Random Access

Thursday
Good day at work…
Quiet evening at home.

NPR and PRI

• Talk of the Nation: Metrosexuals
• Talk of the Nation: Disney Animation
• All Things Considered: Senate Votes Against Cuba Travel Ban
• Fresh Air: Matt Groening Interview
• The World
• Marketplace: Commentary on the last flight of the Concorde

Sidenote: I have listened to The Diane Rehm Show (“Rehm” pronounced “reem”) off and on for about a year-and-a-half now. I find it to be a good show, but I know many people who “can’t listen to it,” because her voice has an unusual, wavering quality that is a result of spasmodic dysphonia.

But even now, at the prime of her career, Diane Rehm has had to fight to retain her voice – the instrument that allows her to do what she does so well. In 1998, Rehm was diagnosed with a rare neurological disorder, spasmodic dysphonia, that strangles the vocal cords, causing vocal tremors and worse. There is no cure. But the treatment, which consists of regular injections directly into the vocal cords of a strain of botulism, has allowed her to return to the airwaves she loves.
-excerpted from an interview in the Bay Weekly

I find the fact that she has confronted her illness and does a show despite it to be a story of great courage and achievement. If you get a chance to listen to her show, give it a try.

Stray Toasters

• The Marlins beat the Yankees. *nod*
• The neighbors started moving furniture again around 8:15. (Just as I was getting into tonight’s episode of CSI!!!) Jess was in another room. I yelled to her: “Jess, the neighbors are at it again!” Oddly enough, they stopped. Gee, I hope that I didn’t make them self-conscious or something…
• Buick. “LaCrosse.” Quebec. It seems that “LaCrosse” is slang for “masturbation” in Quebec. Guess what Buick named one of their new cars. That’s a great use of the marketing research budget.

  In a related note: Lacrosse (the sport, not “the activity”) is often thought to be Maryland’s official state sport. It isn’t. The official state sport is: Jousting, not to be confused with “tilting” (as seen in movies like A Knight’s Tale or other medieval-setting movies).

• I’m not sure “why,” but IE6 doesn’t seem to like locally applied styles. I’ve looked at a couple of my entries in Mozilla and they show up the way that I intended for them to show up; in IE, they are plain old run-of-the-mill text.
• Sissy vs. the Pipes screen saver – Round 3.
• There is… a house… in New Orleans…

And with that, I am off to wander on the other side of the gates of The Dreaming.

Namaste.

Wednesday
I am a genius.

agreed to come over to help me figure out why the Windows PCs couldn’t connect to the Linux one. According to Linux, Samba was working properly. By all rights, the computers should have all been connected and happily playing together. But they weren’t. checked a couple of things and tried pinging the computers. No go. And that is when I noticed something: Only three out of four connection status lights were lit on the hub.

I had neglected to connect the Linux box to the hub.

Yes, “genius,” I say.

While we were working “under the hood,” so to speak, I replaced the NIC in Jess’ computer. She had been having a number of unusual problems with the network… and with normal operations. Once the NIC was swapped out, those problems disappeared.

---

Tonight was a beer/coffee group night. This week: beer. We met at the Porcupine Pub (at the mouth of Big Cottonwood Canyon); and his wife joined us. The pub is celebrating Oktoberfest… right down to having a couple members of the waitstaff in “traditional” attire. I’m still not sure how I managed to miss the young lady in her… outfit (it wasn’t exactly run-of-the-mill)… when we first arrived. *shrug* It was a good time.

: Tell the missus that we’ll have to make a trip to Redrock (or Macaroni Grill) for another run at calamari.

---

NPR and PRI Stories

• Fresh Air: Law & Order creator Dick Wolf and actor Robert Downey, Jr.
• Talk of the Nation
• All Things Considered
• The World

Stray Toasters

• What kind of chew toy do you get for a dog that chews drywall?
• I must remember to exact a terrible and painful retribution from Robert for sending me a link to that God-forsaken “Badger” cartoon/Flash thing.
• ProudBody – I could try to explain, but it wouldn’t do any good. This must be experienced for the full effect.

Namaste.

I have coffee and Krispy Kreme doughnuts.
You may now suffer pangs of jealousy.

That is all.

Tuesday
It was another information gathering day at work. Took a field trip in the late afternoon.

I did some of the rewiring when I got home. I am trying to route as many of the wires/cables as possible along the edges and legs of the desks. I need more Velcro cable ties, but it’s looking pretty decent, so far.

