Eagle

Here's an eagle. Saw it on top of a tree in the Ketchikan harbor. During our Ketchikan harbor tour. It's kind of zoomed way in, but I thought it was cool seeing so many baldies. Part of my famous Bird series.

There hasn't been much content here lately. That doesn't seem to have upset my Loyal Readers too much, but I do feel they need to get a little more for their money. What money? Well you may ask. The answer: none to speak of. But one or two of them may click on my advertisements and earn me a penny or two.

Anyway. I think the lack of content is largely due to the lack of anything interesting to write about. That wouldn't normally be considered a problem on the Morrowlife blog, but still. So let's think of something interesting going on in my life.

Plans for next summer are starting to firm up already. A little. We have Young Women camp during the week of July 15. And the family reunion for LRN4's side of the family is also probably going to happen in July. Don't know when yet. Don't exactly know where yet either, but it appears to be narrowed down to a cruise to Catalina and Ensenada vs. a train trip to the Grand Canyon via the route taken in the pre-automotive days. We voted for the train ride, but we'd do either and be happy.

Nothing else is on the 2010 vacation itinerary at this point, but I imagine we might want to take our Spring Break campout, along with several other shorter camping trips. Don't know where to go in the spring. This year's trip to Mt. Madonna was way too cold to repeat. The previous two trips to Big Sur were beautiful, but you can only go back to the same campground so many times. Especially when it's in the middle of nowhere and you've been to everything and seen everything around it as much as you really ever expect to want to. Admittedly, it's a beautiful middle of nowhere, but still.

So do any of my Loyal Readers have a suggestion for next spring's camping trip location? Here's your chance to really make a difference in the world. Don't blow it.

I had been having massive problems with the iPhone OS 3.1 update, like many, many other people. My most common problem was what people are calling Coma Mode. You put it to sleep and can't ever wake it back up again without rebooting. It was happening one to two times a day, and was very annoying. I also had one instance of it locking up in the middle of a phone call. I read the blogs and Apple help groups, and lots of people are recommending pretty harsh treatments, mainly consisting of resetting the phone to factory settings and reinstalling everything, and then not upgrading to 3.1. One or two people, however, recommended turning off Push notifications and disabling Safari's Fraud Warning function. I tried those things, along with deleting the one and only app I had that used Push, two days ago (or was it yesterday?) and haven't had a single crash since. Of course, past performance is not necessarily an indicator of future results, but I'm cautiously optimistic. It was getting tedious.

So for my iPhone-owning Loyal Readers who are having crashing problems with your OS 3.1 update, you're welcome.

Many thanks to LRN1 and LRN4, who pointed out that yesterday's Monkey news also qualified as Food Violence news. I appreciate your involvement.

That's enough for today. Let's end with today's Toilet News: the ultimate running toilet.

See you tomorrow.

Eagle lighthouse

Here's a twofer - the Ketchikan, Alaska lighthouse with a bald eagle sitting on top of it. We took a boat tour of the harbor there and saw lots of bald eagles. Pleasant little tour, too. Part of my famous Bird series.

Blogger's refusing to add pictures to blogs via FTP again, so I have to do it by hand. Stupid Blogger.

No post Friday. No excuse. Fortunately, not even good old Anon noticed, so no harm done.

Nice weekend - it was quite hot and we spent a lot of time in the pool. LRN2 and LRN4 got back from dropping LRN1 off at school on Saturday afternoon, a few hours earlier than expected, which was nice. It was pretty quiet around here while they were gone. I like quiet, but too much of a good thing can be bad. So I'm glad they're back.

Not much else new. LRN1 reports that it's great to be back into his routine. He likes his house and his roommates and his classes and his job, so there's not much to complain about. He's run into several friends from last year - says it happens like that for the first week of the semester and then you never seem to see them again. I wonder why.

I've found an excellent opportunity for any Loyal Readers who might be looking for work - be a carny! The possibilities are limitless. I know I'm applying.

See you tomorrow.

Baby ducks

Here are two of the baby ducks being protected by the daddy duck from yesterday. Aren't they cute? Looks like the one on the left gets a little more than his fair share of the chow. Part of my famous Camping and Bird series.

Greetings, Loyal Readers.

Normal day. Other than the big company picnic over at the Corporate Ballfield. Free food, decent weather. No complaints.

LRN1 reports he's still having a bit of a difficult recovery. It appears to me that there may be a bit of a suture that has broken off and lodged in the tissue at the front of his throat. Of course, I'm probably wrong. He's going to the dentist's office tomorrow afternoon, so the truth will be out shortly. If I'm right, I propose that each Loyal Reader send me a $100 cash reward for my excellent medical/dental diagnostic skills. If I'm wrong, we'll forget all about it.

