We have 2 dogs and 2 cats which makes for lots of fur to vacuum.  Anyway, Felix who is about 14 months old was clearly distress by something on Sunday.  He made all kinds of unpleasant cat noises whenever anyone came near which isn't like him.  He moved very gingerly and was clearly in pain.

Figuring the emergency clinic would likely only hold him until Monday anyway, we brought him to our own vet who we've used many times and very much respect.  It turns out that the little beggar has a blocked penis and his bladder was huge, thus the discomfort.  The solution was to anesthetize and catheterize him.  Well I sure wouldn't want to try to catheterize a conscious cat!

He's come out ok but will need a particular diet so the problem doesn't occur again.  Total cost: $800.00.  Good thing he was free!

We went out to dinner last night.  Admittedly we go out to dinner fairly often.  We like it.  Last night we tried a new place.  Mexican theme.  It looked nice with an interesting theme appropriate menu.

Josh sat us and brought the wine we order quite quickly, then Janine took over.  At first things seemed like they were going well.  She told us the specials and I ordered the blackened Red Snapper.  That wasn't what I had in mind to order but it sounded good.  My wife opted for the salmon.

We waited quite a while for our meals to come out which was a bit of a surprise because the restaurant wasn't terribly busy - not slow but not really full either.  The food was very good however and it came fresh and hot so it wasn't waiting to be picked up in the kitchen.

At about 7:05 we had finished the wine and the food.  At 7:15, Janine came to see if we wanted dessert.  We said no and my credit card was already on the table.  By 7:30, we were fed up and left our table to find her so we could settle our bill.  Typically I tip 15 to 18%, or more if service is exceptional.  This was the first time in recent memory when I left nothing.

Maybe I'm getting old but I remember good service.  While this instance was exceptionally bad, I just don't think service is as good as it was.  There are exceptions of course but I'm finding indifferent service far more often than I once did.

I'm in a weird place tonight. My youngest daughter turned 18 today making her a legal adult here in Calgary, Canada. Both my girls (and some friends) are going to the bar tonight to celebrate.

Their both good girls and I'm truly not concerned. That said, it's an odd feeling having both my kids become adults. No point here really but I felt the need to share.

I just installed the newest DesktopX (3.49b) and now I'm experiencing problems with IconX (1.11.008). Any attempt at adjustment tells me that changes aren't saved in the shareware version. I'm posting here because the problem only arose after the DX upgrade. I've rebooted twice since.

I just got a pocket pc and of course the first thing I wanted to do was to skin it. I understand PocketBlinds is a dead issue. Any suggestions? I'm running Windows Mobile.

That was cool! While browsing the forums, all of a sudden the new site took over. Very neat!    

At long last, I've finally managed to resolve my problem getting WB 4.95 working with multi-user accounts. I know there's at least one other soul with this problem so here's what worked.

First I uninstalled WB4.6 and rebooted. On reboot, I deleted all non-skin files in my WB directory, then installed WB4.95 and rebooted. Admin accounts worked with WB fine but not limited accounts so I made all users admins and tried again without success. So I rebooted with all users as admins. Now WB worked on all accounts.

Of course giving everyone admin rights isn't a good thing so I changed them back to limited users and tried changing skins. This time WB worked just fine even on limited accounts. A bit more effort than ODNT applications normally need but all's well now.

It's been a whole long time and I don't remember how to connect with IRC. irc.stardock.com? Wincustomize browser won't connect. Please remind me.

I think it's time for this problem to have its own thread. WB5 works fine on my account both at work and at home. None of the versions released so far work on other users on my home machine. Builds a - c will not allow limited users to open wbconfig. This morning, I tried build d which again works fine on my account (admin). I tried running it on my wife's account (also admin) and it simply stopped responding. I wasn't able to kill it through task manager either.

Rolling back to 4.6 fixes things every time. I'm running XP Pro service pack 2.

A friend asked me to give him a hand with his computer. The printer stopped working. Simple I thought, delete and reinstall then wine and a visit. Ha.

As he's got a wireless network, I figured I'd make sure that wasn't the problem so I opened his browser. It took 2 minutes to open a page. Linked to another site, still a minute or so. Time to check his programs file.

No spy ware blocking, no virus protection, no firewall. However his daughter had installed (3 users all with admin privilege) Kazaa. I downloaded a virus/firewall suite, MS Antispyware, Spyware blaster, Spybot and new drivers for his printer. 3 hours later, all was installed. We removed over 200 bits of spyware. I didn't have time to wait for the virus scan but left him directions.

Oh yeah, I removed Kazaa and made all users limited except Max and his account is password protected so his daughter can't go there again. Upside - I'm reminded just why I'm so anal about clearing my machine regularly. I still need to go back to install CCleaner to sweep his registry, defrag and like that. Never actually did get to his printer.