The Nellie Spot

I recently installed OpenOffce 2.0 on my secondary computer at work (yeah, I'm THAT cool). I haven't done much with it yet, but from what I can tell, this software is amazing! Granted, the world uses Microsoft's Office suite...and pays handsomely for it, too.

If you've never heard of OpenOffice before, it's like Firefox is to Internet Explorer: an alternate, open-code software suite that includes a word processor (MS Word), a spreadsheet (MS Excel), a presentation application (MS PowerPoint), a drawing application (not sure MS has 1 app that compares to this), and a database (MS Access). Each application is extremely similar to Microsoft's Office suite in the layout and performance...but OpenOffice 100% free (unless you want to donate to the efforts)! This is a great alternative to throwing down hundreds of dollars for MS Office software!

The greatest thing about the software (besides being free) is that you can save any document (word proc/sheet/presentation/db) as a MS Office compatible file (.doc, .xls, .ppt, .mdb) so that the rest of the world can open up the files on their computers.

Ok, I'm the "tech guy" at the office. I'm the SNL guy who gets onto people for streaming internet radio during work (which slows everyone else down), who scoffs at people when they can't figure something simple out (it's called File > Save AS), and who repeatedly yells at people when they come whimpering to me that they lose a bunch of work becase they didn't take 1/2 second to hit the Ctrl+S button and save their freaking work. Now, I've also scoffed and laughed at people who have very fragmented disk drives. Granted, most computer users never think to defrag their hard drive, let alone on a regular basis to keep things running smoothly and quickly on their PCs, so I cut them a little slack in this department.

So what happens when MY computer is running slowly? I reboot first. Reboots fix most things. Then I check fragmentation of my hard drive. Today, my computer was CREEPING along. I rebooted. Same thing. I then go to my Disk Defragmentor and analyze my hard drive's fragmentation...and find a TON of red! Holy smokes!!! I've never even seen that much red before, let alone on MY computer! What the heck? So, I'm defragging at the moment, while simultaneously scoffing, scolding, and laughing at myself. It's certainly a case of Plank in the Eye.

If you're a fan of either The Office or LOST, then you should read this post on Dwight's (from The Office) blog. It's his theories about LOST, and is pretty darn funny. Especially if you read it with Dwight's mannerisms playing in your head.

I've recently noticed that I say "buh-bye" when ending a phone conversation, both at home and at work. (of course, I throw in the occasional "Toodles!" to friends, too)

I've also noticed how incredibly dumb sounding "buh-bye" is, both verbally and written. Why is it so hard to say "goodbye"? My friend Matt Martin always says goodbye, and each time it strikes me as odd sounding. But it's SO much better and grammatically correct than the backwoods "buh bye" that we all use.

So, in an effort to improve myself, I'm taking a vow to use the word "goodbye" in place of "buh bye". Call me and test me on it. Accountability is needed.

Goodbye.

The weekend before last, we traveled to Dallas to visit some of Allison's old-school friends from high school and college. We got to McAllister, OK and stopped at McDonald's to let Emma run around and burn off some of her 2-year-old energy that had been strapped down for 2 1/2 hours. There, Emma got to play on the indoor playground, while Allison and I were entertained / frightened by the inbred family birthday party. If only I had brought my camera in! We finally got to Dallas and went to Nathan & Melissa Darby's house. Allison and Nathan were best friends in high school. He's super cool and so is Melissa. Their daughter Alexis just turned 1 recently, so she and Emma had a good time hanging out together while the adults hung out. We all ate dinner at a local Mexican restaraunt (forgot the name, but they had great 'ritas!). After the kids went to bed, the four adults sat around and talked for a while. We were honored with a 30 mintue dissertation on Louis XIII Cognac by Nathan. I got to sniff the crystal bottle he acquired recently...and I'm still not brandy person. The girls went to bed, so Nathan and I fired up some Halo 2...until about 3:00 AM.