Update: The piece of suture broke loose at dinner tonight - LRN1 retrieved it. Where's my hundred bucks, Loyal Readers?

I think that's fair.

Special thanks to LRN1 for his comments on the future of Gardenville. I suspect his suggestions are right and I'm very serious about turning th website into a one-topic blog. We just have to make the commitment to update it on a regular basis. With meaningful content.

LRN2 made travel plans today for a summer visit with his friend Jay. Is Jay a Loyal Reader? Let's have a look over there on the right. Why, yes he is! Thanks for your Loyalty, LRN21!

We have some highly important Toilet News today: The King of Toilets is nearly ready. That's gotta be some kind of a nice toilet.

See you tomorrow.

Daddy duck

Here's a duck we spotted at Chabot Park recently. He and the missus were watching their three babies. He looks just a little suspicious of us here, doesn't he? Part of my famous Camping and Bird series.

Extreme Short Shrift. It was Massive Meeting Tuesday. Drove the Miata today, so there was no blogging from the train, either.

All's well. The weather has been incredibly pleasant - cooler than usual, I believe, and sunny and beautiful.

Thanks to LRN1 for his comment on yesterday's post on glowing snakes. They're cool, but they're not quite real. The search continues.

So I'll leave you with some food violence news: When going to the zoo, don't eat the Sno-Cones. Really.

No comments on my gardenvillesoftware.com questions yet. I'd really like to know what you think.

Much more information tomorrow. See you then.

Ducks

Here's a happy, peppy duck couple observing their duck friends. Photo taken at Loyal Reader Number Two's Science Olympiad event, and part of my famous Bird series.

Happy St. Patty's day. One of our many meaningless holidays. I celebrated by wearing my pale green shirt. Must honor my Irish roots, don't you know.

Otherwise largely uninteresting day. Got up an hour late, commuted, worked, and commuted again. Evening plans include more fussing with the new remote control and a few more girls camp phone calls. In the event that my other goodies (DVD burner and video card) arrive, I'm sure I'll find time to install and test them too.

Loyal Reader Number One's iPhone application has been submitted. Let's hope it turns out to be a little more lucrative than the Morrowlife Blog has been (still at $13 and holding!). Remember me when you're rich, LRN1! Better yet, support me when you're rich.

The Stereo Stream website is making progress too. There are pretty much just placeholder pages at this point, but that's a start. I expect he'll have a version of the desktop server available for download Real Soon Now.

Speaking of the iPhone, version 3.0 of the iPhone software was announced today. Developers can already get to it, and it will be available to the public sometime this summer. Lots of people have been looking forward to some of the improvements they're putting in, like cut-and-paste (finally!), push email, and tethering. I think the most important change, though, is peer-to-peer connectivity. Why? Thank you for asking! I see Apple subtly positioning the platform as a competitive portable gaming machine - especially the Touch, with its other functions becoming more and more secondary. With peer-to-peer capability, tons of fun new games will quickly become available, resulting in a lot more hardware sales. It'll be interesting to see what comes along. Your opinion?

How about a little controversy? It's been a long time since we've had any controversy. Consider this: Have you ever seen a stupider idea than this? My answer: not that I can recall.

And speaking of stupid ideas, I definitely think my Loyal Readers and I should pool our money and buy this. I volunteer for the position of "Lord of the Manor." There are plenty of "Serf" opportunities available.

See you tomorrow.

Zoo birds

Here's a little flock of birds at the Detroit Zoo. I think these guys were there voluntarily. Part of my famous Bird series.

Wonders of Blogger. I sat down to write Friday night and immediately fell asleep. Must have been tired. I woke back up just long enough to walk upstairs and get in bed.

The Fourth was pleasant. We had several friends over. We swam, jacuzzified, played croquet, ate hamburgers and associated goodies, and visited. Also watched the local fireworks. They were nice, with one oddity.

We walked out to the entrance to our neighborhood and discovered half of Lardville over there waiting for the fireworks. We arrived at about 9:10, expecting the fireworks to start at 9:30. It turns out they started at 10:00 instead. After going for just a couple of minutes, they stopped. Don't know why. About five minutes later, half of the crowd got back in their cars and left. Immediately thereafter, the fireworks resumed. We thought it unfortunate that all those people came here and waited over an hour for two minutes' worth of fireworks. They missed the best part, too. Including the smiley face. Wow.

Anyway. Several things on the agenda for today. I'm planning to wash the Miata, possibly get the Suburban washed (commercially, of course - it's just too darned big to wash myself), look at a model home with Loyal Reader Number Four, maybe play a little more croquet with the family, swim, and who knows what else.

Have a great rest of the holiday weekend. See you on Monday.