Carlsbad Visit 2008

Every summer, usually around July 4^th, I am obligated to travel back home to Carlsbad, NM to visit the family and let them see their granddaughter. This year, the July 4^th weekend was supposed to be my 25^th Carlsbad High School reunion. However, it was cancelled at the last minute due to “lack of interest.”  Regardless, the vacation dates still went on as planned with my daughter and I parting for Carlsbad on Thursday, July 3^rd and returning to Houston on Monday, July 7^th.

Flying to Midland

The closest commercial airports to Carlsbad are Midland, TX and El Paso, TX. Both airports are about 150 miles away. For some reason, it is more expensive to fly to El Paso, so we always fly in to Midland.

Since we flew out at the start of a major Holiday weekend, I had expected a crowd at the airport. I don’t know if it is just the current state of the economy or what, but checking in today and going through security was the lightest I have ever experienced at Bush Intercontinental.

Our flight was on time and weather was great. We arrived in Midland at 11:15.

Driving To Carlsbad

We had very, very light traffic the entire 150 miles from Midland to Carlsbad.  The roadways are all two-lane nearly all the way except for a short stretch on Hwy. 385. We caught a little rain shower around Andrews, TX. I later looked up the precipitation figures for 2008 when I got on the computer and was shocked to see that the Permian Basin area (e.g., the desert) had more rain this year than Houston.

Locking on to a neighbor’s unsecured wireless

I brought my laptop with me on the trip, of course, but Carlsbad is not really known for its technological advances. My mother has a low-speed dial-up connection at the house so I figured I would make do with that. However, a search of the local wireless networks turned up a surprise: there was an unsecured router somewhere close enough to where I could make a connection.

 

 Killer Bees

Once connected to the internet, I looked up the local newspaper online (www.currentargus.com) to get some information about the Fourth of July activities. The headline for the July 3^rd edition stated that a swarm of suspected killer bees had attacked a residence in Carlsbad, killed a dog; injured a second dog and a horse the day before http://www.currentargus.com/ci_9770192?source=most_viewed

Wal-Mart doesn’t want our money

My daughter and I tried to go to the local Wal-Mart on the morning of July 4. We needed a few things so found them and got in the checkout line. There were only 2 manned checkout lanes open and 2 self checkout lanes open. All lanes were backed up at least 5 carts long and moving as slow as Big Brown at Belmont. After waiting 10 minutes in the self checkout line and only seeing one person actually check out, we ended up just stuffing our would-be purchases in a nearby empty shelf and leaving the store.

It is worth noting that we went back the next day and were met with a similar check-out experience. This may come as a surprise until you realize that there is no competition for Wal-Mart in Carlsbad; there are no K-Mart, Target, or other discount stores at all. If you want to take your business elsewhere, the closest store is 32 miles away in Artesia, NM.

Roswell

The 61^st anniversary of the UFO crash landing in Roswell, NM was celebrated over the July 4^th weekend. The festival, held in Roswell, of course, draws some 6,000-8,000 attendees each year from all over the USA and other countries and even with the skyrocketing price of fuel and a struggling economy, this year was no exception. 

Fireworks on the Pecos

July 4^th always means fireworks and Carlsbad usually puts on a good show. Held on the “beach” in Carlsbad (e.g., Pecos River Recreational Area), the local Fire Department shoots off some $30,000 worth of fireworks every year. As a kid, I really liked the fireworks show and as an adult, I am still awestruck at the display.

Living Desert State Park

High up on a hill on the northwest edge of Carlsbad is the Living Desert State Park- known to the locals as the Zoological and Botanical Gardens, or just Botanical Gardens.  A self-guided hike around the 1.3 mile trail will give you some great insight to the life and history of the the Chihuahuan Desert. You will see some 50 species of desert mammals, birds and reptiles as well as nearly 500 varieties of plants and cactus. 

 

 Drive-In Movie

Drive-in movie theaters are pretty much a thing of the past, but in Carlsbad the Fiesta Drive-In on Fiesta Dr. is alive and kicking. It has 3 screens and sound is provided via your own FM radio receiver. They usually show first-run movies and have a great concession area. Ticket lines open around 8:00 and the movie usually starts around 8:30 (in the summer). The three movies playing this evening were: The Happening, Kung-Fu Panda and The Incredible Hulk. We chose to see The Incredible Hulk and weren’t disappointed.  

