analog_kidd

Wow! That was a great post. Thanks for taking the time to share your story, and an even bigger thanks for serving.

I just bought a Raspberry Pi computer that I plan to use as a Media Center in the bedroom, and maybe another one in the basement if it works out. Rasberry Pi is a computer about the size of a deck of cards. It was designed for educational purposes, and has really taken off in the electronic hobbyist world. There are several Linux distributions that work with it, with a couple of them being set up just for use as a media center. Mostly they run an application called Kodi (formerly named XBMC),   Kodi can pull in content like video and audio that you have stored locally or on your network, or it can pull it in from Internet sources. It has a bunch of stuff it knows about natively, like Youtube or the DIY Channel's video library, but people have written add-ons that make it easy to watch other content, like video from other cable channels, and Crackle for free movies. I've even seen add-ons that stream live TV.   The Rasberry Pi cost me $69 on Amazon for a complete setup: board, case, SD Card, WiFi, cables. I just snapped it all together and two minutes later it's ready to plug in. If it sucks as a media player, I'll find some other use for it. If nothing else I can use it to surf the web and check email.

Over the last few years, my musical tastes have completely moved over to Blues. BB King is a legend. He has been an influence on so many artists over the DECADES that he has been a musician. He really helped to form the genre. Artists come and go, and most will be forgotten, but centuries from now, people will still know the name BB King.   Rest in peace.

  I always felt that way about Journey. Back when they were popular, the stations played the heck out of them. It always seemed to me the singer was crying through each song, and I couldn't stand it.   Now, I rarely listen to radio. I bought a stereo for my truck with a USB port on it. I loaded up a USB flash drive with about 300 albums, and I set the stereo to play random songs. It's like my own little radio station of just songs that I like, and never any stupid commercials.

Hello from Clinton

I don't know how much more the VA offer was, but you likely would have had to shell out money to make a lot of silly repairs, so it would have been a wash. And, there would be countless headaches and delays waiting on the VA. The Investors are going to give you your asking price, which is probably more than what you were willing to negotiate down to anyway. To me that would be a win.

Nackelback was very successful because they came up with a formula for songs that people liked. Too bad they wore that formula out, because every song sounds the same. Here is a good example. Someone took two of their songs, played one on the left channel, and one on the right. You can definitely hear what I mean:   https://youtu.be/Qs4tNeGyTyI  

Back when I was playing Call of Duty on the PS3, I would spend my time in the lobby turning off the audio for anyone that was speaking. I could take only so much F-Bombs and P**** name calls, I'd rather not hear anyone talk. Mostly it came from adolescents who thought it was cool, and would be grounded if their mom heard them talk that way. 

This thread would be so much better with pictures. Hopefully Mrs. John455 will be along shortly. No way I would have unlocked those cuffs without some sort of embarrassing photos being taken.

I usually fill a few 2 liter bottles with water and freeze them. The ice blasts out of the back of the bottle and makes a nice visual. And, unlike water that leaks out as soon as you hit the bottle, the ice keeps for several shots.

I have a friend who has a theory that memories are like marbles in a tube. The tube can only hold so many, and if you add a new marble, one drops out the other end and is gone forever.   He says he is always worried that the marble that drops out is the one that reminds him to drop his pants before going to the bathroom. He says that he really likes that marble.

I keep honey bees, and so far, my dogs have not gotten stung. They wander near the hive every so often, but have never gone right up to it. My bees are fairly non-aggressive, I frequently open the hive with no gear on and they don't bother me. Especially if it's just a quick, take a peek, kind of thing. I did get stung just below the eye once, but I had opened the hive all the way up and was doing some work in there. She got me just as I took off my hood.   I did have a nest of yellow jackets in the barn last summer. I put on my bee suit and went after them. Now, they were aggressive. They would attack and not stop. Even with the suit on, I still got about a dozen stings before it was all over. 

Does the computer give you any error messages, or a blue screen when you try to boot it? If so, please share them. You can Google them too and see if that gives any insight.   Sounds like you found your restore CD's, which is good. Not sure why booting from them didn't fix your problem. Boot from disk one again, and see if there is an option to do a complete restore. That would erase your drive and completely lay down all new bits. You may have just done a "refresh" and left whatever is causing your problem, still on the PC.   Another thing to try, is take off one of the little covers on the bottom, and find the memory. Remove and replace them. Sometimes, over time, with the heat generated in the laptop, the memory will expand and contract and eventually work loose a bit and not make a good connection. Just pulling them out and putting them right back in will fix that.

The Linux idea is a great one, if it's just the O/S that is broken. If all you are going to be doing is using a web browser, you'll be up and running and surfing about two minutes after installing the O/S, it's really that easy. You can even boot directly from most Linux CD's without installing the O/S, just to see if you like it. It will run a little slower like that, but you'll at least get an idea of what you'll be in for.

