… I have internet access! At least for the last few minutes, I have. No telling what’s going to happen before I finish this sentence, let alone this post.

The neighbors have wireless DSL that’s as flaky as flaky can be. I can’t believe they’re paying for service like this… but since I’m *not*, I can’t really say anything. We’re calling cable companies and seeing how much it’ll cost to get us onto a reliable internet connection.

In the meantime, please bear with me as I’m not posting (I can’t even get all of my email usually before the connection dies). Also, I’m working on two websites concurrently, and have YET to widgetize my Andreas04 theme… People have been emailing and asking me to do it, but without an internet connection, I’m just about worthless. You can imagine how fun it is to try to work on those two websites… =)

And now, when I DO have internet access, I have to leave. Wind Symphony rehearsal… grr.

I’ve spent the day (as I do every other day or so) at this little coffee shop in Gas City called Payne’s. It’s great… They serve both frozen custard and specialty coffees, so they’re in business all year ’round, and they have free wi-fi. Which is why I’m here all the time.

We can’t get high-speed internet at our apartment (well, we can, but it’s ridiculous to do it that way – we’d have to pay for both a phone line AND unreasonably-priced DSL) and though I have a friend who has a wireless router at his house and has offered me free run of the place, I am allergic to his house. Literally. Two cats make a lot of dander and stir up a lot of dust – the second I walk in, I’m sneezing and wheezing. So I only go there every other day. =)

Today’s my coffee shop day, which means I have to (feel bad for me, don’t you?) buy something. Today’s choice is the “Mocha Frappe” – I felt the need to pretend it was hot out (it’s currently 43°). I like it here – it’s quiet during the day, and I tend to get a lot of work done.

Yesterday was my day at Steve’s, and he (for kicks, I guess) Google’d my name. Turns out there are like 75,000 results for me (not someone else with my name, he searched for “Tara Aukerman”)… All are a result of this theme that I “ported”.

I found this html theme at an open source website (a site that posts themes people create for anyone to use) and made it into a Wordpress theme – just to see if I had the skills. It was done specifically for my website (so it had a lot of personal extras I wouldn’t have put in if I was doing it for anyone else) and I really didn’t know what I was doing.

When I finished with my version, I asked Andreas if I could post it so other people could download it – I had seen many, many people asking for it. He said, “Sure, but let me look at it first.” He’d done this with several of his other designs with other people, and knew what needed to be done to release it.

Well, someone found my site before he got back to me and downloaded it (who knows why I put it out there? I don’t!) and told someone else… Now there are thousands of people using it in its crappy form. Then, Andreas contacted me and told me that Wordpress.com has included it in their list of themes for people to choose from…

Ugh. I wish that Andreas had had time to look over it – it sure would have been a better theme. So, to anyone here because of the theme, sorry it’s not in perfect condition. If I can help, let me know.

… my foot! Today, we’re getting 3″ of snow. Indy’s getting up to 8. Some first day of spring!

We ate lunch at Wendy’s today – got up too late to make lunches – and I ran to the restroom while Dave waited in line. I don’t normally pay any attention to public restrooms, but I couldn’t help noticing this one.

Four inches. That’s how far away from the wall the toilet sits. The toilet paper dispenser, on the wall beside the toilet, juts out 8 inches from the wall. So, unless you want to hit your head when you sit on that toilet, you have to sit leaning.

that word always looks funny to me… license.

anyway, Dave and I got new drivers’ licenses today – he renewed his and I updated mine. same story as usual – horrible picture. the lady offered me a chance to retake (which I should have, in retrospect) but I decided that I would just take the first bad picture rather than taking several and picking the least bad. I wish I was photogenic. ooh, and I had to say my weight loud enough for the people around me to hear.

the photo to the right is what I look like on my new license.

now I have that taken care of, so David and I can fly to Hawaii as Tara and David Aukerman with no troubles. one step closer to warmth and beaches. =)

tonight I’ve got nothing planned but relaxing and buying some fuzzy-on-the-inside shoes. it’s going to be a great evening. David has a 3000 word seminary paper due Tuesday, so he’ll probably be writing it tonight while I wrestle with the VCR. I have a tape I want to watch, but it’s in bad enough shape that I can only really *listen* to the show – the picture is really jumpy and annoying. if it gets bad enough, I suppose I could always do something constructive. =) I have a lot of sax music to get under my fingers for the next IWS concert/recording session.

hey, and this is good news – something really cool. one of the guys in Dave’s most-fun class asked him to be a wing-hookup (a prof that interacts on a social/friend/fun/family level with a floor or wing) for next semester! that’s neat – it means we’ll be seeing a lot of the Foundation guys. and, what a complement to David that he’s made that much of an impact on kids in a gen ed class! go D!

