On the Edge of BROWNS 2010

Well folks, here it is, the edge of the 2010 Cleveland Browns NFL season. Browns Training camp has already opened for rookies. As for me, I keep on keeping on knowing that God is in control and I know where I'm eventually headed, even if the path there (to Jesus Heavenly Kingdom) looks like a mountain to climb


NEW FILM SCAN EQUIPMENT: Well after using Nikon's FH-816 holder in the 9000ED scanner for how long, I'll be trying out a new 110 film holder for the Nikon. Made by FilmScanUSA, this could be the holder that makes 110 negative scans so much easier.
Problem with the old FH-816 is that either with VueScan or the Nikon software, framing what you want to scan is a tricky process. I won't bore all you with details. Especially since VueScan's frame offset settings in the newer VueScan versions seem to have no effect (In the older 8.41 version, the offset setting adjusted the scan but now that seems to have stopped working). I've heard some good things about the new holder, let's see if they're true .

Night at the Observatory: Over the July 4^th weekend, we had a visit from Carolyn Tallman and her two kids Meg and Joe Jr. (Wish Joe could have made it, he had a operation done on his leg recently and couldn’t make the drive from St. Petersburg). After a nice dinner at Thai Thai in downtown Cocoa (along with Marti), we were invited by Carolyn to join them at the Brevard Community College Observatory for a nifty laser light show in the planetarium. Now I’ve been to a couple of the observatory events (the Mars viewing thru their big scope and a planetarium show) and this show was really nifty. Meg (age 7) really enjoyed the show. Makes for a nice educational field trip. Now we have to get Gigi, Laci and Mommy Tina there for a show. (Gigi is visiting Aunt Holly out in California until August so we'll have to wait till then).

Speaking of Gigi, she wants to play soccer this coming fall (in lieu of Pop Warner cheerleading) so we’ll have our hands full this coming fall. That and my Cleveland Browns on Sundays.

New power pack for laptop: If there’s one thing about these laptops that really drives me bananas, it is how the power packs always seem to break at the wrong times. Now I’m shopping around for a replacement power pack for the laptop. Oh mine still works but it has a intermittent break in the wire near the plug which causes it to cut out on occasion. Not fun when you discover that your laptop wasn’t charging up because the power pack wire was screwed up.

No power at the horse barn AAARGH!!!: Two weeks now and the owners of the horse barn where we keep our horses still hasn’t got the electricity going? I’m wondering what the heck is going on? I suspect they (the owners) are saving money by not having the electricity running. Never mind the horses are suffering in this Florida heat.

From Hank's Grooveyard: I'm not much of a Madonna fan but a couple of her songs I really like, including this one from my junior year in college (1987), "Who's That Girl".

A question I found myself asking quite a bit during my junior year. Now I was engaged to be married at the time but wouldn’t you know, it seemed like every young college freshman girl (and one high school cheerleader) had their sights on yours truly. Which of course left me asking on a number of occasions who’s that girl?

(Now where were they when I was 16 and in a dry spell for a time?).

Usually I include a musical link here but can't seem to find one for this song. But there's this Wiki article on the song

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who%27s_That_Girl_%28Madonna_song%29

But the memories that year, a slave in the computer lab, my 85 Mustang GT (which my then girlfriend always seemed to be snatching away and driving home to her house, leaving me her car at my dorm) and those dreaded Calculus homework assignments (I knew I should have went the Business Admin route in Computer Science instead of the pure Math/Computer Science).

Oh and for my Birthday: Well that dreaded birthday is coming up. Dear Lord, how bout a new Canon digital SLR for my photo business? Fat chance.

A Special Salute to a Korean War Veteran.

It was sixty years ago this past June that marked the beginning of the Korean War in which the United Nations, spearheaded mostly by U.S. troops defended South Korea against a Communist invasion from the north. One of the most decisive battles of this war, the Battle of Chosin Reservior in which 30,000 UN troops fought their way out of a trap in which they were surrounded by 60,000 Chinese and North Korean troops.

One of the American troops who fought his way out of that deathtrap was my step-father and husband of 30 years to my mother, Andrew Guy Hanes. On this, the 60th Anniversary of the Korean Conflict, I pay a special salute to my late step-father (he passed away in July 2006) as one U.S. Military Veteran to another U.S. Military Veteran. Not only was Guy (as we called him) a outstanding U.S. Army officer at one time, he was a loving and caring husband to my mother (they met in mid-1975 and married in the fall of 1976 if memory serves me correctly).



