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  • I’ll stick with Linux, thanks.

    written by

    james

    Out of random curiosity last year, I started to tinker with Linux on a local machine–specificly, a 5-year-old HP laptop that wasn’t really being used for a whole lot else. Not really being willing to bother considering what I could manage to lose and what I might want to keep–there was 4 years of crap on that laptop pre-install, I just pulled everything off that HD and onto this machine, and went about the business of installing Gentoo. I know, at least three of you are laughing at me for having made that decision. I like a challenge, okay? Since then, I’ve been playing, tweeking, updating, tweeking, and playing some more just to see how long it takes me to get everything working. Or, how long it takes me to break things so horribly it doesn’t even boot, whichever comes first.

    There’s a point to this, I swear. The thing that drew me initially to Linux is the fact that it can run on damn near anything with the right amount of tweeking. And the people behind it actually encourage it. I mean, the fact that it’s free doesn’t hurt either but still. I can dig up an old Pentium II, hook it up, pray to god it has an ethernet port on the thing so I can plug it into the router, and probably find a current version of Linux that’ll run on it. Windows and Mac OS can’t really make that claim. Hell, the advent of Vista broke most machines that could have run XP just fine a couple years ago. And Apple’s been trying for, like, ever to find a way to restrict people to buying their hardware if you want their OS.

    They’re trying it again, this time in the form of an update that apparently removes Intel Atom chipset support from the OS. While they point out it probably won’t take very long before someone comes up with a patch for it, they also sort of halfway gloss over the entire point as to why I won’t be buying a Mac anytime soon, against the multitude of advice that’ll no doubt be offered to me by Mac and Mac OS users alike. The OS can run on damn near any Intel chipset out there. And it even needs little to no modification to actually do so. You would think, since it means selling more copies of their OS, and since it means they can take even more market share away from Windows and Linux, they’d be all over it. Apparently you’d be wrong.

    I don’t like being told what I’m allowed to do with something I already paid for. That’s why I don’t own an iPhone, and why once I’m more comfortable with Linux I’ll probably be switching from Windows entirely. If Apple’s going to insist that if I want to run their OS, whether I have space for it or not I absolutely must buy their hardware, I’ll stick to Linux, thanks. Or, if not Linux, someone who’s not trying to work against me.

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  • I get the most random of emails.

    written by

    james

    Of course, most of the random emails I end up getting turn out to be spam, but some are still rather amusing. I got this one last night, for the third time this week and from the third different address this week.

    From: spam@email.address.removed
    To: my@email.address.removed
    Date: Mon 09/11/2009 3:40 AM
    Subject: Webmail Verification Update!

    Your mailbox quota has exceeded the storage limit which is 20GB as set by your administrator, you are currently running on 20.9GB.
    You may not be able to send or receive new mails until you re-validate your mailbox.
    To re-activate your account please click the link and login with the username and password provided for you below:
    https://rpc.formmailhosting.com/showform.php?id=6256
    Thanks and we are sorry for the inconviniences Localhost.

    Hey, don’t get me wrong, I’d love it if someone would give me 20 GB just for email storage and it didn’t end up being Gmail. But, if they did… I doubt they’d sign their warning emails “Localhost”. Or deactivate it for being overquota and require revalidation. Yes, spammers are stupid. Or, perhaps, I’m still tired. That may also be why I’m still smirking.

  • On my fascination with lists.

    written by

    james

    I have no idea why, but sometimes, just for random amusement or because I’m way too lazy to do much of anything else, the best way I find to get my point(s) across on here is in list format. I actually started it while I was still using LJ–and, in fact, probably picked it up from Michelle–as a way of writing things down that I either don’t want to, or don’t plan to right now, go into further detail on. Probably also explains why I’m starting to get back into Twitter at about the same time I considered getting back into blogging. I’m probably just as likely to release a brief blurb about something as I am to go into elaborate detail about it, so they kind of fit rather well together, I think. What I’m likely to go into list format about–in list format:

    • Random, possibly unrelated points with little to no explanation behind them
    • Thoughts of the day, as they happen and as I remember to write them
    • To do lists–I occasionally make those
    • Recaps of possibly related posts, where appropriate
    • Ideas for a project that I haven’t fully fleshed out yet
    • Entries not unlike this one

    Of course, there’s just a lot of things that make it to Twitter that don’t really need any further explanation–or, for that matter, belong on a blog. Or if they do, they belong there after events have happened that actually give them context. That’s also why my Twitter feed’s in the sidebar, and why you can follow it here. I may also make 2 or 3 obscure mentions of something, either on Twitter or on the blog, that don’t get expanded upon for a couple days. That’s generally what happens when I get particularly lazy. And, possibly, it may be a semi-good reason to not be so quick to switch to bullet points/list format/whatever you want to call it. But, it’s worked for me. If it ever stops working for me, then I’ll think about changing my ways. If it doesn’t take too much effort–see the lazyness claim above.

