It's Sunday evening and I just returned from a happy but very sad occasion; the "Celebration of Bill's Life" a remembrance for one of Coffee and Computers' long time members, Frederick William "Bill" McCoy. I have a heart stamped on my hand placed there by his granddaughter to identify me as one of the party celebrating his life. It's an appropriate symbol.
Bill passed away suddenly about a week ago and this evening I had the opportunity to meet his wife and some of his children. Bill and his wife Betty had been married 60 years, a long time together.
I hate these occasions. They mean that we have lost another of our Seniors. I am so fortunate to have been able to enjoy their company for the last 16 years at our Friday morning 'Coffee and Computers' gatherings. And, I must admit that I love "my" seniors. All of "them" bring a richness and comradeness that I personally look forward to each week.
Unfortunately we have been losing some of our members. After all, all of us are getting "older". Of course we all get older by the day but some of us are getting "older older".
So let's enjoy life both on and off the field of 'Coffee and Computers". Know that I am thinking of you and look forward to seeing you each Friday morning.
Doc
PS: Bill always brought the colored whiteboard markers. His daughter-in-law said she may start coming in on Fridays and bring the markers to "keep up the tradition".
The other day we received in the mail the "Community Guide" a neighborhood coupon book that lists dentists, weight loss centers and many many restaurants.
We noticed two restaurants that looked interesting: Panda Mongolian BBQ on Chapman Avenue in Orange and Tabi-ji a Japanese restaurant on North Tustin Avenue also in Orange.
Saturday night is our "date night" but Rosalie had had a luncheon with her weaving group. We thought a Mongolian BBQ would be too much and decided to try Tabi-ji.
We enjoyed our dinner in this modern pleasant restaurant and I thought I'd write a review and put it on this blog.
Before doing so I decided to check the Internet to see of they had a web site. Lo and behold they didn't. I remembered my new "Fifth Rule of Computing" "Google it". When I did I found Tabi-ji was referenced in numerous Goodle listings. One was Yelp (www.yelp.com) a free site listing reviews of almost anything.
I searched for "Japanese restaurnats" near Tustin, and there was Tabi-ji. It had EIGHTY THREE'reviews. WOW. I looked at a number of them and many said about what I was going to say. No need for me to give a separate review. They also had a Facebook listing and I went there and was shown many pictures of their menu items. Another WOW.
Now what am I trying to say here... I again realized that THE WORLD IS CHANGING...OR ALREADY HAS CHANGED.
Is the entire world on the Internet? Possibly, as I seem to notice every day. Are we becoming addicted to our computers? Again possibly. Is this bad? I'll leave that to the sociologists.
Maybe this could be a lesson to all of us. Sit down at our computers before making choices. Take our place in the on-line world. PS: We probably could do all of this on our mobile devices, where the future of computing rapidly is heading, but for the time-being, I will leave this to the younger generation.
So "keep the neurons happy, synapses snapping and enjoy computng".
Doc
The last few days have been an adventure.
As you probably know, I teach a course at The Sailing Academy of Orange Coast College (a terrible place to teach; overlooking Newport Bay and watching the sailboats).
Preparing for this course (Marine Electrical Systems) takes a fair amount of computer time. I use my laptop and the newer classroom with a console and overhead projector.
Getting ready for this semester's course, I decided to update my Power Point presentation to include some links to web pages and presentation of some Youtube videos. Not as easy as it sounds.
I played around with linking to Youtube but found that this wasn't straight forward. I tried linking to the videos but they wouldn't play. Then I applied Rule 5 of Computing: "Google It". Googled "download youtube videos" and found I needed a special program, "YTD Video". Downloaded the free version and downloaded the Youtube videos. But they didn't play in Power Point. kept getting a "mci error" message. Googled "mci error" and found that the downloaded Youtube "mp4" video format wasn't compatible with my older Power Point version (2003 I think). Google suggested I download another special program "iDealshare Video" which converts mp4 into "wmv" format which will work in my Power Point.
Yes, downloaded the free version of iDealshare Video and converted the downloaded mp4 Youtube videos to wmv. Now they worked in Power Point.
Where it stands now is my contacting iDealshare Video and asking to qualify for an academic version of their $49.95 version. Will keep you posted.
Moral of story: What looks straightforward can end up being very complex. Must follow Rule 4 of Computing: "Have patience"...