The next morning, Nathan and I headed to Frye's Electronics (think Disneyworld for tech nerds). We got home and packed up our stuff to go shopping. After picking up some great lunch at a hole-in-the-wall burger joint, we headed to Chris & Sydney's house so Emma could take a nap. Allison and Sydney roomed together at Baylor while Allison was there. Chris and I seemed to hit it off. I mentioned video games, and he was a gamer and gadgets guy, too. Either that, or he's the most accomodating person I've ever met. While the girls sat on the couch at talked, Chris and I played some serious N64 Mario Kart. Emma and thier daughter Ryley took good naps, so the adults got to hang out for a while...meaning I lost LOTS of races to Chris at Mario Kart. We packed up the kids and took them Sydney's parent's house. They offered to babysit Ryley and Emma while we all went to eat that night, which was really great! We stopped to pick up some wine before heading to Moni's Italian restaraunt (it's a BYOB place). We met Holly (Allison & Sydney's other roommate at Baylor) and her should-be-her-fiance-but-isn't-yet-and-no-one-knows-why-boyfriend, Doug. Doug majored in English...at Mississippi (odd place to learn English!). At Moni's, I was introduced to my 3rd favorite appetizer: gigantic rolls and bowls of Alfredo sauce. Simple...and incredible! The guys sat on one end and drank ourselves silly...or 3 sheets to wind, to be exact. We crashed at Holly's place that night and got up to eat breakfast with the whole group again the next morning. It's a great picture of the group, minus Emma doing her best retarded move. Afterwards, we drove back home to God's Country (aka NWA). Going into the weekend, I was a bit nervous meeting all these new folks (which is weird, since I'm pretty extroverted). Everyone I met was phenomonal and really fun!

Sorry that was such a long post. I even left out the fact that we went to IKEA and that it poured all day Saturday and Sunday. Oh wait...maybe I didn't leave that part out. Nevermind.

I just watched a cat vomit outside my office window.

I thought it was having a seizure...then it just hurled.

Lovely, huh?

Thought I'd share.

As previously stated, I've been doing some computer work at my vet's office the last couple of nights. In the process, I decided to clean out the dust bunnies from the computers, as it was overflowing from the inside out. He fixes real bunnies, I fix dust bunnies. Now, I really can't harp too badly on the amount of dust collected on the inside front of the computer...it's a freaking vet clinic! I have 1 dog, and there is dog hair on everything in my house. I can only imagine how much pet dander is readily available at a vet clinic! So, I have no scolding words...just pure admiration.


PS. I will be posting about the family's trip to Dallas this past weekend, I just haven't had too much time to sit down and do it. (Don't worry, Syd, it's a-comin')

I haven't had much time to blog lately, but I promise I'll get around to updating everyone (meaning both of you) with the mundane details of my crazy fabulous life.

Currently, I'm doing some computer work for our vet. It's not difficult work in and of itself, but the computers are a bit dated, so I'm having to get creative on how to upgrade the software on them. I'm going into the vet's office after work hours, so it's just me and the pets, which is fun, but also kind of creepy. When I'm concentrating on something, and then the entire place erupts into loud barking / chirping / and meowing, it really freaks me out. Being the avid animal lover that I am, I am finding it difficult not to go in and pet the animals. I've resisted welll enough so far, except for 1 cat and 1 bunny that are boarding there over spring break.

I watched fragments of the Oscars this year, mainly because I forgot they were on. The only real reason I wanted to watch was to see John Stewart host the show. And from what I've read online, he did a great job and threw plenty of jabs to the rich and reality-detached Hollywood elite.

But one thing has really chapped my hide lately: the fact that Hollywood keeps harping about us (the movie goers) NOT going to the movies. They blame us with pirating movies, waiting for the movies to come out on DVDs, etc. This, in turn, causes the box office numbers to fall drastically. The thing that chaps my hide is that the quality of movies coming out is crazy sub-par. Honestly! What was the last "great" movie you saw at the theater? What was the last movie you saw a preview for and said, "I'm taking vacation to go see the 1:00 PM showing of THAT!"? There really haven't been many "must see's" in a while.

