So, I'm PC savy, really good at it. Still got messed up and am having to do a bunch of manual data recovery.
Microsoft quit supporting MSMoney. Got a new PC for home. Stuff got chewed up and lost all the Money data for our church's accounts. Gone, bye-bye, lost. No backup data recently enough to help. So, I'm back to the paper records and re-keying old data....which needs to be done so I can issue W2's etc., etc.
Crud.
Advice....always backup, always, always.
We've replaced Money with Quicken. I've paid their fee for backup service...puts my data on a computer in their house....worth every cent.
J
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Today I said goodbye to an old friend
In 2000, we moved into our "new" house. This house came with a family room on the patio level off the back of the house, and that became my personal hang out.
The room needed lots of work. It's roof was shot, there was carpet damage thanks to the leaky roof, and so on. We stripped all that stuff out and were in the process of figuring out what to do with the room when we ran into some really nice furniture at a garage sale. For $400 we got two Lazy Boy sofas and a big over-stuffed recliner. This furniture-set determined the color of the walls and the carpet and the rest of the room decor.
The recliner in particular was my friend for nearly 10 years. It was my refuge when coming home weary after a hard day's work. I couldn't count the number of nights I've spent in my recliner when I fell asleep in the middle of some fascinating TV show. Then there were the nights I spent in the recliner when I was fretting about work, or fretting about the lack of work. My chair was my refuge.
Then a couple or three years ago, the right arm became 'floppy'. The frame had broken. I made a patch that screwed to the outside, reinforcing the broken arm....not attractive, but functional.
Then one day I sat down and herd a loud pop. One of the seat springs had broken. Then a bit later another. My poor chair was dying by inches. The seat was now like sitting in a hole.
So Sue and I went shopping for new chairs...hers was not as bad as mine, but also dying.
We bought two lovely new leather recliners. Hers is a rocker. Mine doesn't rock, but in moves away from the wall when reclined. They are beautiful, comfortable, brand new chairs in a house that has been furnished with hand-me-downs for longer than I can remember.
All that said, a few minutes ago I came into my room to watch my TV and sat in this beautiful new chair, and it didn't feel right....not bad, just not the same. My old friend was gone.
Garrison Keillor would have some deep philosophical something to say about this. Give me a few weeks and I'll be just fine, but I sure wish my old, comfortable, accustomed chair hadn't had to die.
I love my new chair. It's everything a chair should be....but when I walk in and sit, my butt is still expecting the old chair, and it's a bit of a shock that my environment has changed.
Life goes on.
The room needed lots of work. It's roof was shot, there was carpet damage thanks to the leaky roof, and so on. We stripped all that stuff out and were in the process of figuring out what to do with the room when we ran into some really nice furniture at a garage sale. For $400 we got two Lazy Boy sofas and a big over-stuffed recliner. This furniture-set determined the color of the walls and the carpet and the rest of the room decor.
The recliner in particular was my friend for nearly 10 years. It was my refuge when coming home weary after a hard day's work. I couldn't count the number of nights I've spent in my recliner when I fell asleep in the middle of some fascinating TV show. Then there were the nights I spent in the recliner when I was fretting about work, or fretting about the lack of work. My chair was my refuge.
Then a couple or three years ago, the right arm became 'floppy'. The frame had broken. I made a patch that screwed to the outside, reinforcing the broken arm....not attractive, but functional.
Then one day I sat down and herd a loud pop. One of the seat springs had broken. Then a bit later another. My poor chair was dying by inches. The seat was now like sitting in a hole.
So Sue and I went shopping for new chairs...hers was not as bad as mine, but also dying.
We bought two lovely new leather recliners. Hers is a rocker. Mine doesn't rock, but in moves away from the wall when reclined. They are beautiful, comfortable, brand new chairs in a house that has been furnished with hand-me-downs for longer than I can remember.
All that said, a few minutes ago I came into my room to watch my TV and sat in this beautiful new chair, and it didn't feel right....not bad, just not the same. My old friend was gone.
Garrison Keillor would have some deep philosophical something to say about this. Give me a few weeks and I'll be just fine, but I sure wish my old, comfortable, accustomed chair hadn't had to die.
I love my new chair. It's everything a chair should be....but when I walk in and sit, my butt is still expecting the old chair, and it's a bit of a shock that my environment has changed.
Life goes on.
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Christmas 2009
Well, let's get the big news out of the way first, we have joined the grandparents' club!
Rob and Amanda have a happy healthy son born in late May. Nathan Robert is (of
course) an extremely gifted child as well as remarkably handsome. We are so pleased that
he is a healthy and generally good-natured child…..a joy to have around, a joy which Sue
experiences every Friday when he visits for the day.
