Testig something

So yeah... 2years and no postings. Not like anybody reads this thing anyways.

I've since moved to Ubuntu. It's great. I'm trying out an applet that makes it easier to post blog entries. Just trying to see if this works right.

Tickled my funny bone

Funnies for the day

OK so I haven't posted anything new lately. Well nothing much has happened but here goes.

Matty's ear has healed...finally. Took 2 antibiotics and a 4 day vet stay but all is good.

It was finally nice they other day. I stepped out at lunch time, holding the door open for the fellow behind me. As we stepped out I went "*cough* *cough* Gee I think I need to go home I'm not feeling well!" Well the guy who followed me out said "Yeah you don't look good at all!" I laughed and laughed all the way to lunch and back. Oh yeah this guy, well he's blind. :-)

Another thing that tickled me lately is this, found on Craig's List.... http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/chi/186980585.html I'm not sure what I find funnier, the story and the images it brings to mind or the fact that he posted it on a public forum.

I have a new favorite new band Ok Go. OK they are not a NEW band, I mean they have released 2 CDs, the second coming out last year, but they did just release a new video and OMG it's great. Head over to http://www.okgo.net and scroll down until you see a picture on the left. Choose your format and enjoy. When you are done with that check their other videos, in particular the one for "A Millions Ways" dance. The cd "Oh no" is good too. Straight ahead rock-n-roll.

Then there is this video. Kids don't try this at home, they are professional actors here. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3587466534692702285

OK I've uploaded some of our vacation pictures to flickr, here's the address...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/warped6/

So that's about it for now. I'll post again when something happens.

Back Home

Home again

Well we made it back. All of our stuff made it through customs (I was worried about some of it). Only took 33 hours or so to get back. 17 hours in airplanes and the rest in airports. Big fun.

The house is still standing. The yard got mowed and is turning brown. The cats are fat and happy.

Matty did something to one of his ears. A big wound of some sort that is now majorly infected. So he is on antibotics. We also clean it out a couple times a day. Damn, puss smells bad. Almost makes me gag just doing it. What's worse is he keeps trying to climb into Aina's lap, but he (or rather his ear) smells so bad. So she keeps pushing him own. I sure hope that it clears up soon.

Now we just need to get over the jet lag. I think by Monday I should be back to Central time. In time to go back to work. Oh yeah!

Next on my list is to figure out how to add pictures to this thing.

Final days

Almost time to go...

We found the missing kampong. If you go around the car dealership you can get to the village. So it's there just kind of hidden from view.

I learned that they have been cutting down breadfruit trees to make way for buildings and such. They used to be everywhere and now they are scarce. It now costs RM4/kilo when you used to be able to just pick them off the tree. Along the same lines lumber is getting very expensive. They mostly use hardwoods (teak, mahogany, etc) but they have been mostly cut down now. It sounds like they have done some replanting but it takes a long time to grow these tress. So most new houses are made with bricks and concrete. To build a “typical” Malay house is now too expensive. Sigh...I guess people never learn.

Yesterday we had lunch at Aina's oldest sister's house and supper at the youngest. That makes everyone now. With 2 days to go. Got to see most of the nieces and nephews but not all. A couple are away at boarding schools and such.
Did some last minute shopping and business today. We tried opening a bank account here. The plan being that we would deposit a little money in there every month so the next time we come back we already have spending money. Or if there were an emergency and someone needed some cash, they could use it too. Unfortunately we can't without one of Aina's family being cosigners, so will try again tomorrow with Kim. Along those same lines. An ATM machine ate my card today. So the sign says “Contact any Maybank office...”. We crossed the street and inquired about it. “Oh we are sorry, we don't control that one. You need to contact the Maybank at the old airport. Oh and they don't check them everyday.” Great. 48 hours before we leave and we need to retrieve an ATM card. Knowing how things go here, I have my doubts. Keeping my fingers crossed.

When we were at Aina's oldest sister's house, we went driving and saw their NEW house. It will be nice once it is finished. The way they build here is different. They work on the house until they run out of money and then everything stops. They save up and then start again. They think they will move in in about a year. That way has it's advantages. When they house is done they already own it free and clear. The problem is that the longer it takes the more it costs. I guess both the way we do it and the way they do it has pluses and minuses.
Too bad Shawn left when he did. We told him about the big bugs they have here but he never really got to see any. Again yesterday when we were driving around we stopped at a couple places to pick up food (of course) and at one stop there was a praying mantis. It was almost the size of my hand. The creepy thing is, it followed me. If I weaved back and forth in front of it, it copied my moves. As I walked around it, it kept turning to face me. It even walked at me a couple times. It was very unnerving. Then the girls came over. It still followed me mostly but in one case it actually lept at Sita. On seemed to. It certainly seemed to be not afraid of us. It was fascinating to get close to this bug. Examine it up close. But not too close, his front arms looked dangerous.

This morning I walked over to the 7-11 to get Coke, and bread. Along the way I saw a grasshopper about the length of side of my hand from the tip of my little finger down to the heel of the palm. One big grasshopper. I don't think I would want to hit that when I'm on the motorcycle.

We are all about ready to go home I think. It's always fun to travel but funner still to get home. When we get to San Francisco, we are gonna check to see if we can catch the earlier flight home. If so we will be home at 7:00AM on Thursday not noon. So Ron Fry if you are reading this, we will call from SF to see if you can pick us up. :-)

Sita has taken scads of pictures. I'm finally warming up to digital cameras. I didn't like them at first but now am thinking of getting a really nice SLR digital. They seem to go for about $700+ so it will take awhile before I save up that kind of money but it will happen. Anyway, as I have been saying lately, when I get a good connection, I'll post pictures.

