I'm trying to fill in some holes in our various libraries. Since Colin and I are headed south for the Non Trad, we thought we'd give a heads up to those whom have borrowed things so we can collect. Here is the partial list:

Deadwood Season 2
House Season 4
Underworld: Rise of the Lycans
Unbreakable
Pride and Prejudice (BBC Production)
Ice Age 2
Tank Girl
The Frighteners
Vampire Hunter D
Vampire Princess
Akira
Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels
Boondock Saints
Jumping Jack Flash
Sphere
Ever After
Prince of Persia (2009 Xbox 360 Game)
World War Z (book)
How to Write Children's Books

There are more titles but I've misplaced my master lists in the move (they're in a box somewhere). Yes, I sadly have been more up to date on the paper copies then the digital ones. Bad geek! If you have any of these titles or any of our other wayward entertainment children, let's see if we can bring out little family together before the New Year strikes as some of these have been out for a year or more.

Wow! My LiveJournal account is still here. Who'd thunk?!

It has happened. After two years, four months, and fifteen days ... I have rejoined the 21st century and have internet access at home! Boo yah and all that jazz.

Yup. And I can't think of a damn thing to say.

Guess I'll do laundry then come back when I have some sort of epiphany or something.

Um, hon, would you be so kind as to call Home Care for me before Friday and ask them to drop off the following at Vilna Foods:

2 packs of Acticoat
A box of 4" gauze squares.
And 40 or so of the large Tegaderm sheets.

Let them know that I'm away and not to try and get a hold of me at work for obvious reasons. Sorry, I should have done this before I left yesterday but I forgot and I can only make collect calls from the barracks.

Oh, and it looks like I'll be done on Friday closer to 3 - 3:30. I don't know if that's doable for you or not ... let me know.

PS ... the plants will probably need watering tomorrow morning. Don't forget the one on top of the water cooler. Give the cats a scritch for me.

Well, here I am in Edmonton. I'm going to be in training all week. It'll be nice to finally get some of the tech know how for the systems I've been observing for the past couple of months. I'm sure my coworkers will be happy when I no longer have to pester them for every little system query.

My accommodations are not too shabby. A step above traditional rez at the university and a step shy of a nice hotel. It does have one feature that neither offer ... a gun safe in the closet.

Other news: Lovely lady Jules asked how I was feeling the last time I posted and I hadn't got a chance to post back before now so I'll give you all the update. For the most part, pretty good. The wound is still there, still open. I know, I know. It's positively ludicrous but it seems to be my lot in life. I'm going to see the doc on June 2nd for a check up. I don't imagine he'll have anything new to say, he never does. The weight loss is still steady. I'm actually having more body image issues then I ever have before. It's odd, even at my biggest, I never really had a problem looking at myself in the mirror or being intimate with someone. Now. Not a chance in hell. *ick* I completely gross myself out. If I can't stand me, I don't imagine anyone else could either.

Yesterday was the MS Super Cities Walk in St. Paul. My many many thanks to those who were kind enough to sponsor me. Mom and I did the 10 km walk in just under two hours. Still not the speediest model on the market but I did it and I'm not even that stiff today.

Made a new soup yesterday. I promised Colin I'd make him a big pot before I left for the week. Parsnip and butternut squash. Turned out really well for my first foray with parsnips. This version had chicken in it and was made with chicken stock but I think I want to make a veggievore version next time.

Spring has truly sprung up north. Mom and Dad have nine new baby colts cavorting in the fields. There should be eleven but two were stillborn. There are two more left to come. The trees are just beginning to bud but it's still pretty frosty in the morning. I consulted with a friend who is an amazing gardener and she recommends I hold off until the week after the long weekend to plant my started seedlings but I can go ahead with the underground items. I'm looking forward to what's going to pop out of the ground this year. I've got some Chinese vegetables to go in as well and fennel and a whack load of other herbs. And of course, there's the giant pumpkin experiment.

I think I'm going to go check out the gym downstairs. Maybe I can walk out this bit of stiffness I'm feeling.

I know it's been a long time since my last post. Things have been going much better up here. I've been at the new job for seven weeks now and it's great. Really good group of people who have a similar dark sense of humour to my own. The work is interesting, shocking, fun, challenging, and always fresh. I really do love it. I'll be in training in Edmonton a lot over the next couple months ... even hopping a military flight to Winterpeg for a few days. I wish I could tell you more details but the job doesn't allow for it.

The snow is finally gone (for good, I hope) and things are starting to green up. I started my garden in the house about a month ago but I won't be planting outside until the long weekend.

Speaking of the long weekend, we are currently unbooked if someone wants to come up and hang at C&C's Bed and Breakfast (Lunch, Dinner, and Snacks)!

Ah, I'm getting the stink eye from Colin. Better wrap this up and go do my part of the taxes. Gotta love the efile extension!

Oh, and one more thing ... I'm doing my Super Cities Walk next weekend. For those who've already donated to my cause, my heart felt thanks. Anyone one else who'd like to help out .... the link is below!

https://msofs.mssociety.ca/2008Walk/Sponsor.aspx?&PID=1001327&L=2

LAS VEGAS - Fans never seem to get their fill of "Star Wars," and George Lucas is happy to oblige.

