A Budget
Last Updated:
Looking for
Computer Support Help?
Check Out
My Resume!
|
|
Hosted By...
|
|||
|
| |||
|
A Budget Last Updated: Looking for Computer Support Help? Check Out My Resume! |
|
||||||
| ||||||||
Update At 0845 No, the kids are up, and noisy - which is to say normal. Me? I'd much rather contemplate the morning and charge right into it - quietly, of course, but that's just me. I guess I would classify myself as a morning person. I'm most productive and decisive in the mornings - not that this drops off in any great way later in the day, mind you, but I tend to "front-load" my days. I'll try to take lunch later - one or two in the afternoon, because I figure "morning" extends until "lunch" and I'm more productive that way. My wife, on the other hand, is more of a night person. When under stress or on vacation (sometimes the two co-mingle), she reverts to form, and the television is on until 1 am or later - as it was last night. One of my biggest blunders has been a television in the bedroom and the fact that I've never learned to sleep with earplugs. So it goes. On tap for today are some careful experiments with my test board - which I made crinkle with the clear finish, which either means there's an incompatibility in the finishes (possible, both are gloss), or I applied it improperly (too thick, perhaps). We shall see what we shall see. There are also other tasks to complete, which, of course, take precedence. Things like the last of the resumes from yesterday's batch of want ads, and more surfing to job sites for other job opportunities. This, too, shall pass. Now I've got to go explain to my children why education is important - it allows them to leave home - alive.
Update At 2100 Spent most of the day working on and with a web site client who runs, in part, a travel consultancy - I guess that's what I'd call it. She went on a cruise, came back with a couple hundred pictures, and now's the tough part - she's got some notes we've turned into a travelogue of sorts, but selecting out of those the best pictures (I'm beginning to understand that there is no bad sunset on a cruise), well, it takes a better man than I. I also discovered tonight that the Adult Trophy for the pinewood derby is for the "coolest car". Oh, boy. There's a problem. We'll have to hope that I don't win that one - it's a traveling trophy, after all. Then again, there is the possibility that it'll be retired in about five years. No pressure, no pressure... And yes, my volunteering gene is alive and well - I volunteered for the outdoor training portion of the program. Well, there's a shock, eh? OA member, Eagle Scout, yeah, I can do that. What's that? OA? Order of the Arrow. Or, in modern explanation, it's a select society of honor campers. You are (or were) selected by your peers as an example of a good camper - then you work hard to become even better. Yes, there's fluff and hoo-raw involved - stuff I don't know if they still do, and I know some of it's still secret (it's a guy thing - we like secrets). But basically attaining the Order of the Arrow was, and still is, a pretty big deal. I've volunteered to go through what's called "Baloo" training - or Basic Adult Leader Outdoor Orientation. The program is designed to give the pack someone knowledgable in outdoor practices who can plan and lead an "entry-level" outdoor program for the pack. So I volunteered. Other than that, not much going on so far in the Dominik Hovel. Hopefully, it'll get better... |
Update At 2130 I think I've been running non-stop since I got up this morning. I know I haven't, but it sure felt like it. Let's see...
Yeah, those cars will be shiny. Should be pretty cool. Unfortunately, I did find out that others in the pack know all about the "secret ingredient" - so I suppose saying "molybdenum sulphide" in proximity with "Pinewood Derby" will probably get me in trouble. So be it. |
Update At 2100 Today was "The Big Day" for the kids. Ann volunteered to go along on today's field trip to Orchestra Hall. Both first grade and fourth grade went. All had a wonderful time. And the kids were some of the best behaved of all the children at the event. Which is nice to hear. I remember when I was a kid, I think we had about three or four field trips total. I think I'll spare you the recollections that would go along with this jaunt - or meander - down memory lane. I'm just glad that, being so very close to so many wonderful opportunities for kids to broaden their horizons, they're taking the opportunities to do so.
Ego-Surfing One of the problems of being fairly far down in the food chain, name-wise, is that you're going to run into "hey, I didn't do that" sorts of things. Like this one my dad did, and he shows up here as well. Meanwhile, there's Grandpa's interest in bowling. I, on the other hand, am on several sites described as "...working a Dilbertesque job..." Oh, crap. There's also that old mess. Oy.
