http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/24/apple-responds-over-iphone-4-reception-issues-youre-holding-th/

It’s surprising that people didn’t notice this happening with the iPhone 3′s. Perhaps the 4 is more sensitive and quicker to respond? Dunno…

Does this account for the big part of AT&T’s perceived (or not) signal issues? I don’t think so.

I can tell you with certainty that, for example when I pull into my driveway, my call will drop. Regardless whether I’m using hands-free or the phone directly. The antenna woes also don’t account for the “Called Failed” problems many people have when just trying to dial someone. I think AT&T’s network issues are the bigger blame here than someone’s Kung Fu grip on their iPhone

Customer: “My Scanner isn’t working. It keeps giving me an error that the program is busy.”

Me: “Did you restart your computer?”.

Customer: “Yes”.

Me:” Okay, I’ll come take a look.” So I go over to take a look.

Customer: “See it’s doing it again.”

I sit down in the customer’s chair and notice the scanner is turned off, and the USB cable is not connected to the computer.

Me: “It’s all set! You just have to make sure the data cable is connected to your computer and the device is turned on.”

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! This is like a Dilbert cartoon! UGH!

The mechanic now says that their supplier sent them the wrong clutch for the car. I have the option of having them “sew” it back up with the original clutch, which they say has a foot amount of meat left on it, or they can re-order the clutch which is $450 instead of the originally quoted $220, and it will be Tuesday before the part comes in. Very frustrating. I’m on the third price quote. I’m having them order the clutch and I will speak with the owner on Monday to try and get him to honor the price I authorized the work for. My only concern with keeping the current clutch is that if it goes in a year or two then it’ll be another $1000 or close to it to replace it.

Once in a while I used to get a 1/2 oz of creativity in me and write a somewhat decent blog post; one that was a little phylosofical, barely witty and mildly interesting. These days all I find I can spout out is something that resembles a journal; a record of events as if recorded for a documentary. I can’t seem to come up with, nor do I have the desire to compose something mildly interesting. My wife would tell me that she liked the way I used to write. I feel like I don’t have that much to say, or at least nothing interesting to say…

Alas spring is here. Trees have a come to life, flowers are blooming, the birds are singing and all that other crap But seriously, I’m glad spring is finally here! So to usher in the new season, I’ve made a couple of changes to the site: I’ve installed new photo gallery software http://www.dragan.org/gallery, and finally refreshed the theme. Doesn’t really matter I guess since it doesn’t affect anyone but my own craving for something new.

Speaking of something new, classes start in about a month. I have mixed feelings about that. I’m, in a way excited, but in another way kinda bummed out about having to study when the weather is nice. I guess it will keep me busy and out of trouble

Neo neo Neo Geo! That dumb song’s stuck in my head. I guess that moron accomplished something! It’s kinda viral LOL!

I’m taking classes again. It’s been 7 years. A long time! I’m starting off with Microeconomics and elements of Psychology. I’m nervous because of Econ. Oh well, I’ll give it a shot and see how it works. Today’s a long day at the University. Ligia works until 8, then I think we’re joining up with friends for whatever.

I need to get out of here. I feel trapped. I guess taking classes to further my education and marketability is a step in the right direction. I’m bored with this crappy city, I’m bored with my job and I’m bored with my house, and oh yeah…I’m tired of the cold and gray skies which are a persistent part of the scenery in Michigan. We’re definitely planning on getting out of here, but it’s just not possible at the moment because of certain circumstances. I’d take a lower paying job if I could live in sunshine for a couple of years. Kind’a the same ol’ crap daily, and we’re both bored out of our minds. I know I am.

I’ve been trying to mentally prepare myself for our impending Romania trip. Just thinking of being on a plane, remembering how it feels makes me nervous LOL. I’ve been having many dreams about flying. Sometimes they torment me, and sometimes I can muster-up the guts to not be afraid of it. Ligia thinks I should be taking flying lessons because I’d love flying a plane! She says sometimes on the freeway entrance ramps our little VW feels like an airplane, the way I drive it haha. Perhaps one day. Until then I need to come up with the right combination of drugs (no, not like cocaine) and alcohol to keep me from freaking out.

I’ve been battling a spell – a long spell of low energy. I have no umpf, no gusto to do anything. It’s almost torture to go to the gym and work-out. Perhaps the crappy grayness of winter sapped the life out of me, I don’t know; perhaps it’s a physical thing. All i do know is that ever since I pinched a nerve in my back last fall, when I was living on Vicodin and muscle relaxants for two months, I never fully regained my energy. I’m dragging in the morning, I’m dragging mid-day, and I’m dead tired at night. When morning comes, I feel like I’ve been beaten with a 2×4 all night and I can barely wake up. Perhaps it’s my “fall from grace” with staying away from carbs?

The remodel has kinda taken a back seat as i am unable to find any motivation or energy to continue. I have some drywall patching and sanding to do in our basement bathroom, and to re-do a couple of large pieces of drywall upstairs where a couple of my friends tried to help me out but wound-up doing a really bad job, so now I’m stuck with needing to redo it.

After a long week we’ve finished the bedroom! Everything was painted, including little trim stuff, the hole in the ceiling came out very nicely for an amateur The closets now have removable closet rods, and it’s unbelievable how less crowded your closet is when the clothes rod isn’t buckling and sagging from the weight of the clothes…steel man…what can I say?! We’ve decided to go looking for a new bed frame to match the wood of the room; a nice low-lying platform bed frame would probably be very nice.