I finally ordered a laptop battery today. I’ve been doing without – just using the power cables – since I got this computer (used). that had been working for me relatively well, but things are starting to get out of hand. it’s just impossible to work well without either 1) having an office or 2) being able to be mobile.

without an office, I have to pretty flexible about when and where I can work… most of the time I work David’s hours from David’s office. but what happens when he has to have a study session or a personal conversation with one of his students? I have to relocate. and to that, I need to be able to work from places that may or may not (as I’m discovering) have outlets.

plus, I just shouldn’t have to drag a thousand cables around with me. that’s the point of having a laptop… mobility. =)

so, I got mad enough today to do something about it.

~

on another front, I’ve talked to my doctor (np) on the phone about my headaches, and she thinks it’s likely they’re being caused by my medicine. so, she’s prescribing me something else (which I’ll start taking in a couple of weeks). I’m supposed to try that for a couple of months and see how things go. she told me, “I think you’ll really like *drugname*.” what does that mean? =)

today and yesterday both fall into the category of “one of those days.”

• we were going to go camping over Dave’s fall break – this weekend. but then the temperature dropped 40 degrees overnight and it rained. so now we can’t go camping. we’re still thinking about what to do – I wanted to do something different.
• I found out yesterday that it’s going to snow on Monday.
• I left my jump drive (the one that has every single file from the project I’m working on) in the USB port in my computer in Indianapolis. I’ve spent half a day trying to access those files remotely.

but the good news is that as soon as 5:00 rolls around, it’s the weekend. =)

I think a lot of people really don’t know when or how to ensure and insure. like accept and except, it’s a pet peeve of mine to see them interchanged.

enough about it, though. so what if the airline employees can’t apply common grammar knowledge to their emails? at least I get the back credit on the points plan for the flight to PA.

so, kids. all is well today with the clipboard. I’m allowed to copy and paste once again. today’s computer drama is hardware on my laptop. the CD drive is going nuts – lots of very high-pitched and high-heat spinning, and less reading of the data… grr. I hope I don’t have to replace the part soon. and I hope that when I do have to replace the part it’s not too expensive. it’s only a matter of time, I’m afraid.

on a happier note, I’m spending tonight with friends. Steve and Rachel “invited” me over for dinner, games, and painting of the living room. I took them up on dinner and painting and suggested that we leave the games until David comes over after he gives his evil 3-hour 20-page math test tonight.

speaking of that test… David and I were walking back from lunch at the Union talking about his test when two students walking in front of us turned around and asked us if we knew something, anything, about Taylor’s history. I told her that Thaddeus Reade is buried on campus and that a dorm burned down – both have historical markers – and Dave told her who Thaddeus Reade was (something I didn’t know – all I know is that a building’s named after him and that his dead body is under some pretty grass on the loop). I thought we were part of some “look how unknowledgeable students are about their campus” survey – Dave thought we were part of one of the sociology class experiments. turns out the desperate kid just had to do a project on Taylor’s history and hadn’t come up with anything yet. =)

and after that, one of Dave’s students passed him on the way back to Dave’s office. this kid told David that he’d read his blog and quoted some of it in a paper for one of his classes. =) be careful what you write online, David. I learned my lesson – you should take heed. but… put some answers online for the kids. if they’re reading your blog, they deserve to find pleasant surprises.

ARGH. I was going to paste in (quickly) some of the fun things people search by to come up with a link to my blog… but alas, I have been defeated by some quirk of XP. I have decided to pout instead of type out a long list.

earlier today, my computer managed to disable the networking devices – not just disconnect me from the network, but completely disable the devices. we had to manually re-enable them. grr.

and now, for some reason, I have no access to my clipboard. literally.

why, flaky computer, are you so flaky?

the worst thing happened… okay, there are FAR worse things than this that could happen, but in my telecommuting and driving-three-hours-a-day-three-times-a-week life, it’s drama.

check this out!

my phone ist kaput. it was laying in the seat of a car, and I plopped down on it – while it was open – a couple of weeks ago. it was fine when I picked it up, but the next time I opened it, a piece broke off and instead of flipping open with both hinges in place, it flopped open, hanging sideways because only one hinge remained.

yesterday, that last hinge fell off. now, the phone doesn’t ring (the speaker is on that top piece, but the power – battery – is on the bottom piece), doesn’t vibrate (same deal), and I can’t tell if it’s on or off. I think it still charges, though – that’s good news – and in emergencies, I can use a headset to talk on it. but that’s not a good long-term solution.

rather than replacing it for $200 and adding 2 years to my contract (buy phone insurance, folks, if you have a flip phone!), they said they could transfer my number to an old phone for free and come December, I can get a new phone with no commitments other than my current contract.

I called mom (in Hawaii) who talked to Leah who told her where my old phone (which I gave to her as a toy when I got my new one) might be at the house in PA, and mom called Uncle Rick (in PA) and he’s looking for it.

anyway, don’t call me. email me or call David if you want to get hold of me. there is no ring, I can’t access voicemail or text messages – or Tetris! =(

I’ll let you know when I get the old phone and can start getting calls again.