Follow-up to laptop fix, and more

Hello, this time from Holbrook, AZ. I'm on vacation, woo-hoo! Tomorrow, by this time (1700), I'll be in Taos, NM, for a week of cruising the mountains of north-central NM and south-central CO. Really looking forward to that! My brother's back gave him fits at the last minute, so he opted to drive his new Hyundai instead of riding his motorcycle. Accordingly, I dropped plans of hauling my bike into the back of my pickup truck, and took off this morning in my '07 Tacoma for Taos. Holbrook just happens to be slightly more than halfway. Anyhow, this new arrangement offers some options not available if we'd done the trip on bikes; like, I brought my DV cam, and intend to shoot video each day we travel. Should make for a great documentary of our trip!
I mentioned a follow-up to the laptop fix in the message header; the Athlon 64 4000+ (San Diego core) finally arrived from Hong Kong, I dropped it in, and it's working great. I'm typing this on it now.

Sorta-new laptop

My 4+ year old laptop was starting to show its age.... still ran great, but in spite of boosting the memory to max (2 GB), and replacing the original hard drive with a speedy 7200RPM Hitachi, the Athlon64-3200+ processor was game but falling behind the times. So, I spent a few hours browsing the forums, looking for info specifically related to my HP zv6000-family laptop. Like, info regarding processor upgrade possibilities. Found out that it could be upgraded to an Athlon64-3800+, no problem. So, I found a used processor online and ordered it. Then I found some more info. The 3200 and 3800 processors are both in the same "family", called Venice. That's why the ease of upgrade. However, this motherboard is supposed to support the 1st processor in the next family of AMD cpu's; San Diego 4000+. It has the same multiplier and core speed as the 3800, but bumps the L2 cache from 512k to 1MB. That's a major boost there! So, I ordered a 4000+ from some guy on eBay. I didn't notice he was in Hong Kong! So, anyhow, it's on its way, I should have it within the next week or so. But the 3800 arrived a few days ago, and was just sitting here. Last night, I had some time, and opened up the laptop, carefully. Got down to the cpu after an hour or so of painstakingly noting every screw and part removed. Installed the 3800, put everything back together, and would you believe, it fired up and ran just great, immediately! I'm typing this post on the laptop right now. I still intend to pop the 4000+ in when it arrives, and then enjoy this laptop for maybe a couple more years.......

Sign of the Times

Here I am, with a group, on the bus, at Mount Palomar. Yes, *that* Mount Palomar. At the observatory. Miles from nowhere. No cell phone reception. But, I fire up the laptop, and guess what? There's wifi. Is that too funny, or what??

AAARRRGGGHHH!!! It's 104 degrees in Riverside! Good thing for the A/C in the bus. Good thing for a nearby Starbucks.

4th of July, in Mammoth Lakes

Hello again, my annual Independence Day trip is to Mammoth Lakes, woo-hoo! Better yet, Jacque was able to join me, WOO-HOO! It's a beautiful weekend, lows in the 40's, high in the 70's. Sun's out, a bit of a breeze blowing, just doesn't get much better. We went out to breakfast this morning, then hit a crafts fair going on here in town. I bought a lawn ornament for Jacque, a nicely made metal rendering of a family of quail (we get quail in our yard all the time). The bus is fueled and swept, the potty is clean, supplies are set up for the return trip. In other words, the bus is parked, and we're ignoring it. Jacque wasn't able to actually be on the bus (she had to work on Friday, bummer). As a result, she drove her 2000 Ford Focus, with nearly 200,000 miles on it, the 400 miles to Mammoth, thru the high desert as well as Friday afternoon traffic streaming out of L.A.! This girl will do anything for an adventure.... Anyhow, her car ran flawless, and we now have wheels to travel around the area! Yesterday, we landed up at Silver Lake, near June Lake, and were quickly "found" by the 20 trillion mosquitoes in the area. Needless to say, we didn't stay there very long. I found out that the "Minnesota" in me apparently is still strong; I killed mosquitoes left and right, deadly efficient on the first attempt. We cruised the Mammoth Lakes area, drove by several places where Jacque used to live. Today, we're going to the 3-grave-site graveyard here in town. Yup, that's right, 3 graves! Dates back to the 1880's. We both drive home tomorrow, the 5th of July. Jacque will go early, to stay ahead of the worst of the heat (no A/C in her Focus), I'll be along later, with 41 tired backpackers.