Friends

A few of my old classmates and friends still live in Carlsbad. Billy is about the closest and longest running friend I have. We met at the age of 5, grew up on the same street, went to school together and have managed to stay in touch over the years and stop by for a visit when either of us is in town. On this particular weekend, Billy was out of town with his family. His two girls are avid participants in the regional junior rodeo circuit and were up in Carrizozo for a rodeo.

I have an old girlfriend and onetime fiancé, Margie, who still lives and works in Carlsbad. In fact, it was on a trip with Margie to Houston in the summer of 1983 to visit her sister and brother-in-law that convinced me that Houston was the city I wanted to in after school. Margie and I are, of course, no longer together but we still keep in close touch. 

Carlsbad Caverns

Any trip to Carlsbad would not be complete without a trip through the Caverns. My daughter and I try to make it out there ever time we visit. On our last visit to the Caverns, my daughter fell on the paved trail, skinned her knee up pretty bad and we had to cut the tour short. This year, we made it through without incident.

I was glad to see a healthy crowd out at the Caverns this year. I had feared that with high fuel prices and the economy the way it is that people might skip this experience.

 

Here is a link to our Cavern’s pictures. Note as of 7/8/08 that some 300+ pics were uploaded and I haven’t had the opportunity to edit the album yet. Thus, there may be some dark pics where you cannot makeout the formation and some may not be rotated yet.

White’s City, established by and named after Cavern’s founder and explorer Jim White, is the resort town that sits about

White’s City

White’s City, established by and named after Cavern’s founder and explorer Jim White, is the resort town that sits about 20 miles out of Carlsbad and right at the entrance to Carlsbad Caverns National Park.

 

 White’s City was built and has been in operation since the 1920’s. Now the entire town is up for auction on eBay.

 

 

As I understand it, Jack White, the son of Jim White, died a few years ago and Jack’s children really don’t want to mess with it anymore. If you want, the town could be yours for a mere $5 million 

 

 

 

 

 

Back to Houston

 

We woke up at 4:30 MST, had a light breakfast courtesy of mom and was on the road by 5:00. Since we lose an hour once you hit the Texas state line, it was really 6:00 when we hit the road. Traffic was light all of the 150 miles back to Midland and the trip from driveway to airport took somewhere around two-and-a-half hours.  We arrived at Midland International Airport (MAF) around 8:30 CST.

The flight back to Houston was on time and uneventful. We arrived in Houston around 12:30 PM. All was well when we got the car (I always fear that the battery will be dead or will have a flat tire).

 

Blog Post #2

I’ve been pretty busy these last few weeks. And while I would like to say that it has all been work related or attributed to learning a new technology, it hasn’t been. Things have mostly revolved around Melinda’s surgery and her getting fired from her Admin post last month, and trying to plan a visit back to the homeland this summer. 

Melinda Udate

As most everyone reading this knows, Melinda had an operation at MD Anderson last month to have her right thyroid removed. A few minor coplicationsarose during surgery but all went well for the most part. Just before her scheduled surgery, she was “released” from her duties as an Executive Administrator at the retirement home where she worked. She is currently still with the company, but now travels around to the retirement homes in different states performing audits, training new personnel etc. She was in Las Vegas for a couple of weeks and was back in town last weekend and Monday. On Monday we went back to MD Anderson for her post op followup. I figured we would just sit and wait on the doctor for an hour or so and just have him ask a few questions and send her on her way. Instead, he ordered another battery of tests (blood, laryngoscopy, etc., etc.). Her appointment was at 3:00 PM Monday and we did not leave MD Anderson until after 9:00 PM.

This past Tuesday, Melinda flew up to Boston to audit and train at the facility there. After that, she goes to New York for a couple of weeks. Unfortunately she will miss my and my daughter’s vacation back to New Mexico 4th of July weekend.

