The Day Arrives Rather Unexpectedly

The neighbor's house down the street - the one the realtor paid me $50 to mow?

SOLD

So the months of earning $250 for mowing are over. I hope to squeak out at least another week or two before relinquishing the duty to the new homeowner.

Too Much TV?!?

Visit THE SONY TV MINISODES site!

Hump Day

Megan said it. Beautifully at supper tonight, during a pause in our dinner conversation, she says, "I can't believe it's already Wednesday."

I agree. This week has gone very quickly. Tomorrow will be very busy as well. At work, I have a schedule laid out for 9/20 through 12/31/08. I have estimates on when things are to be done and what I anticipate working on during a given week. I have given a copy to my manager and, when she returns from a day off tomorrow, I'm hoping we sit down and talk about it. I am anxious for the next months to come and go. There is a lot to be done and not a lot of flexibility as to when things are to be done. I think the challenge of scheduling it out is something I'm good at. I look at priorities and what I know about - understanding there are bound to be projects I don't learn about until they are sitting on my desk as well as projects that are created on Monday morning, programmed Monday afternoon, to my dept (QA) by Tuesday @ 8 AM, tested, and released by noon. Then it comes to me for documentation. My stack of work is quite large right now. Not all of the changes in my bin actually have documentation changes. However, I'm betting a lot of them do. I also have 50+ e-mail messages with suggestions for doc changes, including ones I sent to myself that note that a .htm file needs to be changed from a table-based layout to a tableless layout.
There are also authentic changes to the documentation that need to be done.

One thing to note is that my manager had sent along something she thought should be changed. It was the first documentation change I had made since 9/4/08, according to the tracking document I maintain. TWENTY DAYS WITHOUT MAKING A SINGLE DOCUMENTATION CHANGE! I hadn't realized it had been that long. There are plenty of things I could be doing with documentation but, for the rest of this week and into next week, I really don't think I will work on any doc changes. I'm hoping to have my other work done by noon on Tuesday so I can start making the doc changes. I have ~3 weeks before I will have to start doing what I've been doing the last couple of weeks again. Then by the end of October... know what - I'll document my plan when I have it in front of me.

So I move along. There was an e-mail message sent to the TWer list I subscribe to. Cheryl told me I could quote her so here we go. First, she sent this message to the list:

-----Original Message-----
From: Cheryl
Sent: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 11:11 AM

I work in software doing technical writing and support. I crochet as a hobby. I would like to explore extending my techcomm skills to tech editing in the crochet world for publishers, manufacturers and designers. Ideally it would make possible a dream job that would keep me working and loving it (more than I do now) way past retirement age. Has anyone on the list flirted with combining a hobby with their career?

Any pointers?

Cheryl

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So I wrote back:

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----- Original Message -----
From: Me
To: Her
Sent: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 4:25 PM

I combine my music hobby with writing. I've been writing music reviews forhttp://www.dailyvault.com/reviewers.php5?id=9 for over a decade. I used to get paid $20/column for a site that doesn't exist anymore.

Nowadays, I am "paid" by passes to concerts. I received two passes for a $35concert last Tuesday, I have two passes to a concert on 10/6 coming and I'm hoping to secure two more passes to a concert in Moline, IL, on 11/8 .

I also receive promo CDs in the mail weekly and if you figure $15/CD, I makea pretty good monthly gig!

I find that my review writing has crossed over into my tech writing and the conciseness I use in my TWing has crossed over into my review writing. I don't think writing about your passion has anything but good results.

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To which Cheryl wrote back:


-----Original Message-----
From: Cheryl Wallace
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2008 9:52 AM
To: Paul

... you are officially The Man. And you have great taste in music. :) Thanks for the only upbeat opinion that acknowledges that passion feeds the soul and it worthwhile even if it won't necessarily feed the body. In a perfect world, you'd be following Metalllica on tour writing reviews for shows in every city and I'd be on staff at a yarn maufacturer taking full advantage of a substantial employee discount!.