Stray Toasters

• More conversations with the parental units. Mom’s school is undergoing evaluations by assessment teams from the state; it seems that some of the school’s curricula have been a bit below the acceptable criteria. She had assessors in her class last week. I’m proud to say that as of this evening, she was the only teacher in the school to receive all exemplary marks.
• Storytelling over dinner with Anna, Jon and Morgan.
• The joy that is the 2004 IKEA catalog.
• …and I wonder where she will stay, my little runaway.
• I called a couple of friends with whom I hadn’t spoken in far too long. It was good to catch up on things we hadn’t talked about. I am going to have to see to it that we don’t have so much time between our conversations.
• : I’m sure that I’d (eventually) discover this if I muddled through it long enough… but, since I’m in an “instant gratification” mood: Using Mozilla’s mail program, do you ever receive messages in XHTML that only show the source code and not the “finished product?” And if you have found a way around it, please let me know what it is.

This post was brought to you by the letters “T” and “G” and the number “6”.

Namaste

Monday
Waking up and getting up has never been easy…
“Waking Up” by Elastica.

Unfortunately, that was not the case this morning. The problem was the residual aching in my left hamstring and lower back. Although, I will admit that I did hug the covers for a bit longer than usual this morning.

Work.

Home. I spent the evening in the company of , the short-tressed and . We sat around, ate pizza and watched a couple of shows on the Discovery Health Channel: Buff Brides and a show about plastic surgery. Innnnteresting. I think that the MST3K factor helped make the shows more amusing.

Stray Toasters

• Yet more…
• I spoke with the mother-unit (yesterday) and the father-unit (today). They make me laugh sometimes. I have great ‘rents.
• It’s amusing when your younger brother instant messages you and the first thing that he asks is when HALO 2 is coming out.
• Utah drivers. *twitch*
• One pizza. One order of breadsticks. FIVE cups of garlic dipping sauce.
• Spectral tornado.
• It seems as though the cats are getting better acclimated to the new furniture arrangements. AND… Xena, who usually hides at the sound of someone knocking on the door, was rather social with tonight. As Dr. Rosenblatt would have said: “It’s just so bizarre…“

And now, off to The Dreaming.

Namaste.

Fait accompli.
The office and the bedroom have been exchanged. A big “thank you” to for helping me with the process.

I have already started referring to the new, larger office as “HALO Command Center” and “HALO Control Post.” It’s more “media center” or “den” than “office” now, so I don’t feel bad about the new sobriquet. I still need to rewire a couple of things and get some more cable ties, but we have Internet access and satellite reception, so I’m rather happy. Now, I just need to finish clearing the miscellaneous “stuff” (magazines and books and what have you) from the floor…

Bowling last night was good. I got a 180 on my last game. It should have been higher, but I had a few frames in the middle of the game that were less than stunning. There’s always next weekend. Breakfast was good, as well. I made my third shake; it turned out well. This time, I even remembered to add milk! And I remembered to blend it all the way through, not just the top 2/3 of it. Pat, one of the Sandy City Police officers whom we usually see at the bowling alley, and some friends of his came to V.I. and ate with us. He told us a few interesting on-the-job stories.

I awoke in pain this morning: My left hamstring and my lower back were in disgruntled mode. Apparently, the furniture moving (literal, not figurative) and bowling took their toll. I will be seeking a bottle of Aleve in fairly short order.

---

Football Update
I was 0 for 3 today, despite some rather impressive showings.

Baltimore at Cincinnati
Final Score: 26 – 34
This was a grudge match, of sorts – the Bengals head coach, Marvin Lewis, was the former defensive coordinator for the Ravens. The Ravens got on the board early and then let the Bengals completely own the rest of the first half – the Bengals scored 24 unanswered points. It was not pretty. The second half, however was more to my liking. The Ravens looked more like the team that I have been watching for the past couple of weeks. But, it was too little, too late – they lost the game. I think that I’ll send Bret and my uncle an email saying “Look how badly my team played today…” Just because.

New England at Miami
Final Score: 19 – 13
The dolphins lost this one in overtime. *sigh*

Tennessee at Carolina
Final Score: 37 – 17
The Panthers lost.

---

And now… off to find some mischief to get into…

Namaste.

I’ve mentioned that I like it when a television program can surprise me. This morning, I had a couple of those surprises:

• X-Men: Evolution – “Ascension (part I)”: The first of the two-part season finale. Professor X confronted Apocalypse. And the Four Horsemen of Apocalypse were introduced. And they were not whom I was expecting. Wow. They put a rather interesting spin on the comics’ story line.
• Justice League – “Twilight (part II)”: I didn’t get to watch this entire episode, but I did record it. Of what I did see, I was impressed. As always, the quality of the writing on this show is high. For example, Batman. The writers have maintained the all of the edge that he had in Batman: The Animated Series:
  

  Superman: You don’t know Darkseid like I do!
  Batman: We know he used you, brainwashed you, humiliated you, and turned you loose against the earth…..cry me a river.

