On Thursday, the Coke machine went a little crazy. If you put in your money, you got your drink but you would only get the nickels and dimes of your change. Any quarters were kept by the machine. Of course, we do not have a contract with Coke, so we have to fix it ourselves, and since it is plugged in and uses electricity, it is, by default, technology. Yes, the Coke machine manages to fall under the technology department's umbrella when it acts up... Go figure.After some poking around, and a lot of trial and error, since none of us had any kind of "Coke Machine-related" experience (other than pushing the button in order to get a drink), we managed to get the change-giver loose. Sure enough, a quarter was jammed. After some more poking, the stubborn little fella popped out and hit the floor.... Along with 5 or 6 of his buddies. Guess they figured they'd make a break for it while they could! Too bad for them, because they were all rounded up and herded back into the "overflow" bin.
Thus, I can add "Coke machine repair" to the laundry list of skills I now possess. I used to kid Shan by saying that if I ever got bonked on the head and forgot everything I knew about technology, I'd be useless... As my list grows, I see there are many things I could do... Though, I would guess that I would not be paid quite the same....
I saw a movie when I was younger. It had Matthew Broderick. The quote from the movie is something along the lines of, "Man, it's hot... it's like Africa hot!" Thinking, I believe the movie was "Biloxi Blues," maybe? Sure, I could look it up on IMDB, but I'll leave that for you.. :-) My point is, here in Arkansas, it is Africa Hot... Humid, 100+ thermometer degrees (heat index? Puh-leez... We don't need no stinkin' index, we GOT the heat!). Frankly, I don't see the point of "heat index" or "wind chill." Look, it's hot. If the temp is 100 degrees, and the heat index is 105 or 110, it's still hot. And, will my plans change because it "feels" like 110, or it "feels like" 12? No, if it is already close enough to be that hot or cold, those "feel like" degrees do nothing for me one way or another! What if they came on and said, "It's 100 degrees, but with the wind, it feels like 95!" Whoop-dee, friggin doo... Just tell it like it is - "It is D**N hot, folks. Drink water, and be careful out there."
This weekend is our annual "last hoorah" weekend. We head off to Little Rock (though last year, we went to Shreveport) and spend the weekend swimming, school shopping, goofing off, etc. Since Shan had to be in Conway Friday, she and the kids headed to Little Rock to stay with her brother on Thursday. The co-op where I work has/had three video conferences going on for Friday, so I had to come to the office to help out. So, Thursday night I decided to watch "Saw III" for the first time. I received it for Christmas, but it is hard to find a time when everyone is sleeping except me and that I wanted to watch it. As you know, I have been spending most of my 'open time' getting my Indians baseball card collection into the computer. I did start the DVD once, but I just wasn't into it, so I turned it off. (As usual, I digress...) :-) So, last night (well, technically very early this morning), I fire up SAW III. I have the unrated version, so I'm not sure what you did or did not see in the theater (though I would guess I saw much more in the 'freezer' scene than they showed in theaters). Side note: Shawnee Smith has lost a lot of weight. She looks so much different than she did in "Becker" and you can see the difference from previous "Saw" movies. I'm not saying it's good or bad, just making an observation. Anywho, I liked the movie, but it was not as good as the first one (in my opinion, of course). Frankly, I don't remember much about the 2nd one except the "needle room." The ending of "Saw III" was stupid. Again, I don't know what was not shown in theaters, but the blood coming from Tobin's cut throat looked so fake, so forced, it ruined the mood. Instantly, I thought I was watching some B-level horror effects - like something out of "Evil Dead" (almost comical). Of course, there was the obligatory "the movie doesn't end here" ending... Again, stupid. I am not one of these "all movies should have a happy ending" kind of people, but if this was the last movie in the series, then it should have ENDED. After everything that happened throughout the series, if they had ended it with Jeff forgiving John and finally learning to let go, I would have found that to be much more satisfying. Especially as a means to contradict Amanda's argument that people don't change. Then again, ending it the way they did, Jeff's little girl may very well prove to be the "next Jigsaw."
I am making a lot of progress on the baseball cards, by the way. To date, there are 5,639 cards in the database. I have 50 or so that are in my "to be entered" box (meaning, to be entered into the database), and at least 200 or so that are in my "to be recorded" box (meaning 'cards for which I have to create a record in the database' (mostly way-off oddball stuff)), and I have at least 2,000 that are in a "duplicates" box that I want to go through and make sure they really are duplicates. I have already discovered many cards that I *thought* were duplicates but turned out to be singles I needed! I have decided to take the "assume nothing" approach for this endeavor. Once I have everything entered, then I will know for sure that those truly are duplicates and I can start packaging them for sale on eBay or give away or whatever. You would think that once I get done with my Indians cards, I would be finished except for additional cards I pick up as time goes by.... No, no, no... You see, in addition to my Indians cards, I also have another collection of cards (I am sure I have mentioned this already) that are stars, rookies, players I like(d). And, yes, they too will be entered into a database for record keeping... :-) Though, i admit, I am not a gung-ho about those - I don't particularly care how long it takes to do those, so they will be done "whenever" or maybe even "if" ever... :-)
No comments:
Post a Comment