Friday Saturday Red Mr. Peanut Bank and Gallito Mescalito Blogging

This evening's episode suggested, kinda, by Paul and Matty Boy


Welcome to the Red Mr. Peanut Bank and Gallito Mescalito Blogging Hallowe'en Special!
It was a dark and stormy night, and in the laboratory of Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy, A Terrible Experiment was taking place. . .


The evil doctor and his wicked assistant, Igoragator, were placing electrodes on a sad looking creature. . .


Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Vell, Igoragator, at last, ahftah years of being mocked and humiliated by my colleagues, I SHALL TRIUMPH!


Igoragator Heh heh heh. 'lectricity and dead thing. Heh heh heh!


Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Yes, my wicked assistant and I (zats you!) shall apply electric viahs to zis filty-raggy ting and BRING IT TO LIFE!!
Igoragator Heh heh heh. 'lectricity and dead thing. Heh heh heh!
Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Zat's right! Because de Dahnce Pahty peoples cry und cry for de return of de Bunrab, de filtiest toy in de haus, ve shall GIF DEM VAT DEY VANT! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!


HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!


Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Ah zee viahs hooked up?
Igoragator Heh heh heh. Ya, Herr Doktor!! Heh heh heh.
Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Zen fiah up zee generator!!
Igoragator Heh heh heh. Ya, Herr Doktor!! Heh heh heh.


Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Haff you flipped zee svitch?
Igoragator Heh heh heh. Ya, Herr Doktor!! Heh heh heh.





The Transformation Takes Place!!!


Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy He Iss Alive! HE ISS ALIVE!!!
Igoragator Heh heh heh. Herr Doktor, he looks different! Heh heh heh.
Der Frankenrab Monster Grrrrrrrrrr. . .
Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Vell he doss look different, but sink of zee Darin Stevens on zee Bewitched! Vat counts iss HE ISS ALIVE!!!


Igoragator Heh heh heh. Herr Doktor! The monster has removed the wires! Heh heh heh.
Der Frankenrab Monster Grrrrrrrrrr. . .
Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Vell, I guess he iss a smaht vun! Ahh you a smaht vun, my monster-wonster?


Der Frankenrab Monster Grrrrrrrrrr. . . Must Get Away!


Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy I sink he vants to kill us! Vat vill ve do?
Igoragator Heh heh heh. Run away! Heh heh heh.
Der Frankenrab Monster Grrrrrrrrrr. . . Kill The Skeeky Toys!!
Dr. Frankenchompie'schewedupsqueakykittytoy Run avay! RUN AVAY!!!!


Of course, the Frankerab Monster couldn't stop there. Soon he was chasing all of the gang!


Everyone RUN AWAY!!! RUN AWAY!!!
AAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!
Der Frankenrab Monster Grrrrrrrrrr. . . Must Catch Toys And Knick-knacks!!!!


HE'S COMING!!!! HE'S COMING!! RUN!!!!!!


Der Frankenrab Monster Grrrrrr. . .What A Buncha Chickens!!!!!! Happy Hallowe'en, everbuddy!


¡¡¡SSSSSHHHHHRRRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKK!!!

It's That Time Again Already?

Today Padre Mickey's Dance Party is three years old. Here is my boring first post. Things have improved a bit since then, and today we are celebrating with our new macmini! Yay!

¡Muchisimas Gracias A Todos!

Remember when having a computer in your house was totally SF? The first computer I encountered was in 1973 when I worked for this start-up company in Santa Clara, CA, with the funny name of Intel. I worked in the stock room and worked my way up to the Shipping/Receiving dock. They had these big rooms full of machines with big honking tape reels and something that reminded me of the teletype machine over which my dad would receive news reports when he was Program Director at KSAB-AM on Okinawa. Years later, I worked at a company named Telesensory Systems, Inc., in Palo Alto. I worked my way up from the Shipping/Receiving dock to the position of Expeditor and then Junior Buyer. We had this computer system with monochromatic monitors in which we entered data. This is about the time I met Matty Boy, game designer and Popular Vocalist. He bought one of the first Macintosh computers. My uncle and cousins were working at Apple then, too.

My first home computer was an Apple II I found abandoned in a storeroom at St. Francis Church in San Jose sometime in the late 1980's. Father Eck was very kind and let me take it home. It looked like this:

It had a monochromatic monitor (green, of course!), two 5.25 floppy disc drives, and a Daisy Wheel printer. It was noisy and interesting and my first home computer.

Then, in 1992, I came into a little money when my Godfather, Uncle Red, went on to glory and it turned out that I was the sole beneficiary of his life insurance program. So I called my Uncle Bob who worked at Apple and bought my first Macintosh computer. It was totally advanced, with a colour monitor and 18 mbs of RAM and a huge 250 megabyte hard drive. Whoohoo! I also discovered this internet thang with listserves. I even tried to telecommute. That didn't work well, but I wrote all my essays for my B.S. at SFU on that thing, using the Daisy Wheel printer. It looked like this:

My daughter, Anne, took it with her to Emerson College in Boston and was laughed out of the dormitory!

