Archive for the ‘True Stories’ Category

Grandsons and Computer Monitors

Monday, July 12th, 2010

I don’t let my grandsons anywhere near my computer, so they cannot be blamed for the problem that this article is actually about. If I had simply titled this “Computer Monitor” it would not attract much attention and few people would want to read it. The article is not actually about my grandsons or anyone else’s – although I suppose those people mentioned herein do, or did, have grandparents.

My wife and I will often have our grandsons over to the house for a few hours. This gives the boy’s parents a break – something all parents need. If the weather is nice outside, that is where we will spend most of the visiting time. If not, there are plenty of toys for them in the house. In either case we will closely monitor their activities.

Speaking of monitors, the other day I turned on my computer and monitor. But the monitor did not come on. The power on light emitting diode did not emit any light. I plugged the power cord into a different outlet. Still nothing on the monitor lit up. So I tried a different power cord – no change. I switched back and forth a couple of times and kept trying the power on/off switch. Never did it ever come on.

The very first computers did not have monitors. Actually the first computers were people – people who computed. Hence they were called computers. The first non-living computer was designed by Charles Babbage. It was called a Difference Engine. It didn’t do quite all of the things that today’s computers do. In fact it was only designed to calculate numerical tables.

Now maybe Babbage’s computer did not need a monitor. Or maybe he got sidetracked and never got around to designing a monitor for it. You see, he did get involved in sports for a while as evidenced by his inventing the cow catcher in 1838. But I don’t think that game ever caught on. Or maybe it’s a United Kingdom thing.

But eventually computers started to come equipped with monitors (no thanks to Babbage). My very first computer, a Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I came with a 12” black and white television set that was converted to receive and display computer data instead of television signals.

The rumor is that Tandy Corporation was so uncertain of the sales of the TRS-80 Model I that the original production run was for 4000 units. The concept being that if they did not sell, each store would be able to use one. As it happened, they sold 10,000 in the first month. I can’t prove anything stated in this paragraph – so don’t hold me to it.

Back to the future (well it was the future during the TRS-80 hey-day). I went on line to check the warranty policy of the manufacture of my non-functioning monitor. If the monitor was less than three years old they would email me a label for me to ship it back in the original packing and box. And, no surprise, I would need to supply the the original purchase receipt. Upon receipt of the defective unit, they would ship me a refurbished monitor.

I have the original packing and probably have the receipt. Due to my office perpetually being in a state of serious disarray, I’ve no clue where the original receipt is located. On an old Visa statement I found a transaction that I believe is the purchase of this monitor along with some other item(s). The month was September, 2007. But being within the three years does not help if I can’t find the receipt.

The monitor was purchased at Best Buy. In my looking I found some other Best Buy receipts. These were all so faded that I could not be sure what purchases they covered. In each case I could read just enough to know it was NOT the receipt I needed. So I do know that I did not have in hand the correct receipt at any time that day.

Well, I spent quite a bit of time going through the mess in my office looking for that receipt but never found it. I figure if I find it in time I can send the monitor in for replacement and then we will have a spare monitor. Next step: shopping.

I checked a couple of places on line but did not see anything that justified the wait for shipping. So then I checked Best Buy and Radio Shack. With Radio Shack I got the impression that I would have to wait for the monitor of my choice to be shipped to the store. The best deals at Best Buy also were “on line only”.

(more…)

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Ten Days Ago

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

It was ten days ago. Ten long, thoughtful days ago. I had been wanting the adventure – no, adventure is not the right word. The experience – yes, I had been wanting the experience for a long time. Still, how could I know just what awaited me?

My wife, though not one of us, went with me. She bravely sat at my side throughout the whole thing. We arrived early. We stayed for the full event. She knew some of the people, I did not.

Second by second the time ticked by. Each participant spoke the words they had come to say. Some scientific, some of personal history, some of nature, some of death, and more. The range of topics was limited only by the number of participants present. No, not even that number was the limit as some covered more than a single subject.

