laptop “plugged in, not charging” (via Flexuous)

Oh crap! your laptop says "plugged in not charging" when you hover over the battery icon.  It turns out that you probably do not have anything to worry about.Many newer laptops and batteries are designed not to charge to frequently. Several posts I have found across the internet mention a common "80% charge" feature.  This feature keeps a battery's maximum charge level to 80% in order to extend longevity.  Most of the time if you have this featur … Read More

via Flexuous

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Jury duty

Had an interesting day today.  Had jury duty, got there at 8 AM.  Sat all morning long, didn’t get  picked until just before lunch.  Met Steph for lunch then went back and waited to go to the court room.  About an hour later they came in and told us that that jury selection had been canceled and Continue reading

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Christmas Marquee

Yes we decorated a bit early this year but mostly because we were hosting a party for a friend this past weekend. Also we figure since it is takes so much time to put everything up, we might as well enjoy it for a good month or so. If you only put it up the week before Christmas and take it down the week after, what’s the point… I wouldn’t even bother. So since the theater marquee was done I had to come up with something for it. Continue reading

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Home Theater Doors and Marquee

2009-11 fromstairslightoff

New doors and marquee as seen from the stairs. (click for large view)

Well it has been a while since I posted anything about the construction of our home theater.  We finally got around to buying doors for the opening.  (I think Steph was getting a little tired of the curtains. )  We ordered this nice set of etched pre-hung doors with a square pattern from Home Depot.   It did take about two weeks longer than they originally told us for the doors to come in but we have them on 0% for 12 months and we got a really good deal on them so I guess I can’t complain too much.    When they did finally come in I rented the Home Depot truck and my friend Matt helped me pick these up and bring them to the house.   It was so convenient and cheep that I feel less motivated to buy a truck again considering how infrequently I need it.

We did have a hell of a time finding the correct lock sets and knobs to match the rest of the house.  We eventually had to buy them online as both Home Depot and Lowes had stopped carrying them.

I put the doors up about two weeks ago and have been working on the marquee since then.  I was able to get the marquee finished and put up just this past weekend.   I have included a few more pictures including a close up of the faux burled finish I put on the underside  and a picture of the marquee when it is lit up.

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Filed under Home Projects, Movie Room

Ivar’s Undersea Billboards

If you live in the Seattle area you’ve probably seen the ads (these masquerade as a sort of documentary or news update) where the “mythical Ivar’s submarine billboards” are being pulled up from the bottom of Puget Sound. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you can catch up on the whole thing on Ivar’s Website .

Personally I think this is just an absolutely brilliant marketing campaign. I was even taken in for a minute… but only for a minute… Continue reading

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SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY … Monster Jam….

We went to monster jam on Sunday kids had a blast here’s the link to Picasa.

Monster Jam

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Filed under Out and About, Photos and Film

Stephanie as Monica Lewinsky

So Steph had a Bunko party Friday night in honor of the upcoming inauguration the theme was red-white-blue / presidents / politics etc. I’ll take credit for coming up with the idea of Steph going as Monica Lewinsky. I gave her the idea but she took it an ran with it. The best part was Thursday when she asked me to make her a prop cigar. And yes, she won best costume.

2009-01-16 Steph As Monica Lewinsky
More Pictures… Continue reading

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Gas @ $1.89 / gallon

Last night we went to fill up the car and ended up Gas at $1.89 a gallon
paying under $2/gallon.
I was so happy I had to take a snapshot of it as proof.

The sad  side was that our little Hyundai Accent would only take about 8 gallons of this “cheap” gas.   I guess I should not complain since that will last us about a week of commutes.

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Johnson’s Home and Garden commerical

Watch for Wil! …

His bit made it into both the 30 sec and 15 sec spots.

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Patent Issued

My first patent was issued today from the US Patent and Trademark office. Patent number 07380665 issued June 3, 2008.

3 on bucket

It might not mean a lot to many people but for as long as I can remember I’ve had ideas and inventions floating around in my head. A couple years ago I decided to start patenting my ideas…

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