Vacation Time: UFOs, Little Green Men and a Missed HS Reunion Milestone

My 25th High School reunion was planned over the July 4th weekend this year. Most of us did not even receive notice that there was a runion planned until sometime around the end of April of this year. Nothing about our reunion was listed on Classmates.com. The only way I found out about it was a small public notice was printed in the local Carlsbad, NM newspaper. My parents still live there and told me about it after reading it. Beyond this “public notice,” there was no other notice of the reunion at all. The noticed said that all RSVPs and registration fees had to be received by June 1. I sent my check in right away. On June 5th, I received my check back in the mail from the reunion planner with a small note stating the reunion had been cancelled due to “lack of interest.”

I wasn’t the most popular guy in my class by a long shot, but I was really looking forward to a 25 year reunion. I attended both our 10 year and 20 year reunions. The 10 year was a blast. Nearly everyone was married by then and had kids or kids on the way. Although most of us changed physically, you could still tell who most people were. The 20 year reunion was a little disappointng: Nobody looks the same anymore, some of my classmates were already grandparents and having their own children graduate high school, you hear about more and more fellow classmates who contracted major illnesses, passed on and are no longer with us. I wasn’t expecting to have a blast at the 25, but you gotta admit that 25 years for anything is a milestone that should not be ignored.

But every cloud has its silver lining. My daughter and I are still going back to Carlsbad July 4 weekend. But instead of attending my reunion that weekend, we will be volunteer workers at this year’s UFO Festival in Roswell, NM.For those who don’t know the layout, I am was born and raised in Carlsbad, NM, which is only 60 miles or so from Roswell. This will be my 3rd UFO Festival in Roswell and I always get a kick out of them. As you might expect, these types of functions always attract very unique individuals who are passionate about their beliefs. You could probably go to a Grateful Dead concert, visit the Mormon LDScult farm, and hang out with the Hells Angels for a few days and still not see a bigger group of weirdos in your life.

Father’s Day

I had my daughter this past Father’s Day weekend. In the past, we usually don’t do much of anything mark the occasion except go out to eat somewhere but this year we figured we would try something different and try our hand at picking blueberries. We went out to Morehead’s Blueberry Farm up in Conroe. They open the farm up to the publc around the last week in May and close around mid-July. Price is $1.50 per pound that you pick (compare that to around $3.70 for 12oz. at the grocery store). All in all we picked about 3.5 pounds.

 

Chef John Boy

Around this time last year, I made a promise to myself to start doing a little more cooking at home and not go out and eat as often. This decision was really made more in attempt to give myself more time at home and at the office getting things done than it was a decision to eat healthier and/or save some $$$ (although both are a positive byproduct). And I would have to say that I have pretty much been successful in my attempt these past 12 months. I started out last year preparing the common “guy” meals: meatloaf, pork chops, Hamburger Helper, etc. The past few months, I decided to change gears and try making some Asian dishes. My first attempt was pan fried pork dumplings and I was really surprised how good they turned out. What’s more, they are very inexpensive to make. I spent $10 and some change at the Hong Kong market for all the fixins and ended up making some 4 dozen dumplings and 2 dozen egg rolls for that amount. I ate on it during the week and ended up having to throw some out. I also bought a rice cooker at Target for $30 and this thing has really worked out well.

Put in rice, add water, set timer, and you’ve got steaming fresh rice ready for you when you get home. This weekend, I had some babyback ribs left over from the BBQ we had last night, so I carved off the meat from one racks, chopped it up,

 

and added it to the cooked rice and it was really good.

No Time For Technology

Although I have been getting a lot of things done that need to be done and spending quality time with my daughter, I really want to get back to my studies and reading. I’ve made several attepts to revist Windows Presentation Workflow (WPF) these past few weeks but am just have not been  able to sit down at the same time every night and plow through it.

I’ve gone through a few books and online tutorials related to WPF in the past, used it in a project about over a year ago and then pretty much forgot about WPF. Now that VS 2008 and 3.5 is out, I wanted to revist this technology and study up on it a little more.

Design Patterns are so essential to software design and even I forget what many of them are and how to use then, so I also started going through my old OOP Design Patterns book again.

 

 Currently Reading: Still reading Dreaming in Code. Only time I’ve had to read this in the past month was during M’s surgery.

