April 6, 2013

Good morning! I can get away with saying that because where I am it's just after midnight, so ... morning. Long & busy day today, but not my normal scheduled stuff. More on that later though. Friday was a good day, & starting tomorrow days should be getting even better. I rewrote my schedule AGAIN. It looks better every time I rewrite it, so improvements are always being made. This time Kyle does ALL chores 3 days a week, has 4 days off, & those 4 days I do ALL chores & then I get 3 days off. Sweet! Kyle likes the

idea & so do I. Along with that change I also rearranged a bunch of other things that will help make my days less crowded. Friday I made French toast for breakfast, got the mail, & hand knitted (that's only once a week from now on even though I loved doing it every day ... I simply didn't have the time). I then cleaned the tub, neatened my end table, watered the dining room plants, processed a book out of my

inbox, dusted the Wii, mopped my office, blew the dust out of my knitting machine, fed the pets, & swept the bedroom. I checked the daily deals for the very last time, turned on Investigation Discovery (won't be turning on the TV anymore unless I'm machine knitting because it's too distracting), surfed eBay, talked to Pete who came home for lunch, made peanut butter on toast for lunch, took the dogs

out, worked on my business for a bit by listing some stuff & mailing out sold items, checked facebook & took my game turns, crocheted the lace doily for a bit, had a quick supper, & then crocheted the afghan until Pete got home from work. Then it was the nighttime routine. My Sim, Nikki (1st gen) in the Lakeside Mansion had a busy day too. She showered, took care of her son Harry Schmidt (2nd gen), practiced

martial arts, spent time with the pets, had a birthday party for Harry who aged up into a toddler, had a cake slice for breakfast & went to bed. When she woke up the next day she showered, taught Harry to walk, made waffles for breakfast, taught Harry to talk, & that was all there was time for so she went back to bed. When she woke up she made autumn salad for dinner & potty trained Harry. Harry is all ready to age up

into a child now. All that's left is reading him books that will give him a head start with skills. Since no one knows what skills he'll need in the future, she'll just read as many to him as she has time for before he ages up. I checked Ravelry & Nikki showered & that's where we both left off for Friday. Today I took the dogs out when I woke up, hand knitted while I waited for Pete to get ready, & then we went to work in Denton for the day. We didn't get back until 8:p. We were gone 9½ hours. OUCH! While we were in Denton we went to Cracker Barrel (I've never been there & wanted to try it) & then stopped into a motorcycle dealer & I checked out 3 different bikes. It's a 3-way tie between a Honda Rebel, a Suzuki TU250, & a new one I didn't know existed, a sport bike that's bright red & looks like those super fast bikes you see fly past you at 100+ mph, but this one is MY SIZE. All cost the same, around $4k, so price isn't a factor. The choices are down to style. Classic-style, Harley-style, or racing-style. The racing bike looks cool, but I'm not sure about that whole laying down on my stomach the whole time I'm riding. The Honda Rebel comes in a beautiful metallic blue color, while the Suzuki only comes in silver & has that classic-style look that I know & love from back in the 70's. It's going to be a tough choice. Any suggestions? They also have a much cheaper 125 for sale on the used lot that looks decent too. Lots of options. When we got back into town we picked Kyle up in Princeton & then when we got home I rewrote my schedule (looks better than before), worked on my bead banner for a bit, & then loaded up a new game called Wild Stallion Ranch (pics 2 - 6). For this beautiful home I created Ivan (1st gen). My son came in while I was setting Ivan up & said he looks like Indiana Jones the pedophile. HAHAHA! Never heard that description before. The mustache was freaking him out. Ivan has no sense of humor, loves the outdoors, is easily impressed, a daredevil, & friendly. He decided to be a CEO of a Mega-Corporation since he has NO useable skills & that's the only job that doesn't require any. He likes spaghetti, custom music, & hot pink. He's a Scorpio. His furry companion is Harry, a Turkish Angora who is adventurous, proud, & piggy. Ivan immediately joined the business career & met Pattina Knack. It was an instant attraction between the 2 of them & they were married & pregnant before the day was over. While he was waiting for her to come over he managed to harvest his apple tree. After their busy day of courting he made autumn salad for dinner & went to bed. When he woke up the next morning he adopted a kitten named Magic who is a Devon Rex & friendly. Hopefully Harry & Magic will get along. :) Back IRL, Milligan Water meeting Monday evening @7:30p.

1st Oscars were made of bronze, but today's Oscars are made of 8 lbs of gold-plated britannium. Britannium sounds impressive, but britannium is 93% tin! Oscar is a "tin man" not a "golden boy!"

Academy Award-winning actors of the 19902 top 10:

1. Kevin Costner
2. Anthony Hopkins
3. Al Pacino
4. Tom Hanks
5. Tom Hanks
6. Nicolas Cage
7. Geoffrey Rush
8. Jack Nicholson
9. Roberto Benigni
10. Kevin Spacey

Because of the unique human capacity of self-awareness, we can examine our paradigms to determine whether they're reality- or principle-based or if they are a function of conditioning & conditions.

