November 14, 2009

New kitchen faucet

Today we finally replaced the nasty old drippy faucet in the kitchen. The faucet we chose is made by Delta, it's called Bellini. We chose it because it was clean looking and was very tall which makes getting large pots under it easy and provides more room to wash those large pots too.

Here are some pictures of the process.

Posted by djkay at 4:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

August 18, 2008

Hail Storm - 8/17/08

Yesterday mom and I were in Albuquerque printing her boarding passes for her flight. On our way home I decided to take the scenic route through Isleta pueblo and then down Rt 47 in Los Lunas though Tome and into Belen that way. We made it to the Tome Art Gallery and it started to hail... Hard! I turned around and tried to get away from it, the hail was about an inch in diameter!!!
We ended up going home through Los Lunas on Rt 314. When we got into Belen there was hail piled on the roads/grass/roofs as if it were snow! There was a lot of water puddled up and several side streets had completely flooded. We stopped at the park near downtown Belen because all the trees there had been stripped of their leaves by the force of all the hail. The ground was littered with small branches mixed with large quarter-sized hail.
We got to where I needed to turn to get to my street and I couldn't because the runoff from the storm was washing over the end of the street so fast that had I tried my car would have been washed into the drainage ditch. We had to drive several streets up the road to higher ground before I could get into my neighborhood.
Here are some of the videos I took with my cell phone, my mom's digital camera has some more videos on it and once I get them I'll be adding them to this playlist on YouTube: Hail Storm Playlist.

Posted by djkay at 2:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

July 5, 2008

I'm melting!

I can't believe how hot it is here again today. It was so nice having a thunderstorm roll through every afternoon/evening. It cooled things off nicely. It's back up to 100°F again right now and we still have about 2 hours of sunlight left before the sun sets for the day. My swamp cooler is broken so I'm stuck with the fans I've got. I might go to Walmart and just walk around for the A/C.

music note Currently Playing: PPK - ResuRection

Posted by djkay at 6:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Another wind scorpion in my house

Found another wind scorpion in my house last night!  He was about as big as we've seen them around here.  I've read that they can grow up to 5" across, but we've never found one over 1.5".  They have beady little eyes, and ginormous shredding mouth-parts that most certainly would be painful if it bit you.  They are non-venomous though.

music note Currently Playing: Three Days Grace - Never Too Late

Posted by djkay at 5:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

June 28, 2007

Hiatus

My dad made it to Phoenix Tuesday without issue. Erin and I are going to Gallup tomorrow night to stay the weekend at his cousin's and then he will be staying with us all next week.
On the agenda for the week:

Can we do it!? We'll find out.

Posted by djkay at 4:20 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

May 21, 2007

10,000 Lakes

Erin and I just got back last week from a week-long trip to Southern Minnesota to visit Erin's dad's family for a reunion of sorts. It was a lot of fun and Zack made the trip with us for his first time on a plane and he did very well. There was lots of eating, visiting, and cleaning that happened during our short visit. Over all it was a nice trip and Erin and I had a good time. I took some pictures, but not many of them are of people; most of them are of scenery around the house, or of Zack playing in the yard HE HAD NEVER SEEN GRASS BEFORE! and decided that it tasted pretty good so he would lay down and starting ripping chunks of the lawn out of the ground.
Here's where we posted the pictures that we took; Erin's sister took others and when we get those we'll post them as well: <link>.

Posted by djkay at 6:39 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

May 2, 2007

Productivity to the max

I have never read any of this guys stuff before, but this list is made up of really good suggestions for ways to increase productivity in very simple ways. Not only will these help in a professional workplace, but even just around the house day-to-day. I'm going to try some of these and see how I do in improving my productivity while at the same time, hopefully, beating back the monster that is Procrastination.

1. Nuke it! The most efficient way to get through a task is to delete it. If it doesn’t need to be done, get it off your to do list.
33 Rules to Boost Your Productivity

Posted by djkay at 1:26 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

March 7, 2007

Water, water everywhere... Not a drop to drink

So I came home today and after listening to the answering machine I heard a dripping sound coming from the closet with the furnace and the water heater in it. I open the door and I'm greeted by a running faucet at the bottom of the water heater and it's running down the floor and under the platform that the water heater is sitting on. I pulled the pressure/temperature relief valve and made it drip less, but it was still dripping. I put a cup under the drip and sat down to watch TV.

Erin came home and went into the closet to start getting things together to pack for our trip and discovered that the water had been seeping under the floor and into the carpet in the closet in our bedroom. We called our landlord and after conferring with his brother, the plumber, decided to replace the water heater because it's easier to do. So tomorrow our landlord, and possibly his brother, is coming to replace our water heater.

