So, why do I recycle?

I'm confused as to why I recycle. As a Californian, I'm stuck paying a ridiculous 5 to 10 cent deposit for buying plastic bottles and aluminum cans. If you bring in your saved cans and bottles, you only get a percentage of that back. Additionally, each major city has set up a recycling collection program in which they expect you to hand over your recyclables to them. Instead of getting your CRV back, home owners actually have to pay for the service! What the hell? It's no wonder that recycling has dropped a bit in the past 5 years.
Ok, so I actually attempted to save my aluminum cans. I've been saving them for 3 years now. You might think, "Man, that's a lot of cans." Not really. I had only 4 kitchen garbage bags full. The first problem I encountered is that it is not easy to find recycling centers. Where the hell are they? I found one by accident last month, so today I brought my cans to it. The place was closed in the middle of the morning on a Monday. So I came back at lunch. Finally, I was able to offload these cans...for the tremendous sum of...16.54 (including a few plastic bottles). 3 years worth of saving netted me an amount that is substantially lower than my hourly income. Yeah, so tell me again why I'm supposed to recycle?

Paintballin'

Dave, his g/f Miriam (no relation to the other Miriam I talk about here), Nate and I paintballed today. Man...fun! Outdoor, of course. We went to Bearcreek (backup link) in the hills outside of the Los Gatos area. It's only a 30 minute drive from my place. We got there around 8am, but didn't get started til 9:30 cuz of sign-in and orientation. By the second game, I was hella tired, but I got past that and came back strong. This one game I ran up the hill up the middle. Some how I got to the enemy base, ran right around their main bunker and took four guys out before I was hit. At the end of the last game, after lunch, I moved to the center of the field and held my position for the whole 15 minute game. I ran out of ammo about 6 minutes into the game, but kept myself from getting hit. I had two snipers come up at different times to my position. I would stand over the barrier, yell, and fire blanks in order to draw fire, then duck. The sniper was able see who shoot at me and take them out. The second sniper eventually got hit and passed off the last of his ammo to me...which I promptly used up. Finally, an opponent got around our rear, taking out a nest of our guys. He was so focused, he didn't notice me running right up to his position. I took him out just before the whistle blow to end the game. I got 8 minor welts around my body. I'm sore. Damn I had fun.

Weekends special ...ahhh

My g/f and I have been enjoying some fun and pleasant weekends. Last weekend, we took thangs easy, just enjoying each other’s company. We did go to Great America for the fireworks display on the 3rd. We also had good dinner with her folks on Sunday. We saw Stepford Wifes too. It’s an OK movie…coulda been a lot better. It may be sick, but it’s nice just spending some time with my g/f. :)

Errands and Bank Hours

Doesn't it suck that everyone has pretty much the same business hours? To take care of any real personal business, you hafta take time off from work. I took all of last Thursday off. Got my oil changed, got my new license plate tag down at DMV (lost my original before I put it on my car), had lunch, got a Police Office at the Sunnyvale station to sign off on the fix-it ticket I got for not having the current license plate tag on my car, mailed off a bunch of bills, etc. I didn't even have time to finish up my errands when the business day was ending. Arg.

There was a time when banks had dreadful hours. I think it was something like 10am to 2pm. Then it was a big deal when they started staying open til 4pm. Then it was a big deal for a bank to be open on Sat. Now, they are open from 9 or 10am til 5pm everyday, 6pm on Fridays, and 10am to 1 or 2pm on Sat. Even with all of these changes, their hours still suck. At least banks have made an effort to be available during some of the time that the average person has a free time.

Essential Software for your Treo 600, Mid-2004 Update

To get the most out of your Treo 600, these additional software packages are necessary. This is an update from previous posts.

mLights – Allow you to control screen backlighting and keyboard lighting intensity and hours of operation.

mVoice – Turns your Treo 600 in a voice recorder and .wav player. (You must upgrade your Treo 600 OS to the latest version in order to use this software.)

PowerRUN – Enables your Treo 600 transfer and run .prc programs from your SD Card.

Skinner – Change Dialpad and Favorites skins. Software is included that allows you to create your own skins.

Treo shortcuts – Enables you to program the Phone and Power buttons.

Adobe Acrobat Reader for Palm OS – Enables your device to view PDF files. The package also has a program that allows you to print from several programs to a fax machine, among other things.

pTunes (Pocket Tunes) – Plays MP3 files from SD Cards. You can install various skins to change its look too.

QuickOffice – Open, view and edit Word, PowerPoint and Excel native formats.

Snappermail – POP3 email software that handles file attachments. This software package also includes a program for handling and creating ZIP files.

VeriChat – Enables you to chat on AOL, Yahoo, MSN and ICQ instant messaging all at once. It also allows you to keep these IM sessions open on standby 24/7.


Additional software that will enhance your Treo 600 control, but aren’t useful on a daily/weekly basis.

Filez – This Palm OS file manager lets you view all the individual files on your Palm device and SD Card.

Batterygraph – Tracks battery statics, such as battery status, settings and usage. It displays details on a graph.

Friends

Miriam cooked dinner for my g/f and I on Sat. Tasty pasta. Very good.