Pays to be nerdy

So here's a little known fact about me: I am a big fan of technology.  Can be a force multiplier with regards to productivity, capable of enabling me to communicate long distances, analyze huge volumes of information, and record important data for posterity.  In reality, it enables me to waste inordinate amounts of time doing mindless, brain-killing activities that all but ensure that productivity is bound hand and foot and sequestered in a dark room to slowly lose its anthropomorphized  sanity.

An ironic exception to this rule is when the aforementioned technology suffers some unfortunate fate due to defect, accidental trauma, or general proximity to children.  It is in these scenarios that my now quite mentally unbalanced productivity is released from its fetters and set against the problem not unlike a Treadstone graduate in a Robert Ludlum novel.

I had the opportunity to experience such an episode today when my relatively expensive and absolutely bad-ass laptop decided to stop accepting electrical current from the charger.  This initiated an intense flurry of productivity as my laptop battery's state of charge slowly ticked down like the timer on a quintessential action movie explosive device.  Having lived through such an event before with a different computer I was fairly certain that one of the soldered contacts of the DC jack had come loose from the motherboard, requiring a fairly comprehensive disassembly of the internals to facilitate either repair or replacement.  So I am now like John McLean in his second or third appearance, annoyed at his run in with yet another criminal mastermind, but not surprised as this kind of thing is apparently just going to keep on happening.  "What the... ok, well I guess here we go.  AGAIN."

So putting my Google skills in top gear I sifted through online tech support FAQs, tech geek forums, and random must-not-be-clicked Chinese domained results and found an Ebay listing for a replacement jack for $3.75 with free shipping.  Ordered.  Furthermore, I happened to find an awesomely produced in-house maintenance video on YouTube detailing disassembly of my model of laptop set to inspiring 80's "how-to" music.

After just one watch-though and with plenty of battery life to spare, I turned off the slowly fading laptop and flipped it over for the procedure.  Here is it in yard sale configuration on my desk.

Let's take a closer look see, and.... YEAH. See that metal bit that is directly above PWRCONN1?

Let me just encourage it with a burning metal pointy bit and some fresh solder...

I forgot to take a picture of the "after," but here's then end result:

Fixed!  For a grand total of zero dollars.  I can do anything that I put my mind to with my ingenuity and tech-handiness!  As a matter of fact, I'm sure I can do other things as well!  Like fix that doorknob and unpack those boxes that have sat around since I moved in this house 10 months ago and maybe even sign up for college classes again and...

Hush productivity and get back in the basement.  I'm going to blog for two hours and then get distracted by cats on the internet.

Sometimes the kitchen works

So, I had two forays into the land of serious culinary dedication this weekend.  Don't get me wrong, I cook plenty and get very few complaints from friends and family, but sometimes I feel as if I manage to achieve particular culinary excellence that stands out from the norm. 

The first endeavour was homemade pizza.  Now I know that pizza is not the classiest dish, but I have very rarely had good homemade pizza and it hasn't ever been mine.  We've been trying to figure out how to possibly trim up the budget a little bit, especially in the area of prepared food.  Every Friday night is pizza night, however, and there would likely be a mutiny if I suggested to my children that we do anything different.  So my wife and I figured we'd give homemade a shot.  The first attempt was two Fridays ago, and it involved a crust that was rolled out of a Pilsbury can, Prego spaghetti sauce, regular shredded mozzarella, and pepperoni on top (of course!).  It was not very good at all, and I felt like I failed my children and nearly took them out for ice cream in apology.

So this week I knew that I needed to either step up my game or concede that the 15 year olds at Papa Murphy's were my superiors.  So obviously the pizza crust needed to be made from scratch, so I started scouring the internet looking for the "secret."  Found it on this lovely blog http://www.laurenslatest.com/fail-proof-pizza-dough-and-cheesy-garlic-bread-sticks-just-like-in-restaurants/ It turns out the secret is in two parts: 1) use bread flour (high gluten content), and 2) work it so much that Dough Protective Services show up at your door.  I was skeptical when reading the instructions that said to put the stand mixer on HIGH for SIX minutes and then walk away, but I can attest that this method worked out very well.  The other thing that I decided to do to really make this pizza stand out was to make the cheese from scratch as well.  We already had the cheese making supplies, and we had picked up a gallon of fresh milk at the farmers market with the intention of turning it into cheese as a fun project for the kids (cheese supplies from our local homebrew supply www.austinhomebrew.com).  So kid project cheese became a subset of the larger agenda to make kid worthy pizza.  I was quite well pleased with the outcome of the final product, and we had fun along the way (though the kitchen looked as if it had been used for the set of The Road Warrior and Waterworld). 

