RUBBERTOE.COM - The Toe Pages

(March 9, 2010) -- Last Day

According to the weather guys, this string of nice days we've been having are coming to an end for a while. You could see signs of it throughout the day, as the sunny warm day turned into typical dreary Ohio weather. Luckily I got up really stinkin' early today to have breakfast with Dad, Mom, Wendi, and Matt. We met out at the little "hole in the wall" diner on the edge of town, although Grandma wasn't quite feeling up to making the trip again this time.

I mailed out a couple of packages for some eBay winners, then I came home and did a whole lot of nothing all day. Well, not nothing... I spent quite a bit of time going through my digital photos from the past year and a half - picking out the ones that I wanted to actually have made into prints, and then cropping all of those selected photos as needed. Someone needs to remind me not to go so long between getting batches of prints done, 'cuz this took way too friggin' long. But it's all good... the pics are selected and cropped, and are currently in the process of being uploaded to be printed.

I'll be hittin' the sack early again tonight. Managed to get to sleep at midnight last night, and woke up around 7am like I mentioned. I think regardless of the time I fall asleep, I'm gonna start forcing myself to get up at 8am or 9am at the very latest. Even though I don't really have a reason to keep a schedule, I just think it is a good idea to get into a routine that will allow me to blend in with the humans a little better. Plus then people won't cry so much when they call my house during the day and can't reach me, since I might actually answer... if I can get into the swing of things.

(March 8, 2010) -- Borked RSS

Somehow in the redesign I broke my RSS feed. I doubt anyone really used it, but I'm still gonna try to figure out what I did and get it repaired. If you have it bookmarked or saved in an RSS reader you will probably have to change the URL for the feed once I get it back and running.

EDIT: Okay, I found another way to generate my feed. It can now be found at http://feed43.com/rubbertoe.xml

(March 8, 2010) -- No Rest

Geeze, I can't catch a break when it comes to getting any decent sleep lately. I actually slept from about 4am until noon today, but it felt like the whole damned time I was having dreams that weren't exactly good for getting restful ZZZs. Seems like I was waking up at least once an hour, with this weird sense of panic or urgency... like I was supposed to be doing something for someone, or waiting on a call from someone, or something else that was obligating me to do something that wasn't convenient for me to do.

I can't really remember too many specifics, I just know that I woke up today feeling just as tired as I did when I went to bed last night. I just have a vague recollection of feeling like I had to get to school, or had to get to my job, or had to answer a phone call that I absolutely couldn't miss, etc. Heh... the only reason I really decided to get up when I did was because I figured that if I tried to go back to sleep again, I'd just keep having those weird stress-dreams. I've got a few things coming up where I've gotta be up kinda early, so I think I'm gonna try to force myself into a normal "to bed at night, wake up in the morning" schedule again. I did it about a month ago, so I think I can do it again.

(March 8, 2010) -- Slight Change

Got bored with the old site design... now this one will be here for a while. Deal with it. The only real difference is that the font is different and a bit larger in the blog, and the webcam page now loads all 15 of the past images at full size rather than forcing people to click through thumbnails one by one. If you find something is broken, let me know. Carry on...

(March 7, 2010) -- Grand Central

It's been busy around here today. Genesee stopped by earlier to pick up her Girl Scout cookies, and to bring over some extra crap that she wanted to get rid of. I think she's kinda doing what I am now... looking around and realizing that she has way too much crap, so she's getting rid of it in various ways. She had some scrapbooking stuff that she thought Kayla would like, some other crafting / electronics stuff that will come in handy for me, and then she had a few more things that she asked if I'd either put up on eBay or take to one of the local auctions that I go to. Thomas Kinkade prints, dozens of boxed Cherished Teddies figures, some Noah's Ark stuff... hopefully it'll fetch a decent bid wherever I take / put it.

Mongo, Booger, and Katie came over shortly after she left. He also came bearing gifts. They're actually getting ready to sell their house, so he's also downsizing all his "extra" stuff. He brought over basically the entire contents of his little computer shop that he had behind the garage. Three towers, a monitor, a couple laptops, and tons of "pieces parts" including hard drives, DVD drives, memory cards, cables, etc. I needed an extra monitor here anyway, to fix up the nearly-good PC he gave me a few weeks back, so maybe with all this stuff I'll be able to make a good working system or two. He really is just clearing out though, 'cuz he said I should just pitch whatever I don't want or need when I'm done.

So I've been taking some pics of G's stuff for eBay later, e-mailing the auction guy to see if / when it is okay to bring a load to him, sorting out PC parts, debating over doing a design change on my site, and generally doing lots of random stuff that most people would probably find tedious or boring. That's okay... who's gonna have another decent working PC in another hour or two? This guy.