You play the cards you're dealt.

PS. I'm off to find the Hayseed Dixie Kiss tribute.

Cheryl

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Youtube is awesome:

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I helped Megan study her 44 vocabulary words that she got today for her test tomorrow. 44 words in a single night is a lot. One of her words was "sedated" which, music man here, said, "Oh! 'I Wanna Be Sedated!'"

"Huh?" replied Megan.

"The song is about being calm, which is the opposite of rock and roll. It's a great song."

So she finally could remember the meaning and, for that, I rewarded her by letting her watch this:

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Which then led me to Sugarcult:

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Missed a Day

I missed Neil Peart's birthday. It's not like he would notice I didn't send him a card. Came across this link, though, and thought it was blog-worthy. http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2008/09/happy-birthday-neil-peart.html

In other news, tragedy has struck near us. First, our friend's sister was found dead after an apparent suicide. I was told that her ex-husband found her dead on their wedding anniversary. Second, our friend's father passed away after fighting cancer. Third, I wrote about my next door neighbor being pregnant. She suffered a miscarriage. That happened a couple of weeks ago but by including it in with the more recent tragedies, it qualifies in the rule of 3 bad things happening. Right? RIGHT??!?

In other news, I heard on KRNA that Avenged Sevenfold, Buck Cherry, Shinedown, and Saving Abel are playing in Waterloo on Saturday, November 15th (info here: http://www.rock108.com/page.php?page_id=10345) and yes, these are the same bands I saw a week ago tonight and that I wrote about here: http://www.dailyvault.com/article.php5?id=153

Tonight, I finished mowing the neighbor's yard so I can turn in my invoice (maybe my last) for the month of September.

Also, a while back, Rush played the Colbert show. I had never watched the show - I know, where have I been - and, for my friend JR, I found this:

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com

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Check out the groove @ 1:11. Phenomenal!

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com,

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And that's about enough silliness for today.

Concert Review & the Week Ahead

The Buckcherry, ShineDown, and Saving Abel concert review is posted on Dailyvault.
The week ahead:
Mon: Karen has a training class @ night I hope to mow either our yard or our neighbor's yard. Kids have homework.
Tue: Megan has volleyball. Kids have homework.
Wed: Nothing @ night except homework
Thu: Kids have homework.
Fri: University of Iowa Homecoming Parade. We're playing music on the back of a flatbed truck!
Sat: Babysitting our neighbor's baby. Cleaning the house. Playing @ 5:15 Mass.
Sun: Karen wants to clean the storage room and take every thing out of it. We also want to get Megan's room in better shape and also the den and basement need to be worked upon to make them both better looking. At 3, Alex has basketball practice.

On the horizon, plus, "I'm that guy"

Megadeth is coming out with yet another collection of their "greatest" material. I am looking forward to hearing it in the not so distant future and will, of course, review it for dailyvault.com

Also, I wanted to write about something I do in the car. I air drum. I turn to my local rock station and, depending upon the song, I move my hands and arms with the beat to whatever song is playing. I'm that guy that you see driving down the road who is seriously jamming to whatever is playing. I have this sickness and it's called air drumming. There's even Youtube.com vids about it:

No, this is not me, but... it may as well be.

Pay Attention!

Do you ever feel overwhelmed with every thing? I am down in the den and it's a pit. The kids have stuff all over, I have CDs all over and it's like, do I even want to start cleaning it up? The main part of the basement is even worse - the kids have crap all over. I hate it when my wife comes down here b/c there's never a good result out of that. We just spent about a 1/2 hour trying to find my daughter's black purse that my mother-in-law wants to borrow when they go to Hawaii on Tuesday. Of course, we can't find it. My daughter's closet is a pit - new clothes in the same plastic bag as school papers - and my son's isn't much better. They have a toy box that had socks and underwear stuffed behind it and we didn't even bother to open it up. You go in their bathroom and there's wet wash cloths in a ball, the wet bath mat is on the tile and clothes and underwear and socks every where else. The trash can in there is overflowing b/c they argue about whose turn it is to empty it, there's dirty clothes in their baskets b/c they don't bring them down and then, this is the fun part, the one outfit that my wife is convinced my daughter needs to wear? Crumpled @ the bottom of the laundry basket, of course. My wife bought three new plastic toothbrush holders and, of course, no one can find those either. It's like "ENOUGH!"