The cats, contrary to Grandma's joy on Nathan Fridays, find the child to be VERY
SCARY. There are two theories: 1) They are convinced he will immediately learn to run
and be chasing them at any second, or 2) They have extrasensorarily perceived that the
child has the ability to morph himself into a full sized rotweiller and will do so at any
second. The cats go to ground when the baby arrives in the same manner they do when
Rob brings his actual dog over.
Last year we announced our plans to rip out the old kitchen and rebuild it from the inside
out. New oak floors and baseboards, new red birch cabinets, fresh new paint, and
beautiful granite counters. We put up with the old one for a long time before we could see
clear to do this project. We are most pleased with the end results.
Jim & Sue took a week and travelled to Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia this fall and we
had a ball. Williamsburg has a very large living history museum….took us three full days
to come anywhere close to having it covered. We took another day to see Jamestown,
where English settlement of North America began and yet another to see Yorktown,
where the Revolution ended. We sandwiched in a half-day canoe trip on the York River
estuary, which was beautiful, and got to experience effects of tides while paddling. There
was still more we did; suffice it to say we had a full week.
At the first of the year Laura, who still camps out at our place, was hired into the full-
time position of Assistant Production Manager with the Noble Fool Theatricals (for
which she had worked several show-to-show gigs the prior year.) She seems to have
settled in well. Often she works more or less regular-people hours, but then there are
times we won't see her for days on end….just depends on the particulars of the shows
that pass through her theaters. If you want more details, you'll have to ask her and she
can tell you herself.
Rob and Amanda are of course busy with being new parents. Both are working, so
Nathan goes to day care 4 days a week and to Grandma's on Fridays as mentioned
before. I haven't seen much of any new woodworking projects from Rob as he's lately
been tied up with a major project that a friend commissioned and which Rob had kept
putting off while preparing a furnished nursery.
Sue loves the Grandma business. It's a lot of fun to watch her with Nathan. I'm sure glad
garage sale season is over for this year as she has to stop and minutely examine anything
that looks like a good find for a baby boy. She still works her same library job full time,
but has a schedule that allows for Nathan Fridays.
While Rob continues to hang in at Sara Lee, Sara Lee and I had a parting of ways in
February. They have struggled greatly over the last couple of years, in fact I just read
today that they're closing yet another major plant at the end of the year. I was given a
very fair severance package and then was lucky enough to land new work even before the
severance benefits had run out…just 9 weeks from finish to start. I now work for Bay
Valley Foods (not a household name company, I know), a company that is profitable and
growing instead of losing money and shrinking. I like the job (mostly) and the people
(mostly). I have enough work to do without feeling like there's no end in sight, I'm good
at what I do and I'm appreciated for it. Bay Valley makes a lot of store-brand foods:
every thing from coffee creamers to canned soups to pickles to salad dressings. When
Keebler was acquired by Kellogg's a few years back, the former Keebler exec's got
together and made a new company. A nice place to work. I can run into the President of
the company in the hall, and he'll greet me by name. Pretty neat for a publicly traded
company with $1.5 billion in sales.
This Christmas we pray for peace. We pray for those who remain unemployed or
underemployed. We pray for those suffering illness. We pray for all our family and
friends.
God bless
Rob and Amanda have a happy healthy son born in late May. Nathan Robert is (of
course) an extremely gifted child as well as remarkably handsome. We are so pleased that
he is a healthy and generally good-natured child…..a joy to have around, a joy which Sue
experiences every Friday when he visits for the day.
The cats, contrary to Grandma's joy on Nathan Fridays, find the child to be VERY
SCARY. There are two theories: 1) They are convinced he will immediately learn to run
and be chasing them at any second, or 2) They have extrasensorarily perceived that the
child has the ability to morph himself into a full sized rotweiller and will do so at any
second. The cats go to ground when the baby arrives in the same manner they do when
Rob brings his actual dog over.
Last year we announced our plans to rip out the old kitchen and rebuild it from the inside
out. New oak floors and baseboards, new red birch cabinets, fresh new paint, and
beautiful granite counters. We put up with the old one for a long time before we could see
clear to do this project. We are most pleased with the end results.
Jim & Sue took a week and travelled to Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia this fall and we
had a ball. Williamsburg has a very large living history museum….took us three full days
to come anywhere close to having it covered. We took another day to see Jamestown,
where English settlement of North America began and yet another to see Yorktown,
where the Revolution ended. We sandwiched in a half-day canoe trip on the York River
estuary, which was beautiful, and got to experience effects of tides while paddling. There
was still more we did; suffice it to say we had a full week.
At the first of the year Laura, who still camps out at our place, was hired into the full-
time position of Assistant Production Manager with the Noble Fool Theatricals (for
which she had worked several show-to-show gigs the prior year.) She seems to have
settled in well. Often she works more or less regular-people hours, but then there are
times we won't see her for days on end….just depends on the particulars of the shows
that pass through her theaters. If you want more details, you'll have to ask her and she
can tell you herself.
