A RANDOM, BORING LETTER FROM HOME...

...plus, a picture at the end. Is that enticement or what?

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That Does Or Does Not Compute: I love laptop computers. Back in the days when I used to bang away at my desktop, I had no idea all of that technology could be shoved into something small enough for use while sitting in an easy chair. Maybe someday they'll make a waterproof model that you can use in the bathtub. Wait, no, there's still that whole electricity/water issue, so that's probably not gonna happen. The problem is that the Laptop Computer is so portable that it finds itself in situations a Desktop never encounters. Such as, placing the Laptop on top of a shelf, or perhaps another chair, or maybe even on the floor 'cos you've gotta get up and do something else. "Calls of Nature" can be hazardous to the Laptop's health. One such call happened to me, so I placed my Laptop on another chair, only I didn't place it well enough, and THUD, it hit the floor. Right after that my Wireless network didn't work anymore. My computer's wireless receiver was toast.

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Lucky for me, there was another way to get online; I located my long-lost ethernet cable, plugged one end into the modem, the other into my Laptop, and voila, it worked. The only thing is, when you have to physically connect the Laptop into the modem, it ceases to be portable. Ya can't ride the horse until after you untie it, after all. Yesterday, I took my Laptop to a little shop where GeekSpeak is conducted, and was informed that my wireless mechanism was too difficult to easily get to and that they'd have to charge me a lot of labor. Instead, the GeekGuy at the Geekshop told me to go to Radio Shack and get a wireless adapter. I spent three hours last night trying to get it to work; I was bounced from one tech support person to another, and nothing could be done. My computer was receiving the signal, but the signal couldn't connect it to the internet. Ah, but this issue resolved itself today:

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A representative from my internet/tv/phone provider was due to make a house call today, and he also ended up programming my Laptop. I guess service reps have to have Electrical Engineering degrees, doctorates in Computer Science, and have to be brave enough to climb up a telephone pole to in blinding Oregon Coast Rain to raise the TV cable attached to my house.He was a knight in shining armor, only he had no armor 'cos he was driving a van. I guess the van was armor enough. I still don't know what he did my computer to make the Wireless adapter work. Hey, I guess as long as the buttons work and the connections connect, I'm happy. A case of where Igorance is indeed Bliss.

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Thank You ,Thank You Very Much: While at Wal-Mart one rainy day, I looked deep into a bin of CD's that were priced at Five Bucks Each, and found an Elvis Presley CD; the afternoon performance of the "Aloha From Satellite" concert, performed in 1973. While the Evening performance has been available since that time, the Afternoon Concert wasn't released until 1995; I'd never seen that CD before. Both Afternoon and Evening Performances consist of the same songs in the same order; the idea being that if a mistake was made in one performance, an edit could be pulled from the other. The "Aloha From Satellite" concertwas beamed up to, and bounced back down from a satellite, the first time a concert was relayed in that manner. I don't know if Wal-Marts around the nation have that particular CD, but the local Wal-Mart sure did. So, if you have to go there for some particular reason, you might as well stop by the CD bargain bin; you never know what you'll find there.
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A Further Indication That I'm Falling Apart: Last year, I tried to get glasses from a large local optical firm, but try as they might, they couldn't cut a pair of lenses for me. Something about one eye being too different from the other in terms of focal range. Now, before you growl at me for what I have to say, remember, I tried to give the local optical firm my business. This time around, I went to the visual centerfranchise inside Wal-Mart. Wal-mart! How could I? Well, I did. And if they can cut me a pair of glasses, I'm gonna take 'em down to the Local Optical Firm and rub their noses in the fact that Wal-Mart outdid them! (Well, I'm thinking about doing that...) Anyway, I know I've mentioned Wal-Mart quite a bit in this post, but remember that local people work there too; at least that's what I tell myself when I go in there.

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Is This Worth A Thousand Words? The huge watercraft pictured here, the mighty "Santiago Basin" out of Hong Kong, (which will never be mistaken for a luxury liner), waits for truckloads of logs to arrive, after which one of its three cranes picks up an entire truckload as if it was a toothpicks. It looks like it has a little red submersible craft attached to it (that red thing mounted on the back), although I have no idea why it's there. This was taken yesterday. There's no truth to the rumor that when this boat enters the bay, the water level rises three feet. Heck, not even the recent Tsunami could do that. Me, I'm amazed that it can hold hundreds of truckloads of logs and still be able to float. The logging trucks that pull up alongside this boat look like tinker-toys in comparison; the highest log doesn't even come up to the top of the "Pacific Basin" lettering on the bow.

