The Bennett Experiment

Upgrades...

2011-01-27T19:35:00.001-08:00

So winter has kept me busy dreaming about the day I'll be able to get back on the bike. A fact you've probably gather from my ramblings about the bike and my hatred for winter. Pictured are some of the goodies I've gather during the cold months to keep me entertained and ready for spring. A new front tire, new LED turn signals, stiffer front springs, new chain, gloves and a chain cutter/press/rivet tool. Not pictured is also a pair of AVG riding pants that I got for Christmas. While all of this stuff is fun to look at it is also torturous. :) Well this small collection has kept me sane for the first half of winter, let's hope it can do the same for the last half.

Operation

2010-12-31T15:07:00.000-08:00

I spend a good hour today disassembling a customer's laptop in preparation for a motherboard replacement, just another typical day off. :) As tedious as this process is I really love it. I'm not sure where I get it from but I love learning how things work and my computer repair business is a great outlet for that very thing. If I could spend my days off doing nothing but tearing down and rebuilding things I think I'd be pretty happy. :)

Where have you been all of my life....LastPass

2010-12-28T16:17:00.000-08:00

Do you use the same key for your house, car, storage, work, and bank security box? Of course not! I mean if that key were ever lost or stolen it would at least mean some sleepless nights and at worst cause some real lose. So why use the same 1 or 2 passwords for all of your online accounts? Because who wants to try and remember 15 different passwords right? LastPass has taken the pain out of that problem for me and can for you too.

LastPass makes managing unique and secure passwords for every site you use as easy as could be. All you need to remember is 1 very good password that will give you access to every other password you need. I know this post probably sounds like an ad but it is actually just that this product has saved me a lot of work and given me a much more secure presence on the ever growing web. It is free so give it a try and I'm sure you'll never look back.

Someone stop me...

2010-12-09T18:46:00.001-08:00

Sure, just as soon as I finish writing about how I'm going to be positive and try to embrace winter I have to run across something like this that makes me hate winter once again. You are seeing a Buell 1190 Typhon by Pegasus Racing, one of the many bikes of my dreams. I guess the upside is that not being able to ride for 5 months or so really builds up my anticipation to ride again and gives me down time to fix the bike up for the season again. Right now my beloved SV650 needs some TLC, new front tire, new chain and sprockets and some random work and the electrical system. I should have more than enough time to get it all sorted out by the time any decent weather returns. Until then I'll eagerly await the day when riding is again a possibility.

Hello Winter

2010-12-02T16:06:00.000-08:00

Nothing tells you winter is here like a freezing lake does. I think I've been in denial about winter for a while now but I have to admit that it is finally here. Snow is predicted several times over the next week or two and as you can see the lake is no longer swimmable.

Its easy to find things to complain about during winter, and I'm probably more guilty of that than anyone, but I'm going to make an attempt to see the positive of this time of year. Hmmmm, let's see. It is like the bug and insect apocolypse, gotta love that. Good time to get a little creative and try some new activity a bit out of the norm like painting, writing, reading, etc. Of coarse all of the holidays are great with getting to see family, giving and receiving gifts. Don't forget great food, Christmas music and hot cocoa. I guess when I look at all the the winter has to offer it isn't so bad after all. Maybe a little less like the grumpy old neighbor and a little more like the old forgotten friend.

What I am thankful for...

2010-11-28T14:27:00.001-08:00

Well Thanksgiving has us by for 2010 so I realize that this is a bit late but still. This year maybe more than any other I feel as if I have a better sense for all the things I have to give thanks for. The list is quite exhaustive so I’ll give to give the condensed version.

My Salvation

I have to say that the single most important decision of my life took place when I was 13. Even at that age I realized that my disobedience to God’s commands, be they small or great, separated me from God. Thankfully Christ paved the way in a way that I could not by both taking the punishment for my sin on the cross and conquering death in the resurrection. By God’s grace He is still working on me and what He wants me to be but I am I rest assured that I would not be the person I am today had I not made that decision.

