Monthly Archives: September 2006

Rainbow colds vitamin d

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Ah, the weather is nice and autumn like now, for a few days, at least.

The movement of air yesterday was very gusty later in the morning, it was blowing and blowing and blowing, and we had to plop some things down on one of the hen pens to keep the roof from flapping wildly and threatening to fly away.

Later in the afternoon a storm began to brew and it rained here at home, we were leaving to go to some stores just a bit later. While driving we went past the edge of the storm and it was obvious that it had previously rained there. A bit further down the road it was sprinkling, the storm over us again (we had changed directions on the roads a few times, and the storm was also oddly shaped.) In Duluth proper I turned to my right (east) and spotted a perfect rainbow … it was deep and lovely, and then above it a second one, lighter though, appeared. The perfect rainbow began to grow too, had way more ribbons of color than the traditional ones, it was almost mirroring itself below, with no gap, not all the colors, but the bottom three or four, yes.

The rainbow held in place then for several minutes, then slowly crept back in size to just a quarter of a bow to the south end of the original full one. The light one above dissapeared around then too. That quarter of a bow held for many minutes after that, but we lost sight of it when we turned and then turned again on our way to our first destination.

My “new” 6 year old was very vocal when I pointed the rainbow out, “That’s God’s Promise!” he shouted. :smile:

The next several minutes excited child voices traversed the idea of what the rainbow was and why God put it in the sky and what it means even today for us. :smile:

We went to Ted’s Montana Grill first, and while there the rain started to come down in horrid torrents. Before it let up some hail dropped too, nothing large, but it was noisy on the roof of the restaurant. It was very gusty during that deluge, the front door kept opening up all by itself. It was interesting.

We also went to the new Whole Foods store, the one that “took the place of Harry’s” recently. We were there last week during their first day open, and it was crazy and I hated it, though the store seemed nicely laid out and I thought it’d be nice if not packed with humans so much.

It was after 8pm when we got there last night, and it was so nice, people there, but not too many. We enjoyed looking around more deeply than before, and I enjoyed perusing the shelves for the things I normally get, and seeing what else they had. I am very happy with the store, but it’s just so far to go. I don’t know the actual miles, but it’s several miles beyond where Harry’s used to be, which is way away from anything else we go to.

I got a few capped beeswax candles, and am hoping to enjoy them. I’ve played with a little votive that I got a set of for my glass cat holders, but haven’t lit the bigger pillars yet. I didn’t get any very large in size, just the smaller sort. I’ll get some more in the future probably, to fill in and have candles in different parts of the house.

I also got some Cod Liver Oil for the children. I read an article on an email list recently about vit. D and colds, flu, and it convinced me to start supplementing my own vitamins with extra vit D around times when we have “colds”, and then in winter too, or when extra stressed or inside a lot, cloudy days on end, etc. The Cod Live Oil is made by Carlson and is flavored for children with Lemon. The children had their first dose this morning and said they loved it. :) I am taking a pill form of vit. D along with my LifePack.

Vit. D is made in our bodies from the sun’s uv b rays on our skin. Lighter skin makes more Vit. D with less exposure, the darker the skin, the more exposure you need to make vit. D … our family has very fair skin, and freckles are easy to attain, without burning even. I tend to keep everyone out of the sun entirely from 9am to 4pm during Spring/Summer and let them out more in Autumn and Winter. I am going to attempt a decent normal exposure for vit. D purposes from now on, trying to find info or figure it out myself for timings during the year for enough exposure without freckling or burning.

Until then we’ll supplement for sure, and then we’ll spot supplement during times when it’s condusive to do so. (Winter at least, if we are going to be around other people, keep our systems beefed up to fight off the germs.) I have antedotal info from my teen years. More than once I had a summer cold in Florida and it got bad and so I put on my bathing suit and got out the lounge chair and baked in the sun. I’d do that for an hour or more and I’d often burn myself, but feel better for it, and my cold definitley decreased soon thereafter much faster than it had been, I mean, not full in, yet it quit when I did that. So I knew about that sort of thing naturally, instinctive of myself, never read about it or told to do it. I stopped that sort of thing though because of over exposure and stopped laying out usually, and eventually totally stopped exposing myself to “tan” which I could sort of, but it was a sensitive process and I finally was fine with my pale skin, but have freckly arms more than I’d like now because of all that exposure in my younger years. I have no desire to put that sort of idea of worshipping the sun into my children, want to save their skin, and still will. I’ll teach them how to get sun without getting too much. :)

Anyhow, I have some sort of cold thing that tried to start the other day, and having a new bottle of Vit. D and going out in the sun for 5 to 10 minutes a couple times a day have kept it at bay, it’s not getting worse, not going away entirely, but not over bad and I expect it’ll be better sooner than a usual cold would. So that’s all!