  …and, during Superman and Darkseid’s climactic confrontation:

  Superman: You have to go through me.
  Darkseid: You really are a glutton for punishment. Time and again I’ve beaten you, humbled you. What makes you think this outcome will be any different?
  Superman: This time I won’t stop until you’re a greasy smear on my fist. Let’s go.

  This is definitely different, more mature, Superman than was seen in Superman: The Animated Series.

In other toon-related items, Cartoon Network aired the chupacabra episode of Dexter’s Laboratory. It reminded me of . They also aired the “Techno Turtle” episode, in which DeeDee rescued an injure baby turtle (which she thought was a partially-hatched bird) and Dexter performed bionic surgery on it. It reminded me of The Six Million Dollar Man shows that I watched when I was younger.

Friday
Work. It included a meeting this afternoon; that went well. On the whole, it was a decent day that stretched farther into the evening than planned.

After work, , and I headed to Borders for Friday night coffee and hanging out. , and were there. We sat. We chatted. We (minus and ) went to Applebee’s for a late-ish bite to eat. And, I thank God (and any other higher powers who had a hand in it) that I didn’t see what and saw as we were leaving.

---

NPR and PRI Stories
Talk of the Nation
All Things Considered
The World
MarketPlace
The Connection

---

Stray Toasters

• Apparently, it’s still not out of my system… Tada!!!
• The meeting that I mentioned above was held outside – it was a nice day out and we took advantage of that fact. I sat in the sun, as it wasn’t too warm. Apparently, I got a little bit of a tan… one that is most obvious where the arm of my sunglasses shaded the side of my face (from eye to ear). commented on my tan line while we were at Borders. My retort:
  

  “It’s not a tan line, it’s a racing stripe!”

• Of all the things that came in the mail today, the one that literally made me smile: The Lego “Shop at Home – Holiday 2003” Catalog!
• The lady in the red dress, the pitcher of water, friction and gravity.
• “Mooks” and “midriffs.”
• Bowling pin tattoos.
• The Theme from The Rockford Files.

Namaste.

Thursday
It was a decent day on the work front.
I returned home for a relaxing evening of CSI and anime.

Apparently, I didn’t get this out of my system last night. Thus, I give you: these!
(It’s become rather addictive…)

Star Wars and all affiliated properties are trademark of LucasArts.

---

NPR and PRI Stories
Talk of the Nation
All Things Considered
The World
MarketPlace
The Connection

---

Stray Toasters

• Sissy the Wonder Kitty is apparently fascinated by the “Pipes” screen saver on Windows. She’s been sitting on the chair in front of the other computer, completely rapt, for the past three to five minutes. (update: The monitor just went blank under “Power Saver” mode. She’s trying to figure out where the pipes went. It’s rather cute.)
• Utah Drivers. I’ll just leave it at that.
• Utah road construction. There. NOW, I’ll leave it at that.
• While doing some research for work, I came across this site. I showed it to ; some of the articles on the site really seemed to floor her. I haven’t finished formulating my thoughts on the site, but I think that she said quite a bit about a couple of items (behind the cut tag).
• Linux. My understanding of it is growing. And that’s a good thing.
• A cherry Slurpee® would be good right now.
• I’ve switched from IE6 to Mozilla Firebird for my default browser. I like it, but I’m not sure if I’m going to switch to Thunderbird (the mail client) as I am rather happy with Eudora.
• No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!

Off to wander the lands beyond the gates of The Dreaming.

Namaste.

Last night, I was looking at the site for Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and… well…

This is what happens when I’m bored and have access to the Internet and Photoshop.

Star Wars and all affiliated properties are trademark of LucasArts.

First off: Happy Birthday to !

Stray Toasters

• I think that we might have a solution to the rambunctious neighbor problem. The funny thing is that it was a fringe benefit of another, unrelated idea!

  One of the joys of having a two-bedroom apartment is the “two bedroom” part. As it stands, the master bedroom is being used as… the master bedroom (Go figure) and the second bedroom is used as my office/playspace. We’re about to change that. Since we have been horribly underutilizing the space in the bedroom and the office is very cramped, it makes more sense to move the furniture into the current office and turn the second bedroom into an effective (and much larger) office/playspace/den. It also will serve as a much more comfortable guest room with this configuration.

