The year was 1997.

Bill Clinton began his second term as President of the United States.

Tony Blair was appointed Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

IBM’s Deep Blue defeated Garry Kasparov in the last game of the rematch, the first time a computer beat a chess World champion in a match.

Timothy McVeigh was convicted on 15 counts of murder and conspiracy for his role in the 1995 terrorist bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and received a death penalty sentence.

The first book in the award winning Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling is published. (The last will be published this year)

NASA’s Pathfinder space probe lands on the surface of Mars.

Diana, Princess of Wales, dies in a car crash in a Paris tunnel.

Scotland voted to create its own Parliament after 290 years of union with England.

The domain “Google” was registered.

Hong Kong was returned to Chinese rule

The Florida Marlins won Game 7 of the 1997 World Series against the Cleveland Indians 3-2 in 11 innings.

The Green Bay Packers win Super Bowl XXXI, defeating the New England Patriots 35 to 21 on January 26th in New Orleans’ Superdome. (Sorry Jason)

The term “weblog” (later shortened to “blog”) is coined.

The late Elvis Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker passed away, as did poet Allen Ginsberg, magician Harry Blackstone, Jr., French explorer Jacques Cousteau, American actors Robert Mitchum, Burgess Meredith, Chris Farley, Denver Pyle and James Stewart, American television reporter Charles Kuralt, Italian fashion designer Gianni Versace, United States Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, American comedian Red Skelton, professional wrestler Brian Pilman and American musician John Denver, among others.

And while celebrities such as Woody Allen and his adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn were getting married, an obscure man and woman (to everyone but each other) in Orlando, Florida were married in the beautiful backyard garden of the bride’s parents, writing their own vows, choosing their own music and surrounded by family and friends.

As I told my children shortly before the ceremony; outside of the days they were born, this was the happiest day of my life.

It still is.

Happy Anniversary, Blog Girl. Thank you for the 10 happiest years of my life. And thank you for loving the man behind the mask.

After kids and grandkids left the BlogCave on Christmas morning, BlogGirl and I proceeded to clean up the living room and kitchen and to check online for movies to go see. BG decided she wasn’t really in the mood for “Rocky Balboa” and we eventually settled on “Eragon” which was showing in the early afternoon.

However, as the time to leave to go to the movie theater draws nearer, the weather worsens and just as we would normally be getting into the BlogMobile, thunderstorms blanket the Orlando and Central Florida area. We decide to forego the movie theater trip and instead stayed in the BlogCave to watch a DVD I had given to BG for Christmas, “The Lake House” starring Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock in a story of love crossing time.

Of course the storm blew through quickly and just as we would have been sitting in a darkened theater to watch “Eragon”, the skies were clear and the sun was peeking through the window. So, later in the afternoon we ventured out to see the movie and then enjoy a meal at Bennigan’s afterward. The movie was “ok”; not great and not horrible, but to be fair I had a headache and (for some reason) was sleepy. Of course, “Eragon” opened at number 6 across the country over the weekend, so maybe “ok” is an accurate review.

Here’s what BlogGirl gave The Masked Blogger for Christmas:

Star Trek The Next Generation - The Complete First Season. This has been on my Amazon Wishlist for years, lol, waiting for the price to come down. I used to have all 7 seasons on VHS video tape (homemade by me with commercials edited out), but when I put this (and the remaining 6 seasons) on my wishlist, I started taping over the shows because I knew that one day I’d be getting all 7 seasons on DVD. Granted, the first season is not this series’ best (Roddenberry was supplying recycled scripts that he originally planned to use years earlier when he wanted to bring back the original Star Trek series, which never happened), but ya gotta have that first season.

Star Trek The Next Generation - The Complete Second Season. Same comment as above, with the exception that, while the stories improved in this season (but wouldn’t really hit their stride until the third season) I hated the replacement of Dr. Crusher.

Amazing Marvel Universe. This is a cool book because it is more than a printed book, it is also an audio book. The book includes 50 of the top happenings within the Marvel Comics universe over the years, with the added bonus of 45 minutes of commentary by the creator of many of the Marvel Universe characters (as well as being the former editor and publisher), Stan Lee.

A MetroBlog Logo Black Tee Shirt. Since I write for Orlando MetroBlog, I thought it would be neat to have one of these and mentioned it to BG a couple of months ago…then promptly forgot about it, so I was surprised to open a box and find this in it. Even more surprising is that this shirt only has the “MB” logo on it, not the word “MetroBlogging”. That means if I want to I can tell everyone the initials stand for Masked Blogger!