Attack of the Raving Stupids I'm not going to address the gross incompetence of the teachers in this case - it should be obvious to anyone reading this that "NET SEND" is quite nearly the most benign act one can do with the NET command, and if the kid wanted to, he could have wrecked plenty of havoc - obviously, the idiots who set up the lab failed to disable the CMD prompt access on these machines, or perform any sort of basic lock-down for students. Dollars to donuts I bet you that kids could also hop right from their lab machines to administration as there was probably no firewall between them - then again, we're expecting these people to teach, not to think, I guess. No, my problem isn't with their actions, it's with the fine fellow, Dr. Santiago, who is running the joint. His BA came from Puerto Rico - Okay. His MA in "Recreation" came from South Connecticut State? Good Lord, I've got a frigging doctorate in Beer Drinking, and I've got at least two college classmates who were Masterb - well, I'll call them "Masters of Self Manipulation" and leave it at that. I suppose, though, I shouldn't be surprised. A computer teacher who didn't know what the NET command did or could do, a "Computer laison" who didn't know her ass from a hole in the ground, both hired, no doubt, by a fellow who has a doctorate in "administration", and a master's degree in "recreation". Good grief.
The Bush Space Program I read through the Bush Space Plan (BS, for short), and find myself wondering "which ex-Enron buddy put him up to it" - in my more lucid moments, of course. On the other hand, it very well could be a wagging dog issue. Kennedy's call for a man on the moon was pretty clearly caused by the military need for bigger, better missiles - and since "bigger, better missiles" doesn't sell well, you need to put a civilian face on it - thus, the "man in space/man on the moon" program was born. Now, we don't need bigger, better missiles. We need a better way to put a thumbtack under an ass which is liable to be a problem and cause them to go elsewhere - and decide it's too damned much work to bother us. As far as space goes, we don't need to "explore" the local neighborhood any more. We know about low Earth orbit. We know about the moon. We need to stop "exploring" and start "exploiting". Use earth orbit for what we need to - production of materials which require near-zero gravity. Use the moon for what we need - as a waystation to the rest of the solar system, and observation station for the cosmos, and a low-gravity retirement home for really smart people who can make the place even better for my children's kids, who can move to the moon and go to work on raising better foods in smaller spaces. But what the heck do I know - I'm not elected, I'm not a member of NASA, nor am I a highly educated individual. I'm just a guy with a dream that died. I wanted to go into space. |
Update At 1215 I discovered last night that when you're working with paints near their lower-limit temperature-wise, you'd best let them dry for a very long time. I had put a final clear-coat on Jack's Pinewood Derby car and brought it inside to do the wheels - I needed someplace flat to work and I wanted to sit down to do it (I'd built a jig of sorts which would allow me to make certain the wheels were parallel and the vehicle had adequate ground clearance). I set the car down on a piece of plywood I'd brought in to protect the table. Ten minutes later I went to pick his car up - and large chunks of paint came off. So I switched cars with him. He'll get the bright-copper-colored car, and I'll run the blue one. He kept his original wheels, while I kept mine. A hundred million? For West Virginia?!?!. There is no sanity left - at least, not on E-Bay. Other than that, I've heard from my once-and-hopefully-future-boss - he still wants to do lunch with me, and wants to keep me working. I want to keep me working, too, but if he can't, I'll have to rely on my own talents. It's a race to the finish to secure regular income, after which I'll be racing to finish alternate income. Hopefully enough to keep the ship afloat... And one final note - Mr. Hough dropped a line in my in-box this morning congratulating me on hitting the big 100,000 - no, not age or weight, but visitors. I checked, and shore'nuff, was able to grab this one...
I'm not to the "billions and billions served" yet, but that was something nice to see... Unlike the next one, which came with the subject "so THAT'S what 'rectally' means!"
Update At 1230 But I should have been more thorough. The message didn't reach my final in-box. In fact, it didn't "officially" reach even my computer - it was stopped by the ISP's e-mail filter, which is where I viewed and copied it. I don't know how it's going for the rest of you, but I have noticed over the last month a serious, SERIOUS dropoff in spam. I used to get close to 200 a day between Hotmail and the other accounts I use. On Hotmail, I could regularly count on 20-40 new messages in the "Bulk Mail Folder" and another 10-20 in my in-box. On another account (the one which the above-referenced message arrived on), they use something called "Postini" which catches nearly all of the spam I get there. On average, I was getting close to a hundred and fifty spam from that account daily, and perhaps one from a mailing list might be flagged as spam. Conversely, about once a week a spam would slip through the filter. I would put it's effectiveness at about one inbound spam missed, and and two inbound real messages flagged as Spam. Since about mid-December (Oddly, about the same time the guy was charged in Virginia for spamming) the inbound spam count has dropped considerably. I almost never get spam in my hotmail inbox, and there are perhaps two or three in the bulk mail folder. The other account's dropoff is even more dramatic. From 150 a day to maybe forty in a WEEK.
