Chirstmas in April

Just received my upgrade to my work computer. It's pretty responsive. It should be with 2, yes, 2 gigs of RAM with a P4 3.6GHZ. Also it has dual flat panel monitors on a X600 series Radeon, 160G drive, a DVDRW drive, and an optical mouse. But I'm stuck using windows 2k until June when we upgrade some of my vital support software to a version compatible with XP. Oh, the pain. The pain. Some of the cool keyboard extra keys apparently don't work with Win2K, so I'll just limp along for a few months.
I know its a work comp but how I'd like to take this baby home, except for the fact in has Insmell in inside. amd64 pwns insmell.

The Pain...The Pain

You know I'm not a big sports guy. Sports are fun as long as they are just that...Fun. When it gets serious, I don't like it. Although I'm the one who usually get too serious with it, so that's why I don't play. Plus the fact I'm not built for it. My legs are misaligned. My arms are slightly "double jointed". In these later years my knees are not swell every time I walk around Wal-Mart.

This past Tuesday there was to be a softball game at the church's college property for the men after work. I thought it'll be fun. Why not? I actually had forgotten about playing at lunch time, but I talked to my wife on the phone and she encouraged me to go even so much to tell to buy me a new glove. I did and I went.

All was well in Mudville. I am very self conscious about my sports prowess or lack there of, but I got on base the second time I batted. I didn't do too bad playing first base. Yeah, I missed catching some balls, but then again who didn't. But then the fun part began. On one particular at bat, I got on first due to an error of one of the outfielders. Great. The next batter hit the ball directly to the short stop. Yes, a made to order double play ball. In microseconds, it flashed through my brain an instance from my youth.

It was also in a double play ball and I raised my hands as I slid to interfere with the short stop's view of first. He threw the ball any way and hit my hand. Ow. Who ever was umpiring, declared both were out since I intentionally interfered with the play. Yeah, right. My hand throbbed for some time afterwards. No, I won't do that again, and no, I'm not sliding in. Knees hurt too bad. He'll just have to throw around me.

Back to the present. I saw the short stop, a former marine who served in Desert Storm. Very strong man. Eagle scout type of a guy. Captain America. (no it wasn't Steve Rogers) He tagged the base and cocked his arm about ten feet away. Thought, "NO HE DIDN'T JUST…" That's last thing I remember lying on my back. No. I hadn't slid which he expected me to do, and hit me directly in the head with the softball.

I'm not a guy to make a big deal at getting hurt because let me tell you I've seen 'em. Cause if I was, I'd be making a big deal all the time. But it took just a bit for me to get up. My first words were, "I think I need to go set down. Wait, what am I saying? I'm out any way." Well, this time they let the guy stay on first base since I wasn't out of the base line. Taking one for the team I was. I played the rest of the evening with a HUGE knot on my head. I went home and put ice on my head.

I got such a head ache. I tried to go to work the next day, but came home early and went the doctor who said talk a pill and put ice on it. (Wow. Thaaanks.) I called in sick the next day to rest.

Shoulda stayed home and played MVP baseball.

Half-Life 2 Episode 1....and I just wasted money on a car.

If you don't know what Half-Life is, you must have been locked away "in stasis far from Earth, thought, and time itself." It's just the coolest FPS ever.

Half-Life 2

Better than Wolfenstien(even for it's time),
Better than Dumb, err, Doom,
Better than even Duke Nuk'em 3D(But you never really loose you first love)
Better than Quake 1, 2, 3, 4
better than Unreal
Better then Serious Sam, (snicker, snicker),
Better than Rainbow 6 (although I loved that one, tangos down)
Better than Medal Of Honor
Better than Call of Duty 2....well, Equal in Quality, but too short, HL2 wins
Better than Far Cry only because of modability. Far Cry Rocks.


Download Steam.
Buy the Valve Complete Pack
Play the original.
Play the Sequal.
Relive the story.
Love it.

I just read about the upcomming release of Half-life 2-Episode 1 . I sounds like Gabe Newell and the good folks a Valve are about to release a serial PC game. Wow a serial PC Game! The more things change the more that are the same. Episode after episode of new content. For you Quake and Unreal tournament folk, that's called a story. Yeah a story with a plot and a goal for the player that includes something else other that blowing the an opponents head off. Now I like virtual violence just a much as the next guy, but mindless maleviolence just doesn't do it for me.

My old machine just doesn't have what it's going to take to tackle this new game. I gotta get a AMD 64. Just gotta. My video card is a 9800 pro. I think that will do, but only have a AMD 1800XP that just won't cut the mustard. AMD 64 is the only game in town as far as I'm concerned.

