I have a problem when I use charts in Microsoft Access.  The chart won't display its contents until I click on the chart and then click on something else (the record selector, blank space, another control, etc).  The charts are all designed to use an SQL query as their row source.  After clicking around a bit, the charts always display correctly.  I wish that the chart would display from the start, though.

Scope:
I have this problem when displaying charts in the header, detail, and footer sections of an unbound (no record source) form and when displaying charts in the header, detail, and footer sections of a bound form opened with an external filter.  I do not have this problem when the filter applied to a bound form comes from the form's Properties-Data tab, or when the form has a record source but no filter.  I also do not have any problems displaying charts in a bound form that is unfiltered, nor in reports using identical charts (via copy/paste).

Symptoms:
To view the contents of a chart in one of the affected forms (see above), I must either move the focus to the chart (if the chart does not have the focus when the form is opened) or move the focus away from the chart (if the chart has the focus by default).  I usually accomplish this by clicking on the chart or the record selector, respectively.

I have attempted using vba to move the focus around, refresh, repaint, and requery both the form and the chart.  None of these have fixed this problem, and a few searches for fixes online haven't yielded any success.

 

An example Row Source for a chart:

• SELECT (Format([Date],"DDDDD")),Avg([Cash]) AS Money FROM [RegisterLog]   GROUP BY (Int([Date])),(Format([Date],"DDDDD"));

 

 

I found the first aid kit I used for shows back in high school - it contained the following:

1 - zip lock bag for ice
5 - sinus pain relief doses (expired 12/05)
2 - 3-in-1 first aid antibiotic ointment
4 - ibuprofen doses (expired 12/05)
2 - electrolyte tablets packets (expired 09/05)
8 - smiley face small bandaids
4 - regular bandaids
2 - butterfly bandaids
2 - slightly larger bandaids
1 - sterile gauze pad
1 - Carmex EZ-ON applicator

So while I may not have kept that kit updated, I was certainly well-prepared back then.  Current medical preparedness kit details are, of course, classified.

An atheist was walking through the woods.
 
"What majestic trees!", "What powerful rivers!", "What beautiful animals!",  He said to himself.

As he was walking alongside the river, he heard a rustling in the bushes behind him.  He turned to look.  A 7-foot grizzly bear charging towards him.

The man ran as fast as he could up the path.  He looked over his shoulder and saw that the bear was closing in on him. He looked over his shoulder again, and the bear was even closer. He tripped and fell on the ground.  He rolled over to pick himself up but saw that the bear was right on top of him, reaching for him with his left and raising his right paw to strike him.

At that instant the Atheist cried out, "Oh my God!".

Time Stopped.
The bear froze.
The forest was silent.

As a bright light shone upon the man, a voice came out of the sky.  "You deny my existence for all these years, teach others I don't exist, and even credit creation to a cosmic accident.  Do you expect me to help you out of this predicament?  Am I to count you as a believer?"

The atheist looked directly into the light and said, "It would be hypocritical of me to suddenly ask you to treat me as a Christian now, but perhaps you could make the BEAR a Christian?"

"Very Well", said the voice.

The light went out.  The sounds of the forest resumed. And the bear dropped his right paw, brought both paws together, bowed his head & spoke:

"Lord bless this food, which I am about to receive from thy bounty through Christ our Lord, Amen."

For America's Santas, It's Hard to Be Jolly With the Tales They're Hearing (WSJ subscription required, (I think) it doesn't seem to require a subscription right now).

My mom decided to start a new tradition this year - nachos and A Christmas Story (imdb) the night of the 23rd.  I have seen clips from the movie, but never the full thing.  After all the "You'll shoot your eye out!" and that wonderful leg-lamp (and the fact that this time I didn't sit in my plate of nachos), I think I might be able to enjoy this Christmas tradition.  While watching Ralphie so desperately yearn for an official Red Ryder carbine-action 200-shot range model BB rifle with a compass in the stock, I realized that I don't really have much that I'd like for Christmas.  I want a fire in Mom and Dad's fireplace (and a DVD or two), but until I make that jump to an after-college apartment, I'm pretty much set for things.