Summertime Slowdown

In years past, I keenly anticipated the annual slowdown at the bus company after schools let out. A pretty fair amount of work in April, May and June typically is what's called SPAB runs; "School Pupil Activity Bus". Basically, extracurricular runs. That's in addition to our usual collection of other runs. So, after school's out for the summer, there's a drop. Couple that with the usual reduction in our general workbase (it's nice most places in July, August and September... why go to San Diego then?), and you see it's pretty quiet for work. Time was, I was exhausted and couldn't wait for this time of year. But now, it's different. Yes, I've had some pretty sweet paychecks, and it's been "comfortable" without being insane. But it wouldn't take too many 50-hour pay periods to drop me back below an 80-hour average. Not that it's imperative I average 80 hours, it's just kind of the bellwether in my profession. So, yes, I like the lazy days, but find that I'm crimped in what I can do with those times; don't want to deficit spend on a wholesale basis. One thing's for sure; there's very little I can do to directly impact that situation, other than continuing to do my job professionally. I certainly intend to do that.....

The Never-Ending Story

Hello from Stockton, once again.... and now the grad nite is over! But not before there was more drama. This time, it was #1) dealing with Disneyland's new (flawed) plan for accommodating hundreds of buses descending on them in one evening, and #2) the continuing issue with parking our buses here in Stockton. We arrived in Anaheim, Ca (home to Disneyland) on time, around 1900, from Stockton, after driving the 388 miles with high school students. Disneyland had a new "plan" this year, and all I can say is, "back to the drawing board"..... it didn't work very well. We were fortunate, being one of the first buses there. After about an hour of standing around, wondering when we were going to be released to drop our passengers, it happened, and we were able to get off to our motel rooms for a short night's sleep. Not so lucky were the buses who came later, who faced waits of up to 3 hours!! Bad news when they were looking at a bare minimum 8 hours off before needing to return. The result, predictably, was some schools had to wait in the parking lot until their drivers could legally return. NOT good!! Anyhow, we scooped up our students and headed north to Stockton. Got them dropped off at their school, and went to our hotel. Then the fiasco began. This is NOT a nice neighborhood. Get one block off the main drag, and it looks like the worst areas of Newark. Really, that bad. We had no place to park our buses, and decided early on that parking in that ghetto was NOT the answer. Eventually, we found "tolerable" circumstances, and went to our hotel. That's where I am now, although it's about bedtime. Tomorrow (if my bus is still there), it's back to San Diego, 480 miles of deadhead.

OK, it's a couple days after my last post. So, now where am I? How about Stockton, CA? OK, I know... that's like an improvement over Barstow?? Anyhow, something kinda different about the hotel I'm staying at... I've never seen this before.... the shower has no door or curtain! There's a partial glass "water repeller", but that's all. It's a pretty posh hotel (especially for Stockton), but I thought, "my, I'll bet there's been some pretty considerable water accidents from this arrangement". Anyhow, I'm up here to take a group of high school kids to Disneyland tomorrow night for a grad nite. I've never done a 1700+ mile grad nite before! After we drop the kids at Disneyland (365 miles south of where I am right now), we go to bed at a nearby hotel, get 8 hours off, come back to Disneyland, pick up the kids, drive 365 miles back north again, drop them off, go back to this hotel with no shower doors, get another 8 hours off, then deadhead the buses back 470 miles back to San Diego! 1700 miles in 72 hours or so, geez............. Anyhow, above are a few pix of my shower without a door or curtain.....