But yet, Hollywood doesn't realize this. They think they're losing money because everybody and their dog are pirating (which, to some extent may be true, but cannot account for more than 2% of their total loss). If Hollywood put out better movies (quality vs quantity), brought down the price to compete against the cheapness of DVD rentals, and theaters enforced behavioral issues in the theater, I'm sure that theater attendance would rise drastically.

I just needed to say that. It's been bugging the heck out of me!

Last night, as most of you know, NWA was hit by some severe weather, including tennis ball sized hail and an F3 tornado. Thankfully, there wasn't too much damage done by the tornado itself, but the storm in its entirety scuffed up Rogers & Vendorville pretty good.

I went to bed around midnight, after shooting some pictures of the lightning. I didn't sleep too much for the first hour, as lots of tiny hail and strong winds battered the house. Allison has been sleeping in the spare bedroom over by Emma's room for the past week while our master bathroom shower is being redone. There's a ton of odor from the caulk and dry wall powder all over the bedroom, which she doesn't think fun to sleep in nor is it good for the baby. So, I'm laying there, wondering if a tornado is coming, and trying to figure out how to get to my girls if there is one and where to take them once I get them. Being the great guy that I am, I fell asleep before I answered all the questions. Allison came in once, just after I fell asleep to voice her worries about the storm. At least, that's what she told me happened. I'm a pretty heavy sleeper.

About 1:40 AM, my cell phone rang. I had forgotten to turn the ringer down, so it was on the loudest setting, ringing like crazy in the dead still of the night. I jump out of bed and ignore the call, since it didn't have a matching name in my contact list. I assumed it would be the wonderful Nestle Help Desk letting me know that my office was not visible on the network. I went to lay down again (after putting the phone on vibrate, of course). 10 minutes later, the home phone rang with the same number on called ID. I picked up the phone and sure enough, it was the HD. I told them we had had severe weather and that the office was probably experiencing a power outage. They asked me to go in and troubleshoot the problem, just in case it wasn't a power outage. Good times. I reiterated my point, but they insisted. I told them I'd be there around 2:15 AM and would call them when I got there. I jumped in my trusty van, Geri, and headed up to Bentonville. I got to the office and saw no lights on, which isn't all that surprising. I get out and go inside. I tried the first light switch...nothing. I look behind me toward the kitchen and see the light from the Coke machine coming through the doorway. I go into the kitchen and flick on the light...success! Weird, though, that one half of the office has power, and the other doesn't. I meander through the dark office (which is freaking creepy) trying lights, but to no avail. I vaguely remember where I left my flashlight I use when working on the servers. Thankfully, I found it. The server room was smoking hot since the AC went out. Everything was beeping at me. I call Mr. Know-It-All at the Help Desk back. I very sarcastically stated that yes, the office had no power, as I had told him 30 minutes ago from the comfort of my own bed. His response? "Why, I guess there's nothing you can really do, huh?" ARE YOU SERIOUS?? At this point, the emergency lights POP and come on, helpfully showing my exit options. After checking to see if I had wet myself (which I hadn't, but seriously could have), I grabbed my laptop and started heading toward the front of the office. Then the emergency lights POP and go off again. I still hadn't wet myself. I get home around 3:30 AM and boot up the laptop, knowing there would be 20 emails about the fact the office had a power outage. I responded to the emails (only 10) and let them know it was really just an outage and that everything would be fine. I finally turned off the lights and went to bed just after 4:00 AM. What a crappy night.

Don't feel TOO sorry for me though. I did take the liberty of sleeping in until 8:00 and getting into the office at 9:00, which helped a lot. Sometimes it sucks to be the tech guy.

