May 2014

Hello! Yes, it's been 3 months. :) All is good here. Since I have no idea what I've covered & what I haven't, I'll just tell you the highlights.

I switched to e-cigs. Best thing I ever did & SO much easier than quitting. No more stained walls, my sense of taste & smell is good, & I'm healthier. I'm a fan. I'm using V2, & have never had a problem with their products, so if you're in the market I suggest them highly. :)

Our daughter is coming to visit & attend our son's senior band banquet. She'll be here about a week & her flight will land in Dallas in just over 48 hours.

I finally got my hair straightened & it looks amazing! I found a GREAT place that does full service work. Hard to find these days because for years all they would do is spritz my hair & trim it. New place every time & that's all I could get done. Well, this last place I found does it all. Wash, cut, style, blow dry, & straighten. Not like I've had it straightened before. This won't come out in 2 days or 2 months. This is PERMANENT! Only the new hair growing in may be wavy & then I go back & have it touched up. All that amazing service & wonderful hair & guess what? It was CHEAP too! I'm now a customer for life & the guy who did my hair was exactly who I was looking for. I had 3 criteria for the PERFECT stylist & he hit 2 out of 3. I'm not sure about the 3rd because I wasn't about to ask him if he was gay. :) He's amazing though & I hope he never leaves there. If he does I'll have to track him down & hope he's still in the business.

Our son joined the Marine Corps. & ships out August 25th. Boot camp is in California & either he hasn't chosen a job yet or hasn't informed us if he has, so we have no idea where he's going after that. We plan on attending the graduation, so I get to see California for the 1st time in my life. :D

Yes, I'm still playing Minecraft ... a LOT & I'm going to ArcadiaCon next month! I have 2 servers now: lizc864.mcph.co & a Realms server. ALL of my work can be found on 3 different Pinterest pages:

http://www.pinterest.com/lizc864/minecraft/

http://www.pinterest.com/lizc864/lizc864-minecraft-realms/

http://www.pinterest.com/lizc864/lizc864-minecraft-server/

Hubby decided back in January that my truck was nicer than his Civic (duh!) & started taking it to work 6 days a week. Well, after 5 months of driving the beat up Honda (which I hate) I traded it for a Ford Mustang GT convertible! Straight trade, no cash. I KNOW I got the much better end of that deal & I'm loving my Mustang! Spring, the best time to buy a convertible ... I've been driving around with the top down & getting sun! Hubby told everyone it's the "Midlife crisis mobile", but I prefer to call it my "hubby stole my truck so I traded his car for something COOL mobile"

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/96827460713170653/

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/96827460713290353/

I stopped playing Sims for a while during my Minecraft intro, but have now started again & now play Minecraft & Sims equally. I don't screenshot in the Sims as much as I used to though as I'm not building there anymore. I save all my building for Minecraft, but that may change soon.

I was worried about losing power during this blog due to storms we're having today, but instead my computer crashed. I have issues with my video drivers & once in a while I'll get the black screen of death. The screen just goes black & there's no coming back from that. No Ctrl+Alt+Del, nothing. The only thing I can do is punch reset. Luckily though, Blogger is cool & saves your work as a draft often. I only lost about 1 sentence. Not bad!

The last of the news, but not least is a new puppy! Taz. Hubby, who is NOT a pet person ... especially when we already have cats & dogs, was coming back from a PC repair job at a business one night & while driving through downtown Dallas was stopped at a light & heard a woman crying. Sitting on the curb was a homeless woman crying & holding a TINY little puppy. She was promising the puppy that she would find him a good home. Hubby pulled over & asked her what was going on. She said that this little puppy (I mean he fit in the palm of my hand ... but was eating solid food) was lost & a bunch of mean people were yelling at him & scaring him. HOW can people do that?! How can people be mean to animals? Worse, how can people be mean to domestic animals? Even WORSE, a super tiny little puppy that was already lost & scared??? Sometimes I am SO disappointed in the human race. :'( Anyway, she grabbed the puppy & ran off with him. She was now on this street corner crying (I would be too ... people are so cruel!) & hubby did the unthinkable. He said he would be more than happy to give him a great & loving home & proceeded to tell her that we have other pets & that he would never be lonely. Well, he was going to surprise me but couldn't contain himself. He called me & told me. I of course did the girly "aaawwww!" thing over & over. When he got home & I saw this little guy, it started all over again. This was the CUTEST puppy I have ever seen in my life & we're talking almost 50 years of life here. O-M-G he's cute!!! It only took me a couple days to come up with the name Taz. He's got the wild energy of Taz! He's spoiled rotten & finally about the same size as the Chihuahuas but feels like he weighs 10X as much. He's one solid little guy. Out of control & destructive ... I have to watch him every second, but he bonded with me instantly & never EVER leaves my side. If I get up to walk into the kitchen (right behind me), he gets up from sleeping & follows me in there. Every step & he's right by my side. I'm not sure what he is, but I'm fairly sure he's not a mutt & also fairly sure he's a miniature dachshund. Everyone, meet Taz:

The full-size individual photos can be found on my facebook page @ facebook.com/LizC864

February 1, 2014

Good morning! I took yesterday off. I was too excited. I uploaded my 1st Minecraft map (6th pic) & I already had a rave review! If you'd like to download it, the link is: lizc864.com/Minecraft/2014_January_LizC864_Swampland.zip

After that I couldn't help it, I just had to start February's map! I welcome all suggestions as the maps should only get better with experience & your suggestions.

After uploading January's map I started February's. It only took 2 tries this time. The 1st try put me on the top edge of a mountain in an extreme hills biome. Not very useful for building anything. The 2nd try put me in a forest surrounded by trees & beautiful flowers. WIN! I created a Simple Suburban Train Station (5th pic) & then started building out from there. Unlike my 1st map, this one is more

organized. There are 4 tracks that branch out from the train station & the houses are spaced along the tracks starting out a bit from the station so you can still enjoy the biome. I didn't have to knock down every tree. The 1st house I created is the one I still live in, Alpine Retreat (2nd pic). Then I created the Candy Cane Cabin (3rd pic), a castle (4th pic), & 1007 (1st pic). Notice there is a lot of natural biome around each

house that's great for exploring & gathering resources. No matter which house you choose, you'll have space. The 1st map was more like being in a city, this is out in the country where you can barely see your neighbor's house. :) This is going to be a great map folks! It'll be uploaded on Thursday the 28th.

January 30, 2014

Good morning! Great day yesterday ... I hope yours was too. I made Eggos for our son & I for breakfast, cleaned the house, took the dogs out, made sandwiches for our son & I for lunch, then sat down & played Minecraft. The acgricultural Byzantine village I was playing completed their village (2nd pic). 1st completed village I've played so far. It looks great & I have a great small house in the village. Now it's smooth sailing ... mining, surviving, hanging out in the village ... it'll be great! When hubby got home I made Sloppy Joes for all of us for

dinner.

Almost everything is more complicated than it seems, but almost nothing is hopeless.

Give until your heart sings.

Spock: "Has it occurred to you that there's a certain inefficiency in constantly questioning me on things you've already made up your mind about?"

Kirk: "It gives me emotional security."

--The Carbomite Maneuver

January 29, 2014

Good morning! Great day yesterday. I had a boiled egg for breakfast, cleaned the house, sent the grocery list out & sat chicken out to thaw for dinner, took the dogs out, tried to sync my apps but there's something wrong with iTunes on my PC involving a C++ Runtime error. I added a storage unit to my 2014 January LizC864 Minecraft Map. Anyway, I had seen something on YouTube about a new mesa biome. It was beautiful ... there was a seed for it, so I typed it in & no mesa. Oh well. I deleted that & then started up a brand new game with cheats disabled to see if I could survive. I only died once & it wasn't in a fight, I fell into lava damnit. Guess what? The new mesa biome! What are the chances? Anyway ... good game. It took me a long time of living underground, but I finally started building an above ground home. No roof yet, but I'm getting there. Good game. When hubby got home I made chicken & rice & then we headed straight to bed. It was late & I was so tired. I overslept as a result, couldn't get up as early as I would have liked ... but it's all good. Less Minecraft time today, but that's OK. Cheeseburgers or Sloppy Joes for dinner ... not sure which yet. I'll decide when hubby gets home tonight.

Confidence is faith in oneself. It can't easily be given by another.

Magic happens ever day in a zillion little ways.

Man is what he does!

