May 1st, 2007
Lately, I’ve had more opportunities to cook, since I’ve been home more. It’s exciting! I like to grab a few items out of the pantry or fridge, and then “perform a Google search” for the ingredient(s) + recipe, and try new things.
Actually, just about everything is new to me, since I only really know how to make a very few meals… Mac ‘n cheese, spaghetti, grilled cheese, fried eggs… Recently, I learned how to make hash browns, as well as chili. It’s a lot of fun when it ends up being tasty!
Today, I decided to make falafels, and was pleased with the result. We didn’t have pita bread, so we ate it with tortillas and tsatsiki. Mmmmm!
Since we need to save money nowadays, I’ve tried to compile a “menu” of sorts, of tasty, healthy food that’s not too expensive. That’s a bit hard to do, so some of the meals on my menu only satisfy 2 of the 3. If you’re interested in seeing my menu, you can find it here.
Posted in Other | No Comments »
April 17th, 2007
So today, I wanted to mail off my claim for educational benefits to the Dept of Veteran’s Affairs. I’ve got the GI bill, so I might as well use it, right? Anyhow, the application ended up being about 10 pages, so I wasn’t sure if one first-class stamp would cover it. I also didn’t feel like going to the post office to find out, so I scoured the house searching for more stamps, and all I could find was a sheet of one-cent stamps we purchased when the rate for first class stamps went up. So I decided to have fun with it. Here was the result–for a total of 68 cents, if I count correctly. 
At first, I thought that whoever handled this piece of mail might get a small chuckle out of it, however: I just realized that some poor post office employee is going to have to cancel all of those stamps! I feel guilty, but still can’t help but smile…
Posted in Other | No Comments »
April 15th, 2007
For almost two years now, I’ve been using VOIP telephone technology for my home phone. At first, it was through the local cable company, Grande. We got a small discount, since it was part of a package for cable TV, internet, and telephone service.
But then, I heard of Vonage, and loved the idea that if we moved, taking our home phone service with us was as simple as carrying a small adapter and plugging it in at the new location! And being in the military, we figured we’d be moving at least a few more times. If you’re not familiar with VOIP telephony, basically it gives you standard telephone service, using the normal telephones you’re used to, but the signal goes over the internet instead of the phone company’s wires. (which is the only downfall: if you lose internet connectivity or electricty, your telephone no workie, either! Better have a cell phone as a backup!!)
Sure enough, it worked out great! We were temporarily accommodated at a hotel, and later a furnished, weekly rate studio apartment, and were able to keep our home phone service with us as each location. The price wasn’t bad, either: $24.99 per month for unlimited nation-wide long distance service (with Caller ID), and they even have free calls to certain foreign countries! Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Rants & Raves | 2 Comments »
April 12th, 2007
So, we’ve put our house on the market. It’s already been about 2 weeks, and we’ve only shown it three times so far. I have a feeling our asking price is too high, but we’re trusting our realtor, Bob Winkler. Hope he knows what he’s doing!
I just got a phone call from NATO, and they tell me I’ve been selected as the “first alternate” for the Comm shop post, meaning they’ll offer the job to me, if their first choice doesn’t complete the first year of his contract, for some reason. In reality, I take that to mean “better luck next time!”.
But that’s fine with us! We have a plan: move to Oklahoma, enroll in school full-time (an online university, WGU), and live off the Montgomery GI Bill (and mooch off Cathy’s parents) while I work on getting my BA. It shouldn’t take more than a year, and hopefully it will be substantially less than that. It sounds perfect: Cathy and Benjamin get to spend quality time with family, and I can concentrate solely on blasting through school and getting that degree. Hopefully, I’ll be offered an ESM post with NATO within 6 months or so, but meanwhile I’m going to try to enjoy my first lapse in employment in the past 10.5 years!
Posted in Announcements | No Comments »
March 23rd, 2007
So, I’m off to Germany yet again, next week. It’s pretty much been decided that we’ll be moving to Oklahoma in the near future, once we get our house sold, and Cathy shoots her last few weddings in May.
So the next few months will be a stressful, yet exciting adventure! Stay tuned for more updates…
Posted in Announcements | No Comments »
March 3rd, 2007
I applied for early separation from the Air Force, and just found out that it’s been approved! It looks like my last day is going to be the 28th of March, which is closing rapidly… I’m not sure what I’ll do with myself once I get out, but I’ve been entertaining the idea of working in the IT industry, if I’m able to find a decent entry-level job. If not, I can always fall back on my medical laboratory experience, if necessary. But I think it might be nice to get paid for something I actually enjoy, for a change…
Posted in Announcements | No Comments »
February 28th, 2007
I’ve been using Mozilla Firefox since the early beta days. I remember how exciting it was to have a trimmed-down, lightweight browser that worked well on the old, slow laptop I had at the time. Once I got used to tabs and plug-ins like AdBlock, there was no going back!
Firefox has had its share of security concerns, but nothing like Internet Explorer! It’s hard to imagine all the pain and frustration felt around the world, due to the mass of computers “owned” (taken over) by spyware. The vast majority of those “owned” computers have been taken over because the user did something as simple as navigate to the wrong web site using Internet Explorer. The newest Internet Explorer has improved in every aspect, but you can take Firefox away from me when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Posted in Rants & Raves | No Comments »
February 21st, 2007
So, the other day, I go to hit up my favorite search engine’s website, Google, and I’m greeting with the following ridiculous message:
Gee, thanks, Earthlink! Now I can find all those Used Cars and Airline Tickets that I was looking for! Actually, this is really hard to believe–Not only are Earthlink’s Domain Name Servers so crummy that they can’t resolve www.google.com, but they have to make some extra money from advertising on that page, too?
There have been several occasions where I thought I had lost my internet connectivity, only to find out that Earthlink’s DNS servers were down. Now I use OpenDNS, and have the added benefits of automatic typo-correction, anti-phishing, not to mention the speedy, reliable DNS service I would have expected from my ISP.
Posted in Rants & Raves | 1 Comment »