I'm always captivated by lightning. I love electrical storms...the randomness of the lightning bolt paths, the way it jumps from cloud to cloud and cloud to ground, the shadows of the huge clouds accentuated against their light. Last night, a good cloud passed by with lots of lightning. I sat on my driveway for about 30 minutes shooting in continuous mode trying to get a good picture of a lightning strike. I took roughly 300 shots and only got 2 decent shots. This is the best one of the two.

That's exactly what I said, folks...I love me some Josh Hale! Being a man who has not 1 ounce of ability to fix / repair / beautify anything involving my house. I can change light bulbs and dust ceiling fans...that's the extent.

As previously posted, Josh helped (and by helped I mean he did 100% of it himself) Allison and I put in a new back door (frame and all), and floored our attic. That was the prior weekend. This past Saturday, Josh called and said he was bored. He asked if he could come finish caulking the back door and then begin helping us revamp our landscaping. Without needing to think very long, we agreed to let him come over and do free work for us. He caulked the door and we moved to the front yard to work on the landscaping. He pulled out about 6 large shrubs that we hated, and trimmed up our Japanese Maple. Then we shoveled the rock filler from half of 1 bed to make room for regular mulch. We ran out of places to put the rocks, so we stopped. If you have a friend like Josh, be sure to give them a hug...it's super nice to have a helpful, servant-minded friend like that around.

On a second cool friend moment, a co-worker of mine who got promoted to a different sales account is back in town for a couple of days visiting the office. I run a lot of reports for him throughout the week for his account. He brought me a kick-butt 12" Predator figure to put in my cube! In this picture, Predator is telling you to stay away from my 100 Grand with Peanuts or he'll annihilate you. Predator now has a lovely resting spot on the window ledge above my cube. He's right above my lava lamp. I now realize that I have an extremely tacky cubicle.

I ended up using a flash in this shot. I liked the sky as a backdrop. The blues contrasted against the reds in the blooms really brought out the red. I'm not a photoshopper guy, so all my editing is done with simple techniques (obviously) in Picasa. 

Inspired by Brett's photography of late, I decided to work on my macro portrait shots. Our Bradford Pear started blooming recently, so it became the focus of my attention. I should have used a flash on this picture, but I liked the subdued lighting. 

I use StatCounter to track the hits on my blog, just for kicks & giggles. Here's a chart showing the number of unique visitors (based on cookies) and repeat visits by day. It blows my mind that an average of 30 people visit my blog on a regular basis! I don't think I'm special, so the fact that anyone other than the 3 people I know would visit it is really quite amazing to me. Thanks for looking at my life! I hope it's mildly entertaining.

PS. Friday doesn't count, since it's only 8:30 AM.

1) What time is it? 10:45 P.M.
2) What is your full name? John Thomas Nelson the Incredible (no, seriously!)
3) What are you most afraid of? immediate heights. Like cliffs or towers. Really, it comes down to whether or not I can cause myself to die of a heart attack before hitting the ground. I'm pretty sure I could do that from a plane...not from a cliff.
4) Most recent movie you've seen? Sadly, I don't remember. Mustn't have been a very good movie.
5) Where were you born? Mountain Home, Arkansas
6) Favorite food? anything considered unhealthy
7) Ever been to Alaska? Nope, but I want to go and ride a dog sled.
8) Ever been toilet paper rolling? heck yeah! Even took my high school bible study guys a few times!
9) Loved someone so much it made you cry? Yes
10) Been in a car accident? only a couple of fender benders...my fault, of course
11) Courtons or bacon bits? both, with tons of cheese and ranch (or honey mustard)
12) Favorite day of the week? weekends and whatever day is a holiday
13) Favorite restaurant? Copeland's
14) Favorite flowers? the free kind
15) Favorite sport to watch? Golf
16) Favorite drink? Soda (Coke or DP). Though Yoohoo is a nice treat every now and then!
17) Favorite ice-cream? Mint Chocolate Chip with Magic Shell on top!
18) Disney or Warner Bros? Movies? I'd go with WB. TV, Disney
19) Favorite fast food restaurant? Sonic!
20) What color is your bedroom carpet? Beige
21) How many times have you failed your driver's test? Never
22) What do you do when your bored? Xbox / Read tech & friend blogs
23) Bedtime? 11pm-12am
24) Favorite TV show? 24, LOST, Desperate Housewives, Boston Legal, American Idol
25) Ford/Chevy? No preference
26) What are you listening to right now? Myself typing
27) Favorite color? blue (all hues)
28) How many tattoos do you have? None. I'm WAY too much of a sissy to get one.
29) How many pets do you have? 1 (Belle, my bitch)
30) Five years from now I will be? Hopefully skinnier
31) What would you like to accomplish before you die? Travel Europe for a summer.

