Archive for July, 2007

Got outside tonight and soldered on the new edge connector for the Dig Dug. I was glad I had did one once already with the Ms. Pac-man machine, so I knew how to attach it properly. Or, so I hope. I haven’t tested it yet, I actually had a drop of sweat hit the board, so I thought to be safe I should let it dry for a day. Here’s hoping it works without issue and I can get it on ebay.

We hemmed and hawed about what to do about the Dog for his last training class. He was out of control with energy when we woke up. Or, I should say, when I woke up. Apparently Sarah got up at 6 to be with him because he was not letting it go. On the bed, bark, bark, bark. A little dash here, another few yelps, and Sarah is a really lite sleeper to begin with. I, on the other hand, probably would have slept through Pearl Harbor. Add in four beers, and you could have been shooting rounds off my nose and it wouldn’t matter.

We decided to take him and see how it went. He wasn’t supposed to do much running or jumping, so if we couldn’t control him we would sit out. It was kind of a “fun” day, like those you had on the last day of private school before the summer. They set up a whole bunch of little fun obstacles that you encouraged and gave your dog treats to accomplish. Some were tubs, some were chairs, but all of them were fun and geared towards building up the trust between you and your dog. You held the fixture while he tried to get the proverbial “weiner” so he didn’t get scared when the new objects made noise or moved.

The end of the class came, we did some evals, and then they handed out awards. One for the most improved dog, and one for the most improved trainer. We won for Nokes being the most improved dog. I think it was in the bag for us. I don’t think it gets much worse when you dog says a hello on the first day so far up another dog’s butt that Nokes looked like half of a freaky medusa puppy. He wasn’t the best that first day of class, so maybe that made it easier for people to love us, you really love us!

When we got home, we were tired and didn’t do much. A good portion of the day we spent watching LOST episodes. Sarah got a bug to watch it again, so we had about 12 episodes to catch up on, give or take. That is a long day of computer tv.

In between I finished some changes and development to Megan’s site, which is another huge weight off and one step closer to studying. Later on we took Nokes for a really long walk, and that was our night. I think that makes something like four or five low keys weekends in a row, and it is great.

This morning we took Nokes to the vet to get fixed. Having those forms in front of you, and knowing what the risks are when it comes to anesthesia, I started to get upset. It was hard to leave him there, my eyes welled up when I sat down behind the wheel. When you lose one dog, you are ultra sensitive to the new dog’s safety, rational or not. We got some of the extra’s they were offering for more money to make sure everything went that much smoother.

Sarah and I car pooled because yesterday when she went to work she had another flat. I tire of the nail’s and screws in her car tires, and I feel helpless. I can’t case the road every morning before we leave, but I have to believe it is on our road somewhere.

So her car was in the shop getting some new bulbs and a new tire. At lunch she came, picked up me, and I dropped her off so she could get the car. About the same time the doctor called and gave us great news. The blood work for Nokes came back great, he went in and had the procedure and he was up and around already without any issue. He was actually in back whining a little bit because he was stuck in a crate.

I came home and my arcade parts were waiting for me. Who knows, by the end of the weekend I may have two of the games in the garage working again and ready for ebay. I had some quick website updates that I had to church out before I felt like I could go anywhere. Sarah went over to Jeff and Sarah’s a little early and I came home to be with the dog. He was a little groggy, but nothing out of the ordinary really. Maybe I had made a bigger deal out of it than it was. But, we assumed too much last time and we won’t ever forget that.

After I was finished I decided to bike Jeff’s bike back over to their house. It was a gorgeous night and I knew that conditions were not ideal to ride a bike after there were four beers involved and a considerable amount of nightfall.

The party was hoppin when I got there, and it was your usual good time. Good food, good friends, great drinks, cornhole and a fire in the pit later on. We had some first time faces, which was really encouraging to see, it is just a great way to spend a Friday night once a month. Granted, we’ve really only done two months now of cookouts, but both have been great. Sarah left for a little while to check on Nokes, he seemed to be fine, just snoozin away in the old crate. After she returned we were only there a little while longer before getting home to be with him at a decent hour just before midnight.

Got the bug today, and decided to dig a little deeper.

I thought I remembered Mark DeRoller (who’s white Mr. Do started my whole search) posting a work phone number to call him back in 2001 on some of his inquiries. I looked back, but couldn’t find it right away, I didn’t have time to look through 67 posts. But, I did figure out that he has yet a third email address at a Yahoo account. The first two emails he had listed failed for me, but I see he also has a photo gallery through Yahoo from ‘06, so he may still use that email.

Here’s hoping. I almost get the impression he might have stopped collecting and sold everything off, but who knows, maybe he hasn’t!!!

Got my order from Bob Roberts tonight as planned. I did end up getting some sort of replacement for the original glass caps used on the Wizard Of Wor PCB, here are what they look like.

What I had been reading on the original ones on the board was a little off. On these caps you’ll see printed AVX 104 M5J 911. I don’t know what most of that means, other than 104 is synonomous with the .1 on the schematic. However, they don’t have the typical signs for polarity, and since they are caps and caps have always had polarity in my experience I will have to figure that out before putting it on the board.

Bob emailed me back right away, he is so great like that, and let me know that these caps don’t have a polarity on them, so either way is fine. I did just that and soldered the cap onto the board.

I powered up the game, and it seems to be working fine. It didn’t reset on me when I played, so that is great news. However, it does still have the lines through the screen so the next step will be a cap kit. I also thought that the one and two player buttons were a bit sticky, and the game voice seemed a little weird, like it was repeating. I have to test the Mame version and see what that does, hopefully that will give me a good indication. Otherwise I can go to Robert’s and test his Wizard of Wor to see how the voice piece works in his.

