Have any of you tried Picasa for organizing and editing your digital photos?

It may be a little early to say, but for the moment I LOVE this program.  As many of you are probably already aware, when it comes to computers, I’m not the quickest hard drive in the cubicle . . . so complicated software programs are a HUGE source of frustration to me.  My honey got me a beautiful little HP 735 for Christmas, and I’ve really enjoyed using it.  (He actually gave it to me in September — the sale at Radio Shack included the camera, camera dock, and PhotoSmart 145 printer for a steal at $299!) 

I’ve been playing with it quite a bit, figuring out what it can and can’t do.  At first I got very frustrated with flash capabilities — I kept expecting to point, shoot, and get the same kind of photos I get with my Canon Rebel 2000.  But then the local library offered a freebie digital camera class and it helped me to understand the differences between the two critters.  I learned that it’s important to have a good photo editing program to make adjustments in order to achieve the kind of final product I’d been looking for.

So I’ve been playing with Microsoft Picture It! Photo 7.0 and HP Image Editor (which came with my computer).  I much prefer Picture It! over Image Editor, because there are some “auto” buttons that make adjusting brightness and contrast a breeze.  However, I’m not so crazy about the red eye correction, and for some reason I still get a lot of red eye (even using the red eye flash setting on the camera).  Until I figure out my user error with the camera, I really like being able to fix those little devil eyes on the computer!

Enter Picasa.  I heard about this program on the Kim Komando program a while back.  Decided to check it out, and I love it!  It doesn’t have a bunch of “extra” stuff that I’m never going to use.  It addresses the things that are important to me:  organization of my photos in logical files, automatic correction for brightness and contrast, and a MUCH better (IMHO) red eye correction feature than that of Picture It!  I took a few pictures yesterday over at the Varner Hogg Plantation and printed one out this morning.  It is almost postcard perfect, with a couple of clicks of the mouse.

One thing it doesn’t feature (that I can tell at this point) is special effects.  This doesn’t bother me too much, because I’m not into “soft fade” and “sepia” photos.  The only option I would like is “black and white,” but if I really need this, I can switch over to Picture It! the every blue moon that I might want it.

I’m going to keep playing with it and see how I like it over the long-term.  One thing that was FABULOUS was that upon installation, it scanned my hard drive for all images and organized them in folders automatically.  Awesome, awesome, awesome!

DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW EXCITED I AM?????

Okay, it’s really not that big of a deal.  But if you knew how challenged I am when it comes to this computer stuff . . . well, maybe you would understand the sheer magnitude of my excitement!  Quite by accident, I think I’ve discovered how to insert links in my blogs so that they are part of my text and not the gibberishy www.alsjdf;lasu/hsad/jsldijajdf;ll.html format you see in the little address window above your browser window.

I’ve thought several times “I should ask Miss O’Hara or Darkstar218 how they do that . . . ” but then I never got around to doing it.  And then quite by accident I did it, and it worked!  Wheeeee!

Look out, bloggers — I may just go linkin’ crazy!

Thank you, Intermodal, for bringing this quote to my attention!
 
«Speaking to the American Bar Association in July 1985, the President characterized terrorism as “an act of war” and declared: “There can be no place on earth left where it is safe for these monsters to rest, to train, or practice their cruel and deadly skills. We must act together, or unilaterally, if necessary to ensure that terrorists have no sanctuary — anywhere.” The air strikes against Libya were one manifestation of this strategy.» – The 9/11 Commission Report

I hope my efforts continue to be rewarded this way . . .

I’m in charge of begging for donations for my daughter’s school carnival/raffle/silent auction.  I don’t mind doing this at all, as it is not for me, it’s for the kids and I think that when people are approached by a cheerful person who says “thank you for your time” even if the answer’s “no,” they are much more inclined to say “hey, wait a minute, let me see what I can do for you . . . ” or “call me next year and I’ll have something for you . . . ”  None of my other fellow PTO’ers like doing this, so maybe it’s my “calling” or “gift”. 

I have my first triumph of the day!  I’m not going to name names because it’s not yet printed on the raffle ticket, but I’m certain that it will happen!  A local caterer who has worked his culinary magic for governors and presidents (#41 and #43), as well as famous ball players (Nolan Ryan) and that awesome musical genius missed by all (Stevie Ray Vaughn), has agreed to prepare and deliver a rib-eye steak dinner for EIGHT.  The steak will be served with mescaline greens and raspberry vinaigrette dressing, bow-tie pasta with broccoli and truffle oil, and garlic bread.  Dessert is not included, but goodness, isn’t this enough?????  (The dinners are valued at $35/person.)

Heavens, I hope I win this . . .

Good news for the New Year . . .

Larry Kudlow has an interesting column on www.townhall.com.  With regards to the unemployment rate, Mr. Kudlow reports (for 2004) “Outside of the bubble economy of the late 1990s, this would mark the lowest unemployment rate since 1973.” 

