Welcome to Nowhere

Home » Page 83

  • MP3: 12 step recovery.

    written by

    james

    Occasionally, I’ll share an MP3 from my somewhat large and growing collection. Sometimes, that MP3 will come with a bit of background. This one used to be one of my theme songs a few years ago. Fitting, I think, since I’ve been told by a couple folks I give off the impression of someone who has absolutely no problem doing it. And indeed, for a while when I was going through college and even for a bit afterwards, I gave serious thought to doing it. I had a lot to recover from, and this is the kind of recovery I’d be most likely to engage in–assuming I had the money and the suitable environment in which to do it; something Pembroke/Petawawa kind of lacks. Nevermind the 12 step recovery programs you’re used to. This one would have gotten me back in gear a whole lot quicker if I’d actually thought about getting up the resources to do it. Hell, I consider me recovered now and still sometimes consider doing it–only this time, with the fiance instead of solo. It’s a country song, so if you’re not a country fan, don’t clicky the linky. If you are, enjoy. And hey, if it suits you as well as I think it does me, have a couple drinks on my account.

    Paul Brandt – 12 Step Recovery (please download and save before playing)

  • Hey, who turned on the highschool flashback?

    written by

    james

    So I was randomly bored this morning, and decided to look up the attendance list for one of those highschool reunions I can never manage to scrape together either the money or a halfway decent reason to show up at. Of the folks who were actually added to the publicly available list of people who were going to be there at this year’s meetup, for like the first time ever I actually saw more names on there I knew than those I didn’t. At first glance it almost looked like the school roster for my first or second year there.

    In no particular order, people who’s names came up on that list consisted of: two x-girlfriends, one x-girlfriend’s assumedly current fiance, one close friend who wanted to end up a girlfriend, several good friends of mine and theirs, and a couple people I only really knew of by reputation. This for a school who’s history goes back to before my grandparents were born, nevermind me. I had to read the thing twice to make sure I didn’t unintentionally get into something potentially bad for the mental faculties. And a third in case I missed something. I didn’t.

    I’m not sure if it says more for the folks I used to run with at that school or the ones who went there before us, but I feel just a little bit older than I should after seeing that many familiar names showing up there. And the ironic part, if given half a chance I’d at least for thirty seconds consider reestablishing contact with a couple of them. Not that I’d do it–nothing says hanging onto the past like looking up old highschool folks you haven’t even thought about in damn near a dozen years in some cases, but I’ve been known to at least consider it.

    I may or may not at some point go into details on why I’ve kind of left that school behind, but for the moment, I’ll just say for as much crap as it was required to put up with while I was going there, there were a lot of good reasons for me to stick around. Some of those good reasons were on that attendance list. But, that almost feels now like it was a completely different lifetime–I’ve kind of seen and done a hell of a lot since then. In a lot of ways I wonder if I’d even still get along with some of those people had we kept in touch, or gotten back in touch after this long not being. Still, it might have been nice to spend a weekend catching up with some of them. Now if only I’d been able to aford it, and care enough about the rest of the school to actually bother going. Oh well, maybe next time. Or the time after. Or not. In the meantime, if I end up hearing from folks I used to run with, I’ll burn that bridge when I get there. I’d just like to know who turned on the highschool flashback. And, if next time they’ll warn me first.

    , ,

  • And just like that, possibilities drop into my lap. Or something.

    written by

    james

    Just when you think good things don’t come from a simple trip to the grocery store, along comes a conversation like the one I had this morning. For background’s sake, a little primer. A family friend works for the Renfrew County Board of Education, apparently out of their Pembroke office. She knows someone who’s working with a kid who’s well on his way to going blind–he apparently doesn’t have much vision left and will have none before too long. This kid, on top of pretty much learning how to be blind, is also having to learn how to use the various adaptive pieces of equipment that are out there–like, for example, a screenreader so he’s not stuck recruiting a pair of working eyes to read things to him over his shoulder while he’s cruising the intertubes.

    Apparently, from what I’ve been told, a conversation was had at some point yesterday and my name came up as a possible resource for this kid; specificly in the computerwise education department. It involved talk of potentially contracting me with the school board in order to give this kid a second education on top of the mandatory one he’s getting from his school. It’s a good enough fit, I think–blind dude doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing with the computer plus screenreading technology. Blind geek practically knows computers plus screenreading technology like the back of his hand. Even if it’s just a temporary thing, I don’t think I could dream up a better situation–at least until something comes along that looks better on paper.