Last week we worked almost every night with Nokes on his different training exercises. The trainer had said that she felt like we should repeat puppy training class, and we weren’t too thrilled with the idea. I want my dog to be very obedient, but how much do I want to pay for it? I am sure five years down the line, I may say “Why didn’t I just pay the extra money and do it over again?”, but right now I don’t feel that way. We signed him up for the intro class which we will probably start around the beginning of school.

He is funny, when he knows you have food, he does pretty good. But there are times when it is like you have never taught him anything. Two class periods ago we thought he was going to mop the floor with the other dogs. It was sitting and staying, which he has done since he was really small. Well, there were some issues with him being the “dominant” puppy, or so the trainer claims. She says he was a strong one in the litter, which I don’t really get from him. A lot of that she is basis on his posture, and not how he acts. I don’t think he is overly dominant, not at least compared to other dogs I have seen. But, I do have to give her some credit for whatever training she does have.

On Friday he will go to be neutered. We weren’t sure when to have it done, we have heard contradictory things. The trainer says that it is ok to have it really young, it is better in some instances because it is less of a process when they are young. But others have told us it is too hard on them at such a young age. One thing is for sure, if we get lucky and he chills out some among other dogs after he has it done then it will be worth it to have it done now.

Last Saturday Lady was over for the day, and it was a really long day. He didn’t leave her alone all day, biting at her ears, barking at her, climbing on her, and making some humping gestures. We had experienced this in their short one hour meetings before, but it never went away, unless they both laid down and slept. It was ridiculous and really tested both Sarah and I. We had to separate them quite a bit. Lady was really good about it, most of the time she would just take it, sometimes she’d play back, and sometimes she’d just bite Nokes’ face, shoulders, or take out his legs with her head, pin him dog and bite his legs.

We’re going to try to get him over to Christine’s soon, because time is ticking away for time to get them accustomed to each other. We’ll get the surgery done, and then see if anything changes over there for a night.

Nokes is still losing teeth, we can always tell when he does because he keeps licking his mouth presumably where the blood is coming out. We know to look for a tooth floating around in there somewhere. I was trying to get something away from him that he was eating on the 4th of July, and when I pressed on his mouth with my thumb his front tooth just gave and fell out. It was gross. Kind of funny too, because he’ll have two teeth growing out of one place, looking kind of like a mutant.

He has got some sizeably larger back teeth, they look like mini mountains. I mean feakishly huge like the other dogs would make fun of him in the yard asking why his other teeth hadn’t caught up to his molars yet.

We have gotten him one of those hard Nyla bones, full size, and he just loves that. He’ll spend a ton of time chewing it, quite often we find it bloody. I assume that he is towards the end of his teething period. But he’ll still managed to mangle the one end of the bone pretty good , schredded is more like it. But it keeps him busy, and that is what we care about most.

Well, stopped in at Menuier today and the microfarad cap I had described to her on the phone wasn’t what I needed. Based on what I told her I needed
in person, she pulled out these capacitors that were more radial than axial, tiny in size, and not a glass / ceramic combo like the capacitor I had on the board. I took a couple just in case I needed them, this is what they look like.

So I stopped at King’s electronics, and they couldn’t help me with my Wizard of Wor PCB either. I was able to see with a magnifying glass that the other caps had a label of 50V on them, and what looks like an underlined U and a 561.

So, I came home, frustrated, and emailed Bob Roberts because I knew he knew. I just didn’t want to have to send away for one tiny part like this. I also emailed the collector who had helped me before and he sent me a link to a thread about these glass ceramic caps on the KLOV group.

A couple of things I did take away from the thread was that these caps were generally associated with the power of a game, and they were unreliable to some extent, so that is good news for me and fixing the game. More than likely the exploded charred one I have is the problem. Also, the thread said they haven’t been made in over ten years, which is also why I can’t find them now. Supposedly searching “glass encapsulated ceramics capacitors” in Google will give you some good background information, but I will wait on that to see if the game works first.

Bob got back to me right away. He called what I needed a .1UF 50V Axial Ceramic / Mylar Cap. I trust him, he knows his stuff, so I just did a combo order and had them sent to me. Hopefully I’ll get it on Thursday or Friday. In that thread, the contributors also think you should replace them with something different and more reliable. I don’t know why Bob didn’t suggest something else, I asked about appropriate replacements, but since I am selling it and it was free, I am not going to worry about it.

Church today lasted forever. I agreed to go to Bible Class with Sarah for the second week in a row, forgetting that she had alter guild stuff to do afterwards, AND, we had communion. My patience was low when we got home, and it was terribly hot out.

We gave Grubbs a call, and they were going to the pool, so we decided it was the perfect day to go with them. We called up Dave and he came along too. He had to head back to Minnesota on Tuesday, so it was good to hang out one more time before he left.

The pool was a lot of fun, the five of us spent most of the time throwing the balls around, catching them and jumping into the pool, and swallowing a lot of water. We stayed there right until it closed at 6. It was good to see them, I wanted to say something to them at the very least because Friday they put down one of their dogs. It was time, and it was so sad, and you know what, we can really relate to losing a dog whether or not it was our decision.

When we got home, we didn’t do much. I was so tired, I took a nap. We had some food, and talked on the phone, and that was pretty much the night.

The biggest event of the night, however, was that we turned on our air for the first time this summer. The girls had called off their bet on the 3rd, and the next day Wes and Kate turned theirs on. We made it through the week, so in actuality, we really won:) But we’ll go dutch when we go out to eat at Bazbo’s.

I knew I had to go into work early the next morning, so I did one page for Megan’s website and headed off to bed.