Awe Over the Internet

We had a great row this morning. One drill was just upper body emphasizing on the “swing out” of the oar. We concentrated quite a bit on this working up to using heavy pressure and bumping up the stroke rate. It was just like being in a race again! That old adrenaline was really pumping! Our coaches Alison and Jason will be out of town Friday night. Alison said we could have an uncoached row if I would put it together and cox.

Once again the impact of the internet has made itself known to me. It was about 8:30 a.m. I put out a “cattle call” for rowers to sign up on a first come first serve basis. By 1:30 p.m. I had enough people signed up for the row. While the rowers were filling my in-box with e-mail I was working spread sheets and sending out e-mails to my set-up and tear-down crews for the upcoming run. It just boggles my mind how this is so easily accomplished: E-mail going all over the world in a flash still amazes me!

My old computer sound system was in a pile in the corner. I had a Phillips screwdriver handy so I tore into the offending sub-woofer. Sure enough, the foam was all disintegrated on the speaker. First the foam goes on my truck headliner, and now my speaker! I miss the clarity of my old system. There really is nothing to refoaming a simple speaker such as this.

Google was first used to find different sites selling kits along with detailed instructions for refoaming speakers. These sites have pretty hefty prices for foam blanks and “special glues” to attach the foam to the speaker cone and frame. Knowing the right search words I went to E-bay. Bingo!! I found a supplier of the proper foam at a fraction of the specialty sites. The seller also had advice to use Arlene’s Craft Glue instead of the fancy glues touted. I’ve used this glue on many occasions and it sounds good to me!

I ordered new foam for this project instantly paying using Pay-pal. Things don’t get much easier. My last e-bay bargain was bought and paid for Sunday night, mailed out Monday, and delivered to my doorstep Wednesday morning! The defective cox-box was mailed out Tuesday afternoon and delivered to a suburb of Philadelphia today (Thursday) at 8:05 a.m. The progress of the delivery all tracked online. I don’t think I will ever be passé at what the internet entails. I’m constantly amazed at how my life has changed for the better since becoming computer savy.

I owe that to my best friend Joe. When I was living with him back in 1997-98 waiting for my transfer south he guided me in acquiring my first computer. The rest is history. Had it not been for him, it would have been years before finally broke down and joined the real “Tech world.” I can’t fathom where my life would be today without the computer. I know one thing: I would not be posting journal entries on-line!!