Two Hanky Link

I found this link on Clicked which is Will Femia's weblog on MSNBC. It's an 8 minute video titled 4 Generations and relates the story of giving a gift of a water buffalo to a Chinese farm family. Warning: Put your tissue box nearby before clicking.

Hot and Dry

There is no rain in the guage in the Texas Hill Country. It's dry and there is very little prospect for rain in the near future. Add to that, the thermometer is registering in the upper 90's every day. So it's hot and it's dry and there's no relief in sight!

Since our house sits on the side of a hill with no fear of flooding, we want rain and lots of it. Actually, it would take a flood to reach our average rainfall and to fill the Guadalupe River and recharge the aquifer.

Playlists to MP3 Portable Player

Now that I have my playlists ready, I need to transfer the songs to my MP3 player

1. With WMP (Windows Media Player) open, I plug in the MP3 player to the computer USB port.
2. From WMP select "Sync" from the selections available.
3. Select the PlayList from the drop-down menu "Sync List".
4. Choose the PlayList I want to copy to the MP3.
5. Click "Start Sync".
6. Repeat from step 3 for adding more PlayLists.

How to Make a PlayList

After ripping all my CDs to Windows Media Player, I am ready to make playlists from the collected songs. Playlists are lists of songs (or other audio files) that you can create to organize your library.

• Open Windows Media Player. The window is divided into three sections. On the far left of the Library window under All Music there are 8 subsections. All these subsections contain the songs I ripped with each subsection organizing the songs by a different grouping. All I am interested in now is the alphabetized list (by first letter) under All Music Album Artist, so I will open Album Artist on the + sign to see all the music I ripped listed by the artists' names.
• Select an artist two ways: one, by clicking on the + sign by the artist's name I will see all the albums I ripped by that artist or two, by clicking on the artist's name I will see all the songs I ripped by that artist. In either case the ripped songs will show in the large middle window. There is other information included with the song titles also. The length of each song could be important when making a playlist.
• Now I am ready to make the playlist. Look at the far right side of the window. It's blue. I see Now Playing List at the top with a down arrow. I click that arrow and go down to New List then Play List. Click on Play List and I am ready to make some decisions about the songs I want in my playlist.
• From the large middle window, I can drag song titles into the right (blue) window to build a list of items for my playlist. Lots of options are available now. I can use one or more songs from the artist I have open, then close that artist and open another to add to the playlist.
• After the playlist is complete to my satisfaction, I open the drop down box again and click Save Playlist As and get a new window for naming the playlist. I will give the playlist a meaningful name so I can know which one this is after I have a lot of playlists saved. I'll call this one Music for Fast Walking 1.

Hint: When I couldn't remember what the song sounded like, I put on my headset, selected the song from the middle window song list, and listened to a bit of it by clicking the Play arrow at the bottom of the window (or double click the song title). After listening, I clicked the Stop button and made the decision whether or not to add to the playlist.

Ripping CDs

I am learning how to set up my mp3 player with podcasts and playlists. Here is the first step for getting my CDs onto my mp3 player. First, I have to build a CD library on my computer. I am using Windows Media Player which came installed on my computer.

1. Open Windows Media Player.
2. Click Rip which is listed in the bar along the top.
3. Put a CD you own in the CD drive on your computer.
4. Wait for the window to show the listing for the CD you inserted.
5. Here's the tricky part: Some CDs do not have the information about tracks, artists, etc stored on them that can be read by Windows Media player so the listing in the window will come up with Unknown.
6. If configured appropriately, and you are connected to the internet, Windows Media Player will do a lookup of missing information and load the details.
7. After waiting a few seconds, that doesn't automatically change to list the actual artist and songs etc from the CD you inserted, then you will have to change a setting on your computer.
8. Once the rip is finished, remove the CD and look at the library view. You will see your CD listed under All Music Album Artist.
9. Now you are ready to rip another CD.

Technically speaking this process converts the digital track on the CD to an mp3 file on your computer.

Shout Wipes Plus

I saw this product work wonders so I'm giving it my personal seal of approval. My girlfriend was poured red wine into a plastic cup she was holding and the wine leaked quickly through a slit in the bottom of the cup running red wine down the length of her slacks. Another girlfriend grabbed her quickly and took her to the restroom, applied the Shout Wipe to the stain and they returned to the gathering with a damp spot on the slacks, but NO stain whatsoever. I was witnessing a laundry miracle! How handy these wipes are!

mp3-ing

Playing in my ears right now? Lighthouse by The Waifs. Check 'em out!