July 21, 2008

Dunkin' WTH Donuts

Since when is a dozen 12? A baker's dozen has been 13 since ye olden times when bakers could be beheaded for providing less than 12 baked products when ordering a dozen. (They included an extra just to make sure!) This safety gap has become an expected part of ordering a dozen donuts, cruellers, rolls, or what have you. Today I went to Dunkin' Donuts because I forgot my CAC card at home, and it is office culture to bring in the donuts when you make a boneheaded move such as this. Imagine my surprise when they pulled out the box and it fit 12 donuts, not 13!

Just as an added commentary on this whole fiasco, the box had a banner on it: 0g Trans Fats! Wowee! Perhaps donuts can be healthy treats?

July 17, 2008

Body of Secrets

I've finished my non-fiction book for the year, Body of Secrets. That makes two of my New Years Resolutions complete. One fiction book, one non-fiction book. I've bought a third book for the year, John Adams: Party of One, which I'll be starting today. When I have time I need to get started on my short story.

July 05, 2008

10-4 Good Buddy

Well, I splurged on myself today and bought my first scanner, a hand-held RadioShack PRO-97. It's an analog scanner (triple trunking) and picks up plenty of signals (but not standard FM 86-108 - my only complaint - this would have been a simple inclusion).

The battery life is pretty good (it takes 4 AA's, but I've been using it about 12 hours almost non-stop), the signal strength is good, the squelch is analog/by-feel.

In just a day, I've learned how to search for signals and save the channels I find. A little harder was comprehending how to program the trunking system here (there's two Motorola systems, one digital, one analog...I kept trying to program in the digital system and didn't understand why all I got was squeals). Now that I know I need a digital trunking scanner, I know what I want for Christmas, a BearCat BCD396T, RadioShack Pro-96 or GRE PSR-500 (digital trunking scanners).

I got the cable and downloaded successfully with some software I found on the NET (Win97) -

Can anyone recommend a FREE software that does this? I went ahead and bought Win97 already, but it'd be nice to have a backup.

Any suggestions, etc, from you hams on the list? So far, this has been better than watching TV ;)