    I have absolutely no idea what a thing like this would involve, or for how long, or even what something like that pays–it’s the Renfrew County school board, though, so it may end up only paying minimum wage. Which is still better than what ODSP’s expecting me to live on until something else drops into my lap. Since this is a family friend we’re talking about though who’s apparently got the details, it won’t be hard to pull answers out of her. Which is what tonight’s plan will very likely consist of.

    With this new thing and the OLS thing I’ve got in the fire already, something I’m doing has to stick you’d think. I’d like to think before Christmas I’ll end up working somewhere; it’s just a matter of where, when and for how long. And where I’ll eventually be moving to in order to put myself closer to the potential job site. If either of these things gets off the ground and leads to something else, I’ll be very happy. In the meantime, think I’ll go see what other potential projects of the money making variety I can scare up. And have as much fun as I possibly can in the meantime. See? Geekyness tends to have its positive sides after all. Potentially. But we’ll just not pay any attention to that minor detail.

  • You’ll only hear me say this once. Maybe Apple isn’t quite so evil.

    written by

    james

    Or, rather, it’s evil, but perhaps it’s less evil than certain alternatives out there. In this case, surprisingly, Google’s answer to Apple’s success–Android. It’s being advertised as being probably the most open system currently available, but there’s an article being floated now that tries to question that. Oddly enough, the article makes sense. Android may be the most open system available, or at least more open than Apple’s, but it’s just open enough that the individual carriers may decide to lock it down on their own. From the article:

    Case in point: the last couple of Android phones I’ve gotten as demo units from Google: the EVO 4G and the Droid 2, have been loaded up with crapware installed by the carriers (Sprint and Verizon, respectively). Apple would never let this fly on the iPhone, but the openness of Android means Google has basically no say in the matter. Consumers will get the crapware and they’ll like it. Not only that, plenty of this junk can’t even be uninstalled. How’s that for “open”?

    It gets better, too–carriers have just enough maneuvering room to close it off on their own, and in their own way.

    And it’s not just Verizon, it’s all the carriers. One of the great features of Android is that you can install apps without going through an app store, right? Well, not if you have an a Motorola Backflip or a HTC Aria running on AT&T — they’ve locked this feature down. How? Thanks to the open Android OS.

    Oh, and how about tethering? It’s one of the truly great features of Android 2.2, right? Well, not if you have a carrier that doesn’t want to support it.

    Google has to defer to them to enable their own native OS feature. It’s such an awesome feature — in the hands of Google. Once the carriers get their hands on it — not so much.

    On the one hand, you’ve got Apple telling you what you’re allowed or not to put on or do with your phone. On the other hand, you’ve got the carrier telling you what you’re allowed to put on or do with your phone. And telling Google what it’s allowed to put on the phone it manufactures.

    There are a few more examples in the article–skype, anyone? But you get the idea. Between the two, if I was force to pick, I’d have to say maybe Apple isn’t quite so evil. And now I go thank my lucky stars I’m not actually forced to pick.

  • What is the meaning of your life?

    written by

    james

    Because I haven’t done one of these in a small forever. And because I don’t have much else to do tonight. Yeah, I know the HTML’s a little funked. I’m not fixing.


    The Meaning of Your Life is Joy


    The purpose of your life is simple: to live it to the fullest.
    You believe that happiness is a choice, and being happy isn’t that hard to figure out.

    Too many people struggle in their lives. You think they should just let go and enjoy what they’ve been given.
    It’s easy to find misery, but it’s difficult to find happiness. You know that all the happiness you need comes from within.

  • I need a work from home apartment. Then, a work from home job.

    written by

    james

    Okay, so maybe I may or may not actually need it. But I’ve gotten to the point where that’s one of those things I’ve been contemplating. Almost seriously, actually. If only because the idea of deciding exactly how much I work on a given day is way, way too appealing to me. And considering the fact that your usual type jobs aren’t doing a whole lot of hiring lately, this might just turn out to be the next best thing.

    I’ve given thought to temping, and have even applied with several agencies to that end–not that they’ve gotten me anywhere, but who’s counting? The income would probably be just as steady, only I’m not doing it in -40 degree temperatures after spending nearly as much time getting to/from work as I do at work. There’s just one very minor little problem. Work from home opportunities in Canada aren’t exactly overly well advertised.

