We took a walk in the back today to look at the Oak tree which was cut up and moved to the street. In he morning we had a Christmas gift of the Wii Fit plus which we later played. The new games are interesting. Dinner was cooked shrimp in the shell and veggies. Lorraine called today saying she got our card amd would come to Sarasota for lunch on Dec 26 with Tommy and Ann. We saw the weather was going to be rainy on our drive. Packed our suitcases and got the car ready for the morning trip.

After GMA I went over to the greenhouse to see how the heater was doing. It still was stinky in there. I looked at the exhaust and noticed it was tilted. I went home to change clothes and also to do groceries. Had to take a bad dump as well so it was good to go home. After groceries I went to the greenhouse and raised the flue which was leaning downwards. This broke the supports off the chimney outside. After calling around for a new flue which is 7 inches in diameter, I decided to rebuild the old one. NB Handy which is out Poole Rd has the 7 inch in 26 gauge which is the heavier flue pipes. I took the burner down and cleaned the rust off it and also inspected the heat exchanger with a flashlight. Used some electric fence wire to support the flue so that it rises. I also took apart the flue to see if there was anything blocking it but it was clear. Tested it and then went home for lunch. Picked up some big washers at Ace and repaired the flue then went to the greenhouse and installed it. I also ran the generator for 5 minutes. I also verified that the greenhouse smelled OK. Left the furnace set for Big Bertha to come on tonight. After a dinner of Currey chicken over noodles we went back out at 7:30 PM. All was well with the heater. There were no fumes. We went around and lloked at Christmas lights afterward. The winner was the one on Penny Road. He has added a snow machine this year. We enjoyed the lights in downtown Apex and also behind the post office where there was a ob scene and actually a line waiting to see "Santa".

Today didn't work like it was supposed to. Libbie called that the big heater in House 1 was not working. I did a lot of diagnosis taking things apart before I found out that the vent block switch on top of the heater tripped. I think it was affected by water dripping on it while it was hot. It tripped at a false temperature. It requires a manual reset so the heater was dead. I forced the Hot Dog to come on and take over with a jumper wire. I guess I need an emergency override. The system is built to switch the control out and use the big heater but not the other way around. In the meantime we smelled bad exhaust in house 4. The flame was rolling outside the box. I ended up cleaning a mud dabber out of 4 of the orifices on the burner to stop this and restore the flame to normal. While there I also replaced a section of bench top under heater 2 which was destroyed by crawling around on top of the bench. Dinner was pasta. I didn't paint in the foyer but I did sand the spackle job from yesterday and second coat a few areas with spackle.

We slept late today. After reading the newspaper we tackled the foyer. Got everything ready then went to Lowes to get ceiling paint. We did this because we wanted to mail the batch of Christmas Cards at the Post Office. The mailboxes were full. I carried the letters inside. I painted the ceiling in the foyer. It ended up getting damaged since I made a second pass on wet popcorn ceiling which took some of the popcorn off. I also sanded and spackled the walls. Libbie made her usual yummy pizza which we ate during 60 minutes. This was a very tiring day.

It was a wet night but it stayed above freezing. Anne Nicholas called about the snow and things. We had clear sailing to Hoffman today at North Hills. Waited in line with Jim at the theater. The shopping center was pretty busy and beautifully decorated for Christmas. We left home at 11:45 and stood in line for auditorium 8, the one on the right. The production was spectacular. It was clearly the best Hoffman I have seen. Standouts were Olympia the doll played by a little Korean girl and the Muse played by Kate Lindsey. I looked her up when I got home. she's well on her way to being a superstar. We stopped at Trader Joes on the way home and got wine for dinner along with Pasta for next week and almonds. Libbie got tons of boxes. Afterwards I enjoyed reading the reviews of people attending the HD version around the country. Good stuff. I hooked up Hoffman in my MP3 player which I downloaded yesterday. It was the Dec 3 premier. Dinner was shrimp with veggies. We enjoyed listening to hoffman during dinner.

This is the day of the big snow - forecasts from a trace to 2 inches. More to the West. I went to the grocery store for milk. What a zoo. It was like the day before Xmas at the mall. Later Libbie wanted triscuits and egg nog so we both went over after some yummy soup. It was 54 on the back porch so we stayed indoors for our soup. I hooked Mars up to the Jtag today. All is working. Byonics did not come so I'll keep writing software. Dinner was shrimp and veggies. IT rained instead of snowed this evening.