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  • How’d I get here?

    written by

    james

    I keep threatening to do that post about what the hell happened to me since the last time I was actively blogging (Um, LJ-ing, perhaps?). Well, consider this my attempt at doing so. I’ll warn you in advance there will probably be things that get missed–it *has* been about 4 months, after all.

    For starters, there were more than a few trips across the Canada/US border between myself and Jessica, who’s rarely updated LJ is over here for anyone who doesn’t already read her. Things in that department I don’t think can get much better. Well, beyond the elimination of the border but eh, that’s coming. Beyond that, I’ve been doing a lot more experimentation with Gentoo, my for the moment linux distribution of choice. I’d messed around very briefly with Debian and Ubuntu, but couldn’t get quite what I wanted out of those distributions. That, plus I rather like a challenge and Gentoo definitely provides that. I kept an old HP laptop around for the purposes of experimentation–and, actually, it was the same laptop I did most of my blogging on in the old days–so I can break it 6 ways from Sunday and not really be set back more than a couple hours’ tinkering. Works perfectly fine for me. In addition to that, I’ve been continuing to pound pavement in hopes of landing me a job. Not an easy thing to do when every day the unemployment line gets longer, but we manage. This in between trips to catch up with family, because… well, you know, they don’t tend to like it when you avoid them for long stretches at a time.

    Then there was the move. I’d spent the last year and a half or so on employment insurance while I looked for work, thus enabling to keep my rather nice–even if I do say so myself–apartment in Ottawa’s west end. Not having found anything though, it became necessary for me to find somewhere else to call home lest I end up going very broke very quickly. So, on October 23rd, everything I own and a few things I forgot I owned got stuffed into one box or another, and carted an hour and a half away to this, a basement apartment who’s upstairs neighbour has perhaps one of the creakiest floors I’ve heard in my life. Now, I’m still looking for work, still finding time to do a little geeking, and still–at least, as of about 2 weeks from yesterday–making trips across the border when I have the time, money and transportation. Not a whole lot has changed, save for my mailing address–which I’m still finding things that didn’t get the notification of that change–and the fact some things in life just plain aren’t as convenient as they were a month ago. But, win some, lose some. That be life.

    Once I have the space in this apartment, and everything I’ll immediately need to do so out of boxes and set up, I plan to get back into tweeking the laptop and making things work just that much better. And, with a little luck and a small miracle, it might result in me accidentally coming up on a skill or three I can put in a resume. Never hurts to say you can do something, particularly when that something didn’t require you shell out money you don’t have for a college/university education. Of course, if I don’t get that out of it, then maybe I’ll just have a computer I can use should I ever decide to wipe windows off this one. Either way, I can’t find a down side here.

    Well, that’s the summer and part of spring in a nutshell. Not very exciting, just… chaotic, really. Semi-organized chaos, but still. And if this is any indication, the next couple months don’t plan to be any different. Which, surprisingly, is how I like it. Can’t very well go researching new and somewhat impressive things to buy if you don’t have time to, after all.

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  • Maple Leafs 5, Red Wings 1.

    written by

    james

    Well, it’s not really what I’d call a winning streak, but I’ll take an undefeated streak just as well. At least one point in 7 games, and 2 points in each of the last 2 games, and Kessel netted himself 2 points tonight. Hard to find fault in at least tonight’s performance–hell, they managed to surprise the hell out of me. Could things have been improved? Sure. But, they killed every penalty they got themselves in, they only gave up the one goal, and it didn’t take a shootout. Not a bad starting place. Tuesday, they play the Wild. If they collapse then, I shall take back most of what I said. But until then, halalooya we got us a hockey team!

  • Searching for the elusive new job.

    written by

    james

    After Dell’s closure in June of last year, I’ve been devoting much of my time to trying to find something remotely resembling work that I can get into. I’ve had several interviews, but that’s usually about as far as they go. I have another this wednesday for the CAA–I’ve had conversations with them before, so this shouldn’t be entirely too difficult.

    I attribute part of my amusement at an observation I made yesterday to boredom, and perhaps to being still a little overtired, but a random stat circulated around Ottawa news outlets yesterday morning put a somewhat ironic smirk on my face. In the month of October, 800 full-time jobs were created. But yet, in that same period, unemployment went up by almost half a percentage point. Guess I’m gonna have more competition for that position than I thought. And the search continues.

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  • Maple Leafs 3, Hurricanes 2.

    written by

    james

    It had to happen sometime. I mean, we couldn’t have gone through the entire season on just won win, could we? Well, okay, so maybe we could have. Luckily we won’t have to worry about finding out. After last night’s win, the Leafs are just slightly less likely to have a standing reservation at the NHL basement hotel. Which suits me just fine, even if it means I didn’t get to see the much advertised scoring ability of one Phil Kessel. Ah well, still plenty of season to go. And if we get really lucky, they’ll continue to actually hit the net with what shots they do actually take. When Ottawa’s ahead of you in the standings, you know there’s a problem.