I'm hoping it doesn't explode overnight and spray water everywhere and ruin our stuff. That would suck royally. I tried to connect our hose to the faucet and run it to the kitchen sink but I can't get the hose to screw onto the faucet enough to create a seal so the water just runs down the hose onto the floor instead of into the hose and then the sink. What I've got is a pail propped under the faucet because a cup just won't cut it! AAAAHHHHH!!! I'm going on vacation on Friday for a week!!!

Posted by djkay at 11:09 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

December 25, 2006

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Merry Christmas everyone!!!!!

Posted by djkay at 1:21 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

December 19, 2006

Oh the weather outside is... AWESOME!!!!

It snowed today!!! It's still snowing outside!!! It's supposed to keep this up until tonight, possibly into tomorrow morning!!!!
Check it out:

snow

snow

snow

snow (movie)

Posted by djkay at 1:16 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

December 12, 2006

Long time no update

I haven't posted anything personal in a while so here's a sort of update of what's been up.

Still working, just going through the daily grind doing the same-old-same-old. I need to hang on a little longer an the regional IT position I want to apply for is going to be posted. I also get my stock options in March for reaching the 6,000 service hour mark. Erin and I are gearing up for the holiday, Erin's family will be here the 22nd through the 26/27th. I haven't done any Christmas shopping yet, I've got a couple of ideas for people; otherwise I'm clueless.

I'm studying to take the A+ certification exam early next year and my regional coordinator is going to be spending a day here at my store so I'm going to ask him what kinds of things I can do to prepare for the position I want to apply for. I'm thinking of also going after the Cisco Certified Network Administrator (CCNA) certification as well.

I've got an additional computer in the house now, I got it from someone I work with who bought a new Mac Pro. I've been messing with it and µbuntu Linux; got it working then I tried something else so it's kinda in limbo right now. I was going to convert it to a DVR, but the TV-tuner card in it isn't supported by the linux I put on it to record TV.

Posted by djkay at 1:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

November 29, 2006

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

So it snowed this morning. Not much, and it was very light and melted before it even hit the ground, but it was still "snow." It was raining at home, but in Albuquerque it was snowing as I walked from my car into the store. Signs of things to come?... Let's hope so!!

Posted by djkay at 8:48 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

November 25, 2006

Thanksgiving 2006

Pictures of our second Thanksgiving feast are posted here: nm.computerdave.net.

Posted by djkay at 9:20 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

September 24, 2006

We're dorks

So we're a couple of dorks, we set up our new tent in our study to see what it would look like. The tent is 17' by 9'; our study... 17' 8" by 15'!!
link

Posted by djkay at 4:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

September 20, 2006

I just bought this from that guy in the newstand, what do you mean I can't bring it on the plane!?

This just about sums up all my pent up frustration at the TSA and government agencies telling us that they're making us safer by not letting us bring a bottle of soda or a cup of coffee that we bought at the newstand next to our plane's gate. I mean that has got to be one of the stupidest things I've ever heard.
<link>

Posted by djkay at 6:25 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

September 5, 2006

How Much Less Are You Making?

Kinda depressing seeing all those negative percents.

here's a handy map showing how far median incomes have dropped over the past six years. And it's good news for most of you: Compared to Michigan and North Carolina you're not doing so badly after all.

<linkification>

Posted by djkay at 1:21 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

July 11, 2006

380 Ways to Freak Out Your Roommate

There are some funny things on this list. Most of them are pretty rediculous and many of them are just plain stupid, but still fun to read through. This is the longest list of these that I've seen: <380 Ways to Freak Out Your Roommate>

Posted by djkay at 10:12 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

June 7, 2006

Everything is Hot, Hot, Hot

Well Monday I wrote about it being really hot, and on the way home I drove by that sign near our house and it said... wait for it... 105°!!!! It was frickin' crazy man!! Yesterday was a little more cloudy and it was only 93°, but still warm. Then today it thunderstorms and we get torrential downpours for like 20 minutes. I get soaked walking out to my car to put my windows up so I'm not swimming home and now my feet are freezing because they haven't dried out completely. Oh well, these past couple of days have reminded me of New England, you never know what the weather is gonna do from one minute to the next, we had totally gotten used to it being hot every day and this was a curveball. I don't care much though, we needed the water so desperately.

Posted by djkay at 3:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

June 5, 2006

A Bumpy Ride for a Smooth Vacation

Here it is... the long-awaited account of our recent vacation/trip to Alabama.

