Zebra is probably the leading manufacturer of label printers. It was recently made clear to me that this staus does not protect them from idiocy. Unless you have some interest in technical junk, this story will probably bore you. Please do not read while driving.

Our company did a maintenance upgrade to one of our internal applications earlier this week. Part of the upgrade addressed a change in the printers we use for the application. We had been using the Zebra HT-146, but were forced to upgrade because of a recall. They sent us the 2746e to replace the fire-hazard printers.

Our application addressed the HT-146 specifically by name, meaning that the new printers wouldn't work until a programming change was made. The necessary change was made and was included in the maintenance update, which led us to the events of Tuesday. Unfortunately, the change caused all of the old printers to stop working completely. This forced me to setup 15 of the new printers as fast as I could. Some of the issues included firmware problems and driver issues. Additonally, the cables on the old printers were not bi-directional. I had to make an emergency trip to CompUSA (bleh) with my boss to get 15 bi-directional printer cables. All of this was fun, but the best problem was yet to come.

After getting the printers basically working, I continued to have one last issue. Every time the application tried to print a label the user would get an error saying the printer was "invalid". They could click "OK" and the label would print. Annoying, but not a show stopper. My test system didn't have this problem, so I knew that it was not a problem with the coding change. After racking my tiny brain, I finally discovered the problem.

When Zebra installs their print driver they call the printer "Zebra  2746e". When the application sends data to the printer it goes to "Zebra 2746e". See the problem? I didn't see it at first. The default Windows font (I think it's Tahoma) makes the problem even tougher to spot. When I finally caught the problem I became fully aware of Zebra's lameness. Once I changed the name the application worked fine.

In case you were unable to identify the problem, the issue is that by default Zebra names their printer with two spaces - the application was looking for the same name, but with only one space. Dumb goobers.

I feel really bad for some of you people. You come here to get information about Chase, but instead you are assaullted by my inane mental wanderings. Well, today is your lucky day (literally!).

Last Sunday (Easter), we took a few pictures of Chase. Miraculously, we even caught a few smiles. He smiles a lot typically, but for some reason when we take pictures he becomes mesmerized by the camera and appears almost emotionless. He seems to be outgrowing that, as illustrated in one of these pictures:

Emilie recently tried feeding him some rice cereal, which was not an entirely successful experience. He's still not sleeping through the night, so we thought this might help. So far, no go. In general, he only gets up a couple of times a night but still, we're ready for him to sleep through thoose feedings.

Some of the thrilling talk about cinnamon recently got me to thinking. When you buy cinnamon-flavored candy, gum or dental hygiene products they are often advertised as being hot and fiery. Candy such as Fire Jolly Ranchers are specifically advertised as "fire". The candy and dental hygiene industry has been able to get away with it so far; however, it just doesn't make any sense. Think about the "fire" cinnamon flavor on toast. Likewise, think about cinnamon toast-flavored gum. How can both flavors get away with calling themselves cinnamon? It seems to me that they need to think of a new name for the "fire" version of cinnamon. Cinnamon belongs to toast. Period.

I received some excellent news regarding my watch the other day. Since none of you are familiar with the details of the watch situation, I will give you a brief, boring version of the story. The watch, which I purchased almost seven years ago, began experiencing problems about two or three years after I bought it. Since it is a chronograph watch, there are multiple hands. Mysteriously, one of the stopwatch hands began to reset to the wrong spot. About a year later another hand started resetting to the wrong spot. Whenever the stopwatch was reset the hands would go to the wrong spot (instead of zero). For example, the second hand for the stopwatch would reset to "41" and the minute hand would reset to "50".

The watch was sent to the manufacturer in Switzerland and they informed me that it would cost a small fortune to fix the problem. The amount was ridiculous so I had them return the watch without doing anything. I became bitter and muttered mean things under my breath about the company.

Fast-forwarding to the present...-->> The battery died last week, so I took it in to the shop to have it replaced. While there, I griped about my watch issues. The guy at the shop said he might be able to help. I was doubtful. Anyway, he replaced the battery cleaned the watch and...and...fixed the problem!! He apparently knew something that the other people at the shop did not know and he restored the hands to their rightful positions. He even showed me how to correct the problem in case it happens again in the future.

Although my faith is somewhat restored in the manufacturer of the watch, I'm still a little perturbed. They wanted to charge a ton of money to overhaul the watch, even though it would have been a simple matter to correct the problem. The quality of the watch may be good, but the quality of the manufacturer may not be.

Emilie and I had the joy of being introduced to The Andy Milonakis Show tonight. I didn't think Emilie was actually going to watch the whole show, but she seemed to enjoy it. I think it may be one of the funniest things on TV currently.

First, let me share with you the toilet story.

If you've ever been a guest in our home and had to use the lavatory, you may have had an "experience". This "experience" may have involved a plunger and some level of embarrassment.

From the time we first moved into our home, we had problems with our guest bathroom. During warranty reviews we asked them to correct the problem, but each time we were told that no problem existed. At one point they "snaked" the pipe and told us that indeed nothing was wrong.

The game went on for an entire year until we recently had a walkthrough for our one-year warranty. We informed them that there was certainly an issue and that it must be resolved. Another "snaking" and a radar scan confirmed that nothing was wrong with the plumbing. We persisted and they again checked the plumbing, this time going ever deeper until they found...a wrench. The source of the problem was finally discovered. A wrench lodged in the pipe.

Their attempts to remove the wrench failed and a subsequent visit found them unable to locate the wrench again. They cleaned some other construction debris out of the pipe (this is not a euphemism) and the problem seems to be solved; however, we won't know for sure until the next time one of our guests seeks relief.

Our second tale of the evening is so disturbing that you shouldn't even read about it. It is something so disgusting that I'm almost ashamed to even tell the tale. You have been warned.

While cruising down old S. Virginia I noticed a dead marmot. As I approached the marmot corpse, a crow flew down and started pecking at the flesh of our lifeless friend. I neared the scene and the crow took flight, leaving the marmot in peace. A short time later, I again found myself driving down old S. Viginia and noticed the crow was back to his shenanigans. But as I neared, the bird took flight, revealing that it was not a crow at all, but rather a vulture! That's right - I saw a vulture eating a dead marmot.

From this we learn that crows and vultures are lame.

Exciting news this week! Bucky gets the boot and Idol purification continues. If we can get rid of space-case Ace next week then we'll be good. By the way, did you know that Ace's goal in life is to "to live it...every day"? Very deep.

I gave blood on Tuesday. The girl stuck the needle all the way through the vein and then had to back it out and prop it up to get blood flow. It hurt a bit - I felt like I had a needle poking out of my elbow.

Finally, a question for the day - why is it so hard to find cinnamon-flavored dental hygiene products? Wal*Mart quit carrying cinnamon-flavored dental floss completely. They usually don't have cinnamon-flavored mouthwash. Is there something about cinnamon-flavored products that I don't know? Are they dangerous? I'm really not a fan of mint (of any variety), but I'm unfortunately consigned to mint floss and mouthwash.

Aren't you glad you checked in to see what's new? Chase updates next time...