The Fence

First off I have to say I am sorry for not moderating some comments that are out there. I just haven't kept up on the site hardly at all.

Finally received approval for the fence a couple weeks back at the last city counsel meeting. I still have to do paperwork to make it all official but I am not really in any hurry till this spring.

Did some more work on the laundry room in the basment. Put some blueboard up, taped and mudded. Nothing real fancy, just kind gave it a finished look.

A fence, a neighbor, a city zone inspector

A Fence:
Here is the story about my fence. We took the whole week after Labor Day weekend off from work just to get the side yard redone. After killing ourselves tilling the old grass under and smoothing the lot out I procrastinated on if I should build a fence (most visible) or a deck. Beth reminded me that we need to keep the dogs from wandering and that it would be nice to let them outside without standing and watching in the blazing sun and frigid cold. So I started digging post holes, by hand.
My neighbor George came over with his own post hole digger and really rolled his sleeves up and dug a good 10 of the 20 I needed dug. Never asked for a thing in return. Very cool guy.

In the basement, I built a jig out of a 4x8 sheet of plywood so I could layout the parts for each fence panel. Each panel is custom because??? well some are 54" wide some are 58" and on down the line. Ok I didn't measure so well spacing wise. I did nail the posts laser straight down the line though. But I digress, I have my jig, I can lay out each panel with all the spindles nicely spaced, solid so I can (get this) screw each spindle in (3 screws each, and counter sunk thank you). Only takes about 30 mins to do panel. Haul that bad boy upstairs and outside to do a custom fit. Sounds awesome huh? (too bad there aren't any pics uploaded to see)
On the last Saturday I ran out of spindles and the local HD was out and the HD in Bloomington was out also. So I put the project on hold until I could get more material.

A neighbor

I am surrounded by them, most of us are. Unlike friends, we can't pick neighbors or family.
Some neighbors are cool (like George) and some are not like the one who lives on the north side of the street. Almost to person that I have talked to about what happened says her name through clenched teeth.

A city zone inspector

Beth sends me a text with a pic attached on my phone. A stop work order stuck to the fence with a number to call. So I call the number and talk to Mr. Maddox of the City of La Salle zoning dept. I thought in the back of my mind that I forgot to get a building permit and that is what this is all about. So I ask Mr. Maddox how much I owe for the permit. He politely told me that the permit was only part of the issue. The other issue was the height of the fence, and lastly (not really) where the fence was installed. See the city of La Salle has a right of way that encroaches 40 ft from the center line of Wright St. 40 ft? Really? I was laughing at the guy. I asked him point blank "your fucking with me right?" No sir was the reply. He went on to tell me that the fence ordinance was enacted in 1952 and was consistant with other municipalities....blah, blah, blah.....I told him I don't give a shit about other cities, just my yard.

La Salle Illinois is a nice town, there are parts that have been neglected and the down town is dieing. Pretty much like any other small city in reality. But we have a new mayor and he is trying to clean things up and really pushes hard for people to clean their shit up, ummm homes and property I mean.

Mr Maddox goes on to tell me that the only fence I can have on "my property" is a (get this) 30" high chain link fence, and it can only go out to 9' 3" from the east side of my house so as not to go onto the city right of way. Now some quick math. 40' from center line of the street, and 9' 3" equals a total of just under 50'. Effectively leaving me with nothing!! I was floored! I can't do anything with my yard but pay taxes on it. He even told me that I can't plant trees or bushes in the right of way and that I probably should have had a building permit to re sod the fucking yard!! I had tears I was laughing so hard! I could not believe it. All the other people that have trees and bushes and hedges (more about that) were grandfathered in. Now wait, didn't you just tell me that the ordinance was enacted in 1952? and most people have only lived here at the longest 40 yrs?? I was getting pumped and no reach around afterwards.

The guy was pretty polite, but after hanging up the phone I felt dirty and a strong need to take a shower. I called the mayors office and left a message.
I called the alderman and left a message. The alderman called me back and said I have to request a variance to the ordinance and I have to go stand in front of the City Console and plead my case.
After writing a letter, taking pictures, and drawing a diagram of what I wanted to do with my yard, I sent the packet into the City and waited till Monday. I am still tryng to decide if I want to go through the bullshit of getting approval for a deck now. Or just build it and ask forgivness later.