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And with that, my work here is done. This addition to the Information Superhighway is now formally closwed now that you've been tittilated, amused, and informed by the writings contained herein (I hope). There are certainly worse ways for someone to pass the time (I think).

STAYING UP ALL NIGHT FOR THE TSUNAMI...
...it's coming, it's coming, they were telling us...
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I stay up late most of the time, and maybe I shouldn't do that. I can't sleep if I know something out there's trying to get me. Early Friday morning, I was surfing the web and encountered a news update on the Yahoo site, something about a huge earthquake which devasted Japan. So I switched on the TV, and found out that a huge Tsunami was heading eastward across the Pacific Ocean, putting the entire West Coast of the good ol' USA in jeopardy. "Yikes!", my brain went, and I knew I wasn't gonna be able to get to sleep until I found out more. Breathless newscasters, endlessly repeating themselves over and over again with the same information, all wondering about the tide pulling waay out, which would announce the coming of a mighty ocean wave; they were getting hysterical and were becoming more difficult to listen to by the minute, speculating, "when will it arrive?" and "how big's the Tsunami waves 'sposed to be?" Then a weather guy came on the screen, and said that the Tsunami's course had been plotted, and the biggest thrust was basically heading further south than Coos Bay, where I'm at. Next, I went to the local paper's website and looked up the Tide Tables. High Tide was at about 11:45pm Thursday evening, which meant the tide was falling as the Tsunami headed eastward Friday morning. So it's not really because of the Tsunami that the tide was going out. The tide was going out anyway, which worked in our favor; there would be no High Tide which would make the tsunami-inflated water level not as high as it could've been.
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As the newscasters began speculating about the possible devastation, and emergency procedures, and readings that Tsunami-sensing buoys near Hawaii were providing, they all began trying to get various Tidal experts to speculate how much higher the water levels would be when the big waves finally got here, and they came across with a height figure of about 2 and a half meters, which is somewhere between 6 and 7 feet. Knowledge is power, and the more I knew, the safer I felt, because my neighborhood sits on a bluff about 50-60 feet above sea level. 50 feet minus the 7-foot tide prediction meant I had 43 feet to play with. Plus the fact that my house sits about 20 feet higher than the 50 foot bluff meant that by a fairly long shot, I'd be safe. But I still couldn't bear to go to sleep until the Tsunami actually got here, even though my house is higher up than the local fire station, where people can go to wait out the Tsunami. I knew all this logically, but that didn't make any difference.
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The Talking Heads kept saying the Tsunami would encounter my portion of the coast at 7:15am Friday. So I Had to stay up until at least then. I couldn't rest until I saw it for myself. Just after 7am, I walked over the road that borders the bay, and I thought "everyone's gonna think I'm some kind of wacko for doing this". However, that wasn't the case. 7:15 in the morning, and people were gathered by the side of the road, looking out onto the bay, to see this Big Event that everyone was talking about. I realize that on other areas of the coast, people were seriously impacted by the rising Tsunami-related tide levels, but here, it was the Tsunami that never happened, sort of like the Kouhoutek Comet or Geraldo Rivera's futile attempt at discovering treasure on network TV.

This photo looks almost straight down onto the bay. You can see a full-size seagull down there, looking for food. It was taken from the 50-foot bluff I referred to earlier. The bay at this point is half-a-mile wide, if not wider. Then there's a strip of land (a "spit") between the bay and the ocean. The wave would have to go over that spit before it got to us locals. Thankfully, it didn't happen. Obviously, Mr. Seagull didn't care one way or another.