I wish I could remember more things - like where I last saw that purse we were looking for or the toothbrush holders - but the last time I saw either, I didn't retain it. I didn't think it would be important to remember so I purged it and replaced it with something else - anything else, actually. Now I wish I would have paid attention to what was in front of me.

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Magnetic Death Demos! or Death Magnetic Demos

I have always liked listening to demos of songs. I think a demo of a song often is comparable to a rough draft when writing anything. Rough drafts often capture the writer's original spirit that is then refocused and refined and revisited countless times until you end up with the final product. With Metallica, their demos have often don't have lyrics or different lyrics than what ends up on the official version of the song. The demos for "And Justice for All" are like that. So, courtesey of YouTube, I came across a Blabbermouth.net news item that linked out to 10 videos of the demos for Metallica's "Death Magnetic" release. However, only 2 of them work!?!

Update: 10:35 PM - none of them now work... :<)

So I had to go and find this:

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And this:

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There was also a post that includes this quote from Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy:

"'Death Magnetic' is HANDS DOWN the best METALLICA album in 20 years. This is the CD I've been waiting for them to make since '…And Justice For All'. And thumbs up to them for doing the first REAL METALLICA instrumental in 20 years since 'To Live Is To Die' (if you don't count DREAM THEATER's 'Stream of Consciousness'). Welcome back, boys."

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On the same page, there was a video of Dream Theater playing "Master of Puppets" live in Chicago:

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Then I decided, "That's enough Metallica." How about another heavy band that I like? Lamb of God came to mind:

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And this is the song played by Lamb of God:

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Rainy Rain Days

First of all, Death Magnetic was released. My review of it was posted yesterday on Dailyvault.com (scroll to the bottom)

Second, my review of 4Lyn was published on 9/11 and you can read that here.

Third, it's Saturday and it seems like I have long enough to just pause for a moment before the schedule picks up again - both personally & professionally - and returns to its frantic pace.

Professionally, I can say I survived my week of training @ work on a development product that will replace our existing development product. Basically, we upgraded to what we could have upgraded to 10 years ago. On Monday, I will start using the new product to create a user interface that lays on top of a green screen application. That work (by my timeline) has to be completed by 9/24 @ noon. Then, in the afternoon of 9/24, I'll start putting together what we call the 08V2R1 mass release. That will go out the door on 9/26. THen I'll also put together what we call the 08V3R1 early release, which has to be to a client by 10/1. After that goes out the door, I *may* be able to return to writing documentation and online Help for our applications but, honestly, that's not a given. Using the aforementioned development tool to do a lot of cool things will take time and it will be a management decision what we do and how many resources we dedicate to those types of tasks. My ballpark estimate is that one full-time person could take 2 years to do all the things we want to do and, at that point, if it's me, documentation sits and grows mold. At that point it becomes my manager's decision regarding what I am to work on. I don't know what is going to happen. I think that there are some major decisions that need to be made and it will be very interesting to evaluate where all of this stands on 10/13.

Personally, I am going in 45 minutes to get an oil change for the car. Then Iowa plays ISU in football and I have said, for a couple of weeks, that I planned to sit down and watch it on the Big Ten Network (GO HAWKS!) so I'm still counting on that. I imagine the game will be over by 2. Then we are going to 5:15 Mass. I am playing drums and Karen is singing. I really enjoy playing drums @ Mass. I've been leaving my set @ church and us playing is turning into a good habit.

On Sunday, we need to winterize the camper, which means putting anti-freeze through all the pipes so that the cold winter doesn't break a pipe. We have to have that done by 2 (in my mind) because @ 3, Alex starts up his basketball team practice. It is from 3-5. I plan on making the kids run. If it ever stops raining, I'll mow our neighbor's yard.