Worked on making DVD's most of today. Did a little bit of work on Mars but spent much of the day on the old VHS tapes. Arlene called wanting to know about Aunt Helen. She thinks she's going home. she didn't hear the conference call correctly. We went to Walmart to get tires, left the car and went cross the street to Charleys for lunch. I had 12 spices noodles and chicken with a house salad. Libbie had potato soup and a half grilled sandwich. When I got back to Walmart I found they didn't have my tires. Took the car to "Just Tires" and waited for almost 2 hours while they put four new Kelly tires on for $390 bottom line with taxes, etc. Dinner was Crab Cakes on toast. I layed down after dinner to watch HGTV but fell asleep.

Worked on setting up the packet TNC to a radio to see if I could monitor radio traffic.
Dinner was chicken over Briyani. Loved it.

Did the grocery run and also listened to the conference call with Aunt Helen's therapists. They have no release date. The DVD recorder arrived. I immediately started recording the old VHS tapes onto. The process is working very well which is surprising. I had hoped that this was not going to be a gizmo relegated to the closet. Dinner was grilled chicken and the Polonta veggies which were excellent.

Today I worked on the software for Mars since the Byonics APRS radio is on it's way. I'm going to need something to periodically beacon status out onto the APRS network and want to have it ready by the time the device arrives. I borrowed the LOGE one wire routines because it was made to handle multiple one wire buses with DS1820 temperature devices. I also want to use it to monitor power and the generator. APRS has a telemetry frame that I want to employ for this purpose. I wanted to work on the MAAVS website but never got around to it. Spent a lot of time reading about the APRS protocol. Dinner was Briyani which was yummy. Watched the Disney holiday lighting special on HGTV again. I want to get over to Disney World this holiday.

We both got up early today. Libbie was done sleeping. I went out to get the paper. It's not too cold, around 40, and it's raining. Sunday Morning this morning was qquite good. They had a nice story about Paul McCartney and also the Pnocchio illustrator. The house 2 heater had a CO2 leak in the chimmney. I bought a new stove pipe elbow from Home Depot and installed it in the afternoon. It went in pretty easily. The whole thing needs replacing with a heavy duty metal instead of the light gauge stuff I used. I hope it doesn't leak anymore. I need a sensitive CO2 detector. Dinner was Libbie's excellent pizza.

Worked on Joomla most of the day. Found a gallery application for the CMS system, Phoca Gallery after initially trying several other gallery programs that I didn't like. In late afternoon after the first Met broadcast of the season Il Trittico, I went outside and pulled the tall but dead Marigolds. I planted the daffodil bulbs in freezing temperatures. It was really cold but it's supposed to rain so I wanted the job done. I was waiting for frost to zap the marigolds which happened last night. Dinner was baked potato and boiled shrimp with a bottle of Shiraz. I communicated with some guy on the TinyTrak group about terminal programs. He seemed clueless.

I ordered a TinyTrack with built in 2 meter radio today for communicating with the greenhouse. It cost 250 with the antenna but is self contained. I'll pair it with the Venus project now renamed Mars for this purpose. Mars has an Atmega128 along with a 232 port and header for the OneWire interface. I will use it for greenouse monitoring and packet control to the TinyTrak device. Dinner was cheese and crackers and some of the ham delights which were originally going to go to Jennifer but she was sick today so Libbie brought them home.

Sent most of the pics to Ken today for the MAAVS Memo. These are the convention pics I took as well as the ones from Lenny and Ann-Marie. In the afternoon I went over to the greenhouse with my nail gun and put a new piece of plastic on the end wall by the propane tanks. My hands were freezing as I did this job. We used the heat from the Hot Dawg heater to warm our hands. Dinner was Salmon and Broccoli but no wine.

It's the day after our party. I got the controller card working and mounted in it's plastic housing although it's not needed right away. Dinner was Trader Joe's frozen chicken with peppers. Libbie didn't like the peppers but I loved them! It was a tasty dish.