Do you think someone finally found a way to stop the spammers? Signing them up for multiple copies of AOL's new upgraded software, perhaps? Now they can't reach the keyboard from all the free CDs towering around? Wouldn't that be a nice way to go? Update At 1415
Well, never let it be said that I didn't try to help... |
Update At 1315 And, of course, those who can do nothing but repeat the mistakes of the past are condemning the rest of us to suffer - Dick (again, why is it that so many men who reach national political prominence and have the name "Richard" are such dicks?) Gephardt is running attack ads against anyone - especially Dean. Kerry, who seems to be leading in what is likely an aberation (Iowa is a caucus state, which means you go in with a whole mind, rather than voting on one specific person, and you have to discuss more than "who should we pick for President?"). Mind you, given that representative democracy is the best we could come up with (it made sense 225 years ago - I'm thinking we're a bit beyond it working well any more), we're due the government we deserve. However, when you consider what happens with the Imperial Presidency when Emperor Bush II goes to lay a wreath at the tomb of a man whom Bush likely would have regarded as "disruptive of democracy". You think not? Why in the hell would a President interested in civil discourse block the view of people who think differently with CITY BUSSES? The bottom line is that the American system of Government is seriously, fundamentally flawed. I have only one suggestion - a new Revolution. Dismantle every government department or group. A return to strict constitutional law, with the following amendments
But that's probably too harsh for some people. I tell ya, though, were I king, it'd be done in a heartbeat.
Point Taken, Rick... As to the Bayesian filtering, I'm sure, given Mr. Hellewell's experience in the field, that it works. I'm also certain that what works now will be overcome. Which is why we need to get ahead of the Spam curve - if we can. I'm still disgusted with the, what, .04% break-even point when it comes to spams - something like a .04% return allows spammers to break even. Heck, my dad worked with targeted direct mail, and a response rate of 2% was average - their response rate was something in the neighborhood of 10%, so he must have been doing something right. And before you come after me that my father was sending junk mail, remember - I'll listen so long as you're a priest or nun - because those were the only people for which I ever stuffed envelopes. Update At 2415 (yeah, I know, technically Saturday, get over it) Let's see. There were eight adult cars, and in that, we ran two four-car races, the top three finishers competing in the final adult runoff (our track has six lanes). I finished first in the first race, and a disappointing DNF (Did Not Finish) in the final adult race - which quite honestly was not my fault as one of the other adult vehicles hopped the track and pushed me off the edge - and I apparently ran into the post. Since the adult races were run first before the sibling or boy races, they decided not to re-run the final. I can live with it.
For the record, that's my car above. The gold striping along the side is actually some spare brass tubes I had which I polished, then took a small dowel, sanded it down a bit, and inserted it into the tubes. What was I thinking? Dunno. It looked sorta cool. We'll try harder next year. The gold blob in the middle (with a screw in it) is the "hatch" where I stuck the bbs - BBs, then glued them down. Fortunately, since I did that only last night... well, keep reading. And the round dot on the back is the tag the pack applied. More on that, too. The adult winner? A very narrow, thin, rounded-wedge shape - simple lacquer finish, no stain or paint involved. Rhiannon's car was perhaps the most disappointing. There were maybe eighteen sibling cars - I think the top two finishers in each heat advanced. In Rhiannon's heat, her car hit the bottom of the ramp in first place, and then failed to even cross the finish line. Again, as a reminder, both kid cars were done with the Moly Z treatment, while my wheels and axles spent most of this week in a baggie half-full of graphite (with Moly Z in it, so the tube says on the back, I noticed tonight as I was packing for the trip to the race - then promptly forgot to apply it one last time). The track looked pretty slick - it's only about three years old. I would estimate it was forty feet long - the top portion started out five feet off the ground, and took about sixteen feet (or the first two sections) to reach the floor. The remaining three sections were flat on the floor, and the finish gates (more on those in a minute) were about two feet from the end - where the final foot or so of rail was built up with foam to slow the cars gently - and then there was a four-by-four inch block of open-celled foam which was used to put a firm stop to the cars. I saw only one car break one part off the front end (it appeared to be solely cosmetic).