Frommer’s Best RV and Tent Campgrounds in the U.S.A. This is a great addition to my library. It’s a book I can use personally for locating camping locations when I go tent camping and one that I can use as a reference professionally for my other writing job. This is almost 1200 pages of site reviews, amenities, fees, photos, directions and maps of almost 5,000 RV and Tent Campgrounds in the continental United States.

Marvel Heroes 2007 Calendar. Every year BG gives me a calendar to hang in my office next to my desk. They are usually either Star Trek, Comic Book or fantasy artist-themed. Sometimes I point out one I would like in the days before Christmas and sometimes she surprises me. This year she really surprised me because she didn’t give me one! That’s right, I didn’t get this gift until the day after Christmas when we were walking through an office supply store and I saw the calendar display and exclaimed, “Hey! You didn’t get me a calendar this year!” It completely slipped her mind. We laughed and she let me pick this one out.

SanDisk Sansa e250 2GB MP3 Player. My newest toy. This one was really a surprise. BlogGirl said, “I wanted to ask you if you wanted one, but I knew you’d say you wouldn’t use it if I did, so I just got it knowing you would use it if you had it”. That’s why she’s my wife, she knows me so well. I can play audio files, video files, listen to FM radio and use it as a digital voice recorder. This might be fun to listen to when I’m hiking, though I usually prefer to listen to the sounds of nature around me…we’ll see. I know I’ll use it when walking for exercise. At least now I can look like all the kids that work in my office. Ok, I won’t really look like them, but I can have this hanging around my neck with the earbuds stuck in my ears like them.

I think that concludes my list of Christmas gifts this year. Now I just need to carve out enough time to enjoy them.

Hi, remember me?

I know, I know, it’s been a while. Things have been rather hectic here in The Blog Cave and in the life of The Masked Blogger. Lots of working hours (18 one day), lots of family and friend things and…some other things. If you’re in my address book, you’ll hear about those in a separate e-mail later tonight or tomorrow, but for now be assured that there have been few empty moments in my existence for the last couple of weeks.

And I don’t anticipate any for the next month either, but then every November/December is like that, no matter how much I try to make it otherwise.

Here’s a condensed version of the past 3 weeks or so. I was handed two new and good-sized projects by my division’s director. One of them involved a reduction in force action for our entire division and that has not been easy or enjoyable. Stressful and time-consuming, it has been. I had to oversee a project that will put 86 people in the unemployment line next month, one of them from my own department whom I love dearly as a friend and a co-worker. This was not an unexpected situation; all of us have known that the job we are doing for the big government agency is one that we would eventually work ourselves out of, yet I guess we all hoped it would still be off in the future somewhere. Instead, it is now. Barring any changes, we will do it again in April or May.

As unpleasant as it has been, I have learned a lot about certain procedures, policies and people that will be helpful to me.

The other project is an on-going one that is also teaching me a lot about the division I work within. Though my department’s work touches others and I have picked up some things from them along the way, almost all of my experience has been in the one department that I supervise. This project is helping me add to my store of knowledge about the entire operation. The more you know, the less expendable you are…I hope.

We had a busy, but enjoyable Thanksgiving dinner with some 30 family members. I was so tired I didn’t even take my camera to shoot pictures. After eating and celebrating the November birthdays, my father-in-law, 3 brothers-in-law and I sat down and ironed out the plans for our first camping trip together in January. I’m looking forward to that.

On Black Friday after work (when the crowds were pretty non-existent) Blog Girl and I ventured out to have dinner and buy our Christmas tree. When we got back to the Cave we put it up in the stand to allow it to “fall out” overnight. It is a huge 8 foot Frasier Fir that looks much bigger here than it did at the tree store. Saturday I put up the lights outside the house and the lights on the tree inside, and then Blog Girl and Amber decorated as much of the tree as they could reach, and I finished the top. It looks very beautiful.

Sunday morning after dropping Blog Girl off at Lake Eola, I went to Amber’s new house and put up hooks all along her eaves and then hung her icicle lights. After that I returned to pick up BG from Lake Eola and then we went to meet our friend Rhonda at the Disney Marketplace where we did some shopping and visiting. It was Rhonda’s birthday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY RHONDA!!

Today at work I got a really cool early Christmas gift from my friend Denise. If you’ve got a laptop and you’ve had to go searching for a Wi-fi signal so you could connect to the Internet, you know it can be a chore to boot up the laptop and go through all the steps to try to get a signal, only to find out there isn’t one nearby. Well, the WiFi Finder Plus licks that chore and makes locating that needed signal a breeze. Just push the button and within a few seconds the WiFi Finder Plus lets you know if there’s a signal and how strong it is. It also locates Bluetooth signals and has a little flashlight as well. Denise said she just couldn’t wait to give it to me and I’m glad she didn’t. I loves me my new toy! Thanks Denise!

