Windows Live Writer

Finally got a new computer and am in the process of setting it up. It had this blogging program on it, so I thought that I would give it a try. Since I am still on a dial-up out here in the wilderness of southern Indiana, I thought it would be a great idea to be able to blog when I am offline. It seems to have lots of bells and whistles, so far I am impressed.

The unrelenting Summer heat has relented today and it was just in time for us to get our first load of hay in the loft. I didn’t think that we would be putting any square bales in the loft this year because reasonably priced, good quality square baled hay is a thing of the past. I thought that we were going to try to get by with just big round bales but we fell for it again and this hay is another disappointment. These bales are half the size of the hay that we got a few years ago for half the price. It is so light and loose that it won’t stay on the elevator.

In this tough economy everyone is trying to get rich by ripping off their neighbor. Small farmers or hobby farmers have to have their own hay equipment and their own hayfield in order to survive anymore. We can sit and reminisce with the Grandkids this winter about how you used to be able to buy good clean hay without weeds in heavy, long, tight bales for $2.00 per bale.

Now let’s see how Windows Live Writer publishes to blogger.

Accolades

I am proud to announce that Paypal has seen the light. I have criticized Paypal, GoDaddy and the USPS websites in some of my past blogs for the slowness of their sites for those of us who are still stuck in dial-up country.

Paypal has heard my cry and changed their ways. I can now visit their site and take care of my business without stroking out. It is a pleasure to go to Paypal now. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Now if GoDaddy and the US Postal Service would just follow their lead, redesign their sites and get rid of the caged, running squirrels in wheels who are now powering their servers. I would never have to worry about my blood pressure again.

Since I am sure that Paypal, GoDaddy and the USPS all follow my blog regularly, I expect that we will be seeing these much needed changes soon.

Calf Bloat Update

Welcome To Wilmoth Farms posted on her blog some tips and a link in my comments about Angus' bloat and I am sorry that I haven't left you a comment, well actually I tried but it just wouldn't work.

I am so happy that you got DSL, some of us are going to be on Dial-up forever it seems.

Angus hasn't had another episode of bloat, just those three times, I doctored him like I would a goat with bloat which was baking soda, veg. oil and bouncing his belly.

I talked to a neighbor who raises around a 100 bottle calves a year and he said that he has a chronic bloating calf right now that he put a plastic valve in. He said that she was the first chronic bloater that he has ever had. He has only had to tube a few on rare occasions in the past.

I am not sure what caused this in Angus but he is over it now, he may have just gotten too much green grass because we were in the process of weaning him. He may have gotten into the goat mineral also.

I am not too happy with him, he nearly killed me yesterday trying to get me to give him a bottle. He is too big to punch and butt me. I couldn't get away from him, he kept circling me and spinning me around. I got so tired and dizzy that I thought that I would go down.

I am on foal watch with Jetta right now, she is waxed and ready to go. I set up with her last night and hopefully she will go early this evening or early tonight.

Phone Calls on Dial Up

We had a wonderful thunder storm on Wednesday night that produced enough rain to keep us from being forced into a burn ban. One flash of lightening was very intense and the boom that accompanied it was deafening and too close. Our lights did not go out but my phone died.

Sometime later one of our phones rang but it wasn't the one that is hooked into our computer system, so I knew that the problem was with the phone or lines into my computer. I started plugging and unplugging and testing until I found the problem to be with my HotCall HC2000 box.

The HotCall HC2000 is a little device that rings to let you know that you have a call coming in while you are using your dialup internet connection. This box has kept me happy for many years and I am sure that it has kept our family and friends happy as well because they didn't always get a busy signal when we were online. It has lasted many years and served us well. It will be disposed of with honors.

So, off I go to look for another HotCall box with thoughts of having to order it and how long it might take to receive it in the mail. But then, I think that with all of the new technology that is out there today and the fact that I haven't researched this in a long time that there might just be a software solution other than CallWave and some of the call forwarding programs that I have tried before. They require a call forwarding from your phone service and there is a small fee that you have added on to your monthly phone bill.

Sure enough there is a little program that works wonderfully with no fees from the phone company and it actually works great. I had it downloaded and installed in no time. I am really happy with this software. It is called PhoneTray Dialup and it is located at http://www.phonetray.com/index.htm.

They have other programs too that are free that will zap telemarketers and block callers that you don't want to talk to, but the one that you want is called PhoneTray Dialup, it is the only one that allows you to receive phone calls while being online.

It has a 30 day free trial then after the 30 days are up you have to pay $15.95 USD to purchase it. This is a one time fee that you can use on other computers and never have to pay for again. You will receive a license number that you keep in a safe place in case you have to upgrade or download a new copy to a new computer.

It only works if you have Call Waiting through your phone company and it works really well if you have Call Waiting Caller ID because it will tell you who is calling and their phone number. You even have a choice of whether it tells you in a male voice or just in a text box. You can chose to disconnect and take the call, place the internet connection on hold and take the call, ignore the call or zap the call with a choice of recorded messages.

I do have call waiting which is required but I do not have call waiting caller ID, so all calls just come up as N/A for me. I can't believe that it took a storm for me to find a program that I like so well.