My Wonderful Wife

The second most important event of my life took place on August 27^th, 2005, the marriage to the love of my life. Nina and I have been married 5 years and I wouldn’t trade them for the world. The Lord knew what He was doing when He brought us together because the last 5 years have proved that we draw on each other’s strengths and balance each other’s weaknesses. Sometimes life has been easy and sometimes life has been very hard but I will always be thankful that I had Nina to go through it with me. I love you Nina.

My Family

I have always been thankful for my immediate family and blood relatives but I never really expected to be as close to my in laws as I am. In marrying Nina I inherited a wonderful group of people that I have learned a great deal from and am privileged to call my family. Mom Tanner, Jeremy & Mandy thank you for your love and acceptance of me, you guys are great!

Everything else

Church family, small group bible study, Lucy (the dog), the cabin, our health, steady jobs, God’s provision, etc. Again far from exhaustive but I had to rattle off a few more.

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

It is coming...

2010-11-23T11:30:00.000-08:00

If there is one weakness I have it is trying to keep secrets that I am really excited about, that said I am having a difficult time of it right now. If it were up to me I think we would be smashing Thanksgiving and Christmas into one big event this year and just get it all over with on the 27th. How could that be so bad right? In reality that won't be happening but I'm just saying.

Not sure if this can qualify as something worthy of a blog post but it is on my mind all the time so it qualifies for me.

An ounce of prevention...

2010-11-09T21:06:00.001-08:00

This is one of those things that I was so awed by that I had to pass it on. Prey Project has created a free open source piece of software that helps you protect and track down your computer in case it is ever stolen. Sure there are plenty of services that do this same thing but they of course are not free and I would argue don't offer much more value that what Prey gives you for $0. To give an extensive list of what Pray does would be too much but let's just say that once you tell Prey that your computer has been stolen it will begin to find any and all WiFi hot spots and begin to report back to you where it is at. It can tell you what programs are running, take a screenshot of the desktop as it is being used, use the camera to take a picture of the thief and loads of other features that will bring you closer to getting your computer back.

The program took me all of 10 minutes to download, install and configure on two computers. I'd say the effort is far outweighed by the immense benefits. Stop saying "wow, that's cool" and go get it for yourself.

Prey Project

2010-11-04T18:06:00.000-07:00

Interestingly Creepy

The above link will take you to a video of a Six Flags park near New Orleans that was closed in preparation for Hurricane Katrina. How does a place that is designed to be so entertaining become so instantly creepy the moment you take away any trace of human activity. I kept waiting for something or someone to pop out in this video and scare me, just has that feel to but for whatever reason it was intriguing to me. Seems like a great spot for a zombie apocalypse scene. :)

A Must See!

2010-10-24T17:04:00.000-07:00

MST3K. I love this show! As best I can remember my brother Jake and I have began to watch this show when I was about 14 and at 27 I continue to find it just as entertaining. If you've seen it then you know what to expect but if not just imagine 3 wise guys taking cracks at some of film's worst productions. Most of the films that are viewed are old black and whites from the 50s because let's be honest, most of them are terribly acted and terribly written...perfect material for such a show.

If you haven't taken the time to jump on to Netflix and check out the wide collection of MST3K archives then please stop reading and do so now. I suggest staring with "Lasterbast" and ending with something like "The Wild Wild World of Batwoman".

Dinner is served

2010-10-22T18:11:00.000-07:00

What do you get when you put together a sweet tooth, feeling snacky and the ingredients for sugar cookies? Why dinner of coarse. Nina and I both had a craving for something sweet the other night and "real" food just wasn't going to cut it so we had to get creative. Low and behold out of nowhere appeared a magical bowl of sweet sugary goodness that we called our "meal". We try not to make a habit of this sort of behavior as the consequences of such a lifestyle would surely land us on the next season of "The Biggest Loser", but it is ok every once is a while I suppose.