Monday night the Mayor shows on my doorstep. Kind of blew me away. We talked a bit and he took off and said "I hope to see you at the meeting".
Beth and I cruised downtown and pleaded our case. I felt like I was standing in front of the principle office in High School again. I told the Alderman and the Mayor that at the meeting. told them about all the money we have spent on the house, that after 18 yrs of military service I never thought that I would ever have to defend my own property. Talked about the trees we took out, etc. etc.
The exercise was kind of cool really, I got to see City politics in action and the processes.

The board approved and gave approval, but! I have to pay $200, enter into a contract with the City and "pay a lease" yearly on my own property! But the City attorney (ass hole) says that I have to go in front of the Zoning Board, plead my case then go back to the City Console for final approval. For christs sake! it will be November before I can finish the fence.

Mr Maddox told me that a city employee turned me in, but "we" all believe it to be my North neighbor that actually called. From the grapevine, she calls the City at least once a week to bitch about something. It is pretty routine for them to get the call. So what do you do? she lives through her windows! and gossips. I look at it this way, I am going to outlive the old bat and in a couple years? I'll buy her house after she is gone and do whatever I feel like after that!!!

So I wait on the City and time..................what a bitch!

A long list

Here is a long list of things that we have done on the house since this spring. I am sure I missed a few things. I have a pile of pictures that I need to post but I will get to those later.

We had the old driveway pulled out along with the Lilac bushes and roots. The guy we had do the driveway said the roots were the hardest things to pull out. We also had the front walk way dug out and new cement poured. The cement was (both the driveway and walkway) stamped to look like cobble stones and we came back later and stained the cement the same color as we found under the original porch landing. A cool find.

We tilled and pulverized the side yard, leveled the yard and re sodded.
Started a fence but had a stop work order slapped on me by the city. (a long story that I will fill you in later with the details)

Landscaped the west side yard.

Replaced 6 basement windows (2 to go)

Installed a water softener (maybe old news)

Finally got a piece of frosted glass for the pantry door.

Repainted the sun room/front porch.

Made a built in desk in what was originally planned to be a breakfast nook. We decieded that a nook wasn't practical.

I am sure that there is a ton of things that I forgot.

An update/overview

I was asked by my church to give a "talk" about Dan Terry two Wednesday's ago. I really put the whole thing off for a few weeks until I could muster the courage and actually do it. The link below will take you to the site and if you want to listen I droned on for about 25 mins. Select the audio cast Pursecution by Scott Cavanaugh.
http://www.mygracefamily.org/sermons.html

So at age 45 I had my first testimony! Kind of funny when I think about it.

The war comes home

I know I haven't written in many months, but after at late night phone call Saturday night I really felt a need to write something. There are very few times in a persons life that things are kind of put into perspective through some outside influence.
We as Americans really live an insular world. Far removed from what the rest of the world as it spins around us. Whether this is by design or just a total lack of concern it is kind of sad state of existence. Oh yes! there is a big earth quake in Haiti, lets just dump a shit ton of money at the problem and as it fades from the news we forget. Most people can't pin point Montana on a map let alone Haiti.
Where am I going with this?? My sister-in-law's brother was killed in Afghanistan last week. He was executed (yes executed) by the great Islamic warriors called the Taliban.
Great my ass! the Taliban is nothing but a bunch of ignorant, closed and narrow minded clan of latent homosexuals (yes, men and boys are for fun and women are for breeding) that run around with guns and shoot people in the name of Allah! Fuckin blow me ok?
Dan Terry was truly one of the good guys in that country. He was there to help the people and has helped the Afghans for over 30 years. He was fluent in Dari and Pushtu. Dan and his friends were coming back from a 3 week trip from setting up an eye clinic. The convoy of unarmored vehicles were ambushed by the Taliban, robbed, marched into the woods and SHOT one at a time and left. 6 Americans, 1 Brit, 1 German, and 2 Afghan drivers. the Taliban reason? They were spying for America and proselytising. Again blow me! Dan was in tune with god but would never attempt to push Christianity onto a Muslim population. They were doctors, that's all.

I feel very sad for Dan and his family. They are good down to earth people trying to make a difference in a fucked up little country (that most Americans can't find on a map). Dan will be truly missed in this world.

