Thursday, January 26, 2006

 
A COUPLE OF DAYS IN ORLANDO


Spent several hours last week reloading all the files from several different “saves” on my laptop. I had been planning on reformatting my harddrive for quite some time, but the breakdown finally forced the issue. So there were five different sets of CD’’s containing the data from different times. Some of it was repetitive, so this process included consolidation and deletion, and the result is a clean collection of data with no repeats. I just took a look at what I have for contents now in my Docs and it is 5.97 GB: 13,519 files, 423 folders! I still have not loaded the files I took off my old desktop, and very little of that is repeat, so this shall grow a bit more. Most of it is photos, thousands and thousands of photos- I love digital photography!
Tuesday, I headed down to Orlando, did two days, stayed overnight in my van. Spent most of day one at Islands of Adventure; day two at Universal. But first checked at the Margaritaville Store at City Walk and they still haven't gotten the lock open. They say they are
going to replace the whole thing, but I don't think they have much of a rush on it: except for my interest in shooting the Nancy Blauers’ piece, they really have no reason or need to open it anyway.
After leaving the store, headed into IOA, and spent most of day one at Seuss Landing: that could
stand alone as a theme park all by itself- really great job they did! Being January, it wasn't very
crowded, so I got to “ride through” on most rides, which was nice. Cat in the Hat is just wonderful. Got a couple of shots with Thing 1 and Thing 2, and the Cat himself. Then watched Thing 1 and 2 hamming it up with other guests: at one point one guest and the Things all stood on their heads! Also did Hulk, Spidey, and Dr Doom. Spidey is probably the best all around ride experience there is: they really put it all together for that one.
Wednesday, I did ET a couple of times, and ran into a couple of ladies that had stopped to talk to me in the parking lot. They had become interested in my book URL they saw on the back of my van as they drove in behind me, and then commented on my Pride Go-Go scooter: they had one too. But they claimed problems and it turned out to be the short life of the battery charge, as I had had with mine, so I showed them my extra battery pack I had made and directed them to my blog for details. Anyway, I ran into them again at ET, and we hung together for Woody Woodpeckers kiddie coaster, while we waited for the Animal Planet show. I talked one of them
into it, (the other was all for it) and we all had a great ride, then we the headed over to the Animal Planet show. After that, I took them over to a little park area that few know about and they had lunch while I laid down on the grass for a rest. They headed over to Men In Black while I continued to rest. Later as I was heading out, they called out to me from the line for Shrek 4D and we chatted a bit more, but I declined going in, as I was pretty beat by then.
As I left Universal Studios, I remembered that I needed to head over ot the Royal Pacific Resort to reshoot some of the great carving that decorates that place. So I got on the water shuttle and took the short cruise down the man made canal and headed on in, this time, knowing exactly where to go. I did the shoot, and then laid on on the beach while I waited for a return boat. The sun was in my face, and the warmth felt good on this not so hot day. After a while I saw the boat go by heading for the nearby dock, and went over to board for the return trip to City Walk.
Undecided whether to go home or stay for another night, I rested in my van, and actually slept for about 90 minutes, then decided to head home. I had been thinking of trying to stay “on the road” for the rest of the week: I do want to go explore the Tampa area at some time, so was thinking along those lines, but just wasn't up to it this time.
Oh! Spent the first evening at a movie, Hoodwinked. Oh my! If you like Barney, you might enjoy this film. If it had been presented as a school project by 5 year olds, I would have been amused. The animation was almost embarrassing, and distracting in its stiffness; the writing was disjointed and forced, the “plot” was never announced or maybe the writer never decided; just a bloody mess. 4 to 5 year olds, might be amused for a while... Can't imagine how this even got released! But don't let me discourage you: if you want to see it, you might enjoy it! There were some funny moments… er, instants… but they were irrelevant, as if in the process of making it, someone came up with a joke so they threw it in the movie wherever they were... This one gets no stars, and in fact, owes me one for sitting through it!
Hey! Maybe instead of seeing that movie, you can drop me a note and spend a pleasant evening reading a free eVersion of my novel?
:)
Jud

Thursday, January 19, 2006

 
An exceptional collection of wildlife photos!

-Jud

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

 
I received my laptop back on Tuesday, 17 Jan, new harddrive, new cooling fan, new heatsink, and spent the next 24 hours downloading updates. I am back!
-Jud

Monday, January 09, 2006

 
Well, afer four days of calling Toshiba, and talking to several different operators, I finally got the okay to return the puter for replacement of the harddrive they installed three weeks ago, so in a few minutes, I shall once again be without my puter! See you soon!
Meanwhile, go ahead and scroll down and check out some of those links, especially the photo links in "Ketchup".
Enjoy!

-Jud

Friday, January 06, 2006

 
Puter troubles go on!

Have been having some troubles with my newly repaired just back from the shop after 5 weeks laptop, and a friend suggested I take a look at the event viewer which tracks what happens on your puter.
Well, I found event viewer via search and boy is that fascinating! Anyway, was checking one of the things- and yesterday there were about 60 alerts re the hard drive not pinging, then today one read, "1/5/2006 9:06:56 AM: The driver has detected that \device\Harddrsk\DR1 has predicted that it will fail. Immediately back up your data and replace your hard disk drive. A failure may be imminent."
Oye!

I called Toshiba, given that they replaced the HD when it was in the shop and they told me I had to try reformatting first- ugh! But given the noises I have been hearing from the HD, I don't have much hope, and am irritated (mildly) that I will have to spend three days DL’ing updates just to prove that the HD is bad before I send it in and then wait who knows how long for my ptuer to be back. Thing is, if I leave it on, it works good enough, with a few hang-ups now and then, but for how long, so gotta do it!

Oh well...
-Jud

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