Breathe in warm, moist air before eating. Taste is about 75% smell, so clearing your nasal passages will enhance flavors.

Clandestinely "borrow" a co-worker's cell phone, set the ringer volume on high, & hide it in another person's desk.

HipGeo:

HipGeo v3 is a major update to the HipGeo user experience -- Based on community feedback our redesign provides a more streamlined, media rich user experience and iPhone5 support. We hope you enjoy the new look!
Record, Blog and Share your Adventures! Featured in TechCrunch, Mashable, Gigaom and more...
Seamlessly create and share videos, photos, text and mapamations while automatically creating a timeline of all of your amazing moments.
What makes HipGeo so great?
* Record Everything! - Video, Photos, Photo Effects, Notes, Places, Routes, HipGeo can capture it all!
* Share Anything! - Share to Facebook, Twitter, Email as much or little as you want. Seamless sharing to your Facebook timeline as well.
* Easy To Use - But not limited. HipGeo has powerful tools if you want them.
* Beyond Mobile - HipGeo automatically creates a beautiful, customizable web blog as you travel to share with your non-mobile friends and family.
* Works In Remote Areas - HipGeo automatically stores and uploads your posts when a network is available.
* WiFi Only Mode - Save your data plan! HipGeo will upload only on WiFi if you want.
* Capture Your Routes - Sometimes the adventure is not where you went, but how you get there. HipGeo can automatically capture your route as well as the places you go.
* Spontaneous - Share those spontaneous moments to your blog and your friends even if it's not part of a trip.
* Flexible - Use the HipGeo trip feature to gather your moments into a single beautiful presentation. Create your trip before, during or after it actually happened.
* Amazing Travel Animations - HipGeo will play back your adventure as a slide show with map animations.
* Bulk Upload - Got Photos? HipGeo will bulk post in the past from the camera roll. GeoTagged photos will be placed in your timeline when and where they were taken.
* Explore Other Adventures! - Live vicariously through other travelers or find cool stuff near you.
* Really Free - No need to pay extra to get all the cool features.
* Full Website - Access and edit your blog with powerful editing and posting tools from the web.
* NOTE: Continued use of GPS running in the background can dramatically decrease battery life.

In the legend of Lady Godiva, Tom was a man who bore a hole in his window's shutters to watch her ride by on her horse naked & was struck blind as a result. That's where we get the term "Peeping Tom."

May a desert scorpion seek shelter in your shorts. -Johnny Carson 1978

Monthly Payments:

Monthly Payments is a simple loan calculator to compute monthly payments and interest on a given loan amount for a given duration (# of months) and % interest rate. Monthly Payments uses the Amortization formula found on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amortization_(business)

No, the top 10 list doesn't have a typo, Tom Hanks won twice in the '90s, once for Philadelphia & a 2nd time, for Forrest Gump. For Hanks, this decade was a "box of chocolates."

Old athletic shoes can be recycled & made into playground equipment & tracks. http://www.recycledrunners.com

U.S. and Soviet negotiators make progress (1990):

U.S. and Soviet diplomats meeting in Washington, D.C., make significant progress in negotiations concerning the role to be played by the newly reunified Germany in Europe.

U.S. Secretary of State James Baker and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze carried out most of the negotiations. Both sides approached the meeting with caution. Although U.S.-Soviet relations had been progressing quite well in the past few years, the recent independence movement in the Soviet Republic of Lithuania and the aggressive Soviet response toward that movement--which included a military intervention in March 1990--had temporarily soured diplomatic interchange between the two superpowers.

In early discussions, the Soviets indicated their preference for Germany to remain completely neutral. Many U.S. officials, however, wanted the reunified Germany to become a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). During the talks, the Soviets dropped their insistence on German neutrality, but suggested that perhaps Germany could join both NATO and the Warsaw Pact (the Soviet equivalent of NATO). Both sides agreed that a U.S.-Soviet summit meeting in May would explore this question in more detail.

The Baker-Shevardnadze talks did not produce the any serious breakthroughs or dramatic resolutions. However, they were indicative of the continuing spirit of cooperation between the two nations that began when Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in Russia in 1985. As the Soviet suggestion that Germany take membership in both NATO and the Warsaw Pact suggested, Cold War suspicions had not entirely disappeared. In July 1990, Gorbachev dropped his opposition to German membership in NATO in exchange for a U.S. promise of much-needed economic assistance to the Soviet Union. Shortly after German reunification took place in October 1990, Germany did become a member of NATO. The suggestion that it also become a member of the Warsaw Pact became superfluous when that organization dissolved in March 1991. Gorbachev resigned in December 1991 and the Soviet Union ceased to exist.