Now my commentary:
Every 79 cents that we spend for a bullet that hits its mark, center mass, on some fucked up bastard that claims his god is better than mine (or yours) is money well spent.
Look don't send me any emails. I am a conservative, pro military, pro American, pro gun, I drive a 13 mpg GMC Yukon XL, steal music and videos off the internet and not apologetic for my morals or opinions. If you don't like me or my writings, move on to the next blog. If your are just totally offended but what I write, go fuck yourself and continue to pretend that none of what happens in this world affects you. Just keep complaining about $3 a gallon gas and ask your councilman to bring a motion at your next city hall meeting demanding a answer to why they closed your local Starbucks franchise. The next time an innocent is shot in the back of his or her head for not following sharia law I hope you puppy dies.

I am a American soldier, when its my time to go to the 'stan' I will send every bullet down range aimed at the Taliban with most vengeance and laugh when one hits center mass. If you believe that none of today's terrorism had to do with religion again go bury your head in the sand.

Cry havoc and release the dogs of war. Can you tell I'm pissed?


So how is that home improvement project going????

Bam!

Another month gone! Still here! I got a call a few days after I wrote the last update that I was not going to Iraq after all.
Funny how most folks around me responded with a " at least they are not shooting at you over there, Afghanastan is another matter" Well I am here to tell you that yes they are still shooting and setting up IED's in Iraq, not as many but still killing American's none the less. Funny how Iraq has fallen off the map as far as news goes and people just think it is all over with, NOT!

So anyway I am waiting for the next call up to snatch my name out of a hat and off I go!

I have a couple projects going on and want to get some pics uploaded before I talk about them.

Another month

I just happened to notice that it has been another month gone and I have not written to much again. Things have been just as they say in the upper northeast "wicked crazy".
I received an email midweek a few weeks back that I was being activated and being deployed to Iraq. Not even a phone call just an email directing me to report. Now being an IT guy for a small company, it is pretty hard to just walk out the door from my job on a Wednesday and tell your employer that for the next 16 months you are going to be "gone". Kind of fucked up huh? Well after a flurry of phone calls and text messages "they" decided I wasn't needed, but to stand by for the next unit that is being mobilized. Work has been pretty cool about the whole thing.

What does that have to do with the house. Nothing really other than I haven't done much.
Did get some gutters on the house last week, Larry did a great job and was in and out and done in an afternoon. Had some rain, gutters worked great, basement still leaks.

Not sure if you all remember, I started to finish out the laundry room a long time back with white 1/4" melamine. I did take and tear those four panels out and started to replace the melamine with OSB and then the melamine over the top. FAIL! I hate that stuff with a vengence! so the laundry room is still half finished just a different color. I left the OSB as it is.

Short Video of the stump grinder

I don't know I just think this is cool. Sorry for the camera moving around alot.

Ax men 2

Here is an after shot of the yard, looking kinda bare. Molly and Sugar are surveying the landscape.



Here is just some shots showing the scale of the tree and just how large it was.

Ax men

Had a couple tree guys come over a couple weeks ago to give me quotes on removing the trees in my yard. Now before some tree hugger starts to go off on me about global warming etc, just let me say "kiss my ass" I am going to replace them this spring.
The two White Locusts and the Norwegian Pine were growning into the foundation, creating cracks and leaks. The neighbor told me the pine had been there more than 40 years so I suspect it was towards the end of its life span anyway. Limbs would die and fall off all the time into the yard. The locusts? You get out there and rake those leaves. They gave good shade but are really messy in both the spring and the fall. I have tracked in the leaves through the house for a year now and they just never go away. So now that I justified my genocide of the trees, I called 3 guys to come and give me a price to remove them. I figured that it being "off" season for tree removal and these guys are looking for work I would give it a shot.
Stuarts Tree Service did a great job! Cut the trees, ground out the stumps, filled the holes with dirt, raked the whole yard and gave me a credit for the locust wood because it is good burning. Can't say enough about them. They also came in $300 less then the other guys.

I stood outside at lunch watching them cut these bad boys down and the thought occured to me that if I tried to do this myself, A:I would still be trimming the branches off the first tree. B: I would be hanging off of something with a chain saw in my hand. C: cussing like a sailor, and D: where would I put the cuttings?

I like option D: Let the pros do it from a bucket truck.

You can see how big the spruce grew to be in the pictures below. You never really knew how big it was from looking up.

Pantry Door

Made some progress on the pantry door this weekend but ran out of stripper towards the end. There is easily 8 coats of paint on the door. It was taking 4 applications of stripper to get down to the wood. The kitchen really took a beating when it came to paint over the years. Like the rest of the room there was a peach color applied somewhere over the years that kept leaching out from behind the white. Most of the white was just primer that some PO painted on and just left it.
I cut out the top part of the door (reluctantly) so I can put in some etched glass to allow the light to come through. Like the rest of the room the door and trim are made of pine that has yellowed and hardened nicely over the years. I am just gonna sand, prime and repaint white.