If you have a dial-up and you can't get phone calls while online, you should check this out. If you have a modem that allows it, you can even put your connection on hold and take the call, then go back online without having to redial. This works for me for about three minutes before my internet connection disconnects.

Google Reader

Thank God for Google Reader! There are several blogs that I enjoy reading on a daily basis but because the authors use complicated backgrounds and lots of gadgets, I can no longer go to their actual blogs. I don't blame them, if I had high speed internet I would probably do the same thing but since I am still on a dial-up connection that moves as slow as molasses on a freezing cold day, I cannot wait 20 minutes for a background to load.

Google Reader is just great, all that I get is the text of blogs that I am following alone with whatever pictures that they posted with that blog. All of the latest blogs from my favorite authors are there in one place, no ads and no gadgets in the side bars. Google Reader helps me to find some extra time in my day.

AT&T has finally brought DSL to one of the small towns that I live near, but it does not reach me. The other small town that I live near on the other side has cable internet service but it doesn't reach me either. I get depressed when I think about it, so I won't think about it by using Google Reader.

I do have HOPE for CHANGE in this upcoming year. Once President O gets in office, I will have both cable and DSL to choose from.

Invalid CTF File

I have been having this problem and getting this error trying to update AVG Anti-Virus 8.

Invalid Update Control CTF File

To fix this:

1. Navigate to:
For WinXP: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Avg8\update\download

For Vista: C:\ProgramData\avg8\update\download

2. Delete avginfoavi.ctf and avginfowin.ctf

I did this a couple of times and the error just kept coming back the next day. So I took the next step of downloading and installing a fresh copy of AVG 8 after removing the original program. Guess what? After spending a grueling 6 hours downloading and installing the new AVG, I started getting the same error. So, I am back to square one and back to deleting the files again.

I have done many searches on Google and find these same fixes time after time. It seems to fix the problem for most people but I guess I am not most people.

**Update** After a few weeks this problem finally went away on it's own with no extra help from me or anyone else. So, if you are still having this come back time after time, there is hope, just keep on deleting.

**ANOTHER UPDATE** Here it is nearly two months later and after thinking that this problem was solved, I got the same error again today on Dec. 17, 2008. Please, if anyone knows of a permanent fix for this besides ditching AVG altogether, post your solution in a comment below.

Zone Alarm

My slow dial-up connection is holding me prisoner tonight. I started a download of the Zone Alarm Firewall at 8:00 this evening and it is now 12:30. I am very sleepy but I cannot go to bed and leave the connection open all night. I thought about setting my alarm to get up and shut the computer down when the download is complete but I know that I would just keep hitting the snooze button.

My download is 79% done right now and I wouldn't have to even do this download if it weren't for either a Microsoft Update or an AVG Update that killed my internet connection. This same thing happened to me back in July with a Microsoft Update and I got it fixed somehow. This time I couldn't fix it without totally uninstalling Zone Alarm.

I may be wasting my time anyway because I may install this new Zone Alarm Firewall and lose my connection again. Microsoft or AVG is doing something that makes Zone Alarm have a nervous breakdown or something. I am going to shut off the Automatic Updates from Microsoft, but since I got an update from AVG at the same time, I can't say for sure who the culprit is. I don't have time to figure out how to fix their messes in either case.

Good Morning! I ended up going to bed and setting my alarm, I finally woke up enough to disconnect the connection after hitting the snooze button around five times. I am going to do some more research on my computer problem before reinstalling my new copy of Zone Alarm. I will try to find out if there is a fix or if the offending update has issued a patch for the problem.

Firefox 3.0.1

I finally got around to downloading Firefox 3.0.1 and a new Google toolbar to go with it. I love being able to access my Google bookmarks from my toolbar but found that they would not show up with the new Firefox browser. The bookmark button on the toolbar kept asking me to sign-in, which I did but the sign-in never worked.

Here is the fix for anyone having this same problem; Just go to "Tools" in your Firefox browser, then select "Options" then click the "Privacy" tab. Under the "Cookies" section, you should have "Accept cookies from sites" checked but I don't accept cookies from third parties and that was my problem with the bookmarks. You just need to click on the "Exceptions" button and then type "google.com" in the box at the top, then choose "allow". This will allow Google to place a cookie on your computer as a third party and will fix your bookmarks.

At first, I didn't like the new Firefox browser. It seemed slower for some reason but after cleaning out my cache and cookies, then rebooting my computer, I think that it actually is faster and I need all of the speed I can get with this painfully slow dial-up connection.

Surge Protector

Yesterday morning's rain was wonderful, I refuse to complain about the rain after last year's drought. It's the mud that keeps giving me problems. A river washed through our barn/house, so the whole barn floor is slippery and we have puddles in the barn. Water also came through the wall into my living room while I slept yesterday morning. I kept waking up to the thunder, lightening and pouring rain, that gave me a good excuse to just keep right on sleeping.

As soon as my Husband left for work, there was a painfully loud clap of thunder that was followed by a pop that shook the house. The electricity went out, then came back on, so I rolled over and slept some more.