Then the week starts. It'll start out slow on Monday but picks up steam on Tuesday. My friend Phil and I are going to Moline, IL, to see Saving Abel, Shine Down, and Buck Cherry. There was a 4th band - Avenge Sevenfold - but their singer has vocal cord problems so they cancelled the rest of their tour, including Moline. Also, on Tuesday, Megan starts her volleyball league.

On Wednesday, the kids have school pictures so that involves making sure they look nice in the AM before they get on the bus. Karen usually works early on Wednesdays but she is going in later so that she can make sure the kids look nice. If the weather is not rainy, I am planning to mow our neighbor's house down the street.

On Thursday, it is "back to school" night @ Regina. We will get to see their classrooms, have some watered down punch and maybe a cookie.

On Friday, we will hook up the truck to the camper and go to Zwhingle to store the camper for the winter. Then we are going to Balltown. I imagine we will be in Balltown by 8 PM.

On Saturday, we are going to help my father-in-law clean his windows that are on the 2nd story. There was originally talk about going golfing, but that's not a certainty. At night, we're going to a Catholic Knights dinner in Dubuque.

On Sunday, we'll return to North Liberty in time for Alex's basketball practice from 3-5. He was also invited to a classmate's birthday party and we are taking him there after practice.

Then we're to 9/22 and the whole cycle restarts. Karen has a training class @ night on 9/22. Other highlights include my deadline @ work on 9/24, and the Iowa Homecoming parade. Judy, our parish music minster, talked last Saturday about having a float in the parade and playing music on the back of a flatbed truck! Wouldnt't that be totally sweet?!? Saturday, we'll probably play @ 5:15 Mass and Sunday is basketball practice.

The following week (9/29) is the week of my decade of service @ my employer!

Rise above this

This is my favorite song. It is powerful, talks about meeting challenges and going forward.

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Take the light, undarken everything around me
Call the clouds and listen closely I'm lost without you
Call your name every day when I feel so helpless
I've fallen down but I'll rise above this, rise above this

Hate the mind, regrets are better left unspoken
For all we know, this void will grow
And everything's in vain, distressing you though it leaves me open
Feels so right, but I'll end this all before it gets me

Call your name every day when I feel so helpless
I've fallen down but I'll rise above this, rise above this
Call your name every day when I seem so helpless
I've fallen down, and I'll rise above this, rise above this doubt

I'll mend myself before it gets me
(I'll mend myself before it gets me)
I'll mend myself before it gets me
(I'll mend myself before it gets me)

Call your name every day when I feel so helpless
I've fallen down but I'll rise above this, rise above this
Forty eight ways to say that I'm feelin' helpless
I'm Falling down, falling down, but I'll rise above this, rise above this,
Rise above this, rise above this doubt

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In other news, things are crazy busy.

A Brief Pause

This week has been crazy and next week will be even crazier, both at home and at work.

At work, I am attending training for a product called JWalk. It starts tomorrow and goes until the 12th. Then, on 9/15, my co-worker and I will start developing changes with JWalk for release on 9/25. I don't think I will be able to work on documentation until 10/1.

Outside of work, some key dates:
9/11 - Megan starts her volleyball league
9/14 - Alex's basketball practice starts up again and I am the assistant head coach. The head coach, Tim, won't be there on that date so I get to run practice.
9/16 - I'm going to Moline, IL, to see Avenge Sevenfold / Buck Cherry / Shine Down / Saving Abel for *free* as Warner Brothers is sending me "hard tix" for that show.
9/17 - school pictures
9/18 - back to school night & Megan's volleyball league
9/19 - we're taking the camper to storage in Zwhingle and spending the weekend in Balltown.
9/21 - Alex's basketball practice

Somewhere in there, I will write a concert review of Avenge Sevenfold / Buck Cherry / Shine Down / Saving Abel. To say I have a backlog of reviews to write is an understatement.