This photo looks south, and at middle left, you can see a bluff with a white building on top, about 4 miles down the bay. It's the Coast Guard Tower, and at the right, is where the Ocean meets the bay, and if the tide's high, you can see waves crashing on that bluff. There really wasn't a whole lot of water activity there as far as I could see. That bluff is about 20 feet higher than the bluff I was standing on, and the bay looks fairly placid. The tide is low, and near the bottom of the photo, a shallow portion of the bay is exposed. The seaport town of Charleston is located just east of the Tower (off the left side of the photo) and I understand there was some structural damage to the docking area. Lots of fishing boats dock there, I'd imagine boats were bumping into docks, perhaps docks bumping into other docks. A friend of mine lives in his docked boat; I hope he's okay. Of course, Charleston is right at Zero Feet above sea level; not a great place to be during an approaching Tsunami.
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Back to Friday morning, I'd been hanging out on my Perch of Safety for a long while, and had been up for close to 20 hours straight; it came time to head back home and catch some ZZZZ's, Tsunami or no. I woke up that afternoon, and drove into town to see if any other places were devastated. By then, the sun had come out, and before heading up the highway, I took this shot out of my car window. It was still fairly windy, but as far as I can tell, this particular section of Coast was spared the agonies of devastation. Local school districts here had been closed, and a shopping mall in North Bend, near here, decided not to open for business. It's located where the bay comes up and around, and is close to sea level; better to err on the side of caution. Further north, up around Tillamook, where there's a lot of relatively flat territory, people were heading to safe places, in some cases going up over the Coastal mountain range, towards the Willamette Valley. Gold Beach, which is about 60 miles south of here, experienced some damage in its harbor; Brookings, which is close to the California border, experienced some really high tides, and in Crescent City, California, a town which is built near the harbor, there was a lot of boat, dock and structural damage. Back here, some of downtown Coos Bay is actually on land that was scooped up out of the bay long ago, and there was no damage that I could see. So many in this area got off easy this time around. But I think I'm going to get what's known as a "72 hour kit" together and put it in the trunk of my car. Such kits consist of foods, a can opener, a flashlight, bottled water and other necessities, just in case things are worse the next time around.
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In no way was this post meant to trivialize the suffering that the nation of Japan is experiencing right now. The news footage from over there is just terrible. This world can seem very big most of the time, and it's events like this that show just how vulnerable we all are. The earth's crust isn't all that thick, and we're all just running to and fro on top of it. Let's hope Mother Earth calms down for a while.

PHOTOGRAPHY WITH WILD ABANDON...

...or, the coastline near Bandon, Oregon...

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I posted some photos of Cape Blanco last month, and on the way back from there, I stopped off in Bandon to take some more photos, which are unpublished until now. (You can find the Cape Blanco photos by scrolling down, or failing that, going to the Feb. 2011 archive.) I'd wanted to spend some time on the Bandon beach. The last time I went here, I was pressed for time. So anyway, come to the ocean with me...
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Left: 200 feet above the ocean, looking north towards Cape Arago, 25 miles away. Right: Seastacks scattered on the beach, looking south.
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Left: some expensive real estate out there with lots of lumber scattered around. Right: The big staircase provides beach access.
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Left (and right): Down on the beach, among the seastacks. Some of the smaller rocks are white agate-type stones, rounded off by erosion.
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Left: Seastack with seagull perched on top. Right: Coast Guard ship a few miles out. I had to wait for the ship to position itself. Fairly warm, but Windy.

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Left: The same ship, further out while waves crash on that big rock. Right: The beach curves around to another set of steps and a hilly path.
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Left: The sun is sinking low, and I've returned back to where I started. Right: A huge set of seastacks, with a hole that waves churn through.

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Left: A group of high school runners stretching before their evening run. Right: A gorgeous sunset from high above. Colors by Ma Nature.

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After climbing up the stairs and then on the steep pathway back up to the top showed me exactly how far out-of-shape I am. After that last photo, I had to hurry up and get out of there; I figured there was half-an-hour of light left and home is close to 30 miles away, and I made it just before Total Darkness set in. My night vision's not what it used to be. But I definitely wanna come back down here and spend more time.