Brain damage and forgotten projects

I found some pictures of the pantry that I put together around the first of October just before I left for fall vacation to Army boot camp. I ran bead board on the inside of the closet to match the rest of the kitchen. Painted it gloss white and then measured and cut some shelves to fit the space. I bought some decent plywood, stained and then clear coated everything. I like the contrast of the shelves and the white. Beth came up with the idea and good one it is. I added a dual electrical outlet for the microwave and whatever we need to plug in.







And the final product.
Under the Micro we put in some bins that hold the dog food and dog treats. The bins will hold a 50 lbs bag of dog food with no problem, and a good space saver.

Slacking the month away

You know after my boot camp vacation I had great plans for restarting work on the house and I have done absolutely nothing. No idea where the time has gone. Thinking that being cold as hell, snow on the ground, furnace running, I would hibernate and just plow ahead with the renovations. But no! The holidays, work, and everything else spinning around me I did nothing but think about doing something.

I did have an addition to the family, Molly!!!!


She is 7 years old, and retired. I got Molly from the same kennel as Sugar (aka Princess). She is a good old girl and spends a good 23 hours a day sleeping. She LOVES her pillow and tennis balls. Did I mention she LOVES her pillow? Anyway Molly has done her duty at producing pups and needed a good home. Molly has no real people skills, don't know how to walk on a leash, took a few days to get the idea that we pee and poop outside and not in the house, little things like that. But she is a good girl and only wants some attention and love. We have lots of that here! Sugar is playing the spoiled snot but thats ok, she gets just as much attention as she always did.


Ok so I bought a few toys for me that came from "Santa" I bought a planner and a joiner. I was thinking that the cost of all the stripper I buy it would pay for the planner. As long as what I need "stripped" is less than 10" wide I am ok. I still need the stripper but the planner is much quicker.

Here is a stack of trim needing stripped.


And a pile run through the planner.

And below is the wood primed and repainted with 4 coats of gloss white. I had a guy at work ask me why I was redoing all the woodwork and why didn't I buy new trim to replace the old? I thought I was gonna smack him. In reality I should be smacked in the head, but I just cannot throw away 80 + year old wood in the trash to replace with press wood. This pine is really neat, hard and has a great yellow look to it. To bad I have to paint it.

Here is the final look of the refurbed trim around the kitchen window and the door leading to the living/dinning room.

3 am and no customer service

So here I sit at the Oklahoma City Airport waiting for the United Airlines rep to show for work so I can try and change to a earlier flight, no such luck. The kiosk's don't start to operate until 4:30.

Why am I in the OKC airport? well I graduated from my Army boot camp school on Wednesday and after a litany of comedic errors I am now just leaving on Friday morning, EARLY! and no one is around to change my flight and lesson my agony of no sleep for the last 24 hrs. Again I have to say that 208 older men and women that are prior service made it through the "class" and are now officially American Soldiers. Let me tell you the next time I have a mid-life crisis I think I'll just go and buy the red sports car and just dye my hair.
I am 44 with 17 years of Naval service and I thought "hey! why not do the extra 3 years in the reserves and get some retirement out of the deal." I will tell you all some thing, I am not 20 anymore and those 4 in the morning 3 mile runs blow donkey dick when your at the back of formation sucking wind trying to keep up with the young bucks and a drill Sargent is gnawing at your ass to catch up. I did not have a good time and I wouldn't do it again. I did learn a few things, but mostly it is a young mans game I am playing in and I should stick to remodeling my house. The first two pics are a before and nearly after shots. I shed 20 + pounds and moved allot of fat around my abdomen.

A shot of me just waiting around, we did allot of that. Not really being sad, just bored.

This was actually one of the more fun days, we were waiting to patrol a "town" looking for a downed pilot. (this is all training not real life, the Army does employ Iraqi expats to role play for us) and gather intel. What happened and really surprised the Drill Sargent's and instructors was the planning we put into our operation and totally turned what had been a miserable experience for the previous 3 platoons, and a mission accomplish for us. Here is the scenario:

Picture a small town with buildings etc. We were suppose to patrol and gather intel to look for a downed pilot, ala Behind Enemy Lines the movie scenario. Previously the other platoons just wandered en mase down the road pissed the locals off and got into a fire fight, most got killed in a cross fire and that was the end of the scenario for them.