January 28, 2014

Good morning! Yesterday was a great day. I got everything done that I needed to before playing Minecraft. See, there's the trick. Do everything I need to do BEFORE opening Minecraft ... because once I open that game, it's all over. I don't look up again until it's bedtime. I can't help it. I've tried. The game is stronger than I am. NO willpower to walk away. I still refer to Minecraft as the crack cocaine of the gaming world. You can't just "try it" to see what it's like. You can't just play for 5 minutes. Well, I can't. Many can't. I cleaned the house, sent the grocery list out, took the dogs out, cleared out my iCloud e-mail & read an article about Siri & then instead of working on my hand knit afghan, I opened up Minecraft & started a new game which is a Byzantine Agriculture village. I spent 

much of the game collecting resources for them & then while on a mission out to the desert to find a lot of sandstone for them, I found a lucky box, opened it & a Wither came out! Scared the crap out of me. I had never seen one before & was sitting there saying "Holy crap! Holy crap! Holy crap! It's a friggin' Transformer!" It was flying around & blowing stuff up all around me. Luckily I

was far from home & the village was safe, but holy crap! I was inevitably hit by a strike & died. Oh well, there went all my experience points. I had made it up to about 20 & I had some cool stuff on me. I was way too far from home to respawn & run back & collect my stuff. I wonder if it's still out there flying around. I have no idea if it's a permanent addition to that world now or not. Probably with my luck. Occasionally, the lucky box is very UNlucky. Once before it spawned a crapload of spiders & I died instantly. I might have survived the Wither except I was just standing there staring at it trying to figure out what the hell it was & watching it fly around & blow stuff up. I never ran. I was too mesmerized by it. In between gathering supplies for the Byzantine village, I got tired of sleeping outside & created a nice home for myself out of the materials I had on hand from my expeditions. I made a nice looking home / station from coal blocks & sandstone (2nd & 3rd pics). I can't wait to see which game I'm going to play today. I have many. Not only 1 for each of the half a dozen cultures, but a game for each of the different types of villages for each culture (military, religious, etc.) I also have my multi-player, creative, & plain ol' survival games. Never bored! :)

Archer: "I really thought you were beginning to understand human emotions."

T'Pol: "Not when they apply to primitive quadrupeds who haven't evolved the ability to speak or use a toilet."

Better beans and bacon in peace than cakes and ale in fear.

We cannot change the cards we were dealt, just how we play the hand.

January 27, 2014

Good morning! Yes, it's been a while. I've been busy. Let's see, what's new? My final results are in from the ancestry DNA. It's amazing how the final results are so different from the ones I got earlier. Northern European. Denmark mostly ... more than anything else. YAY! :) Other than that I've been playing Minecraft. Yeah, I know. Big surprise. I pulled an all-nighter last night & am getting tired. I'm going to try to stay awake today & reset my schedule that's been completely upside down, but we'll see. So how are all of you? Good I hope.

A book is a gift you can open again & again.

Admiral Leonard "Bones" McCoy was not initially written into the script for the pilot episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. DeForest Kelley's participation came about when Gene Roddenberry asked him over lunch about doing a cameo, fully expecting the actor to say no. Not only did Kelley agree to reprising the role of Dr. McCoy, he reportedly accepted SAG scale as payment for the appearance, instead of a higher rate more appropriate to his role in the franchise. Kelley's scenes in "Encounter at Farpoint" marked his final TV appearance.

All times are beautiful for those who maintain joy withing them.

Although the crew of the Starship Voyager had some interaction with the Alpha Quadrant early in their journey into the Delta Quadrant, their friends & family did not become aware of their plight until more than 3 years after they went missing. Starfleet had spent over 2 years searching for the crew before giving up hope & officially listing them as lost. 14 months later, the Doctor's program was sent over an alien relay network to make contact &, after a brief adventure, return with a message from home. (Message in a Bottle.)

Always present your front to the world.

Approach your lives as if they were novels, with their own heroes, villains, red herrings, and triumphs.

Come on, it's not like we would have made an ideal couple. A Vulcan & a human? Romeo & Juliet probably stood a better chance. -Tucker, "The Augments"

Discipline yourself and others won’t need to.

Dream as if you'll live forever live as if you'll die today.

... Good words. That's where ideas begin.

High 5.

Human beings are superhuman.

I am a verb.

I believe in coincidences. Coincidences happen every day. But I don't trust coincidences.

I can't change the laws of physics.

If your ship doesn't come in, swim out to it.

I give myself sometimes admirable advice, but I am incapable of taking it.

