here's hoping

I am about to upgrade my computer from Windows 98se to Windows 2000 so I can use an iPod. I'm getting conflicting advice about whether to spring for Windows XP, but I have this installation disk for Win 2000 Professional handy and I'm saving my money for a digital underwater camera. I'm going to back up everything I can, then attempt a "dirty" installation so as not to lose too many programs. If that chokes, I will wipe the hard drive clean and do a "clean" install, then re-install the programs I have installation disks for. If that doesn't work I will either go get Windows XP, or kiss the camera goodbye for another year and buy a computer with XP already installed.

A few observations here: (1) At first, I thought the failure of iPod to work on Win 98 was Apple's revenge on PC users until I realized how much money Apple is forcing PC users to spend on Microsoft products. No, we aren't migrating to Apple just for the sake of a portable music player. (2) Market saturation of personal computers in the U.S. is now complete. Americans who do not have a computer now will never buy one because they are too dang much trouble. (3) The old saying, "If everything works perfectly, it is time to upgrade," proves itself true again.

I once converted a 486 computer running Windows 3.1 into a Linux machine. It took hours and hours. It worked, but when it worked it was like watching paint dry. If I didn't think of it as a hobby it would have been a total waste of time.

Wish me luck on this conversion. Who knows when I will be able to access Blogger again?

what's an "awscom?"

In case someone other than one of my children should accidentally stumble into this and wonder what an "awscom" is: Back in the good old days when the Cold War's thermostat seemed permanently set at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, the U.S. Army maintained missile sites in Europe. These weren't just missiles. They had nuclear warheads - "tactical" warheads, not the "strategic" kind that could wipe out a continent. These missiles demanded the supervision of the Artillery Corps, maintenance services of the Ordnance Corps (not "ordinance," which is the kind of thing I write for a living nowadays), the Military Police (to stand in the towers and watch the encircling trees), and a few administrative support types like me (Adjutant General Corps). As the story went, "If the balloon goes up, we fire the missiles and our job is done." The headquarters for all this activity was the Advanced Weapons Support Command or AWSCOM, a fancier name for what was also called the 59th Ordnance Group. Until computers came along I had no use for the acronym, AWSCOM. Now, it has a ring to it - a cross between "awesome" and "dot-com." So, there. Now you know.

61 is nothing to fear

For my birthday last year, my sister-in-law sent me a card that said, "Just because you're 60 doesn't mean you are too old to do all the fun things in life." Inside, it read, "61 is too old. You have one year to do everything."

Cute. With a message like that weighing on my mind for a year I knew we couldn't do dinner-and-a-movie on my 61st birthday, assuming I should live so long. So when the 61st rolled around earlier this month, I did the only sane thing an elderly codger could do.

I went scuba diving. I joined a group from my dive shop, and we ran up to the Rainbow River, just north of Dunnellon, Florida. I haven't been "wet" since last November. My buddy hadn't been diving for a year and a half, so we made a good pair. We spent the first 20 minutes remembering how to achieve neutral buoyancy, which is the state you want to be in. I'd get "heavy," bump the river bottom, give my vest a puff of air, and ascend like a balloon. We were in 20 feet, so getting an embolism wasn't a major threat, but it was embarrassing. I'd get back down, look around for my buddy, and find him up at the surface. We went up and down like a pair of yo-yos until we began to get the hang of it again.

The real fun of diving is seeing the fish. I never was big on fresh water fishing but I saw several that would look fine on a dinner plate. We saw a huge gar. I missed seeing a huge turtle. The limestone river bottom has small openings from which water flows, and other openings from which bubbles escape. The grasses bend with the flow but give about 18 inches of dense cover for fish and other critters. This is a great place to cool off on a hot day, with a snorkel or dive gear, and a great place to go kayaking - my next toy after I splurge on an underwater camera.

the Southern Blogs Ring

I've just joined up with something called the "Southern Blogs," a "ring" of (at the moment) 21 blogs that you can read by clicking on "previous" or "next" in the little box, top of right margin. This is described as "a ring defined by latitude as much as anything; if your blog is south of something, an idea, a state of mind, or even a popularly held misconception then you will probably be comfortable here and most certainly south of where you are at."

My four regular readers will probably think I've finally lost my mind. Their image of me as a father does not include what they probably think of as a "typical Southern male." If that's correct, then we raised them right. I am Southern in the same sense that Kentucky, where I was born, is Southern. Kentucky was a Border State during the war of 1861-1865, when brothers fought brothers. That fits in with my being a Gemini, which means (as we should have learned from our high school's speech and debate class), every issue has at least two sides. As a lawyer, I can argue either side for a fee. As a thinking person, I believe the "truth is out there," hidden in the middle of the bleatings and pontifications of the extreme right and extreme left. I am also Southern in the sense that I was raised in a Southern Baptist Church, but I am now proud to call myself a Methodist ("open hearts, open minds, open doors"), thanks to my beautiful wife of 33 years.