I am still working on my TWing contract and I want to get that put to bed today so I'm signing off.

SP & Rush

I've tried to explain to some people what Rush did with "Tom Sawyer" when I saw them in concert earlier this year. Fortunately, You Tube has everything...

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com so it is no longer available for your viewing pleasure.

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JM Review

Dailyvault.com posted my John Mellencamp review: http://www.dailyvault.com/toc.php5?review=5629

While I'd like to say it's the best of 2008, I haven't heard all of Metallica's "Death Magnetic" yet so I'm not going there... except to say it is a really good release.

New Month, Old Error

I don't get it. I am now getting an error when I compile my CHM file.

I don't know why. I can't figure it out. If I have the CHM open and navigate to the same topic, the error doesn't display. It doesn't make sense to me. I want to finish this work either today or tomorrow, but I can't deliver this file unless this is fixed.

Update!

Figured it out! There is a file called eHlpDhtm.js that was included in my project. I made a backup, deleted all of its contents, recompiled and I'm good.

householdhackers.com

This is crazy!

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FFF & DD

We went to the Regina Fall Fun Festival last night.

First we wnet to Mass @ 6. Then Karen and I rushed from Mass to the beer tent to work from 7-9 (tell me we're not Catholic?!?). After working, we met up with some friends. There was a band called "Twist and Shout" playing. Megan's friend's dad, Jeff, plays bass. We both were checking out the band, 1/2 wishing they'd ask us to sit in, but that didn't happen. I said to him, "All we need is a guitarist and a vocalist and we're up there in 2009." He agreed.

I also talked to my friend Randy for a bit. I hadn't seen or talked to him in ... a long time.

While I was waiting for Karen to finish talking to one of her friends, I was talking to another of my friends - can you believe I have friends? - Paul. Paul's son is playing guitar in a band called Girl Repellant. Paul is a good guy - I like talking to him. We were talking and this woman comes over to us and says I don't know what's going on but those kids over there are acting up. I think it's the one in the green hat.

So Paul and I walked over there. We found the kid in a green hat and just sat in the general vicinity of the supposed trouble. Nothing happened. I asked the kid in the green hat if he was okay. He said yes. I asked him if he needed help and he said no. Then he left.

Today we are going to clean a couple of windows - yuck - and then return to the Regina FFF to play bingo. After bingo, the plan is to stop @ Hy-Vee, pick up a pizza for Alex and I and Chinese for Karen and Megan, and return home. After we eat, we need to clean Megan's window on the side of the house. We need to get the ladder up to the 2nd floor and monkey around with trying to clean it. I am not looking forward to that. I am fearful I will drop the window and watch it shatter on the ground as that would be 'my luck' to have that happen.

So, here's hoping that my next entry doesn't start out "be weary of what you fear because it can happen."

After that group of friends left, I rode the ferris wheel with Megan and then we went home.

One final note: http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=4689215&blogID=428574837 sounds very cool...

She thinks wrestling is real...

Before I get to the meaning behind the title of this post, I'm in awe that I haven't updated this blog since 8/25. It seems my weeks go too damn fast.

I'm back now, though, and with a killer video from Local H, a band that has really grown on me in the last few weeks. I needed to become familiar with their 12 Angry Months release in order to review it for DV and in doing so, I've really come to like this band. I was at their My Space page earlier and got this video:

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Wednesday was the Virgil Donati drum clinic. 100+ drummers in the same room, watching a master of the instrument bend it to his will. He came across as very business-oriented, informing us we could purchase his DVDs and/or CDs. I understand the dough has to come from somewhere on these clinic tours, but he started out the clinic talking about how stuff was available for purchase. His negative first impression was immediately replaced, however, when he started playing. He could do anything he wanted to do it seemed on the drum set. He played with his feet in the same way that most drummers play with their hands. It was really humbling.

Last night was WWE. I had joked with my co-worker that I was going to make a sign to hold up that says "She Thinks Wrestling is Real" but I didn't. I talked to the guy who runs blindman.com and he is going to send some pics for me to post in my blog. I am still a sucker for WWE. The athletes are just that - athletic.