Doc
I have been getting ready for my upcoming Orange Coast College Sailing Academy course, "Marine Electrical Systems".
It is a three evening course on the electrical systems on pleasure craft. I cover a number of subjects including batteries, direct current systems. alternating current systems, corrosion of devices on boats and lightening protection. I use a my own Power Point presentation plus a lot of hands on training.
The other day I thought I would go to www.youtube.com and see what they might have to supplement this course. I already use one Youtube video (basic soldering) and thought there might be others. I typed in "Marine Electrics" and lo and behold, there were dozens, or possibly hundreds, of appropriate videos others already had uploaded. And they covered everything I was teaching in my class.
That's when I had my epiphany. Wow, almost everything has been uploaded to Youtube. Incidentally, Youtube is owned by Google. Wouldn't you know it!
Just to try it I typed in "fry egg". Up came dozens of videos on this subject. A few were a little "corny" but others had some useful tips. Same for "scrambled eggs".
Then I tried "warping a loom", since Rosalie is a weaver. Dozens more came up.
So, has the whole world been uploaded to Youtube? Good question. Explanations on Google. Videos on Youtube.
Give it a try. Type in anything about which you might be interested and see what you find. You might be surprised.
So keep the neurons happy, synapses snapping and enjoy computing.
Doc
Rosalie and I just returned from one of our trips to Mendocino (Albion, actually, about seven miles south of Mendo).
We had a wonderful time while there, visiting our daughter Margaret and her husband Mickey. The weather was nice, pleasant days and cool nights. This makes it nice for wandering around during the day and great for sleeping. I do have to say that their house is cold in the morning and a wood fire in their stove sure feels good.
Yes, they have a good iron, wood fire stove as well as a propane heater. But, propane is expensive so they mostly use wood for heating. Like almost everyone on the North Coast, they put in a large supply of fire wood each fall. Their cooking is done on a modern propane stove/oven however.
One of my great pleasures is that Margaret makes coffee for us in the morning. What a way to wake up. Smells great and tastes better. They also have a subscription to the daily New York Times. Mickey, her husband, goes up the gravel road while walking the dog and gets the paper from the Albion Ridge Road newspaper mailbox. Sometimes when they don't have the dog, I walk to the paper box myself. Great exercise because it's about a quarter mile to the main road.
Pulga, the dog, has an interesting back story. Pulga, which apparently means "flea" in Spanish, was found by Mickey's son Cody in Mexico where Cody works managing vacation rentals for a international company. Pulga, "the flea" was found wandering around, hungry and covered with fleas (thus the name). Cody rescued him and shipped him to the States. Cody's birth mother, lives forty or fifty miles south of Albion and drives a bus. Candy, his mother, and Mickey have worked out a "joint custody" arrangement. Candy drives Pulga up to Mendo and transfers him to Mickey for their joint custody period, maybe a few days or sometimes for a full week. Then, on a Thursday, Mickey meets Candy and the bus and transfers Pulga back to her.
Pulga, by the way, leads a dog's (charmed) life. Eats a special meal, has a sweater of his own, and lounges around most of the day except when he is out playing with Mickey. Margaret also is crazy for Pulga. What a life.
Now, to the "old age" bit. We make the drive to Albion in two stretches. We leave Tustin around 9:30 - 10:00 in the morning and drive to Gilroy. We drive up the 405, join the 5 north of LA and drive around three hours to just south of Buttowillow. We have lunch at an IHOP and gas up in Buttonwillow. About two hours north of Buttonwillow is the junction of 5 and 152. We take 152 to Gilroy where we have reservations to stay the night at a Quality Inn.
Gilroy is an interesting place. It's known as the "garlic capital" because it has a large garlic processing plant just out of town and the whole area smell "garlicy". It also is home to a gigantic outlet mall that we enjoy. And, the town, garlic capital and all, has some really good restaurants. So we enjoy our stay and it breaks up the trip.
Now, am I getting "too old" for this? Good question. The normal trip to Gilroy is about five and one-half hours. This time it was six and one-half hours. There was a lot of traffic. Yes, we went to Gilroy on Thursday, April 10, a few days prior to the beginning of the Spring holiday season: School out, etc. But I feel THERE JUST ARE TOO MANY PEOPLE IN CALIFORNIA CREATING TOO MUCH TRAFFIC, ETC. Yes, maybe in my "old age" I am becoming more sensitive to all this, BUT DRIVING IS NO LONGER FUN.
