Deborah Woehr

I spent a good part of yesterday afternoon finishing up my baking, despite the fact that I had two more cookie recipes slated. All of the cookie tins are filled and ready for this year’s Beer Claus (the hubby) to deliver. Plus I have three dinner plates that are brimming with cookies. That’s enough, considering that my husband is planning on baking his infamous cheesecake.

As for the Ebay fiasco, I received an email from them with some helpful information on how to recover my money as well as report that seller for fraud. Speaking of which, I haven’t heard a peep from him since I asked for my refund. I even went so far as to ask him to provide the serial number so I could check it with the manufacturer. Not a word. Fortunately, if you buy anything using PayPal, you’re insured. That was comforting.

My husband called me a couple of hours ago to tell me that he’d received the program from the retailer who said that they didn’t have it in stock. So it looks like I’ll be getting this for Christmas after all. It’s funny how things work out.

As for my writing, I haven’t gotten anything done since Tuesday. I’m beginning to compile some of the submissions I received for the anthology so I can get a feel for how this book is going to look.

I’ve been researching the costs for FileMaker Pro 7 for the past month for my Mac. Filemaker has just put out a new upgrade, but the price on the old version is still just as high as the new version. Plus, it isn’t compatible with my setup. It seems that every major software company has adopted Microsoft’s bloodsucking practices. That’s not what has me so upset right now.

I’ve been scouring the Internet in the quest for finding this program at a more reasonable price. One of the places I checked was Ebay. Makes sense, right? A couple of weeks ago, I found an auction that didn’t have a reserve price and zero bids. I decided to watch this item because it was almost up.

The next day, I receive an email from Ebay’s VeRO program, informing me that the listing had been removed for possible copyright/trademark infringement. Okay, I thought. This is a minor disappointment, but life goes on.

I kept looking. When my husband had major difficulty ordering from the major retailers, he suggested I try Ebay. I did and found an auction that had the Buy It Now for $99. I bought it, logged onto my account today, and found the listing gone from my records.

Next, I checked my email. Sure enough, I found a message from the Ebay VeRO department, informing me that the auction was pulled due to a “possible” copyright/trademark infringement. They didn’t bother to give me any real information except a list of policies and links to more information about their policies. The difference between the prior incident and this one is that I’m now out $100 and have to track it down myself. See below.

If you are a bidder and received a notice about a listing you were participating in, please keep in mind that we are unable to provide you with contact information for the seller. Since the listing was removed by eBay, the results are null and void. We do not recommend that you proceed with a transaction for a listing that has been removed early. Doing so would be at your own risk and without eBay insurance coverage or use of the feedback forum.

I received the above excerpt when I wrote to Ebay, explaining my situation. It’s from an autoresponder. In the meantime, I’ve requested a refund from the seller, which I doubt I’ll ever receive. The listing is gone, so I can’t alert other buyers if this was a fraudulent sale. I’ve kept the emails from both Ebay and the seller to dispute with PayPal. I’m hoping they can resolve the matter, if it comes down to that.

What upsets me the most is that this guy told me that this was the third time that Ebay has revoked his auctions without explanation. Why was this guy allowed to continue posting auctions if they were having all these problems with him? I wrote to Ebay a second time, asking them to require sellers to list the serial number for any software that they sell. That way, we can call the manufacturer to see if the program is legit and not a pirated copy.

Last weekend, we had an “almost” when my oldest decided to drink in the living room (against my explicit instructions) and spilled his water all over the table. That wouldn’t have been any big deal if it weren’t for the glass inlays, which the water seeped through and dripped on some old family photos.

Fortunately, the only thing that got wet was the paper frame that held my husband’s grandmother’s wedding picture. I still keep these out because I want my family to enjoy them. But this got me thinking about natural disasters and stupid little accidents such as the one above. With all this technology available, there is no excuse not to have backup copies of your photographs.

I’ve known about photoblogs since I signed up with Blog Explosion last year and even looked at a couple. One of my frequent haunts is opensourcecms.com, where you can test out a variety of Open Source programs without having to install them on your server. On Monday, I found two programs for photoblogs: Pixel Post and Plogger

I decided to install Pixel Post for a test run on Deb’s Photos and Drawings. I’ve just begun to play with it, but I like the fact that there are a variety of templates and plugins available. This program is very basic and easy to figure out. I had no problems with the installation or uploading and manipulating images.

One of the things I don’t like is that you can’t create subcategories. I guess I’m so used to the bells and whistles of WordPress that I’m spoiled.

“Perhaps she mistook the cops for the Others?”
No, this lady needs some serious Anger Management classes, along with jailtime before she kills someone. She should also get her license revoked, since she has so little regard for others. Let her bike her way to the set.

I’m at the very end of Chapter 12, where Amanda has picked up where she left off on her sleepwalking. Was this caused by guilt over her desire for revenge, or is she being stalked by another dangerous enemy? Will she tell Travis, who is dealing with incredible losses of his own? Or, will she keep silent and hope this will go away?