While I was in LA a few weeks ago for work, a co-worker pointed out the way LA-liens refer to their highways and how dumb it sounds when you apply it anywhere but LA.

They refer to all the highways as "the". The 10. The 105. It seems fine when you're listening to the traffice reports in the morning there. But what if you applied that to NWA?

"How do I get from your house to the Nestlé office?"
"Well, first you go down Carley and turn West on the 412. Then you hit the 540 going North. You'll stay on the 540 until you get to exit 88 and then take the 72 East for about 1/4 mile, turn left onto NE McLain, then right onto NE Courtyard Loop."

In fact, I believe I'm going to start giving directions using "the" to identify all highways. I'm surprised Little Rock-ians don't already do this, as they feel they are the Arkansas equivalent to LA. :)

My sister called this evening as the Nelson household was finsihing dinner. She told us that she went grocery shopping at the Springdale Wal*Mart Supercenter instead of her normal Fayetteville Supercenter. As she and her 2 sons were heading from the back of the store to check out, one of her sons heard a helicopter that sounded super close to the store. Amy got a bit spooked and gathered the kids around her. Then they heard the cops and firetruck screaming into the parking lot. She rushed back to the Lawn & Garden center and crouched down in the checkout stand with her kids as a man rushed into the store followed by a group of policemen. Apparently, the man running from police made it to the employee-only storage area in the back of the Supercenter before being shot in the back. Here's the local coverage of the story (which isn't nearly as crazy sounding as Amy's version). Everyone is OK, but she's pretty freaked out over the whole thing.

Just when it seems that the rest of the nation and Fort Smith are the only places with crime, we get our few moments of reality (another example is the Boston club beater who got shot down outside of my hometown, Mtn. Home a few months back).

I realized that I have an extremely random and unhealthy fear. Yesterday, driving home from work, I decided it was really nice outside and drove with my windows down and held a 75mph speed (about 5mph slower than normal). Any faster, and the roar of the wind is unbearable for me.

As I passed several cars in the right lane (a whole ranting post in itself), I re-discovered my unhealthy fear: being hit in the face/ear with a rock kicked up by a passing vehicle. Yeah, random. But who hasn't almost wet themselves when a semi throws a big rock up and it smacks their windshield? Same fear, just with the idea that a rock could directionally come through my window and rip my ear off.

Despite my unhealthy fear, I continued to drive with my windows down. I just bent my head in toward the middle of the car a bit more than usual. Does anyone else have any random, unhealthy fears? I'd love to hear them (mainly so I don't feel quite so ridiculous)!

My parents were biting at the bit to keep Emma for a weekend, so we finally found a weekend that worked out well, which was this past weekend. Mom and Dad met Allison and Emma in Harrison (halfway between here and Mtn. Home) and did the drop-off. Emma is really good at exchanges, so she doesn't get all weepy and fussy when we drop her off with others.