The article from the link above is sitting on my desk back at school because it really hit me how bad the times are for other people .  One Santa from the article had to stop quipping that bad children would receive socks for Christmas - too many kids were asking for socks after hearing their parents worrying about money.  The recession is over, according to the economics experts.  This Christmas I hope we can be happy for what we have, especially when so many kids out there are asking for socks instead of an official Red Ryder carbine-action 200-shot range model BB rifle with a compass in the stock.

Merry Christmas.

I'm having problems with the network card on my desktop (XP).  The quick fix is to reboot my computer and hope it doesn't happen again anytime soon.  But after spending more than an hour trying to figure out the exact cause this weekend, I am out of ideas.  My roommate had this problem before upgrading from XP, only it would happen anytime the computer was on for more than about 4 hours.  Aside from the operating system, the only similarity I can think of is that we both use TrendMicro (version 8 when he had the trouble, versions 8 and 10 when I had the trouble).  However, I had successfully used this computer for more than a year with TMSC 8 before the problem started.

The symptoms:

• The computer will be working fine for hours or days, until suddenly all http traffic fails to successfully load.  I can ping other computers and on- and off-campus servers (Google being my favorite), I can check email using Thunderbird, but I cannot get any webpages to load in either Firefox or Internet Explorer.
• the ARP table doesn't seem as full as it should be.  I compared between my laptop and desktop (connected to the same switch), and the desktop had only the gateway for the subnet I'm on, while the laptop had several other local IP addresses.
• I can't enable the wireless network card, nor can I disable the Ethernet card.
• I disabled the Windows Firewall (I left the TrendMicro firewall up), but this did not fix the problem at the time.

Some solutions I've seen on the Internet but haven't tried yet:

• from: http://beer234.blogspot.com/2008/10/port-80-blocked-windows-xp.html
  Restart the Windows XP PC in Safe Mode.
  Run Regedit.exe to open the registry editor.
  Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESystemCurrentControlSetServicesvsdatant
  Click start in the right pane and modify the value to 3.
  Restart the PC and port 80 should no longer be blocked and you can use http with any browser.

"28 Days Left in the Semester", the dry erase board read.  Every day I pass by it, I'm reminded that counting down until you leave a place for forever isn't the way to live.  Graduating and job hunting is scary business.

I was walking to class about a week ago just as the sun was peaking out above the power plant.  We must have had a nice freeze, because all the cars in the lot had beautiful patterns of frost crystals spread across them.  I've never seen sublimation before in the wild, so to speak, but as the sun hit the ice crystals on those cars, the ice didn't melt but instead turned to steam and drifted up.  It was really weird to see steam coming off of cold, parked cars when the air was cold enough for me to see my own, heated breath.
I wish I had taken a picture.

My college has an emergency alerts system that sends email and text messages to registered students and staff in the event of an emergency.  Because of an error in how they set the system up, I was able to send a message to about 12,000 people last Wednesday.  (The error has since been corrected.)

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It started out simply enough.  I was just making sure that my contact information was up to date so that I would get any emergency alerts.  I saw that I was subscribed for alerts for both campuses, and I noticed that I could "Click for more information".  This sent me to a page with a basic description of alert distribution list, an empty section that was labeled "Posts", and a 3rd empty section I can't remember much about.

When I clicked on the "Add new post" button, I expected one of two things to happen.  Either I was going to get a message saying Insufficient Privileges, or I was going to find an online forum or message board.  Instead, I was presented with 2 text boxes, one for the text message and one for the email message.  At this point I was sure that the system waited until someone attempted to post a message before determining if the person had permission to send a message to the whole campus, which seemed somewhat sloppy.

