My Substitute Reality -You're just jealous cause the little voices only talk to me-

Friday May 22, 2015

New Phone

Filed under: Camera/Photography,Computers,Cool Stuff — don @ 8:00 pm

I’ve had my Samsung S4 for 2 years now so I figured it was time for an upgrade.

I gave a fleeting thought to an iPhone but figured there’s really nothing that new about them that would drag me back to Apple.

I’ve been very happy with my Android so I decided to go with a Samsung S6.

It’s very similar to the S4 and the S5 that Betty got about a month ago with a few extra perks.

1)  It has an honest to goodness fingerprint reader.

2)  It has built in induction charging.

3)  It’s made out of metal and glass instead of plastic.

4)  It has a REALLY high resolution screen, much more than the iPhone 6.

5)  It’s got a REALLY good camera that takes low light photos very well and will take 4K video (although I don’t know what to watch it on other than the phone).

6)  It has an 8-core CPU vs the 2 core iPhone. (although the 2 core iPhone CPU is pretty good)

All of that plus I’m not shoehorned into the App Store and what Apple thinks I should use.

I’ve heard the new Samsungs are really locked down but I unrooted my S4 not long after I rooted it and never missed it.  I have a friend at work who says he could never be happy with not being able to change ROMS.  I guess if you live for doing that it’s understandable but if I want to geek out I have my computer.

I’ll play around with the new phone and report anything that’s super cool.

Tuesday May 5, 2015

Heading Back Down

Filed under: Cool Stuff,Family,Life,Personal — don @ 12:42 pm

We will be heading back down to Mexico on June 30th.  Since they need about 4 days to put in my permanent plate I figured I might as well take advantage of the extra US holiday that they don’t celebrate.

According to the email they sent me it takes 1 day to make the new plate then I have to go back for any adjustments the next 2 days.  It’s possible I will be done on the 3rd and if so we could come back then instead of waiting for the 4th.

We are also going to stay in a hotel on the US side this time.  It’s the Quechan Hotel and Casino right at the off ramp from I8.

Maybe I can win enough to pay for my implants!  Ha!  I’m a funny guy.  I’ll be lucky if I don’t lose much.  I do like the nickel slots though but I suspect they will be updated like the slots in Vegas where you don’t use money anymore.

Tuesday January 6, 2015

Implants in Mexico

Filed under: Cool Stuff,Family,Personal — don @ 1:35 pm

I’ve been wanting to get implants on my upper for about 6 years but with the cost of them in the US I couldn’t justify it.  I had actually had my middle four teeth on the upper pulled and a bone graft done about 6 years ago but when I was finally told the actual cost I decided to wait.

The cost in the US was going to be around $30,000 and that was for just 4 teeth (2 implants).

Earlier this year I realized since I was over 59 1/2 I could take some money from my 401K without a penalty so I started looking at dentists in Los Algodones, Mexico.  I heard about Los Algodones from Richard and I know Dale and Donna also got some work done there.

The dental group that seemed to be the largest with many good reviews was Sani Dental Group.  I got a quote from them and scheduled my first visit for December 27th-31st.

We arrived on the 26th and drove over the border without talking to anyone.  We went straight to the Hacienda Los Algodones which is a hotel owned by Sani.  It’s a very nice little hotel with decent sized rooms and very friendly employees.

The next day we went to Sani and they did a CT scan and a panoramic X-ray.  Then I met with a diagnostic specialist.  He said I needed an All on 4 (which is what I wanted anyways) and he suggested I get an implant on my lower back right molar (which had been extracted quite a few years ago).  I agree with them and we also planned to do a post and crown on one of my teeth I had done a root canal on a few months ago.

They said to come back on Monday so we spent Sunday checking out a few stores in town.  Every few feet someone comes up and tries to sell you something.  We weren’t buying.

Monday morning I went in and they numbed my right lower side so he could put in the singe implant.  That was completely painless so I was ready for the extractions.

He then numbed my upper right side and started pulling teeth.  I had 4 on that side with one a molar.  That wasn’t very pleasant and he had to keep adding Novocaine.  He finally had them all out and started doing the implants.  Again, the implants were not painful at all and he had the 2 in within 15 minutes or so.