Currently Listening To: Obsession by Animotion on Sirius Super Shuffel, channel 12.

 

 

A Bad Day At The Races

I am a traditional guy who is passionate about the old time big 3 American sports: Boxing, Baseball and Horse racing. Although not much of a gambler, I do enjoy going out to Sam Houston Race Park to watch the races and see the horses from time to time. It’s cheap to get in to the place and draft beers are still only $4.50 (compared to $8.75 for fewer ounces at an Aeros game at the Toyota Center.)

Saturday, June 7, 2008 was the Belmont Stakes race; the third, and final, leg in the Triple Crown of horse racing– preceded by the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness.

We went to Sam Houston Race Park on Saturday to watch simulcast coverage of the Belmont Stakes race. We had reservations in the Winners Circle restaurant, which, if you’ve never been, I highly recommend. We also got free admission at the gate ($5 each in savings) because we were wearing “brown” (in support of stakes hopeful and Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Big Brown).

 

Lunch at the buffet was excellent, as expected. They even had a chocolate fondue fountain going. Those guys who run the buffet there don’t mess around and always provide great, high quality food in an array of choices. One warning I will say about the Winners Circle restaurant: the service of the wait staff is horrid for tables of only a few people. If you have a large group, you will probably be OK. I have experienced this numerous times. True, you get up and get your own food at the buffet, but good luck if you want a refill on your ice tea or water glass. If you want a beer, you are probably better off going up to the concession area and getting it yourself.

Big Brown was the odds-on favorite in the 11^th race. He had already won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness and was set to be the only thoroughbred since Affirmed in 1978 to will all three. The only noted major contender he had (we thought) was Casino Drive, who had been scratched early Saturday morning due to a re-aggravated left hind hoof. It had also been reported earlier that Big Brown, was utilizing an acrylic and fiberglass “patch” on one of his hooves but had been cleared to race by the track veterinarian.

After a great meal at the buffet and a couple of beers, the 11th race came up and I decided to bet $20 on Big Brown (#1) to win. His odds at post time were 1:3, which meant if you bet $1 you would win .30 cents if he won, even less if you placed a place or show bet.  I also bet $5 on Icabad Crane (#10) to show.  (With a name like that, I had to bet something.)

 

 

 

What Can Brown Do For You?

After it was all said and done, Big Brown came in dead LAST out of a field of 9. Icabad came in next to last. The long shot, Da’ Tara (at 38:1 odds at post time) came in first. Think about that: a $2 bet on this horse to win would have yielded 79.00 The next long shot, Anak Nakal (at 34:1) came in a dead heat with Ready’s Echo (at 29:1) to show.

So I lost. But so did everyone else.

Some interesting factoids about this years Belmont:

• Total wagering at Belmont and incoming simulcasts this year was $13,740847, a 43% increase over 2007 which was $9,580,465
• Belmont Park total seating capacity: 32, 941
• Attendance Capacity (including grand stands and infield): 85,000 – 90,000
• 2008 park attendance: 94, 946.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

 

 

 

 

Blog Post #1

This is my first “official” blog post. Although I have blogged on a few things in the past, for the most part, I have been neglecting my blog posts ever since I registered here but am making a conscious effort during the week to keep my blog up to date.  I promise.

Microsoft Live Mesh

I signed up for Microsoft Live Mesh a couple of weeks ago and starting using it immediately after I received my invite.

The first thing I did was to configure a file sync between my My Documents folders on all 4 of my devices (2 laptops, 1 work PC and 1 home PC). The sync occurs every few minutes and I have found it to work very well so far.

 I configured the remote access service and used it on numerous occasions. I am not completely sold on this as of yet. For starters, it seems noticeably slower than other remote access services like LogMeIn. I also noticed that it caused IE 7 to crater a few times and that it takes awhile to reconnect to a device once you have disconnected. On my work PC, I noticed that the icons on my desktop are in a constant Auto Arrange mode. Lastly, on all devices I tested on, I was prompted almost every time to install the Live Mesh software on the source device even though the software should have already been installed.