I've been a whitewater kayaker for about 35 years now. In fact, it's one of the main reasons I was drawn to move to TN. I would come here every year from flat water Florida, to the glorious mountains of E. TN to paddle the rivers.   I will tell you that there are quite a few different styles of kayaks, and you really need to decide what kind of kayaker you want to be. You cannot take a kayak designed for the lake down a whitewater river, and you will be miserable taking a whitewater kayak on a lake since it would be sluggish and have a tendency to turn all the time.   Here are the basic styles of kayaks. try to figure out what is your main goal and go from there. Fishing (will have rod holders and a place to put fish and tackle) Touring / Lakes (will be a long boat  and have a keel to help you go straight and fast) Whitewater - Playboat (will be very short with very little volume. designed for whitewater "tricks") Whitewater - River Runner (mid-sized boat to just have fun paddling down rivers) Whitewater - Creek Boat (big faty boat with lots of volume to help stay on top of the water)   If you wanted a boat that could be taken on whitewarer or a lake, I would look at the River Runner style. It will be great on rivers, and just OK on a lake. It will not be good to fish from, however.   Figure out where you want to end up paddling, and go to a place that sells kayaks, and talk to them about what you want. The demo day that was mentioned above is a fantastic idea.   CraigsList is  a great place to find boats too and you can save a lot of money. Flatwater kayaks will probably be in good shape. You'll need to scrutinize a whitewater kayak a bit more, since it will likely have lots of scratches and gouges from rocks. Whitewater kayakers tend to be committed to the sport and will keep doing it (its an adrenaline rush addiction that can't be shaken), so there may not be as many of those used boats. Flatwater kayakers will often buy the boats, use them a time or two, and then they sit in their garage taking up space.   Whatever you decide, get out on the water and have fun.

What happened to your laptop? Is it hardware dead, or did the operating system just get corrupted? The operating system can be fixed. Laptop hardware can be fixed, but it's usually not worth it.

Thanks for the tip. my copy is on the way.

I have had that same watch for probably ten years now. Never once had to change a battery or set the time. I think I've replaced the band twice now. the band holds up well, but the small band you tuck the tail into is what breaks. Its always cool to see the time change at exactly the same time as other things that use the atomic clock to sync with, like the servers at work, or the Comcast box

Isn't he just amazing? Apparently a Whitehouse Photographer took this photo of him on Air Force One. Supposedly getting some ridicule across social media.

  Back in the 80's when I signed up, I recall there not being any question by anyone of my age group. every one just KNEW you had to sign up. I don't know if the Gov just did a better job of making that known, or if there was just more of an attitude of loyalty to the country, and that was just a part of it. I suspect that current generations just don't care. Maybe it has to do with being war weary from over a decade of fighting someone.

I really like RSA for VPN authentication, but for server authentication, it's just a pain in the neck. It does not make one bit of difference for connecting to a server via a UNC path, or remote management, both of which give you full Admin access of the server. So if I can gain an admin password, bypassing RSA is trivial. Plus, if I can get physical access to the server, I can boot it with a utility disk of some sort, like DART, and one or two easy registry edits later, I have RSA turned off and the admin password reset.   We use RSA on our servers, and its just more of a hindrance than anything else. Having to look at your fob a hundred times a day and enter the token+pin is time consuming and annoying. Especially when followed up by a 16 character password.

  :up:  I work in IT, and we use that a lot.

I made an appointment with the loan officer at my Credit Union to talk about refinancing my house. She said it would take about an hour, and I told her I had meeting right after that and would be cutting it close. She's only at the bank location that is convenient for me one day a week, and it's hard to meet up, so I set the appointment.   I show up for the appointment a few minutes early and let someone know I'm here to see her, and she motions to the loan officer that I'm here. I can't see her from where I was, but I could hear her, and could tell that she was on the phone. I could also hear her giggling and making small talk in between talking to a customer about a loan.   I'm a patient guy, and I know small talk is a part of a work day, but after standing in the lobby for over 30 minutes listening to it, I had had enough. I made eye contact with the manager, and he came over to apologize it taking so long. I told him I had an APPOINTMENT 30 minutes ago, and that she knew I was short on time. He apologized again and took my name and number and said she would call to reschedule.   The manager knew I was annoyed. He should have made sure she called me immediately after hanging up the phone. But by the end of the day, I still had not received a call, so I emailed her. That email went unanswered for a week, until I emailed her again on the day she is in my local office. She finally replies and wants to set up the meeting right at the time my standing weekly meeting starts (the one I had to leave for weeks prior). She can't do it any other time, so we set up the appointment for the following week.    I looked back through my email and it was like SIX WEEKS since I started the whole process.    I would have given them a piece of my mind and walked away a long time ago if it weren't for the fact that my property is unique in that it has an old cemetery on it, which means the banks want nothing to do with loaning me money on it. This bank has told me that it should not be a problem, so I really want the deal to work out. Although, with the way things have been going thus far, I fully expect them to come back and say they also can't do it for some reason, or that they will gladly do it at 10% interest on a balloon mortgage.

  Or use this one:   http://www.lmgtfy.com/?q=amazon+hp+dash+cam     :cool:

You got to give him "credit" for keeping it real with the Thug Life his music portrays. At least he's not hypocritical. Maybe he can do a benefit concert for the boys while he is in prison.   Article says the police confiscated the handguns. I wonder where that gold plated Desert Eagle will end up?