If you are reading this for the first time it must mean you are a member of the "ring," because you can't find this blog using Google. If so, don't expect recipes or gardening tips. I don't even have the recipe for a mint julep. I can't tell you what to expect because I never know what will come out next. This is mainly for our children but sometimes takes on the tone of a letter to the editor. . .a place to vent. I'm a fan of the Devil Rays but a bigger fan of the Red Sox, and I've seen enough of the world to believe the South is a nice place to live but it is not God's Back Forty. I am a Democrat the way Will Rogers was a Democrat. ("I don't belong to an organized political party.") I believe the judge made the only correct decision he could make in the Terri Schiavo case, and I believe conservatives have forgotten what they have historically stood for. I also believe the Red Sox can do it again this year, but the season is still early yet. Stay tuned.

Summer has arrived

In Florida, we measure the passage of Spring into Summer by the date we turn on the air conditioner. It's still pleasant in the mornings but the afternoons have become hot and muggy. It is unusual for Spring to hang on this late in May. This evening it was 86 degrees and humid and the house felt like a microwave, so we reluctantly agreed to flip the switch. "I'll turn it off when we go to bed," I said. But I probably won't. It's been on for an hour and it feels better already. Thoughts of diving in 72-degree spring water (see below) are beginning to creep into the random thoughts of odd hours. Right now I'm thinking of celebrating my 61st birthday diving in the Rainbow River with other divers and instructors from my dive shop. You can check out their web site at: http://www.macssports.com

if it's Saturday I must be in Home Depot

But not this Saturday. Instead, I bought a new garage door opener at the local Genie dealer. I love garage door openers almost as much as remote controls on TV sets. This is my third one and I installed the other two myself, so who needs to spend 70 bucks on an installation charge? I refuse to admit how many hours I spent on this project. For 70 bucks I wasn't paying myself minimum wage by the time I finished. That's OK. I needed a project that I could do with my hands and take pride in when it's over and done with. I spend my normal working days reading, writing, thinking, talking, and sometimes arguing, not necessarily in that order. My hands have no calluses. Rarely can I point to something at the end of the day and say, "I did that." Removing an old garage door opener and installing a new one is a good thing to do. The work requires all the home repair skills a man needs to know except plumbing. The new opener is quieter and smoother, and has electric-eye sensors inches off the floor that stop the door if something is blocking the path. The remote doesn't work, yet, but I had to leave something to do tomorrow.

p.s. -- Does anybody need about 14 feet of old bicycle chain?

finally, photos

I just uploaded two photos (see below). Memo to the Blogger people: The programs we are to use for photos, Picasa and Hello, are not winning new friends from people like me. Getting a photo on the board is a very klutzy process. Ah, well. For free, it is worth every penny.

Ginnie Springs 

that's me on the right 

thinking ahead to Summer

We've had a delightfully prolonged Spring in Florida. It is still cool in the mornings and nearly perfect in the afternoon. The Gulf waters are warming up. It is time to think about getting wet again! Above are two photos of me at Ginnie Springs, underwater, in dive gear, which I've posted as a reminder of what the antidote for a hot summer day looks like. (OK, it took me two days to get the photos up but, hey, they're up.)

hooray, Rays

I love the Rays this year for their total unpredictability. They get "up" for the best teams in baseball, defeating the White Sox (second win tonight), the Red Sox, the Yankees (four out of five so far). Then they turn around and drop two against the Twins. Hmmmm, maybe there's some predictability in this pattern. Give these kids a chance to mature and jell as a team and they will have a better second half. We've said that before - like, every year. "This could be the year" worked for the Red Sox. Stay tuned!

the Good Rays showed up

When the Rays are good, they are not perfect but they are fun to watch. They were fun last night and again tonight, with good hitting and pretty fair pitching, beating the Yankees (highest paid roster in Major League Baseball) at Tropicana Field. That's three wins out of four games here, plus one for two in New York. Red Sox fans, eat it up. Devil Rays fans, we have a team worth paying attention to. This is going to be a good season.

off to see the Devil Rays

The New York Yankees are in town. Tonight is a good night to appreciate being under a dome because it has been raining in St. Petersburg all day. The big question at the moment is, which of our teams will show up tonight? We have the Good Rays and the Bad Rays. The Good Rays usually start the game but they change uniforms with the Bad Rays in the seventh inning and take the rest of the night off while the Bad Rays go out, blow the lead, and lose. Sometimes, like last night and the second game in New York, the Bad Rays get the whole night off and the Good Rays are allowed to act like a real baseball team. When that happens, the highest paid roster in Major League Baseball (the Yankees) or the second highest paid (the Red Sox) will get pounded by the lowest paid roster. Don't try to make sense of it. Just kick back, relax, and watch the show.