Blue joke

Hehe... couldn't think of a better title... Had to look up "blue joke" to see if it meant anything. And it does. It's "dirty joke", in other words. But no worries, there is nothing dirty about this post.

Last Saturday, before we got out of the car to go to the pool for the kids' swimming lessons, I was in the mood to tell jokes. So, on our way back to the car after swimming, they wanted more. I don't have a big reservoir of jokes in my head so, as a stalling tactic, I just said, "Okay, I have a joke". Then, a moment of silence. While buckling Janelle up, she asked, "What is it?". I just said, "No, I don't really have one"... to which, Jed responded, "You really had a joke then. You said you had a joke but you didn't. So you were in fact joking". Well, those weren't his exact words. But it was really insightful, don't you think?

On to the next half...

The story for tonight was "Blue Moon". Jed asked what "blue moon" meant and I told him it was the rare event when there are two full moons in a month. I told him it happens because the moon's cycle is really only 28 days (is that even correct? I'm too lazy to look it up). Then, it went on and on until I said that it would never happen in February since it only has 28 days. But he immediately thought about leap years. Oh, right! Then, I realized, blue moons in February (during a leap year) would be the statistically rarest ones. Of course, this is all assuming I'm right about the 28-day moon cycle. I know it's not exactly 28 days but it's around that, right? Okay, I'll look it up. Be right back... k, I'm back... I typed "lunar cycle" and Google gave me this: 1 lunar cycle = 29.53059 days. I just managed to misinform Jed tonight. I'll remember to correct him first thing in the morning, how's that? :) So this means we'll never get to see a blue moon in February.

Does the "blue joke" title make sense now? :)

Take care y'all!
Ever

LiteOn won over HP...

The black "clip" at the center of our laptop's DVD drive had been loose for a while. After we got back from a mini-vacation recently, I couldn't find it anymore. I asked around and it didn't sound like it could be replaced. And so I went shopping for an external reader/writer. I initially got the HP dvd1170e. But sadly, it wouldn't work with my TDK DVD+R's. Pretty picky.

I was intent on getting a new brand of blank DVDs but I came home with a LiteOn 22x EZ-DUB instead. :) It was $10 cheaper than the HP one so I was really hoping it would work. And it did. So, here is the HP one, sitting by me, repackaged and ready to be sent back to the store.

The only thing that I was hoping I could make work but haven't been able to is the SmartErase functionality. The manual says it should work with non-RW discs. But when I tried it from the bundled Nero, it says I could only do it with RW's. The screenshot from the manual is actually different from what I'm seeing. So, I must be missing something. I don't know how to get to that screen. Oh well, a little googling will probably help. If not, a call to customer support would be in order.

'Til next post.
Ever

Neti Pot and Fleas

Nope, there's no connection between the two besides the fact that I'll be talking about both of them in this post. :)

Jing told me about Neti Pot just recently. I think she just remembered out of the blue. A former coworker told her about it so it has been six months at least. Anyway, it's for rinsing your nasal passages. We got one at Target the other day and it came with 50 pre-mixed solution packets. The brand is NeilMed.

How it works is... you stick the pot's spout up your nostril.. hehe... and the water (with the dissolved solution) goes through and out the other nostril. Then, you blow your nose and then switch nostrils. It's just a tiny bit uncomfortable the first couple of seconds because you feel the water cross over. I've been doing it and so have Jed and Janelle. They get a kick out of it. I would like to think that if we weren't doing it, our colds would be in worse condition.

They also have the plastic bottle kind that is supposed to be better because it adds pressure. The water coming out of Neti Pot simply flows, relying on gravity. We actually went to Costco tonight to get it but sadly, they no longer carry it. I remember seeing it every time I checked out what they had for allergies.

k... enough about Neti Pot... on to the fleas, which the Neti Pot can't help with, in case you're wondering... While I still can't remember the context, Jing (again) reminded me about what made Janelle think fleas came from Texas. There was one episode of SpongeBob where Sandy (the squirrel) said she got her fleas when she went to Texas. If I could only remember why that was even brought up... that was actually the funny part. I think it was when Jed and I came back from his school's field trip at some ranch and brought home a flea. Or was it a tick? Man, I always forget the difference between the two. Oh well, I guess the story will come back around... eventually.

'Til next post.
Ever

The wooden block is gone!

Heh, Ate Sonia... finally, a new post. Buh-bye to you, wooden block. I hope you enjoyed being at the top for three months. Man, it's been that long. Gotta grab this chance to empty my to-blog list again. I'm sickish so I'm staying at home today. I missed choir again yesterday. :( I/we might take the kids out biking this afternoon (or tomorrow morning), depending on the weather and my condition. We bought their bikes about a couple of months ago. And yep, they're still unused. So sad!

We've said buh-bye to the birds nesting in our backyard. It was kinda tragic. A crow invaded their nest again. We don't know whether it managed to eat some of them. But one thing's for sure, one of them managed to escape. My father-in-law saw it fly away with the parents. Hopefully, the others got the chance to escape, too. Good thing they could already fly. Bad crow! But like I said to Jing that night, if it were an eagle, we would have been awed. Let's cut the crows some slack. That's what they do. It's part of the natural food chain.

I read somewhere that the Vermont (don't remember if it was a city or county or what) constitution was adopted on 7/8/1777. I wonder why they didn't do it the day prior. Could bad weather have played a factor maybe?

I don't remember the context but there was one time when Janelle thought that fleas came from Texas. It was really funny. Apparently, when I noted it down, I didn't think it was going to take this long before I wrote about it. All I put down was "fleas from Texas". :(

I did it again. I thought everything had suddenly become touch-screen. Jing was showing me a text message on her phone. I was trying to open it by touching the message. Yikes!

Cerelac! When Francis, Arlene, & kids visited us sometime ago, Francis mentioned that he had bought Cerelac from Amazon. He even said that their local Wal-Mart carried it, too. And guess what, our local Wal-Mart does, too. Yummy! I had been looking forever for it. Oh, btw, nope, we don't have a new baby nor a toddler. It's for me. :)

Jed recently saw the Arnold S. talk on TV. He said, "This is the first time I've seen him talk and he sounds exactly the same as he does in Terminator". I don't mean to tease. Just thought Jed's comment was really sincere and funny. Jed, btw, has been answering Jeopardy questions left and right. Even many of his guesses are right on!

I was looking up the local Wamu's hours yesterday and some of the branches that came up in the results had "talking ATMs". Never heard of those before. I should try them one day.

Tough times. Working on our loans to be modified. One down, one to go. Thanks to our dear friend, Res, arguably the kindest person on the face of this planet.

Just found this budgeting tool called YNAB. I was bummed when I heard that MS Money was being discontinued. But it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. I had been using both Money and Excel because Money doesn't have good budgeting features, particularly the envelope system. YNAB is what I'd been looking for. When I need to enter an expense, I just do it once. In my previous system, I would log it twice, once in Money (to update my physical account balance) and another in Excel (to update my envelope balance). Check it out if you want/need to take control of your budget.

I guess that's about it. Better rest now. 'Til next post.
Ever