave up and had her take me home; we stopped first at the theater to pick up my cell phone, and then at a nearby take-out place because everyone in the house shortly to be hungry and nobody wanted to cook in a big way. We ate dinner, and I went to bed around nine, utterly exhausted. Woke up again this morning at 5 with a horrible taste in my mouth, and a ton of things to do today, and started hacking at them.

No show:

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 02:42:47 GMT

Unfortunately...I'm down with something, as is most everyone else. Going to bed now, and yeah, I missed the DIY Messiah myself. I wasn't in any shape to go.

Have extra ticket for Do-it-yourself Messiah Monday night in the Loop:

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 04:25:32 GMT

Meredith was running a 101F temp today and feeling rotten, and is in no shape to go to the DIY Messiah Monday at 7pm, down at the Harris Theater. I have the ticket, of course - it's free. Give me a shout here or by email at jim@memnison.com - I REALLY didn't want this to happen, but it is what it is.

And one more story…

Sun, 20 Dec 2009 04:02:03 GMT

…from the Dayton Daily News (my hometown paper) about the twins. This was a surprise, really, and will beyond any doubt be the end of the stories.

Part of it is that it’s all been said – there’s not a lot more to add.

Ho-Ho-What-the-heck?

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 12:27:32 GMT

Guy is away, and his friends troupe in and wrap his entire apartment for Christmas. Including stuff in the freezer, towels on the rack, you name it. (video)

Planning the future:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 12:17:36 GMT

Another thing that was going by the wayside recently was any advance planning for the future. At this point, it’s starting to rev up again…I have two memberships purchased for me and Mere at Capricon and a room reserved; now to make sure that the $$ is there at the time.

On Monday, I’m going to go into the city for the first time in a while for the fun of it (rather than IVIG treatments at Northwestern Hospital monthly) with Meredith for the Do-It-Yourself Messiah. 3,500 people all singing their hearts out, with the audience as the chorus to a full orchestra and soloists, and the audience arranged as Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Baritone, etc. Mere will sit with me in the Baritone section, unless we run into friends.

In a surprise move, we’re having another couple over for Christmas Day to have dinner and play games and the like; the guy is agnostic, and the lady is Jewish, so Christmas is sort of a extra-day-off for them, and they’re a LOT of fun to be around. She’s also a very good foodie and cook, and she’s bringing stuff to complement the Roast Turkey…

Still have no idea what we will do with no New Year’s Eve party. No Weird Food Party this year.

HD Complex:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 12:06:32 GMT

This year we decided to buy a big household present for everyone rather than a lot of stuff (of course, Mere still makes out, but…) so the big add was a combination of an HD TV for the living room, and a HD TiVo and a Blu-Ray player to go with it.

This is changing the ‘viewing experience’ quite a bit here.

First, there’s remembering where the heck the HD channels are….I just finished a listing of the channels that we watch and how to find them, with a note on there as to which is HD and which isn’t – and if there’s a HD channel, that’s the one in the listing.

Without the listing, it’s VERY confusing.

The HD TiVo really has much more limited space than the old living room one, and while TiVo touts a ‘DVR Extender’ eSATA hard drive that you can attach to the thing with a Terabyte of space, the things are out of stock and unavailable – apparently Western Digital ran into serious quality problems with the thing and has ‘temporarily’ stopped production. For now, anyway.

That means no pile of stuff on the TiVo that we haven’t gotten around to, and that we’re forced to watch and delete on a real thorough basis.

The HD TiVo does have one very nice feature – it records in HD, of course, but it also can pull down streaming stuff for us from my Netflix account. Some of their movies are set up that way, and we’ve discontinued our movie channels as of yesterday – the Netflix stuff (either rental or streaming) is much more useful and bang-for-the-buck.

It also is able to access YouTube, for what that’s worth.

The quality of the HD images and of the Blu-Ray player is rather good, and we like that part a lot. Both the TiVo and the Blu-Ray are hooked up to the house Ethernet system, and can pull things off it from the Internet or be updated on firmware that way. We only have two Blu-Ray discs at present – my gifts via Sinterklaas – UP and NATIONAL TREASURE, but we haven’t gotten through either yet. In the future, I’ll probably buy either combo packages (DVD, Blu-Ray and ‘downloadable to MP3 Video player’) or Blu-Ray for the future.

Actually, our purchases of DVDs was dropping considerably. Ditto books. Susan and her Mom are on a Sara Paretsky binge at the library, going through the entire oeuvre, and I’m too busy to do much reading for pleasure (and have a huge backlog in any event) right now.

The Art as Commissioned:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:20:59 GMT

Michael Jackson commissioned fantasy art about himself that defies description; one of the pieces resembles a Communist Chinese propaganda poster with Comrade Michael leading the oppressed children of the world…just check out the pieces and imagine how much he spent on this stuff.

I’m thinking of a Botticelli-like painting like that first one with Bernie Madoff surrounded with cherubs….gaaaah.

Potters field:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:16:21 GMT

Screwups at Arlington National Cemetery have misplaced cremated ashes re-buried as ‘unknown soldier’ because they scooped out the urn when digging a hole at a gravesite. dumped the dirt in their landfill, and only later found out the dirt contained an urn with ashes….