Getting better

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I’ve not felt well the last few days, some sort of virus, but I’m on the upswing now. Yesterday I started to feel a bit better and that increased all day. I’m still struggling a bit, but over the worst. :)

Yesterday, late afternoon, we had a big storm hit, it rained in torrents for a long while, sheets of rain angled from west to east –not sideways, but quite angled. Later the rain straightened up, and then lightened up and some birds started flying about through it, I noted. There was lightening in the storm, indeed one blast seemed to be close and I heard something go “POP!” inside the house. I turned off all the electric boxes (surge/strip to plug electronics into) for the TV/DSS up and down, as well as the desktop computer, unplugged the laptops, but I didn’t unplug the modem/router since I was trying to get a radar image to load and study (I was at home alone, btw) and there were no more close hits and I just risked it (as I would anyhow if we all had gone somewhere and the storm hit while we were out.)

It was nice to have the rain. I enjoyed it all alone. :)

It’s good to be alone when one is recouping, not horribly off, just still bad but inclining up the rampway to feeling better. I speak of introverts, of course (not that an extrovert woudn’t like to be lone to recoupe, but I can’t imagine they’d truly like it as I do for as long as I can, nor say it was ‘enjoyable’) and when my family came home hubby presented me with lovely cream/ivory color roses from Costco (something to aide my getting better.) Daughter and I had looked at the roses in the past, but more closely the last time we were there, last week. I noted to her some very pretty pink varieties, and white/cream but dropped a very large hint that if anyone were to get me roses, that very ivory sort right there would be the ones. She did well yesterday, told DH which ones I would want.

Lasagna and Math

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Today is Lasagna day. I’m making a bunch of it for us and another family.

Yesterday I was able to get the Math-U-See package I have wanted for awhile. A very long time ago, a few years ago –that is, I got the first level of the above stated product. I haven’t used it and lost the VHS tape and only had watched one lesson before losing it, and don’t use a VCR anymore in the first place (have one and COULD use it, but don’t have it hooked up and I wouldn’t WANT to use it for Math-U-See lessons!)

I looked up Math-U-See more recently online and noted that they do now have DVD’s but their program has been updated, and there is no DVD for the first level as I have it. So I’m ditching that and going with BETA for all three children. My youngest is too young, but will benefit as he can, and might spring ahead (since he IS a very smart young man) and in any case will be there at the spot he needs to be to use BETA on his own if not with his siblings.

All the children are natural number interest savvy children, as I and their daddy are. We aren’t “great” at it all, just facinated with it and see much in it, just for DH and me that we didn’t have the right instruction in school to gain better usage of it. Math-U-See is the right approach for us, I want to give my children the advantage in maths that I didn’t have, to just “get it” in the way they can, not have some rote definition placed on their shoulders as THE ONLY WAY. I am providing Math-U-See to them so that someone more savvy can show us what it means, how to do it, and that’s cool. Seeing math is important, and I never had cuisinaire rods to work with, only my fingers, and they are still my friends in many cases of numbering even today. :rolleyes: I don’t HAVE to use them all the time, just DO sometimes. I also have a block in some maths somewhat due to 4th grade class punishment with multiplication tables being written out and written out and written out on and on, for talking when teacher was in hall with another teacher. Hmph. It was horrible for me, since little introverted 4th-grade me was just sitting there quietly keeping to myself during that hub-bub. She, the teacher, didn’t recognize that, but did recognize one person as NOT being bad and didn’t have to do the work, but HE was being noisy during the hub-bub. That bothered me and I can understand that from this side of life, I was INTP then, just didn’t know about it in the mid-70′s (not until the past few years really.) So did I do that work? I fretted over it and my best friend was in a different class and she had compassion on me and wrote them out for me. What a friend! :)

So I’ve had a chip on my shoulder since then, and being a P (INTP) I do struggle with wanting/needing visual understanding of those silly scribes that are numbers. I need to see the ideas, and I get it fast, but don’t do the long maths well, it’s a struggle, it hurts my head. Not that I can’t do it, I hate it, it’s stupid when I know I can get it fast from a different perspective if it’s allowed.

