December 2001 Archives

Just a friendly reminder
Remember to say 'Rabbit Rabbit' when you wake up tomorrow morning.

(Hmm, I'm assuming you have to go to sleep to say this. Does this mean that people who are partying all night can't do it?)

Movie Recommendation
Find out where the movie Amelie is showing near you and go see it. Now. Just get up from in front of your computer and go see it!

I just saw it earlier today and thought it was quite wonderful. One of the better movies I've seen this year.

Holiday Photo
I was cleaning out my camera today and found this picture I'd taken of a special christmas tree ornament (It's the bird). This was my very first ornament that was given to me when I was a child. It has become a bit of a family tradition that it is the first one to be put on the tree every year. When I was around for the tree decorating I always tried to find the perfect spot for it to go. Also, every year my mom would give my sister and I a new ornament, so by now there's quite a collection. It's a tradition I hope to continue if I'm ever a dad.

I can't wait till I live someplace where I can actually fit a tree.

A need for more art
The museum was quite cool today. The exhibit was pretty amazing. On the way out we got caught up looking at a bunch of other exhibits and were there till they were closing the museum. I feel the need to go back there sometime soon, as well as to learn more about the artists whose work I enjoyed.

Okay, so I said I wasn't going to post much today
But my parents are busy with a couple of things so I was hopping around the net a little. I found some cool rumors of stuff at Apple.

The power of music
I hadn't put a picture up in a while, so thought I'd put one up of my DJ setup. Spinning is one of those things I love to do to relax. I'm able to just focus on it and everything else just goes away. For the past three weeks or so my turntables hadn't been hooked up because I'd brought them to a friend's party. But last night I finally got off my ass and re-hooked everything up and spun for a few hours. It's still magical to me how I can take two records and just blend them together almost seamlessly.

Now that I've gotten that taken care of I need to go and buy some blank DATs and work on a new CD (since a Special Pete's been bugging me for a new one for ages).

Quiet day today
I realized this morning how at peace I've been with myself lately. Having over a week off really does wonders to how one relaxes. I stopped in at work yesterday for a quick meeting and was just amazed at the level of stress that office has. I did my best to get in and out of there quick so that it wouldn't ruin my mood.

Probably won't be much posted today. I'm currently waiting for my parents to give me a call and say they are ready for breakfast. I'm going to show them one of my favorite places (soundbites). Then it's back to the apartment to clean the apartment some more. After that I have to zoom out to pick up a friend to go to the mfa. There's this exhibit there called The Look: Images of Glamour and Style. My new friend Angela was interested in going to see it and my friend becky gave it a thumbs up. And then finishing off the day we'll most probably go out for an early dinner.

Friday Five
1. What was your biggest accomplishment this year? Oh my. I think my biggest accomplishment was a mental/emotional one. With my impending lung transplant I had a few moments of freaking out about the whole thing. In the end I learned to relax more about it and not let the waiting rule my life. It will happen when it happens.

2. What was your biggest disappointment? That I wasn't strong enough to go through with going into the hospital the time they did call me to come in.

3. Will you be making any New Year's resolutions? Undecided as of yet. It is quite possible, we shall see. I tend to usually make them and then ignore them though.

4. Where do you wish you were celebrating? My dream location would be someplace warm enough to celebrate it outdoors. So that I could throw a nice outdoor gathering with my friends and get to spin for them all night long.

5. What do you plan to do for New Year's Eve? I think I'll be heading to two parties this year. My friend Jeff is having something, and then other friends of mine are having a party that will probably go on all night. It depends on if I have the energy for it all. The question now is, 'will I have a date for New Years?"

(-- From FridayFive.org --)

UPS annoys me
So I missed UPS by moments today and so I won't be getting my copy of Macross till Wednesday now. I'm a bit annoyed because they have no way to pick something up before they could even deliver it next. When I've dealt with places like FedEx before they've always been quite helpful with handling things like that.

Just call me Defrost Man
My parents came up and helped me clean a bit today (they are great about helping with that). While they were here I defrosted my freezer in record time. There was a good inch of ice on the top and back walls of it, so it looks HUGE now.