Rock Scroll Visual Studio Add-in

I installed RockScroll last week. This is a really  cool  free add-in for Visual Studio 2005 and 2008 that displays your code in the scroll bar of the source editor and takes up a negligible amount of resources.  I particularly like the fact that the Indicator Margin items (bookmarks, breakpoints) show up in the scroll bar as does source code change tracking. Additionally, I found that if you double-click on a word in your source code, RockScroll will highlight every like word in the displayed source.

Some dislikes about RockScroll:

·         Scrollbar looks bloated with very large source code files (ex:  Dataset Designer.cs file).

·         Does not work on specific file types (.js, .xaml, .css, .aspx).

·         Trips the scroll bar when using #region and code is collapsed.

Replacement iPod

 I ended up purchasing a new iPod Classic (black) to replace Carla, who died prematurely last month. I was missing my music and really getting behind on listing to my favorite podcasts (.NET Rocks! and Hansel Minutes) and just could not stand being without an iPod any longer.  I really wanted to go with an iTouch but I just had too much of an investment in various accessories for the Classic still laying around the house. Plus, I want to get an iPhone when the new one’s come out (hopefully) in another month or so. Since I have only about 8GB or so of music and audio files, I thought I could just put my music easily on an iPhone and just give the Classic to my daughter, thereby killing 2 birds with one stone.

Other News

I registered the domain thebarkingbitch.com. Although it will be awhile before I can do anything with it, the intent for the site is a forum for public sound-offs, venting, griping, or getting whatever has been bothering you off your chest.  

Currently Reading:  Dreaming in Code by Scott Rosenberg.

Currently Listening To: George Thorogood Bad To The Bone on Buzz Saw- Sirius channel 19.

 

Justifying A Repurchase

Remember when iPods came out and you found yourself repurchasing your favorite albums you already had on CD with MP3 files?

Remember when CDs came out and you found yourself purchasing your favorite cassette tape on CD?

Remember when compact cassettes came out and you purchased your favorite 8-Track tape on compact cassette?

Remember when 8-Track tapes came out and you purchased favorite your vinyl albums and/or reel-to-reel tapes on 8-Track tape?

There are just some albums that justified the repurchase. I, for one, owned a few of my favorite albums on four different types of media formats. I don’t recall all of the albums, but here is a partial list of ones I’ve owned on vinyl, 8-Track, cassette, and CD:

• Kiss – Alive!
• Kiss – Alive II
• Kiss – Destroyer
• Ted Nugent – Double Live Gonzo
• Meat Loaf – Bat Out Of Hell
• Styx – Cornerstone
• Eagles – Live
• Eagles – The Long Run
• Rush – Exit Stage Left
• Rush – 2112
• Foghat – Live
• Tommy Movie Soundtrack

Now that Blue-ray has won the HD DVD war, I am considering which movies I own on DVD and/or VHS that I will repurchase on Blue-ray. I went through my collection the other day and there were a few that I had originally purchased on VHS, repurchased later on DVD and will probably eventually purchase on Blue-ray:

• War Games
• Brainstorm
• Real Genius
• Logan’s Run
• The Time Machine (1960)
• Tron
• 2001: A Space Odyssey
• Searching For Bobby Fischer
• Pink Floyd: Pulse

Obituary

Carla, a black iPod Classic expired on Monday, April 14^th, 2008 of apparent hard drive failure. She was 2.233 years old and had only used 5.73GB of her 30GB capacity.

Carla’s first song to be played was Pink Floyd’s Run Like Hell. Her final transmission was a Hansel Minutes podcast.

Carla is survived by an older sister, Mary, a blue 6GB iPod Mini.

In lieu of flowers, her owner has requested a donation be made to Apple’s Quality Assurance program.

RIP, Carla. You will be missed. 

Technology Resolutions for 2008

Like most people, I have a difficult time keeping most, if any, New Year’s resolutions. However, 2007 was probably one the most successful years I had for setting and obtaining my goals.

In 2007, I had resolved to:

1)      Find a new job as a .NET developer.

2)      Get to the gym and workout at least 3 days out of the week.

3)      Get the first floor of my house remodeled.

4)      Start reading non fiction books and/or Biographies instead of fiction and novels. (As a side note, a successful resolution for 2005 was to start watching less television and start reading more.)

