Daily Doings at the Line of Death Bar & Grill

Yeah, my birthday is coming up soon. And I'm thinking back to some of the gifts I received over the years.

There were a few clunkers, like the Bedknobs and Broomsticks game I got when I was 6. I tried playing it once or twice, but I didn't have the dexterity to balance the ball on the little plastic platform as I added plastic extenders at the bottom.

As for parties, I really don't remember having any birthday parties. Maybe my neighborhood friends came over and helped me celebrate, but I don't have any distinct memories of that happening.

1971: My 7th birthday. I received a Juliette portable cassette tape recorder. (I forgot the model number, but it had a knob instead of piano-key-like buttons, and an external microphone.) For the next 3 years, I'd tape programs off of TV, music from the radio, and conversations with my friends. Then it stopped recording, for some unknown reason. But it still played tapes, so I kept it. I added a headphone jack in 1979. I finally tossed it in either 2002 or 2003.

1974: My 10th birthday. I received a Realistic AM/FM digital clock radio. (I think the model was the Chronomatic 100. Not quite sure of the model number,though.) This had the old leaf-type digits with white numbers painted on black "fins" of plastic; no LEDs or LCDs. One would drop every minute. Years later, the clock mechanism stopped working, and my dad used the radio in his basement workshop. It was moved upstairs to the kitchen when the existing kitchen clock radio died.

1977: My 13th birthday. It wasn't a gift to me per se, but my dad bought himself a Realistic Minisette IV radio and cassette player that year. I used it to re-dub and copy the tapes I already had. We had to replace the AC adapter, as I left it plugged in the wall, didn't have it connected to the tape player, and the adapter melted. It would have caught fire if I hadn't pulled it out of the wall.

1980: My 16th birthday. My parents offered to pay for a trip to Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario with some of the older members of my Boy Scout troop. I think this was their gift to me that year.

1981: My 17th birthday. Not really a birthday gift, as I had graduated from high school the month before. I received a Panasonic RX-5100 boom box. I began taping stuff off the air again, and made cassette copies of my albums. But it had a history of eating tapes, and I had to repalace the plastic door holding the tape. Until recently, I used this as the amplifier for my Minimoog. I still have this unit, and should take it apart and clean it up.

And no, I didn't go out to a bar and get drunk on my 18th or 21st birthdays.

Now, when I celebrate my birthday, it's not about the gifts. I usually go out for a good meal for dinner, and have steak and eggs for breakfast. (It's what the astronauts ate!)

Sometimes I wonder why I bother writing posts describing how my day went, or how my weekend went, etc. I rarely, if ever, get any feedback on them, and wonder if these posts are getting read. If anything, they're more of a momento for myself.

Anyway.....I slept in until around 9am, missing the Centerville Americana parade. Again. (People were placing their lawn chairs on their spots since Sunday.)

Afterr getting out of bed and showering, I did some more housecleaning -- first the upstairs bedroom, and then the garage. I spent about one hour on each of these two areas. I moved some stuff around, and got rid of many cardboard boxes I had been saving for a future use that never happened. They're in a pile in my kitchen, waiting to be taken to the county dump for recycling. I hadn't done the cleaning for years, due to various reasons or excuses: no time, no desire, no energy, allergy to dust, etc. There is still more work to be done, but if I spend 1-2 hours a day workong on them, it will get done.

I was invitied by my friend Winter (yes, that's what she calls herself) to a cookout at her place in the afternoon. I got there at 5, and brought my copy of 1776 for folks to watch. No one else had head of the movie or the play, so there was no interest. Our friend Charles was there, and we were soon joined by Susan and Mark. I had two large, yummy bratwurst patties.

Afterward, Winter needed to make a store run, so I took her to the local Walmart.

On the way home, I saw fireworks displays for Moraine (which I liked because their show was high-up), Miamisburg, and Centerville. A lot of people had parked in the shopping center near my home, and the show ended just as I was nearing home, so the last mile took a while.

I don't care for crowds -- either people are getting imy way, or I'm getting in their way. And I don't care for fireworks displays. The loud ones are too close to munitions for my taste. So I tend to isolate myself on the 4th, and not do what everyone else does.

Today's plan: More cleaning, more job hunting, picking up M from day care and spending a few hours with her.