We leave Gilroy the next morning, go up the 101 to the 880 to the 238 to the 580 to the Richmond Bridge. Yes, I still remember how to navigate this route. Incidentally, at the Richmond bridge there are a couple of public restrooms. By timing the amount of morning coffee in Gilroy, the restroom stop at the bridge is "just in time" welcome. However, we must stay in the left, triptic lane in order to pull off the road to park at the bridge. After our stop, we must get ready to "gun" the car to cross the three triptic lanes to get to the "cash only" lanes. This can be hair raising because we must wait for a break in five lanes of traffic and rush across the lanes to get in line to pay our $5 toll. Yes, I might be getting too old to enjoy this.
The rest of the trip is over the bridge and joining the 101 that we take to Cloverdale where we pick up the windy, narrow 128 to the 1, the junction of which is about three miles south of Albion.
Incidentally, Albion is a junction of US 1 and Albion Ridge Road. If you blink, you miss the little junction. Then we go up the Albion Ridge Road where we look for the yellow road sign that depicts someone on a horse. This indicates that Margaret's "G" Road is just past a large tree on the left. The trip from Gilroy to "G Road" is about five and one-half hours. So Gilroy is about the half way point. It did take us a little longer this time because of traffic (see the above bold print).
Coming back almost is the reverse of this path except we stay on the 580 to the 5 and now stop at a Holiday Inn in Santa Nella because getting LA at 7:30 P.M. and driving the carpool lanes is just too much "white knuckle" with low separation walls and lights coming at you (again, see above bold print).
We arrived back in Tustin around 4:30, Thursday, April 17 after a TERRIBLE trip down US 5 where traffic was backed up for 45 minutes at a construction area and then down to the 215 to Pasadena where traffic was backed up because of an accident in the carpool lane (again see the bold print above).
PS: Our stay with Margaret and Mickey was wonderful as usual. We really do love and enjoy our kids. BUT, AM I GETTING TOO OLD FOR THIS TRIP? Only time will tell.
Doc
Hi Judy.....
Today was an interesting session of 'Coffee and Computers'. Lots of questions and lots of answers. The neurons were working hard and so were the synapses.
However, as we get older we lose neurons from our original fifteen billion at birth and the synapses take longer to connect so recall takes a little longer.
I'm saying this because at 'C&C" today, questions were asked and people offered zillions of methods to reach the same answer. I attribute this cacophony to people reaching into their own neuron store and offering their particular method to solve a given problem.
There's nothing wrong about this, in fact, it's encouraged and enlightening. However, the shouts of "go the upper right', "no go to the lower left", "no click on this" or that, to me gets confusing. It just reiterates that there are a "zillion" ways to reach the same point.
What about the neurons and synapses? I only have so many left so I don't know the zillion ways to do something. I have my own ways to do things and when I "forget" I go to the program's Help menu or Google for a solution.
I appreciate other peoples' ways of doing things but I stick to my tried and true ways because my neuron store has lost so many neurons (I slip on each night's loss each morning when I get up) and many of my synapses have to fight their way through the goop in my brain that my responses aren't as fast as once they were!
So bear with me and give my neurons that are left and the synapse connections time to process the cacophony of suggestions. But stick with your own tried and true ways if they work for you!
Yes, I am aging as this morning's session showed. But aren't we all...
Doc
What a day...
First, some sad news, at least for us photographers. I went on the Internet to check some prices for an item for my Epson R800 pigment ink photo printer. I hoped to pick some up at my favorite amateur/professional camera store, Calumet Photo, here in Santa Ana. Llloyd Denny and I have been going there for years to purchase upscale gear.
Well, I got to their web site, www.calumetphoto.com and was met with a notice that the parent company had suddenly filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection. A Chapter 7 filing means this is the end; immediate end of business for the company. The notice stated that they were closing all their United States stores, including the one in Santa Ana that Lloyd and I, and other serious photographers, have used over the years. They mentioned that their non-US stores would not close. (PS: I just went to check their web site again and it came up with a blank screen!!).
You know, I wasn't surprised. I went in there the other day and I was the only customer in the store. The salespeople were just killing time.
The notice on their site said that the filing happened so rapidly that they didn't even have time to give their employees advanced notice. Wow.