That's Rhiannon's car - the dark spot in the middle is where I gouged out the BBs - she wanted to play with the car and didn't want to worry about the bbs getting lost. I removed the hatch she had (same thing as on my car - a flat strip of polished brass) to avoid anyone hurting themselves (the edges had been rounded, but kids being kids ...). So Rhiannon was pretty broke up. Jack, on the other hand, had to watch as five races out of six he finished in last place. The painful, painful part of it was that he would hit the bottom of the slope every single time in first place - and promptly drag-ass to the back of the pack. So obviously, wheels were the problem. I'd had the worst wheels, and yet the graphite/Moly combination seemed to do the trick where speed was concerned. Either that or I spent more time on my nails - which I doubt - I did mine last, and I was in a hurry to get them done, as I recall - which is why I bagged the Moly in favor of graphite in a bag. Now I know better.
Yeah, Jack's car - the finish was much smoother before I dragged glue-covered BBs across it.
And this is the whole bunch together on the table. There were some neat cars there - one was a cell phone - it actually folded. One was sponge-bob Square pants in a bathtub (there was a penny taped in so he could make weight). There were three "Rails" (a wedge in front, two square rails going straight back to another wedge in back). Winner of "weirdest car" was a kid who quite literally reproduced the artwork and appearance of a box of Dots candy on his block of wood. One of my tigers won an award for "Best concept car" - he'd designed a rocket, and was actually in the running for a while. Another of my tigers was in the top twelve finishers in speed. Not too shabby - the kid even beat his two older brothers. Ah, yes - finishing. When I was a kid, the first two cars down the track would live to race again - made the evening damned long for a kid eliminated in the first race. But our pack invested in a package which apparently included hardware AND software - and it's pretty slick. The hardware portion was essentially built to attach to the end of the track, and would time, to four decimal places, the duration of the race - and display it on-screen - which then got shot out to the projector which shot it up on the wall. The bottom portion would display the current race and the upcoming two (showing lanes and the number of the car in that lane), while the top portion of the screen would show the lane times (when a race had completed). But I'm getting ahead of myself. The software automatically calculates the race so that each of the cars runs in each lane - since we had 72 cars, we had six heats of twelve races each. Each time a race was run, the software would calculate the order of finish, and display the time along with the name - in order, instantaneously. It would apparently then immediately save the results to disk - and then display a green light on the up-side of the track to let the starters know it was OK to start. With staging and help to run the cars back and forth, it worked well.
How well? We finished 72 races in a little under 2 1/2 hours - and that was with one very long break for thank-you awards for the leaders ( Once the heats were done, there were about six races to determine the overall winner (who beat the second-place car by something like .002 seconds), then the "turtle race" was run - Jack was in 64th place (of 72) at the end of regulation (in order to win the turtle race, your vehicle must cross the finish line - failure to cross disqualifies you). He came in third in his heat, which eliminated him. Oddly, the final two cars they had to do a runoff for had to go down the track three times - the first two times neither car finished, while the third time the "winner" coasted to a stop directly under the finish gate - barely triggering the sensors. The only weird thing was at weigh-in. I'd weighed all three cars the night before, and again today before we left - all were right on 5 ounces on Ann's kitchen scale (a weight-watchers scale which stops at a pound, and which I had set up so that the "zero" setting was actually about a gram - in other words, I wanted the cars to weigh in light so I could add weight). I got to the table for weigh in and discovered that
Go figure. Rhiannon was devastated when her car failed to cross the finish line once. Jack was pretty happy to see his vehicle roar down the hill at all. I was rather upset at missing one of my races because I was distracted. All in all, though, I would say it went pretty successfully - we have plenty of room for improvement. For next year's reference - reduce the ground clearance by at least half. Regulations stated 3/8", but the car could very well have made it with a quarter-inch, possibly less. Second, start experimenting NOW on wheel loading - not graphite, but using clay or wire or some other material, fill the wheels so they run smoother. |
Update At 1130 I open the door. "Hi, I'm Sister Mary and this is Sister Christie and we're Missionaries spreading the good word of Jesus Christ!"
Do you say I answered "F". Then shut the door in their faces. Hey, yes, I'm rude. I didn't ask them to interrupt what I was doing, nor would I think of interrupting their leisurely saturday mornings. I also didn't feel that wasting their time would be beneficial to anyone - we all know I can't dance, so that's a waste of time... Now I'm off to mess with a computer I worked on yesterday. When I left, it was booting and playing games. Then they tried to run the defrag that came with Windows ME.