While at seminary in 1994, we went crazy and purchased an Apple Performa. It had a 750 mb hard drive. My cousin, Diana, who was working at Apple asked me if I could wait until June and they would be producing a 1 gigabyte hard drive. I said, "Why would anyone need anything that big?" and bought the Performa. It came with us to Panama (so did the Mac) and I wrote my Master's thesis The Establishment of the Standards of the Book of Common Prayer on it (hello! HELLO! Are you still awake?). It looked like this:

I moved it to my office at the church after we visited the U.S.A. in 2002 and purchased one of those new-fangled iMacs. It was blue, and had a 5 GB hard drive. We wuz State of the Art! Combined with our dial-up modem, we wuz invincible. It looked like this (just in case you forgot what they looked like):

I upped the RAM and even advanced to the new-fangled O/S X, a mysterious operating system which was super cool. Meanwhile, the Performa wasn't cutting it. My sister, Melanie, was visiting us and purchased an eMac for me at the brand new Mac Store here in Panama City. It was super cool, with its 40 GB hard drive and Intel processors. It replaced my Performa at the oficina en Parroquia San Cristóbal, where it is still in residence (but driving me crazy). It looks like this:

Then, one day in 2005, the iMac died. We went to the new MacStore here in Panama and encountered the Macmini. I was worried about the price, but purchased it on faith. At the same time I purchased it, using our Missionary Account, someone deposited an equal amount in the Missionary Account! So we decided that We Were Meant To Have The Macmini. It was pretty cool: 1.25 ghz PowerPC processor, 40 GB hard drive, super-cool flat-screen VGA monitor. We loved it, especially since it could travel with us. It looked like this:

However, as you all know, it has had it problems in 2009, and, even with a new hard drive, went to the Great Computer Store in the Sky this month.

So, yesterday, we went to the Mac Store on Calle 70 en San Francisco en Ciudad de Panamá  and purchased as new Mac mini as a result of your generosity. Now, David, I DID talk to them about the VGA to DVI adaptor, and the sales person assured me that the one I had would work, but, when we got home, we discovered that it didn't. So we were unable to use the new computer until today, when we purchased the proper adapter. So, now we have THIS:

2. GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 3 MB shared 1.2 cache. 2 GB DDR3 SDRAM, 320 GB hard drive, and SUPER DRIVE. AND Leopard 10.5.6. So "thank you" to everyone, and I am spending the evening getting to know this thang.

I'm figuring that Red Mr. Peanut Bank and Gallito Mescalito and friends will have a Super Special Hallowe'en Thang tomorrow.
Speaking of said holiday, why do all the wankers Newscasters on CNN and Other Channels keep saying that today is "Hallowe'en Eve"? WTF does that mean: "All Hallows Eve Eve?" Sheesh!

R.I.P., Macmini

Those who have been following this blog for a while may remember that while we were on sabbatical in California, our mac mini was sick. The hard drive was replaced and it seemed to be working well. It is one of the first models and therefore an ancient computer by today's standards.

The mac mini had been doing this for quite a while:


Unfortunately, it continued to do this sporadically even after its visit to the Genius Bar in Emeryville, CA. But it was working well, overall. Then, about four weeks ago, it went on the fritz again. We finally got it to the shop and received a call on Monday that the logic board needed to be replaced, at a cost of $600.00. A new mac mini may be purchased for $599.99.


I mentioned this on Facebook and received immediate response in regards to helping raise funds for a new computer from Psuedopiskie of Some Disagree With Mom and Dave of Friends of Jake. Then I learned that Reverenda Ann posted the news on the HOB/HOD listserve. I also saw posts at the blogs of Grandmère Mimi and Mad Priest.

So tonight we're gonna go buy a new mac mini, thanks to the generosity of so many people. As soon as I receive the list from St. Francis, I will be thanking folks individually, but for now we want to thank everyone for your help. You are a wonderful community!!

¡Verdad!

Sunday at Parroquia San Cristóbal

This is little Yasir. He's only eight days old! His mom, Samantha, brought him to church Sunday morning for his blessing. He'll probably be baptized in January. He sure is little and sure is cute!

Tuesday Miss Bebé, The World's Most Beautiful Grandchild™ Blogging

Miss Bebé encounters the Bubble Fairy!

Saturday Night in Gamboa

Saturday evening the Lovely Mona and I were in Gamboa at Iglesia San Simón for their patronal festival. Of course, St. Simon's feast day isn't until this coming Wednesday, but since San Simón holds services on Saturday evenings, we celebrated early. San Simón was the very first church (along with San Juan en Betánia) to which I was assigned when we first came to Panamá over ten years ago. The congregation holds a special place in our hearts, and I fill-in for Padre Nelson when he is away, so I'm the Assisting Clergy there.

Wesley Scott and Padre Nelson had recently found the old church bell, so they had it restored and built a stand for it just outside the door. Since Bishop Murray was presiding, we had him bless the bell. Since we had no acolytes, I filled in as thurifer and acolyte. I realize that some of our Altar Guild and Sacristy-rat readers may be troubled by the fact that the frontals and the Bishop's stole are green while Padre y yo are wearing red stoles. Well, we didn't have enough red stoles or green stoles, and since Padre was using the propers for the Twenty-first Sunday of Pentecost instead of the propers for the Feast of Sts. Simon and Jude, the Altar Guild used green. The Bishop and his priests discussed the matter, and decided to go with the Christmasy colour scheme you see here.

The Bishop handed out certificates to Mr. Luther Atkinson and Mr. Wesley Scott for all their work for St. Simon's.

After the Mass we had a lovely dinner of tossed green salad, chicken pot pie, french bread, coconut tart, cocobread, chicha, and helados.

Photos by the Lovely Mona:

Front of San Simón


New Walkway


The Bell


The Chancel


Mr. Greaves, organist


Thelma and Homer Welsh


Los clérigos


The Congregation



Blessing the bell


Ringing the bell


Obispo Murray y Padre Edwards


Incense time


Mr. Luther Atkinson receives a certificate


Mr. Wesley Scott receives a certificate


The spread





Partiers





¡Salud!