He also predicts “. . . at 5 percent or lower unemployment, the 4 percent growth rate of the economy will spur a flood of new individual tax collections at lower tax rates. Hence, another economic surprise of 2005 will be a pronounced decline in the federal budget deficit. “

Good news indeed for those of us responsible for providing for our families.  Good news for our much-maligned-by-the-left president.  If you’d like to read the complete article, click over to http://www.townhall.com/columnists/larrykudlow/lk20050109.shtml.  For some equally encouraging prose, check this out, too:  http://www.thbookservice.com/BookPage.asp?prod_cd=c6579.   Amazingly, a German reporter documents how much better the American economic model is over the European model.  I’m not usually interested in this type of writing, but I’d really like to read this book!

A spy by any other name . . .

I know you were watching, Miss O’Hara!  My husband and I have you to thank for this addiction . . .

I read about Sydney Bristow on Miss O’Hara’s blog months and months ago.  Started renting the DVD’s since I’d never watched the show.  Watched almost an entire season in one very long night . . . ohmygoodness, it was like eating peanuts, but so much more exciting! 

Tonight’s season premiere was good.  There were a couple of things that got on my nerves — for one, Sydney’s under-her-breath comments to Sloane at the beginning, but considering the full scope of their history, I suppose those comments were justifiable.  It just made her look so childish . . . and she’s anything but!  The other didn’t have a thing to do with the show.  Have you ever seen that many commercials during a two-hour program??????

My husband commented that you’d think it was the Super Bowl and advertising was at a premium.  I replied, “Well, you know all of America’s watching to find out just what it was she read on those documents in Whittenburg!”

And wasn’t that wild????  Jack had Irina executed?!?!  And then to find out why . . . thank goodness we got a little bit of that story (although I’m sure there’s much, much more to it) before evening’s end, or I don’t think I would have been able to stand it!

On the home business front . . . .

We have a potential job ahead of us (and I’m fairly confident it’s in the bag, although it’s never good to count one’s chickens before they hatch) that is a doozy!  A local convenience store chain hired us to provide solar shades for one of their stores.  They liked them well enough that they’d like us to give them a contract quote for the remaining 19 stores in their chain.  Wowsers!  This weekend, my husband and I will be driving about 500 miles round trip to measure the windows in six of the stores.  (The other stores are all local and easily done without an excess of driving.)

We will be hitting Eagle Lake, Giddings, Luling, Gonzales, Port Lavaca, and El Campo in our travels!  Because there’s absolutely no way we can drive all those miles and measure all those windows in a single day, we’re staying over in Gonzales.  There aren’t any hotel/motel type establishments that I could find through Yahoo! Travel, so I went to the ever-so-trusty www.BBOnline.com.

We’ll be stopping over at http://www.stjamesinn.com .  Their regular rates are about $125 per night, but the innkeeper is giving us a business rate of $85 per night, plus tax.  And that includes a full breakfast for two.  The inn has a 3-diamond rating with AAA, so it should be nice.  While this is a business trip, it’s been a long time since my honey and I went on a roadtrip together, so I’m excited.  I think we’ll have a lot of fun, even while we’re working hard.

I have a lot to do between now and Saturday a.m. when we leave, so I’d better get some sleep!  Good night! 

Yesterday was productive, and today seems to indicate a good year ahead . . .

Yesterday we managed to put all the ornaments away, take down the tree, and watch one of my favorite movies.   This morning, miracle of miracles, I woke up early enough to get a shower, get ready for church, and EVEN go for donuts before church and still get there on time!  If you knew just how time-management challenged I truly am, you would understand the phenomenal significance of this.   

The service was really good.  Pastor Jamie (yes, our pastor’s name is Jamie and our daughter’s name is Jami [no “e”]) had a really good message about the race of faith.  He talked about athletes who train with weights on their ankles and how much faster they can move when they remove those weights.  He then encouraged us to drop the “weights” that keep us from running the race God has set before us, the race of faith. 

I know there are lots of things that I let get between me and God.  And it’s my hope to eliminate a lot of those things, so that I can see Him more clearly this year.  As the scripture says, “. . . let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith . . .”  (Hebrews 12:1-2)  When those things blocking my line of vision are removed, it will be so much easier to focus on Jesus, and become more like Him.

Jami has two more days of vacation, and then it’s back to school for her.  I think she’s ready.  She spent almost the entire day reading today.  She actually started and finished “The Banks of Plum Creek” by Laura Ingalls Wilder today!  She’s a fast reader and her comprehension is very high.  I’m such a proud mommy.

Tomorrow I have to pay bills, do laundry, clean house, make some business calls, and investigate medical transcription training.  I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned that here before, but I am thinking about getting my certification as a medical transcriptionist.  From what I understand, many companies hire “work at home” transcriptionists and the pay is good, along with all the benefits.  I’m a pretty speedy typist (82 wpm with 3 errors, so final 79 wpm), have a fairly strong command of the English language, and am a good speller. 