(March 6, 2010) -- Busy Work

I've been doing random shit around the house to keep myself preoccupied over the past couple of days. Moved some stuff around in the living room a little, packed away all of my CDs, started cleaning out cupboards in the kitchen, etc. With all of my music either on my computer or my iPod, it's not like it makes a hell of a lot of sense to have them out "on display" in the living room - even if they are in a couple decent storage racks, it's not like I'm ever going to actually use them. And the kitchen... well, from all of the auctions that I've been to, winning boxes of misc. crap that usually contained at least some kitchen stuff... well, it got to the point where I had like three of everything. And not just three of everything that I actually need or use... just three of everything. So yeah, I cleaned out the cupboards and threw away three laundry baskets full of pots, pans, plastic storage containers, various shaped baking pans, etc.

I probably got a little carried away though, because I actually threw out all of my pots and pans except for one really big nice pan that I've had for a long while. The "regular" pots and pans were lookin' kinda worn anyway, so I figured since I was cleanin' house that I'd just go ahead and get rid of those half-assed ones and buy some new cheap ones from the dollar store. It's not like I do a hell of a lot of stove cookin' lately anyway, so even the $15 set of pans from Family Dollar is gonna be good enough to last me quite a while. I used that cleaning method when I cleared most of the stuff out of the second bedroom, so I'm gonna try to stick to that "if you haven't used it in the past few months, you probably don't need it" method for all the other rooms.

When I was working on the living room the vacuum was pissing me off so I decided to take it apart, clean out all the parts and pieces, then put it all back together again. Surprisingly, I must have done a good job because the thing works like new now. Toni and Matt came over to hang out for a while last night, and Toni even asked what I did to the carpet because it looked different. Heh... some people think it is weird that I'm always trying to make my place look as nice as possible. The thing is, I really don't have any excuse for it to be any way other than that, ya know? I'm not working, so it's not like I'm too tired... I don't have kids or anyone else that I can blame for the mess... so if the one thing that I really feel like I "need" to do on a day to day basis is to keep my house from becoming a disaster, how can I not at least try do that? Meh... but then again, maybe it's just me...

I mean, to the people that would ask me why I bother trying to keep my house neat... my question to them is "Why don't you want to?" (Heh... meaning, why don't they wanna keep their place as nice as possible... not why they don't want to keep my place neat... heh... you see what I'm gettin' at I think.)

(March 6, 2010) -- Meh

It's been a crappy couple of days. Haven't been able to sleep more than a couple hours, shoulder has been hurting more than usual, etc. And to top it off I had to make a tough decision when it came to me and Kayla. We've been kinda "off and on" for the past couple of months. I sat down and really thought about it... thought about who she is, thought about who I am... thought about if our two personalities would ever really be able work out. She just wants different things than I do right now, and I want different things than she does. It's one of those deals where I really do love her, but our two lifestyles just don't blend together very well.

Like I said, I spent a lot of time thinking about it before I made any decisions, but even after going through it all in my head over and over I just didn't see us on a path where we'd both really be happy. Heh... it's hard to explain all this without going into details... which I'm not going to do... but yeah... she's just making a lot of decisions lately that I just don't "get" and at the same time she's wondering why those things are such big deals to me. It's one of those situations where we each just want our lives to be a certain way right now, and those ways are significantly different from each other.

I kinda feel like a dick, because it's not like she did anything wrong... but I'd feel like a bigger dick if I just kept stringing this along, always hoping that she would change more, always wishing that she'd eventually be more like I wanted her to be. I mean, we talked about it a little when I went over there to tell her the other night, and in a way she is right. She said it isn't fair that I'm still basically giving her crap about the way she's choosing to live even though she's in her own place. And what I mean by her being right is that she is in her own place... she should be able to make whatever decisions she wants about it.

It's just so hard for me to just sit back and let her do her own thing, when I think that a lot of her decisions could really end up biting her in the ass in the long run. I want things to be good for her, I want to help her avoid any problems, and I feel like I know how she could do that... so when I give her advice, or "give her crap" about something, it's only because I really feel like I am right when I'm telling her those things. My logic is that I'm "older and wiser" which means I might know how to handle certain situations a little better than she would. But her logic makes sense too... it's her place, her life, and she's going to make her own choices.

So if we stayed together it would just be the same old thing - my advice would just seem like nagging to her, she'd be doing things that I don't agree with, she'd be wondering why it bothered me so much, and I'd be sitting here every day wondering and hoping that she doesn't do something that ends up making her new life fall apart. It's kinda like if you kept telling your friend not to stand so close to the edge of a cliff... and if they didn't listen to you, eventually you'd just wanna turn away because you wouldn't wanna see the mess that would happen if they do fall. It's like "Hey, you worked so hard to get up here... now why do you wanna take a chance that you might fall?"

