Category: Life

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Life with(out) a laptop . . .

I’ve not been posting recently and until this past week, I’ve not had a really good reason. From Sunday to Wed. my church had revival meetings with the Steve Pettit Evangelistic Association. They were really great and were a good reason I didn’t have time to post. But now I have a better reason for not posting . . . my laptop (Powerbook G4 500 Mhz) decided to retire.

I really didn’t realize how much I used it until Thursday afternoon it started acting really funny and crashing. Well, it froze up one last time that evening when I was trying to read my e-mail. I restarted the computer and well, it didn’t. The screen went black and well stayed black.

I tried to coax it to start-up several time and even got it to start once long enough to do a quick backup. But, alas, my poor laptop has died. After I performed an autopsy the cause of death seems to be a bad processor. The last time I got it to startup, it crashed again and then as if a final good-bye beeped five times and the constantly flashed the sleep light in intervals of 5 flashes (meaning a bad processor). I can’t complain, however, because it has been though much. It survived ~5 years, always on, through one car wreck, being carried by my when I was knocked off my pins by a car in the UT parking garage and having both it’s hinges broken when I tripped walking up the stairs.

The good news however, all my data is safe and sound and I am able to use a different computer to access it. Now, I just have to get my hands on this new laptop.

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Church

It has been a while in coming, but I’m excited to point everyone to my church’s website. It look great, good job Jon (he is the guy on the left side of the picture in the funny striped shirt :-) ).

While you are viewing the site, take a look at our next special event Friend’s Day and come as my friend. Steve Pettit is a great speaker and the music is beautiful.

Also, you can learn more through a short video about my Church here.

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Listening

“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”
– C.S. Lewis

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Got that?

Got this from a friend and really enjoyed it. See how many you can answer correctly.

The answers will be at the end so don’t look ahead. According to the source, the average person answers 7 correctly. I think that might be a little low, but maybe not. There are 27 questions so make space for writing them all down. Once you have answered all the questions, click on read more for the correct :-) answers.

  1. On a standard traffic light, is the green on the top or bottom?
  2. How many states are there in the USA?
  3. In which hand is the Statue of Liberty’s torch?
  4. What six colors are on the classic Campbell’s soup label?
  5. What two numbers on the telephone dial don’t have letters by them?
  6. When you walk does your left arm swing with your right or left leg?
  7. How many matches are in a standard pack?
  8. On the United States flag is the top stripe red or white?
  9. What is the lowest number on the FM dial?
  10. Which way does water go down the drain, counter or clockwise?
  11. Which way does a “no smoking” sign’s slash run?
  12. How many channels on a VHF TV dial?
  13. On which side of a women’s blouse are the buttons?
  14. Which way do fans rotate?
  15. What is on the back of a Canadian dime?
  16. How many sides does a stop sign have?
  17. Do books have even-numbered pages on the right or left side?
  18. How many lug nuts are on a standard car wheel?
  19. How many sides are there on a standard pencil?
  20. Sleepy, Happy, Sneezy, Grumpy, Dopey, Doc. Who’s missing?
  21. How many hot dog buns are in a standard package?
  22. On which playing card is the card maker’s trademark?
  23. On which side of a Venetian blind is the cord that adjusts the opening between the slats?
  24. On the back of a Canadian $1 coin, what is in the center?
  25. There are 12 buttons on a touch tone phone. What 2 symbols bear no digits?
  26. How many curves are there in the standard paper clip?
  27. Does a merry-go-round turn counter or clockwise?

Answers:

  1. Bottom
  2. 50
  3. Right
  4. Blue, red, white, yellow, black, &gold
  5. 1, 0
  6. Right
  7. 20
  8. Red
  9. 87.5
  10. Clockwise (north of the equator)
  11. Towards bottom right
  12. 12 (no #1)
  13. Left
  14. Clockwise as you look at it
  15. The Bluenose
  16. 8
  17. Left
  18. 5
  19. 6
  20. Bashful
  21. 8
  22. Ace of spades
  23. Left
  24. Loon
  25. *, #
  26. 3
  27. Counter
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Spontaneous Combustion

A while ago I heard on Paul Harvey that Woman were ~80% more likely to spontaneously burst into flames while pumping gas into their car. Later, I learned in my chemistry that one of the risk factors for Spontaneous Human Combustion was being a woman. I sorta laughed both off until I saw this while filling up my car.