In retrospect, maybe we all have contributed to their demise. A few weeks ago I needed ink for another of my printers. Went to Calumet where I always was able to get that particular ink and they were "out of stock". I went to www.officedepot.com and ordered the ink. The next day it was delivered to my door. I'm sort of sorry that this may portend the future. On-line is becoming so easy and convenient that it is making it awfully hard for "brick and mortar" stores to compete. In some ways I am sorry but life moves on.
So, goodbye Santa Ana Calumet Photo. I loved going in, touching the merchandise, speaking with their very knowledgeable associates and sometimes purchasing their recommendations.
Judy, I was going to go on and tell you all about my bringing back to life my Epson R800 which started the above adventure, but this is for another "blog time". I promise I will get to it...
Doc
Recently the storage shed I built some time ago needed work. The roof and some of the structure had water damage. I'm getting to the point that I no longer want to climb on the roof. I needed professional help.
A friend recommended a person who had done work around her house. We called him on her recommendation and he came over and fixed the shed. His name is:
FELIPE (JOSE) CASTILLO
REMODELING SPECIALIST
PHONE: 714-319-0705
EMAIL: CASTILLO9022@SBCGLOBAL.NET
He lists: Paint, Doors, Framing, Tile, Basic electrical and plumbing, Drywall, Stucco, Fencing, Landscaping and More.
His work is excellent, he is on time, cleans up and purchases all the materials needed for the job. In addition, he picked up a lot of scrap lumber and wood and took it to the recycle place. And his price is reasonable.
Rosalie and I would highly recommend that you call Jose if you have any work that needs to be done.
Maggie Pohlman has been kind enough to take pictures of members of our Friday 'Coffee and Computers' gathering and collecting brief resumes.
I am in the process on adding these pictures and descriptions to this blog. It will take me some time to get everyone shown, so be patient.
In the mean time, take a look at those who are there so far and let me know if the descriptions are accurate.
If you are not there and would like to participate, come in on Fridays.
Doc
As you might have guessed, Rosalie and I enjoy eating out. We eat out about three times a week which I calculate is about 15% of the 21 weekly meals. And we enjoy finding new restaurants.
Our latest is SATHA THAI KITCHEN, a small establishment at 1161 Irving Blvd, across the street from Ralphs just past Newport. It's a little tricky getting into their parking spaces because of a hair raising left turn off Irvine, but it's more than worth it. I think they have six tables seating about 25 patrons total.
The food is more than excellent. Last evening we went again even after being there for lunch a few days before. They have an extensive menu and the dishes are freshly prepared in a small kitchen just off the dining room.
We decided to start with their fresh spring rolls with shrimp. There are three rolls which they cut into six pieces because there only were the two of us. It came with a dark, flavorable dish of dipping sauce. Wonderful. We also ordered hot green tea, green tea so we could sleep at night.
For our entrees, Rosalie selected the Pad Thai (pan fried noodles with chicken, egg, chili powder, bean sprouts, green onion and fresh ground peanuts). Apparently this is the national dish of Thailand with as many variations as Indian curry. Of course, I dipped my chopsticks into it for a taste and it was outstanding. I make Pad Thai at home but this was soooo much better. I will try to emulate it, but doubt if I can.
My entree choice was Papaya Salad (asterisk-- Hot and Spicy). Incidentally, the server always asks if you want it hot, or what degree of hot. Rosalie likes hers spicy but not hot while I like mine "medium" hot. My salad came, beautifully presented on the plate, and was hot and spicy as ordered. This again is a traditional dish which usually is served very hot and spicy. Some restaurants warn you against this salad because they don't think non-Thai pallets are attuned to this degree of hotness! I enjoyed every bite. No, I wouldn't even try this at home.
Lastly we did something we almost never do. We ordered dessert on the advice of our server. Flavored sticky rice with sliced mango. Wow. We were told the mangos came from Mexico because Mexico and Thailand are on the same latitude so growing conditions are similar. Well they must be because the mango was perfectly sweet. And the sticky rice was prepared with strawberry juice so it was strawberry colored. Now, sticky rice (Googled) is "sticky". It is a special rice grown for just this consistency. Ours was covered with a whipped coconut milk dressing. Again, WOW.
Rosalie and I highly recommend the SATHA THAI KITCHEN. Great for lunch with a seperate lunch menu ($7.50 for any of the 20 selections served with egg roll, soup or salad and rice...a bargain.) Dinner selections also are moderately priced and their menu lists 91 choices. Only note is that because the place is small, and parking limited,plan on going early.
Eat on, my friends...