It Gets Better... (See Previous Post)

OK, yesterday was quite the experience; military moves are renowned for last-minute itinerary overhauls. But today takes the cake. I mean, do you remember what SNAFU stands for? How about FUBAR? This was truly a FUBAR! We stayed overnight in Barstow, tasked with traveling the 42 miles out to Fort Irwin in the afternoon, pick up troops, and deposit them at Ontario (CA) airport. Simple enough. Then deadhead home to San Diego. We arrive 1.5 hours early at Irwin. No troops. Nobody to help. Our dispatcher is working the problem from her end. Finally come to find out the soldier who typed up the transportation order REVERSED the pickup/destination! Meaning, we were about to be overdue for our pickup 3 hours' drive away! No resources available in the LA area to cover for this screw-up, either. So, we battled the TONS of traffic returning to LA at the end of the weekend, pick up up our personnel, and haul ass to Fort Irwin. Now, I'm back in my motel room, an additional night having become necessary by the circumstances. This experience shatters all previous military Snafus........

Barstow??

Well, this job's not *ALL* glamor.... once in a while, it's a JOB. Today (it's now 2330), started at 0200 when I awoke earlier than I had to (0430), and never really got back to sleep after that. Gave up at 0330 and got up and got going. Drove an empty bus (deadhead) to the old George Air Force Base, a relic of the Cold War that's been turned over to the California National Guard. I had a pickup of returning troops from Iraq, taking them to Fort Irwin, a huge, sprawling Army facility used for desert training. It's such a national treasure, the huge decisive edge U.S. troops enjoyed in the Persian Gulf War has often been attributed to the superior training and tactics developed largely at Fort Irwin. Yes, the M1A1 Abrams tanks had a tactical superiority over the Russian-made T-72 tanks, but the battlefield tactics honed at Irwin turned the contest into a rout. The Iraqis never had a chance. You may recall that there were more US casualties from "friendly fire" than from the Iraqi Army. Anyhow, I needed to be at what's now called the Southern California Logistics Base at 0900, arrived at 0830. About 0930, a Master Sergeant arrived, asked us what our assignment was, and informed us that our flight had been canceled. Not rescheduled, not late, canceled. OK, that's not unheard of with military transportation contracts, there's quite a bit of waste. I had a later run, along with one other fellow driver, but it was 10 hours away. So, we drove one bus to where our motel was, Barstow, CA, about 30 miles away, and got into our rooms, hurrah! We met up with several other drivers from my company, and re-spotted at 1920. Shortly after, we were informed that the troops that were supposed to have arrived earlier were, in fact, on this flight. Meaning, even though we'd been assured (with a signature as well) that the earlier flight was a no-go, and so we were all canceled from that trip, they now needed us to do 2 trips instead of one. My day was looking like it was going to end around 0130 or so, 23.5 hours after I'd awakened for the beginning. WOW! Nonetheless, after talking to Dispatch, we were all a "go" to do it. So, we drive out to Fort Irwin, about 1.5 hours away. There, another Master Sergeant approaches me and informs me that the issue's been straightened out, there was another company contracted for the run, and they were just late arriving. Wonderful, I'm thinking, I'm pretty beat anyway (I only got 1 hour of broken sleep at the motel). So, we're happy, leaving the base, when our on-duty dispatcher calls us. The OIC back at the Logistics Center called, and was demanding to know when the coaches would be returning to pick up his troops. Oh no! Are we reassigned again, and back to do another run? 10 minutes later he's calling back, the other buses finally showed up, and we've been relieved of duty. WOO-HOO!! I've now returned to the motel, fueled and parked the bus, and have had a glass of wine, making me ineligible to drive for the next 8 hours. Sounds good to me! Sometimes, this really is a JOB! Tomorrow, I return to Fort Irwin, to pick up troops and drop them at Ontario (CA) Airport. Then deadhead home. I wonder what military mysteries await me tomorrow.........

In like a lion, out like a... lion?

Hello from Mariposa, CA! I'm staying here in this California foothill community for a couple days, picking up my group in Yosemite on Sunday. Then we return to San Diego. Mariposa's nice, really a tiny town. I have yet to find a grocery store, apparently they don't have one, just a mini-mart. The name means "butterfly" in Spanish, pretty name, IMHO. Anyhow, the reason for my title of this posting: April's been a lot wetter than normal in San Diego. In fact, most of the state is well above 100% of normal, but San Diego was a teeny bit behind. Not any more! The day before I left on this trip, CA got hit with another winter-type storm, out of the gulf of Alaska. San Diego's mountains got dressed in white, again! The picture above was taken at about the 5000' level, the road goes to 6000', and you can be sure there was lots more snow up there. Of course, this area (Yosemite) got nailed too. I thought I was going to have to chain up on the way up here, I cross a summit that's right at 6000', and there was plenty of snow on the ground. The road was wet, but not icy. A few hours later, though...... and I'd have been chaining up. Anyhow, it IS April, so everything's melting off pretty fast. But don't put the rain gear away just yet; we're supposed to get another wave on Tuesday! Then a possible additional wave on Friday! Hence, the title of this posting.....