Not 4th platoon, we split up send one squad around to the right the other around the left and a small and heavily armed fire team up the middle to do the meet and great the locals. The instructors said we did a classic Shaka Zulu maneuver with sucking the bad guys into the middle and enveloping them from the sides and behind, a set water buffalo horns as minds eye picture. We got the pilot and only "lost" a few men. Mission accomplished! That was one of the fun days, after that we did a 5 mile march back to the barracks with 50 lbs on our backs. Fun!

The below pictures are of everyone marching back to the barracks, really what a sight! 208 men and women stretched over 2 kilometers "rucking" down the road. Pretty awesome sight.

Some of the gear we had to wear all the time. About 50 lbs worth. Inside the "flak vest" or IBA are two SAPI plates, ceramic plates that protect your chest and back. Very inflexible pieces of gear, and they create a person to sit differently, lay prone differently, shoot your weapon differently, and use the latrine differently. Those bad boys will stop a 7.62 round from tearing your body up if you were ever shot, but a major pain to wear until someone does take a crack at shooting you. Glad we have them, but suck to wear daily. Add your canteens, ammo, helmet (ACH), M16-A2 and you can have a real weight loss party hauling that shit around! Who needs Jazzercise? What I found most helpfull in the attitude area was doing pushups with all that gear on! I was able to do more pushups by the end of the course, but it didn't help with my attitude!

That is what helped with the weight loss, that and really crappy food. I am not kidding, I have eaten in many 3rd world countries and the food was better than they gave us sometimes. My favorite? oh well that has to be the "we ran out of food for you guys and here is baked beans and hamburger meat mixed in for texture shit dinner"

bon appetite!!!

What you do when you drink alot of water and stand around all day? Hang out at Big Bobs porta potties and? wait to use a stinky toilet!

Waiting to be searched for brass and ammo. Every time you go to the range the Army wants to make sure you don't bring ammo and spent brass casings back to the barracks, so you have to be searched!

Liberty Village waiting to be cleared of insurgents. We got our buts kicked on that exercise.

The big guns! fun to shoot! but really suck to clean, and I mean suck! This bad boy will throw more lead down range than any nail gun you can buy at Home Depot!

Don't get me wrong there were and are some very motivated people willing to serve their country at a moments notice and are very good Soldiers. Out of the 208 men and women in my class about 1 % were held back for various reasons. Mostly medical. Everyone else finished what needed to be done and moved onto more training or back to our civilian jobs until needed. The oldest was 53 and the youngest was 20. SO you can see there was quite a cross section of expirence. Most guys had already been to Iraq or Afghanistan at least once in thier lives and want to do more by serving more. All of us are prior service (Army, Navy, Air Force) and wanted to go active duty Army, the other half of us are Reserves and National Guard. This course is a mini boot camp the Army has for all returning prior service personel that want to be in the Army, Army Reserves or Guard. A boot camp with cell phones is what I call it. We had a bit more free time than the young kids in regular boot camp and got to use our phones more, but not by much.

I remember standing there watching these young guys march by and thinking they are so young, anyone could be my kid. The world by the balls and nothing that they didn't know or anyone could tell them! Come on you remember how it was! not an once of fatality, we are going to live forever! Back to me standing there; my knees hurt, my back hurts, I have a headache, and the food sucks here! Hey anyone have Icy/Hot that I can use? Motrin? how about an aspirin that has been in your pocket for a couple of days? no? A tear forms in my eye, I wanna go home and cuss at the kitchen ceiling instead of getting up a 4 am! I want my mommy!

Sucks to be old!!

Im proud to serve and will continue to do so if called. I am also proud to be an American Soldier and have the oppourtunity to continue to do my best and defend our country.

Thanks to everyone that has supported me the past 6 weeks and I am glad to be home!

What is OK about OK?