    I did come across one or two companies who pretty much just serve as the bridge between contractors and clients, which is probably kind of what I’m looking for–unfortunately, in one case they’re primarily US-focused for both clients and contractors, and in the other their method of actually getting contractors into the system escentially requires that you forget Windows and boot into their own operating system–not cool for someone who kind of needs to hear what he’s doing. thankfully I’ll probably never be so desperate for work that I’ll just grab hold of the first thing to pop up, so this is mostly just all manner of research at the moment. It’s an interesting prospect which, if I do it right, will escentially allow me to work a halfway decent schedule and still have time to do the important things–like spend time with the fiance, and plan for the eventual wedding on top of finding a so-called real job.

    If I can find a company with the flexibility I like and technology I can actually work with, something kind of like ContractXchange minus the need to use their own OS, it’s a definite possibility for me to consider–if for no other reason than I’ll already have most of what I need handy, and situations like this one may not be as frequent an issue.

    It’s things like this that the research I’ve been sort of doing tonight comes in quite handy for. That, on top of the added fact that if I’m seriously thinking of actually doing this, I’m probably going to need a bigger apartment. A lot of these arangements I’m noticing strongly recommend you have your own dedicated office space, plus phone line, for this kind of thing–or at least a dedicated digital phone if nothing else. Which pretty much means the current setup I’ve got going on–the computer’s in the living room, and the only phone line I’ve got here is my personal one (Is my apartment even big enough for two landlines?), plus at the moment it’s a one-bedroom–is probably not about to make the cut. Neverminding the fact actually doing the work, particularly during the hours I’d prefer to be doing the work, would not be conducive to anyone I happen to have staying over–like, say, the afore mentioned fiance–actually sleeping if it was done in this apartment. I could probably, in a huge pinch, invest in something like Skype or Vonage if I had to and solve at least one problem. If I wanted to take all this ultraseriously, I could go even further and invest the money in an entirely separate computer strictly for all my work-related crap–but that just might be pushing it a little tiny bit. Since the initial setup’s probably going to cost me anyway if I’m actually considering this, it’s kind of worth throwing out there. Particularly if I have to start making modifications to the setup on this machine in order to get it to play nice with what they want me to do.

    Like I said, this is pretty much mostly just research and random contemplating at this point. I’m throwing it up here mostly because I can, and because if I do decide to dive in with all this, I’ll probably need to look this up to figure out what I don’t want in a potential employer of this variety. And, well, because there may be an idea or three floating around I haven’t yet run across. I don’t even know if this is something I’ll seriously give chase to, but if I do, at least now I have a pretty good idea what I’ll need, what I’m looking for, and what both will cost me. Now, let’s see if I can pull a random job out of my hat. That’s always helpful.

    , ,

  • The college thing bursts into flames, but I’m not done yet.

    written by

    james

    So you may or may not remember I extended my stay in Rochester for a little over two weeks extra. This a direct result of the fact the conversation I ended up having with Algonquin College’s disability department virtually undid everything I was trying to get all comfortably tied up when I wrote this entry. With pretty much three weeks before the course was supposed to start, and escentially a week past the deadline with second career, disability chick decided completely at random that the course was not going to be accessible. She was even nice enough to tell me she confirmed that with two of the individuals who were directly involved in that program–including mister questionable availability, who I’d already spoken to and got a rather different story from.

    Since I only had less than 3 weeks to actually do anything with all this–classes would actually be starting this morning, I pretty much effectively declared that ship sunk after hanging up the phone with her and jumped off it. Not all that long after doing that, I got wind of another way to get me the hell off government paychecks. It involves first getting a hold of ODSP people and figuring out who’s palms need to be greased in order to get them to put up the cash for software that will actually let me do something vaguely resembling work. As luck would have it, person I’m dealing with at second career told me he got wind via someone at the college that the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) might cough up the money to purchase my screenreader of choice for purposes of employment. Handy, considering the company they’re trying to aim me at has absolutely no intention of purchasing it themselves.

    Employment specialist’s goal now, what with the college thing going down river without me, is to get me hooked up with a job working for Online Support. I’ve had more than a few dealings with them before, which usually ended in either being outright ignored, or a somewhat appologetic rejection based on they don’t have the kind of financial room necessary to purchase the technology that would make me able to do the job–oh, did I mention they’re a semi-national, multimillion dollar corporation? Yeah, didn’t think so. His current theory is, if we can convince them I’ve got the cost of the screenreader covered, we might be able to squeeze me through the door and into something vaguely resembling a minimum wage job. Which would still be a huge improvement over what I’m getting now. Now we just need to get someone from ODSP to say yes sir and fork over the dollars, then we’ll have something to walk into a room with.