As it turns out, woman are 80% more likely to reenter their car while filing up with gas. While reentering their car it is possible to have an undesired effect of generating static electricity while sliding across the seat. The net result of this static electricity with all the gas fumes is an explosion when the electricity is discharged on the pump handle as the first metal object touched.

Ouch.

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Rules of the Air

An e-mail I received from a friend reported that these rules appeared in the July ’04 issue of an Australian Aviation Magazine. They were so good, I just had to post them.

Stephanie, especially remember #3.

  1. Every takeoff is optional. Every landing is mandatory.
  2. If you push the stick forward, the houses get bigger. If you pull the stick back, they get smaller. That is, unless you keep pulling the stick all the way back, then they get bigger again.
  3. Flying isn’t dangerous. Crashing is what’s dangerous.
  1. It’s always better to be down here wishing you were up there than up there wishing you were down here.
  2. The ONLY time you have too much fuel is when you’re on fire.
  3. The propeller is just a big fan in front of the plane used to keep the pilot cool. When it stops, you can actually watch the pilot start sweating.
  4. When in doubt, hold on to your altitude. No one has ever collided with the sky.
  5. A ‘good’ landing is one from which you can walk away. A ‘great’ landing is one after which they can use the plane again.
  6. Learn from the mistakes of others.
    You won’t live long enough to make all of them yourself.
  7. You know you’ve landed with the wheels up if it takes full power to taxi to the ramp.
  8. The probability of survival is inversely proportional to the angle of arrival. Large angle of arrival, small probability of survival and vice versa.
  9. Never let an aircraft take you somewhere your brain didn’t get to five minutes earlier.
  10. Stay out of clouds. The silver lining everyone keeps talking about might be another airplane going in the opposite direction. Reliable sources also report that mountains have been known to hide out in clouds.
  11. Always try to keep the number of landings you make equal to the number of take offs you’ve made.
  12. There are three simple rules for making a smooth landing.
    Unfortunately no one knows what they are.
  13. You start with a bag full of luck and an empty bag of experience. The trick is to fill the bag of experience before you empty the bag of luck.
  14. Helicopters can’t fly; they’re just so ugly the earth repels them.
  15. If all you can see out of the window is ground that’s going round and round and all you can hear is commotion coming from the passenger compartment, things are not at all as they should be.
  16. In the ongoing battle between objects made of aluminum going hundreds of miles per hour and the ground going zero miles per hour, the ground has yet to lose.
  17. Good judgment comes from experience.
    Unfortunately, the experience usually comes from bad judgment.
  18. It’s always a good idea to keep the pointy end going forward as much as possible.
  19. Keep looking around. There’s always something you’ve missed.
  20. Remember, gravity is not just a good idea. It’s the law. And it’s not subject to repeal.
  21. The three most useless things to a pilot are the altitude above you, runway behind you, and a tenth of a second ago.
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Failure

How easy is it to not try something because of the fear of failure. Well, the other day my sister told me a quote that I’ll try to remember when I’m afraid to fail.

Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the ark; professionals built the titanic.
– Unknown

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Hypothecate

hypothecate hye-PAH-thuh-kayt (verb) : hypothesize

Example sentence: The user hypothecated the computer didn’t turn on because it wasn’t plugged in to the electrical outlet.

Did you know?

The meaning of “Hypothecate” is not without controversy. It has mainly been used in scientific and linguistic sources. “Hypothecate” is a homograph and is derived from the Greek “hypotithenai” (“to put under, suppose, deposit as a pledge”). Using “hypothecate” instead of “hypothesize” is a legitimate (albeit uncommon) usage word in its own right, not a misuse of its homograph. If you want to avoid the controversy altogether, however, you can stick with the more common “hypothesize.”

for more interesting words visit http://www.m-w.com/