5)      Put more money in my 401K.

With the exception of getting to the gym on a regular basis, all resolutions were successful.

Hoping for more good fortune and a lot of self discipline in 2008, I decided on the following technical goals for the coming year:

1)      Start using Visual Studio 2008 on a full-time basis. I have VS2008 installed on my home and test machine and want to get on it full-time as soon as possible. However, the company I work for is still in the midst of a full-time project under VS2005.

2)      Start using technology more for notes, lists, memos, etc. Call me old fashioned, but to me there is nothing better than a ballpoint pen and a 3×5 memo pad for taking  notes, making memos, and grocery lists. I’ve used MS One Note for years for work and other technology related notes but I’ve always had the habit of not referring to anything (especially emails) once it was filed in a folder. I even had a Palm Pilot for a couple of years but didn’t like it very well for note taking. While the pen-and-paper method has sufficed over the years, I feel the time has come to starting keeping such lists on something else.

3)      Up my technical subscription count to 10 periodicals a month. I now subscribe to (and, for the most part, read) about 7 technical periodicals a month. These are:

·         Code Magazine

·         Technology Review

·         2600 (quarterly publication)

·         MSDN Magazine

·         SQL Server Magazine

·         Wired

·         PC World

4.       Start writing and more. Back in 2000 and 2001, I used to write numerous articles which primarily focused on the Windows operating system and Microsoft Office applications. Since 2002 I haven’t really written much and admittedly, I miss it.

5.       Get a better grip on WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation). If anyone out there (other than someone on the core WPF team at Microsoft) tells you that they know WPF inside and out, they are probably lying to you. I have been fortunate enough to be working with a team of professional and highly-skilled developers for the past 6 months on a major WPF project. We have learned a lot and have done a lot in the project directly related to WPF. But the more I learn about WPF, these less I think I really know about it.

Currently Reading: The Art Of Deception by Kevin Mitnik.

The Ghost of Christmas Past: Technology Gifts Over the Years.

As you might expect, I usually get some sort of electronic or technology gadget for Christmas.

This year I received a Sirius Starmate 4 Satellite Radio for my car. After getting the unit installed, it was up to me to activate it. I did so online and by the time I walked back out to my vehicle to test it, I had satellite radio.  $70 for the unit and around $100 to get it professionally installed. Add in another $143 for a year’s subscription.

Some 27 Christmases earlier, I was on the receiving end of another car audio device- an in-dash Sony AM/FM radio and cassette player, complete with Dolby sound and noise reduction. The giver spared no expense on this unit let me tell you. The unit cost nearly $200 back in 1980 and was replacing my then state of the art in-dash Pioneer 8-Track unit. I ended up later selling the 8-Track to a friend of mine for around $75 having paid nearly $200 for it just two years earlier.

Since 1977, it seems I have received some sort of electronic and/or technology item every Christmas. To the best of my memory, here is a concise list along with cost of the item at that time:

1977: 12” B&W RCA television for my bedroom which had a manual channel selection dial (no remote). Cost: $99 (estimate).

1978: Unisonic Toiurnament 2000 Electronic TV Game. Came with B&W Pong and skeet shooting game.  Cost: $100 (estimate).

1980: To compliment my new Sony car stereo, I also received a Realistic (Radio Shack) 40 Watt, 7 band car equalizer/amp. Cost: $75.

1981: A Cobra 40-channel CB Radio. Although not as popular as the CB craze in the 1970’s, 1980-1981 saw another surge in the CB craze. This was largely due to the popularity of The Dukes of Hazzard TV show and Smokey and the Bandit movie sequels. Cost: About $150 for the radio and antenna.

1982: A Panasonic AM/FM radio alarm clock with built-in (tethered) telephone. Cost: $99.

1983: A Casio EL-512 scientific calculator. This calculator was for my College Algebra class my first year in college. This unit could store up to 4 “programs” and had more buttons on it than the space shuttle Cost: $75. I still have this calculator, by the way.