I'm no writer, but if I were, it seems to me I'd want to poke my head up every once in a while & take a look around ... see what's going on. It's life. You can miss it if you don't open your eyes.

In traditional Betazoid marriage ceremony, the bride, groom, wedding party, & guests are completely nude.

It's not where you take things from - it's where you take them to.

Joy is not in things; it is in us.

Keep calm & carry gum.

Make the time to enjoy the simple tings in life.

Missing? The Captain is missing? It seems I've found myself on a voyage of the damned. Very well. Please advise the highest-ranking officer who is not missing to see me at his earliest convenience. -The Doctor, "Time & Again"

Our bodies are our gardens, to which our wills are gardeners … either to have it sterile with idleness or manur’d with industry.

Part of being a Captain is knowing when to smile, make the troops happy. Even when it's the last thing in the world you want to do. Because they're your troops, & you have to take care of them. -Sisco, "Rules of Engagement"

RAIN DOES NOT FALL ON ONE ROOF ALONE.

Right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant.

Star Trek: Voyager episode "Blink of an Eye" was originally titled "Wink of an Eye," until the production staff realized that was already the title of an episode of Star Trek: The Original Series. Coincidentally, both episodes share a theme of alien visitors in a time-accelerated state boarding the ship to find the crew apparently frozen because they are moving at a much slower rate of speed.

Star Trek: Voyager's 2-hour pilot, "Caretaker," aired on January 16, 1995. Not only did it serve as the premiere for the series, but it also launched the new United Paramount Network (UPN). The fledgling network ran for 11 years before merging with The WB network to form the CW in September 2006. With the final episode of Star Trek: Enterprise airing on May 13, 2005, that made the 2005-6 TV season the only season in UPN's existence in which a Star Trek series did not air on the network.

Step into the light.

That which we call destiny goes forth from within people, not from without into them.

... To boldly go where no man has gone before. -Notto on the dedication plaque of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-A

Today is the day.

We must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope.

When do any of us do enough?

Whenever a group of people start believing they are better than everyone else, the results are always the same.

You are free to fly.

Your biggest debt is to your talents.

Your voice can change the world.

January 14, 2014

Good afternoon! OK, LOTS of news since yesterday. MAJOR news! I'll save the best for last though. :) Yesterday was a great day. I cleaned the house, sent the grocery list out, took the dogs out & updated all my i-apps. After that it was smooth sailing with Minecraft. I built a watchtower that came out great (2nd pic), then a little building that's mostly just for hanging out since there's no back wall & a partial open ceiling (3rd pic), then another one just like it but different colors (4th pic), & this morning I built an epic castle (5th pic). It was a 5½ hour build & it's fairly amazing! All the interior pics & final pics after it's landscaped will be put on Pinterest later when it's done. Now for the huge news! I got my 23andme results back with over 900 relatives & those are

just the ones who have 23andme accounts! I've sent out 25 requests & will probably send out 25 per day until I get to them all. I've already had someone reply back to me. YAY! A relative! Now ... the absolute best news: The results are back as to which countries my ancestors came from. Now this is all on my mother's side. There's no DNA transfer from my father's side. That's how it works. So, on my mother's side (I

didn't see ANY of this coming ... I mean it's ALL a 100% shock to me! 6th & 7th pics) ... #1) Mexico #2) U.K. #3) Spain #4) Poland #5) Jamaica #6) Italy #7) Dominican Republic #8) Cuba #9) Colombia. Now ... REALLY?! I mean ... SERIOUSLY?! I was always told "Dutch" or "Greek". Maybe on my Dad's side ... but on my mother's side (she didn't know ANY of this either!) ... we were seriously left in the dark! I guess my

grandmother didn't want us to know? Is this why she shunned her entire family & I never got to know any of them? Why was she hiding all this? This explains so much though. My eyes, my hair, my ability to tan really well. But ... REALLY?! I still can't believe it. I'm Mexican? I can't even speak Spanish after taking it for 3 years in high school & I don't even like Mexican food. HA! Jamaica?? It's ALL a shock. I think the U.K.

is the only one I was expecting. The rest? REALLY??????? WOW!!!