Update At 2300 Please, folks, should you have the misfortune or desperation to purchase a Compaq, HPaq, Hewlett-Compaq, or whatever name their placing on such conglomerations of shit these days, please, pretty please, for me, grab the seller by the testicles (you might need a microscope and a tweezers) and refuse to release until said sales-critter includes in the box - or preferably hands directly to you - the honest-to-God Real Windows CD which he used to make up the system - or, don't buy the pile of crap. I'd use stronger language, but I should hope that, by now, most of you sane folk would steer clear from that sort of crap unless your very first intention was to gut it and replace it with a real operating system. My first experience with Compaq was in about 1983 or 1984, when I helped my father specify a replacement for his IBM PC without Hercules graphics card at work. Yes, that's right, full-height DUAL 5.25" floppy drives. And nothing else. Could you imagine what you could do these days with a whopping 720K of storage - erm, disk storage? Yeah - we went all out - a 40 Meg hard drive in the Compaq 12 Mhz AT-compatible. And that thing ran, but it was expensive to keep running. Every time something flaked out, the Compaq guy (and only the Compaq guy) had the tools to open the case and work on it. Yes, I know - restore partitions and the like. Frankly, they're useless. The machine I encountered today, a 2-year-and-seven-month-old Presario had a 60-gig hard drive in it - and had close to seventy games installed and removed - some properly, some ... well, the old fashioned way (delete the folder, and all is gone, eh? Not). Yesterday, I had the machine jerkily running Lego Castle Creator or some such nonesense. It ran full-screen full-motion video - albeit a bit jerky. Yes, jerky. I attributed it at least in part to the fact that the 128 Megs of RAM this box had just weren't enough to cope with Windows ME and the boatload of problems. But it ran video up to 1600x1200x24M. This morning, I get a call. "It was running slow again (well, it was going to until we removed some of the software on it), so I ran AOL's System Check (oh, great, the guys who invented the internet are now checking hardware? Back up, I'm gonna hurl). It had some problems, so I ran the defrag (oh, shit - forget the hurl, it's the other end now). Now my mouse doesn't work and I'm getting all sorts of errors." Uh-oh. Laundry time. Mind you, these are good people who do not wish to become technological experts. They want the damned computer, which is "new" (the other computer runs Windows 95 - still - and is doing OK) to just run, damnit. Windows ME (remember, F*ck ME) doesn't allow that. This is, fortunately, one of those rare technology issues which can actually be solved with a boat. Not many people know that - but a boat, attached to the computer, preferably by a stout line, will continue to work. As for the computer, it's effectiveness is most noticable when it is on the bottom of a body of water which said boat (previously mentioned) is afloat upon. That, or beer. Simply pouring a beer into the top of the computer while it is on has been known to resolve many an issue like this. However, I cannot emphasize strongly enough to REMOVE THE POWER CORD before doing this. So I went over there. Sure enough, there was a mouse cursor - no hope in hell of controlling said mouse cursor, but there was a cursor. And the video had dropped from the 1600x1200x24M yesterday to 800x600x16 today. Hmmm. First, I figured, I'd get the mouse working again. After some restarting and fumbling, the Device manager admitted the problem - Could not load VMouse.VXD. "Oh, yeah, I got that error. Clicked OK." Checked the usual \WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL - no SETUP.EXE, no INSTALL.EXE - heck, no EXEs. Not even CAB files. WTF? Um, OK. Great. Asked for his original Windows CDs - nope, no "Windows ME" disks around (before I thought it was a sad joke. Now, I'm of the opinion that the phrase "Windows ME" is, or should be, lexicographically equivalent to "F*ck ME". But that's just my opinion). We went through every single disk (which were remarkably well-organized). No, they'd let him - or his wife, actually - leave without giving her the disks. Personally, I'm of the opinion that selling a computer without the OS disks should be a crime - after all, don't you pay for those? I know I did. But that's all two-year-and-seven-month-old water now well gone under the bridge. Along with the peckerhead who sold them the computer, most likely. Probably moved onto other career highlights. I'll not speculate. I, meanwhile, returned home for my Technet CDs. I don't often go out with them (even Superman has to "take a moment" and find a phone booth), but I was fortunate enough to find an old Beta of Windows ME. Or so I thought. Stuffed it into the cupholder and ... "This beta version expired on May 15, 2001..." Son of a ... Rats. Phooey. There were, by now, children present. Unfortunately, as I worked on the thing the situation deteriorated. I'm sure some of you are of the opinion that it was my intervention which caused this - that's your opinion, thanks. My own opinion is that I undertook to resucitate a dead