Why on Earth? The Drums?

My earliest recollection of music is playing a black metal stove with purple Tinker Toy sticks. I had a Lincoln Log cylinder as a drum, a Tinker Toy cylinder as a cymbal, and an Indian drum. Hitting the edge of the stove produced different sounds as well. I remember, for one Christmas, my parents bought a pair of drumsticks. In their parental wisdom, one stick was for my brother and one was for me. Ironically, I didn't like the sticks as they were too big for the stove and cylinders I had assembled. Plus they were heavier, weight-wise, than I liked. I think one was broken hitting the stove at some point. This 'set' was situated in front of our 8-track stereo. I don't remember how, but somehow, my mother bought the Gene Simmons solo release. I used to listen to that release repeatedly. With the 8 track, I could skip the songs I didn't like and repeatedly listen to "Living in Sin" and "Tunnel of Love." I remember mimicking the drum pattern of "Tunnel of Love."

Years later, I was in 4th grade. I remember, vividly, that we had to choose what instrument we wanted to play. I chose drums and told my mother that in the car on the way from our old house on Red Bud Road to the house we were moving into on Sally Drive. Soon after, I began taking drum lessons, didn't practice, didn't have any desire to learn my rudiments and now, frankly, I wish I could go back in time and actually practice. I didn't have a big picture as to how important rudiments are to drumming. I routinely play the paradiddle and am working on trying to play that faster and faster. A paradiddle is "RLRR LRLL"

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The next to last one is Virgil Donati. I paid $10 for a ticket to see his drum clinic on Wednesday night @ West Music in Coralville, IA.

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A cover? Already?

And, in case you like the original a lot, here's a cover of the latest new Metallica song...

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Even if I had 25 hours in a day, I would not waste my time learning to do this...

The title of this entry says it all... Dude, don't you have some friggin' homework to do?

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com

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I'd rather spend my time listening to some classic BC...

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com

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And, if BC is too squeaky clean, you have to experience some EM raw. Raw = f-bombs. If you don't like f-bombs are don't even know what one is, you shouldn't watch it. For those that like BC, you will find the first few minutes of EM doing BC hilarious.

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com

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BUT.... if you LIKE EM and you don't mind a F-bomb, the ice cream man skit is hilarious.

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com

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I was in a church and the pastor started talking re: George Carlin missing the point about religion. George Carlin said that if there was a God, why would he allow things to be so crazy and out of control. The pastor went on to say Carlin doesn't get it. God gave all of us - humans - the power of freewill. As I listened to the anti-Carlin tirade - and I'm agreeing with the pastor's opinion about Carlin's opinion of religion - I really wish the pastor had seen this clip, which I consider better than anything else Carlin ever said:

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Editor's Note - the video in question was removed from youtube.com

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An Unexpected Movie Review

On a date night with my wife in July, I lost the discussion re: whether to see "Mama Mia" or "The Dark Knight." I am the minority. I hated "Mama Mia."

I thought it was cheesy, too many sexual overtones - too much to make it 12 year-old daughter appropriate, not enough to be "Wedding Crashers" material or "Knocked Up" material - and the singing... James Bond singing? C'mon. I was the only guy in the showing we went to.

The plot wrapped up too quickly "Oh yes, after 20 years, after being an independent person, just because *you* show up, say you love me, I'll just drop all my independence for you." I'm not a feminist by nature, but I'm really surprised there wasn't as much uproar from that group about that whole scenario as there is about "Tropic Thunder" using the r word. I found myself marveling at how there is one girl in the background who, in the same song, goes from "sunglasses on" to "sunglasses off" to "sunglasses on." Sloppy editing.

Anyways, I hated it and think I wasted a $8.50 and not just b/c I'm a headbanger at heart. I really didn't object to Abba being the main music - I objected to the whole silly plot line of the Meryl Streep character. She was built up to be *so strong* and then, in a matter of a single scene, gave up all that for someone she had not seen in 20 years. I didn't buy it. I felt ripped off.