  • Have we hit bottom yet?

    written by

    james

    It’s no secret that I’m a Leafs fan. Probably to my own detrament, even. But I am. It’s well documented on my LJ, and even more so on my older, much deader blog. I’ve joked that it might as well be a religion. Well, that religion’s on the verge of finding itself in shambles, at least for those of us devoted to our Leafs. We’ve won an impressive… 1 game all season. And one might argue we didn’t deserve to win. You know it’s bad when I don’t lose sleep over missing a game. Even now, while it’s been switched on over here and will start in a couple minutes, I wouldn’t be too upset if it disappeared from my television. It’s all to do with the sinking feeling I get every time we talk Leafs. Face it, we’ve kind of hit rock bottom this season. Even a guy who’s probably a bigger Leafs fan than me called it the worst start in franchise history. Can we break out of it? Sooner or later we have to. “Close but no cigar” should be our new slogan.

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  • I thought it was just a 24th-century thing.

    written by

    james

    Apparently, I now stand corrected. Scientists have discovered antimatter. Well, sort of. The Fermi gamma ray telescope picked something up they’re calling antimatter when it observed a lightning storm. Don’t look now, but we may yet be heading for Star Trek days in my lifetime. Probably not, but hey, it’s a nifty thought.

  • Giving that new phone thing a try again.

    written by

    james

    One of the things I’ve been working at trying to accomplish before the move (more on that later), and haven’t actually managed to accomplish yet, is the replacement of my old Nokia phone–specificly, the 6682. I tried once before, but the folks over at Rogers’s sales department seem to have a bit of a hearing problem. Or perhaps just a comprehension problem.

    I ordered the Nokia E71, but about 5 days after the order was placed the phone I actually received wasn’t it. No big deal, I’ll just return it. Except not quite. I fired it back at UPS the same day I received it, and 2 days later, they knocked on my door with the exact same phone–and no return sticker thinggy. Brilliant. I spent pretty much the next week trying to twist their arm into getting me another one before I packed everything up and scrammed back to the Pembroke area. Suffice it to say, and not really all that surprising to me, it ended up actually rather not happening. Go figure.

    Then, the move happened. I packed up my old apartment in Ottawa, came 1.5 hours southwest-ish to Petawawa, and unpacked most of it in the span of a day or two. Actually, a lot of stuff’s still in boxes–but, hey, the majority’s actually useable again. I can live with that. Once I had things up and running here, it was back on the phone to Rogers to try and sort this mess out. I still had the phone, in its original UPS packaging, sitting on the end of my desk–well, once said desk finally got put back together–for the first weekend of my living in the new place. Rogers still wanted to email me a shipping sticker thing to print off and use. Which would have been perfect, except I still had absolutely no way to get access to said email. They tend not to remember you told them that 5 times already.

    I eventually gave up on that, as my return window was very quickly closing and I was flirting with a headache. I also finally ended up getting net access that Sunday night, but by then I wasn’t about to reenter that same dance. So instead, I called UPS up myself. And, as luck or something like it should have it, this time I got someone with more than half a clue. I scheduled them to come and pick up the thing. I got the address to one of their receiving yards from Rogers that morning, and when shipping dood showed up, it got handed to him. Along with a request to forget about billing me, and stick Rogers with the price tag–something he seemed a little too eager to do, but I wasn’t about to argue. Meant I could cheap out and well, cheap is good, no?

    The phone never did come back to me, and the fact they’re not charging me for it on this month’s bill would seem to indicate they did receive it, and didn’t screw up the processing of it. Either that or someone just committed a rather significant oopsy. Either way, as long as the price for that phone doesn’t end up on a future bill, I’m not about to call them up and say otherwise. So now, with that phone being on its way or already back to Rogers and out of my hair, I can focus on getting the one I was actually after.

    Which, last week, is exactly what I ended up doing. Only this time, rather than them simply sticking the wrong phone on my bill, the one I was after for whatever reason wasn’t showing up as one I was eligible to actually purchase. Perfect. So far you’re 3 for 3, Rogers. So I give them what for over the phone, and the rep basicly decides at that point to take responsibility for the whole damn thing. Which, when dealing with me, has been known to be a mistake. She tells me she’s going to keep checking, and call me if and when it actually gets sorted out. And, since everything should have been reset when I returned the phone and I knew I was eligible for it before I tried to buy it the first time, clearly it was a problem internal to them.

    I wasn’t holding my breath–remember, I used to sit on the other end of similar conversations. I know most folks who say that do it with the complete intent of blowing you off knowing the chances of them getting you again are pretty well slim to none. Particularly when you’re running an operation with multiple call centers in multiple locations dealing with multiple thousand customers nationally. This morning, though, I did get that call. Whatever went and broke on their end wound up getting fixed. Finally. So, after much nashing of teeth and a whole lot of wanting to curse out the next rep to pick up the phone, I managed, somehow, to at least get the order processed. Now, hopefully they send me the correct phone on this attempt. And, hopefully they do it before Google Voice goes global. Otherwise I see a bitchfest in their, and my, near future.

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