Random holiday season thoughts
While a lot of this holiday was kind of emotionally exhausting there were some parts of it that were quite cool. One of the first was my godparents stopping over at my parent's place. Their son and his wife also came along. I hadn't seen any of them for years. Their son Christopher and I are right around the same age and we always used to have fun around the holidays when our families would visit.

He's now married with two kids and the kids were along for the visit too. I really love 2-4 year olds, they are so cute. One of their daughters is 3 and a half and finally decided that I was a worthy person to talk to after being very shy on first arrival. By the time they left I'd been invited over for tea with her and her doll (though I wouldn't be able to try on her shoes because they'd be too small). It makes me wish I got to see my nephew Cameron more often.

On other fronts, it sounds like Cameron loved the alphabet blocks I gave him. My sister asked him if he wanted her to open them up right away and he was like, "well of course!" We'll have him spelling in no time! (I fear I'd be too impatient as a father. I'd want my kids to grow up fast so I could get the fun toys that *I* want.)

Next year I hope that my sister can make it up to CT with Cameron. I think that Christmas when there are kids around is great. He'll be three and a half then and that's one of the perfect ages. Everything is still magic then. And I think they help bring magic to everyone else involved.

Late night hunger
Last night blog reading has left me craving eggs, pizza, and chinese food. Somehow I'm not sure all of these would combine into anything slightly edible, or even deliverable.

Hello? Yes, could I have a general tso's chicken with egg pizza with extra cheese?

SCORPIO (Oct 23-Nov 21) - Week of December 27, 2001
Technological advances in the fifteenth century spurred Europeans to expand their explorations of the world by sea. Even more important than the astrolabe and compass was the caravel, a new kind of ship. With three masts and a triangular sail, it could make headway against the wind, allowing longer voyages to uncharted lands. I hereby name the caravel to be your power symbol for 2002, Scorpio. The astrological omens suggest you will have an excellent chance to find your personal equivalent of a means to sail against the wind.

(-- Courtesy of Free Will Astrology --)

Daytime TV
I'm on vacation right now and so have been kinda slow waking up in the morning. The last two mornings I've caught this horrendous show called 'Shipmates', which is a love-connection-esque kinda show. On this one they send a couple off on a cruise, and basicly film their every moment together.

I'm watching with a kind of horrid fascination and wondering if they use the same pool of people they use on other dating shows.

Long lost Brothers
In a lattice of coincidence best friends for decades turn out to be brothers. It's unbelievable how many of his missing siblings this guy had associated with in the course of his life.

Big Thanks out to Evan
After my last post I felt like I should send a big Thank You out to Evan for Blogger and all the work he's done on it in the past year. The XML-RPC support was one of the coolest things I've seen in a while. (Now if he can just get scp support in there I'll be ecstatic! ;))

Blogger Back?
Blogger got hacked. I'm actually fairly annoyed at whoever was responible for this. Why do people even bother doing things like this. Are they that bored? It looks like it happened over Christmas too. Sheesh.

FF X
Another few hours dumped into it. I just got to meet up with Rikku again. It's a pretty interesting story so far. I'm quite enjoying the game. The graphics are some of the most amazing I've ever seen in a game yet. The storyline so far is a bit linear, but I'm not really minding it that much.

Waiting patiently for MicroTech now
So I'd reported that my Smartmedia reader hadn't been working after the upgrade to 10.1.2. MicroTech has already released a tech note on this and is supposedly working to fix it. Here's hoping that it won't take TOO long to get it out the door. I want to start doing pictures again.

On another picture note, I think I want to start using my film carmera too. I'm going to dig that out today.

Home Again
So I just rolled into home a few minutes ago. Suprisingly, there was almost no traffic on the road. The one downside was getting home to see a sticker on the front door from FedEx saying they'd left something for me. But, it was nowhere to be found. I hope a neighbor might have picked it up for me to keep it safe.

Ahhh Christmas
I really do love Christmas. While I'm really a religious person, I just love the whole idea of being able to do things for my friends and family. As a result, it takes me a little bit longer to get up to speed, but by the time the 25th rolls around I'm quite ready for it. This year I got to play Santa a lot. As I was shopping around for my family I'd keep an eye out for things for friends and ended up getting stuff for many people. It was great fun.