I wish they knew what I know about it. So since they didn’t, it’s my turn to learn this stuff better now, with my children.

Today is Lasgna day though. Lots of lasagna making and with the children then, the normal way of numbering, whatever they are doing always involves numbers at some point, and if they are watching me, invariably something numbering comes up when I’m cooking, for sure, even when I’m cooking as I usually do, without measuring or recipes, though I do use recipes often enough, I rarely use one precisely though. Starting soon it will be something I want to do: have one of the eldest two children measure my “on the fly” cooking, to develop actual amounts to replicate in the future, for me or them. This is the sort of numbering we do all day long, converting numbers and things having to do with food, temperatures, scrapbooking, watching hurricanes, etc.

Shooting Star report

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Ooh, I just saw a really big “shooting star” low in the NW sky. (just before 6am Eastern)

DH was getting set to leave to go to Knoxville for a few appointments today. It’s early, still dark, and I was awake in the family room, updating the windows software on my new laptop, so I decided to go out with him to see him leave, and comment with him on how it felt outside, temps being lower the last day or so.

We stood there on the front sidewalk and it was pleasantly chilly. I was turning to the left and scanning the sky for star clarity (I love it when it’s cold and clear!) when my eye caught something new moving, and I instantly was able to see it and enjoyed a very large fall of something from fairly low in the sky, rapidly moving downward, it was very quick, but very visible, quite large for a “shooting star” and very classic in how it looked –”shot” downward as a “shooting star.”

It was a very satisfying experience for me. I love watching meteor showers and the last time there was a decent one around we had overcast skies. So this set things to right for me. A surprise large one. (Whatever it was doesn’t matter, it was just something falling through the atmosphere, of course, not “really” a “shooting star” … that’s just our romaticized way of speaking about things falling into our air space, as long as it’s not right on our heads.)

Geek Update

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Well I did get a new laptop. It’s very similar to my old one, though a different “model” and different “software” but the same basic hardware. The funny thing is, at BestBuy they pulled up the info on the model I had bought that had the protection, in order to find a replacement for it in their stock. The data said it had an ml-40 processor, when in fact I know it was an ml-37 … and they listened to me but still went with the paperwork that printed out and gave me two options:

They didn’t have an “ml-40″ and so they tried to up-me to a “compaq” that had x2 and a “50″ but same otherwise except for screen size, it was 14.1″ whereas my “old one” had 15.4″.

They also had an HP that actually had the same hardware profile as my old one, but they considered it a step down since it had a ml-37 and not an ml-40 like my paperwork stated I had.

I went with the HP since I don’t LIKE the Compaq cases, they seem flimsy to me, and I had a compaq before and hated what it did, and don’t like how they treated me. They are now made by HP, but still the same or worse to me, the cases are just flimsy when a few years ago they didn’t seem that way to me. In any case — I like the HP and how it feels and that is primary for the choice, this LOOKS the same as my old one, just is a bit different in how it’s divided on the harddrive, and some of the software.

My hubby got an HP a few months ago, and it’s similar to this new one. The first one I had was a dv5035nr. I loved it. I got it in February 2006. Hubbies is a dv5215us. My new one is a dv5224nr. His has an Athlon Turion 64 Mobile ML-34, mine both were/are Athlon Turion 64 Mobile ML-37.

They all have “Quick Play” technology, but my first, the dv5035nr didn’t have the same software workings as hubbies and this new one in that medium. I also had a standalone install of WinDVD that I can’t recall if it was on the computer originally, or on a disc that was in the box that I had to install (or could, manually) or what. I didn’t BUY it, and didn’t have it from another computer, I don’t think. I still have to look through stuff and see what’s in the box. I know hubbies doesn’t have a dvd player software standard either, like WinDVD, for example, but I never looked through all his stuff either to see if it’s on something else.

I had the BestBuy complete coverage on the old computer. It’s satisfied now that I turned in that one and got a new one in exchange. I have to buy a new warranty on this one now. We have 14-days to do that in. It’s a worthy thing, in a household like this, I guess. Where nothing is sacred from any organic contact, though usually not my own hand having much of anything to do with it, not directly or subdirectly, or indirectly really.