Dolchstoss:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:10:30 GMT

Bulgarian newspaper reporting about Serbian anger over Bulgaria’s support of Kosovar independence:

Radio Television Serbia said that the Serbian delegation at the ICJ, led by ambassador Dušan Bataković, “believes that Bulgaria, as many times in history so far, has stuck a knife in Serbia’s back, by defending the secession of Kosovo”.

The idea that the Serbs brought any of this on themselves, of course, hasn’t occurred to them.

The comments area for the story (all this is in English) are pretty wild, going into cats and dogs fighting, incest and Monica Lewinsky.

Clobberin’ time?

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:00:10 GMT

“Hey Oscar Wilde, it’s Clobberin’ Time” is a odd art site that states its purpose as ‘an extension of a personal art collection of various artists interpreting their favourite literary figure / author / character’. Worth a look for the oddity of it all.

Love cooked medium-well:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 10:55:42 GMT

Woman in Louisiana serves boyfriend with a side of boiling grits; parboiled.

The man told sheriff’s deputies that he came home from work on Nov. 7, got into an argument with Brown, told her that he was breaking up with her, then went to bed.

Rare loves:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 10:45:06 GMT

Dayton Daily News article; the reporter’s adopted child from China was first raised by a foster family in China, who the child hadn’t forgotten -and who hadn’t forgotten her. Great story about how the foster family and the adoptive family got in contact…

Considering the whole thing with the twins and sisterfar, this hits home with me.

Things moving along:

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 10:38:14 GMT

Meredith is having her last day of school for the year today, and we’re just as happy for her to have some serious down-time. She has been getting really stressed over various things – it’s coming out right now over the tons of homework these kids are assigned – and I’m stating to get really serious rebellion over homework from her; fits of wild temper and the like that I rarely see.

Part of it is that she’s concerned over me, and part is due to a close pal of hers that has a tumor that has caused a lot of trouble for her; it’s in a terribly tricky spot, and the docs have the poor kid on chemo, and it’s caused the kid a lot of obvious trouble. It’s a collection of other stuff too that is putting the kettle on the boil for Mere…

As for me, this is the longest for a while that I have kept out of the hospital. Knock on wood. I keep very close tabs on things, and note that when my insomnia kicks up for whatever reason (generally when I’m upset about something or when my body is giving me some other trouble, like sinuses) it adds to my troubles about keeping my system in fair shape immunity-wise.

I spend a lot of time with paperwork munching these days; pretty much most of my free time, so to speak. Tons of medical paperwork, claims and the like, bills and the like, and so on. It’s easy to get stuck behind the tidal wave, and you can’t or problems with it will blow up. If you’re looking for why-Jim-hasn’t-been-posting, that’s a big part of it. Also working with Mere two-falls-out-of-three on her homework, which can easily run from the time I quit work to eight in the evening, with a break for dinner.

Suggestions welcome; need new bank:

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 21:19:34 GMT

I’m really tired of the rumbledy-toss of big banks buying small fry – and then going under due to hilarity at the home office.

We use two banks and a credit union; the latter is WAY out of state, and I’d transfer over to that except that we’d never have a local bank.

Bank #1 was Mid-America, which was bought by National City, which was then bought up by a big Pittsburgh bank. Bank #2 was a local bank, which was then purchased by Park National, and subsequently went bust and was taken over by the FDIC and is now part of US Bank – another Big Bank. In both of the cases, heavy mismanagement at the top killed the banks.

National City, however, has had some heavy use of fees and charges, and just this week zinged us for a $100 with three overdraft fees – except that there was no actual overdraft. Just that there might have been one the next day, except that we had put in a deposit that they decided not to consider relevant. According to online sources I’ve been reading, they are notorious for this sort of stunt, and I’m sick of it.

I complained, and they told me to stick it.

Any suggestions for a new bank for us greatly appreciated – IF the bank isn’t one of these big outfits that mismanaged their way into serious problems and then decided to squeeze all of their customers to make up the difference. We live out in the DuPage suburbs of Chicago, if that helps.

The front page of the paper:

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 03:44:10 GMT

http://bit.ly/6bT2Os (from the Newseum, possibly not good after tonight – front page of today’s Daily Herald)

IL_DH (pdf of the page – big center layout of photos of the girls)
Click twice on the graphic to get it full sixzed

Reprint:

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 08:15:50 GMT

The local suburban daily newspaper, the Daily Herald, is reprinting the Newsweek story on the twins with different photos:

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=342760

Newsweek article about the twins:

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 07:44:32 GMT

http://www.newsweek.com/id/225492/page/1
The Power of Two:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/225098
Photo gallery of the kids, etc. The Intro picture is particularly stunning.

This has been in the works since spring. Newsweek came in with a Pulitzer-award winning photographer who was fresh from covering the White House and Obama and Bush to do the shots. The interviews mostly were around Duckcon.

There are errors. They goofed on the date Meredith Grace was found (a year earlier), and a few little things. (For instance, a photo that was supposed to be of our house in the Chicago suburbs is really of the other family’s home in suburban Birmingham. Our house is not nearly as new, etc.)

But it’s written beautifully, and we are very happy with it. That’s it for twin stories in the news until they’re grown up and can talk on their own…if that ever happens! Enjoy the article and the photos!