Today's been very mellow so far. Since it is just my parents and me things have been fairly quiet. We went through our stockings and then opened up presents. The big hilite for me this year was the Twin Peaks First Season DVD set. My parents also got me a nice hardcover version of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I had an old old old paperback box set of the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, but the box was long gone, the books have been through many many a move and were missing pages, so this was a great gift. AND, after seeing the movie I wanted to start re-reading the series.

The my mom's friend Ellen Carey came by and joined us for a yummy breakfast of Eggs Benedict. So now it's time to relax until we head over to my cousin's for dinner, and then I'll be on my way back to Boston tonight. All in all things worked out pretty well.

Once again, hope everyone's holidays were great!

Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas to all my friends out there everywhere. I hope all your holidays are good ones. Now it's time to start getting ready for the New Year. (Does this mean I need to start thinking of resolutions for the new year already?)

Book Report: naked by david sedaris
I'd heard a lot of David Sedaris' stuff on This American Life on NPR. Some of them even are in this book. I really enjoy the way he tells a story, This book has quite a few. He has a way of talking about topics that might normally be depressing in a way that makes you laugh about it (many times a bit nervously).

I definitely would recommend it. As I mentioned earlier in the weekend I really enjoyed how I can hear his voice telling these stories. If you can find a copy of this on tape I bet it owuld be quite good. I've listened to his latest book 'Me Talk Pretty One Day' and it was really good.

The downside to system updates
So after doing a bit of research i discovered that in fact, those brand new Zio! drivers I downloaded last week do not work with OS X 10.1.2.

I wish I had known this before I had gone and upgraded all the systems I use. I figure it is because it looks like apple upgraded their USB support with this rev, but it still annoys the crap out of me. I'm going to have to try and install drivers in classic and download some pictures there.

The good and the bad
The Good: Lord of the Rings was stunning. I was just speachless as I left the theatre. I was very skeptical of this movie when I heard it was being made. There have just been too many good stories ruined by Hollywood. But as the reviews started coming in, I was finding myself getting more and more excited for it. I wasn't let down in the least. It also got me thinking of a number of other series of books that I always thought couldn't be made into movies. There's a heck of a lot of potential out there.

The Bad: My damn smartmedia reader stopped working. The card still works in the camera, but when I plug it into the reader hooked to the computer it didn't show up. I'm pretty sure that it is the reader because I tried it in both my parent's computer and mine. As a result, no picture for today. I'm going to try and pick up a replacement one tomorrow because I want to be able to post pictures on Christmas day.

LotR
Well, I'm off to check this out. My parents tell me the new theatre down the street from them is pretty great.

Relaxing
My parents had some pictures from snapfish.com show up as available to view online today. This one is from Thanksgiving and is me sitting with my nephew, Cameron. This was one of those rare quiet moments where he was watching Scooby Doo with me. He loves Scooby Doo. It's fun watching it with him. It's amazing the power of television on kids though. If something like Scooby Doo is on and he walks past the TV set he's stuck. He'll just stand there staring at it. (He wasn't real thrilled with the cooking channel though, that bored him and he wandered off to play with legos).

More OS X geeking
So I am down at my parent's place and they have this swanky new G4 running OS X. I realized that I could make an account on the machine for myself and now I have my own environment on their machine that I can play with as I like. I always hated the idea of having to share bookmarks and things like that because it just gets so cluttered. I have to say it works amazingly, better then I would have expected. I can have my own setup of Entourage, all my own settings for the desktop (I like things at a higher resolution then my parents :)). It rules.

Ugh
The other day a friend of mine from online had a heart attack. He seems to be recovering fairly well, though is still having some problems remembering things. The whole thing has kind of re-freaked me out a little bit. I have this kind of feeling that people my age should have to be having these major medical issues. Last year a friend of mine went into this hospital suddenly for a blood clot in his brain, my lungs are all broken and I'm waiting for new ones. It seems like having friends go into the hospital used to be a rarity for me. In fact, I know it was. I'm just not real sure how to deal with it.