The subject of death: that was mine. We were to speak words recently assembled, but my words were from nearly four decades ago. I had brought with me words written a long time ago because I did not know what the rules were. But I did not hide it. In fact, the very words themselves revealed the time lapse. I am not ashamed. The words were good. The story they told was not.

Even though she is not one of us, Margaret was also required to speak some words. She asked me to recommend some of my words for her to speak. I did. She spoke them. She did well.

And then we were required to prove our ability by putting together words that related to a subject that was announced just before we started the creation of the new sentences and paragraphs. Although it may not be the intent of our host, this procedure would prove that the words we were soon to speak were truly structured by none other than ourselves. After all, who could say that the words I spoke on death were arranged by me? I could, but who else?

And so we did. It was scary. It is my habit to arrange words and rearrange them and often do that repeatedly before I consider them worthy of presenting to others. Even then I am not always so sure. But I did as required. I put together words about – toothpaste. And, even though she is not one of us, my wife did so also. And she did well.

The task was enabled by a chemical supplement: a product originating in the equatorial territory of the Americas. The product is made from a bean which comes from a pod which grows on a tree. The bean is fermented and roasted and further processed until it becomes the thick pellet we were given. It’s powers are nothing less than magical. All at the event were able to produce sentences that met the requirements of our host. For me, I am sure it was the cacao bean that made the difference.

So was the experience what I expected? No, not quite. I had anticipated true critiques of the word packages provided by each of us. That was not provided. In a way it was a relief. I was prepared for negative feedback on my words, but I’m not so sure I could reciprocate. And that would not be fair.

The group comes together on a regular schedule. The next time is four days from now. Will I be there? No, I will not. I’ll not stay away because of my concern stated in the previous paragraph. As it happens, I’ll be traveling to another state on the day of the meeting.

Will I assemble with these people in the future? Yes. After all, while I am required to sit through whatever words they wish to speak, regardless of my interest, or lack of interest, in the subject, this provides a reciprocal advantage. They must listen to whatever I choose to speak of, regardless of their interest, or lack of interest. In other words, I have what all writers want: a captive audience.

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Bid Box Sale

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

Do you like to have yard sales? Or garage sales, sidewalk sales, or moving sales? I don’t.

The reason I don’t like to host such a sale is because I’m not good at bargaining. If I place a price of $12 for an item, I want $12 for that item. The other side of that token is that if I see something I wish to buy is priced at $12, I expect to pay $12 for it. If it’s not worth $12 to me, it’s likely I won’t buy it.

But that’s not the way it’s usually done. I remember taking a couple of items to a sale my sister was hosting a long time ago. I don’t recall the items but I do recall that when I sold an item (at a price less than I had been asking) I was left feeling that had I held out, I could have gotten more money for it. Likewise, if I did hold out, then failed to sell the item, I regretted not taking the best offer I had received.

Some months after that event, I found myself in the position of needing to sell the furnishings of a small house. Remembering my sister’s sale, I developed a system I call the Bid Box sale. It is sort of a silent auction – with variations. The first step was to set a threshold. I believe I set it at $25. Mind you, this was almost three decades ago, so some of the details I relate here may be inaccurate. The threshold was the dividing line between what would fall into the Bid Box grouping and what would not. Items priced at the threshold amount and above would be Bid Box items and subject to the Bid Box rules.

Next I prepared a small box with a slot in the top, much like the box you might put your ticket in for a drawing. I also prepared a number of slips of paper with a place to write a name, phone number, item name, bid amount, date, and time. I believe I included a comments field, also. If I didn’t, it would have been a good idea. The date and time were in case of two or more identical bids for the same object.

It worked like this: Everything priced below the threshold you could purchase for the price stated – or you could try (and usually succeed) to talk me down on the price. But not so for the Bid Box items. For them there was no haggling.

Mind you, you could purchase a Bid Box item for it’s stated price. That made me happy and you got to take the item home immediately. However, if you wanted to bargain me down, it didn’t work that way. You could put in a bid for the item by filling out a slip with all the pertinent information. The bid did not obligate you. Nor was I required to accept your bid – even if it was the highest. The bids were not checked until the end of the sale which was at 6:00 pm on Sunday. These points were emphasized to the bidder prior to their submission of a bid.