Rob and Amanda are of course busy with being new parents. Both are working, so
Nathan goes to day care 4 days a week and to Grandma's on Fridays as mentioned
before. I haven't seen much of any new woodworking projects from Rob as he's lately
been tied up with a major project that a friend commissioned and which Rob had kept
putting off while preparing a furnished nursery.
Sue loves the Grandma business. It's a lot of fun to watch her with Nathan. I'm sure glad
garage sale season is over for this year as she has to stop and minutely examine anything
that looks like a good find for a baby boy. She still works her same library job full time,
but has a schedule that allows for Nathan Fridays.
While Rob continues to hang in at Sara Lee, Sara Lee and I had a parting of ways in
February. They have struggled greatly over the last couple of years, in fact I just read
today that they're closing yet another major plant at the end of the year. I was given a
very fair severance package and then was lucky enough to land new work even before the
severance benefits had run out…just 9 weeks from finish to start. I now work for Bay
Valley Foods (not a household name company, I know), a company that is profitable and
growing instead of losing money and shrinking. I like the job (mostly) and the people
(mostly). I have enough work to do without feeling like there's no end in sight, I'm good
at what I do and I'm appreciated for it. Bay Valley makes a lot of store-brand foods:
every thing from coffee creamers to canned soups to pickles to salad dressings. When
Keebler was acquired by Kellogg's a few years back, the former Keebler exec's got
together and made a new company. A nice place to work. I can run into the President of
the company in the hall, and he'll greet me by name. Pretty neat for a publicly traded
company with $1.5 billion in sales.
This Christmas we pray for peace. We pray for those who remain unemployed or
underemployed. We pray for those suffering illness. We pray for all our family and
friends.
God bless
Friday, November 27, 2009
A blessedly quiet Thanksgiving
We had a really nice day.
As things worked out, Rob, Amanda, and Nathan arrived about 6:00 p.m. That left us with a well-planned menu and lots of time to get it all put together. Everything was done and ready to serve except for the gravy failure. We just did without the gravy.
Rob brought his new camera.....and Ebay acquisition. Like me , he has tired of the short comings of the point and shoot digital cameras and sought to get a good SLR camera. Unlike me, he got serious and went after one. He found a used unit through the WWW that cost only and arm and not both an arm and leg. He tells me that's his Christmas present...Amanda's is a TV that hangs over the fireplace mantel.
Laura has no big news; at least none she's shared with her dad. She has given up two boyfriends in the last several months, but was spending time with the one before them again (I think; at least that's what I think I've pieced together.) Poor kid wasn't feeling good today (Friday). Sounds like the 24 hour crud I had not long ago...let's hope it's the 24 hour crud.
Nathan is getting big. I over heard Sue working on his Mom about setting a christening date....she has gotten a gown for him, but it will soon be too small. I didn't hear whether there was consensus for the date.
No big news from me. I have no idea what Sue wants or needs for Christmas. Maybe I'll do some online shopping when I finish up this note and find some inspiration.
As things worked out, Rob, Amanda, and Nathan arrived about 6:00 p.m. That left us with a well-planned menu and lots of time to get it all put together. Everything was done and ready to serve except for the gravy failure. We just did without the gravy.
Rob brought his new camera.....and Ebay acquisition. Like me , he has tired of the short comings of the point and shoot digital cameras and sought to get a good SLR camera. Unlike me, he got serious and went after one. He found a used unit through the WWW that cost only and arm and not both an arm and leg. He tells me that's his Christmas present...Amanda's is a TV that hangs over the fireplace mantel.
Laura has no big news; at least none she's shared with her dad. She has given up two boyfriends in the last several months, but was spending time with the one before them again (I think; at least that's what I think I've pieced together.) Poor kid wasn't feeling good today (Friday). Sounds like the 24 hour crud I had not long ago...let's hope it's the 24 hour crud.
Nathan is getting big. I over heard Sue working on his Mom about setting a christening date....she has gotten a gown for him, but it will soon be too small. I didn't hear whether there was consensus for the date.
No big news from me. I have no idea what Sue wants or needs for Christmas. Maybe I'll do some online shopping when I finish up this note and find some inspiration.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Work stuff today
Things are moving forward mostly, but a few setbacks that are frankly staggering.
Found a flaw in the way the new forecasting software is handling one scenario. Our software provider is in denial about the issue. We think they are violating a basic premise of the business they sold us to support. It will be interesting to watch this play out.
On the other hand, as a whole we are making progress and improvement. So, over all I'm pleased with where we are....but the software problem we found will not go away by itself, it will only compound with time.
