Jordan Independent - Blog entry - Comments

If you're not there early,

Mathias Baden — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 12:13:59 -0500

If you're not there early, no candy for you. Blink and you will miss it. These kids are fast!

(Mathias Baden is the editor of the Jordan Independent. He can be reached at editor@jordannews.com.)

Just putting up a reminder

elkes4 — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:47:15 -0500

Just putting up a reminder to be at Lagoon Park on Saturday, March 27th. Be sure to be there prior to the 10 am. Hop Off and give yourself plenty of time to park.

There should be some of the

elkes4 — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 09:25:50 -0500

There should be some of the local teenagers there, they will be assisting the youngest age bracket and hopefully making sure that the smaller kids (which is broken up into three age brackets) do not have problems. I am not certain but I think the age brackets are 2 to 4, 5 to 7 and 8 to 10. One of the ladies also usually goes around and hands some candy to the wee ones who are under two and yes, there will be an Easter Bunny.

Although this might jinx the

Katrina Styx — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 10:55:21 -0500

Although this might jinx the whole thing... laptop seems to be working! Replaced the hard drive - the only thing left we hadn't done, and it hasn't locked up in a few days. :-)

(Katrina Styx is a staff writer for the Jordan Independent. She can be reached at kstyx@jordannews.com.)

I can tell you from some of

elkes4 — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:24:45 -0600

I can tell you from some of my Uncles stories (they used to drive truck) that on a daily basis there are vehicles that will draft them for endless miles, pull right in front of them with only a few feet of clearance, not allow the semi to pull into a turn lane and that is why you will see some trucks that travel in packs at times, to allow one of them to make an exit. You also see certain areas where the town or state relies on the income generated by fines and tickets to sustain their government. I can not say which ones, because these shift with the ever changing laws, however Iowa does seem to be one that was avoided at any cost by one uncle. My father used to call some of the grain haulers “cowboy’s”, this was because many were not actual long haul trucker’s, but were used to hauling crops when they need to move them. These were usually truckers that would be on the fastest route to the drop site; some of them would be on long haul mode due to price and time constraints. The other obstacle faced by the drivers is that when towns put in their own standards of travel, it makes it difficult for them to do anything as simple as going to the bathroom or taking a break to eat a warm meal. I personally would put up with the inconvenience of waiting for a truck to make a left hand turn, than face an operator of a vehicle who has been denied any break privileges and has been driving for three hours on a delivery that could have been only half an hour, had the roads not been off limit, so do you wonder why there has been an increase in prices for delivery yet?

I do not know if it is still the practice, however I do remember hearing about how easy it was for anyone to get a license in certain other states and that it was almost encouraged for residents of other states to get their licenses there. This means that there has been an increase of foreign truckers who are not fully acclimated to the conditions and rules of the United States. This does not make them bad truck drivers, just not as experienced as the drivers who have been around a long time.

I am not saying that we allow convoy’s of trucks to fly through town, I am just wondering why the DOT and other state agencies are bent on increasing the mileage traveled for these trucks. If they were attempting to just give in to the drivers, I would bet the drivers would prefer to cross at 173rd and not backtrack. This would also make sense for the business owner, as it would decrease operational cost.

I have run across bad truck drivers and yes even been bumped while traveling down the road. You will come across bad people everywhere, you can not use one pixel to ruin your perception of an entire picture, nor should two pixels dominate the other five thousand of them. It takes lots of pixels to make a sharp digital image and even the pixels with nothing in them are important to the whole image.

Because they're human.

Thom Boncher — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 08:40:14 -0600

Because they're human.

Regardless of the type of vehicle, a certain percentage will be DUI. Another percentage will have medical problems. Another percentage will have personal problems that affect their judgement (for instance, in a hurry to get home to a sick family member). Just like the rest of the human race. And just as in any human endeavor, a small group of bad drivers can give the bigger population of good ones a bad name. It wouldn't be too surprising if those cowboys Katrina described were known to, and avoided by many of their truck driving peers.

Mr. Pritchard taught us to always be on the defensive, and to immediately respond to anything that cut into our comfort zone. In other words, we were taught to not wait to see what the other driver was going to do, but to take action to re-establish our comfort zone. Then he taught us about the appropriate actions for various situations. Slowing down, turning, pulling into a rest area, or whatever. He said speeding up was not a good option, because it always left us ahead of a dangerous driver, where we couldn't see him/her as well. Those lessons also served me very well when I was riding a motorcycle.

Hopefully, the theory of defensive driving is still taught in Driver Ed - though sometimes I wonder if new drivers are being taught that the best defense is a good offense.

When I was a little girl I

Katrina Styx — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:12:26 -0600

When I was a little girl I remember going to an Easter egg hunt like this. As far as I can remember, my parents only took us once. All I know is that I got really bummed because an older kid jumped into my section (for the younger kids, where the eggs were easier to see) and picked up all the eggs before I or any of the others in my age group could get to them.