That three day sale (Friday through Sunday) was quite successful. I sold almost everything (above the threshold) at an acceptable price. No regretting having refused a low price. No getting stuck with something left unsold because I hoped for more than was offered. Here are a few of the items and what the sales results were. All the other Bid Box items not listed here sold at satisfactory prices.

A couch that I priced at $140. On the second day of the sale a gentleman came by and offered me $120. I explained the Bid Box system and he placed a bid for $120. He walked back to his pickup on the street, then turned around, came back to me and bought the couch for the full $140.

A compact washer-dryer set priced at $150. A few bids were placed. One was for $140. but when I contacted them Sunday evening, they said that they had changed their minds. I believe that they found another set elsewhere and purchased it. The next highest bid was for $125. That bidder did purchase it for that amount.

A television set priced at $100. A man came by on Friday and offered $50. He would not place a bid. He came back on Saturday and offered $60. He still would not place a bid. In the meantime others were putting bids in the box. The man came back later on Saturday and offered an even higher bid. I don’t recall the exact amounts of all of his bids. He came twice on Sunday. Each time he raised his offer and each time he would not place a bid. Then he came back a third time on Sunday. It was just before the sale was to close. This time he gave me the full $100 asking price.

My favorite bid incident was the only major item I did not sell. It was a teletype machine that had an adapter board which allowed it to be used as a computer printer. When I purchased it used, to use with my Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I computer, the printers that were on the market were in the $1000 and up range. I paid $600 for this machine.

By the time of this sale the prices of personal computer printers had dropped considerably. I had a newer and better printer for my computer. The teletype machine had virtually no value. I decided to price it at $100. I would have been thrilled to get that price – or even half of it. Nobody offered me full price and only one person placed a bid for it. The bid was for the grand sum of one dollar. Just one.

I declined the bid. I took the machine with me to my new home in another state. After I had been living there for a few months I realized it was time to try to sell the teletype for whatever I could get. I placed an ad with the asking price of $125. I was prepared to drop the price as needed to – well, probably to as little as $10 or $15. I received only one inquiry. That person bought the teletype for the full $125 that I was asking. It was worth rejecting the bid offer and hauling the machine nearly 200 miles.

As you can see, the Bid Box sale really worked out well for me. Without it I know I’d have let the TV and couch go for less than I got for them. The same is likely true for the washer-dryer set. Or maybe I would have been stuck with some of these items left unsold. As for the teletype, who knows?

If you plan on a sale which will involve several items worth more than pocket change, feel free to use my Bid Box system. I don’t care if you call it a garage sale, yard sale or moving sale. However, if it is a yard sale, please let me know. I just might come by. I could use a larger yard.

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The New Nursing Home

Monday, April 26th, 2010

Just a little note about an amusing incident. Amusing if you are me. For Margaret, not so much.

Margaret is a Registered Nurse. Actually, all nurses are registered nurses because the state requires you to have a license before they let you earn an income doing nursing work. Getting a license is registering.

But I digress. I like to do that, (digress, that is) because it helps me make a really short incident a bit longer. And the more words I use telling you that I’m not yet telling you what I started out to tell you, the longer it will take me to tell you whatever it was that I was going to tell you. What was I going to tell you, anyhow?

Oh, yeah! I remember. Margaret is a Registered Nurse as in RN vs a Licensed Practical Nurse as in LPN. In other words she went to school longer than LPNs do.

Margaret works in a nursing home. She has worked in nursing homes for most of the time we have spent as a married couple. And that is nearly two decades. Two very good decades, I would like to point out. But I digress. I like to . . . Oh, never mind.

It is very common for her to receive an occasional mail solicitation from a medical facility (nursing home or hospital, etc.), suggesting she contact them about an employment opportunity. This is especially true when a new facility opens in the local area. Or in the not so local area. Sometimes even out of state.

