Here’s the rundown of friends who have deserted the Midwest: Aaron, Mike, Brandon, Alex, Kyle, Grant and next week, Summer.

Really, it’s a bit of a bummer.

A friend of mine recently told me about a band I should check out called “The Hold Steady.” I did a quick search and found them on the iTunes Store, and also found them on Amazon.com’s MP3 store.

With Apple’s store, the songs came with Digital Rights Management, or DRM, which limits how many times you can transfer the song files to other computers, and you have to “authorize” a computer to play the file with your iTunes username and password.

But Amazon.com’s MP3 store doesn’t have that restriction. Many times you can music for the same - or sometimes even lower price - but without all this DRM mess. The download process is smooth, and it works great on any MP3 player.

Why Apple persists with DRM is beyond my comprehension. I recommend that you send Apple and the rest of the music industry a message: purchase DRM-free music from Amazon.com.

It’s your money. Make it your music, not Apple’s

• Watched the movie “Dog Day Afternoon.”
• Gave my desk a much needed cleaning, accompanied by shredding of documents no longer needed.
• Jump started one of our cars after it died on Amy while she was at the bank. I’ll get it checked out more tomorrow.
• Studied my Ruby on Rails book (a lot).
• Joined Amy and Ember for a little recycling at Wal-Mart.
• Played outside with Ember, then played even more with her inside while Amy went to work.
• Circuit training in the hot garage.

A pretty full day, I suppose. It started out with rain, so I knew it was going to be a pretty low-key day anyhow. Tomorrow is even more packed. It’s funny how vacation can be sometimes.

At least I succeeded in not checking my work e-mail. That’s a big deal for me. Really.

The dead battery thing was a bit of a bummer. I’m going to get it checked out more tomorrow by taking it to Auto Zone. Are you aware that they’ll test your battery for free? Of course, if the battery is dead, you’ll likely feel inclined to go ahead and purchase from them. I’m hoping that’s all it is. I’d hate to get stuck when we do our traveling later this week.

I’m glad I had a lot more time to spend reading my (731 page) book. Man that thing is a doozy. But, I need to read it to keep up with web technologies, and it’s the perfect tool for some projects I’m working on. I just need a little more education to make my ideas come to fruition.

The one thing that really annoys me about shopping is how the cashiers really push customers on signing up for the store’s credit card.

For instance, one store we visited (an outlet store I should say) had some great buys, so I snatched them up and headed to the counter. I was expecting the “Would you like to save XX percent by signing up for our store card today?” question, and I already had my answer ready to go: “I don’t use credit cards.” It’s my defacto answer for retail stores because it lets the pusher know that I’m not interested in their drug.

But this cashier, young and ignorant (as I was once) had her own reply: “But there are a lot of things you can do with credit that you can’t normally do.” One thing she mentioned could be done with credit was the ability to “buy now and not have to pay for 60 days,” overlooking the fact that I was handing her CASH as she said that to me.

Like the 10% off my first purchase is worth the trade off of the 20% interest rate of a stupid credit card.

Logic like this worries me. I fear for our country’s future.

And I managed to trim a minute off my time from last week’s race.

OK, I’m officially tired now.

Have a great Independence Day.

I ended up meeting my two goals for the race: don’t die, and finish. Out of 219 runners, I finished 181st; achievements unlocked!

This was a important race for me. After being laid out a few months ago with a bad back, I was determined to do something to push me to the opposite end of the pain spectrum. If I was going to hurt, it would be from my own effort, not because my body was breaking down from too much desk work.

The race, as it turned out, was much easier than I expected. Perhaps that was from the two months of training I went through (give or take) using the training guide (pdf) from another popular area run.

I was five minutes into my run and thinking “I can’t believe I’m really doing this.” I’m not one of those skinny mini runners; I’ve got some bulk to lose for sure. But I did it, and that was really all that mattered. Now, I was a little sore on Sunday (my calves felt like bocce balls), but it wasn’t that bad. Overall, it was just a tired, worn out feeling.

I remember when I got the idea to run a 5K. I had just moved to Lawrence and caught the beginnings of an early morning race on Sunday by accident. That was eight years ago. The thought was in my head that I’d like to try that “someday,” but never got around to it.

I suppose I can check it off my list now. I have to give a big thanks to my friend Sara who told me about the race and was my running partner. I’m not sure I would have done it without her prodding.

Have you ever wanted to do something but never got around to it? Don’t waste any time, my friends. It’s worth pursuing your dreams.

I couldn’t tell if it was when he was pooping or peeing, but sometime during the waste elimination process he would let out a kind of “yelp!” He would then sit still for a few seconds, then proceed on with his typical Guinea pig duties (sleeping, eating and pooping).

I kind of thought it was going away, but Monday evening, the noise was worse than it had been. Tuesday evening, he went to the vet and I signed him up for an overnight stay to be checked out Wednesday morning. Then we got the call: he had a stone in his bladder and they had to do surgery to get it out. Of course, we instructed them to proceed. The picture shows the stone in the doctor’s hand. Look at the size of that thing; it’s about the size of a large marble! Holy crap.

Apparently this was caused by a bacterial infection, and shouldn’t be a chronic condition. I saw Butterscotch after the surgery yesterday during my lunch break. Thankfully, he was alive and looked good. He was, however, a tad bit out of it. Drugs tend to do that to 3 lbs. furballs.

To recap, here are some lessons learned:

• If your pet is acting funny, trust your gut and get it checked out.
• Don’t run out and spend your economic stimulus check. Instead, put it in savings, you never know when you’re going to need it.
• Don’t beat yourself up about not acting sooner. Even if its eating you up inside.

Hopefully, he’ll be coming home today. That’s good news, since his buddy, Espresso, misses him terribly. He’s been pretty emo the last couple of days.

I know how he feels.

The web site is geared toward the small business owner who wants to improve her web site, with the typical wit and wisdom you’ve come to expect from the artist formerly known as The Grubesteak.

In a way, Smallshock will be like a giant FAQ of questions I’ve been asked in my experience with web development, and I hope my insight will help small businesses owners get the answers they need.

Smallshock might not be for you, depending on your level of interest in the subject. But, I’d encourage you to stop by and take a look.

I try to stay busy
I do the dishes, I mow the lawn
I try to keep myself occupied
Even though I know you’re not coming home

I try to stay busy
I take out the trash, I sweep the floor
Try to keep myself occupied
Cause I know you don’t live here anymore

Well, it’s not entirely the same (since they came back this morning), but it’s close. Let’s just say I got a LOT done around the living quarters.

It was quiet. A little too quiet. Thank God they’re home.