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Burned through yet another laptop!

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For the last 7 years I’ve been at home on medical leave. During that time I haven’t just stayed in bed … I’m an extreme type A personality that has to be busy all the time. That’s probably one of the reasons why I’m not healthy yet! I keep running myself to the ground by staying up to all hours working – even when I’m home on medical leave. Yes I’m still working even though I’m home, it’s just not at the job that I used to do.

These days I work behind a computer blogging and doing graphic design. I must be behind the computer screen about eighteen hours a day most days. Way too long but that’s the way it is. My long hours are hard on my computers. I’ve been through two laptops so far. My last one pretty much burnt itself out two weeks ago. It got slower and slower and I started calling it Molasses as a nickname if it worked at all.

I finally broke down about a week and a half ago and bought yet another laptop. So far I love the new HP. I hope this one lasts several years but we’ll see. At least this one might have a chance .. I’m hoping to go back to work in the next month or two so my computer hours will be cut down to some degree so that should save the laptop. Of course I expect I’ll be working on it just as hard when I come home from work and on my days off. I plan on using this online business cards design site to create some business cards so I can promote my webdesign and graphics business to my coworkers once I get back to work.

Do you work from home on the computer? If you do, how many hours a day are you on the computer? Do you go through computers/laptops much more quickly than you think you should?

Neighborhood break ins

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A year or so ago my husband signed up for a community watch newsletter at our local police station. Time went by and he never got any notices. Until this week. It seems there’s been a rash of break in in the neighborhood. cars and houses are being broken into and if we see any suspicious people in the area or if someone tries to gain access to our house by knocking on the door handing out flyers etc we’re supposed to call the police at a specific number. Well I suppose we’d call 911 if it were something serious but if it were just something hinky or suspicious we’d call the hotline number.

I’m actually thinking of contacting the officer in charge of the investigation because someone tried to break in to our house in mid-December when I was home. I thought it was my husband coming home extremely early from work as it sounded like the person was using a key in the door but it wasn’t Chris and when my dog started barking and growling like crazy the rattling at the door stopped. I was scared seeing my dogs reaction. Her hackles were up and the sounds at the door hadn’t been normal but by the time I went to look who ever it had been was gone. I am certain someone was trying to get in though as there was signs someone had been on the porch and our outer door was open.

I’ve actually thought of getting one of those home security systems. I could get a professional one or the kind you can buy from a place like Costco where you set up your own Cameras etc. Probably the professional one is best but having a camera or two wouldn’t be bad .. I live on a busy street and there’s lots of activity and sometimes some strange stuff goes on close by even though I think my neighborhood is basically safe.

I guess I’ll look into home security tomorrow when I’m more awake! While I’m at it I’m going to make a note to look at workflow management software at eoncode.com too. A friend of mine was looking for some print management software and I think that might work for his company.

Anyway – how is your neighborhood? Is it safe? Any break ins or scary stuff going on? Do you feel safe, do you have home security and if you do what kind do you think is best?

Puddles and Guitars

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I think I’m going to have to buy myself a pair of rubber boots! We had all that snow last week, about 18 inches of it and now it’s all melting away so quickly we have ponds of water everywhere. It’s so hard to get around if you’re walking anywhere. Yep, rubber boots are definitely a must .. until it freezes and snows again that is and with this crazy weather that’s just what it’s going to do soon enough.

Speaking of weather, our house has been so dry this year! We have humidifiers on our main floor and upstairs and I fill them almost daily. I’ve never had to fill them as much as I’m filling them. I don’t know why it’s so dry this year. My husband happened to have his Gibson guitar when he was visiting a guitar store earlier today and the man was an old pro at assessing the condition of guitars. He looked over my husbands guitar and said it was still in very good condition but there were a few places in the fret board areas that the wood had shrunk a bit .. probably because the house is so dry! I wonder if the wood will still look shrunken to this man with the expert guitar eye in the summer time when there is more humidity in the air?

I think Chris was in the store secretly trying to get a deal on a new guitar. He says he was just talking to the store owner and learning from him but I have a feeling he was checking out an instrument or something. He’s sneaky.

Anyway – how’s the weather in your area? Is the snow melting or is it raining there? Are you dealing with huge puddles too?

I could be sleeping better

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I’ve been more tired than usual lately. Perhaps it’s because of all the late hours I’ve been pulling staying up studying for exams … but I’ve noticed that I just don’t sleep as much or as deeply lately.

I wake up at night and try to get comfortable, fluff up my pillow and change positions. I’ve even gone out shopping for new pillows. I purchased a couple of firm pillows to see if that would help. My old pillow used to be quite firm but it was getting softer and losing it’s shape so I thought that might have been part of the problem but the firmer pillows don’t seem to be helping. Perhaps a neck pillow or even a new mattress might help.

I know one thing that really might help … if I get more active during the day. I’ve been less active in the last couple of months because of all the studying I’ve been doing. So .. I plan on starting to take the dog out for long long walks again beginning this week. She definitely needs the walks and I could use them too. The walks will be good for me physically and I’m sure they will help me sleep wise too.

Karaoke neighbors – again!!!!

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Oh my gosh … what is it with the house next door? I don’t know why but it doesn’t seem to matter who lives next to us but eventually they seem to get a karaoke machine at some point.

Oh and once they do they set it up in the living room so that the speakers are facing our living room so that we can hear them sing all of their songs endlessly over and over again – usually badly … for hours and sometimes days on end.

Oh boy … and the holidays are just starting .. if they just set up the machine that means that they are testing it for when they have guests next weekend and perhaps the weekend after next … AHHHHHHH!!!!!!

I’m still not sure what I’m doing this weekend or for Christmas. In light of our neighbors new Karaoke machine … hmm I think I’d better make sure I’m away from home. I think it’s going to be noisy around here. My poor dog. She hates the singing that comes through the walls! You’d think our walls that are over two feet thick would block the sound but it doesn’t.

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