Recently, we have had two new hospitals open in Lafayette. Even more recently a new nursing home opened in town. Today the mail carrier delivered a large post card from this new nursing home. It was addressed to my darling wife, Margaret. Well, let me clarify that – it was not addressed to: Ms. My Darling Wife Margaret. It was addressed to: Ms. Margaret Deedon.

So it was addressed to Margaret, not to me. Why would I think it might have been addressed to me? Margaret is ten years younger than I am. I won’t tell her age but I am . . . uh, forget that. Anyway, she is ten years younger than I and we are both in pretty good health. So there is no reason that those sending out the postcards might think she is not a possible prospective employee. None at all.

So as I looked at this postcard sent to my (ten years younger than I am) wife, I noticed that they were not seeking employees. They were suggesting that she “Reserve your private suite now. . .” In other words, they want her as a resident!!

I’ll come and visit you once in a while, Margaret.

ROFL

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Cletus Koors

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

In Lafayette, Indiana, there is a company called SIA. SIA stands for Subaru of Indiana Automotive, Inc. Originally the “I” stood for Isuzu but they dropped out of the agreement a few years ago. I work for US Security Associates (USSA). SIA contracts with USSA for security services.

This year March 13th was the night of the annual awards banquet for the SIA group of the USSA employees. It is often referred to as our Christmas party, but it is a bit off season. It either runs from one to three months late, or from nine to eleven months early. I’ve never been sure which. Regardless, it matters little as there are no Christmas decorations or Christmas music. Nor is there anything else about it that would remind you of Christmas. Well, there are drawings for gift cards so I guess they could count as gifts for the lucky winners.

The company, SIA, began production in 1989 with the first Subaru coming off the line on September 11 of that year. Early in the life of the company there were some employees of SIA that also worked for USSA at SIA. Or perhaps it was employees of USSA that worked for SIA. Maybe both. A long time before I came on the scene here, a ruling was made that prohibited this “double dipping”.

There was an exception made for one Cletus Koors. This year marks Cletus’ 20th anniversary with USSA. I’ve known Cletus for seven years and have always admired and respected him for his knowledge and excellent work ethic. I’m sure these factors played a role in his being the exception to the no double dipping rule. At this year’s banquet he was given special recognition for his two decades of service to USSA. For most of the time I have known Cletus (perhaps all of the time and beyond), he has worked full time for SIA during the week and worked almost full time for USSA on the weekend. That is part of the work ethic I spoke of.

All of the above I already knew. At the banquet I learned that Cletus saved the lives of a family from a fire. He was driving past the house where he could see a fire going on and he helped the residents escape from the flames. There is no doubt he saved the lives of those people.

On another occasion he stopped to help a stranded motorist. In doing so he went out of his way to help the motorist get a part needed to get the car going again. Upon return to the vehicle they discovered it had been crashed into by a semi-truck. Police and medical rescue personnel were on the scene – searching for bodies. The body (the motorist) was safe and sound because Cletus had taken him from the scene to find the needed part. In all probability the man’s life was saved by that act of kindness performed by Cletus.

After I had been an employee of USSA for a while there was an occasion when I was nearby while Cletus and Somebody were having a discussion about something. Now my memory has dropped some of the details on this, but bear with me. I don’t recall who Somebody was so I’ll simply call him “Somebody”. (Sorry, Somebody, I have a poor memory.) I don’t recall the topic of their discussion either, so I’ll simply say “something”. Cletus and Somebody held different opinions on the matter of something.

As the discussion ended, Somebody turned to me and sought my opinion on the matter. No doubt Somebody was trying to get me to agree with him and against Cletus. I declined to express an opinion on something. The reason I gave Somebody was that I didn’t want to make Cletus mad because I knew Cletus had two interests, money and guns. And I also knew that if he got mad at me he wouldn’t throw money at me.

Now let me be perfectly clear: Never did I ever think I’d have to worry about work place violence with Cletus. Never!

Still, it never hurts to play it safe.