April Fool's, brought to you by the NWS

Whoa, it's raining pretty good out there right now! Surprise, surprise, San Diego's getting a late-winter storm. For once, most of the precipitation is falling here in San Diego County; LA County is hardly getting anything. Of course, I had to go out in the thick of it, when it was REALLY coming down. On those occasions, I remind myself of the years of driving 85 miles (one-way) to Spring Lake Park Bus Company (I'm sure they're defunct now...) when I lived in MN. In the winter, just about the time I'd be *starting* to get warm, I had to go fire off a stone-cold school bus, in sub-zero temps. IF it lit off, then I had to hope and pray the heater worked. Often, the bus never did warm up. So, a little rain here, I can tolerate .
Anyhow, yes, I'm aware it's been a while since I've posted; I'll make more of an effort to be more timely in my postings. Otherwise, I hear about it from one of my relatives (probably the only one who reads my rants). Hope your day is going well!

Things are looking better

Hello, again! It's been a while. I'm sitting in a Starbucks in Escondido, CA, while my group is eating at a nearby restaurant. I bought in on a Starbucks offer about 7 months ago, $25/year for a 10% discount on almost everything they sell, and, more importantly, access to their wifi network. Gives me the opportunity to get away from the bus and spend some time online. Otherwise, it's not uncommon to be bored for hours on end. Anyhow, business has picked up considerably, and I've been quite busy. Just found out yesterday that a major ski trip that canceled last New Year's is a "go" this year. That's good news, that trip (and another in March) canceling really hurt. So, 2010 is looking a lot better than 2009. Hopefully the same is true with you. Merry Christmas!

October=Vacation!

Hello from Farmington, NM.... home to daughter Sabrina and grand-daughters Chloe & Jade. How did we come to be here? Jacque suggested to Sabrina, when told Sabrina needed to attend an event back east, that we come take care of the grand-kids while Sabrina did her trip. Sabrina thought that was a grand idea, and so we arrived several days ago. Our grand-kids are 8 & 4. No big deal, we've both been down this path before . Except, of course, on the first day we're "in charge", Chloe (the 8-year-old) comes down with the flu! We are praying the whole time that Jade, the 4-yr-old, didn't follow suit. So far, she hasn't (WHEW!). Poor Chloe, her flu hasn't been easy. We thought she was "out of the woods" yesterday, but no joy. Last night was difficult, again (The night before was worse). I feel so badly for Chloe, while Jacque and I are re-discovering the joys of sleep deprivation! Anyhow, mom returns tomorrow. We're just hoping we get thru this evening in better shape than the other nights. Wish us luck!

Basically, I'm on vacation.....

September has been really slow at the bus company I drive for; so slow, I'm basically just considering it "vacation". My real vacation starts in a few days, Jacque and I are going to New Mexico and Colorado to visit relatives and enjoy the scenery. I was talking to another driver who said he'd taken nearly 2 months off, basically because it was so slow and he wanted to see friends and relatives scattered around the country that he hadn't seen in years. I think, by the time this year's over, I'll be looking at about a 60-hours/2-week average. Pretty incredible, when I look back at all those years when it was way above 80-hours/2-week average. Hopefully, 2010 will be better. Anyhow, there is some good news here; Jacque's been getting lots of bonuses and extra hours, so her income is way up, and at least partially offsetting my lacking income. She'll make more than me this year, for the first time, by quite a margin. Fine with me, it all goes into supporting our lifestyle. And all the time off is kinda nice, to be perfectly honest. Except when I look at my paycheck!

Mellow August... not any more!