  The added benefit: When the neighbors are moving furniture, I will have the sound system on my computer to add my own sound effects to the mix. I never really needed the 900+ .wav files that a friend gave me a few years ago. But, as I recall, there are many of them that will be useful. Not to mention that the volume for HALO tends to get a little… loud. And I am also rather boisterous when watching football. Now all I need is Bolero… ::: evil grin :::

• I managed to suss out a Linux command more-or-less on my own last night. There might be hope for me getting the hang of it after all…
• retroCRUSH: The 20 Worst Movie Titles in Hollywood History
• retroCRUSH: The Worst Superhero Costumes of All Time
  

  Black Goliath: You know, when you’re an 80 foot tall black man, isn’t a costume to hide your secret identity a bit useless?

  You have NO idea….

• I-resign: Funny Resignation Letters
• As if the Utah Baby Namer wasn’t bad enough… I came across Bad Baby Names.
  

Tuesday
After staying up later than I should have last night, morning came too soon. I got up and got prepped for work in fairly short order. We were supposed to go to a presentation this morning, but wound up not going. *shrug* That allowed me to get a few things done at the office.

After work, I got to deal with the clusterfuck that is rush hour driving in the southwestern part of the Greater Salt Lake City Metropolitan Area. I figured that I would avoid the bottlenecks that are the result of the three construction zones between I-215 and home by looping around and coming home from the south. Good theory, but the execution can stand a little refining. I’ll have to investigate alternate routes.

Jess and I headed to The Gateway (hereafter referred to as “Larryland: North”) to see an advanced screening of the Ed Harris / Cuba Gooding, Jr. movie Radio. We got there to discover that they had overbooked the theatre. *shakes fist* So, we decided to get something to eat. On the way to get dinner, we stopped to say “hi” to , whom we hadn’t seen in far too long.

We ate at V.I. Jon and John were there; they hung out with us while we ate. I made my own milkshake tonight. Yes, I made it; Kris taught me where to find the ingredients and how to make them last weekend. I usually have a Cookies and Cream shake; tonight I added chopped nuts to the mix. It was a little thicker than I like (though not quite as thick as a Blizzard from Dairy Queen), but I figured that it was only the second time that I’d done it, so that was okay.

We came home and relaxed for the rest of the evening.

And now, I am off to seek the gates of The Dreaming.

Namaste.

I just got off the phone with him. He’s driving to from Baltimore to Ohio to visit members of my grandmother’s side of the family. He made it to Frederick and saw a sign that said that part of I-70/I-76 is closed.

The reason for the call: He wanted me to give him an alternate route.

Thanks to Ye Olde Streets & Trips, I was able to do so quickly and easily. After I told him what roads to take and where they connected, he was on his way.

The reason that I find this amusing: He’s driving the new car… with the On*Star system in it.

I’m not sure if they ever subscribed to On*Star, but I find it funny that he called me – on the other side of the country – for directions.

I love my dad.

It is.

Slept in a little because I was up later than usual. came over to help me set up Samba on my Linux rig. As I was moving files, I was a little taken aback by the reported size of the hard drive in it – I had forgotten that I had put a 40 GB drive in there. *boing* Guess where all of our mp3s and videos will be going. He also gave me a 21″ monitor that he was getting rid of. 21″ monitor… I can’t wait to see HALO on this.

Work wasn’t too bad.

I spoke with my dad for a bit – I called him to let him know that the birthday card he sent arrived.

Post-work, I set up the new monitor and watched a little football.

&nbsp&nbspat&nbsp&nbsp

So far, St. Louis is on top.

And now, off to and ‘ place for some gaming.

Namaste.

What makes for a great day off?

Relaxing.
Drawing.
FOOTBALL!!!

• at
  The Ravens took the win. It was a mostly defensive battle, but the entire team played well. And, they need to give the rest of the team whatever they fed to Ed Reed: He blocked a punt and ran it in for a TD and picked off a potential Cardinals TD pass for a great run back. And… Baltimore is on top of the division at 3 – 2.

• at
  Miami gets another one in the “W” column.

• at
  The big cats rolled over the Colts… and remain undefeated.

• at
  Pitt dropped this one to the Broncos, but they played well. It came down to a field goal in the last few seconds. I think that I’ll have to send another email to Bret and my uncle…

• And, special note to :
  at
  Congratulations to the Browns for their home win over the Raiders.

---

Simpsons Amusement of the Day
Lisa was on a quest for a more satisfying spiritual path. They did a scene with her walking against a black background and had signs for different churches floating around her. The two most amusing:

• Bed Bath and Baha’i
• Church of the Latter Day Druids

She discovered a Buddhist temple where she met Richard Gere, who gave her a tract explaining some of the tenets of the Buddhist faith. The ideas seemed to fall in line with her quest, so she ran to her window and:

Lisa Simpson: I am a Buddhist! I… am… a… Buddhist!!!
Ned Flanders: My Satan-Sense is tingling…

And now, off to figure out our pre-movie doings and then see Kill Bill.

Namaste.