'Star Wars Kid' cuts a deal with his tormentors

Check out this story

Boy, I just got snickered at, but never got $300,000 bucks. Man, maybe I never knew any good lawyers.

Ok. Now I'm really confused

According to the BBC,

Research presented at a major European science meeting adds to other evidence that cleaner air is letting more solar energy through to the Earth's surface.

But just a few moths ago they said,

They believe soot is twice as potent as carbon dioxide, a main greenhouse gas, in raising surface air temperatures.

Now which way is it? I think the gas from these greenhouse people are raising my temperature. I'd like to nuke 'em all.

Duh of the day....

"When you are dealing with rootkits and some advanced spyware programs, the only solution is to rebuild from scratch. In some cases, there really is no way to recover without nuking the systems from orbit," Mike Danseglio, program manager in the Security Solutions group at Microsoft, said in a presentation at the InfoSec World conference here.

From eWeek

And then what happens to your Microsoft License for XP?

Math humor....

I've been helping my wife do her college math. She is really coming along very well. How I'm able to help her I don't know. I never took any college math.

Some times discussing the work has gotten way too emotional. Both of us are way too independent to admit we can't do something or don't really know.

Well to lighten the spirit of things check this out.

Roy Mullins

My mom's dad, "Pampa" Roy had been very sick. Some sort of blood desease that required him to have blood transfusions very often. 2 weeks before Christmas we visited with him. He was lucid but couldn't remember things. He commented that he hated getting old if it meant you couldn't remember anything. 3 weeks ago he took a decidly drastic turn for the worse. He had constant in house care. They stopped giving him some of his medications. We knew the time was short.
Soon he had to be admitted to the hospice ward. After church on Wednesday night last week I stopped by the hospital and visited. He was sleeping. Apparently that's all he had been doing. His wife, Dixie, was there and we had a nice chat. When I left, she walked out with me for the first time in a while to go home and sleep. She'd been there a long time. The next day I took my sons with me and we sat and visited. Papa,(as I call him. Pampa was his word) was still sleeping and hadn't woke.
He had lost any weight he had left. Nothing but a skeleton. He had been steadily losing weight for some time since had contracted the blood disorder. Tuesday, almost a week ago, on my way to work, I recieved the dreaded call. He had passed away the night before at around 11pm.
This was tough. I'd been through this once before. My other grandfather had passed away about 10 years ago. I had been in the very room whe the Angels swooped down. It makes you feal so mortal. I had incriminations about the how little time we had spent together. How well we actually knew each other. Then I realize, it didn't matter now because there was nothing that can be done to correct it.
You just think everyone will be around for ever. But it just isn't true

Roy Mullins
Funeral Time: Friday, March 31st at 10:00AM
Mullins, Roy, 81, formerly of Knott County, husband of Dixie Lee Mullins, died Monday, March 27, 2006 at the Hospice Care Center. Born in Amburgey, KY, he was the son of the late Leander and Allie Gibson Mullins. Mr. Mullins was a Union College graduate, a U.S. Army World War II veteran, and a German Prisoner of War. He was retired from Kentucky State Government where he had been a director of the Department of Surface Mining, Reclamation and Enforcement. He was a former Vice President of Arch Mineral, a Knott County Court Clerk for 12 years, and a principle and teacher in the Knott County School System. Mr. Mullins attended Southland Christian Church. Survivors other than his wife include two daughters, Lanine Little, Lexington, Lana (Charles) Cornett, Hindman, KY; a sister, Ruby Faye Mullins, Amburgey, KY; a stepdaughter, Lisa (Robert) Tudor, Frankfort, KY; a stepson, Mark (Kelley) Cheatham, Danville, KY; 9 grandchildren, Michael Little, Jr., Emily (Jeff) Frohlich, Debbie (Heath) Todd, Michelle (Jeff) Fugate, Chad (Mary) Cornett, Justin Cornett, Jeanne Faye Mullins, Stephanie (Jeremy) Gibbons, and Jason Mullins; 11 great grandchildren; a special niece; and two nephews. He was preceded in death by a son, Rickie Neal Mullins; and a sister, Audrey Mae Terry. Funeral services will be 10 am Friday at Hindman Funeral Home, Hindman, KY with Pastor Jeff Fugate presiding. Burial will follow in Rest Haven Cemetery in Jeff, KY. Grandsons and great grandsons will serve as pallbearers. Visitation will be 3 – 9 pm Wed. at Kerr Brothers Funeral Home, Harrodsburg Rd. and 5-10 pm Thurs. at Hindman Funeral Home with a service at 7 pm. Memorial contributions are suggested to Cardinal Hill Hospital, 2050 Versailles Rd., Lex. KY 40504.

Thanks, "Pampa". You will be missed.