    I’ve already put a bug in folks’ ear about it, who according to their voicemail are supposed to be in the office today, so we’ll see exactly what kind of strangely diplomatic 5-page answer I get from them about it. In the meantime, that whole college thing? Stick a fork in it. At least for this year, it’s done. If this employment thing falls through, or if I can find out the second career program will be around next year, I’ll at least have the flexibility to start drop kicking the necessary people to get that ball rolling a lot sooner and with a lot more maneuvering room than this time. ‘Til then, it’s off to find some answers. And maybe possibly beat a few heads together in the process. Hey, that’s always fun, no? And they say I don’t do much during daylight hours.

    , ,

  • A small note to Clive Doucet: No one likes opt-out mailing lists.

    written by

    james

    Ottawa city councillor turned mayoral candidate Clive Doucet has one very small problem. He doesn’t quite get how mailing lists–particularly those advertising his position leading up to a municipal election–are actually supposed to work. Instead of allowing folks to choose to sign up for his advertisements, he chose instead to assume anyone who’s emailed him for any reason must be interested in his platform and has therefore given instead the option of simply being removed. Why is this a problem? Much to Clive’s dismay, not all of us are really all that interested.

    I sent one, maybe two emails to councillor Doucet in early 2009, as a direct response to the fact OC Transpo had been dragging the bus strike out and making it nearly as political as some of the crap that came out of the house of commons. The response I got to that email was, pretty much, a politically correct version of “Go screw yourself”, and a reminder that the wicked evil cruel union wouldn’t be pushing the city around if he could help it. I pretty much wrote him off as an ass–even if he was one of the two people who actually did get back to me (the other was a form letter that pretty much said they’d look into it).

    That was pretty much the end of my exchange with Ottawa city councillors in general and Doucet in particular. Flash forward to the start of the municipal campaign runs. I get up, go through my morning routine, and the very first email that shows up in my inbox? a newsletter from “Clive Doucet for mayor”. Flash forward again to tonight. I wrote that off as a simple mistake–he doesn’t strike me as very tech savvy, honestly–none of them do, really, but him in particular. Tonight when I got in, I was treated to another newsletter from “Clive Doucet for mayor”. This one, at least, came with an unsubscribe link–the last one didn’t exactly have one.

    Hey, Clive? I emailed you a year and a half ago. At most twice. How does that translate to I want to receive advertisements or what have you from you? Most particularly after I no longer live in the city you fully intend to handle I’m sure with the same positively charming touch you demonstrated during our brief conversation. Tell you what. Nobody likes opt-out mailing lists. Particularly from charismatic individuals such as yourself. On the up side, at least you’ve given me a solid reason to avoid emailing you from anything other than a throw-away address from this point. Thanks for that, at least. Now, please, set your spam on fire. I’d appreciate that very much.

    , ,

  • Fun and amusement at fiddle fest.

    written by

    james

    I’ve written a couple entries referencing the anual fiddle festival held up at Pembroke’s Riverside park every September around labour day. On a random wim, the parents and I decided to shuffle over there tonight to see what we could find for entertainment. And, as often happens, we found exactly that. And this time, I even managed to recognise a few of the songs that were being played.

    Just to get a general idea of how things are set up around there, everyone who’s competing in the events of this weekend–and probably a few spectators who just want an excuse to party–piles into Riverside park, which is escentially a special event grounds that just so happens to double as a beach and very nice area to walk when it’s not jam packed with people. From about a week before labour day right up until then, when the competition shuts down, there are trailers, trucks, buses, and all manner of other things. When they’re not competing, each site tends to do their own thing so far as performances. Most of them are little more than social gatherings among friends. When the competition isn’t going, it’s almost impossible to distinguish the folks who’re just there for the party from the competitors. At that point, it generally amounts to a very glorified outdoor kitchen party. They have guitars, at least one piano, some folks doing vocals depending on the group, and of course, a crap ton of fiddles. There are stepdancers as well but I think we showed up too late to see those. They’re selling food–mostly of the burger and fries variety, and if you didn’t provide your own alcohol you probably don’t have to go far to get some. Mostly though, people show up there for the music.

    We spent the better part of the evening, or at least a good 2 hours and change of it, walking from one site to the next doing just that. We’d hear a decent song or two, hang out there for a few, then when they started getting into areas we weren’t in the mood for, we’d move on to the next one. The selections were almost all folk/country or some mix of the two–it’s a fiddle festival; what the hell do you want? The usual selection at least tonight was anywhere from probably 1960 through to about 1990, though I did catch a song or two that sounded newer. At the end of it, my legs were about ready to go on strike right there, and I don’t think I was the only one in that state, so we packed it up and slid back to our respective houses.