Here's a family picture from 1995-1996 or so. Guy Hanes is in front, second from the left. That's me there in front in the turquoise-blue shirt.



And another photo of "Grampa Guy" with my mother and his grandchildren..









Nowadays, Lt. Andrew G. Hanes is in the care of our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ in Heaven. God Bless you Guy and THANK YOU so much for your service in the Korean War.

Fourth Of July Special Posting.

Well folks, we had a pretty wonderful Fourth Of July though I didn't get too many pictures. Guess my shutter finger needs a short rest. But it was a nice family-centered event and we celebrated America's Birthday in Florida style.

Sweet 16 For Leslie:

Well, here’s a few pics for a little Sweet 16 party

we threw for our lovely neighbor Leslie. It was just us, Leslie and her friend Sharly but it was a nice little shindig. And she absolutely loves the aquamarine pendant (her birthstone) that I got her from Quartzsite, AZ.

NeatImage: This is some neat photo restoration software. Well I gave NeatImage a try (recommended by my friend Ted Marcus (one of his webpages) and color me impressed. I've only tried it once so far but I'm impressed with the quality improvement. I've included

Raw Scanned Negative (size-reduced for Web):

After Basic Photoshop color restoration & some brush work:

After processing with NeatImage:

OK the improvements may be a little hard to see here but on my screen, the NeatImage difference is noticeable. Gotta try this on my other 110 scans.

Otto Graham Jersey

Well after several purchases of Cleveland Browns jerseys with then-current player nam

es and numbers, only to have to retire them when that player was traded, I decided to go retro-throwback. This time I purchased a white #14, Otto Graham jersey (Otto Graham Hall Of Fame Browns quarterback from 1946 to 1955). This way the jersey will never be rendered “obsolete” due to any trade or anything.

Now to find the Brown version of this jersey which doesn’t seem to be available at this time.

COMING SOON: A Special Salute to a Korean War Veteran. I’m working on it.

Cursed Sirius…now charging for on-line listening.

When I first got Sirius satellite radio, they offered a listen-online feature to all paid subscribers. You could use your laptop or desktop computer as a Sirius receiver. I found this rather useful at times, especially during on-the-job layovers where I had WiFi access (in hotel rooms, or at restaurants).

That was all well & dandy until last year when Sirius announced it was replacing their 64 kb online service with a “CD-quality” service running at 128 kbps. And as you probably guessed, they are now charging for what was once a free service ($2.99 per month according to Sirius). But you could still use the old service free for the next year if you went ahead and did early renewal, which I did.

That one-year service expired some time ago this year. So I did look into the $2.99 per month service. That’s where Sirius gets a little greedy, you have to pay a lump-sum payment for about two years worth of this service instead of simply buying it month-by-month. Figuring that I wouldn’t get enough use to justify this expense, I did not purchase this service.

Isn’t that typical now, online companies looking to charge for what was once a free to paid subscribers.

Dirty rotten skunks.

Those annoying changes in atmospheric pressure.

One of the more annoying aspects of land-based travel across the country is the effect of atmospheric pressure on some of your belongings. Like for example when you go up into the higher elevations (nearly 9000 feet in some cases), the change in the atmosphere does some funny things. Like the effect it had on my can of shaving gel, forcing the gel out of its container and all over the inside of my shaving bag.

UPDATE: The Lawn Mower makes a Idiot of me again.

Well folks, I thought I had the lawn-mower working quite nicely. But my wife informed me that once again she could not get the lawn mower started. So I had Steve Witt take a look.

Turns out I had a screw loose (in the mower, not where one might think). The new pickup coil worked its way loose and got damaged against the flywheel. You guess it, we had to buy another new coil and I let Steve install this one. Oh sheesh.

Well Bruce’s Small Engine Repair in Merritt Island is happy, I had to buy another part from them.

OK, I found the recip\e for Monte Cristos.

At last, after tasting those delicious Monte Cristo’s the NASA cafeteria made, I found a good recipie on-line (at Allrecipies.com) for making those delicious sandwiches. I’ll give it a shot for this Fourth Of July.

UPDATE: Yes I did make those Monte Cristos for the Fourth. They turned out quite well, not bad for my first attempt at Monte Cristos.