1984: After asking for one for nearly 5 years, I finally got a police radio scanner. It was a VHF-Hi 4 channel portable scanner. Cost: $150. Back then, a scanner was completely useless until you purchased and installed the frequency crystals for the frequencies you wanted to monitor. For example, just about all of the emergency departments in Carlsbad (Police, Fire, and Ambulance) used the VHF frequencies 155.000mhz to 157.000mhz or so. Each crystal cost about $5. Nowadays, you buy a police scanner and it usually comes with a minimum of 100 channels you can monitor. Instead of crystals, you just key in and the frequency you wish to monitor from the keypad. I recently purchased a portable Radio Shack 1000-channel scanner for $150. About 150 channels were already preprogrammed to the emergency channels, weather band, CB frequencies, marine, Coastguard, etc.

1986: I had just moved into my first apartment, and bought myself a Sanyo AM/FM dual-cassette boom box for. I paid over $100 for it at Federated. This unit is still in service out in my garage.

1987: A Fuzzbuster radar detector. This proved most invaluable now that I lived in Houston. Cost: Over $200.

1988: A replacement 80-column video card for my Apple IIe. This card also came with an extra 64K (yes, as in kilobytes) of RAM. A lightning storm ran through the Houston area sometime in November ’88 and caused damage to my prized computer. Surprisingly, this card, which fit in one of the Apple IIe’s 7 expansion slots, was the only thing damaged. Cost: I think I paid around $100.

1989: I bought myself a Technics component home stereo. It came with speakers, receiver with integrated amplifier, dual cassette deck, AM/FM tuner, 5-disk CD changer, and automatic turntable system. I purchased it at Highland Electronics (this is before Circuit City and Best Buys started popping up all over town). Full purchase price was around $1000.

1989: A Sony portable boom box that had a CD player and dual cassette player/recorder. It also came with a remote control although the AM/FM tuner was analog. Cost: Around $200

1990: Pedometer to use while jogging. These things are cheap, cheap, cheap these days and you can even get one free in a box of cereal. This one cost over $50 17 years ago and wasn’t very accurate.

1991: An electronic guitar tuner. Cost: around $100. You can get a better unit now for under $20.

1992: Borland Turbo Visual C++ suite (on about 10 3.5” floppy diskettes). Cost: $110. Note that this was originally installed on a Packard Bell 386 computer with about 4MB of memory.

1993: Epson monochrome laser printer. Cost: over $700.

1994: Auto CD adapter. Allowed me to play CDs through my cassette player in my car. Cost: $80.

 1995: I bought all the parts (motherboard, memory, case, cards, etc.)  and built my first Pentium machine. Cost: around $1000

 1996: 17” Monitor (not flat screen) Cost: $750

1997: Sony Mavica FD7 Digital camera. Cost: Around $300.

1998: Windows ’98 operating system, and Motocross Madness (first release) PC game which came packaged with the first version of the Microsoft Sidewinder game controller Cost: around $60 for Win98 and $50 for the game.

1999: A Nokia 5170 cell phone. Cost: Not sure about the phone by itself. For the phone, contract, prepaids, accessories and all, the bill came to over $300.

2000: A Palm Pilot IIIe.  Cost: Around $100.

2001: Sony DVD player. Cost: $179 at Best Buy.

2002: Rio 800 MP3 player. Cost: Over $150

2003: Nikon Cool Pix 2000 digital camera. Cost: Over $400 with additional 64MB memory stick.

2004: Apple iPod Mini (6GB) Cost: I think the cost for the unit itself was $149 but I also bought an additional $200 worth of “optional” accessories: Wall charger, FM radio tuner, protective cover, etc.

2005: 19” Flat panel computer monitor. Cost: Around $150

2006: Apple iPod Video (30GB model). Cost: $149.

It is probably worthy to note here that as of this writing, I estimate that I have spent well in excess of $800 downloading music from iTunes alone since I received my iPod mini 3 years ago.

   

Christmas Memories

Recently, my fourteen year old daughter asked me what my most memorable Christmas was. After thinking about it for a while, I told her about the Christmas I had 21 years ago.

After graduating from Airco Computer Learning Center in the summer of 1986, I had landed a part time contractor position as a computer operator for an oil field tool manufacturer in Houston. At the time I was hired, it was agreed that my contract would be good for a length of 6 months, which would take me just about to the end of the year before I had to get another job.