Anyways, my thoughts go out to Turner, who needs to doodah doodah again soon.

Childhood
My mom was going through some of her old stuff and found a mother's day card that I made in school one year. It's great. The front is colored in crayon and has some flowers on it and on the inside is stapled a piece of that three lined paper with the following written on it:

A mother is someone who
Buys food
loves you
Takes you to the movies
helps you plant your garden
Teaches you things
cleans the house
makes the bed
paints the house
love Gregory

Last minute
But still just in time. Happy Solstice!

Nice OS X article
Earlier this week on OS News, an article by Scot Hacker called MacOSX Week: Tales of a BeOS Refugee came out. I just got around to reading the whole thing and it is pretty good. He compares it a lot to BeOS and shows off some of the cooler features of OS X, while giving some ideas on things that could be done better. More and more, OS X is becoming the OS to watch, much moreso then XP IMHO.

Friday Five
1. What is the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? I really haven't eaten anything that I'd consider that weird. I think the weirdest would be like octopus sushi (which I couldn't stand), but that isn't even really that weird.

2. Name one (material) thing you can't live without. Hmm, if it was one set of something it would be my DJ setup. If it had to be one individual thing, my TiBook. I bring it with me everywhere. I'm all set for when I go into the hospital for my transplant. I plan on having my laptop bag set for someone to bring me as soon as I can sit up on my own. It'll be filled with a bunch of DVDs that I can watch while stuck in the hospital.

3. Name something you've always wanted to do but didn't have time for.Tai-Chi. I've got a few friends who do it and they really like it. It's something I've always thought sounded kind of cool, and could help me given my screwed up lungs.

4. What outrageous thing do you wish you had the nerve to do? Skydiving. (One of these days...)

5. How do you plan to spend your weekend? Relaxing (see below). Maybe finishing up some christmas shopping. I've got a bunch of anime I've downloaded that I want to watch. In general, nothing productive. :)

(-- Survey from fridayfive.org --)

Relaxing
I bopped down to my parent's place (pictured to the left) this morning. I figured I didn't have anything better to do (besides play FFX), and that it would do me good to get out of the apartment for a bit. I feel like I'm starting to relax a bit finally. Though I know it will hit more over the weekend. I really am not used to taking time off, though I'm learning.

Today I hung out at this tea bar down the street from my parent's. I'd been meaning to sink a few hours into this book I've been reading and today proved to be the perfect time. I wish I'd taken a picture of the tea bar, but I felt kind of weird pulling my camera out and just snapping away pictures in the middle of this place I'd only been once before. It's really nice inside, and is pretty relaxing. I put on the Cowboy Bebop movie soundtrack and read the first third of naked by David Sedaris. I wondered how many people had read the book who hadn't heard him on This American Life because as I read I can hear his voice, and almost can't imagine it any other way. I highly recommend the book though, so far I'm loving it.

More on relaxing tomorrow.

Not an Addict!
So far I am successfully resisting the urge to bring my PS2 down to my parent's this weekend. I can be away from FF X for a few days, can't I? Though, it wouldn't hurt to bring it down, would it? I could just play it a little bit. I'm just getting to what feels to be a major part of the story and I'm going to have to put the damn thing down till after christmas.

The other thing is, things tend to be fairly slow down at my parent's. I will certainly have a fair amount of downtime when I COULD be playing. (Though I think my mom would kill me if I brought it into the house :))

Scorpio - Week of December 20, 2001
Here are a few of the gifts I'd love to get you this holiday season: a hand-loomed Turkish shower curtain trimmed with precious stones; a mud-cloth journal crafted from Ghanaian textiles and Italian paper; ceramic and silver spice jars from Peru; and a wool patchwork ottoman made from the traditional ground covering used by shepherds in Kyrgyzstan. By offering you these domestic yet exotic gifts, Scorpio, I'd hope to inspire you to expand your sense of home in 2002; to relax as you extend your reach; to travel far and wide whether or not you ever leave your natural habitat.