It all started on Thursday, we got up early and Erin dropped me at work and then went home. I worked the morning and Erin came by and picked me up and we went to lunch and then left the car at the parking location and got to the airport. We made it through checking our bags with American Airlines and security with no problem, we got on the plane and made it to Dallas without a hitch. Then we discovered that the flight from there to Huntsville was delayed about an hour. No big deal; we went and found something to eat... Oh wait! Everything closes at 8 except McDonald's!!!! Oh well. We got back to our gate and call Erin's mom to let her know that we're still waiting; she checks status online and sees "canceled!" WHAT!!!?? We ask another passenger and apparently they made an announcement while we were eating. DOH!!! Now we get in line to get re-booked. We end up on Delta the next morning at 7am because there aren't any flights after 10pm and that's the first one the next morning. We're given vouchers for the Marriot South and food (dinner/breakfast). And one more thing, you don't get your luggage. We go downstairs to wait for the shuttle (that's supposed to be there already) and manage to make it to the hotel an hour later. We got box lunches from the hotel, only there's no fridge in the room so our sandwiches spent the night on ice. We made it to the hotel around 10:45pm, the restaurant closes at 11pm and we weren't going to drink in the bar so we just went to bed.

Next day after the break -->

Friday we got up around 5am because we had to be in the lobby by 5:30am to get the shuttle to the airport. We check out and get a ride to the airport and then stand in line to get tickets/boarding passes since all we had were vouchers for tickets. We get our seats, they're not next to each other. We get stopped at security for an extra pat-down and then make it to our gate; we leave our tickets with the desk and they're going to try and get us seats next to each other. We find some breakfast in the form of weak coffee and a muffin. We get on the plane and make it to where? Oh that's right, Atlanta; not Huntsville. We make it to Atlanta and have enough time to ride the train/shuttle thing to the next gate and walk right onto the plane. We finally land in Huntsville, meet Erin's parents and then head to baggage claim to find out where our luggage is. American Airlines tells us to file a claim with Delta because it's not there yet and it will be given to Delta once it does arrive. We go talk to them and the earliest we could have it is that night, but probably not. Great! We give them the address in Tennessee where we'll be for the weekend and leave. We go to the PX on the arsenal and get a change of clothes and toothbrushes/deoderant, etc.

We get some lunch, head to the house and pack up some other stuff. Then we head to Tennessee. Have a nice time and hang out, then Saturday our luggage gets to Knoxville (the nearest airport) at some point and we get out luggage that afternoon around 4:30/5pm!!! So now we've been without luggage/medication/grooming stuff for: 50 hours!!!! WOOHOO!!!

NEways, our luggage had been searched and plopped back in the suitcases, but everything was ok inside. We were able to enjoy the rest of our vacation, but it was needless to say not the way we intended to start out.

I've got pictures and video from Tennessee that I will post soon once I put all the pictures together.

Posted by djkay at 8:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

May 29, 2006

Memorial Day

Memorial Day is today.
memday

Posted by djkay at 9:19 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

March 31, 2006

Big time update

Many of my more recent posts have been kinda dry and short. I've got this grand idea that I'll put stuff on here every day, but that's probably a little unrealistic given my attention span sometimes. I've got a couple of projects in my head and that I'm working on and it's difficult to split my time up between them all. I'd like to spend more time re-working my website, as well as working on a model of the nuclear power plant that my dad is working on, and reading a new book, not to mention some minor improvements around the house (read installing a shelf in the kitchen). Erin and I have also gotten ourselves hooked on watching the first season of Lost; we've gotten through the 3rd DVD in the set.

I've been working every day and it's gets tedious at times, but I look at it as a stepping stone to bigger/better things down the road. I've spoken to my Store Team Leader at length and she's willing to work with me to help me get the necessary training/certifications that I need to continue on my career path. She knows that this isn't where I want to be; that I'd be much happier in a position where I got to use tech every day all the time, instead of once in a while here when someone has a question about a program. The computers don't break that often, not because they're well built/maintained (they don't have to be), but because the people using them don't know that much about computers so it's hard for them to muck 'em up. I'm hoping to get some certifications under my belt and then once Erin is done with her degree we can seriously think about where we want to go and I can start putting out feelers as to the possibility of moving up to a regional IT position within the company. I really don't like working in the store, well mainly I don't like working in a grocery store, but I'm in a much better position than I was when I was slicing deli meat and slinging chicken wings, but I'd like to get out of the retail world and into something a little more tech oriented; i.e. the regional help desk, or even a regional IT infrastructure guy.

Erin and I have been sitting down each weekend for the past 2 weeks and planning our meals for the upcoming week. It's been going really well and other than switching around the days, we've pretty much stuck to our menu. It's made the evenings much less stressful because we no longer come home from work/school and ask each other "what do you want to have for dinner?" We know and we just start making it. It's great, plus we have greatly diversified our palate by having things like fish, pork loin, and roast beef; no more just plain mac & cheese or some lame-ass chicken (we still have chicken, it's just more creative).