The second dinner that turned out quite well this weekend was planned for Sunday to be eaten during our weekly fellowship with my sister and her family.  My wife had picked out a recipe for apple barbecue bacon-wrapped chicken that had appeared on Pinterest.  As she had an early-ish meeting to attend at church Sunday morning, she asked me to prepare it since it needed to cook in the crockpot for several hours.  Apparently I was overly enthusiastic in my application of bacon; I saw two pounds of bacon in the fridge and assumed that all of it was intended for this yummy dish (it was not).  So I got a scolding from my wife, but the bacon to chicken ratio turned out to be very acceptable in my opinion.  The dish was heavenly (or alternatively sinful) and everyone expressed that it was exceedingly nom-worthy.  I also received accolades from the entire universe and I'm fielding offers from Food Network to host a show, while being simultaneously solicited by Paula Dean to give her remedial training in bacon.  Not really.  But that's how I feel when something I made goes over well with my extended family.

So all in all, the weekend was quite high on the delicious food index.  No meals were procured from vendors.  The Longhorns pulled it out against Oklahoma State.  Not bad.

Oh now I remember...

I am not sure why, but for some reason I often forget that I am uncomfortable in situations with large crowds and lots of noise.  In such an environment, my immediate thoughts go to establishing an exit strategy and finding a place to stand that is as far as apart from the chaos as possible.  I don't think there has been any time in my life in which I didn't feel anxious in such a situation, and so it stands to reason that I would try my level best to avoid participating in one.  However, every so often (more often than I can bring myself to believe) the opportunity presents itself to attend an event or function that promises to include unreasonable numbers of strangers in an unfamiliar setting- and I say to myself, "Sure. Why not?" 

Well the answer, self, is because we will freak out and end up behaving like a mental patient- often in plain view of acquaintances and strangers alike.  It isn't a matter of determination or willpower apparently.  No matter how much I'd like to be able to "take one for the team", at that scale I have a 100% track record of reacting poorly. 

Such activities seem to include:

• House parties full of strangers that generate large amounts of chaotic stimuli while providing no opportunity for conversation with anyone one person that doesn't include yelling at the top of my lungs.

• Places of business that specialize in erecting as many bouncy houses as physically possible in one large room in which children reenact Lord of the Flies while adults do nothing and pretend that everything is probably "fine."

• I wish that I could think of another specific example here, since a bulletized list with only two bullets seems insufficient, but oh well.

The aftereffects of surviving one of these situations seem to involve an overwhelming desire to take up a mountain hermitage in a remote country and shunning the idea of any further social contact for days.  So for the sake of the people whose company I otherwise enjoy in more comfortable circumstances, I gather that I should try and avoid these situations that leave me with a general disdain for humanity at large.

In the beginning

I an uncertain whether or not I have anything to write that is worth publishing in this particular format; I am certainly not very well versed with the institution of the blog and have never followed any one blog with regularity.  If I have any clear motivation in starting my own, it is in the spirit of journaling for the sake of expressing my ideas to myself (also not a practice with which I am terribly familiar). 

I have, however, always been fond of writing so perhaps this will prove to be diverting at the very least, and myabe constructive in some specific way if I am lucky.  I imagine this blog might appeal to the reader more if I narrow the focus of my posts to a particular subject, however, I haven't thought even remotely that far ahead yet.

This is what I might best characterize as a impulsive decision to mimick the behavoir of friends and acquiantances based on anecdotal evidence that such an exercise has been cathartic for them.  At the very least, my hope is that by taking the opportunity to record some of my daily thoughts I will at some point in the future be able to look back with some amount of perspective and find continuity in my life.  As it stands, I oftentimes find it quite difficult to relate to the memory of my former selves with regard to intent, convictions, and motiviations. 

With any luck, having a running record of such things will enable me to be better aware of myself beyond the immediate.  Who knows what such clarity might acheive? God help us all.