So yeah, I've been feelin' pretty crappy since then. There were other people around when I talked to Kayla about this, so I didn't really get to say everything I wanted to say - but I guess there isn't much else that needs to be said when you are telling someone that you don't think it will ever work out between the two of you. I hope I am wrong about everything though. I hope that she'll be happier now, not having to change who she is in order to be what I wanted... and all of those choices that she's making that I think are bad... I hope all of them work out perfectly for her, proving that I was worried and stressed over nothing. Yeah, I'd be the dummy for bailing on something that could have been good... but if I am wrong about all of it, at least she'll end up being fine.

(March 1, 2010) -- What's That Smell?

Got the new cheap-o camera for my webcam today.

It looks nice... smaller than my current one... but when I plugged it in with a suitable power supply it just made this sad *SQUEEEEEEEEEE* sound until I quickly unplugged it again. That, along with the faint smell of burnt PCB, makes me think that I probably got a camera from the crap end of the bin. I don't have another power supply that I can try with it right now, but I'm not gonna toss it until I can hook it up to at least one more adapter to see if that makes a difference. Oh well, looks like we're probably gonna be staying black and white here...

(March 1, 2010) -- NTB

Took the car in for an oil change as planned. I went to NTB out by the mall because I also had a slow leak in my right rear tire, and I was pretty sure that's where I got my tires originally - and it included that little extra warranty where they will fix any tires with nails or screws or whatever for free if you get a damaged tire. Well, when I got there they keyed in my name and there was nothing. I told him I was pretty sure I got the tires at that location, so he went out and looked at the tires and agreed that it was their brand.

I don't know if their tires always have that repair warranty, but once he realized that I did get the tires at that store there weren't even any more questions. They changed the oil, plugged my tire (it did have a nail in it), balanced all four of them, and I even got my 10% discount like when I originally bought the tires. A grand total of thirty bucks, which I don't think was too bad. Now if I can only keep myself from going another 5000 miles before my next change.

(February 28, 2010) -- Sick

Kayla was kinda sniffly the other day, but today she's full-blown sick. Rather than being over at her apartment with her two nephews, she asked if I'd mind if she came over here to take some cold meds and try to get some sleep. I picked up some "nighttime" cold medicine at Walgreens, and within about an hour of her taking it - she's zonked out. I think I'm gonna take some myself, just as a preemptive measure, so maybe I'll be able to go to sleep at a human hour tonight. I kinda wanna get up early tomorrow anyway to put a new air filter in my car and go get the oil changed... my car is probably crying since I'm considerably past the 3,000 miles when it comes to gettin' a change.

Oh, and I re-looked at the info for that new webcam camera that I'm getting... it actually does have IR LEDS and alleged low-light capability, even though it is a color camera. (I wonder if it is one of those color cams that switches to black and white when the light levels get too low.) We'll have to see. Oh, and I think I'm going to configure it with a stupid-wide field-of-view lens, so you'll probably see much more of the living room (or wherever) if I can get everything hooked up properly. Hopefully it won't have too much vignetting around the edges.

(February 27, 2010) -- Trudging Along

Trudging might be a bit heavy of a word... but yeah... things have been moving along okay here over the past few days. I'm still not sleeping worth a shit, but at least during the hours that I am awake I'm feeling pretty good. I haven't been doing anything really noteworthy, although I've been working on little projects of my own around here - plus I've been helping out other people with things that I am able to help with. I wouldn't change how I am, but I imagine that sometimes the assholes of the world have it a lot easier, since the generic assholes that I'm speaking of would likely only be concerned with themselves. I dunno... give me time... maybe I'll turn in to one of them.

Frequent visitors to my site might notice that the webcam is now in a different, slightly odd location. I've actually got it taped onto the front of my TV stand at the moment... but that's only because I'm expecting a new camera in the mail sometime over the next week or two. (It's coming from Hong Kong... heh...) It's nearly identical to the black and white camera I've been using pretty much since I moved into this place, except it doesn't have infrared night vision like the B/W one. BUT... it's not like I'm losing anything, because the IR doesn't work anymore on the black and white one anyway, so yeah...

I've been wanting a color webcam again anyway, so when I saw one for less than ten bucks on eBay I decided to go ahead and snag it. Being that cheap, I'm kinda worried that it is gonna be crap - so if it does suck I'll just continue with the B/W one, and I'll probably put it back up high in the normal location like it used to be. I'm pretty hooked up when it comes to B/W surveillance cams, but good color ones are just more expensive than I'm willing to pay. I'll just cross my fingers about this new one and hope that el-cheapo technology has progressed since I last tried one.

