And LOL.....
Duty calls.
I have to run cross town to fix the lockset on Lori's door. She could not get in from the garage and had to go around outside to her front door to get in.

Meow for now.
See ya later.

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

Just got home from my eye doctor appointment and.................
No bad news to report.
He made some adjustments to my glasses prescription to match my eyes to each other a bit and give me a bit more for close up reading and my tasks at work.

But other than that, he said my eyes were still healthy, and I will see him again in two or three years unless I notice any significant changes.

Meow!

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

Got that AA 24 hour coin today.
A good reminder of that first step I took.

And...for my next trick....................
Gonna try to kick the cigs.

Have tried a few times in the past and faltered.
Maybe now that I don't have the whiskey riding shotgun I may finally stand a chance.

They say the first thing is to pick a date.
Well, the 22nd worked for me and the booze, so I shall pick October 22nd as my 'stub it out' date.
This will prove to be much harder for me, I am quite sure.

Wonder if they got any coins for that?

Meow.

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

You can do it Mark!

You are already slightly more than 1/2 way there and can also beat this "smokey curse".

If the Chicago Cubs could beat a 103 year "curse" on not winning the Wold Series last year and making it now 3 consecutive years in the National League Central Division Championship, something they have not done in over 100 years... SO CAN YOU!

I am sure everyone here on the SETI boards are rooting for another Kittyman VICTORY!

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I used Allen Carr's Easyway to stop smoking.

Stopped smoking after 35 years on 21 April 2009 with the "Easyway" program on DVD after hundreds of failed attempts on my own. Get the book if you cant track down the DVD. The DVD has totally disappeared in Australia.

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Thank you, Dr Who Fan and Monday.
I appreciate the good vibes and confidence.
This is gonna be a hard one to beat.
I shall have a look at that Allen Carr info, but this is going to take sheer will and determination on my part.

Meow.

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

... but this is going to take sheer will and determination on my part.

And if sheer will and determination need a hand, another vote for:



Keep in mind that nicotine is the most addictive substance we know of, even more so than cocaine and heroin (ease of availability may contribute!) Nothing wrong with some assistance kicking it. I certainly couldn't have done it without them; with them it wasn't so bad. And they are covered by just about all health insurance plans (for obvious $-saving reasons).

Keep up the excellent progress! :^)

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Thanks, Mr. Kevvy.
But I can tell you for a fact that in my case, it is not the addictive nature of nicotine.
It is the damned HABIT of it.

I quit taking cigs along when I go to Lori's place on the weekends a long time ago already. I used to run out and have a couple of puffs on commercial breaks whilst we were watching television.
I no longer miss it.

I quit taking them along to work in the car a long time ago. I used to have one on the way to work and another on the drive home. Or when I was running errands around town.
I no longer miss that either.

It's when I sit down for the hours that I spend on the computer here at home that it is an ingrained thing.
I KNOW that if I can kick it, eventually it will be just like the other cases where I have been able to turn off the trigger to light one up.
I just have to come up with a way to fool my mind for long enough for those triggers to subside.

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

I know exactly what you are talking about Mark.
Its the same here.
After my heart attack last year i didn`t smoke for 7 weeks and didn`t miss it a bit.
As soon i started getting bored i started smoking again.
Much less than before but here you go. :(

---

With each crime and every kindness we birth our future.

I know exactly what you are talking about Mark.
Its the same here.
After my heart attack last year i didn`t smoke for 7 weeks and didn`t miss it a bit.
As soon i started getting bored i started smoking again.
Much less than before but here you go. :(

That's exactly it.
I have to find something to replace the trigger with something else.
Like maybe petting the kitties.............they would like that!
I might start wearing their fur off though.......LOL.

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

I suggest exercise... for me it was buying a bicycle which gradually became not just a recreation but my mode of transport and that kept me from reverting. You may prefer walking, or cross-country skiing, or working out at a gym, but whatever it is, it will get you away from the "triggers" ie the computer or just being idle at home, and also once you feel how your endurance and energy have improved, you won't feel like filling your lungs with gunk and undoing your progress. Regular exercise will also undo some of the damage smoking does over the years by reducing the risk of heart disease, for example.

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The patches did nothing for me. In fact the patch made it worse. I posted about Chantix in your other thread.

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...

The patches did nothing for me. In fact the patch made it worse. I posted about Chantix in your other thread.

Were they Nicoderm? I tried other patches and they were universally awful.

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The patches did nothing for me. In fact the patch made it worse. I posted about Chantix in your other thread.

Were they Nicoderm? I tried other patches and they were universally awful.

I think it was Nicoderm but do not remember. I tried several brands of patches and gum but they did not work enough for me.

---

...

I know exactly what you are talking about Mark.
Its the same here.
After my heart attack last year i didn`t smoke for 7 weeks and didn`t miss it a bit.
As soon i started getting bored i started smoking again.
Much less than before but here you go. :(

That's exactly it.
I have to find something to replace the trigger with something else.
Like maybe petting the kitties.............they would like that!
I might start wearing their fur off though.......LOL.

That is part of the reason Easyway is so effective, it addresses the head stuff. Following the program my, at the time, girlfriend and I got rid of all smokes, lighters and ash trays accept one. We planned to have our last ever smoke immediately before bed on a Friday night. Friday night because Saturday and Sunday were the least stressful days of our week and had the least habit triggers. After ceremonially smoking my last smoke I immediately became a "happy non smoker" in my head instead of a poor bas t*%@ trying to quit smoking. Armed with the knowledge that the very real physical cravings that manifest in my stomach would reduce over two weeks I renamed the cravings to " The craving Monster". Every time the craving monster reared its ugly head I would poke all of my finger at my stomach and chant " die "mother (expletive deleted)" DIE. And all the time reminding myself that I was a "Happy non smoker" these were remarkably effective techniques and it did truly become the easy way to quit smoking.

