The Vent and Rant Thread

[ApK]

My kids, my daughter especially, has that issue with toothpaste. She doesn't like any mint, and doesn't like bubble gum. We have to buy kids fruit flavors on Amazon.
We also get cinnamon flavor from Amazon. It's gotten hard to find locally. That's my personal favorite (though I'm fine with mint), and will serve my kids in a pinch.

[Rumpelteazer]

Update on my scanning woes.

I bit the bullet and bought an A3 scanner, the Viisan VF3240. I'm now experimenting with it and even if I don't use the highest quality the scan is good. It's a isn't quite as sharp as the one I got done professionally recently, but that might be because I haven't found the right settings yet. I'll be experimenting today to see what works best. It does seem Acrobat has a problem with opening the pdf; it's too big and it displays it truncated, but I have a pdf editing app that can open it without problems.

I'm now experimenting with which dpi I want to scan patterns in. It looks like 600dpi is more than good enough (it can also scan in 1200dpi and 2400dpi). I do need to push down on the lid, otherwise the area around the fold will be lighter.

I do have a couple of patterns that are bigger than A3, so I'll have to experiment with folding the paper or going to get those scanned in at the copy shop (they can scan up to A0 size). Luckily bigger than A3 sized patterns are rare.

I think this scanner is going to be a good investment for my cross stitching.

ETA:
Now I have to rescan most of my kits and paper patterns. That will take me good portion of a day (including editing and merging files). But it'll also give a chance to see what I got and maybe make a priority list.

[ownedbycats]

Alert Ready test today. So of course I'll probably forget about it until everything in apartment (and neighbors apartments) starts blaring nuclear sirens.

[Renate]

Originally Posted by Rumpelteazer

It does seem Acrobat has a problem with opening the pdf...

Why are you even stuck dealing with PDFs?
PDFs might (I said might) have some advantages for some things, but scanned documents doesn't seem to be one of those.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

Alert Ready test today. So of course I'll probably forget about it until everything in apartment (and neighbors apartments) starts blaring nuclear sirens.

I did forget about it.

Good news: It interrupted a Nickelback song on the radio!

[Rumpelteazer]

Originally Posted by Renate

Why are you even stuck dealing with PDFs?
PDFs might (I said might) have some advantages for some things, but scanned documents doesn't seem to be one of those.

Because PDFs work best with the cross stitch app. Amongst other things a PDF can contain multiple pages in one file. When working with images (jpg or png) one image per file. So if you work on project printed on multiple pages you’ll have switch between files. I like to be able to see the next page when stitching in that area. One of the reasons is to prevent a vertical page break line from appearing in your stitching.

You also don’t want a huge file size. That slows down things in the app. 600dpi is the sweet spot for me.

Today my sister found some old family photos. So when I get back from my concert trip on Friday I’m going to see how well this scanner scans images.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[DNSB]

The last time I was scanning images for OCR, I found multi-page TIFFs were the best choice for my uses.

[ownedbycats]

Brand-new carton of milk split open in fridge overnight. Good start to the morning.

[ownedbycats]

Menstrual products... "up to zero leaks" makes no bloody sense. Yes, pun intended.

[Rumpelteazer]

I started my new cross stitch project today. Yesterday I used thin, red fishing wire to sew a grid in the fabric to make things easier for me. After about 75 stitches today I noticed I made a mistake yesterday in gridding. Not a huge problem and fairly easily remedied, but I would need to rip out the stitches I did so far.

I was a bit too impatient doing that and ripped a couple of threads in the fabric. Of course in a space where when I restitch things I won't stitch over it.

So I have ordered new fabric. Tomorrow I'll cut it to size, glue the edges to prevent fraying and on Thursday I'll grid it, paying extra attention. I'll probably restart the project on Friday.

Gridding is the most tedious part and I'll have to sew in a grid of 25 by 25 squares. That took me almost three hours yesterday. Skipping it won't do, because a grid does save me a lot of time in the end. Yes, there is fabric with a grid printed on it (dissolves in hot water), but that's only available in white fabric and not the creamy/off white colour of this project.

[Renate]

Originally Posted by Rumpelteazer

I'll probably restart the project on Friday.

Sigh. No project ever ends up as successful as you had planned it.
But usually it ends up pretty good anyway.

[Rumpelteazer]

Originally Posted by Renate

Sigh. No project ever ends up as successful as you had planned it.
But usually it ends up pretty good anyway.

It's just annoying because I was on a roll with cross stitching. And gridding is just so tedious. I'll take the opportunity to prepare another project (this I can use pre-gridded fabric with). The Mucha one is 50 shades of earth tones (okay, 29 shades and 8 blended colours). Plus, because it's a bigger project with lots of background it isn't the type of project that reveals itself to you. Only after finishing it and taking it off the hoop do you see what you've done. So I got two smaller, very colourful project to work on when I'm fed up with browns and greens.

[PeterT]

I know by now most of you are fed up with me and eye issues but... guess what!

Thursday evening the lens went walkies again and was non findable. The friends I'm staying with had a family emergency in California and have been gone for a few weeks. Sent an email to my Eye Care team as their contact lens specialist had told me she was willing to help out. Friday morning heard back and she was available, so I headed downtown. Within minutes of getting there she had located and removed the lens!!! She also gave me a little plunger (think of a drain plunger but 1 inch long) which can be used to remove the lens

Made it home with the lens and all was great.

Saturday afternoon the damn thing went AWOL again! After much peering (I got smart and used the selfie mode on a tablet to blurrily see the eye) I was able to at least see the glint from the lens, and eventually removed it

Sunday yet another stray! I do know what is causing it though; both times I had dozed off sitting on a sofa in the basement. This time though, no luck in seeing it, or feeling it through the eyelid and moving it around. Decided to rehydrate a backup lens and wait till the morning.

This morning I put the backup lens in so at least I could see. Decided to once again try the selfie camera on a tablet and... I could see the lens between the Iris and the nose. Managed to manoeuvre the plunger to be on the lens and, SUCCESS. It's out!

[JSWolf]

I'm not fed up by your eye issues. I like to hear when it gets sorted.