Stijn!!

[flipper35]

Originally Posted by GH85Carrera

Wow, I went to some thanksgivings with maybe 25 people, at a max. Usually a lot less.

Growing up, mom would get the biggest turkey she could get. We would always invite some single officers, usually 1st and 2nd Lt. and Captains that were stuck on base and could not get back home. We usually had 4 to 6 men come over to eat dinner with us, and leave with some leftovers. Dad could not invite enlisted men as that is not allowed for officers to socialize with enlisted, without special permission.

The most we have had was 178 at the fair grounds.

You know a road trip will be interesting when the head of the division who is british gets in the drivers seat and starts quoting the Blues Brothers.

[GH85Carrera]

Were you on a mission from God?

My dad talked about some of the family reunions he went to as a kid. His dad had 9 brothers and sisters, and his grandfather was one of 12. He said they shut down some small town for the reunion. My first year in Oklahoma I drove my fraternal grandparents to a Thanksgiving with some distant cousins. There were a house full of distant cousins, none of them I ever kept in touch with.

My dad said he had more cousins than he could count, and my mom had just one. Dad was on only child, so no aunts or uncles on that side at all.

Back from the shooting range. The restaurant there is closed, as it is a separate business from the range part. The company that ran the restaurant owed 30 grand in back taxes, and the IRS shut them down. The IRS does not like tax evasion much at all. I have no problem with that.

They have one side that is for public, and one side for members only. 20 bucks was all it cost to rent the lane. I got there just after they opened, and the floor was empty of shells. I wondered what to do with the empties from my revolver. Then I shot the 9mm automatic and it ejects shells with a lot of force, and sprayed then everywhere. About the time some other shooters showed up, the floor was covered in shells. My buddy grabbed a squeegee tool to rake in the shells as he reloads. I was happy to let him have my empties.

[GH85Carrera]

More weird weather here. It is supposed to hit 70 this afternoon, and yeat another dry cold front comes through and down ti the 40s by morning.

We got the house decorated for Christmas. The tree is down from the attic. It is a nice looking tree with lights already strung on it. The very bottom strand is not working. I have replaced the fuses, the special gray base bulb with a fuse, and done all the trouble shooting I can do. It is fortunately on the bottom, so we put that on the back side, and it is pretty well hidden.

[Porsche-poor]

Afternoon all. It's been a strange few days. Two snow storms and lots of ice.

[GH85Carrera]

Yuck!

It was 70 and clear blue skies yesterday. Today the prediction was heavy fog, but we have very light drizzle. No flooding with just 0.01 inches of rain so far since midnight.

I wish it would just go ahead and rain and stop teasing us with another wet and damp day and just a trace of rain. Oh well, everyone talks about the weather, but no one ever does anything about it.

[Porsche-poor]

The rain is back here. Temp hovering around 40.

[GH85Carrera]

Well send down RAIN. No frozen crap!

[Porsche-poor]

I'll just go outside right now and fan the air East for you.

[GH85Carrera]

Thanks!

[Porsche-poor]

Did it work? It stopped here and is colder for now.

[GH85Carrera]

Well it will take some time to get here. We have a 50% chance of rain tomorrow. Keep fanning!

[Porsche-poor]

I might have to bill your boss for all the overtime.

[Porsche-poor]

Morning all. Still chilly here but no rain.

[GH85Carrera]

I think your hard work is helping! We are supposed to get up to 2 inches of rain this afternoon and this evening. Thanks for the rain! Nothing so far, but it is suppose to start by 5:00 PM.

[Porsche-poor]

good cause my arms are getting tired.

[GH85Carrera]

You worked too hard, most of the rain went south of us!

We did get almost 4/10th of an inch. The humidity is at 99% and bit foggy this morning.

[Porsche-poor]

Well at least I tried. I can not be held to what happens one state east of here.

Morning by the way.

[GH85Carrera]

Having fun with the cable provider. The tuning adapter has been blinking for several days. It is supposed to go to a solid green light after 15 to 20 minutes from a "cold boot" the locked in signal. So the tech has been great, replacing some cable signal issues and even crawling around in the attic.

All the cable connections are fine, but still no lock. So replace the tuning adapter. No green light at all. OK, replace the cable card. It is a PCMCIA card that plugs into the TIVO DVR. OK, no luck, oh wait, none of those on the truck. OK, another tech has one 30 minute drive away. So off goes the tech in search of a new cable card. Actually none of them are new, all just "refurbished" and about 50-50 odd that they work. Oh well. At least the call is not costing me any direct money, all paid for with my monthly bill.

[Porsche-poor]

Morning all. Cold, damp and rainy today. Four days of work this week and then burn some PTO for Friday.

[GH85Carrera]

We did get some more rain, and more predicted through Tuesday night. Then back to seeing the sky.

The cable SNAFU and emphasis on the F is ongoing. Back in 1996 the US congress passed a law that cable companies can not have a monopoly on the set top boxes. Tivo and others had to have a way to sell their competitive boxes, and Tvive and other innovated and had features long before the cable companies.

It requires the cable company to provide a cable card, which is just a PCMCIA card like my first laptop used. That can only receive the base channels, and there is a separate "tuning adapter" that sorts out the compressed digital channels. Most the techs at Cox Cable have no experience with the aftermarket systems.

We weekend all weekend with no TV service at all. Our first available repair time was today at 10:00 and they sent out two independent contractors that had once heard about cable cards. They were as useless as my dog for help. So now we have another service guy coming tomorrow, and I can only hope he has some training and equipment to fix the issue.

I am keeping a log of all the issues. I will be talking to customer retention after we are back up and running. As this seems to keep running along, the conversation will be long on my side.

I am a bit upset at the poor service. For the last 34 years they have always fixed the problems promptly. I pay my bill with a automatic payment, so never a late or missed payment. I would think I would get better attention from them. Some supervisor will hear from me.