A friend knows that I do eBay from time to time, as well as doing it a lot in the past, so she dropped off a bunch of collectible bears for me to put up for her. After doing a little research, it seems that the collectible bear market on eBay isn't as poppin' as it used to be. She has good stuff, don't get me wrong, but it looks like people just aren't looking for that kinda stuff right now. After talking it over with her we decided that it might be quicker, easier, and better paying to just take the stuff to a "real" local auction. Since I was already easing my way back into eBay, I went ahead and grabbed a couple pieces of old pottery from Aunt Sharon to put up there. She'd been tossing around the idea for a while, so I figured this was probably as good a time as any. The pieces are pretty rare... I think they'll do well.

My Flickr Pro account was getting ready to expire, so I went ahead and bought another couple of years for my account. It isn't that expensive... and since I already have a bazillion pictures up there as it is, I'd hate to just stop and let all of them vanish. I mean, I'm assuming that's what would happen... I dunno... but yeah, my interest in photography certainly isn't any less now than when I first joined, so I'm sure I'll be putting it to use just as well as I have over the past few years.

Kayla's feelin' a bit of a squeeze over at her place. Her complex has a laundry area, but of course you have to have quarters to use the machines. I think she said it is $1.75 to wash, and then $1.75 to dry. I told her that I'd make a deal with her, and that every now and then she could load up all her dirty stuffs and bring them over here and use my washer and dryer. But since I'm gonna be saving her pocket-fulls of quarters by doing that, she agreed that she'd help me clean my house. Like, clean clean... the sorta stuff I probably wouldn't bother doing myself, due to either laziness or because it would make my neck and shoulder hurt too much. (ie: scrubbing the bathroom and kitchen floors, dusting stuff, stuff that is "up high", etc)

I know I could just let her come do her laundry with no strings attached, but that would kinda miss the point of her having her own place, ya know? Being on your own means you really need to try to be on your own. Not necessarily relying on other people to just give you help with the things in daily life that just have to be done. But I give her props... for basically having zero "training" for real life she's doing pretty good. It's been a couple months now since she moved out of here, and things in her little "life bubble" over there aren't anywhere close to how I would want them to be for myself - but with each day it seems to be getting a little better... and for now, it seems to be working for her.

The Social Security situation is starting to settle down... I mean, I kinda see where everything is headed, even if it isn't quite there yet. The workers comp thing... well, it's getting there as well - but it's still gonna be several more weeks before it reaches an end. There have already been two hearings this month, where my "percentage of disability" was being debated, and I'm still getting letters from the IC and my attorney to let me know that more hearings are still needed. Actually, this past hearing, they did come up with a percentage rating for me - but as usual, at the end of the notice it says that either side may appeal the result within 10 days. I suppose either side is just as likely to do that this time. But yeah... it's gettin' there... slowly.

Another thing that will keep my busy whenever I decide to start working on it... Uncle Rick gave me his old PC to see if I could either clean it out or just wipe it and start over with a new install of Windows XP. Aunt Sharon got a new PC that they're going to use just for business, so their old PC (which is F'd up beyond belief) is gonna be their "fun" PC once I get done with it and get it back to them. It isn't much of a hassle for me to help out with that, since I've got another half-busted PC that's been sitting here for a couple of months myself... and I can just buckle down and work on both of them at once.

Yesterday was kinda nice though... didn't do much of anything. Kayla stayed over so we popped some popcorn and watched a movie, we both caught up on our Cafe World stuff, and generally just chilled here in the house and enjoyed the calm. There's enough snow again that I might try to talk her into another sled riding trip before it goes away... I just wanna try to get some better pictures, not do any sledding myself. All I have are those friggin' round sleds now though... the ones that you are pretty much just holding on and going along for the ride. Maybe we can get Josh or Jake involved and have them do some daredevil sledding for the camera. Too bad Jim doesn't live closer or we could get some good Squirtman shots of him biffing into a snowbank or something.

Heh... this entry is pretty long for stuff that isn't "noteworthy" heheh...

(February 27, 2010) -- Funeral / Love Lies Bleeding

Good live performance I hadn't seen before...

(February 25, 2010) -- Bella

Kayla brought a friend over to visit...

(February 23, 2010) -- Half Days

I've been having a rough few days. I've been hurting more than usual, so I've been maxing out my meds - topping it off with an Advil PM now and then - and for some reason it's been kicking my ass more than usual. My days have basically been split in half... sleeping a few hours, waking up for several hours, sleeping a couple more, waking for a few, etc. Very annoying. I really want to be able to go to sleep and wake up at normal hours like the humans do, but it's just not happening. Gotta love side effects.