Just in case the system ended up letting me send a message out, and because it was accurately describing what I was doing, I decided  to send a message that said "Test - Manhattan_Campus_Alerts sent 12:20 P Central".  This way people would not get a blank emergency alert, and I just felt like I should put something there.  I didn't really think this through very far, otherwise I would have realized that if this works, I would be sending a message to everyone on campus, but I was still convinced that I was going to get a message telling me I wasn't allowed to send this message.  Instead, within 15-20 seconds after pressing the send button and thinking "Why'd it send me back to the beginning?  Does that mean it didn't work?", I felt me phone vibrate with a text message - the text message I had put in the box on the web interface.

After panicking for a few moments (well, hours really, but I started acting before the panic stage was over), I talked with a couple of older, wiser souls who encouraged me to call someone so that they would know that I wasn't acting maliciously and so that they would know to patch the hole in their system.  As luck would have it, they guy I tried to call was out for the week.  Of course, I didn't find this out until I got a call from the director of the department responsible for the alert system.  Luckily, he wasn't too angry with me (I'm not going to jail, that's enough for me).  He thanked me for treating it like a test rather than saying that there was a bomb on campus.  It turns out that even though any student could have sent a message, I was the only one who did.  Normally, only about 5 people are allowed to post to the emergency alert system.  He did request that I call before clicking anything critical the next time I try testing their security.

Most people don't know that I sent the message, unless they happened to be around while I was panicking about getting expelled or going to jail.  I have had a few suggestions about what I should have said instead of "testing":

• "Class is cancelled for today.  Please leave campus."
• "Long live Tony"
• "Hey ladies, I'm single.  Give me a call at (###) ### - ####

Then again, any of these messages would likely have resulted in some more serious punishments.  And for now, I'm just glad to have this whole experience behind me.

I'm working on finishing off my resume before its final review, and it seems that I'm missing an objective statement.  I'm an electrical engineering major with a specialty in digital electronics.  So far I've got "To obtain a full-time job in the digital electronics industry".  I don't know if I need to add qualifiers like "as an engineer", or "by using this amazing complement of skills you can review in the splendid resume found below", or if something that short really would cover it.

If anybody knows anything about this and would be willing to offer suggestions, I'd appreciate it.  I'm going to be sending it off for review probably late tonight, but it will still be a work in progress.

We managed to avoid the "swine flu" H1N1 virus in summer camps at K-State (to the best of my knowledge).  Now that class is back in session for 1 day, we have at least 2 cases.  KU has 30 cases after its 3rd day of class.  I made the connection at the floor meeting that I work at the front desk in a way that interacts with almost every resident who walks through the doors at night.  My plan right now is to stock up on hand sanitizer and make use of it often.  Beyond that, I'm just going to rely on my wicked good looks and awesome luck to get me through the next few months.

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In other news, because of previous failures to hire new desk workers, there are currently only 8 people who are supposed to fill 220 hours per week.  That's an average of 27.5 hours per week per person (and we also have to go to class, eat, and sleep).  The new administration has made significant changes to the desk layout, but the actual policies are remarkably the same as before.  It's just really hard to do the same thing when everything is in a different place, including me.  I've decided to wait until the end of the week to give the new layout a try, and then I'll be requesting that we make some changes to improve the layout of the desk.  I think that this should be enough that I don't complain about anything just because it is different.

Abortion provider George Tiller was murdered while ushering for his church yesterday morning.  Instead of analyzing the possible outcomes for the controversy because of this, I'd like to propose a solution to the problem.

As I see it, there are two sides - those who think women should have the right to choose (pro-choice) and those who think that abortions should never happen (pro-life).  So here's the fix to make everyone happy:

So now every woman can choose whether or not to have an abortion, and every woman will choose to not have an abortion.  Both sides of the argument have what they want, and both think they've pulled one over on the idiots on the other side.  Now everyone can sleep safely at night and argue about something else.

Too bad it will never work.