Lucas offered a glimpse into the latest creation in his sci-fi universe at the theater-owners convention ShoWest on Thursday, showing a sequence from "Star Wars: The Clone Wars," a computer-animated movie due in theaters Aug. 15. It will be followed by a TV series of the same name, to air on the Cartoon Network and TNT this fall.

The movie came about as an afterthought while Lucas was developing an animated TV show of the same name. That show debuts this fall, but Lucas figured it was ripe for big-screen treatment, too.

"You've got the whole assembly line built, and then you say, `Hey, we can make up something,'" Lucas said in an interview. "It was like old-time moviemaking. What I love about television, it's like Monogram Pictures or the old studio system, where a couple guys come to work and they sit and have some coffee and go, `Why don't we make a movie about such and such? OK, fine.' And at the end of the day, it's pretty much on its way."

Set in the years between episodes II and III — "Attack of the Clones" and "Revenge of the Sith" — of the big-screen "Star Wars" chronicle, the movie and series present fresh adventures of Jedi warrior Anakin Skywalker, his mentor, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and other colleagues.

The movie introduces a female Jedi, Ahsoki, who is Anakin's young apprentice.

"It's like `Band of Brothers' in space, with Jedi," Lucas, 63, said. "You can tell lots of stories. They come up all the time."

Lucas said he plans to produce at least 100 hours worth of TV episodes of "Clone Wars."

He also is moving forward with a live-action "Star Wars" TV show focusing largely on new characters removed from the Skywalker family. That show will be set in the decades between "Revenge of the Sith" and the period when the original film, 1977's "Star Wars," takes place.

So can fans ever get enough of "Star Wars"?

"I don't know," Lucas said. "I'm thankful every year that it keeps going."

Wow! It is amazingly foggy out this morning. You couldn't even see the fence posts from the road. In honour of this pea-soup-er, I'm going to make ... you guessed it ... pea soup for dinner tonight.

It is my last day at the bog. I am the happiest of campers.

Last night, the IT department did some work on the system. Pretty routine stuff from what their email indicated. As per routine, when we came into the office this morning, no connectivity to the servers in Bellevue (yes, I find humour in the fact that the head office shares its name with one of the more famous insane asylums in the US). Here's the story of the last hour and a half.
IT calls and asks me to reboot the local Dell server so I go into the furnace/boiler room that houses our two servers (yes, go ahead and gasp in horror). I clean the layer of peat moss off the machines, swap out the monitor/keyboard/mouse connections that were hooked up to the Tacit server and had a look at what the Dell server was saying. "Virtual Memory Low". Ctrl+Alt+Del. Nothing. Do it again for good measure. Nothing. Lovely, hard boot time. Push the button. Hum the 10 second wait song. Press the button.
"Chirp!"
Heh? Wassat? I look around the back of the server cage where that new sound came from. There's a piece of equipment back there that wasn't there when I left last year.
"Chirp!"
Who are ... hold the phone! All the pretty green lights just disappeared. I go back round the front and everything is dead as a doornail. Fudge monkeys.
I find a flashlight and go have a look at the new gizmo. Up on it's side, leaning against the back wall of the ATCO shack that serves as our office is an APC Smart UPS. OK, that's actually a good thing. Not the way it's sitting on the dirty floor instead of being racked in the cage but having it is good. Push power button. Nothing. Push again and then hit the test button. Nothing.
I hate this joint. *sigh* Walk back to my desk, call Bellevue. Sit on hold for 15 minutes. Tell IT guy who I am, where I am, and what happened.
"What does the screen say?"
"Ah, there's no power to anything in the rack. The UPS is down and it won't restart."
"But what does the screen say?"
"Again, no power to the servers or the monitor ... therefore it says nothing."
"Oh." Pause. "Did you ..."
"Yes, I tried the power button on the UPS ... twice. Nothing. Do you want me to bypass the UPS?"
"Umm ... I need to talk to my supervisor"
I almost wish there was music when you get put on hold.
"Ah, Connie?"
"Yup"
"Can you try unplugging the UPS at the wall and plugging it back in."
"Ooohkay. Do you want to go on hold or should I phone you back?"
"Why can't you just stay on the line?"
"There's no phone in the room where the servers are."
"I'll hold, I guess."
Back in the dirtiest server room on the planet. I unplug the UPS at the wall. Oh, just frigging lovely! The face plate and the box come out of the wall. I tuck it back in ... gingerly ... noting that I can see daylight through the hole. With great care I plug the UPS back in. A small flash and a tiny zort. Could have been worse, I guess. I hit the power button on the UPS then the test button. Green lights begin to come one.
"Chirp!"
Hal-lee-freakin'-lo-ya! Server boots up .... slowly. I go back to the phone.
"OK, everything should be online here shortly."
"..."
"You still there?"
"Yes, I don't think you did it right. I'm not seeing you on the network."
"The server was booting up..."
"Nope, no Pine Bluff on the system."
"Well, no, they're still down for repairs after the big storm ... in eastern Canada. I'm in the Vilna location ... in western Canada."
"Oh. I thought you guys were the same place. Yup! There you are. Have everyone in your office reboot their machines to reconnect to the server. Bye!"
Head. Desk.

Do you think I'm going to miss this place?