Real quick; Egg nog is on the shelves!! Tomorrow the “Superman Returns” DVD goes on sale.

It’s late and I have to be up at 4:30 tomorrow, so don’t look for the e-mail with the “other things” news tonight. Probably tomorrow.

About a week ago Josh Hallett, founder and organizer of the successful, informative and enjoyable BlogOrlando 2006 conference and a consultant on corporate and social blogging (as well as most things “geeky”), posted an entry on his blog regarding people wearing Bluetooth headsets in stupid locations. Both the post and the comments made me chuckle because I realized that, in the short span of time that I have had my own Bluetooth headset, I have probably been guilty of wearing mine in some stupid locations. I plead “new use” syndrome (that peculiar action of using something new quite a bit at the onset of ownership or availability, then finally finding a balance as the “something” becomes more familiar) and the fact that my headset is SO comfortable I sometimes forget I even have it on. But I have been making progress (”Hi, my name is The Masked Blogger and I wear my Bluetooth headset in stupid places.” “Hi Masked Blogger.“), now that I am a month into using my Bluetooth, in removing mine after each use when it would not be appropriate to wear that handy little object.

I particularly enjoyed the “It’s a phone, not an earring…take the damn thing off!” line.

Along the same lines, TechEBlog recently published an article entitled “5 Gadgets You Don’t Want to be Seen Wearing” along with pictures. Shown below is the gadget I found the most amusing, the “Techno Privacy Scarf”.

“Developed by Joe Malia, this ‘Techno Privacy Scarf’ supposedly protects your privacy when using portable devices in public areas - or at home.”

This article reminded me of some of the ridiculous creations I used to see in Mad Magazine when I was a kid when I would read the “Inventions We’d Like To See” feature, where artists would draw inventions like the “Cigarette Smoke Recycler” (which resembled the human wastewater recyclers in “Dune“) and the “Electric Shaver Necklace“.

I love new tech toys and you still might see me occasionally wearing my Bluetooth in stupid places…but I’ll definitely skip the “Techno Privacy Scarf“.

I mentioned in an earlier post that we were going totally wireless here in the Blog Cave. This past Monday morning the land line was turned off (just in time to avoid those intrusive campaign calls before the election in 3 weeks) and I collected all the wired phones from around the Cave and placed them in a box to go in the attic. Although I’m glad to have them gone, it turns out some habits are hard to break. For instance, I still walk into the Cave and instinctively look to where the answering machine used to be to see if any messages came in while we were out.

When Blog Girl called to tell BellSouth we wanted to turn off the land line, I was mildly surprised to hear from her at the conclusion of that call that there was no effort to try and talk us into retaining the line. Family, friends and acquaintances have reported to us in the past that when making similar calls they have been offered rebates, chances to hold their number for 60 days in case they changed their minds, or at the least to have a recording on the line to direct callers to any new number. Not that we would have used them, but Blog Girl received none of those offers.

I came across an interesting piece of information that may explain that lack of effort.

Current Analysis, Inc., a company that, according to their website, “provides competitive response solutions that enable companies to effectively anticipate and counter competitive threats, and win more business.” released statistics that showed as customers continue to trade in land lines for voice-over-Internet-protocol phones, cellphones and cable-enabled phone service, 20 million phone lines have fallen out of use in the past six years in the U.S.. 20 million! That’s a little over 9,000 each and every day of those 6 years.

No wonder they gave up trying to talk customers into retaining their home land lines.

After 6 years of mediocre connectivity service and really bad customer service, Blog Girl and I have finally made the switch from Verizon Wireless to Cingular Wireless. Our contract with Verizon ends in November and we had been talking about and looking into switching since last year when several of my fellow government drones mentioned the high rate of connectivity, in their personal experience, when traveling the country. Another reason for wanting to switch was the fact that we wanted to be able to take and use our cell phones with us when we go to France next year. Verizon does not use the same system that is used in Europe so when we traveled to Scotland this past spring we could not use our own cell phones and had to rely instead on pay phones to make calls. Cingular uses the GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) system that is standard in Europe (and much of the rest of the world) which means we will be able to use our cell phones to communicate throughout the country and overseas as well.