The only idea is this: $350 dollars once is good: but what if the second time that is bought and something happens, thats $700 that has been laid down. Another time then, that’s more. Of course it seems horrid to consider it, but really, could one afford to buy a new computer or be able to get it for $350, laptop I mean, a decent one. So in the end, it means, buy one you like, and spend more to make sure you get a replacement if something happens to it. Then if something happens you can get a new one that is alright exchange … then you have to decide to go it alone, or get the guarantee. Of course it does make sense to get the second guarantee warranty. It does make sense.

I’ll end this mish mosh now. I am pleased with how things went, overall, and overall for sure.

Geek News

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We got the news from GeekSquad that my laptop can’t be repaired, so we need to go pick out a new one. Not such a happy bit of news for me, they don’t have many models in the store, last we saw, that are comparable to my HP that I had, a dv5000 series with a Gig of memory for starters. (I want more memory than that, though, and want a decent kick in an Athlon 64 processor, though I don’t need the fastest available.) The thing is too, their website has ONE Hp listed in notebooks, just one. It’s not that I am stuck on HP, but I did like my laptop and it wasn’t broken from their standpoint, but from something that a cat did to it. So poohey I don’t know what will transpire. We are leaving to check it out now.

The Ancestoral Two steps forward, three steps back

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My sister sent me an email recently, and I only plugged my computer (desktop of course, laptop is still MIA) in last evening, having had it off for a few days while moving things around and fixing things. The email she sent me was a link to a genealogy for a family we are supposedly connected to, and it had different info for a part of the info that supposedly pertains to us directly, than what has be told us by others researching similar lines, but not ours personally.

In fact, this family line I had contact with the owner of one site over discrepancies, but still they are up. The neat thing is that the newer info I saw on the other site last night is encouraging, a work towards an understanding of the gap, perhaps. All in all it’s not totally helpful since in the 1500′s it’s not always easy to know dates of everyone. I find that listed info that continues on for generations is always someone elses direct line, mine ends with some woman, or begins with some mystery man. Not entirely, I mean we have a lot of decent connections known, just not everything, not by far (it’s crazy, it’d be really wierd if we DID have more, there is so much to know with the little we do know!)

I was up late last night researching the internet for something because of this. Last year or the year before I had stumbled onto something and had a hunch that a person with a certain name had to be connected to these other people in some way, and be connected to my direct line somehow, not that THEY would be directly related, but maybe a side-ways relation, uncle, etc. So last night I started hounding at that hill again, and picked up a large scent and started reading things of Latin that I had long before stopped (since the only latin I know is the basic nothing of knowing English which is very friendly to latin in many ways), and found more and found German sites that I could translate that talked briefly about the person here and there. I looked at the latin things again and found that I was reading them with more context than before, and finding great delight in that. I also found that, whether there is basis to this or not, I would put a word or phrase into Google translator as Italian to English, and it’d get me the basic word understanding, though it wasn’t “Italian” but seemed so in many ways to me, who knows little about Italian, but more than I do about some languages, though I’m familiar with Spanish, and have waded through tons of Dutch genealogies enough to have a gist of that language for context digging, and also German is somewhat contextable too, French atimes is as well, as well as all those lanuages having a part in American English for sure, making them easier for anyone to just dive into looking at to gain perspective. All in all I came away with wanting to read Latin better, and determining it’s worth starting study of it with my eldest now, I guess, and I have found a lot f interesting latin texts online that would be a delicious challenge to peruse (reading source, ah the joy.) I’ve never studied latin before, mind you. I never wanted to learn it in school ’cause it seemed so dry to others taking it. I’m all for living books, and that would include latin learning. FWIW

So anyhow I found that time the other year an obscure reference to someone that just seemed like they would know about what I was wanting to know. Of course they are long dead, but it does seem as I’ve found out that the person was indeed connected to the ones I wondered about, for sure. And still I don’t know about the “missing generations” the quizical pondering of who it is, which generation is the one placed with, what year born, or died, or married. What children did they have. How well did the noteworthy one know my actual ancestor that is missing. That in their day they just knew them and didn’t consider someone in 2006 would wonder who they are, what chidlren did they have, what year did this or that happen in. :rolleyes:

This very frustrating business is case in point for me: I may look for a published family tree, and find that so and so is listed and that part is right, and then find they only follow one person from this or that generation and there was nothing new to glean from them. Dead ends, dead ends. But every so often something new comes online, like the other day my sister found something that was different, and no one else is listing it that way.