(-- Courtesy of Free Will Astrology --)

Voices from the Past
I just got off the phone with my old friend Michelle Nagy. I mentioned her site once a few months ago, but want to again because she always makes me smile when I talk to her. We first met back when I was at CMU (I had a mad crush on her back then). We bumped into each other about a year or two ago at Club Passim during a Cutting Edge of Campfire and have been keeping in touch ever since. Though I think she needs to send more email, and maybe take a roadtrip up to Boston sometime.

Definitely give her site a look, and check out some of her stuff over on at mp3.com.

FFX Update
So the game is reporting 15 hours of playtime already. Augh.

The game is pretty cool though. I'm sure I'm only in the first little part of it. I'm not sure how big the game is supposed to be, but I still get the feeling I'm only in the very first bit of it. So far I dig it, the graphics are good, the storyline is okay (I still don't fully know what is going on yet), and it's sucked away a bunch of my time already.

Gregory's Vacation Antics
Once again, time off, and work calls. This time at least it was something important, but it is still kind of annoying. I have determined that the only time I will end up getting a real vacation is when I have my lung transplant. But that will end up being work of its own kind.

Final Fantasy X
Wow. I just picked this up today and have been playing for the last hour. It's amazing. One of the most beautiful games I've seen yet for the PS 2. I haven't even read much about the game so wasn't sure what to expect. But, I'm now on vacation till next year (I love saying that) and I figured I might as well spend all my time playing this silly thing.

Christmas Madness II
So I drove past the house in the picture on my way home. It was already dark. I was blinded by the time I passed the house. Every possible thing that could have lights or be outlined by lights... was.

ick

Christmas Madness
I got this picture on my way into work. I was stuck in front of this house for about 5 minutes because traffic was backed up. I could only imagine just what this place would look like at night. They have a frickin zoo's worth of animals in front of the house. Also, notice that there are two santas. One right out in front and mini-santa taking a dump in the chimney. I personally don't get the whole 'decorate your house to make it visible from space' thing. Growing up my dad would always put a single candle-light in each window and that was about it.

Where's all the people?
I went to the post office today to send of presents to some family members and there was almost nobody there at all. I didn't even have to wait. Very odd for just a few days before Christmas.

Is there such a thing as TOO sucessful?
AdCritic looks like it may be closing their doors. Why? :The short answer: we became so popular so fast that we couldn't stay afloat!"

Such a shame. I always loved being able to go there and find cool ads.

NetFlix
Evan also mentions NetFlix. This is one of my favorite net companies. I've been using them since I got my DVD player, almost two years ago. Their customer service is pretty good. The only problem I'd have with them is related to what Evan likes so much about them. I live in Boston and it takes an extra day or so for dvds to get back to them. I'd love to see an east coast distribution center for movies so that your service level isn't reduced by living further away from them.

To add to his list of netflix-like place that offer adult fare. A friend of mine recently mentioned XRentDVD. One of these days I may get around to trying it out.

IRS
Evan mentions that the IRS is giving suprisingly good customer service these days. I've had some mixed results with them. While the people I've talked to have been very helpful while on the phone, their follow through was just not that adequate. Up until recently I'd been dealing with a problem where an old company I'd worked for had misreported my pay by a few thousand dollars and never notified me of this.
So, about 2 years ago I got this notification that I owed money. Lots of it. And I went to go about fixing it. I got revised forms from my ex-company to correct what had happened. And I sent/faxed numerous copies of it over the course of those two years. There is not a record of ANY of them ever being received. One of the issues here was that they told me I wouldn't hear anything for two or three months. So every time I sent something in I just had to wait. They made it sound like whatever I sent in had to float through a few departments before it would be resolved.
So finally one day I was completely fed up and the person I was talking to at the IRS sent me over to the Tax Advocate. This is the department that handles problems that just aren't being solved.
About a week later I got a call from a very nice lady who listed to me relate my story for the 10th time or so. She had me call my ex-company and have them fax her the paperwork and that she could handle everything from her desk. Two weeks later I got a letter from her saying it was all fixed.
Now, while this woman was amazing and I'll be forever grateful to her, I wish I'd been able to talk to someone like her from the start. She was the person who understood best what went on, and was able to action on it immeadiately. I wonder if there isn't a better way to match up cases with mine with people like this more rapidly.