I love my window blind business most of the time, but being self-employed and in sales to boot, the income is not reliable.  And there are no benefits.  Thus my investigation into other areas of employment.  The main priority for me is being able to work from home, and it seems that won’t be a problem as an MT.

Well, it’s late and I’d best say “adios” until next time.

HAPPY, HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I hope that you all had fabulous New Year’s Eves and that this year promises wonderful things for all of you.

Our New Year’s Eve was a lot of fun.  We went over to our friends’ house down the street where we enjoyed good company, good food, and I “learned” to play Texas Hold ‘Em.  I say that in quotes because I didn’t (and still don’t) have a clue what was going on, but I must say that I had a lot of fun.

Our friends get together every so often to play and the way they play is really cool (if you have issues with cards/gambling, although I suppose there are people who should stay away regardless).  Each player put $10 in the jar and the final three split the pot.  So even if you lose, you only lose $10.  My hubbie and I came to the conclusion that it cost us no more than going out to dinner (because neither one of us won ), but we were with good friends and laughed a lot over some of the silly bluffs that we tried to get away with!

When we both fell out of the game, our friends also have a dart board, and so we threw darts for a while.  I hadn’t thrown darts in several years and so my arm’s a little sore today!  We actually have a dart board that we need to find a place to hang — it really is a lot of fun, too.

Now if my friend just had a pool table, we would be in fine shape!  (I LOVE to shoot pool, but unfortunately don’t care for going to the types of establishments one must go to to shoot pool . . . and we don’t have a table or a place to put a table, if we could afford one.)

In addition to the good company and the fun games, the food was DELISH!  I brought Picante Cream Cheese dip with tortilla chips and Fritos.  Lisa’s mom made Chicken Spaghetti, Texas Trash, and these jalapeno things that were awesome.  She split a jalapeno, scooped out the seeds, filled it with cheddar cheese and a small piece of venison sausage and then wrapped a piece of bacon around the whole thing.  YUM!  She also took a block of cream cheese and poured jalapeno jelly over it and served it with Ritz crackers and Triscuits.  YUM again!  Her aunt made little egg rolls with all the right dipping sauces.  Needless to say, no one went hungry!

It was a family party, so the kids were there, too — they played and ran through the house alerting us to the passing time and managed to stay awake for the Big Event — Happy New Year!

I have to say, this year’s New Year was so much better than last year’s.  We went to a murder mystery dinner with SIL, and it was a total fiasco.  While there was some drinking last night, it was done responsibly.  There was no pressure to drink and I enjoyed the couple of glasses of wine I had with my meal.  At last year’s party, we got there a little late and the host made a big deal of saying, “You guys gotta’ catch up!  Have a shot of schnapps!”  I was 27 days shy of my 40th birthday and I could have sworn we’d stumbled through a time warp into a college party.  I don’t have a problem with responsible drinking, but the party last year was a bust because the focus was all on getting loaded.  When it was all over, they said “We should do this again next year!”  I think not.

So when we received the invite down the street, it was a great relief and a very enjoyable evening. 

Well, my family is waiting for me — we’re going to watch one of the DVD’s that they gave me for Christmas . . . one of my favorite movies and one I recommend highly!  See ya’ later!

We’re NOT stingy, and here’s the numbers to prove it . . . I’ve emphasized some important points (IMHO) in bold, italics. 

Stingy?
Bruce Bartlett (archive)

December 31, 2004 | Print | Send

The other day, a United Nations official accused the United States of being “stingy” in terms of aid to tsunami victims in South Asia.  After criticism from the State Department, the official clarified his position.  Americans are not being stingy in helping tsunami victims, only stingy in terms of overall foreign aid as compared to other countries.
 
This is a familiar attack, which comes up annually when the foreign aid appropriations bill is before Congress.  But let’s look at the facts.  According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris, in 2003, the world’s major countries gave $108.5 billion in combined foreign aid.  Of this, the U.S. contributed $37.8 billion or 35 percent of the total.  The next largest foreign aid contributor was The Netherlands, which gave $12.2 billion, following two years in which it was actually a net recipient of foreign aid.

Bruce Bartlett is a senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis, a Townhall.com member group.

©2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Feeling a wee bit better . . .

I’ve got a to-do list as long as I am tall, but that’s okay!  I’m feeling better about things (even with the yucky weather) and adjusting my attitude to embrace the thought of how nice things will be when I’ve finished all the things that need to be done.  I’ve a few business items to complete before year-end, laundry to do, Christmas decorations to be packed away, grocery shopping to do . . . if I just tackle it in little bits, it will all get done.  To paraphrase Dory in Finding Nemo,

“Just keep working, just keep working . . . “