A lot of rearranging head stuff and two weeks of manageable reducing withdrawal symptoms = 8 1/2 years smoke free. :-)

---

Well......
I kinda pre-rewarded myself for my impending 'tossing of the butts'.
I have not bought any new computer bits for a long time now, except for a SSD to replace a failing hard drive.

The ol' kittyman finally scraped enough kibble together and ordered some parts for an upgrade to his daily driver.
Not a barnstormer, but should be significantly better than the 3.3Ghz Xeon quad and P5K Deluxe I am running now.
It is just getting too anemic for crunching and surfing the net.

Here's what I got coming. Really kinda a budget build, but I picked what I thought was some good middle ground.


Intel® Core™ i7-6850K Processor.
Not the latest and greatest, but saw some test reports that showed it had excellent work throughput. And it's 6 cores instead of 4!
ASUS X99-PRO/USB 3.1 LGA 2011-v3 Intel X99 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 ATX Intel Motherboard.
Was on sale for $50.00 off, and I have always had good luck with Asus boards. Hope that luck holds.
EVGA SuperNOVA 850 G3, 220-G3-0850-X1, 80+ GOLD, 850W Fully Modular, EVGA ECO Mode with New HDB Fan, Includes FREE Power On Self Tester, Compact 150mm Size, Power Supply.
Great bargain, single rail, 10 year warranty. And the G2 I bought some time ago has been rock solid.
Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - CPU Cooler with 120mm PWM Fan.
Very basic, but should be enough. Can always upgrade the 120mm fan or get a better cooler later if needed.
Crucial 16GB (4 x 4GB) 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 2133 (PC4 17000) Desktop Memory Model CT4K4G4DFS8213.
Crucial is what Asus benched the board with in their specs. Going 4x4 instead of slightly cheaper 2x8 should allow better use of RAM bandwidth. 4 times the RAM that I have now, and much faster DDR4 instead of DDR2.

I am hoping to plug in the Samsung Sata SSD and continue from where I am now.
Probably have some teething pains updating drivers and such, but I hoping there are no real problems in the transition. Like I said, not the best of the best, but I think the best bits in that general class.
Total deal was around $950.00 all in.

I shall be paying it off with my ciggy savings.

And I should be a much happier kitty when I get done. On both the computer and the non-smoking fronts.

Meow!

---

"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

That all looks like some pretty competent bits and pieces. I have to admit, that it is nice when you can treat yourself and you can buy stuff that is new - it has been a while for you, hasn't it? When I treated myself a couple of years ago, 'Skylake' was starting to reach the shelves and I thought to myself, "remember, that bleeding edge will already be out-of-date, so buy quality". I went for a 4690K build, back then - the numbers for 'Skylake' at that time were a little scary.....especially in the UK! So, I just got higher spec things and more things. As you say, giving up cigarettes, means you'll be making the savings to pay for it - and then some. With some of the figures you've mentioned as being 'extra costs' for smoking, after a year, you'll be over $3k in pocket - even after the costs of the parts. Maybe smoking should be looked on as being, poverty by instalments. You'll have way more fun, with some newer gear, than with cigarettes and alcohol - maybe even seeing yourself tackling that little RX.

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Don't take life too seriously, as you'll never come out of it alive!

You are correct, not had any new toys to play with for a long long time.
The 6850k has been out since May 2016, so it's had time to cool off a bit pricewise.
This will be the first new rig I have ever assembled on the TRAILING edge instead of the bleeding edge.
That is quite a departure for the ol' kittyman, for sure.

I had to spend quite a lot of time yesterday researching the correct bits to put together, as I have been away from the market for so long.
I am looking forward to putting it together.
And it should be lightspeed ahead of what I am running now.

I just got frustrated with this rig getting tied up over the weekend. CPU is mostly running at 95 to 100% capacity between crunching and surfing the 'net.
It's my daily driver, and it is stable enough, it's just not fast enough anymore.
It's P5K Deluxe mobo was released in mid 2007. And the Xeon 5470 I'm running in it was released in September of 2008.
Things have advanced just a tad since then......LOL.

I may put it back together as another crunch only rig, as I won't be reusing any parts from it except the SSD and the GPUs. I should have something in spare GPUs here to get it running again. And I think I have a spare case in the junkyard somewhere.

Parts are starting to ship!

Meow!!

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

I am running an Opteron 1210 on my SUN workstation since January 2008. Recently it started crashing and I checked its 8 GB DDR2 RAM (four modules) via the SuSE Tumbleweed ISO disk which has a RAM tester. One or more modules were failing, so I bought 4 Corsair DDR2 modules for 105 euro. Apart from this, I only changed its hard disk, which had started at 160 GB and is now at 1 TB. I also installed an Audigy sound card and a GTX 750 Ti GPU board, for which SuSE Linux gave me the 384.69 driver. All the rest is just the same of 2008. I had paid 780 euro for it. I have always liked SUN computers, now they are Oracle.
Tullio

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Wow o wow o wow.
I gotta give Newegg a AAA+ on this one.
Ordered most of the new computer bits on 10/1. They all arrived yesterday.
Ordered the CPU cooler and a new case just yesterday. And they both arrived this morning.
Just fantastic order processing and shipping!

The kitties give Newegg their best meows!

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."