I was 21 years old, still living out in Spring, TX with the family of a friend of mine in Carlsbad,  and had decided that if I did not find another job by the first of December that I would go ahead and move back home to Carlsbad, NM,  finish college, and see how things worked from there. Maybe I could move back to Houston and try again at some other point.  

The first of December came and went with several interview  but no promising job prospects. Then, right at the 11^th hour on December 15^th (two days before I was to move back), I heard back from a company down in Pasadena that I had interviewed with just after Thanksgiving.  They wanted me to start on December 22^nd!

I quickly found a one bedroom apartment in Pasadena where I was paying $295 a month in rent. A fellow contractor at the oil tool manufacturing place gave me a couple of old sitting chairs and an autamin he no longer needed. I went to Gallery Furniture and bought a full sized box spring and mattress with frame. Lastly, a stop at Wal Mart to buy a shower curtain, sheets for the bed, and in-line touchtone telephone (this was before the age of cellular, and cordless home units were not very reliable- plus, anyone with police scanner could easily pick up on one’s conversation). Other than that, my apartment had no furniture or fixtures whatsoever.

My parent’s arrived on December 22^nd bringing with them my old study desk, 19” color TV and stand, and a couple of knickknacks.  Letting my parents have the bedroom, I slept on the floor that night in a sleeping bag in the dining nook of my new apartment and went to work the next day. At the time, I had less than $500 in savings and gave that to my parents to see if they could find some furniture for my apartment while I was at work.  They found a couch and dining room set at Sears for around $300. They also got some pictures and wall hangings so the place didn’t look quite so bland. I was set.

As I had only lived in Pasadena for about a week, I didn’t know my way around town and had not yet gone grocery shopping (I didn’t have any pots and pans yet in which to cook, so it would not have mattered groceries or not).  We needed to find some place to eat breakfast on Christmas morning. Driving around and not finding much open, we finally landed at a Shipley Donuts which was doing quite a brisk business.

Most of the gifts I received that year were “new apartment” and “living on your own” related: Dinnerware, utensils, a Mr. Coffee (with analog clock) coffee maker, electric can opener, etc. If I had been thinking, I would have asked for a microwave oven as my new apartment did not come equipped with one. Microwaves were not all that cheap back then although smaller, lower wattage units could be purchased for $100 or less. These “lower end” units are now referred to as “popcorn” units, as just about all they were really useful for was popping microwave popcorn. And they weren’t even very good at that much of the time.

With all of my time divided the past week between finding an apartment, moving, and getting acclimated  a new city and a new job, I had little time to get my parent’s anything for Christmas. Nor did I have much money left; security deposits, rent, furniture, and buying dress clothes for work (we had to wear dress shoes, slacks, shirts and ties back then) had just about drained me of any and all financial resources. So I decided to give them my much-beloved VCR.

Granted, until a few years ago when DVDs dominated the market, VCRs were a commodity and could be purchased just about anywhere for under $100. But the VCR I gave my parents for Christmas that year cost me- get this- over $700 just a few months earlier. It was a top-load Curtis Mathis that came with a tethered remote, and only allowed you to preprogram one show at time.  It was considered state of the art at the time and I had to take a loan out to purchase it. Now that I think about it, I was probably still paying on it when I gave it to my parents.  It would be nearly 3 years later before I would own another VCR and I think I paid nearly $200 for it at a Target store. It is probably worth noting that I also bought my first microwave oven at the same time I bought the VCR. I want to say that I paid a couple hundred for it as well.

For Christmas dinner, we met the family I had been living with while going to school that year at Steak and Ale. Earlier, I had called around (on my new touch tone phone) other places to see if anything else was available, who was open, etc. What was available-mainly Hotel buffets- was expensive ($21 or so a person back then, if I recall), so Steak and Ale it was.

I was 21 then and it has been 21 Christmases since then. Over these years, my job in Pasadena has been replaced by better ones. The furniture replaced by better furniture. I lived in a few more apartments since then but at the time of this writing, have moved back up to Spring, TX and own my own house. And even though my parents have not converted to DVD yet, the VCR was eventually replaced by a better one. But I have yet to have a more memorable Christmas than that one.

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