    I try to make it to that competition–or, at least, the afterparty–at least once every year. This is one of those rare things that, even if I were still living in Ottawa, I’d have to make the trip back here just to check it out. It’s probably the one thing that actually makes Pembroke feel more like home than, say, the apartment I had prior to my moving here. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean I wouldn’t move away if given the option. But I’d definitely be coming back at least once a year, right during that first week in September. Call it one of my very few unwritten rules.

    If you happen to have some free time this weekend and are in or near the area, drop by Riverside park in Pembroke and check it out. I believe the players start wrapping things up on Sunday, but if I’m not mistaken some may stick around until Monday instead. If you’re interested in checking it out, have a map, of sorts. And if you do decide to go, let me know what you think. I’d be curious to see if it’s just a Pembroke area thing. If I get bored enough, I might end up back there out of random curiosity myself. Hey, that wouldn’t hurt my feelings any.

    , , ,

  • Why open source owns your soul: even the non-coders can fix things.

    written by

    james

    In the days of Windows and only Windows, the usual routine was find a bug, hit report a problem, kick back and maybe someone would get around to eventually, if you asked really really nice and forked over a hundred, maybe possibly fixing it. If they weren’t busy sucking back a beer or something. There was no real two-way exchange of information, per say–they either fixed it and you didn’t know about it until later, or they ignored it and you didn’t know about it until later if at all. Flash forward to the last week or so.

    As I make no secret of, I power this site on WordPress plus about 20 wickedly handy plugins to take care of everything from statistics to adjusting things so folks who come across a 4-year-old link that no longer works can still find the entry they’re looking for at its new location. It was that latter redirect plugin that decided at one point to give me issues. For the record and those curious, if you want something similar for your own site the plugin is Smart 404, and it only works–to my knowledge, anyway–on WordPress. Now, before my year or two of experimenting with that other blogging platform, I had this site running under a different piece of software. That piece of software, still in development, took care of my needs back then with the exception of the whole comment spam thing–but the way it handled links in general was just different enough that when I set this up, and included the old entries from my first attempt at a blog, those links promptly broke. Not horribly, just a slight enough change that Apache threw a page not found error.

    WordPress in general is very good about redirecting things within its own isolated environment to where you want to go. So, for example, if you were to go to https://www.the-jdh.com/index.php?post=123, it would redirect you to the appropriate post automatically–and to the appropriate, much more readable URL of that post–with no coaxing from me whatsoever. Kind of wicked nifty cool in an “I’m a lazy tech geek” kind of way. The problem is, there’s no native functionality for redirecting other links, not created by WordPress, to their appropriate wordpress equivalent. Enter the redirection plugin, Smart 404.

    When I set it up to do what it was intended to do, though, I ran into another, slightly frustrating, problem. If you were to go to https://www.the-jdh.com/year/month/date/some_post.html, which was the old link structure on the blog, even with the plugin in place you’d get a 404 instead of being redirected to https://www.the-jdh.com/year/month/some-post/, which is one of WordPress’s default structures. Now, if we were talking closed source projects here, I’d of just switched to something else that did a similar thing–I’d have a better chance of seeing the problem fixed, and sooner, by doing that. But instead, it started out entirely in public comments on the blog of the developer of the offending plugin.

    The actual conversation was, were it to happen over IM instead of blog comments, very short yet still very effective.

    I posted a couple comments over there, pretty much explaining what happens when someone references one of the old, non-working links, and what according to the plugin documentation is supposed to happen. After running a real quick test to get access to exactly what it was the plugin was trying to do, the conversation effectively turned very quickly to something like this.
    Dev: Okay, try this line of code and let me know if it breaks.
    Me: *copy, paste* Okay, looks like it doesn’t explode. And hey, it does what it’s supposed to now. Who knew?
    Him: Awesome. *throws it into CVS*
    Me: Hey look, new version. And there’s the fix I tested. Awesome squared.

    Yeah, it was literally that easy. And a very awesome reason for why sometimes, being able to actually see the program’s inner workings is a very good thing–you get to escentially debug and test a patch for your own problems, rather than waiting on the software’s tech support department–if they have one–to get around to communicating with the developers, who may or may not then get around to actually diagnosing and fixing the problem. The open source community as a whole gets major props for that. And major props to the Smart 404 developer for being nearly as quick to implement solutions to problems as his users are at finding problems to fix. And huge props to WordPress, because–really, do I need a reason? Now excuse me while I go consider for the thousandth time learning PHP or something.

    , , ,

recent Posts

Recent Comments

Archives