My Kindle DX is coming!

So I have been waiting for *years* for a decent ebook reader.
Back around 1992 I bought an Apple PowerBook 100 as my first notebook.
I purchased several electronic books in HyperCard format including Sara Paretsky's Indemity Only and Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
At a little over 5 pounds in weight it was not very comfortable reading in bed, etc.

I have tried several PDAs over the years including the Apple Newton, the HP Jornada and the Dell Axim but the screens were all too small for easy reading. The main problem has been my rate of reading is faster than I could change screens.

I almost bought a Sony 505 Reader in December 2007 after seeing a first-generation Kindle which I thought was just ugly. At that time I heard from someone who knew someone that Apple was coming out with their own version. Since then Amazon has released their Kindle 2 which looks much better physically and Sony has released their new 700BC which has a touch screen with a slight loss in letter clarity, but no official word from Apple.

Last month Amazon released the specs for their Kindle DX and I was hooked. This version is the size of a hardcover, rotates the screen automatically when you turn it and has native pdf support so I can read my RPG documents and anything else I create. I just got word today that it is being officially released on June 10th and mine should ship the 15th!
Go watch the video on Amazon's site, it's amazing!

I'm going to be able to download for free any of the thousands of public domain books from Project Gutenberg and many other places around the web.

Now the question is what to read first?
PG Wodehouse? ER Burroughs? Book: The Sequel?

I'm a published author!

My submission was accepted and will be included in Book: The Sequel!

You can get more info here at their website!

Or check out the widget on the right ----->>>

Pictures from a Caledonian Garden

So the new kittens haven't sat still long enough to get their pictures taken yet so here are some of my flowers.

The first fall after we put in the grass and flower beds I planted about 400-500 bulbs - daffodils, hyacinths, crocuses and tulips. I love bulbs - just plant and forget! Sadly, the voles also love my bulbs and most of the tulips have been eaten. Here's a couple that haven't.





Our Irises have done pretty well. Most have not bloomed yet, here's an early one.


This is a new plant for us this year. My parents bought us some bulbs for our anniversary last summer and the Allium made it. I tried planting some 5 years ago or so and they never came up.


This is not a flower. This is Sunshine "Miss Frecklenose" Laycock watching out the back door to make sure Daddy refills the bird feeder. We call this "Paying The Cable Bill" because our cats love to watch the Nature Channel!

Book: The Sequel

My sister sent me a link to very interesting website called Book: The Sequel where people are invited to write a short one sentence sequel to a famous book.

They have a couple of examples like:
HappyMeals are all alike; each unhappy meal is unhappy in its own way.
—From Anna McKarenina (sequel to Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy)
Bob Marley was dead, to begin with.
—From Kwanzaa Tunes (sequel to A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens)

Anyone can submit one and this one popped into my head almost immediately:
73X7 m3h 15HM3al — From m08Y d1CK 11 (The L33T edition)
(sequel to Moby Dick by Herman Melville) Submitted by Frank Laycock

L33T or Leet is a way of writing on the internet that use symbols and number to stand for letters. More info can be found on Wikipedia.
My line translates as "Text me Ishmeal" - From Moby Dick II.

Submitted versions scroll up along the right hand side of the site and Mary emailed me this evening to let me know she saw mine!
Now I just need to wait until the end of the month to find out if mine makes it into the compilation book!

The Great American Songbook (as sung by cats)

Kittens?
Did somebody mention kittens in a last post? :)

It's spring so once again we have kittens that we are fostering for Kindred Kitties.

Our first cat of the year is Rosamund.

She is about a year old. Her family lost their home to foreclosure and when they moved into an apartment they kept their dog but turned their female cat (who they were calling Buster) over to Kindred. Rosamund was *very* unhappy about living with us and since we had just watched the BBC adaption of George Eliot's Middlemarch we named her after the young blond troublemaker in that story. Since we have gotten her fixed she has settled down a lot and can now be annoyingly nice, sitting on my book while I am trying to read.
She does not travel well or get along with other kitties so she is with us until the population drops at the Kindred storefront in downtown Kenosha.

Our first set of kittens for the year were also victims of a foreclosure. A family lost their house and gave their cat and 5 newborn kittens to their neighbor. After a week they called Kindred and we got the 8 week old kittens while the mom went stright to get fixed and then adopted.
We decided to name them after great 20th century American composers.
These five kittens went up for adoption on May 9th and were all taken by May 13th!
One family took two of them.

Cole Porter

Cole is now known as "Tigger" and was adopted right out of carrier as soon as he arrived at PetCo, not even getting into one of the display cages. He is living with 4 other cats and 3 children.

George Gershwin


Irving Berlin


Vivian Kubrick


Jerome Kern

Jerome was the last one adopted and could have been adopted twice, a family who adopted one of the others came back to get him too but he had already left with a family an hour before.

Action shot!

In the litter pan back to front are Irving, Jerome and George. Vivian is about to exit the Kitty Kondo and Cole is eating.


We now have another set of kittens but that's a subject for another post.

Test

This is a test, it is only a test.

Here is a wafflehead ->

So if I get 6 people to "follow" this blog on Facebook it will start automatically loading my new posts to my Facebook wall.

Argh!

So I got a Wii for my birthday in August of 2007 and a Wii Fit for my birthday in August of 2008.
I have been checking my weight and BMI every day since then.
*Every Day*
For 282 days.
Including the days I hurt my back in December and could barely stand.
Including the six days in April when I lost 8.4 pounds because I had the flu and couldn't eat or keep anything down.
Including one day in October or so when I woke up at 11:50 pm out of a sound sleep and went into the living room and "Wii'd" myself.
And then yesterday morning I got on the Wii Fit and the little animated Wii Fit board said "So I guess you were too busy to exercise yesterday, Cap'n Frank?"

Some how I missed Tuesday!
Still not sure how.

I blame the kittens.......