Tell Me: Griffo Info

I have travelled the World extensively and have visited the McIlhenny Company factory at Avery Island in Louisiana, USA.

Their product is a favourite of mine.

There is no way that that the one production location in Louisiana could supply the World with Tabasco. Perhaps there are Knock-offs being produced in China or elsewhere. But every bottle I have ever examined says made in Avery Island,Louisiana

Recent reports have been published where China is making copes of some great Australian wines. see WineCopies.

Years ago ( in the 1980s) there were concerns about the real validity of Johnny Walker Scotch. This always proudly announces “Product of Scotland”. An enterprising group purchased several bottles from various locations around the World and ran the samples through a spectrograph. And, you guessed it, only some (about 30%) matched the original product from Scotland. Now, as with the Tabasco product, it all tastes OK, but why do we need to be hoodwinked?

I wish manufacturers, distributors, retailers and governments would be more responsible with their labelling.

Oh Boy this hurts…

As an older computer user, this blows my mind.

And I know from talking with many friends, this deal sounds beyond comprehension.
Makes me wonder where things will be in 5 years.
My first PC was a TRS-80 with 16K of ram and an external cassette sound recorder for more permanent storage. I remember I paid over $2000 for it.

Get the drive at frys.com

John

Where we live in Australia in the southern summer, we got hot with a massive hail storm last Monday.

Our property sustained significant hail damage, as did out neighbours and surrounding area.

The hail was mostly golf-ball in size, with some the size of hen’s eggs. It all happened at about 3:30pm in the afternoon.

We were sitting outside on a pleasant afternoon and could see a bank of wild rolling cloud approaching from the north. I took some video with by standard Canon digital camera.

Then the storm hit! The hail was sporadic at first, then after about 4 minutes, it was a constant hammering of hail for about 45 minutes. We had to retreat to inside as even under an out-door patio area, the hail was bouncing off everything.

Damages: Flooding inside. Smashed roof tile and sky-lights. Significant denting of heavy metal patio roofing. Lead flashing on roof all holed. TV antennae broken. Garden shed roof holed. Luckily our motor vehicle was undercover. Many vehicles in the path of the storm had broken glass and lots of dents.

The State has declared the event a natural disaster.

Trying to get repairs is hopeless, as all services are stressed to the max. I have managed to put temporary fixes on a few things. Today we removed water laden carpets from one room.

But all in all, we are lucky as we survived and still have a home to live in.

John

Being an Aussie, I grew up on Vegemite. I have been in the USA for the past six months and whilst I was away, Kraft introduced a new version of Vegemite.

Well, upon my return, I just had to try out the new product.

To me, this “new” product is nothing other than a marketing ploy to reduce production costs and thereby increase profits. CheesyBite is said to be a blend of Cream Cheese and “REAL” Vegemite. Cream Cheese is obviously cheaper to produce than Vegemite, so why not use it to dilute the original product? Similar to “New Coke” from a few years ago where Coke tried to substitute real sugar in the drink with Corn Syrup.

The new CheesyBite simply has NO bite. I get no more taste on my SAO Crackers than I do from regular Peanut Butter. Very disappointed!

I hope that the original product continues to be available. I know I have trouble finding it in Texas.

The new CheesyBite score:- 2/10 Sorry Kraft, you really need to try something else.

JohnG

If you have a Gateway laptop and it ever fails to boot, then you are pretty much on your own.

I recently tried to get help for a family member who has a Gateway Vista laptop. it is about 3 years old. Now it will not boot. It does not even get through the progress bar on the initial “Gateway” screen. The progress bar stops about half-way.

There are on-screen option… F10 or utilities, F2 for BIOS.

Using the F2, the system start showing BIOS and Processor and memory info. Then locks up.

I tried on-line chat support from Gateway, and then 24Hr email support from Gateway. The common responses were just cut-and-paste sentences from some resource the responder has. In neither attempt (chat with their “expert”, or their email tech responder) were any of the concerns I outlined addressed.

Result = Pay $100 for 30 minutes phone support. This would only result in a wasted phone call. The machine is kaput! Their help sucks BIG-TIME.

Stay away from Gateway products as their support is pretty well non-existent.

It is a sad day when tech support has dwindled to such a low level. Bad Gateway!

Review of Acronis Migrate Easy

Link: Acronis

OK, we have been battling for several months now with a 4 year old PC (Windows XP) that my Wife uses. The 60GIG hard drive was close to capacity. It was so close that we could not even perform a Defrag!

I had attached 250GIG pocket USB drive and had directed most internet downloads to go to the external USB drive.

She is heavily involved in her love of movies and so does voluntary work for FilmSpotting and their podcast productions. (plus her Blog stuff at MagneticNorth )
This involves downloading large video and sound clips of films. Hence the large accumulation of data on her hard drive.

I knew that the hard drive would need replacing. I dreaded managing getting all her programs and MS-Win-XP onto a new bigger hard drive. Then the crunch came when downloads and FireFox and many other programs began to complain about the HD free space.

Then I learned about Acronis Migrate Easy. I read on-line what was promised. I read several user comments. I believed none of them because of my long term relationship with MS-Windows and programming. But Hey! It is only a PC where I am not doing real development work. Something needs to be done, and it needs doing now. So why not take a small chance and try it out.

The Process:

Downloaded the 15 day trial software, installed it (only just, given the space limitations on the existing HD). Went out and bought a new 500Gig WD hard drive and set it to “Slave”, Installed it, and then ran the Acronis program. I opted for the ‘Automatic’ process (I think the second on the menu) and reboot, watch, walk-away, come back in 50 minutes, and it reported success and was done.

Then I removed the origingal HD, re-configured the new 500Gig HD as IDE Primary (using the jumper block on the back of the HD unit).

Feeling 100% confident, I put all the panels back on the PC case, plugged all the cables back in, and turned it on.

VOILA! All worked perfectly and now we have a PC with enough spare space for several more years! I had been ready with the original Win XP Install CD and activation key, but neither were needed.

Summary:

If you need or want to substitute a newer larger HD to a PC, then go with Acronis. I give it 10/10 for meeting expectations.

John

I have a friend who claims he and his family live in Winnipeg.

So out of curiosity I had a look on-line at their current weather.

I am now convinced that he is lying about living there. Nobody could live there. Here is the current (Just after Midnight, Tuesday morning Dec 23 2008) and forecast weather for the next few days!

And those temperatures are degrees ° Celcius. I know I could not live there! Hope you all survive the winter there.

John

Spotted this little gem whilst searching for another picture on the internet. Thought it was worth sharing

GD&R