Personal Archive

while it is outside their body?
I’ve only seen mine on an ultrasound, and that’s as close as I hope to ever see it.

Elevator mysteries

In the building in which I work, there are three elevators, two passenger and one freight, all in a row.  There is a set of  up and down call buttons next to the freight elevator, and another set between the passenger elevators.  Sometimes the buttons by the freight elevator work for all three, and other [...]

Good samaritans

I waited a little too long to put gas in my car today.  I was on the way to the gas station, and in fact was in the left turn lane waiting to make a U-turn to get to the station, when I ran out of gas.  That’s the first time I’ve done that in [...]

I know I’ve seen various mentions in the press of natural mosquito repellents more effective (and less unpleasant to humans) than products with DEET. I couldn’t remember what they were, but a web search turned up several.

Catnip (Nepeta cataria) — ten times more effective than DEET — available as Catnip Oil Insect Shield
Lemon Eucalyptus [...]

The little red needle is pointing to “E”, and while that always stood for “Excellent” in my book, I think it means we’re out of gas!
— Firesign Theatre: Don’t Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me The Pliers
I stopped at a gas station. Since it was after 9 PM, the attendant had locked the door [...]

Speaking of nerdgasms…

I bought my mother a Canon PowerShot A460 camera, and she really likes it.  It’s a fairly compact 5 megapixel camera, and quite inexpensive.
I’ve had a PowerShot G2 for about five years now, and it’s about time to replace it.  I’d like to get a digital SLR like the Canon Digital Rebel XTi for digital [...]

Car stolen (dream)

This morning I woke from a nightmare in which I was unable to find my Yukon after shopping at Fry’s Electronics.  At first I thought I just misremembered where I’d parked, but after a friend and I searched the entire parking lot and the surrounding area, I concluded that it was stolen.  Somehow I managed [...]

Dawnie, greyhound, age 11

My mother just informed me that her greyhound Dawnie was diagnosed with an osteosarcoma today, and had to be euthanized.  She had been in pain since late last week, and although it’s possible that she could have been kept alive for a few more weeks, it would have just been more weeks of pain.  Mom [...]

I’ve been practicing sleeping for over forty years now, and I thought I’d gotten fairly proficient at it, but last night suggested otherwise.  Here’s the suboptimal way to get a good night’s sleep:

get exhausted during the day
drink way too much water with dinner (but not to this extreme)
go to bed two hours earlier than usual
fall [...]

At the security checkpoint, they usually tell you to remove your laptop from a bag and put it in a bin to be xrayed separately from the bag. And to take your shoes off, etc.
Yesterday they didn’t tell me to do that, and I’d forgotten about it, so I just sent my entire backback [...]