January 13, 2014

Good afternoon! Sunday was a great day. I started a new world in Minecraft (more on that later) & I got some of my DNA results back. Health-wise I'm one of the healthiest people alive. I knew that, if I never started smoking I would be one of the healthiest people on the planet. My largest health risk is Type-I diabetes & even that is a low risk at only 6.5% chance. I have a DECREASED risk of breast cancer which is a huge relief. Along my mother's line, I have European/Near Eastern heritage. Exact countries will be disclosed later. On my mother's side I'm related to the singer Jimmy Buffett! It's great to know this information. I'm extremely relieved at seeing my health report, The Jimmy Buffett news was great & more info will come later as to 

exactly how we're related & I'll also receive addition ancestry info & possibly more relatives. I also can't wait to find out exactly which countries my family is from. Europe is cool, once I find out where in Europe I can plan my 1st ever vacation out of the country & have a great time SEEING where I'm from! WOO!! Now, Minecraft ... the more I play the more ideas I get & then I start a new world to implement these 

new ideas. My latest world, 2014 January LizC864 Plains (2nd pic) is going to be my best yet. They're always improving! I can't wait until I have one that I feel is good enough to open up to the public as a Minecraft server. The 1st house I built is the 3rd pic. It's taken from a distance, but that's because I wanted to get the large trees into the pic that I planted in the front yard. All interior pics can be found on my 

Pinterest Minecraft board. The 4th pic is the 2nd house. The front isn't actually the house, but a safely walled in farm that contains carrots, potatoes, sugar cane, wheat, chickens, & a cow. The house in all the way in the back behind the farm. The lip that goes all the way around the farm is to protect you from spiders climbing in.

This pic is of the 3rd house which I've moved into because after I build each house I go mining so there's some resources in each house for you. While mining after building this one, I found 2 chests in a cave & ended up with a LOT of really cool stuff, so I moved into this house with all my cool stuff. :)

This house, the 4th house is my design & was built this morning & is complete.

Today's Sims game is Small Steps Daycare. My Sim is Vinnie & he's just getting started. He's in the business career & should do well since he doesn't need any special skills for that career. It's by far the easiest career for that reason.

Grandma taught me to never judge a species by their eating habits. -Tucker, "Broken Bow"

Klingons 1st appeared in the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "Errand of Mercy" & have evolved significantly through the subsequent films & future TV series. Linguist Mark Okrand was hired to develop a working Klingon Language (also known as Klingonese) for Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, which he based on the guttural sounds James Doohan created for The Motion Picture. The newly created language was the basis for Okrand's The Klingon Dictionary, 1st published by Pocket Books in 1985. Qapla' = success

Stay true, stay fly.

We have come to believe what we have is maintenance-free. It is not.

Word by word the great books are written.

January 11, 2014

Good afternoon! "Where ya been?" "Busy." "Too busy to write?" "Yup, sorry." What's happened since Monday? Hmmm ... I've enjoyed Carnation Instant Breakfast, cleaned the house ... played Minecraft. Yup, that's about it. LOL! Many would say "get a life man" ... but this IS my life & I love it. I'm happy. :) Different strokes for different folks. As long as you're happy & you're bringing no harm to others, you're doing the right thing with your life.

"Big Goodbye" episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation introduced the 20th-century detective-novel character, Dixon Hill, through a holodeck program that Captain Picard would revisit throughout the series & in the film 1st Contact. It was the only episode of any of the Star Trek series to win the prestigious Peabody Award for excellence in television broadcasting. It also won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Costume Design & an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Cinematography.

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.

Ferengi Rules of Acquisition are a body of principles that all Ferengi males are expected to memorize & live by. The rules form the cornerstone of Ferengi society & were originally set down over ten millennia ago by the 1st Grand Nagus, Gint. 1st Rule: Once you have their money, you never give it back.

Fight scene between Kirk & the Gorn captain in the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "Arena" was filmed at Vasquez Rocks in northern Los Angeles County. The park is a popular filming location, with several other episodes of the original series, The Next Generation, Voyager, Enterprise, & the 2009 Star Trek movie filmed there as well. The familiar spot has also appeared in many other movies & TV shows, including Bonanza, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey, Roswell, NCIS, & New Girl.

Fort I built this morning in the 2014 January LizC864 Swampland map. I took a few days off from working on this town because of Internet issues. Instead, I created 2 new games & was playing offline. The 1st of the 2 games is coming along great. They both are, actually. Screenshots will be uploaded to Pinterest. So far I've built the structure & added a short front deck to it made w/ Jungle Wood Slabs.