I just looked and relized that I have not written in a month! My excuse? well the month of October I really didn't do to much around the house at all. My excuse now? I am for all intensive purposes in lock down. I had a mid life crisis and went and did a really foolish thing and joined the Army Reserves. Now I am sitting in "boot camp" for middle aged men and a few women. We have all served in another branch of the military and decided to join the Army for various personal reasons. Most people are here just because of the economy. Others, who knows, only them? So I am in week 2 of this fun little summer vacation located in Ft. Sill OK. And so far there is nothing OK about this place. Out of 208 soldiers I am the third oldest at 44, out here humping on road marches, push-ups, sit-ups, and anything else that the drill Sargent's think up to do for there own pleasure and sick sense of humor. I swear 90% of them are suffering from PTSD as most of them are multiple combat tour veteran's of Iraq and Afghanistan. What the Army does is take prior service and cram them into a 4 week course that "normal" boot camp kids get 8 weeks to complete. This last week has been the hardest physically, all 4 platoons of our Battery are physically burnt out with all the physical work we have done. Compounded with the daily grind, we really only get on average about 5 hours of sleep. So needless to say I am burnt out. I would give any day to work on the kitchen in the summer heat again. But that is my twist on my predicament. And I made my own bed.
But for all the tax payers out there, I want to let you know that your money is being spent on some very highly motivated, skilled, and professional soldiers. We have the best fighting force in the world and we should all be proud of the money and personel that we spend it on. These people are true warriors. Gotta go, times running out for my pass and I have to get back to the barracks

Too much, too little

Here are some nice pottery that Maezie put together for the front porch. Some spiky stuff and some cabbage looking stuff. All in all the stuff looks pretty good. She even spray painted the pots. I don't want to take away from the hard work by saying stuff, she did a great job and it has been something that I thought about doing for some time. But when you have $50 to spend on building materials, or plants? Well enough said.

I have written about this a long time ago, but here I go again. There is a closet in the kitchen that was used as storage (duh) but was just kind of strange being there. I have postulated that it was originally built as an access to build stairs up to the second floor, if the home owner (a) could afford to have it constructed when the house was commissioned or (b) when the home owners family grew he could add the stairs at a later time. My neighbor told me when she moved into her place 40+ years ago she had the same setup with the exception that she actually had stairs already in place but they ended topside in the unfinished attic. Over the years she and her husband finished it off and made a large bedroom. Simple and nothing extravagant.

Having said all that, We took the time this weekend and set about "finishing" the closet and transitioning it into a full fledged butlers pantry. Don't get me wrong, the room is a closet. 4 ft deep and 3 ft wide, so there is nothing at all fancy or spacious about the tiny room. It will consist of two large bins to hold Sugars food, a shelf above that, then a microwave and coffee pot, then more shelves above that.
You also have to keep in mind that as picture two below shows (looking up), this is the only way to get into the attic. A nice and tight little hole eh?

The box like shelf below is really the only way I could hide the sloping wall beneath and still square the room out. Why does the bottom 2 1/2 ft slope in? Well on the backside of this wall there is the stairs that run down into the basement. On top is where the doggie bins will sit.

Originally, many moons ago, I had made a false panel on the front of the "box" that one could push in and the panel would pop out. why? I dunno, I thought instead of having a dead space underneath, although sloping I could store "stuff" in there. Maybe some liquefied potato's? (inside joke)

Me doing something and looking handy with my tape measure hanging on my pocket.

So having tried to kill myself the last two days to get this room going I am paying the price of ambition tonight. My body is killing me! I feel like I went 5 rounds with Mike Tyson (in his prime). Notice I didn't say 12 rounds? I would be dead, and Mike probably still could whoop some ass even with that crazy tattoo on his face.

Only 6 more weeks and I am leaving for 5 weeks. To little time, to much to do.

I did splurge and bought a HP mini netbook this past Friday. I am still on the fence as to if I really needed this thing or not. I mean, I could have bought a neat power tool or something for the same money. I still have a need for a large planer or sander and then there are those bills.......... But having said all that, it isn't to bad. See my laptop of 5 years is dieing slowly, the hinges on the lid are broke clean through and it is just slow as hell. You can't even watch midget porn on the thing without it chopping the video and heating up so badly one would thing it was going to spontaneous combust. I also thought while I was away on Army training this winter it would be a hell of alot easier to carry a netbook around that a 12 lbs laptop.

I don't know, we will see if I even have time to use it while I am away. http://www.notebooks.com/2009/05/26/hp-mini-110-netbook-introduced/ don't let the pics fool you, it is tiny! the screen is 10" diag and wieghs about 3 lbs? about the size of a notebook or a day planner that people use to carry around. I was going to do the Verizon wireless deal that they have but after I got looking at the numbers of a 2 yr contract? you really need to have a use for that type of service bad. Other than that? You are going to spend about $1200 for a $300 netbook in the long run. They have a 24 hour plan that will give you access for $15 a day as needed.