Jack
Widespread Panic
Jack was really a jester
Who held his one good eye on the queen
And there sat the king beside her
He’s pointing his sword up and down with every scene
And the wizard’s in the corner
Catching peanuts between his teeth
And the dog’s lying in the shadow in the archway
There’s one good dog sleeping filled with good ol’ dog dreams
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Exhaustion is driving single-handedly for 8 and a half hours, caring for your sick spouse and kid, spending a restless night as spouse deals with said illness, then spending the next day caring for everyone. Hallie became the third (and final) victim of the stomach bug this evening right before her bedtime. I could have three sick family members on my hands tomorrow, though Kelly seems to be rallying at the moment.
Life is full of adventures, isn’t it?
Boy, it’s a good thing I didn’t get sick during my trip to China. Chinese hospitals were found to have given patients fake IVs.
That’s the thing I found with China: everyone around was trying to make a buck, usually at your expense. This seems to proceed with the blessing of the officials. I think these food and drug scandals are early tremors. The Big One – one where thousands of Chinese die due to unbridled greed and corrupt regulation – will strike any month now. Even so, I doubt the Chinese government has the will to actually protect its people from its own crooks. It will take a few very large riots before anything changes.
Kelly has been hit hard by the stomach bug I mentioned in the last post. Travis is also a victim though his spirits are considerably better. I found out my sister-in-law, niece, and nephew fell victim yesterday during their drive back. I feel bad for them. At least we were home when it struck.
My guess is the “resort’s” pool. I’m thinking the kids might have swallowed the water while (most) of the adults did not, though Tanya was in the pool and I don’t think she drank the water. It could be a virus, or simple food poisoning. I’d appreciate hearing from any fellow Turners who may have also gotten sick (or gone swimming and didn’t get sick).
On most mornings I would be thrilled to wake up after 8 AM. That kind of thing usually doesn’t happen once you become a parent, so its to be savored. Sleeping in this morning meant that I missed saying goodbye to my relatives, some of which hit the road before I was fully awake. I had also hoped to get in a group picture this morning but that didn’t happen, either. No group, no group picture.
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We’re in Pine Mountain, Georgia this weekend for the Turner family reunion. We’re staying at the Pine Mountain Club Chalet ..uh, “resort,” with a nice cabin right on the lake. The weather has been sunny and hot, with the exception of yesterday evening when afternoon thunderstorms cooled things down.
I am particularly enjoying this trip because I was last here the summer I met Kelly, ten years ago. I could not have imagined that the next time I would return I would be married and the father of two wonderful kids. The cabins haven’t changed but I sure have!
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You know the Stephen Wright joke about the phone with no five on it? I feel the same way. Our cordless phone has ceased to dial 1. That means we can’t dial 911, or enter our bank or answering machine pins (both “1111,” in case you were wondering). Normal people would probably trash it and buy another. Me, I did what any self-respecting geek would do: I took it apart to see if I could fix it.
The electronic parts are fine. It turns out the problem is in the conductive rubber keypad. The 1 key’s pad is missing some conductor, which probably wore off over time. I’ve put in a note to the phone manufacturer to see if a replacement part is available.
In the meantime, don’t think because we don’t call you that we’re avoiding you, especially if your number has a 1 in it . . .
I kicked off the new WordPress version of MT.Net late last night. I didn’t start out with the plan to do it but once I saw how easy it was I got hooked on it and didn’t stop until late last night.
I first began using WordPress back at my last job, where I updated a Lyceum server with news about the company. I like WordPress’s look. Drupal is a bit too complicated for a simple blog like mine.
The real key was the script I found on D’Arcy Norman’s blog. D’Arcy did the migration a few weeks ago and detailed it all on his blog. He made generous use of Panayotis’s detailed instructions, so it was actually a group effort.
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For the past day or so I’ve turned my copious spare time towards moving my blog to WordPress from Drupal. Fortunately, there are plenty of good SQL scripts to move tables from one to another. Unfortunately, most scripts were designed for blogs with few posts to migrate. Thus there were precious few examples of Apache Rewrite rules to point old Drupal links to their WordPress equivalent. Most of the transfer time involved figuring out the proper Rewrite-Fu to make the switch as painless as possible.
I’ll explain all the geek details in another post. Time for dinner!
“Nowhere you can be that isn’t where you’re meant to be.” Those are the wise words of Mr. Lennon and Mr. McCartney from All You Need Is Love, and its true: I must be right where I’m supposed to be. I’ve not been particularly enjoying this involuntary vacation, but I’m trying to make the most of it. Its not where I would’ve chosen to be but here I am. Imagine if life was always exactly what you expected it to be. Why bother living it?
Maybe I needed some adventure. I thought I had some adventure. Did I need more? I’ve said it would be tough to top my last job and that’s proving to be true.
Damn it. Sometimes I hate being right.
I spent this morning mowing the lawn, as I wasn’t available to do it this past weekend and won’t do it this weekend, either. Then I surveyed the garage and sorted through all the stuff in it. Then it was lunch with my former coworker, Matt. So many projects I’ve been putting off due to work commitments. Though I allegedly have time now, I still can’t get them all done. One’s tasks will expand to fit one’s available time.
Saturday will be one month unemployed. I felt confident the first week or two and had my confidence slowly lag until …well, today. Today I felt inspired. I’m going to find that awesome job or else I’ll create it for myself.