Goth household is my Sims game of the day. Lewis Goth is my 3rd gen Sim & he's still a baby. His 2 traits so far are Artistic (music, painting, & writing skills), & Easily Impressed. Lewis is a Pisces who likes Soul music, fried peanut butter & banana sandwiches, & the color gray. So far, it looks like he has 3 options: Join the music career, work from home & sell his paintings, work from home as an author making money off of his books. 3 options already & he's only a baby. SWEET!

"I am finding it a difficult challenge to integrate into this group, it's full of complex social structures that are unfamiliar to me. Compared with the Borg, this crew is inefficient & contentious ... but it's capable of surprising acts of compassion." -7 of 9, "Day of Honor"

I avoid looking forward or backward, and try to keep looking upward.

"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home & crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous - with treasures to satiate desires both subtle & gross - but it's not for the timid." -Q, "Q Who?"

Keep on the sunny side of life.

Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.

This ship is a match for any vessel within a hundred light-years. And what do they do with it? 'Well, let's see if we can't find some space anomaly today that might rip it apart ..." Neelix, "The Cloud"

Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.

We first endure, then pity, then embrace.

Why seekest thou rest, since thou art born to labor?

Wind in your sails is none of your making.

Work like a horse, eat without thinking, go for a walk only in really pleasant company.

World is round so that friendship my encircle it.

January 6, 2014

Good afternoon! There were 40 Minecraft screenshots since my last blog post, so rather than attach them all here, just go to my Pinterest page to view them. Pinterest also cross posts to facebook & Twitter, so if you don't have a Pinterest account, no worries. We temporarily lost Internet last night just as I was about to start the next house in my January Map, so since I couldn't pull up the info I needed to start the next house project, I started a new "No Internet" game & just had fun exploring. I did really well. I have all kinds of great stuff & a fairly nicely equipped house. That game is in a Taiga biome & I spawned in the middle of a beautiful place with wolves all around me no matter which direction I looked. I tamed one & began my exploration. I have 2 full double chests, with 1 being nothing but cobblestone. More than I can ever use. The other double chest is full of all kinds of really cool stuff that I've mined & collected. Topping the list of "Too many of" resources is cobblestone, 2nd is coal. I have a LOT of coal blocks just to try & condense so it all fits. I think I'll swap out the initial cobblestone I used to build my house with coal blocks. Gotta use them somewhere! Other than playing Minecraft yesterday, I did get everything else done that I needed to do, though I didn't eat much. I skipped breakfast & lunch & had a plate of bacon for dinner. Yeah, I know ... the picture of health. LOL! Bacon & Minecraft ... now how's THAT for an awesome weekend?! I'm watching the Weather channel right now & WOW is it cold all over the U.S. Wind chill is -42° in Fargo. That's 42 degrees below zero! WOW! Stay warm everyone. If you're in an area that's excessively cold, don't venture outside unless you have to. Temperatures that low with the wind can be dangerous.

5 worlds credited w/ forming the United Federation of Planets are Earth, Vulcan, Andoria, Tellar, & Alpha Centauri. Humans, including Zefram Cochrane, the inventor of warp drive on Earth, settled on Alpha Centauri in the 22nd century.

Can there be any day but this?

You're doing a freaking great job!

January 4, 2014

Good afternoon! Let's talk about purchases. When you buy something, you expect it to work, right? I mean things wear out, but you don't buy something to OWN it & then expect the company to sabotage it, do you? If you bought a car, how would you feel if you suddenly got an e-mail from the manufacturer saying "You've had your car too long, so we've planted a self-destruct button in it that will blow up the motor & trans in 30 days. Please visit your nearest dealer & buy a brand NEW car if you wish to continue driving anywhere."? No, no one

would accept that. So why do we accept that from software companies? Today, Intuit did that to me. I opened Quicken to do my bi-weekly reconciliation & bill paying & 1st the program crashed during opening. The 2nd time I opened it, I got a pop-up message saying that I needed to buy Quicken 2014. How much? On SALE for $60. Why? Because soon my software will no longer connect with my bank accounts &

download my recent transactions, making the program USELESS to me. I don't mind being asked to upgrade to the latest version, but I don't like being forced. In fact, my response was to uninstall Quicken, NOT upgrade to the latest version, & blacklist Intuit, meaning that I will never send them another dime. After that whole fiasco, I went ahead & paid my bills & then tried to read something in Kindle. A couple