It's been a good trip. My batteries seem recharged. When I get home I will be ready to tackle some projects I've been just picking at. My room, learning C#, HTML, CSS, Java Script, etc. The house in general needs painting and so on and so on but I'm ready for it now. I just hope I can keep it going for a while.
I seem to have lost my stolen Internet connection. Well ok it seems to come and go. It did hang around long enough yesterday to let us get our bills paid but that was about it. I might have to do some war driving and see if I can find another connection. :-) Or try using the computer downstairs. They seem to have their Internet connection working again here at the house. Either way I'll post this when I get connected.

That's it for now.....

Trip North

North!

We made it to Butterworth. As I sit at desk with the azan coming from the mosque across the street and the 2^nd to the last prayers of the day echoing out of the loud speakers, we are having mixed feelings about what we found. The family house looks really cute! It's been painted 2 tone blue and white. On the other hand it is now situated between 2 buildings of a car dealership. Almost all remnants of the old kampung (village) are gone. The little village road, that people used to walk up and down, yelling in the windows as they pass, is gone. To get to the other side you now have to walk way down and around the block. The street in front of the house is even busier than it used to be. The shops that used to be in front of the house are also gone. Replaced with a parking lot. Mak is doing the usual running around opening all the windows (still no glass so some things haven't changed) and plugging in and turning on all the fans. Aina and Lisa are busy looking through her old photos and reminiscing. Sita is somewhere, she had found a chongkok (mankala) board but I don't if she found enough marbles.

I gave Paman Zane the family tree I printed out. He was happy. He had a big smile on his face and laughed. He said he didn't have time to look at it closely right now (prayer time) but I hoping to either get corrections before we leave here or copies of any documents that he has. I'm hoping he likes it that someone else is helping out with the family history. I do wish I had a recorder of some sort so that I could record his and Mak's stories. Hopefully it won't be long before we come back again.

We stopped and looked at a place that was selling homes on a lake. In some cases literally ON THE LAKE. Houses/apartments built on stilts on the lake itself. They were very nice but a bit small for my taste. We would like to find a place the whole family could use. That way we have our own place to stay when we come back. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

We found out we still had a bank account open from when we were in in '97-'98 with 250RM in it. We figured it was time to close it so we did that the other day. When we first talked to the teller it sounded like the account had grown to 1,900RM! We were like WOW! We planned on giving it all to Mak. Well our windfall was short lived. Turns out that it was 197RM and that it was going to take 6 months for them to send us a check in the US. Shoot. Oh well easy come, easy go.

We are planning on visiting Aina's sister and brother-in-law tomorrow (I think). We are also planning on seeing the Z's (old friends of ours that live in Penang) soon. I'll probably go to my brother-in-law's barber shop and get my hair cut.

Well that's all for now. I'll post this when I find a connection. Aww.. the continuing battle to find a connection... well so it goes.

Afternoon off

A long post

Ahh...an afternoon off. Time to try putting up a little longer posting.

OK...I'm sore. We played fotsal yesterday. There was a total of 15 of us playing in rotations. Someone would get tired and sit out and someone else would replace them. Fotsal is indoor soccer played on a smaller field with a slightly smaller ball. The rest of the rules are pretty much the same. We played for 2 hours. I was goalie for one side or the other most of the time. I haven't had THAT much exercise in a LONG time. I made some really good saves but then on the other hand I let a couple really easy ones through. One I had actually caught, turned around and dropped it into the goal. D'uh! Sita played the opposite goalie most of the time. She also did well. Lisa played for a while but she was more interested in reading her book (more about this later). In the award department, Mas (sister-in-law) won the award for best woman player. Shawn won for best male player.

Aina. Lisa, and Shawn have gotten hooked on a new (well new to us anyway) book series. The Black Magician trilogy by Trudi Canavan. The first book is The Magicians Guild, second is The Novice, the third is The Highlord. (http://www.trudicanavan.com/) Aina and Lisa have finished both books 1 and 2 and are working on 3. Shawn has started on 1 and will probably finish 2 before we get home. Then I might get my chance at them.

We saw Shawn off today (July 10). Mah (Aina's mother) was sad. She was crying as he left. On the way back to Kim's house she said “I can still see his face.” * sniff * * sniff * I hope he makes it home ok. Won't know for a couple days. I'm sure he'll be fine, but still we worry.

The girls are going out tonight with Kim's girls. Not sure what they are up to. A movie I think. Of course that means we have a free night and I don't know what WE are going to do!

Tomorrow (July 11) we are headed to Penang for a couple days. See some friends, good for the soul... Ooopps sorry... song lyrics again. We will see Paman Zane (Aina's uncle and family historian) and will give him the family tree that I made. Not sure where he'll put it (it's about 10 ft long and 2 ft wide) but I think he'll be very pleased to see it. We will be there until Friday (14^th).

I believe we are headed to Port Dickson this weekend with the whole family.

That takes us up to next Monday and Tuesday. Will need to do more shopping. I still want to make a trip to Jalan Imbi to pick up some cheap software.

And that takes us up to the 19^th when we come home.

Time certainly flies when you are on vacation.

Day whatever number it is

Redang Beach


So hanging out at Redang Beach. Hot (duh) not much of a breeze. Been snorkeling and scuba diving. Also climbed to the top of a smaller island.

Shawn is going for a boat dive this afternoon. The rest of us are going for an hour long walk in the jungle.

We will post pics as soon as we can find a better internet connection.