GENTLEMEN, START YOUR ENGINES...
...the Car Engine, not the Search Engine...
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First it was the Cell Phone. Drivers who use cell phones have more accidents than those who do not. Whether or not the cell phone is being held while yakking away, the outcome is the same. Well, John Q. Public, there's something else to watch out for, and that's Drivers who use the WORLD WIDE WEB while driving! I can relate to this whole Web Thing, 'cos I'm online quite a lot, and it takes all of my psychic energy to navigate the Web. In fact, while online, I'm less effective at doing other things; I miss plot lines in TV Shows, entire football or baseball games fly by, and were it not for instant replay, I wouldn't know what just happened. I've always been like that; multi-tasking and me don't agree. Since I'm not someone else, I have no idea how it affects others, but Surfing The Web While Driving can not be a good thing...? State Farm Insurance polled 900 drivers recently and 19% of them said they surfed the web while driving. Well, up go the insurance rates...or at least, a good reason for Insurers to Charge More...
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THE EYE OF A NEWT: Here's a dubious political development...Newt Gingrich (who lives up to his first name) has said he expects to be a Republican Presidential Nominee in 2012. Isn't he the former political bigwig whose wife died in the hospital, but before she died he was already dating someone else...? He's an annoying little guy whose best years are behind him, and Sarah Palin would look like a liberal next to him. Oh my gawd, I've just had visions of a Palin/Gingrich ticket...Excuse me for a bit, I feel a little green in the gills...if this is the best that the Republicans can come up with, welcome to a 2nd term, Mr. Obama.
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PORK FOR PORK: It's been a long time since I've eaten a Pork Chop. They're good and I love 'em. 82 million Americans can't be wrong; that's how many of us consume Pork in one version or another. Pork, of course, used to be ballyhooed as being "The Other White Meat". However, The National Pork Board (yes, there is actually one), doesn't think "The Other White Meat" is usable anymore; it's out of fashion, old hat, irrelevant, and no longer effective, so says the Pork Board. The new Pork slogan they've just adopted, after probably paying an inflated amount for some ritzy ad agency to come up with, is: "Pork: Be Inspired". How about that, "pork" for Pork! I never 'sausage' a slogan, and while I think Sausage/Egg/McMuffins are great, and while they postpone my appetite for a while, they don't inspire me.
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PLEASE PASS THE TOE JAM: Have you heard about this yet? A diabetic guy in Roseburg, Oregon (my neighborhood, roughly), woke up from a nap to find out his dog had Eaten His Toes! Evidently it's an instinctive thing in a dog's nature to removed diseased flesh from its Human. This isn't the first case; back in December, a dog ate the toes of a 10-year old Illinois girl; she had a sore on her foot. The only human food I can think of that would even come close are Mushrooms, breaded or otherwise. Chomp! By the way, the guy in Oregon is giving up ownership of his dog. Good thing, probably; otherwise perhaps he'd wake up with Fingers missing one fine day.
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A HOLLYWOOD DOPE: Here's the latest dope on an actor, or the latest actor on dope, whichever you prefer. Charlie Sheen, who thinks he's better and more worthy than you or I or the Rest of the world, has been fired from the alleged 'hit' TV series, 2 and a half men. In the wake of his absence, the show will be re-titled "Two Men". And, right before I set this post into motion, I found out elsewhere on the 'net that he's hired some sort of Understudy. An understudy. For a non-employed actor. Oh, and in case you wondered about this Sheen photo, he's not waving to the crowd. He's flipping the bird five times in one collective gesture to people he thinks just might be fans of his. It's these people we glorify by bothering to actually watch them trying to act their way through sub-par scripts for useless, totally irrelevant TV shows and/or movies. I actually thot Sheen did a good job of replacing Michael J. Fox on the "Spin City" series a few years back, but whatever positive qualities people attributed to him are now gone, long gone. Good riddance.
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A little closer to home, these two structures are near my house. The first structure just has to qualify as the Original Haunted House looms over the neighborhood. The owner puts Goats in the yard instead of hiring a neighborhood kid to mow the grass. And, I'm not sure if that Pink House is the one John Mellencamp wrote a song about, but it's just about the ugliest and most garish house I've ever seen. A pink house! I'm gonna have to read over the county zoning laws; a big Pink House has just got to be a violation of some code or other. The Pink House's owner has got me a little bit confused. He's cutting down a few trees on his property, which means my house gets more sun, but yet I love trees too. I think living in a Pink House is a Cry for Help. "Help! Send Paint! Anything but Pink!" It's probably safe to say that there ain't no man-caves in a Pink House.
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So what's the overall theme of this post? Most of the above stuff was gleaned from a Newspaper. Conditions for newspapers are not favorable in this day and age, but I can't think of a better way to enjoy a cup of coffee than to have a newspaper at tableside. So I salute newspaper publishers everywhere for enriching my life.