days ago while trying to read something in Kindle, the app suddenly started malfunctioning. I could no longer turn the page, & after repeated attempts the calculator app that I have on there (the iPad Mini didn't come with a calculator, I had to download one & it's a pain in my ass ... it has pop-up ads that interrupt what I'm doing & keeps wanting me to buy the paid version) ... anyway, the calculator popped

up, with a pop-up ad, and a notice to purchase the full version if I want to get rid of the pop-ups. Uhhh ... I was trying to READ something in Kindle! WTF?! I ended up having to reboot my iPad. Well, it did it again this morning & this time a reboot didn't help. My son walks in, asked what was up & I explained the problem. He picks it up & it works perfectly fine for him. Story of my life. My PC does the same

thing. It will crash HARD & not even find the hard drive on attempted re-boot. Hubby comes home & it works perfectly. I have Kindle on my phone, but the screen is a little small to work off of. I either need a magnifying glass to see the tiny print on the screen, or I have to zoom in & then scroll all over the place to read a single line of text. Next step ... find a Kindle reader for my laptop. I keep seeing ads

from Amazon about how you can read Kindle books on ANY device. I went to Amazon & couldn't find it anywhere. I did a search & still nothing. I did a Google search & STILL nothing except a link back to Amazon which listed anything but Kindle for PC. I ended up going way down in Google to about the 12th hit & finally came across with a thread about the whole thing & in there was a link to what I was looking

for. Why didn't Amazon make this easier? The link went to Amazon, yet if you search from within Amazon, nothing. I got the reader installed on my laptop & when I opened it all my purchases instantly showed up. YAY! I was able to read what I needed on a larger screen, while working on my desktop PC. Perfect! Now it's mid-afternoon already. So much for a productive day. Sheesh! At least yesterday

was a good & productive day. :) In Minecraft I built a Windmill & Brickwork Home (see pics). I had Bran Flakes for breakfast, cleaned the house, sent out the grocery list, took the dogs out, had a Frito Pie for lunch, shopped for an anniversary gift but ended up buying myself a new PC chair instead. Oops. I checked out Pinterest, catalog shopped but there was nothing at all I was interested in & that's

after going through a huge stack of catalogs. Yesterday's Sims game was Modern Condo & I even got some game time in on that. Pork chops w/ stuffing for dinner & then our nighttime routine. I would have gone to bed earlier, but I was determined to get ANY texture pack or mod to work in Minecraft. By 4:a I gave up & none of it worked. I just don't get it. Everyone keeps saying how great mods & texture packs are,

but I can't get any of them to work. If they're that damn difficult to use, then they're not that great in my opinion. I could understand if I were really bad at computers, but I'm not. Someone like me should be easily able to install a mod or a texture pack. Someone like me should at least be able to get one to work after several hours of attempts. It's not like I'm one of the people who barely knows how to check their e-mail. I guess I'm lucky that I like playing the game in Vanilla. There was ONE texture pack that looked really nice & would have been fun to play, but oh well. There's one mod that I would have loved to have, but I guess I can do without it. Well, hopefully what's left of today will be better than how it started out. :)

Don’t be afraid of history. Take all of it you can get.

Just keep your head above, swim.

We're going to stumble, make mistakes ... I'm sure more than a few before we find our footing. But we're going to learn from those mistakes. That's what being human is all about.

January 3, 2014

Good afternoon!  Yesterday was a great day off. I completed a Hidden Chiseled Sandstone Fortress (2nd - 5th pics) in Minecraft. The 2nd pic is the small bedroom which is 2 levels underground. The 3rd pic is the Treasure & Storage Room, 4th pic is the Crafting & Creation Room, 5th pic is the Enchantment Room, & the 6th pic is a view from the outside which shows several of the buildings in the town. About half so far are now underground, making the town twice as large as it looks from

above ground. This morning I added a Medieval Windmill but no screenshots until I complete the landscaping around it. Today's Sims game is Modern Condo.

Only do what your heart tells you.

Principal Photography on "Emissary," the pilot episode for Star Trek: Deep Space 9, began on August 18, 1992. The 1st scene to

be shot was Commander Benjamin Sisko's initial entrance into the space station's operations (ops) center.

Problem is difficult but we’ve got a chance and no one knows enough to be a pessimist.