man. The only disks he received from Best Buy, where they sold him the computer, were two Restore disks, one "Emergency Recovery" disk, and two disks of "How To Use Your New Computer." Nice. After struggling with the thing for three hours, I tossed in the towel. I told them point blank they could take it to Best Buy and find out if it was compatible with XP - if so, I'd be happy to come over and install it over the rest of the stuff they had on there (after burning a backup of their data), and start over - this time, installing only those games the kids need or want, and removing the old/outdated ones - and then, for good measure, using some sort of "save the system" tool to make sure that future installations can be recovered from, as it were. So that was the afternoon and early evening shot to pieces. Other than that, Rhiannon did to a pretty good job of selling cookies today (yes, the cookie sales have started. No, unless you're willing to pay shipping up front, we're not shipping to you). And that is what passes for a "restful" Saturday. Tomorrow I'm supposed to de-decorate and unlight - and lob - the tree out. Yes, it's still green, no, no needles have fallen. We water our trees... |
Update At 2300 I caught a sale at Mills Fleet Farm (great place to go for clothing that fits fat people without the stigma - er, rather, well, the stigma that is attached to "Big And Tall Mens Shops" - and the high prices). I bought a pair of black jeans (could double as work pants, depending on where I end up) and a pair of blue jeans (because I needed them). All for less than a cheap pair of pants on a 25% off rack would have cost me at the fat man's store. Today's event - er, well, yeah, event - was pretty interesting. That is, if you're a kid interested in Destination Imagination. On their team front, they accomplished little - they had a good time, certainly, but accomplished little. So it goes. Today's been the coldest of the last many days - at 4 pm we had a temperature - still - of 1 below (zero, that is). No, it's not the same level of cold as the Nor'east has suffered, and truth be told, it's not nearly what we're used to, but it's cold. I can remember as a kid there were perhaps two winters of my first fifteen which were "snowless". As in we got a little, but it mostly left the grass showing. For the most part, we spent much of the winter with at least two feet of snow on the ground - that is, where we hadn't packed it flat by playing soccer on it. I can still remember the sound the snow makes when you walk on it when it's ten below outside. Again, I was one of those kids for whom recess was cancelled only when the outside air temperature was below twenty below zero, or it was raining. Now they cancel recess for my kids despite their play area being bounded on three sides by buildings and the fourth has a pretty hefty row of trees about a block away. As a child, my playground was about the equivalent of three city blocks - and while it had a row of poplars around the outside, they weren't large enough to stop much of anything. The wind would hit us from whatever direction it pleased, and you'd best be prepared - or be cold. Lately, however, winter seems to have become ... wimpy. The last time school was closed early in the metro area for a blizzard was about eight or nine years ago - and for me, about three jobs. We've had no real decent "blizzards" in about the last three years. The winter of 2000-2001 was the last winter I can recall with "decent" snowfall, and that was an abberation - it almost made up for the three years before, and the last two haven't been much to write home about. As it were. This upcoming week is, normally, our coldest of the year - right around the 20th of January is where we hit our low spots - after that, it's upward in the temperature department. Of course, it's also got the Iowa Caucus, which means election shit, as well as the anniversary of the Roe V. Wade decision, always a fun time in this house... Hopefully, it'll be upwards in other departments. FYI : not that it's a big deal, but I've updated my "up here" portal page. The key difference is a dirty little mapquest secret. Here's the trick - go to Mapquest. Using their directions page, insert your own address (or any address you want to start from - work, home, whatever) - and then for your destination, enter a non-existent address. Submit it for directions. Mapquest will return with "cannot find this address, please re-enter." Copy that link (or bookmark it). Use that, and you'll never again need to enter your own address as a starting point. Obviously, since the URL contains my home address, I'm not putting it up here... Otherwise, enjoy...
|
Copyright information here..
), a shorter break when the computer rebooted (saving the results, which was something of a miracle), and a few other stops for raffling off various things. I would guess that the actual racing time was something in the neighborhood of perhaps 90 minutes all told. Well, truth be told, the top finishers had combined times for six races in the 14-second range. By contrast, Jack's total finish time for his races was nearly 30 seconds. Some cars ranked below him had shorter times, but they failed to finish at least one heat.