It seems that there is value in having people in areas where ancestors came from. They sometimes are happy to list all research they can find on the people connected to whatever it is they are researching. It’s an odd perspective for me to consider, since we today, my family, left this and that area, and that and that and that area and this and that other area and on and on so long ago. People actually live in all the old ancestoral haunts today. They can go and view library documents, church documents, town history. Lucky them. Really.

Our Room

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I”ve been busy. My hubby agreed to move his “office” into the little area next to the “family room” and let me have the room his “office” was in. This is a big deal, a really big deal.

His desk is long and obnoxious to a degree, but it “just fits” putting it in that one position. Phew! I am glad of that.

The office room is/was full of stuff and a mess, mess, mess the messiest mess of messiness here. I’ve wanted to do something with this room for a long time and now have my chance to clean it out and set it up for crafty usage. :) The computer desk, desktop computer, is in there now, here actually, where I am typing currently.

I’ll set up the “daybed” again, it’s been dismantled propped up on the wall in here for months now. It was my last baby’s crib, it’s a convertible thing and the mattress is a good cotton/wool mattress, so I like using it as a light sitting device. I want to reinforce it and put a board under the mattress, then it will be more solid, for a bit heavier use, but never, never, never for grown man usage. I am small and children are OK to sit on it, and I’m just a big kid, in that way. It looks charming though and will look fine with a nice cover and throw pillows, maybe a foam sort of daybed shaped cushion to make it more “couch” like.

The sewing machine will come in here too, and I’ll try to activate it again. It still works, but “how well will it work” is the question. It’s an older machine, built in the 1960′s. I got it in the 1980′s from someone my mother cleaned for. It needed a tune up then, and worked flawlessly afterwards. It’s sat around for a long time now, and has been moved to three different addresses since getting it fixed up back then. It’s a Singer, and looks just about what the picture in our old encyclopedias, that were printed in the very early 1970′s –that I grew up with, of “sewing machine” was. I don’t have those books, but then I could compare it since it was in the 1980′s and we had the set still. My machine looks older, but very similar. A real retro vintage look for sewing.

I’ve always liked it. It’s fancy, electric, but very manual as well. Lot’s of gadgets that are fairly complicated, depending on what the task is you wish to complete. I just like to use it to do simple sewing, constructing garments simple-like. FWIW. The last thing I made was a dress and pinafor for my daughter when she was One year old. I miss sewing, and really want to get back into it for making skirts, instead of buying most of them for me and my daughter. I have never made pants, and don’t think I will. Not for me, I don’t wear them, neither does my daughter. I won’t make them for the boys though, too fussy for me.

Dresses, skirts, and blouses and shirts I can do.

My crafty other things will come into this room too, and also the “home school” stuff will be in here. I still have work to do, get a few more things out of here and then get it set up better. There are three bookcases in here already, one for my stuff which is already on the shelves all along, and the other for DH’s work stuff. I’ve moved them around a bit, and am not sure if I’ll move them anymore. Someone pro-sprayed the walls in here this year, just with a horrible flat paint, and the concrete floor has that paint stuck on it for at least a foot and a half out from the wall, which makes moving furniture nearly impossible, it’s like having sandpaper on the floor. Urg! (This room is on a concrete slab, “the basement” walkout level.)

Hopefully this will aide me in my scrapbooking and rubber stamping and other endeavors, and I hope to get some of my photographs enlarged and framed to go onto the walls in here and around the house. I’ve “always” wanted to do that, and never have. (framing is what stops me, it’s so expensive!)

I’ll try and come up with a innovative way to deal with enlarged photos. Not the “frameless” plastic “frames though, well, maybe some of them could be that, I’m not sure now. I mean, I am open to anything else mostly. :)

In this whole affair is my husband’s office, and he’ll be in the “family room” now, so it’s still a dicey affair with three children in the house and hubby on the phone a lot for work. It’s something that we have to work out though, he needs space, but so do I, so do we, as a family, and me and the children as “living here all the timers” since we homeschool. We used to talk about sharing the room that is ‘mine’ now, but I couldn’t see that working and said so, my stuff being family oriented (very little ‘selfishness’ involved in my crafty things) I need to spead out and build up and have work stations. DH’s space took up a large portion of this room, and now that the desk is out of here the room feels bigger. The small space his desk is in now works since it’s just big enough, a cushy corner of room next to the bigger square-ish family space, so he’s next to open, and has plenty of room to move around out of the way, and has a little view through the bathroom right in front of his desk (a bathroom we still need to finish!) We’d like to find a nice headset for him to use with his phones in the house too, noise canceling mic and headphones, if possible.

