How Sad Am I?

Apparently my great fix for my audio driver didn't last. Oh well. It was nice when three times in a row I turned on my computer and it had sound.

CD

I was trying to take a picture of how a CD burns. (You know, where you can look at the back of a burned CD and see how far out the data is burned.) That didn't happen, but this is a cool picture.

PF Chengs

We went out to dinner on Sunday to P.F. Cheng's. It's one of my favorite places. Kelly had the "wine flight" or something. It looks like a lot of wine. It's not quite as much as it seems. Kelly didn't drink it all because the wine made from guava was not pleasing to her.

Now I'm just wet

Here's my morning:
Wake up, O-dark thirty. I think to myself, "oh I can hear water dripping down the gutters. I bet it just rained. It'll be cool when I run"
Get up, prepare to run, stretch leave house, still O-dark thirty, or O-dark thirty five
Warm up walk
Run two blocks
Let the heavens open up and rain down on me.

And it rained. And rained. And rained. I was so wet by the time I got back (see photo). I sprinted a lot on this run though. I ran 3.7 miles at 11:04 miles which is fast for me. I sprinted and then rested in periods of less intense rain. It rained all day. It will continue to rain for like a week. I wonder if I'll have a big leak under my sink like I did the last time it rained this long.

At one of my jobs I got to play with a white fluffy dog. How cute are we?

Exciting news

I have exciting news. I have in the past mentioned how the sound works about half the time on my computer. I was having a bit of a meltdown last night (after I ran five miles) because the sound wasn't working and the way I normally make the sound work also wasn't working.

Once again I went back to Google and the message boards in search of an answer. This time I found a totally obscure post about the driver (not the Toshiba brand). So, for anyone who has a Realtek AC 97 Audio Driver, first of all, I'm sorry and I feel your pain. To fix your problems, download and unzip (don't get the .exe) the file for the driver. Run the install program but do not restart the computer. Go into the extracted file and delete the one called alcupd.exe. Then restart the computer.

I don't know if it's totally solved the problem my little computer is having. But I've gotten the sound to come on twice in a row which gives me some amount of hope.

Also, I'm having the best salmon ever in life right now.

Monday Music Mambo

Even though it's Tuesday...

1. Name some of your favorite drummers. Or name A drummer if you don't have any favorites.
Buddy Miles who used to play with Jimi Hendrix, Alex Van Halen (of Van Halen) and the drummer is Dave Matthews Band whose name I don't know.

2. What song contains your favorite drum performance?
Baluchitherium is a song from Van Halen's "Balance" cd. I love the drums on all of "Under the Table and Dreaming". Also, "Iko Iko" has a great drum beat.

3. Do you prefer the drummer to simply keep a beat, or do you like him or her to show off a bit?
Both if he does it right. If he can't show off while keeping a beat what's the point really?

4. If you were a drummer, how would you personalize your drum kit?
Lots of stuff to beat on. As much stuff as possible. Mostly fancy drums and a wood block. I've never been too much on fancy odd cymbals.

I'm adding my own bonus question: Who of your friends would play the drums if they were a musician?

Answer: Amanda. She'd be great. Who can say "tap happy"?

The Running and Exercise (or not) Update

Ok, I forget when last I wrote about running. Friday morning I ran 3.6 miles at 11:20 miles. I was quite pleased. Saturday I meant to run but was fighting off a migraine. Sunday I knew I wouldn't run. Sunday was rough for other reasons, many of them involving neighbors and domestic disputes. Monday morning I meant to run but was unable to get out of bed in the morning, largely due to not having a nap on Sunday. So I ran Monday night (that's tonight). I haven't figured out how far yet but maybe 5 miles. I don't know how long it took me. Lake Nokomis was quite crowded. I had to run on the bicycle trail.

The Sunday Seven

This is a sad post because I realized how few "rewards" I'm in a position to give myself right now that don't involve food. Many rewards involve healthy good food but still...

Suppose you're on a weight loss program and you're urged to come up with "rewards" for yourself for sticking to the program. Name up to seven rewards, that can't be related to food, that you would set for yourself.

