AtomicMrX

For the past week I have been unable to make a stable connection to the internet. I called Comcast and they said my cable modem was only working at 40%. So a service call was put in and they just left our house. The cable guy said I was getting too much cable strength and it was acting like noise and so he put a new connector on the cable lines in the basement and said they would send someone out to do the same to the cable from the house to the pole.

I didn’t realize how much I rely on internet connection. So many applications now a days require a connection for it to run correctly.

I haven’t heard back yet from the builder Bill but should tonight. Builder Bill came over with a friend and looked at my kitchen sliding door and kitchen window. I am looking to replace the drafty energy hungry things and do it with my income tax return money (which I have now). I just hope they give me a price that fits nicely with my budget!

Saturday I spent a large portion of the day (4.5 hours) over at a co-workers house working on her computer. I was doing a major overhaul on it. Here’s the list of what I performed:

• Attach External Hard Drive, format and partition.

• Install OS X 10.4
• Install Updaters
• Install UserOpPatch1.9 (to force the OS recognize an external DVD Drive)
• Install iLife ‘06
• Install iWork ‘06
• Setup .Mac account on Apple web site
• Set Parental Controls and go over what actions should be taken.
• Correct User Accounts (kids accounts were set as Administrative and should not be - also was set to automatically startup as one of the kids accounts instead of the login window)
• Install new printer-fax-scanner
• Install Fonts
• Install Fonts into Font Book and show how to use the font utility
• Introduction to Widgets, Safari, and around the new features of the OS X 10.4

I got paid $20 an hour for the work and I was going as fast as I could so I wouldn’t waist her time and money.

I was ready to relax after that intense mental workout! So Shannon and I went to Wally’s Buffet in Independence. It was okay - kind of cheap and the food was too. We may go back, we may not.

Today is laundry, balance check book, pay bills, and cut my hair. Then at 6:00 PM I’ll be over at my friend Bense’s apartment having dinner.

Tomorrow I go to work and I’m going to have a talk with my supervisor and his supervisor because I am just not happy with the situation I’m in. I’ll talk about that later.

Shannon has to work the evening of February 14th so we decided to have Valentine’s Day on his day off and a little early this year. We celebrated Valentine’s Day on Friday February 10.

I kind of went a little over what I had planned to buy but it just kind of happened. I bought Shannon a $25 iTunes gift card so he can fill up his iPod Shuffle he got for Christmas. Right now he only has about 50 songs on the poor thing. At 99 cents per song he’ll be able to fill it up and have extras! I gave him an adaptor for his car to play the Shuffle through the car radio but it doesn’t work on his stereo. When you put the cassette adaptor in it thinks it should “clean” the cassette heads - instead of playing music through. So I bought Shannon a new FM transmitter adaptor - we’ll see if it works better. Plus I gave his a nice card. Last year we gave each other the exact same card - weird! I also gave him a sugar free box of candies (they fit into his diet).

Shannon went way over what I spent. He got me this:

I love it! He did an excellent job picking out a ring that I would like. I told him I was picky about rings. I don’t like gold jewelry and we had talked a lot about what would work and what wouldn’t. It’s for my right hand ring finger. It is white gold and has three real diamonds in it. Shannon says this is a temporary ring until we can afford to get better ones for each other. It’s kind of a promise ring. Shannon doesn’t have a ring for himself yet. We’ll have to get one for Shannon that could withstand a lot. His job would destroy it - working on cars.

Plus Shannon got me a great card and to top it all off - two Cadbury Eggs!! He knows I go crazy for them and somehow got some before the season even starts.

We exchanged gifts and cards then went to eat at Jess and Jim’s in Martin City, Missouri. It’s an old stake house that has great food. We both cheated on our diets and had way too much food. It was delicious! When we got home we both had a chocolate desert! I had a Cadbury Egg and Shannon had a sugar free chocolate!

This was the best Valentine’s Day so far!

Well I finally made it to Brokeback Mountaind.

Shannon and I went last night and it was a great movie. I haven’t been to any movie for over a year or more. I just don’t like the theatre “experience” much any more. Too many rude people have ruined it for me.

The movie had great mountain scenery and some fantastic acting. It was very true to the time era of 1963 (from what I have heard through stories older friends have told) in depicting homosexuality’s acceptance in America (or lack there of). It really shows how far acceptance has come and how far it still needs to go.

Go see it.

I got all my tax stuff put together, accounted fore, and all the 1099’s that I’m gonna get. I just need to drop it all off at the tax preparer (Mercer and Mercer Inc) and I’m doing that this morning. I should get my results in about a week or less (depending on how busy they are).

I hope I get a lot back! I need to put some in a savings, some toward bills, and some on home repairs. I wish I could put all of it toward home repairs but I just can’t. I’m hoping next year I will be able to use some of it to buy a new computer. As computers go this one I’m using is very old, but with the few additions I made to it last year it should keep me going for a year or so.

Shannon’s off today. He had to use his Personal Time Off or loose it. He has been off work since Tuesday to use up Personal Time Off. He’s broke so it hasn’t been a real fun time off for him.