Who’d a thunk , a “LORD”

I just completed the online game Lord of Ultima.

I am officially a Lord of Ultima.   It’s been a long haul,  and my carpel tunnel,  from the years of network administration,  has really kicked up.   If not for that,  I suppose I could continue on and get a second or third “title”.    Alot of the people I played with have done that.  But as they say,  ”Descretion  is the better part of Valor”.

I really want to thank a great group of people,  ”The Ninth Leagion”,  for letting me tag along.   It was a great new experience for this old gamer,  (mainly a first person shooter kind of guy).

Anyway,  if your interested in a free web strategy, MMO, game,   L.O.U.  is great fun,  but very time consuming.   I might even be able to give you a few nice cities and some gold,  if you act soon.

P.S.  The river ice is GONE!

First Ice! Dec. 10th.

Ok,  I woke up this morning with the river frozen completely over,  hard enough that a good sized rock doesn’t break through when thrown from 30 ft or so.   That qualifies as “First Ice”.   Low temp  last night was 20 and the high today was 28.    I was eight days off,  I guessed Dec. 18th.     Unless it get’s a lot thicker,  I’m expecting we’ll lose it again later this week,  they’re forecasting 40 to 50 degree days.

With cold weather well on the way,  I’ve been working on keeping my many 12volt batteries up to snuff over the winter.   To help with this,  I recently purchase a new battery maintainer from Northern Tool.

It looks like this.     And so far I’m pretty impressed with it.  It charges normally,  at 2, 4 or 8 amps,  or maintains and desulfates the battery.   They claim that Sulfation is the main cause of batteries going bad.    I did the recommended test on 4 batteries so far.   Which involves using a normal charger to fully charge the battery,  then let it sit for 12 hours off charge,  and finally test it with a  voltage meter for voltage output.   If it doesn’t show 12.3 volts,   it’s unchargable.

So far all of mine have tested at over 12.3 volts,  and I’ve been running them one week at a time on maintain/desulferate,  then stacking them on a bench.    When I get though all of the batteries,  7 of them (hopefully all will test good),   I can hook all 7 of them up to the new charger on maintain/desulferate,  and forget about them until spring.

Beats the heck of of going out  to the garage once a month in freezing weaather and hooking up batteries to charge for a day.

The cool thing about it,  is it’s all automatic.   The last battery I put on,   intially showed “deeply discharged” on the machines light panel.   Four hours later the panel said it was charging normally,  and the next morning it was on maintain/desulfate.   Cool !   Plus it’s waterproof,  maintians up to eight batteries simultaneously,  and has a 5 year warranty

Dec. 9th and the subject of river ice

Dec. 9th on the river,

The low last night was 27 degrees and the high today 30.   At  9 am,  the upper half of the Au gres river,  from town halfway out to the Bay,  was thinly iced over.  Very thin ice,  a small stone would break through and leave ripples.   Though it was cold today,  the sun was strong for the second half of the day.   We lost a couple of hundred yards of the thin ice,  but now at 5:15 pm,  dusk,   the thin ice is moving downriver again.   With very cold temperatures forcast for tonight,  I sort of expect real ice in the morning.   The ground on the banks of the river,  is definately crusty!

More tomorrow.

Dec. 7th

Dec. 7th,  the 70th anniversary of Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.   The date doesn’t seem to be getting as much notice this year as I remember from the past.  Could just be me though,  we are kind of isolated up here.  At any rate,  I haven’t seen much on the TV about it,  and the movie channels don’t seem to be running any WWII movies.

On another note:   It’s December 7th, and we haven’t had a ‘real’ hard freeze yet.  We had a few snow flurries,  and it seems quite cold,   but so far,  35 degree days have been the norm,  with the high twenties at night.    I’ve seen icy slush in the river one time,  but right now it’s flowing cleanly.   The wife and I have a little bet going about the river freezing.   I’m guessing Dec. 18th it will be solid,  with maybe a few flash freezes that melt away between now and then.   Ice fishing,  is going to be another story this year,    I’m pretty sure that will come after Christmas,  maybe New Year or later.  Just a guess, ya know?

As far as river fishing goes,  the water has been very clear,  and down quite a bit from summer.   There have been a very few Perch,  and not much else on our stretch of the river,  but I hear that last week they were catching WhiteFish from the docks up town. (Not one of my favorites)     I’ve hoping the river starts running clean again next year,  maybe the fish will come back.  Eighteen Days until Christmas!!!!

Xoom followup

I guess my wife like’s her new Xoom tablet.     From what little time I can get ahold of it,  I pretty much like it too.   It’s fast, stable,  and does just about everything I’d ever want a tablet to do,  and then some.   I’m not impressed with the security on it,   but I’ve tried to impress her with that thought.   “Don’t type anything on the Xoom,  that you wouldn’t stand in a crowded mall,  and yell for all to hear” With a addendum,  that it never goes away!! (anything you yell in the mall,  will be repeated over and over for near eternity)

There are a few issues with the Android OS that bug me,   but I’m so ingrained in PC stuff,  that any other unfamiliar OS,  tends to get on my nerves.   All in all,  I think it’s pretty impressive that a computer luddite,  can pick one up and be pretty much fully operational in a week or so,  -With just a little bit of help-.

My recommendations for a tablet computer,,,,,   get something mainstream,   Apple,  Android, etc,   and be sure to try them out first to be sure the way it works is compatible with the way you work.  It’s way more than a phone,  but not quite a full computer.  I don’t use a cell phone,  though I have in the past,   but I believe that a lot of people would get nearly just as much usefulness from an internet enabled phone, (provided they can handle the extra costs).  Our Xoom runs on WiFi,  and that was already in the house,  so there were no added connectivity charges.  (And I control the security on it)   The tablet is a lot quicker to access that a computer,  and therefore get’s used more often throughout the day.

Overall,  I guess I’d give the Motorola Xoom tablet,  about 4.5 stars out of 5,  knocking off half a star for the price we paid, (though that seems to be changing)

Hanging out, on.

Now that I’ve calmed down a bit over the reports that my  pensions will be taxed in 2012 by the state of MI. ,   I feel a little better.   It’s been noted that my tax guy,  can probably help a lot.

In fact,  I talked with him today,   and it doesn’t appear that my tax bill will amount to much.  (A good thing, as there isn’t “much” to give them)

The weather has taken a definite cold turn,  though it’s not freezing water regularly yet.   (compare that to news from Denali, Alaska,   where -35 degree’s have been noted already)

A few people are catching a few small perch in the river,,,   those that are really stubborn and stick with it,  might even be getting  enough for dinner.   You’d think with the Perch, would come predators like Walleye,  and Pike,  but I haven’t seen any evidence of them.

I’m finding a bit of time to read my favorite blogs again,  and www.ballseyesboomers.blogspot.com has put up a great video about the “Occupy protesters”