The Hobbit Hole III - Journey to the Cross-roads!

[HairOfTheDog]

Welcome to The Hobbit Hole!

Journey to the Cross-roads
The Two Towers Edition

Come on! Come in! -if you would like to have some seedcakes and a pint and relax a while. (If it is a special occasion, we still have a few bottles of the old wineyards left!)

Our first thread ( New Zealander builds Hobbit hole ) reached 4,100 posts, and we thought that was big. Our second thread (The New Hobbit Hole ) held us for over 48,000 posts, and we loved it dearly. We talked about moving to a new thread for the last 38,000 posts, but we are really slow to muster! Finally, the time has come. Tomorrow (at 12:01 am, to be precise!) The Two Towers comes out, and we start a new chapter.

[Sam Cree]

Good night, everyone.

[Corin Stormhands]

Becky is working on my last nerve.

Ha! I am certain that raising a teenager and a pre-schooler at the same time will be the death of me!

Attitude / Hyperactivity

Pick a child. Pick a trait. They gots both.

[Wneighbor]

WN: keep your hand on the throttle and your eye upon the rail. Words to live by. Thanks

might I add one more thought to that?

and the rubber side down.

[Wneighbor]

whew, you had me really concerned for a moment.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

Ah, it's very good!

Good night!

[Wneighbor]

Night Sam

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

I was laid off in May 2001... since then, I've only had one job that paid anywhere near my former pay grade, and it was only a 6-week contract position. Everything else (when I'm working) has been, at best, about half of what I was making pre-2001.

[Wneighbor]

Ha! I am certain that raising a teenager and a pre-schooler at the same time will be the death of me!

I hear ya on that one buddy. At first I thought it was a good thing that my kids were born so many years apart. Then............ they began to grow older.......

remind me not to fuss about Myranda deserting me anymore.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

"has been" should be "has paid"

[Corin Stormhands]

Corin! Where are you? Did you get distracted by the homebrew again?

No, I was makin' up a fantasy budget for the pool. We have a membership meeting Thursday night to talk about our need for an equity loan (if we don't get it, we don't open next year).

And what the "treasurer" gave us is complete crap. She's done this for years and is tired. I understand that. At the same time, it's her husband who controls all the chemicals and she has the checkbook.

I am about to resort to pitchforks and torches to storm their house to get the records.

On one hand they say they want to quit. On the other, they won't turn over the information. I have been the President for two years. I could not tell you the name of our bank, our accountant, or our insurance company.

It's quite frustrating.

/rant

[Ramius]

The High Tech sector will pick up again, but probably not fully until the first quarter of next year.

Part of the late-90's runnup in high-tech was part of the dotbomb bubble, and that part will not be recovered, and rightfully so. The basic business was not there to support it.

Another part of it was the runup in 1999 and the Y2K-related surge in sales. During 2004, the systems that were sold back then will all be (of course) more than four years old and in need of replacement. This will cause a surge in various high-tech sectors as systems are replaced and/or reinforced with newer systems.

You heard it here first. :-)

[Wneighbor]

Yeah, that's pretty much my friend's experience. He's started his own business back home but it's still in infancy stage. Not a lot happening but he's getting by - mostly with odd jobs and temp jobs. I don't even know if he'd take the job back in Austin now if they call him back. I guess he's gettin' kind of used to living on the edge of destitution.

[Wneighbor]

Sounds pretty questionable huh?

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

Yup, that's what I've been doing since 2001!

[Wneighbor]

of course, there are always other questionable activities going on in the backwoods hills of the state............ stuff for which folks in metropolitan areas tend to ridicule us hicks.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

Believe me, I know all about the dotbomb fiasco. It was a dotbomb that laid me off in May, 2001.

And actually, I've been hearing that "things will pick up quarter after next" for nearly 2 years now. One of these times it will be true, I guess. I'm not holding my breath, though.

[Corin Stormhands]

Sounds pretty questionable huh?

Some of us speculate that the reason we're still having trouble is mismanagement of funds about 10 years ago.

We DO have a lot of competition with some new facilities that have opened up. But we should still be able to get 200 member families. That would cover our budget.

As much as I've said this is my last year. If we could get things away from her control, I'd consider staying on.

[Wneighbor]

If we could get things away from her control, I'd consider staying on.

All I can think to say is:

[Corin Stormhands]

Yeah, that's pretty much what the Mrs. says too...

I'm outta here. The trolls will be restless again tomorrow. I need to get enough sleep so's I don't wanna tell 'em to blow it out their shorts...

(okay, I already wanna tell 'em that, but I need enough sleep so I can keep from sayin' it)

g'nite

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

An update on Implosion Day!

I've recalculated the numbers, and have a new prediction:

August 12, 2003. Probably sometime in the late afternoon.

I don't know if NES will reach it first or not! Their posting rate is too erratic to tell for sure. The HH posting rate is remarkably steady, with a daily average for the month of July of 370.25 posts.

More numbers as they become available!