The family room will needs to be “finished off” –we don’t really spend much time there still. Most of the drywall is up, just a little left to go around the outside edge of the ceiling, and the paneling isn’t up yet. We have things to do alright, and it just takes a bit of time, and a lot of brawn.

I actually did some brawny work on the ceiling in the ‘office’ yesterday and the day before. There was a big hole that was made to pull some wires, and never was repaired. For many reasons we need to rip out the ceiling and put in a new one someday, so for now I just put in a temporary patch, not “temporary” but a sloppy patch is better than a big hole over your head. It was hard enough to do this myself. It’s done though, which is a big relief. One day I’ll empty the room and we’ll rip the ceiling out. That will be a great day, but until then I’m making this a great room, and when the day comes, it’ll be easy enough to move my well organized room out to do the work on the ceiling. :)

6 Years

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Today is my youngests birthday. He’s six today! He was my only “homebirth” baby, and born very quickly on a night when the Harvest Moon shown bright (actual “full” being a tad later than his actual birth, but I won’t squabble that since it was so VERY HUGE in 2000 that night and just the same the next rising.) I was in labor for sure only late in the night on Sept. 12th, and gave birth sometime around 1:57am -give or take — there was no one with a watch or clock available to note the time, the midwife hadn’t arrived yet. It was a great night, and all was well during and in the end.

My “A” is a small guy, he was my smallest baby, but not that small. Just smaller than my first two, which the eldest was 9lbs 1oz. He’s been the one who has stayed in “his age” for clothing, the other two were always way ahead of that sizing. He’s my sweety, just regular really, since I am comparing him to his siblings for size. He’s just regular. :)

He was really funny when opening his presents this afternoon. A couple or a few times he said, “What in the universe is THIS?” That sure made me chuckle.

We’re having his request for dinner tonight, steak. We weren’t going to do that, but in the end were able to fund it. So what happened earlier today when DH came home from the meat store with the steak and a few other things for the freezer this week? He was vacuum sealing “cubed steaks” to put into the freezer for another meal, and “A” said, “That’s what I said I wanted for my birthday dinner.”

What? Nah. You said “Steak” and you meant “Steak” and we are having “Steak.” He argued lightly a bit longer after that, but then said, “I only want rice with the steak.”

OK dude.

He is one that you must FORCE to eat any veggies lately. So on his birthday for his birthday dinner he can have “the night off” this year.

I have pictures from the days events that I’ll get onto FLICKR soon, and put some here as well. (not today, but in the next couple of days.)

Saturday Blues

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Saturday was a very bad day for me.

First I went to grind some grain to get flour to make bread. My Nutrimill I had last used a few days before –just fine. This day I connected it and filled it and turned it on “as usual” and all that happened was a soft “click” when I turned it on, not the motor starting, but just a click and nothing more. Plugged in or not, same thing.

According to the manual there is nothing about it (really, the manual mentions NOTHING.) Online sites selling the Nutrimill state its “automatic reset” is wonderful, basically. I say pooh to it.

When the canister is removed you can see the “fuse” area, a black rectangle like thing with the red 12 “button” in the middle. On mine I do not know what it felt like when my machine worked, but this day it was “loose” like.

In any case it’s that when the machine is ‘turned on’ whether plugged in or not, the ‘click’ sound emminates from the area of the machine right above the ‘fuse’ I described.

What’s going on with it, I have no clue. I leave this sort of customer service thing to my DH. Unfortunately, this happened on a Saturday, the Saturday of a Holiday Weekend (Labor Day in the USA.) We were going out of town on Monday, and wouldn’t be home until Wednesday night, so there was nothing that we could do until today, really. I don’t know that DH has done anything yet either.