Friday night, we went out with the Hales, the Tokars, the Eichlers, and Todd to celebrate my birthday (Feb 28), Sarah Eichler's birthday (Mar 2), and Travis' birthday (today). We met and ate at Fudrucker's, then headed back to the Eichler's house to play some games and hang out. We ended up playing some always fun Scattegories. Lots of laughing and randomness! We retired close to midnight.

Saturady morning, I got up around 7:30 to go visit with Dr. Davis, our vet. He needs some computer work done his office, so I went to see if it's anything I can actually do. It was neat (and sad) to be in the back of the vet's office where all the sick animals were. After that, we met Josh & Margo and Margo's parents at the infamous Sunset Grill for some breakfast. It was an hour wait for food, so we just sat around and talked for a while. If you've never been, I highly recommend Sunset Grill...they have great everything! I really like their cinnamon toast, which is doused in butter and 100% covered is sugar and cinnamon! Good stuff!

After breakfast, Josh & Margo and us went to Lowe's to get some home improvement items: a new back door, blinds for that door, and 5 4x8 sheets of 1/2" plywood to floor the attic. Since I am absolutely worthless as a fixer-upper, we successfully got Josh to volunteer for the job! We loaded everything up and headed for the house. Josh yanked out our existing back door and was getting ready to install the new one when we realized we got the wrong door type...we needed one that swung the OTHER direction. So, we loaded up the door and took it back to Lowe's, exchanged the doors, and came back to finish the job. I keep saying "we"...but I was pretty much there as the financier, moral support and as a tool gopher. After the door was done, Josh started cutting the wood to floor the attic. He did let me feel cool by letting me chalk the board using this cool device that stretches across the board like a measuring tape. Then you pop the string down on the board, and it leaves a perfect line for you to cut down! It's lots of fun! After lots of hammering and squatting and cutting, Josh finally finished the attic.

That night, Allison and I went to Copeland's to eat some dinner after hitting up Lowe's again for some miscellaneous items we forgot to get earlier. My good friend Blake got me a gift certificate to Copeland's for my birthday, so we utilized that. Tasty food! Their spinach and artichoke dip with fried bowtie pasta for scoopers is amazing! We then came home and watched this past Thursday's episode of ER and then LOST. I have to admit, this last episode of LOST may be the best one of the entire series! Good stuff on there!

On Sunday, Allison slept in until 9:45! I got up around 8:00 because some stupid birds were pecking at the window above our front door. I might have to get Travis to come over and shoot the birds like he's been doing at his house. The darn things are driving me nuts, and Belle just sits there staring at them every morning, jumping up and down every now and then to try and get them! I needed to do some work on my community group lesson, so I chilled in the office and worked on that until it was time to go to church. The service this morning was easily the best service I've attended. I'll try to write more about that later...it's worth recapping.

After church, we picked up some Arby's for lunch, and headed toward Harrison to pick up Emma. We thought it would be quicker to go through Rogers / Eureka Springs since we were already in Rogers. We were wrong. It's technically shorter than going from Rogers to Springdale to Harrison in miles...but the winding roads between Rogers and Berryville took forever!

When we finally met my parents in Alpena (they kept coming towards us to make up for our behind-schedule-ness), Emma was super-stoked to see us! It was really fun that she was excited...we got worried she might not be excited. We headed back home, listened to the Hogs beat the tar out of Georgia, and then went to Community Group. Now, I'm on my way to put Emma down for the night and begin about 2 hours of ironing. It was a good, productive, adult-only weekend. But I'm also super glad to have Emma back in the house.

I'm really digging American Idol this season! Well, I'm actually only digging about 5 contestants now, but they make up for the remaining drabs that are still there. If you're interested, you can see my harsh recaps of the shows on the TV Addits blog.

In what may be the worst idea ever, the Christians with a dream came up with the idea of creating a shooter video game (think Halo 2, Grand Theft Auto) with a Christian-focus. Based on the Left Behind books...and Christians wonder why we get a crappy reputation?