Saturday, May 01, 2010

Connecting to the Home Network

I finally bought a wireless router yesterday so I could connect the Wii I bought to the Internet and get access to Netflix videos on my TV. I've never messed with wireless so I had to do some research on what exactly I needed. I thought I understood the issue and found a Cisco router on sale at Meijer. Target lost the sale since they had none. Which was mildly annoying since it would have been nice to get it all purchased at once and on the same day. But the staff was helpful in telling me where I could get one.

Staff at Meijer was helpful, too, when I asked to doublecheck that I had what I needed. Bad news for Target--in getting the router I noticed that Meijer had a better selection of gaming related stuff.

Hooking up the router went smoothly. And connecting the Wii to my wireless network was easy. Plus, linking my Netflix account to the Wii interface was no problem at all. A quick test worked well and Mister was pretty happy that he could get Dilbert and Coach on the big TV now.

Later, while I was making dinner, I noted to Mister that it was funny that he was watching a TV show on my computer and Lamb was playing a game on the TV. The media is all merging, eh? Although not my phone--which I stubbornly use only for voice phone calls.

I ended up taking care of Lamb on Friday earlier than I expected. I had the day off, so planned on picking up her and Mister from school. Lamb complained of feeling ill at school and the school called mom to get Lamb. Mom called me to come and get her before she went to work, and luckily I was home in between shopping trips (oh yeah, that's important because I usually leave my cell phone off). My Ex thought Lamb was sincere in not feeling well, but two weeks ago when I was also off work, Lamb was ill, too. And both times she seemed to recover nicely in my charge. Now, I think highly of myself, I'll admit, but I make no claims to being able to heal the sick by the simple act of placing my hand on their forehead. I suspect Lamb clearly wanted dad time.

This makes sense, really, since recent changes have reduced my time taking care of Lamb a bit, and she's mentioned this a few times to me. Things can change again, and I'm expecting things will change this year, but I'm just going with the flow for the time. And I think Lamb is working the system to get more time with me. Which is both sweet and troubling.

There just isn't enough time in the day to do all the things I need to do--let alone what I'd like to do. If only all problems were as simple as setting up a wireless network at home. Welcome to life, I guess.