That whole affair on Saturday really upset me. I was looking for info with my DH online on his computer, and I got frustrated and went into the kitchen and put on music to play on my laptop, and then a bit later started to search google for more Nutrimill info, but my keyboard wasn’t acting right. It was odd, and in the back of my head I thought “liquid” but didn’t bring that info to the forefront. I continued trying to get some words typed out and finally just “restarted” the computer, and that didn’t help the situation. I stupidly tried another restart right away and the computer screamed at me intensely (as if when the motherboard posted there were keys stuck on or something … ) So I turned it off and cried a bit, then picked it up and screamed my head off … there was liquid coming out of it, a pool of something on the butcher block island I had my laptop on.

What had gone on previously was that our cat Dixie was trying to curl up on it and sleep when she could, that day. It was something new for her, doing this to my computer, but she was a known keyboard sleeper from the past in certain situations. The only difference for my laptop was that I used to have the butcher block island in the ‘dining room’ area, and had moved it to the kitchen by the window just the day or so before.

I knocked her off my laptop a few times, and DH also did, and we both yelled at her at times, and I think she retaliated.

Yes, it was pee on my laptop.

I always leave my laptop open during the day when I’m puttering around, I often have music playing, and it’s just plainly a kiosk for me to stop at here and there to check something out.

I’ve lost laptops before because of liquid, always someone else doing something, but THIS time it was different, a cat peeing on my laptop. Ugh. UGH!!!! Fortunately we got the laptop full coverage through Best Buy when we got it this year. We learned fully well the past few years that when it comes to my laptop, children seem keen on pouring things on it every so often, though they KNOW they aren’t supposed to. We thought they’d learn finally, being older now, and there wouldn’t be any issues.

Seriously, we’ve had cats pee on things before, but NEVER a computer piece. In this case, it must be retribution for being knocked off several times and yelled at.

Saturday turned into a horror for me then, two main things going “kerplunk” on me without me having done anything wrong with them personally. I got the hard drive out of the laptop right away then, and got my data off, then put it back in and off to Best Buy we trotted. Same scenario as the Nutrimill though, it was Saturday, a Holiday Weekend (Labor Day) and though we had it in to the Geek Squad right away, it wouldn’t be going anywhere or getting anything done for it until the middle of the next week at most, and as well the date they gave us as the trouble ticket said ‘Sept 15′ or something close to that, and DH said the guy said, “and a week beyond that is how things are running with HP” … so it’ll be a September of blahdom for me.

I cried and cried and cried that day. I slept pitifully and cried on Sunday. I woke up Monday numb and cold about it. We left to go to Charleston, SC that day. I missed it terribly and kept thinking it must be at home, but it wasn’t. Getting home last night was empty.

I have the Desktop to work on, but it’s relegated to a corner in the basement. It’s not a Kiosk for me. It’s not my sweet mobile HP.

This comes at a time when I was trying to sort through things and get the Desktop organized and data saved elsewhere so that I could Clean Install Win XP and get new partitioning going. Now I’m missing my laptop and can’t effect this change without it. I need the space and the working laptop for another computer if problems crop up in the install.

I’m working with an old disc, 40 gigs is all it holds. So I have to reorganize it all to make it work better. This Desktop runs well, but it has little space and I am trying to get it squared away to run better, be a happier machine to work on. I have music to rip from LP’s and I need space.

I could use a huge hard drive, but haven’t managage to alocate one to the system ($)

Thus here I am on a cramped hard drive running my laptop data off of an external 30 gig laptop drive, and trying to moosh down the data on the Desktop so that I only have what I need, and can arrange it all so that I can put it elsewhere temporarily, and then get Win XP installed again, and I can do do most of it without my laptop back, but not the full tilt version of everything.

Questions remain though, when will I get something back and what will it be?

This is about the laptop, and a similar query about the Nutrimill exists. What caused the Nutrimill to not work, and Can they/Will they fix it under warranty. When will we get answers. Eventually will I send it back and what will they do, what will I get back?

Functionality for me has been swiped down to rags. No music in the kitchen (except for earphones, which isn’t my style to work with, I like full sound in the open) and I can’t grind grain AGAIN. I can’t believe my new mill went. My Whisper Mill burnt up and we lost it due to company changes, they “stole” it, in other words, accepted delivery and never contacted us and never could we get in contact with them. That aside, besides the mill dying, it’s frustrating that I waited long to replace the mill, and finally did, and not too long later, it to quits working, and the manual says nothing about “reset” being automatic or any sort of true troubleshooting. Augh ….! I say. It’s not fun, and I’m really sad about it all.