It was 23 years ago next week that I was offered my first full-time job: a support contractor for what is now the 88th Communications Group at Wright-Patterson AFB, near Dayton, OH. I was flown to Dayton for the interview, stayed overnight in a hotel, was offered the job, flew back, and started the following week. So I had a couple days to tie up any loose ends, pack the car (an '85 Chevy Citation), and drive down from Buffalo, NY to Dayton, OH.

In the span of that 23 years, a lot of the local landscape has changed. The first couple of weeks, I stayed at the Residence Inn near the Dayton Mall. Back then, route 741 south of the mall had a Shoney's restaurant, a go-kart track, Steve Kao's Chinese restaurant, and a Ground Round restaurant. All of them are gone now, replaced with other businesses. The Residence Inn has changed hands as well; it's now a Hawthorne Suites hotel.

Also in that span, I've lived in a second-floor one bedroom apartment in Kettering (3 years), a 2-bedroom townhouse in Centerville (6 years), and a 2-bedroom-and-loft condo in Washington Twp. (14 years and counting).

I sometimes think about how my life could have been different. If I had accepted another job elsewhere. If I had bought a house instead of a condo. If I had married someone else. If R and I would had stayed together. If we had more children. Would I have been better off financially, or worse?

Dayton isn't the greatest. It has its good points and bad points. But I've come to like it here. I like the reasonable cost of living. And I'm within a day's drive of most of the people and things I want to see. And my daughter is here too, and that keeps me anchored to this part of the country.

It's been a surreal week, with Marcus passing away. I feel like I've lost a good friend. And he was. Petting him was like therapy for me -- it would relax me.

Anyway, I had his body cremated on Tuesday at a local pet cemetery.

That evening, after work, I returned the flea killer to the store where I bought it. They refunded my money. A few minutes later, as the suggestion of the cashier, I called the company and told them what happened. They asked for the lot number and other indeitifaction on the package, so I had to go back to the store and ask for the product that I had just returned. The company was apologetic and said "We take this very seriously.....we'll start an investigation". At this point I don't know if I'll get any financial compensation. But I think this is a much better appraoch than vilifying them online, or taking legal action against them.

This afternoon, after work, I picked up the urn and the cremains. The urn is ceramic, in the shape of a sitting cat, with a shiny black (onyx?) finish. While I was there, I got to pet one of their office cats: a big orange cat named Jamaica. He was slightly bigger than Marcus was. And he too liked to be petted. I should go back every so often to get some "kitty therapy".

I also had tags made for him, Merlin, and Bubastis --- my other cats who were waiting for him at the end of the Rainbow Bridge. I have their cremains as well, in the same type of urn. I also stopped at Michael's Crafts to get some ribbon to use as a "collar" to hold the tags in place.

Meanwhile, Mercury is staying in the loft area, and giving me lots of "kitty kisses" (licks) and "love bites" on the cheek and chin. Ouch! I think he has fleas as well, but I don't think he has them as bad as Marcus did.

Anyway, I made two videos of Marcus while he was still alive. I held the phone in one hand while I petted him with the other. I tried to capture the sounds he made while he got petted. I uploaded them to YouTube earlier this week.

October 2011: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xt7jbafFsWY

March 2012: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JjY5Atmd9s

...honors Bob Moog on what would have been his 78th birthday. The "Google Doodle" is an actual working synthesizer, in the style of the classic Minimoog. Thanks to filkerdave, I've seen a "preview" of it on the Google Australia page (http://www.google.com.au/), and the Google UK page (http://www.google.co.uk/). Tweak the knobs, touch the keys, andplay with the pitch wheel. It's all there.

And soon, it will be on the Google USA page (http://www.google.com/) and Google Canada page (http://www.google.ca/).

[Updated 27-May 04:00] Now that May 23rd has come and gone, the Google Doodle has been moved to their Doodle Archive page at http://www.google.com/doodles/finder/2012/All%20doodles.

A couple of months ago, I asked myself this question: "What was the last time you had a real vacation?"

What is a real vacation? Once where I don't have to worry about what's on my to-do list, my budget, keeping up on email, watching TV, or any other "distractions" of home. The times I was on unemployment, or staycations (where I stayed home and tried to catch up on home stuff), or trips to my parents, relatives, and friends in Buffalo -- they don't count as vacations.

I think the last one was 2007, when I went to Starwood.

The past few years haven't been great for me, financially. As a result, my travel budget has been zero.

( Before then.... )

Where I currently work produces some Neat Stuff! They manufacture parts made from silicon. These parts are then used by solar cell and computer chip manufacturers in their fabrication.