The catalyst that finally made us take action, even though we have another month on the Verizon contract, was when a business entity that I have a relationship with offered 2 free Motorola Razrs if we signed up by October 12th. That was a savings of over $200 to do something we already intended to do AND we’d get a couple of the neatest cell phones on the market. The only downside is that we’re paying for 2 service plans for a month, but the positives definitely outweigh that negative.

Our phones arrived in the mail last week and we’ve been playing with and familiarizing ourselves with them during that time; Blog Girl moreso than myself though I am trying to catch up to her. The phones take acceptable photos and decent videos, as well as being compact in usage. Our reception and connectivity has been excellent during calls and, as an added bonus, during 2 calls made to Cingular to clear up some questions on our part Blog Girl actually concluded both calls with a smile on her face. That is important when you know that, without exception, every time she finished a call with the customer service department of our former provider she was angry, crying or cursing.

We’ve also ordered the carrying case, car charger and bluetooth earpieces in a money-saving package deal and those should arrive this week. I’m going to feel like some character from Star Trek with that metallic earpiece attached to my aural organ, but it will be much safer than driving with one hand. Icing on the cake for me is that my ringtone is one I’ve wanted for quite a while…the Superman theme from the movies.

Since we had to get the phones a month before our old contract expired, we decided to pass on having our old numbers transferred and opted instead to get new numbers. It just eliminated a lot of potential problems that seem to be inherent in getting a number and then having it changed to your old number when the contract expires. I’ll soon be sending out e-mails to family, friends and business contacts to advise of my new phone number and Blog Girl will be doing likewise.

In addition we’ve decided to go completely wireless in the Blog Cave as it relates to our communication tools. Our PC’s have been wireless for quite a while and even though we had cell phones we maintained the landline phone as well. As of next week we’ll eliminate that duplication of service and have the landline phone shut down. As it is the majority of calls we receive on the landline are telemarketing calls (despite being on the DO NOT CALL registry for 2 years), survey calls and, especially during this past election period, campaign calls from candidates and PACS. In other words, useless and unwanted calls that we’re tired of paying to receive.

I’m also thinking of getting a Cingular PC card for my laptop to use whenever I can’t find a Wi-Fi signal, especially overseas. Although the rates were reasonable at Internet Cafes in Scotland and England, I spent a goodly amount of money posting my travel blog and e-mailing family and friends. Not to mention the time involved in getting to a cafe, waiting for an open spot and then getting back to our lodging. I’d like to eliminate that cost, both in time and money, in France next year, or even here in America when traveling. If anyone reading this has experience with using PC cards to connect to the wireless phone signal, I’d love to hear whether you were satisfied or not.

Here’s an amusing “Hello Moto” commercial with a funny twist at the end.

You may have noticed some of the changes I’ve been making around here. A few days ago I added a graphic link to my new MySpace site, a couple of days later I added my list of books read (that is still a work in progress as I have to get the books I’ve been reading in 2006 listed) and today I changed the header graphic above and the color of the sidebar headings. Let me know what you think.

But I could not have done any of those things without the help and assistance of 2 lovely ladies who graciously gave me their time and technical know-how. I can handle your everyday HTML coding but for some reason I’ve never been able to get a strong handle on CSS coding, which is the basis of WordPress templates like the one I use for this blog.

So I’d like to offer a sincere “Thanks for the info” to Hänni (HAW-knee), the Grand Empress of Hännihaus and Michelle, the Goddess behind Zengrrl. Shortly after sharing some of her knowledge of “the Force” (mere mortals such as myself can only handle so much in one session) Hänni packed up her bags and moved Hännihaus to the Lone Star state of Texas. Thankfully that move was not a result of meeting me, but rather a move already in the works so that she and her hubby could live closer to where he works. The Sunshine State’s loss is the Longhorns’ gain, but hopefully the “art”-ful one will find the time to return and visit O-town occasionally in the future. Michelle is an obvious graduate of Hogwart’s School of WordPress Wizarding and helped a great deal with issues I was having with my header graphic and sidebar additions. I told her that once I saw what she did I would be able to do it own my own after that, but I almost put the lie to that statement today when I was attempting to change out the header graphic. However, after some tinkering and spellcasting, I was able to get the graphic I wanted to show up where I wanted. Michelle is currently splitting her time between Mouseville and the cheesehead state of Wisconsin. She’s been back in our neck of the woods a few weeks but Blog Girl and I haven’t had the chance to meet up with her as of yet. Soon, hopefully, soon.

I’ll continue making changes in the decor around the cave, but the real credit goes to Hänni and Michelle for getting me on the right track. That’s why I’m grateful to the ladies.