From this point on, I’ll need to pay close attention to my objectivity. They’ve become friends because of circumstances beyond their control, but will they stay friends as the hauntings grow more terrifying. Although I’d like to see a romance develop between them, I have to remember their backgrounds and consider their motivations as I continue with this story.

Travis does have feelings for Amanda, although he isn’t ready to admit this yet. He has a strong distrust of people, especially of women. Amanda isn’t any better off, having barely survived an abusive marriage. Romance is the furthest thing on her mind. It will be interesting to see how this factor plays itself out and how the ghosts will take full advantage of their weaknesses.

This time last year, my husband and I were surprised when we opened our front door in time to see his best friend driving away. Then we saw what he’d left–-a six-pack of Spaten (sp?) beer for my husband. It didn’t stop there. The next night, we found two bottles of Pepsi (my favorite drink) sitting on our doorstep.

Then, on Christmas Eve morning, we received a visit from our other friends, a couple we met when our sons started kindergarten. They brought over a tin of treats and visited with us for about 30 minutes. When they left, my husband and I looked at each other. We felt like shit because we hadn’t done anything except throw up the Christmas tree and the lights on our rental. I hadn’t even bothered with cards.

We were going through a low period, having lost my father-in-law the prior summer. I think they knew that and were trying to cheer us up. It worked.

This year we’re in a much better frame of mind. Yesterday, I whipped up at least ten dozen (lost track) of cookies and plan to bake more today. Beer Claus didn’t realize that he had started a tradition.

As for the Christmas cards, I didn’t bother. I’m not sure whether I’m lazy or just cheap. But I did send eCards to my family, including my sons. They got a big kick out of it this morning.

Cheers, everyone!

My husband and my oldest son have established the tradition of decorating our house with Christmas lights the day after Thanksgiving. I’m not sure when this started, perhaps when he was about three or four. When we were living in our rental, he would string lights along our overhead cabinet and across the beam that separated the dining room from the family room.

Each year since my kids were toddlers, my husband and I would take them for a long drive to look at all the light displays in our neighborhood. Some houses had a simple string that lined the eaves while others went all out with spectacular displays, depicting Santa or snowmen. The kids were enthralled and insisted that we go at least one more time before Christmas Day.

This year, I took the boys out with my sister-in-law and her boys (and my mother-in-law). They just turned three, so it feels like I’ve stepped back in time a bit, since mine are so much older. My sister-in-law found some neat displays in the paper, and we went out to see those.

One was a neighborhood effort in Willow Glen. The first house had a sleigh sitting in their front yard, while four our five consecutive houses had giant reindeer gracing their lawns. Words can’t adequately describe this, so I’ll have to drag out my old digital camera and go out there again so I may post a picture. I’d better do this quick, as Christmas is almost here.

Last weekend, I read Scot Cunningham’s post about the latest PC campaign and rolled my eyes at our government’s idiocy. You can read Scot’s post here. Last night, I walked out of my office and into my living room, where my husband was watching his news show. The topic discussed was whether or not we have the right to say “Merry Christmas”. What a stupid load of crap!

The last time I checked, at least two-thirds of the US population believes in the Christian faith in some shape or form. Before I start ranting, the lady went on to say that one town is rebelling against the mighty Thought Police by creating signs that say “Merry Christmas” for the businesses as well as the regular folk. Good for them!

The news segment ended with the female guest shrugging and saying, “We can say Merry Christmas if we want to. It’s our First Amendment right.” Yet, the deer-in-the-headlights expression on her face and the hesitant tone of her voice told me something quite different.

This issue has been gearing up for at least three years. I had the pleasure of watching my youngest son sing in the school Christmas concert. They called it the Winter Concert, but whatever. The kids sang all kinds of Christmas songs, throwing in a couple of Jewish and Hispanic songs in for a well-rounded program. Several days later, I stopped by the school’s office and overheard the teacher’s talking about how a couple parents complained. That was the end of the Winter Concert.

The contract assignment I’ve been working on for the past two weeks is finished. I had ten minutes to spare when the copier/scanner decided it didn’t like the paper I was feeding it. It took a lot of effort to restrain myself from venting a slew of curses against that machine. Couldn’t stifle the groans, though.

I had ten minutes to finish this job because something was wrong with their network and they needed to shut the servers down. After some cajoling (and internal swearing), I got the machine to cooperate for me.

When this show first aired, I wasn’t sure if I was going to enjoy it as much as the others. For one thing, the producers should have used one type of family–parents with two small children or families with (or of) adult children. I felt bad for the kids who got eliminated because they they didn’t have a fair chance against the adults.

Despite this qualm, I enjoyed the show and felt very satisfied when the Lintz family won last night. I would have been just as happy if the Bransons had won. The Weaver family had an excellent chance of winning but then blew it when they reached the stadium and copped out. That was fine by me because they were rude and nasty to everyone, except Ted the Fellow Christian.

The next episode looks like it will return to its regular theme, which is too bad because I enjoyed seeing areas of my country that I’ve yet to visit. Regardless, I’ll be tuning in when it airs in February.