1. Time to read a book (when would that be?)
2. Take a walk around Lake Nokomis
3. Sit on my patio or swing on my patio in my hammock
4. Buy a CD or something from iTunes
5. Swim in the pool (summer is coming, it was 80* today)
6. Drink more water (that's not really a reward, but it does make me feel better)
7. Learn a new song on the guitar (again, not really a reward but I miss the guitar, I haven't played in a long time)

Unconscious Mutterings

I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Groovy ::The Brady Bunch
2. Jealousy ::Natalie Merchant
3. Watching :: and Waiting
4. Kenny :: Chesney, G
5. Games :: fun, Bridge, board
6. Bread :: PBJ
7. City :: Cincinnati, Minneapolis
8. Stems :: Flowers
9. Birds :: bird feeders with finches (I told you, I think it pictures when I try this)
10. Listener :: me

The Saturday Six

1. What is your favorite kind of museum?
The kind I've never worked in, and the kind that isn't crowded when I visit. Seriously. I'm that easy to please.
2. How long has it been since you walked through a museum?
Saturday.
3. When you enter an art museum, what type of art do you generally visit first?
I usually walk through art museums pretty fast. I start with the paintings I can recognize, or where I can at least identify the subject. My browsing speed increases with the abstractness of the paintings.
4. Take the quiz: What Famous Work of Art Are You?

I Am Best Described By...

From the Lake, No. 1 by Georgia O'Keeffe

What Famous Work of Art Are You?

5. Judging your own personality, how well do you think the quiz's result matches you?
I like Georgia O'Keeffe so I'm ok with the results. It's not the most scientific quiz is it?
6. If you could own any famous piece of artwork for your own, which one would you choose?
Anything by M.C. Escher. Also the guy who paints with the dots. Who is that?

One of the most ridiculous things I've ever read

Maybe it's because it's midnight and I haven't slept over four hours a night for the past several nights. I was just reading this story about a city manager in Florida who is being fired after announcing he will have a sex change operation. I got to the third paragraph and read a quote from a commissioner and then read the commissioner's name, Gay Gentry. After that line I couldn't take anything else in the article seriously. Is that wrong?

3X Thursday

1.How would you describe your personality? Do you like it? Why why not?
When I hear personality, I think INFJ. I'm other things too. I'm a total gadget head and a nerd. I love to learn and I love music. I also enjoy hanging out with people and enjoy my alone time. I do like my personality. I'm trying to figure out how to treat people well within my personality, I can't imagine changing it.

2. What type of personality do you like the best? Why?
I like being an INFJ. I do appreciate the extroverts in my life. I need help talking to new people and exploring new things so I appreciate people whose personality is different from my own.

3. Do you believe that there are just certain personalities that don't mix well? Why/why not? When you are put in a situation with someone who is vastly different than you, how do you deal with it?
I think all personalities can mix and help each other. I've gotten along well with a couple people who I can't believe I was ever friends with because we were so different. We really got along and enjoyed our differences.

Speaking of goofing off

I have homework that I badly need to do, but I feel I need a brief break. I had a lot of anger last night that I needed to get rid of. This morning when I woke up I knew I needed to run, and so run I did. And I ran. And ran. And ran. I ran 4.75 miles, probably longer than I should have after not having run for so long. I had a great time though. I was very intentional about adding to my run, and running a slightly different route in the beginning to burn off some energy (running up hills). By the time I got to the normal part of my run I didn't have the energy to be angry anymore. I needed every bit of energy I had to keep running.

I'm glad I could find a way to take all that energy and use it in a constructive (and not destructive) way. This is a therapy method I may have to repeat a few more times. I could be a good distance runner again before this is all over.

Quite a relevant Wednesday Mind Hump

List your top five methods of goofing off.

1. The internet. While RSS feeds and blogs are my best friends, they are also really my worst enemy. You know about most of my favorite sites including Overheard in the Office, Post Secret, and Eyeteeth. Some of my less well known eqaully favorite time wasters are Car Talk, especially "Time Kill Central", Sudoku on the Strib, Cindee's Web Page, and Most Popular News on Yahoo.

2. Aside from poking around on the internet, I love to blog. Today I need it anyways to get some stuff out of my system.

3. Taking pictures. I love my digital camera. Which explains some of the more odd photos that have appeared here.

4. Running/exercising/walking. In the summer I will run or walk forever. The weather's getting nicer so I can do that again. Today I had some pent up anger from some bad news I got last night so I ran an extra long time before going to work. I ran 4.75 miles at 11:21 miles. (Yea me!)

