Trudging through tech, hunger games

I was pissed off that I drove home in an off and on downpour, dirtying Ali’s Volt that I spent considerable time cleaning over the weekend.  When I got out to the house it was not raining at the moment.  I figured I would take the opportunity to pull out my Absorber to wipe the Volt down so it still looked good.  Yes, I’m weird.

I wound up spending most of my night futzing around with some technical challenges instead of digging into my new Blade MQX which showed up.  The first challenge was race timing related.  I have been testing a new version of my timing software and trying to test out some new features.  It has been a bit frustrating as bugs are uncovered.

I then wanted to work on getting my tech set up for the FF draft party I am hosting Thursday night.  I normally hook up a laptop to the 73 inch tv and run Skype on it to connect remote owners to the draft virtually.  Last year I used my work laptop to do this which has a HDMI output.  The picture quality was much better with this type of connection but it was buggy.  My 7 year old TV does not play nice with the HDMI output from the laptop, the picture will pop off occasionally and there is a lot of noise that comes across the audio channel.

I futzed around with it a bit to see if I could resolve the issues with the HDMI connection, even downloading a new video driver which actually made things worse.  It was annoying.

I decided I would be happier with lower quality video if it wasn’t snapping and popping all the time.  I grabbed one of the race laptops which I have used in the past and connected it to the TV via it’s low tech S-video output.  Yes the picture on the TV now looked like I was watching an old VCR tape but at least it didn’t sound like a bowl of Rice Krispies are coming through the sound system.

While I was futzing around behind the tv making the connections it turned off.  When I tried to turn it on I had problems.  Instead of hearing the rotating mirrors spin up like normal I instead heard a repetitive clicking noise, like something was stuck.  The red FAULT led came on.  I think I said out loud, FCK!  I had ideas of having to rush out and go spend money on a new big screen tv.

Turning the set off and back on did not clear the error.  Turning off the surge protector the tv is attached to did not fix the problem.  The only way I managed to get the tv to breathe again was by physically unplugging it for about 30 seconds and then plugging it back in.  I have had this happen a few times before.  I am sure it is only a matter of time until I can longer resuscitate the set.  A new tv, oh how horrible it would be to have to buy one, not. 🙂

So anyway, by the time I was done screwing with everything it was was after 10PM.  Despite the time of night, I was committed to watch Breaking Bad after my shower.  Unfortunately I was so damn tired I kept drifting in and out.  I can’t tell you very clearly what happened during the second half of the show.  It was quarter to midnight when I finally closed my eyes for good with Sadie snuggling by my side.

So I made some adjustments in my attempts to entice Nicki into eating more.  I first took the mat which is normally in front of the door leading to the garage and put it in front of Nicki’s food stand.  This gave her a softer and slip-free place to stand while eating.

When I prepared her chicken I took more care, cutting it into smaller pieces and removing the skin.  Nicki seems to appreciate when I get the cutting board out.  And then when I was done with the prep instead of calling Nicki over, I yelled, “Sadie!, Dinner is ready!””  When Nicki saw Sadie coming over to her food dish, jealousy spurred her into action.  She cleaned her mostly chicken filled meal plate.

This morning I thought I was going to strike out with feeding Nicki.  When I started making her food, right after I let them out first thing, Nicki went back to the bedroom to sleep.  I decided I would halt her meal prep and make it after I ate breakfast.  My sleep cycle is much different than Ali’s, Nicki is used to starting her day later now.

So after I did my breakfast dishes I resumed dog breakfast prep with Nicki still back in the bedroom.  When I completed it I tapped the spatula used to mix her stuff on the bowl, one audio cue she normally responds to.  However again, she did not come out until I said “Sadie! Come get your breakfast!”  Nicki came out shortly and cleaned her plate.

It’s funny having to use psychological tricks on your dog to get her to eat but at this point I’ll do a full song and dance routine if it gets the job done.

I am going right from dog sitting the girls to dog sitting my buddy’s dog, Lucky, starting Thursday.  I have had Lucky out at the house a couple times before, he is a lot of fun.  I am looking forward to bringing the girls out to the house to play with him over the weekend.  Sadie and Lucky have a real blast playing together.