I still haven't figured out a good way to relax on the weekends. It seems like every chunk of time I get on the weekends ends up being used to do something. That's why I'm looking forward to the trips we have planned coming up. We'll be in Delaware the first weekend in May for Meriah's graduation, and then she's coming out here the end of May for a week. Plus we're hoping to either go to Alabama to see Erin's family this summer, or have them come out here (I still need to look again at my vacation time and see what I can afford to use to take time off - over a weekend will probably be best). August is when I'll be in Las Vegas for Dan's party for a weekend, then in September we'll be in Massachusetts for Dan and Niki's wedding. I just wish I could have a weekend where I didn't have to go anywhere unless I wanted to, and I could do whatever popped into my head. I know that's wishful thinking, but... um yeah.

Welll I've blabbed my head for a while and I can't think of anything else that's going on now that worth noting... OH, the other day the Dept of Agriculture came in to do their routine random audit for scan accuracy and we did awesome. The last time he came in to do this we had 11 discrepancies; this time we had 4 and if 3 of those things had had signs like they were supposed to we would have have only one thing wrong and that's a huge improvement. I was elated because it showed that I've been doing a pretty good job of making sure things are cool, and it gave me some confidence moving forward on my regularly scheduled audits throughout the store that I should not be finding that many errors as I go. Makes my job easier, and it makes the store look better. My goal now is for there to be 0 errors next time they come in to do this type of random 100-item audit. WOOHOO!!!

Ok, now I'm done.

Posted by djkay at 10:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

March 22, 2006

Snowing....

So, not only did it snow last night... IT WAS STILL SNOWING THIS MORNING!!!! And it continued to snow until part way through the afternoon. I took some pictures this morning, as well as a couple of movies with the digital camera, but I won't be able to get them posted online until later after I get home from work.

Check them out on nm.computerdave.net.

Yeah, so it was only a lousy couple-a inches, but I've been having serious withrawl issues since moving out here. I knew that it was psuedo-desert, but DAMN! Plus it's like people out here have never seen frozen water, it was crazy; I'm the only one going the speed-limit (75 MPH) on the highway, and people are giving me looks like I'm crazy. Get a clue dude, I'm from New England where we laugh at dustings like this and just jam the accelerator!!!! YEEEEHAAW!!!

Posted by djkay at 10:18 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

March 12, 2006

SNOW!!!!

It finally snowed this morning/last night!!!! Nothing much, but it's the first snow we've seen since getting out here to the American Southwest, and it's also the first precipitation of any kind since before Thanksgiving. I took some pictures after I got to work today and have posted them here: nm.computerdave.net. These pictures are of the Sandia Crest to the North of Albuquerque in the Rocky Mountain Range in North-Central New Mexico.

Posted by djkay at 5:45 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

December 13, 2005

Christmas Tree

Ok, I finally got the pictures of our Christmas tree posted. Check it out.

This weekend we have a party to go to on Friday night that a co-worker of mine is having, and then I have a holiday dinner to go to on Saturday with the Leadership from my store (sorry, no Erin at that one), and then on Sunday we're going to see the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra perform Handel's Messiah! Exciting, plus my family gets out here 2 weeks from tomorrow!!!!!!!

Posted by djkay at 11:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

November 25, 2005

Thanksgiving

Yesterday was Thanksgiving... we had Stephanie and Andy over and grilled a turkey. We had mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce, stuffing, gravy, crescent rolls, and sparkling cider. It was great and the food was delicious. We finished it all off with pumpking pie, cake, ice cream and coffee.

Today, I decided to join the masses of crazy people out to get the "Black Friday" sales. I actually made out pretty good, I got 7 new pairs of jeans and a few new Gamecube games that I've been wanting for a while. I've updated the list above because I did buy a couple of things that were on that list... oops, sorry. Hopefully no one had gotten any of those things for me so that they don't have to worry about duplicating something I now have, or dealing with taking something back.

Posted by djkay at 4:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

November 1, 2005

Halloween 2005

We were totally excited about decorating and handing out candy, here's some pictures/videos of the porch after we were done.

We had about 15 trick-or-treaters, and we handed out about half of the candy we had; not counting all the candy we ate before Halloween! We had a great time doing it and hopefully we'll be able to do more next year.

Posted by djkay at 6:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

October 9, 2005

There's someone for everyone

Find a guy who calls you beautiful instead of hot. Who calls you back when you hang up on him. Who will lie under the stars and listen to your heartbeat, or will stay awake just to watch you sleep.... Wait for the boy who pursues you, who kisses your forehead, who wants to show you off to the world when you are in sweats. Who holds your hand in front of his friends. Who thinks you're the prettiest when you have no make up on and insists on holding you around the waist. The one who is constantly reminding you of how much he cares and how lucky he is to have you... The one who turns to his friends and says "thats her" ~ Anon

Posted by djkay at 2:43 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)