A couple of nights ago I was on my way to meet a friend when I heard this awful dance music coming from a car. Now, don’t get me wrong, there’s some dance/techno music that I like and can be appropriate in the right place. This was neither.

Not only was it the most generic of dance music, but looking over at the offending vehicle I saw, much to my dismay, the side profile of a Jeep Compass. Not a great Jeep mind you, but a Jeep still and mortified I was. Anyone that knows me, and even many that don’t know me, know of my love affair with Jeeps. So to hear the thumpa-thumpa pounding out of a Jeep just added to the moment.

There I stood at the crosswalk, fixated at this Jeep and the waves of thumpa-thumpa emanating from after-market sub-woofers. Inside the dark windows I could only imagine the bopping of ball-capped heads and vibrating of loose change left over from the last Tim Hortons run in time with the bass.

And then, as the light changed and they pulled away I breathed a sigh of relief — it was actually a Dodge Caliber that I saw. Whew. That was a close one.

Graeme is going in for a root canal today. Drop a comment below to either make fun of him or express some sympathy. He’ll like it!

Lately, and as mentioned  before,  I’ve been overdosing lately on Google Analytics. Someone should really stop me. Or at least sign me up for a statistics class so I know what I’m talking about. Or, if I can’t learn that, I can at least make up more convincing stats.

So, with that half-hearted disclaimer, I present this weekend:

Beer: 1
Banana: 2
Email Received: 101
Email Sent: 29
Grilled Cheese Sandwhich: 2
Slightly-Burnt Grilled Cheese Sandwhich: 1
Cookies: 0
Hours Slept: 12
Laundry Detergent Made: 96 loads
Blog Posts: 2
Kool-Aid: 2L
Visits to Herman: 1
Songs Listened: 236
Total Time: 15.5 hours
Hours not sleeping or listening to music: 19.5
Ladybugs spotted: 1

Maybe next time I’ll think of this at the beginning of the weekend. Maybe.

I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with computer mice. Mostly with me loving them and they, in turn, hating me.

Actually, that’s not true. I don’t love them.

In the last couple of years I’ve gone through four mice, with the first three dying due to cord complications and just generally being cheap mice. You get what you pay for it seems.

For the last while I’ve been using an Apple Mighty Mouse with pretty good results, though the scroll ball has been a bit flaky lately. And by flaky, it either doesn’t work, or generally will only go in the opposite direction I want it to. Very, very helpful. I’m sure it’s cheating.

So, after some google searching and numerous tutorials on rubbing it vigorously and other tutorials on not rubbing it vigorously or you’ll risk damaging it (shame that they appeared on google in that order) I finally found the last resort.

No, it’s not buying another mouse — it’s butchering this one.

This guy seemed to have the best instructions around so I went with him.

For the most part, amidst a few variations, it went pretty well. Pried it apart with my Leatherman, broke the seals, undid the cables and cleaned the four itsy-bitty rollers. Each time I said “okay, of all parts, I can’t drop this one” I did, of course, drop it. Not that it stopped me from saying it next time. I’m a slow learner.

Then came the time to reassemble and glue it back together with crazy glue. Sounds easy enough, right? Well not until you hear this little crack  and watch as this pool of crazy glue pours out onto the poor little guy. If only this was the safe-to-eat pre-school glue I remember from oh so long ago, then it’d a simple clean up. I’m positive there were vitamins in that brand.

No, this was the toxic, bonds forever and ever in five seconds or less brand now covering fingers and mouse.

My fingers might feel a bit funny, but at least the scroll ball works again!