Spent the morning doing a little Kahlo 4 debugging and did some newsgroup browsing on the totty forum. Using the newsreader I can go back 6 months whereas using the web interface I can only go back 4 months. I turned the heater on the back porch at noon, a half hour before the party. It was cold and rainy. We had a nice turnout of the violet group. Lots of nice food - salads and cranberry breads, sandwiches and deserts. There was a Chinese gift exchange run by Sylvia.
Dinner was some leftover sandwiches and salad. Libbie made her pepperidge farm ham delights but they were burned a little on the bottom and weren't up to snuff.

We vacuumed and finished cleaning up for the party tomorrow. Dinner was the Trader Joes Caneloni.

IT was a fat paper this morning. Did my Krogers run and got the paper, OJ and milk. We may have had our first frost last night. It was supposed to be 31 outside but the geraniums and marigolds in the backyard are still blooming. I cleaned the driveway and garage while Libbie took care of the back porch. We're having a party Tuesday so lots to do.

I got good news this morning from John Benziger. He doesn't need the controller by Dec 13 which is what I was shooting for. It doesn't work packaged in the new box. So disappointing. I walked up the hill and found our biggest tree fell down. I measured it at 12 feet in circumference. This is too bad. IT came down right on the fence. Libbie made soup for lunch then we worked on the Christmas lights and decorating the tree. Dinner was salmon with broccoli and rice. We did have egg nog but did not have wine with dinner.

Cut the case and mounted the board into it. Powered it up and no luck - dead. No LCD, nothing. Did a lot of buys today in the IRA account. Called the broker and did an assisted trade of Atlantic Power. This is a big hassle. It will be nice when Atlantic gets listed on the NYSE. We went out to dinner tonight at La Cocina. Had the usual Quesidilla with a Margarita. Did not do First Friday because we were tired so we went out to dinner instead.

The check came today while I was working on the case cutting openings in it. I went to Scottrade and deposited it in the IRA account. Amazingly the office had 5 people in it, 3 brokers and 2 counter people doing nothing.

I spent most of today trying to get the LCD on Kahlo4 to work. No such luck. I did find that the AVR chip was not soldered on one side but this was not the reason for no display. Can't figure this one out. Went over to Rite Aid and got my free Gillette razor. Dinner was the leftover ribs and squash. The rollover check did not come today. I did some more portfolio studying and feel I am now ready to deploy the funds when they get here. The Scooba juice arrived today. I need to call iRoomba about my battery which is not performing.

Went for the paper late today, about 8 PM. This is a busy day. So much to do with the controller card and then the MAAVS website and my car. I changed the oil on the Corolla. It was 1500 miles overdue because of the Florida trip last week. I got the heartbeat working on the controller but still can't get the LCD to function. Don't know what's wrong. We used the Scooba to clean the porch floor, both sides. I moved the xmas tree onto the table inside. Dinner was Libbies fantastic pizza again. We heard that Helen fell over night and cracked her pelvis.

I spent some time building a hypothetical 401k portfolio with my rollower money. I constructed a spreadsheet for this purpose showing yields, percentage allocations and bottom lines investment and yield percentage. I am able to get to 8.2%. Looking at CU numbers I found that a 5 year CD pays 1.7% which is awful. I can borrow for less than 4% and get 8% in return with my stock account. This afternoon we went to Target via Kohls. I got two flannel shirts for $50 and $10 Kohls bucks back. We then went to Target for Libby juice glasses and ribs for tonight. Dinner was Lloyds ribs, squash and one glass of Cabernet.

Today is Black Friday. Watched the madness on TV then went outside and did some yard work. Mowed the back and picked up sticks with the wheelbarrow. Next I scoped out the taillight wiring on the Corolla and wired a trailer hitch connector for the brake lights. That's all that's wired - the brake lights. The turn signals are separate lines from the brakes in the Corolla so I couldn't wire them up directly. We took the trailer to Home Depot and picked up a Christmas Tree. It was easy - dropped it right on and tied it down with two bungie cords. The tree price was $32 for a 6-7 footer. I was happy. Earlier in the day I participated in Black Friday by calling the Van Wezel box office and purchasing 50% off tickets to the Vienna concert on Jan 1. It took several redials and a 15 minute wait to get through but I had success. Dinner was left over turkey dinner with all the fixins.