Well.. about 10 days before my 1 year warrantee expired, my Gateway Laptop died.. It's the second time I've had the same problem, the power button gets stuck, so once you shut it down, there is no way to reboot. Luckily, I noticed before I shut down, so I was able to back-up all my stuff that I would have lost anyway.

I'll have to reinstall all my software and such, but in many ways, that isn't such a bad thing.

Gateway's policy is that they don't fix machines, instead you swap them out. So, I got the full value of my original purchase to put towards a new laptop. I got another Gateway.. although it is faster then the one I had and a better video card I think.

Champaign was out, so they are shipping me another one... 3-5 days.

Link to the computer if you are interested in seeing what it looks like.

Comes with Windows Multi-media which I've never used before... Hopefully it will work out OK.

Also, in essence, they refunded me the value of my original purchase and I bought a new one.. so another year of protection!

Pretty amazing

SteelCitysFinest.com

The pictures in the below page were used to test the level of stress a person can handle.

The slower the pictures move, the better your ability of handling stress.

Alleged criminals that were tested see them spinning around madly;

However, senior citizens and kids see them standing still.

None of the images are animated - they are perfectly still.

Are these moving?

I've made several New Year's resolutions and one of them is to get back in the saddle in regards to blogging again. I've had a lot to talk about, but the day always goes by with me saying "Shoot, I meant to ...." as I lay down for bed.

One thing is the house is coming along. I have most of the upstairs bathroom plumbed in and the remaining lights put up in our dining room. Tomorrow I hope to get to Lowes to pick up drywall for the dining room ceiling and the upstairs bathroom, so I can get that functional.

Speaking of that, the transmission in my truck has gone out, so Holly and I are sharing a car. Which means, most mornings I go to the gym with her, which means I am getting excercise (her resolution, not mine!).

We are starting to get a better handle on our finances, which is the 2nd of my 3 resolutions.

Our fireplace is all installed and functional in the west wall of the dining room and I have all the windows and siding put up (yeah!!). The end of the remodel is in sight, although we are still a few months and a few thousand dollars away.

HomeZula.com is starting to take off more, I've had about half a dozen accounts created in the last week or so and I've started getting better about calling ads I see in the paper.

Maybe it will start covering it's own costs someday.. :)

List of Smoke-Free Restaurants in Champaign County