Hello again from San Diego, where the high at our little mobile home is supposed to be around 90 degrees today. It's well on its way already. We're about 5 miles from the water; go inland another 10 miles and it's going to be around 106! But so far, up till a couple days ago, August has been really pleasant, with temps below average for this time of year. So, no complaints. Not that anybody would listen, anyway :)
It's been SLOW at work, my hours are WAY down. Thank God Jacque's hours and bonuses are up, that's pretty much offsetting the difference. September still looks pretty slow, but hopefully will pick up a bit. October looks more promising. That's as far as our work forecast goes, but November and December are traditionally slow, so I expect to limp through the remainder of this year. Hopefully 2010 will be better!

Mid-Summer Heat Wave

Wow, it's HOT! At least for us, here in SoCal. Temps are breaking the century mark in inland valleys, in the upper 80's and low 90's here where we live, with the Pacific Ocean in sight. Add to that the fact that it's rather humid too, and you understand why we're a bit uncomfortable here. Jacque and I are jumping on the company bus for a Las Vegas trip this weekend, it's supposed to be 113 on Friday! That'll keep the air conditioners humming. Well, it is July, after all, so I guess it shouldn't be a surprise. I just came back from my Independence Day trip to Yosemite. A great trip, blissfully uneventful! I stayed in Oakhurst, a small California mountain town nestled in at around 2300' elevation, so it gets plenty warm there, too. As a result, days were mostly spent inside, with walks in the morning and evening. There's a quaint 1880's-era cemetery close by, I took a few pictures of it, including one of a beautiful old chapel and one of (I think) an eerie headstone. Tell me if you agree... (click on it to enlarge it... it's even scarier!)

Bored in Ventura

Well, actually Camarillo. I'm here on my annual Memorial Day out-of-town trip. Which, for the past few years, has been here. A really easy trip, it involves bringing my passengers up to Camarillo on Thursday, late, after all the traffic. Then, Friday morning I take them to the boat landing where they board a boat for Channel Islands National Park. I go take care of my business (dump the head, get diesel fuel), and I'm basically done and on my own until 1800 or so on Monday. Pick up the hikers, stop immediately for dinner, and head back to San Diego after the worst of the returning holiday traffic is over. What's not to like? Well, just gets a bit boring. I do have the laptop, and a semi-decent Internet connection, and a TV, and a book, and walking shoes, and a Fry's Electronics about 5 miles from here. I can drive the bus there, and did yesterday. But, otherwise, the bus stays parked. One thing I did do that was kind of fun; I set up Jacque with a Skype account before I left San Diego, so we could teleconference. Skype software is especially easy to use that way. It worked great! But, still, there's hours of "not much to do". I guess that's why they pay me to sit here, I'm not home with my wife. Doesn't happen all that often, so no big deal. Next trip (AFAIK) is 4th of July, also a 5-day trip. Only, quite a bit more work on that one....

Busy, busy.....

It's that time of year; it's busy at the bus company. I just returned from a Fresno/Merced trip last night, and I leave for a 5-day Ventura trip this afternoon. The Fresno trip did not go off without a hitch; one of our newest coaches developed an issue, twice, inconveniencing my group and maddening me. Oh well, even new machines screw up sometimes.....

Burning Time in Oakhurst

Starbucks is my location this afternoon.... Starbucks in Oakhurst, CA. My group is busy doing their thing in Yosemite, while I hang out here, to return early Sunday morning to pick them up and go home to San Diego. My motel has the strangest Internet issue I've run across in a while. Attempting to sign on via their web-based authentication resulted in a Certificate error... their Security Certificate was self-signed. I worked around that, but they have some strange DNS (Domain Name Server) issues. Sometimes the server, DNS Advantage, finds the address, some times it doesn't. We're talking basic stuff here, like www.google.com. The best one was when they couldn't find their OWN address, www.dnsadvantage.com! That I found humorous. Anyhow, I finally packed up the laptop and walked the 3 blocks or so to Starbucks, where my Gold Card allows me 2 hours of free Wi-Fi daily. It's working great.
Otherwise, it's a cool day here, kind of a pleasant change from the usual. Guess I'll get in a walk later this afternoon.....