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Presenting THE Ken Williams

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

All of my loyal readers (all two of them) will recall the blog I posted on February 19 titled “Ken, Tom, and Deanna” in which I spoke of how I found one of the great female vocalists of the 20th century. That singer is Deanna Durbin. I also spoke of finding a very funny political satirist, Tom Lehrer.

But mostly, the article was about trying to find a friend I’d not seen or even communicated with for over four decades. That friend is Kenneth L. Williams. Wednesday evening, upon arriving home from a visit with my two grandsons, I found a voice mail from Ken Williams – the Ken Williams.

I did not find Ken, he found me. I am so happy to find that he had actually been trying to find me while I was trying to find him. He had already begun to find traces of me on the Internet a while ago. He put two and two together and got four (he always was good at math). When he ran across the above mentioned article, he did not suspect the Ken in the title was himself.

After he read the article, of course, he knew who was whom. Ken was him, Derby was me. This shows the miracle of cyber-space.

I called Ken back at the number he left and we had a lengthy conversation. Of course we didn’t catch up. You can’t catch up over forty years in just an evening. Well, unless both of your lives have been really, really dull. If there had been even the slightest bit of doubt that this was the Ken I’d known – and I don’t think there really was – a few minutes of the conversation confirmed that he knew things no other Ken Williams would have known.

Ken is the one wearing the blue sweater, I am the one not.

Ken, welcome back into my world. I can’t wait until we can get together in person.

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A Little Bit of a Love Story

Sunday, February 14th, 2010

Just a little story about when Margaret and I were first dating. For me it was pretty much love at first sight. I seriously doubted Margaret felt the same way, at least not as soon as I did. She had previously told me she did not expect she would ever get married again. It was on our second date that I decided to let her know that I thought we had a future together.

With the hope of not scaring her off, I simply told her that I knew that at that time it was too soon for her; but someday I was going to ask her to marry me, and when I did, she would accept.

When I was about the age shown in my avatar (and before Margaret was born), MGM released a musical called Thrill of a Romance. I have a CD with Michael Feinstein singing one of the songs from that movie. I had put that on the CD player and had it set up so that while I was sweet talking Margaret with my prediction, the above mentioned song was playing in the background. The song title: “Please Don’t Say No, Say Maybe.”

The irony is that Margaret did not even realize what was playing on the CD. She was paying no attention to the lyrics so she didn’t realize that my bold prediction was not backed by as much confidence as I would have liked. Then again, perhaps she was simply too enthralled with what I was saying to pay attention to the background music. Of course, I’d like to think the latter.

This September 30, we will celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary. That is 20 years of love growing stronger each day.

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Radio Repair

Monday, February 8th, 2010

The story you are about to read is true. The names have been changed to pronouns to protect the innocent – and because I don’t remember half of them. Hey, it’s been over twenty years, give me a break.

He was working in a store where, among other things, repairs were made to electronic devices.

She had brought in such a device for repair and had now come back to pick it up. She gave her name and/or a claim check.

He went and found the device. A book shelf size stereo radio. It had input jacks to allow another audio device without its own speaker set to be played though this radio. You know, a device like one of those new-fangled compact disc players. The radio also had an auxiliary, 120 volt, receptacle to make it unnecessary to find a separate outlet for the CD player.

He wrapped the cord of the radio around itself to keep it from tangling. Then he plugged the plug into the aforementioned auxiliary receptacle so it would not dangle while she carried the radio to her car. While doing so he joked, “If you plug this in here it won’t use as much electricity.”

She was pleased to learn this money saving technique.

He felt the need to confess that he had just been joking.

She looked disgusted and began to write the check to pay for the repair.

He told her that it would be twenty dollars. Then he added, “Of course, since this is a stereo radio, that will be twenty dollars for each side.”

She started to change the check to forty dollars.

He stopped her and, again, told her that he was just joking.

She completed the check for twenty dollars, took her repaired radio and left the store.

About two minutes later she came back into the store. She walked rapidly past him to another store employee. As she passed him she said, “I have a question, and I’m not going to ask you!”

Now what do you suppose got into to her?

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