Also at work, we will be installing SAP to run the business....a really big deal. Both my boss and his will be assigned to the project full time. I will be tapped to be a "subject matter expert" supporting the implementation while seeing that my every day duties are performed as well. This is a project that will take two years to complete and which will literally reshape how the entire company does business.....like I said, a really big deal.
In the more mundane vane, I need to schedule to use up 4.5 days of vacation before the end of the year. I've agreed to cover the week between Christmas and New Years when nearly everybody else will be gone. I'll probably work a series of 4-day weeks.
Found a flaw in the way the new forecasting software is handling one scenario. Our software provider is in denial about the issue. We think they are violating a basic premise of the business they sold us to support. It will be interesting to watch this play out.
On the other hand, as a whole we are making progress and improvement. So, over all I'm pleased with where we are....but the software problem we found will not go away by itself, it will only compound with time.
Also at work, we will be installing SAP to run the business....a really big deal. Both my boss and his will be assigned to the project full time. I will be tapped to be a "subject matter expert" supporting the implementation while seeing that my every day duties are performed as well. This is a project that will take two years to complete and which will literally reshape how the entire company does business.....like I said, a really big deal.
In the more mundane vane, I need to schedule to use up 4.5 days of vacation before the end of the year. I've agreed to cover the week between Christmas and New Years when nearly everybody else will be gone. I'll probably work a series of 4-day weeks.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Internet Phone
Well how 'bout that?!
Early results show that this technology is actually for real.
I have tried out Magic Jack with an extra phone we had laying around. It sends, receives, voice mail works, caller ID shows incoming phone #'s, etc. etc.
There was a tinny quality to the sound, but when I hooked up a better phone that went away. Cheap phone = crummy sound. Better phone = sounds just fine. Called a few long distance friends, enjoyed the visits and everybody heard everything just fine. No skips, jerks, pauses, stutters, echoes. Nothin' The only stuff to complain about at all went away when I removed the cheap phone.
Magic Jack will support 911 calls from home....that's part of the painless initial setup. Opening the package was harder than performing the installation. There's some advertising during the install process that's mildly annoying, but easy to ignore and get on with life.
In order to work, one needs high speed Internet (we already had that) a reasonably powerful PC that wasn't already maxed out on other stuff (already had that too). Therefore, why pay AT&T for service at $40 a month? Beats me.
Magic Jack will not work when the power is out; so a second phone source is a good thing (cell phones....we already have those too)
So, early results all positive.
Early results show that this technology is actually for real.
I have tried out Magic Jack with an extra phone we had laying around. It sends, receives, voice mail works, caller ID shows incoming phone #'s, etc. etc.
There was a tinny quality to the sound, but when I hooked up a better phone that went away. Cheap phone = crummy sound. Better phone = sounds just fine. Called a few long distance friends, enjoyed the visits and everybody heard everything just fine. No skips, jerks, pauses, stutters, echoes. Nothin' The only stuff to complain about at all went away when I removed the cheap phone.
Magic Jack will support 911 calls from home....that's part of the painless initial setup. Opening the package was harder than performing the installation. There's some advertising during the install process that's mildly annoying, but easy to ignore and get on with life.
In order to work, one needs high speed Internet (we already had that) a reasonably powerful PC that wasn't already maxed out on other stuff (already had that too). Therefore, why pay AT&T for service at $40 a month? Beats me.
Magic Jack will not work when the power is out; so a second phone source is a good thing (cell phones....we already have those too)
So, early results all positive.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Trying out an Internet phone
At the risk of promoting a product...
Giving a trial to Magic Jack. Tired of paying AT&T nearly $50 a month. It wouldn't be so bad if they gave you an honest rate, but they quote a rate and then tack on a gillion mysterious fees and taxes. I think it's bull.
So, gambled $40 on Magic Jack after doing research. If it's not what it's cracked up to be, we're not out much. If it's good, we can pocket cash we've been giving away.
Installation on our end is done very painlessly. I'm supposed to get an email within an hour from Magic Jack with a confirmation to get stuff working.
.....supposed to give us unlimited local and U.S. long distance. I invested $40 for the first year (hardware and service). $20 next year.
Will keep you posted.
Giving a trial to Magic Jack. Tired of paying AT&T nearly $50 a month. It wouldn't be so bad if they gave you an honest rate, but they quote a rate and then tack on a gillion mysterious fees and taxes. I think it's bull.
So, gambled $40 on Magic Jack after doing research. If it's not what it's cracked up to be, we're not out much. If it's good, we can pocket cash we've been giving away.
Installation on our end is done very painlessly. I'm supposed to get an email within an hour from Magic Jack with a confirmation to get stuff working.
.....supposed to give us unlimited local and U.S. long distance. I invested $40 for the first year (hardware and service). $20 next year.
Will keep you posted.
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