5. Listening to music. Ahh, music. I've been on a tour of media players lately. I love Windows Media Player 11. It's super slick and I love how it deals with art work. Sadly the thing eats RAM like no other and I just couldn't deal with it. Also it doesn't support drag and dropping files which is something I need. I explored several other media players including Media Monkey and WinAmp before deciding on Songbird. Songbird is a great media player but it's on version 0.2.5 right now so it's only available as an unstable developer release. I used it anyways and it's really slick. However, it's got a lot more bugs than I am emotionally prepared to deal with right now. My favorite features: whenever I add a song to any "watched file" like the file I download music into, Songbird automatically adds it to my library without my telling it to do anything. When using an Mp3 search site like AllTheWeb or Mp3Realm it integrates the search results into the player and gives me the option to play or download the music in the browser/media player. Things I wish they'd add: Songbird doesn't know what to do when I delete music from my computer, it leaves said files on the playlist. There's a button to remove songs from the playlist but no "undo remove" function, either a key shortcut or a button. Drag and drop from Songbird into other apps is not supported. I have recently discovered iTunes which I swore off a while ago. My favorite iTunes feature: it supports dragging and dropping files, especially dragging and dropping files onto my Palm sync list. What I want from iTunes: sync to my Palm.

I think that was longer than I meant this post to be. Oh well, I'm putting off homework so it seems appropriate.

Back in the singles column

Through a sad set of circumstances, I am no longer going to have dinner with the guy I asked out. So, I'm back in the singles column. I'm kinda bummed. I'm trying not to be mad, so far it's working ok.

The voice in my head is back

The voice in my head is back. I had conquered it briefly.

I used to have this roommate that would obsess about everything in a new relationship. "I called him, why didn't he call me back?" "Can I use your phone to call him and see if he picks up?" "What if he..." "What if I..." "What do you think I should do?" I never really understood how she got so wrapped up in things. At this moment I have immense empathy with her. She's not even in the situation any more, she's engaged, or maybe even married.

I have decided to acknowledge how totally wrapped up in this situation I am right now and in writing this seek help to "unwrap" myself. I'm still interested in the situation, I'm just going to give it a normal, constructive (and not destructive) amount of attention.

Running and Smoothies

I ran this morning. 3.6 miles in 43 minutes which is actually (slightly) under 12:00 miles. Considering how long it's been since I've run in the cold morning, and how windy it was (20-30mph) I was pleased. I also got to wear the nice blue shirt my parents got me for Christmas.


I mentioned before how I found smoothies. This is one I just made (and later spilled all over). They are wonderful, even better with Vanilla yogurt. That's right, vanilla, I hate plain yogurt. That's the second smoothie I made today and the second smoothie I've spilled today. I have a picture of the spill but it looks gross...

Two Cool Memes

First, The Sunday Seven:
Name the last seven specific items that you purchased at the grocery store.
Mercifully I'm not embarrassed by this.
1. Lime - for making guacamole
2. Strawberries - they're on sale at Kowalski's right now. The good ones too. I bought them for smoothies, I'm sure we'll talk about more later.
3. Frozen blueberries, also for smoothies.
4. Five cups of yogurt which I'm counting as the rest of the seven. Some were for smoothies, some for breakfast, which incidentally was a smoothie this morning. I'm not on a smoothie diet, although I am beginning to see how that would work.

Second, The Monday Music Mambo:
1. What's your favorite Irish artist? Is it wrong to say U2? I like The Corrs too. I can't really think of anyone else, although I do legitimately like U2 so it's not a total cop-out.

2. What artist, album or song makes you think of the color green? I have this album by a band called Spookfloaters and the cover is green, and most of the rest of the album and the disc too.

3. Irish music is all about enjoying yourself. Name a song (Irish or otherwise) that you enjoy a lot. I just got a bunch of new music while I was on vacation. I'm currently listening to some classic greats including "Mambo Italiano" and "Come-on-a-my house" by Rosemary Clooney, which are really good despite how long ago they were released. I also love "Beautiful Girl" and "Best Years of Our Lives" by The Baha Men (of "Who Let the Dogs Out?" fame) and "Temperature" by Sean Paul. Those are all great workout songs by the way.

Here I am

And here I am today. I got lots of sun. I got most of it yesterday when I ran four miles.

Fun with the camera

That's two aunts and two uncles and me. We were testing out the timers on our cameras.



That's Aunt Joanie and I.