16 April 2002

A couple of pictures from the weekend...

After dinner on Friday, Jeff expressed the need for a belt, and we were in the same shopping center with a K-Mart. So we sent the boys down to buy a belt. Alas, the K-Mart was closed. But as they came back up the walk, someone commented that they looked like the Earp brothers approaching the O.K. coral. So naturally, I went to take a picture.

But I had to wait for them to get close enough for the flash to work, and then the camera didn't want to work, and... They charged me! Less than a second after this picture was taken, Matt missed me by a hair's breadth, and Carl flat-out slammed into me!

This picture also demonstrates Kevin's super-power, because he was part of the charge as well, over on Matt's left, just off-screen. Kevin hates having his picture taken. Our theory is that the camera didn't work because Kevin was telling it not to until he was out of the shot.

"...No, Jeff, I don't think Meghan would particularly appreciate it if you brought a super-soaker to her wedding..."

Actually, it isn't a super-soaker. It's a koosh gun. It shoots little yellow rubber rings. Not that I think Meghan would have appreciated that much more...

There was a controversy over the tie. Jeff showed all of his ties to K.T. and Kevin. K.T. - who is notorious for being extremely picky about ties - told him they were all hideous, and gave him one of Kevin's to wear.

Jeff then showed all his ties and Kevin's tie to Matt, Rachel, and me. The tie I liked best was black with falling leaves on it, but that's an autumn tie. Two more of them were, in fact, pretty ugly - at least next to Jeff's nice black suit. Two more were acceptable, but the red tie did the better job of highlighting the silly earring I'd loaned Jeff for the wedding, which had little bells on it.

I brought my bike to work with me today. I haven't ridden it for months - many months. I keep meaning to, but by the time I get home, there's always something better to do... like get online.

I'm hoping that I won't have as much of a problem taking some time from my work schedule to ride around a little.

The only question right now is, where to store it? Right now the bike is in the hallway just outside my office, but it takes up half the hall, so that's not really acceptible. There's no room to put it in my actual office, and there isn't even a bike rack nearby where I can just say "Screw it," and leave it outdoors all the time. (Well, I could leave it out, but I'd be chaining it to a tree, which is likely to piss off the landlord.)

I'm probably going to go ask our warehouse guy if I can stick my bike in the warehouse, next to the basketball stand no one ever uses. I hope he'll be okay with that. Getting the bike onto and off of the bike rack is more effort than actually riding the damn thing...

I was chatting with people online last night, and got up to fix myself some popcorn. When I came back, my screen had gone black, as if the laptop had gone into power-saver mode. Which is odd, because it's not supposed to do that if it's plugged in.

Well, maybe I hadn't plugged it in all the way, or the cord was loose. I tipped up the laptop so I could see the back of it, and jiggled the power cord.

A very pretty blue light shone briefly at the base of the plug. I blinked, and jiggled again. Another couple of little blue lights, and my brain finally caught up with the situation. "Sparks! Stop it!"

Just 'cause I'm a contrary cuss - even when I'm the one giving the orders - I jiggled the wire again, but there were no more sparks. I unplugged it and called Apple's tech support.

The tech support guy collected all my information, and then told me he was going to forward my call to a "product representative."

What could I do about it? I agreed, though I was thinking, How hard is this? Power isn't getting into my computer. Sparks came out of my power adapter's cord. Therefore, the problem would seem to be with the power adapter. I paid for the three-year warranty which covers parts and repairs, and this is part of my computer. Therefore, all you have to do is slap a new adapter into a box and ship it to me!

It turned out that the product representative just wanted to give me a survey so they could determine whether there had been any actual danger from the failing adapter - whether the sparks could have damaged myself or my things. There wasn't; they'd been contained inside the plastic wrapping for the wire, which is why I only saw pretty blue lights instead of actual sparks. After I answered the safety survey, the guy promised to send me a new adapter right away.

Luckily, between us, Matt and I have about five adapters, so losing one temporarily wasn't that big of a deal. I swiped the spare out of the computer room, on the theory that I wasn't planning on using the printer or scanner this week, anyway.

It was a little disconcerting, though, and I keep looking at the plug for the adapter I have at work and wondering if it, too, is about to start showing me pretty blue lights...

--Liz