And I had no idea they were doing this in my part of the country.

The first step is growing the crystals, or ingots. They use the Czochralski Process, or "CZ" for short, to create the ingots on-site. These ingots are pretty to look at, but they're heavy.

Then these ingots are sliced and machined. Sometimes they're polished, and sometimes holes are drilled into them, using either diamond-tipped drills or electrical discharge machinery (EDM).

Naturally, quality is critical, so there are plenty of quality control measures taken during the fabrication process.

I don't spend a lot of time on the factory floor, so I don't know everything they do. (But I did get a tour the first week.) And if I did, what I would know would be considered proprietary information or a trade secret.

Why silicon? Because some of these parts need to be non-conducting, which rules out parts made of steel.

One drawback to silicon is that it's brittle, and can break easily, like glass.

But I like working here. I like working in engineering support, working side-by-side with engineers. And they seem to like me and my work. I just hope they have plenty of tasking for me -- and money in their budget -- to keep me employed for a long time.

So I've been listening to a lot of the Pat Metheny Group -- and Pat's solo work -- this past week. It's my favorite music for long-distance drives and traveling. I don't have all his CDs, but I'm working on it.

How did I first hear about him? In 1978 or 1979, there was a series of films I saw in high school science class called "The Search For Solutions". And the theme music the used in the opening credits was by the Pat Metheny Group. (The song they used was called "The Search", from the "American Garage" album. How appropriate.)

Flash forward to 1984. A new radio station in town, with the call letters of WRXT, and a free-form play list, played Pat's solo guitar song, "New Chautauqua", from the album of the same name. I loved the song so much that I just had to get my own copy. And so I went off in search of his albums.

Over the years, he's been a pioneer and a trailblazer. He started off playing trumpet, and switched to guitar a few years later. He's also taught at prestigious music schools such as the University of Miami and the Berklee School of Music, and did so at a very young age (late teens). He was one of the first guitarists (that I know of) to experiment with guitar synthesizers, and the myriad sonic possibilities available through them. And he uses the various guitar sounds for different effects, much like a painter would use different colors on a pallette to create a painting. Some of the guitars he uses are quite distinctive and unique. Perhaps the most unique is the 42-string Pikasso guitar that Canadian luthier Linda Manzer built for him.

And sometimes, he's outspoken and opinionated. Years ago, Metheny ripped Kenny G a new one, after Kenny G released his version of the Louis Armstrong classic, "What A Wonderful World", with Kenny G playing along with ths song via an overdub.

I don't know much about his personal life, and I don't need to. It doesn't matter to me. I do know that he travels a lot, performing for audiences all around the world.

I got to see him live in 1997, during the "Imaginary Day" tour, which had a stop at the Fraze Pavilion in Kettering, Ohio. And I hope I can see him in concert again.

This Friday, the multi-state Mega Millions jackpot is at $476 million. Yesterday, it was $363 million...and nobody won it.

So,what are the odds of you winning? In a nutshell, not bloody likely!

( The mathematics behind it all. )

I don't watch that much TV these days. In December of 2010, I cut back from standard cable to basic cable, in order to save some money. Other than recording a few things for a friend (his daughter was a contestant on Jeopardy), I haven't recorded anything off TV in a long time. I think the last series I recorded was "Blood Ties" (when Lifetime aired it), and the Simpsons 20th Anniversary special.

I have software and a hardware dongle to convert a three-jack audio/video signal (video, audio-left, audio-right) to a USB signal. (I use the Honestech VHS-to-DVD 3.0 package.) But I haven't used it much. And I probably should. I have about 500 VHS tapes and 100 Beta tapes I ought to covert to digital format soon, before the tapes degrade.

So I'm thinking....could a digital video recorder (DVR) fill my needs? But first, what do I want it to do?
1) Record shows off the air (for the few times I'd need it)
2) Play back on any of the three TVs I have in the house, preferably without connecting wires to them
3) Accept a video signal from an external device (e.g. a VCR) and record it on DVR, replacing the computer and Honestech software and box
4) Burn DVDs, or at least put it in a format that can be burned to DVD
5) Basic video editing, such as chopping out commercials and creating titles (I may still need software to do this)

Next, whose unit should I buy? I've liked TiVo for years, and they have a decent unit for about $100. I'd prefer to not deal with the cable company (I have Time Warner), they're always trying to sell me services and features I don't need or want. And I want to do this an inexpensively as possible.

Any recommendations?