The Summer's Last Swim

2010-10-14T04:17:00.000-07:00

This past weekend was probably one of the nicest fall weekends that I can remember. Sunny and close to 80 degrees the whole time. It made for a perfect time to break out the grill, invite over some friends, and let the dogs hit the lake. Lucy is posing here as she watches over everyone to make sure they are staying in line, or maybe she is just waiting for someone to throw her toy, I don't remember. Either way it was a wonderful day that we all thoroughly enjoyed and won't soon forget.

My Favorite Season

2010-10-07T17:08:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure what it is about Fall that I love so much but it is by far my favorite time of the year. Unfortunately here in WI Fall consists of a good 4 weeks if you are lucky and then winter pushes it's way in. We've had the privilege this year of being on Crystal Lake and every day I look out the window I'm amazed at the beauty of God's great creation. That being said I could hardly pass up the opportunity tonight to take a leisurely ride across the lake, and with a little coaxing Lucy joined me as well. Not a whole lot more to say, I think the picture speaks for itself. I'll enjoy it while it is here.

Annual Visit to Whispering Orchards

2010-10-02T18:20:00.000-07:00

Every year in Fall we join a few of our friends and family and head to Whispering Orchards in Cleveland, WI. As you would have guessed there is an apple orchard there but also a great little restaurant, a hay maze and a petting area with goats, a lama, and few other friendly animals. This year we were joined by Beverly Mark and the newest edition to the Wissbroker family, Noah, shown giving his "turd" face. We had a wonderful breakfast, came back to the cabin for a quick canoe ride on the lake and had dinner at D E O'Malley's Pizza place later in the evening. All in all it was a wonderful day with friends on a beautiful fall day.

The new view

2010-10-01T20:05:00.001-07:00

As you probably know we were able to sell our house at the end of September and have since moved to a cabin we are renting on Crystal Lake in Plymouth, WI. Not that I didn't like the house or anything but I must say that I feeling a bit spoiled living at the cabin. I mean look at this view! On top of that we get to use the paddle boat, the canoe and the fire pit whenever we like, there are no house projects I have to complete, and for the first time in years we feel like we can come home and truly relax. I can get used to this.

I'M BACK BABY!

2010-10-01T19:52:00.001-07:00

Ok so I've taken a very long hiatus on this whole blog thing I had the best intentions for. I am going to give this one more shot but if I can't stay with it this time then it is going to go the way of the dodo bird. I've decided that on top of posting about what we are up to I will tastefully scatter in posts that relate to my interest in the computer field. Don't let that scare you off though because I plan to post tech topics that will be helpful and not just geeking out on geeky geek talk.

Boxee project

2009-04-12T19:26:00.000-07:00

Thanks to my brother Jon, the open source community, and the wonders of bit torrent I've finally been successful in building my first true Home Theatre PC. The specs are nothing impressive but thankfully they don't have to be. The important thing is that the PC is discrete, quite and works almost seemlessly allowing us to watch content for free over the net that we would other wise have to pay $60 or better for a month. The picture you see is of our current setup with the 42" LCD, the black HTPC (running XP & Boxee) in the shelf below and the ipod touch that I use to control it all from the plush comfort of my couch. It's not a perfect setup just yet...Boxee on XP doesn't have capability currently to play either Hulu or Netflix content but I'm hopeful that will change in the near future. Honestly though if those 2 issues were resolved then this very cost effective little PC serves the purpose of cutting off any need I have for an expensive cable bill every month.

A gathering of talent...