My work in the bathroom downstairs has begun. Ligia sealed the grout on the floor tiles, and I started installing the vanity. I had to knock out a few of the vertical tiles at the base of the wall in order to push the vanity as close to the wall as possible. I also discovered that the vanity was made for a horizontal drainpipe – one going into the wall, then curving downward. I didn’t have a 1.5″ hole saw, so I drew in the diameter of the pipe (plus a little extra wiggle room) using a cut-off piece of the 1.5″ pvc drain pipe I had reduced, then drilled a couple of small holes into the base of the vanity, and traced the circle with a jigsaw. The round cut isn’t a perfect circle, but then again when it’s hidden inside a cabinet, who cares? I did a mock-hookup of the plumbing, then cemented a fitting into the drainpipe. It turns out I had to do some drywall patchwork because of removing those three wall tiles…the grout was stuck really well and ripped a bit of the drywall. Ah well, nothing a 4×4 aluminum patch and joint compound won’t fix. The drywall adventure continued with a seam cracking…I guess when the drywall was put in – at least in this particular junction, the drywall was seamed betweens studs – don’t do this please when you’re drywalling…just buy an extra sheet of drywall and cut it properly, or for goodness sake, screw in an extra stud! I barely leaned against this wall, and *cccrraaaack* goes the seam! Oh joy! More joint compound slathered to patch it up! Sanding heaven…yay! Joint compound is like the bondo of walls, except for nobody really cares if that’s joint compound behind a patch of paint or it’s already solidified cousin, drywall, but man people sure do care when you slather on bondo into a dent on a car LOL With the plumbing figured out, next is the plumbers putty and “gluing” the pop-up to the sink. The instructions say to Silicone glue the sink to the vanity…hmm…that just doesn’t sound too sturdy, but hey, what do I know?! My kind of the dilemma now is in which fashion to fasten the vanity to the wall? I could theoretically use 3″ deck screws, but my only concern is that because of the slight angle of the basement floor, there’s a little uneven gap from the top of the vanity running downward, and so the hole in the crappy wood the vanity is made of will eventually give and the thing will move back and forth a little if you lean against the vanity. I wonder if there’s some kind of nut/bolt system I can use…? Then I could drill in the stud, the bolt would be stable, but I’d use a washer and nut on the vanity perhaps to really stabilize it…although the gap isn’t *that* big behind it. I gues this is where a little free Home Depot consulting comes in hehe

It started as an idea we had to rip out the carpet is some of the rooms in the house in favor of the hardwood flooring which is already in the house in most rooms. We decided to start with our bedroom because it – we thought – would be the easiest and less hassle. All we were going to do is rip out the carpet…until we started pulling all the furniture out of the room and notices that the carpet ran into the closets as one piece! Grrr! Just as well, because we also noticed the room was in desperate need of a fresh coat of paint. Out came everything from the closets as well; this of course prompting us to paint the closets too! Then I got the idea to replace the closet rods (this was actually an old idea of mine which never came to fruition; I actually had the 2 new closet rods in the garage and there they lied for years and started to rust…new rods were required!) which meant a small pry-bar and removal of a couple of the support boards for the rods.

The next day it was off to Home Depot to buy paint and a few painting supplies. Back to the house and we started furiously patching little holes in the wall and wiping down the walls, and taping everything that needed taping, removing wall plates, vent covers – all the good stuff. Of course, like with any project, there are bound to be a snag or two…I guess so far only one in our case…while painting the ceiling, the roller punched a little hole in the drywall! Yikes! It’s probable that there was a leak in the roof before I had it replaced 3 years ago. Oh well, tomorrow was going to be another day. We finally got done with a coat of paint on Sunday night.

Monday we needed some more paint, a drywall patch and some joint compound, and some more paint rollers. Of course while you’re in Home Depot, you just can’t help but browse and look around the other isles to see what’s there, and you’d be amazed at what you remember you need! In our case we looked at some sink/vanity combos we need for the new basement bathroom, but thought oh well, we’ll just stick to what’s at hand and do this later, but we did wind up buying some drip pans for our cook top. As we struggled with installed the wrong kind of drip pans (thanks, home depot dude…), we started looking online for them, then started looking at Home Depot’s website for a sink/vanity, and decided to go back and buy one from the store and take advantage of a sale they were having. Meanwhile I remembered I bought an expensive Moen faucet back in the summer which we returned and used store credit towards the new vanity which included a faucet. So we bought the vanity and the plumbing parts for it, and decided to change some door hinges and door knobs, so we bought those as well, and went home and slapped on the second coat of paint, changed a set of door hinges and cleaned up post-painting. Now we just have to re-assemble the closets and move furniture back in!

Future projects will include re-doing the front room and immediately after the bedroom’s back in place, installing the vanity/sink combo in the basement.

Spammmers hit my wordpress! I was too naive and left comments wide open. Before I knew what hit me, I had over 700 spam comments within a couple of days Not anymore! Closed that right up I’m now requiring registration.

Been playing around with different themes in WP and mobile support plugins. I installed a couple of plugins which format my site nicely for mobile device, and o course the iphone/ipod touch has it’s own plugin ‘cuz it displays so much nicer