(Katrina Styx is a staff writer for the Jordan Independent. She can be reached at kstyx@jordannews.com.)

Most people do not realize

nowtap — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:07:05 -0600

Most people do not realize you should use you laptop on a firm surface. Most laptops vent out from the bottom. So using them on your lap or on a pillow on your lap is not recommended. They over heat on blow things up.

Have you tried using your

Mathias Baden — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:39:05 -0600

Have you tried using your laptop as a boat anchor? Sounds like it's the only use left. I know, spoken like a true American: Just save up and buy a new one. Bummer, though, for sure.

(Mathias Baden is the editor of the Jordan Independent. He can be reached at editor@jordannews.com.)

Haha! It could very well be

Katrina Styx — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:34:33 -0600

Haha! It could very well be the cats. The one does like to rub his head against the edge of the laptop while I'm using it, almost as if he's making sure I'm not disrupting the traps he's programed.... No UPS deliveries though.

elkes, I've done control + alt + delete many times. When it's frozen, that doesn't even load. Also have done disk checks, ram tests, and all sorts of other things that I don't even know the names of.

The suggestion was made yesterday that either my apartment is caught in a weird magnetic field that makes electronics not work properly, or I'm somehow trapped on an island in Hawaii where the show Lost was filmed... But seriously, the only real guess so far is that heat somehow fried something. Just wish I could figure out what.

(Katrina Styx is a staff writer for the Jordan Independent. She can be reached at kstyx@jordannews.com.)

I forgot to mention that if

elkes4 — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:01:36 -0600

I forgot to mention that if the weather turns bad.... the Egg Hunt will be moved to April 3rd.

Katrina, have you ever

Thom Boncher — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:29:12 -0600

Katrina, have you ever considered that your cat may be using the computer while you're away? Do strange UPS deliveries show up on your doorstep? You might want to look at your computer's internet history - though if your cat is really devious, you might find nothing there.

They look so innocent.

Did you push control alt

elkes4 — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:21:34 -0600

Did you push control alt DELETE? if not I have a delete button that comes in both four and ten pound, the trick is to swing it out in the garage so the pieces don't wedge into the carpet.... giggle

I feel your pain with the lap top.. mine is a 98 and since 2003 has limped on and on.. the 96 is now the kids toy and still works, but is slow because of the operating system... one thing that can cause issue is the ram... it is running pretty cheap at Micro and really does help speed things up.. that and keeping it clean by using the disk clean function and defrag as well... that is for both laptop and desk top computers.... just an fyi that hopefully helps someone.

On page A5 of today's

Thom Boncher — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:31:33 -0600

On page A5 of today's StarTribune, one can read a story about the Kansas City, MO school district. The gist of the story is that after any number of expensive attempts to increase achievement and raise enrollment, KC is considering closing almost half of its' schools.

Money alone won't get the job done. Sadly for KC schools, many parents waited until the threat of closings affecting their kids became apparent. And I'd bet many of the ones who are making noise now think the solution is to just throw more money at the problem.

We in Jordan are blessed with a School Board that's up close, and personal. But we still must do our part to raise our kids, and to keep the lines of communication open with the board.

Thanks for the words of

Katrina Styx — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 10:43:41 -0600

Thanks for the words of encouragement!

I did talk to the property manager about the leak, and that has since been fixed. Plenty of melting water outside, but my dining room is still dry, thankfully.

The car's check engine light reads out a couple issues with the transmission, but none of them are very specific. The light goes off intermittently and I haven't heard any unusual sounds in the engine or noticed any substantial changes in performance, so I'm hoping it's just because it's aging. Trying to treat it well and take care of it, and hopefully it will last until I can replace it.

elkes4, if my laptop were old I wouldn't be nearly so annoyed. My PC is six or seven years old now, so when that stops functioning properly I just shrug and give it a figurative pat on the back for lasting as long as it has. The laptop, however, is just more than a year old. My problems started cropping up just a couple months after the standard warranty expired, go figure. So far as we can tell, it's probably a hardware issue - just not a regular one - or overheating, though based on my most recent uses, I doubt that's the case anymore.

Thom, I love that picture you painted of an upstairs neighbor, and I wish I could say that was my issue! But alas, I live on the top floor, and the water was coming from the roof, not another neighbor. We thought that power surges could have been an issue at first, but the laptop acts up whether it's plugged into the wall or on battery or even in another apartment. So it seems to be isolated to the machine itself.

All in all, it's just another experience. It's easy to get frustrated when all this happens at once, but like elkes said, bring it on.

(Katrina Styx is a staff writer for the Jordan Independent. She can be reached at kstyx@jordannews.com.)