Then he numbed my upper left and extracted the 2 teeth and then put in the other 2 implants.  As before there was no pain involved (of course my mouth was very numb).

Next came the part I did not like at all.  He said my bone was medium to soft and that he didn’t want to install the temporary plate that screwed on.  He wanted me to use a full denture for the next 6 months.  I told him I really didn’t want to do that as one of the reasons I went with the All on 4 was you get teeth screwed into the implants basically the same day.

He convinced me to try the denture but as soon as it was in I started gagging.  I told him there was no way I could put up with that for 6 months let alone 6 hours.

He said he would go ahead and install the temp plate like I wanted as long as I signed a paper absolving them of any damage caused by not waiting.  I went ahead and did that since I was not going to use the denture.

So later in the day we started doing the temp impression/plate.  To do that they put a plate in your mouth and start painting what I believe was acrylic material so that once they had it done they used it to make the temp.  That was probably the most uncomfortable procedure of the whole day.  It was in my mouth for close to a half hour and wasn’t doing my gag reflex any good.

On Tuesday I went back to have the new temporary screwed in.  It looks great and feels *okay*.  I suspect I’ll get used to it in time.  I do have to take it easy for the next 3 – 4 weeks and not eat anything hard.  I figure I can handle that.

To sum it up my experience was mostly good with the exception of the full denture.  I know I will be very happy once I get my permanent plate in about 4-6 months.

I should also mention that Betty got a post and crown while we were there.  The cost for both including a panoramic x-ray was only $300.

I would like to say something about the town but we really didn’t spend much time walking around.  On Monday we did go to a restaurant for lunch and then another one for dinner.  The one we went to dinner at was called Kashas and it had excellent food for decent prices.  When we first got there we noticed only one other couple.  While there a bunch more people came in and they were all locals.

If you walk around town be prepared to be semi-accosted by all kinds of people trying to sell you trinkets, artwork, and various other items.  Most of them would take NO but a few were very persistent.  One guy actually scared Betty with his aggressiveness.

I highly recommend going to Mexico if you need any dental work that would be expensive in the US.  You can save a lot over the cost in the US where it costs 300-400% higher.

Wednesday July 9, 2014

Global Warming?

Filed under: Cool Stuff — don @ 5:52 pm

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2014/06/25/government-data-show-u-s-in-decade-long-cooling/

 

Government Data Show U.S. in Decade-Long Cooling

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s most accurate, up-to-date temperature data confirm the United States has been cooling for at least the past decade. The NOAA temperature data are driving a stake through the heart of alarmists claiming accelerating global warming.

Responding to widespread criticism that its temperature station readings were corrupted by poor siting issues and suspect adjustments, NOAA established a network of 114 pristinely sited temperature stations spread out fairly uniformly throughout the United States. Because the network, known as the U.S. Climate Reference Network (USCRN), is so uniformly and pristinely situated, the temperature data require no adjustments to provide an accurate nationwide temperature record. USCRN began compiling temperature data in January 2005. Now, nearly a decade later, NOAA has finally made the USCRN temperature readings available.

According to the USCRN temperature readings, U.S. temperatures are not rising at all – at least not since the network became operational 10 years ago. Instead, the United States has cooled by approximately 0.4 degrees Celsius, which is more than half of the claimed global warming of the twentieth century.

Of course, 10 years is hardly enough to establish a long-term trend. Nevertheless, the 10-year cooling period does present some interesting facts.

Source: National Climatic Data Center, NOAA

First, global warming is not so dramatic and uniform as alarmists claim. For example, prominent alarmist James Hansen claimed in 2010, “Global warming on decadal time scales is continuing without letup … effectively illustrat[ing] the monotonic and substantial warming that is occurring on decadal time scales.” The word “monotonic” means, according to Merriam-Webster Online, “having the property either of never increasing or of never decreasing as the values of the independent variable or the subscripts of the terms increase.” Well, either temperatures are decreasing by 0.4 degrees Celsius every decade or they are not monotonic.

Second, for those who may point out U.S. temperatures do not equate to global temperatures, the USCRN data are entirely consistent with – and indeed lend additional evidentiary support for – the global warming stagnation of the past 17-plus years. While objective temperature data show there has been no global warming since sometime last century, the USCRN data confirm this ongoing stagnation in the United States, also.