When it quit raining, I got up and found my wet floors and of course no phone service. This sounded a little different to me when I held the phone to my ear, it was just dead. Usually when someone steals our phone lines or service is just out, I can hear dead air but this was just dead with no sound at all. I had the feeling that it had something to do with that lightening strike.

When my DH came home for lunch with the cell phone, I called neighbors on both sides of us and they both had service. So I whined around until I got my DH to wade through the mud to break into the phone box on the outside of the barn/house and hook a phone up out there to see if the problem was inside the house. Sure enough we had service out there, so I came into the house and started the process of elimination.

I found out that my high priced phone line surge protector had done it's job and gave it's life to save my phones and computer. So I rerouted a few lines around the surge protector and was back in business. However, my computer and phones are now at risk if we should get another storm. I will purchase another one because this proves that they actually work.

Thief Strikes Again

We were without phones and internet service all day again yesterday. The copper thief struck again. I had to take the neighbor's other two dogs to be groomed and I passed the crime scene. There were only a couple of AT&T trucks there this time and one police car. They were all sitting around laughing and taking a break while my phone lines were lying there shredded and my contact with the outside world was disconnected.

The problem is this; I realized yesterday that they are not replacing the lines with anything new, they are replacing it with the same old copper wire. The reason that I know this is because this is the third time that this stretch of line has been stolen. The lines hang down close to the ground in this spot and it is on top of a hill in a secluded area with no trees to block their view for a couple of miles, so they can see a car coming very easily in any direction.

Now I am not that smart but I have noticed that they only steal these lines on weekends but they do switch it around from Friday to Saturday or Sunday nights. But they are basically hitting the same areas each time. We have been without service on around six different occasions since this all started.

At least this gives the AT&T repairmen something to do, so maybe they won't lose their jobs to downsizing. Job security is good thing, I guess. How's that for a positive attitude? I do know all of these guys pretty well, since we have had a lot of phone problems in the last several years. There was a time that I talked to them at least twice a week. But other than the stolen lines, they did finally track down and fix our problem after I talked to a nice man at the Utility Regulatory Commission. Maybe I should give him another call, at the very least our phone bills should be adjusted for all of these outages.

My Year End Rants

After taking care of renewing a domain name, I thought that I might vent some steam here. I have around 28 domain names registered with GoDaddy.com and every time I have to go to that website I get so angry and I always threaten to transfer my names somewhere else!

I know that they make pretty good money and brag about what a quality company that they are and how many customers that they have, so why can't they afford to build a better website?

We live in an area that has no high speed internet connection options, so unless we want to shell out the money for satellite dish service, we are pretty much stuck with dial-up. We get by, sometimes painfully, but there are a few websites that are without excuse.

I can go to many big websites without getting upset, sites like Amazon and eBay are not a problem at all, but GoDaddy, PayPal and the United States Postal Service websites are just impossible.

GoDaddy.com is without question the worst, they take the first place ribbon for being the all time slowest website out there. I hate going there and avoid it at all costs. I guess I need to do some shopping and find another registrar, to save myself from a total melt down.

Why is that site so slow? It takes forever to pull any information from their databases and having to wade through all of the stupid advertising is just ridiculous. Don't they make enough money selling their services? Putting so much advertising on the site makes the whole shopping experience confusing. I really don't understand how they do any business at all with all of the confusion on each page.

If their site is any indication of the speed of their servers, I don't think that I would want to host a website there.

Enough of that, now let's talk about AT & T, the phone company. Since we do only have access to the internet by dial-up and pay each month for phone service, wouldn't you think that we should have a right to a working phone line? My continuing fear is that we would have some kind of emergency and have to depend on our home phone to dial 911.

The static in our line is so bad that you can't keep a internet connection and the disconnects while you are talking on the phone are very annoying. We have just had to adapt by starting each phone conversation with "Now we might get disconnected because we live in a third world country and the phone service isn't very good here." We understood about "dropped calls" before cell phones were even invented.

I will have to admit though, that things are getting much better than they used to be. We used to have to spend weekends and Holidays with no phone service at all, that hasn't happened in a long time.

We have had to call in for repairs so many times that we get a little irritable with the stupid things that we are told each time. Our neighbors are having the same problems and the phone company has even blamed the electric company. Then finally, the last time that a repairman was out, he sat in my house and told me that they just don't know what is causing it, and I do appreciate that kind of honesty. I just wish they would give us a break on our phone bill.

We called repair last Friday the 28th and were told that, "Yes, they could hear the static", then they said that they would have it repaired by January 5th, the next day they called back to find out for sure that we still needed repair and to assure me that they would have it repaired by January 5th, I said something to the affect that that was a long time to go without an internet connection and with a phone that you can barely use, she quickly snapped back that she had said BY January 5th and not ON January 5th, that made me feel much better. In the mean time she wanted to know how I felt about the service that they had provided today.

All in all I will have to say that, AT & T employees are much more intelligent than those people who work in Hospital Billing but that really isn't saying much because the only people that rank lower than Hospital billing employees are Spammers.