2009-04-12T18:51:00.000-07:00

Saturday night was a loud and busy one at the Bennett household. As you can see we had quite a gathering of musical talent joining us in our quest for rockstar glory. :) We were joined by Jeff Kolb, Tim and Candice Weisbrocker, Jerm and Mandy, and of coarse mom. We all kept our distance from Jeff for fear of being beat to death by the fury of his drum sticks and we were all seriously impressed by Jerm's display of vocals! In time we'll work our way to the top of the rock band charts but for now we'll have to settle for a good evening with friends. :)

2009-04-08T20:06:00.000-07:00

The Project that never ends...
We started our most current home renovation project of refinishing the living & dining room in October of 2008 and we are finally putting the finishing touches on it. You may be wondering why this project has taken nearly 7 months to finish up and it's basically because I'm a slacker. We've been sitting with this project 90% done for the last few months and I've unfortunately grown comfortable to seeing raw plaster walls around each window, but beleive it or not that isn't the look we are going for. Thankfully I have good friend and neighbor, Sean Follen, who is willing to spend his time skillfully picking up where my ignorance falls off. With Sean's help the window sills have been cut to sit level and now all that is left is for me to stain them and start putting them in place. I can't wait to have this project behind us as we move on to the next.

2009-04-08T20:01:00.000-07:00

With a tear in my eye and a frown on my face I must say goodbye to a fantastic piece of hardware. Behold the Rocketfish Full tower case (aka: Lian Li) in all of it's glory. Now granted unless you have a real interest in PC hardware this probably just looks like a oversized case to you but in material, parts and design this case is in every way superior to your typical case. The difference is comparable to what you would find in a car that gets you from point to point and a purpose built sports car, neither can be fully appreciated unless you understand what makes it high end. Maybe one day when I have enough $ or time to build a water cooled PC I'll get something this nice again but until then I'll just have to sell it on Ebay for 2x what I bought it for. :) Thanks Best Buy.

2008-08-05T20:05:00.000-07:00

Our never-ending project

If you've ever seen the house we were thrilled to purchase in August 2007, you know that there is a lot of work to do. That being said we've had a couple of projects in the works recently have just been completed and we thought we'd share our relief. (Whew!)

First off is the guest bedroom on the main floor that mom will be using when she moves in with us. This one was totally gutted and redone, we also refinished the floors and I'd say they turned out alright.

We also had the roof redone which was desperately needed; I have much more peace of mind now when it rains. 2 down a million to go.

2008-08-05T19:49:00.000-07:00

Which way to go…

Just a brief apology for being so slow in actually posting anything to the blog. The last month for us has been the busiest of the year, like it has been for everyone else probably, and it's just been tough to find the time to post. Now that the preaching, room project, wedding, roof redo and a host of other things are complete for the time being we should have more time to keep things up to date here. Check back for more updates soon. Thanks.

Oooooh shiny!! :)

2008-07-08T04:07:00.000-07:00

So here are the guest room floors, finally finished. The process took about two weeks total to do but I think that it was worth the effort and $. We are planning to take this same refinishing process to the rest of the main floor of the house. This is kind of an experiment room so now that I've done it once and learned what not the do the rest of the house should be a little simpler. Only trim to put up and touching up the paint and we can say it's done. :)

Jake & Laura Bennett

2008-06-29T10:23:00.000-07:00

So Jake's wedding was this weekend and it was great to be there to see family as well as a number of friends that I haven't seen in years. Thankfully the trip both there and back was uneventful for us though driving through the night to get home this morning did get a little hazy. Thanks to Ryan K. for keeping me awake. :) The wedding went great though it was more than warm for all of us on the altar as well as everyone else in attendance as well. Nina and I are so glad to have been able to be a part of the wedding and we are so thrilled for Jake and Laura. They've been dating for a LONG time so I know they are glad to finally be together now and forever.

Let's give it a shot

2008-06-27T03:14:00.000-07:00

Well I've been recently inspired to start a blog for Nina and I just to kind of document what's new here in WI and to be able to share it with family and friends. It always seems like there is something that you can't share over the phone without pics and such so this will help fill that gap. I'll try to keep it fairly up to date with the more noteworthy things of our life so as to not bore you all too much. :) Hope you enjoy it, thanks for the idea Jared and Adri.