Third, the USCRN data debunk claims that rising U.S. temperatures caused wildfires, droughts, or other extreme weather events during the past year. The objective data show droughts, wildfires, and other extreme weather events have become less frequent and severe in recent decades as our planet modestly warms. But even ignoring such objective data, it is difficult to claim global warming is causing recent U.S. droughts and wildfires when U.S. temperatures are a full 0.4 degrees Celsius colder than they were in 2005.

Even more importantly than the facts above, the USCRN provides the promise of reliable nationwide temperature data for years to come. No longer will global warming alarmists be able to hide behind thinly veiled excuses to doctor the U.S. temperature record. Now, thanks to the USCRN, the data are what the data are.

Expect global warming alarmists, now and for the foreseeable future, to howl in desperation claiming the USCRN temperature data are irrelevant.

Of course, to global warming alarmists, all real-world data are irrelevant.

Wednesday November 20, 2013

Happy Birthday, I’m 10

Filed under: Cool Stuff,Life,Personal — don @ 8:27 pm

On Sunday November 17th a special day happened and nobody said a word, not even me.  I forgot it until Monday morning.  What was it?  Ten years of sobriety.  Ten years since my last drink.  Ten years of a much better life.

I had been thinking about taking the day off work until I looked at a calendar and realized it was a Sunday.  So I think I’ll take December 8th which is 4 days before my 60th physical birthday and combine that with this one.

I think I deserve it.

Thursday May 30, 2013

New Phone

Filed under: Cool Stuff — don @ 7:50 pm

Yay!  I bit the bullet and got the Samsung S4.

Since the company pays for my phone they allowed us to get whichever we wanted.  We won’t be able to upgrade for 2 years so I hope the S4 lasts that long.

It’s a pretty cool phone.  It has all kinds of nifty features that the iPhone (and most other smart phones) doesn’t have.

I’m not sure which is my favorite of the “cool” features and it’s going to take a little getting used to not having an iPhone but I’m glad I made the switch.

As I discover neat things about it I’ll put them in the comments.

In the meantime here’s a link to the hype

Wednesday May 15, 2013

New Car

Filed under: Cars,Cool Stuff,Family — don @ 9:37 pm

We’ve had the Hyundai Sonata since 2004 and Betty figured it was time to replace it.

We were thinking about getting another Hyundai but then Daryl mentioned that we should take a look at the Toyota Camry Hybrid. It’s the top rated Sedan on CR now with a 93. The only vehicle above it is the Tesla but we don’t have $100k for a car. We also didn’t want to spend $30,000 on a car but we were willing to spend 2/3 of that so I started looking at used ones.

Last night I found a 2011 with under 22,000 miles for about $4,000 less than all the other ones of that basic year I had been seeing. The only problem was it was in Carlsbad which is near San Diego and about 110 miles from home.

We decided it was worth it to drive down there so today Betty, Jenny, Patrick and I went down and we went ahead and bought it.

Here’s some pics.

2011 Camry Hybrid

2011 Camry Hybrid

Cam1

Cam2

Wednesday April 17, 2013

S4 or iPhone 5?

Filed under: Cool Stuff,Geek — don @ 2:37 pm

It about time to update my phone again. I’ve had iPhones since a few months after the first one came out and I’ve always been very satisfied.

Last year my company took over paying for my phone so we split it off from the family. Now my 2 year contract is up and I’ve got a decision. I heard through the grapevine that we were no longer going to carry 3 different carriers and going to go solely with Verizon.

I’ve been with AT&T since my first cell phone back in the 1990’s when PacBell first introduced a digital cell phone. Our first phone was a Nokia 2190.Nokia 2190

It was big and bulky but it was true digital. Over the next 10 years we had Nokia and Samsung phones.

Now that Apple is not the leader anymore I’m very tempted to go with a Samsung S4. The S4 is being touted as the iPhone killer but then quite a few other phones got that moniker yet didn’t really kill anything.

Here’s a link to an S4 review.

I would be interested in other people’s opinions. I know all about the iPhone but I’ve never owned an Android Smartphone. I do have the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet and I like it. Betty and all the girls here have androids and they seem to like them. I need to make a decision fairly soon.

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