The Day that Never Comes

Way behind in posting all the stuff I want to post so I choose the most important: the new Metallica song!

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This is an amendment. While I like "The Day that Never Comes," I think an early favorite track on "Death Magnetic" has to be "Cyanide." "I've already died / it's just the funeral that I'm waiting for." Cutting lyrics!

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Behind

And, by the by, I am behind in updating this blog with all the things I want to write about. There have been really good ideas tossed around on the Techwr-L list re: two monitors v. 1 and counting change back. I will be updating soon.

NEM

Nothing Else Matters by Metallica is not my favorite piece by them. I think the lyrics are kind of sappy and, frankly, when it was a married couple's first dance, it ruined the song for me. Metallica and a wedding reception, I can live with. When I got married in August 1993, we danced to "Enter Sandman." That all said, this version of NEM rocks...

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21 to 18

I have been working on my TWing contract from 9-12. As I signed out of Hotmail, I noticed an interesting link which took me to an even more interesting article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26271328

Make the drinking age 18. Presidents of major universities want a "dispassionate" discussion about the issue. Okay. I'm open to that.
Let's talk about it.
Let's strip all the emotional stuff from it.
Let's get law enforcement officers.
Let's get victims and families of people that have been killed by a drunk driver.
Let's get people who are sitting on the side of the road and get plowed into by a totally intoxicated female who only cares about getting her CDs after she injures someone.
Let's get the wives of husbands who endure their husband's pain as if it were their own.
Let's get them all in a room and ask them to dispassionately discuss the issue.
Let's see how far that gets.

Folks, here's how I see it. I agree with one of my friends. He says that one day you're 20 and you're not allowed to drink any alcohol, even in the privacy of your home with your parents. The next day WHAM!! You are 21 and you are expected to immediately
a) know your limits
b) know how to drink in moderation
c) know how alcohol will change your behavior

There is no clause in the law that says "under parental supervision, a minor may drink alcohol." I think that's what is wrong. I don't want my son or daughter out on their 21st birthday, doing crazy shots of booze and getting sick. That wouldn't be fun. I want them to know what they can / cannot do. Who is going to teach them? If *I* don't teach them, their friends will when parents are gone and they are alone in the house with beer or hard liquor. Who should teach my child? I say me.

You Tube Again - Beginner drum beat

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Know Your Audience

On the Techwr-L list today, Evelyn Lee Barney wrote something very profound that, maybe, has been said in other places, using some of the same words, but it wasn't until today that I thought, "Wow."
She wrote:

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I don't think we can ever really know (depending, maybe, on our audience) what is a common-knowledge detail to them, and what is not. My personal frustration with software documentation for aps that are new to me is when they say something like: "If you'd like to perform X function, just use the Y-enator while holding down cntr." No screen shot, no tip as to where to find the Y-enator, let alone what its primary function is (and you'd assume it has a primary function that isn't X, since it's a Y-enator, not an X-enator.) I'm particularly annoyed with this type of instruction when it turns out that the Y-enator is in a sub-sub-sub menu of a main menu that otherwise I never use - so know nothing about, and takes me an hour to find.

Anyway - if asked as a reader of docs what one wish I had - I'd say: "whatever you want me to know about, tell me :::where::: it is :::first:::. Almost everything else I can figure out on my own. If given a second wish, I'd say: "if your software does not do something the average person would likely expect it to do (my favorite example is that Cool Edit Pro - at least my edition - is a sound editor with no volume control. You have to control the play-back volume from your computer media task bar, or your speakers) then say so, up front.

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After over a decade in Tech Writing and seeing more documentation/online Help files than I can count, I totally agree with Evelyn's assessment of documentation. Navigation cannot be forgotten but it is. Software functionality gets buried too easily and the worst part - even after working with a system on a daily basis for nearly a decade, I can't remember every single place where something exists. We have an option to do XYZ - it's a check box on a ton of screens - and if I need to update the doc to say that XYZ has a new thing associated with it (and need to find all references to XYZ), where do I go? The doc. I have accepted that I can remember a lot of things - like anniversaries and some birthdays - but not all things.

The other element is about stating up front what you cannot do in the software. I have over 4000 CDs, tapes, VHS tapes, DVDs, and records (45s and 33s). I used to try to find a replacement for my Excel spreadsheet that tracks them all. I wanted something that could generate reports on the fly. I wanted something that could give me a quick report of all my Metallica CDs or all my Metallica *and* Megadeth CDs. Searched high and low. Downloaded freeware and shareware. Sent my requirements to tech support at one company and their tech support person wrote back, "Our software doesn't fit your needs." That was beautiful. Honest. Not the answer I wanted, but honestly, if I would have spent the time to import the file into their software (and that may have been the issue that they identified as not being able to support, but assume I could get the Excel file imported and then couldn't do all the other stuff I wanted to do.) I learned before spending more than 1 hour of my time that I was going the wrong way.

You should know your audience well enough to understand what they need to know in order to complete their task.

Late breaking news...

You can listen to one of the new Metallica songs called "Cyanide" on their MySpace page: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=4689215. Also available is the live version of the epic "And Justice for All" from Chorzow, Poland, on May 28, 2008.

80s

Okay... definitely, I consider myself a child of the 80s. It's what I grew up with. There was, of course, a lot of good music in that decade and a lot of not-so-good. I know some of it was good because the classic rock station played both "Home Sweet Home" and "I Wanna Rock" while I was at the North Liberty pool today. Both Motley Crue and Twisted Sister are artists that survived that decade and now their songs are considered "classic rock." The same station played Foghat's "Slow Ride." It was fun to be walking up to the water slide and have Alex and I both air guitaring to it. They also played "China Grove" (the Doobie Brothers) and Led Zeppelin's "Dancing Days." Anyways, the 80s were a lot of fun. Karen's brother plays in a band that plays a lot of 80s music - I know I've written about him previously on this blog - and I found the perfect shirt: http://tinyurl.com/58ovw2 but it got taken down, for whatever reason.

http://www.topatoco.com/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=TO&Product_Code=WON-80s&Category_Code=WON is the original link.

Apologies to my friend John to whom I sent this link prior to verifying it still existed.

Links

This is an odd link http://www.uniphiz.com/physiognomy.htm. Per the website, It is "amazing face reading software [that] tells you about the character of this person. You gain accurate insight into the true nature of famous people." Hmm. I don't know if I want to know more about the famous people in the world - I can read People magazine to learn anything and more than I want to know about anyone.

My friend Phil passed along this info for you XM radio subscribers. I believe in "free radio" so I don't pay for any radio service:

Mandatory Metallica
Mandatory Metallica is an amazing amalgam of the greatest rock band in history. The channel will play music from the entire Metallica catalog, including rare live recordings from the band's personal concert archives, extensive interviews with the band and more. In addition, a wide range of artists will be featured as they talk about what Metallica means to them including the likes of Judas Priest, Smashing Pumpkins, Linkin Park, Slipknot, Disturbed, Guns 'N Roses, Chris Cornell, Ashes Divide, Blackstone Cherry, Five Finger Death Punch, Atreyu, Skid Row, Cinderella, Mastodon, Dragonforce, Triumph, Tesla and dozens of others. "Mandatory Metallica" (XM 51) will be available on XM from August 16 through September 30.

I would really like to hear what Skid Row and Cinderella have to say about Metallica. I'd also like to hear what G-n-R think, especially Axl since Metallica made it a point to make fun of the band's tour rider . . . is that the right word? It's a list of all the things the band needs in their dressing room when they are about to go on stage.

Finally, the most important link of the day: http://www.pollstar.com/news/viewnews.pl?NewsID=10950. On this link, you'll read about Metallica's upcoming tour of North America, including a stop in Moline, IL!