(Of course, then I had to take care of California too, since they'd gotten the same initial tax information. But that's another story.)

Up early once again
It is weird waking up when it is pitch black, only to discover that it is only 6:15 or so. I really do hate this part of winter sometimes. It just really throws my whole sense of time off. I never noticed it much before this year.

mp3 madness?
I remember way back in the days of the napster wars, hearing an argument in favor of napster saying that CD sales had gone up since it had been around. I was a little skeptical of this since I knew more then a few people who had boasted to have not bought a CD in over a year since they had been downloading everything they wanted. Now we're starting to see some backlash from all that. John Robb's Radio Weblog points to a few articles about this. The one paragraph in particular struck me:

In Germany alone, one survey by market researcher GfK found that blank CD sales jumped 129 percent this year. Purchases of pre-recorded music dropped 2.2 percent in the same period. Indeed, blank CDs now outsell recorded discs in Europe and Canada, according to one label executive.

The other questions in my head are: did we create this situation ourselves? Are the record companies the only ones who are at fault? Could there have been some kind of solution between the recording industry and places like napster that would have solved this better? And how will this all shake out?

Yum!

Last night my friend Bree and I went out to Redbones for dinner. Redbones is this great BBQ place in Davis Square that I don't get to go to often enough. Ribs are one of my favorite foods. I think it has something to do with that whole primal, ripping the meat from the bone thing. (RAAAR!). The only problem is that the ribs I had last night gave me a bit of a stomach ache. Bah, what is happening to me. I used to be able to eat anything and not be affected by it.



Bree also gave me two CDs she made. One was a collection of Christmas songs (including some of my favorites). The other was a mix of different folk singers that we both like (including one my favorite songs 'El Dorado' by Sam Shaber). Thanks Bree!

Stalkers 'R Us
Nari posted about Coincidence Design. I have to say that I found this kinda neat, but also quite disturbing. It's almost, but not quite stalking. And it ain't cheap. It looks like if you want to use their services it'll cost you around $80,000.

Okay, I may hate being single, but I'm not THAT desperate.

Feel Better Than You Should
My friend Rach mentioned it in her LiveJournal. Alka-seltzer is now marketing Morning Relief. It's for those times when you've partied a bit too hard the night before.

Are there other products out there which are as specificly targetted towards people with hangovers?

Updated Lungs
I've converted my lung page over to the new site format and added it back into the list of pages for the site. I hope to be updating it a bit more, just to talk about things to do with my lungs and my health in general. I always feel kind of weird writing about it here because most of the time it is just me whining about coughing or the long wait to get a new lung. So now you can go there if you feel like reading my bitching more often :).

Yet another site added
I've gotten kind of slow adding sites to my blogrolling list. These days I usually only add sites that I stumble upon that make me wow 'oooo' for one reason or another. Sometimes it is the design of it, sometimes it is the person's writing, sometimes it a combination of both. The one added today is a life uncommon. It's a pretty cool site. The owner is also a fellow lomo-ite and has a lomolog, something that I've actually thought about doing, but am basicly too lazy to do. (The digital camera is easy, I just pull the card out of the camera and slip it into the reader. It's not like I have to go someplace and get pictures developed!)

(link fixed now)

Where I work
I blew away the text for this post by mistake. This is where I work. Posted without anymore comment ;).

(I had posted a big long thing here, but screwed up and somehow deleted it. Ooops)

A big THANK YOU!
A big thanks out to my sekrit santa. I thought about waiting till Christmas to open it, but I just gave in. Santa got me a book that's been sitting on my wish list for ages: James Gleik's Faster. I read his book Chaos long long ago and thought it was pretty cool, so I'd wanted to pick this up. Thanks again sekrit santa!

Now I'm just waiting for my victim to receive their gift. I'm hoping he will mention it in his blog when it arrives so that I know it got there safe.

They tried that here too
A woman in berkeley is struck in a crosswalk while using 'pedestrian flags'. They tried the flag thing here in Cambridge a year or two ago. The idea is that you have a number of these bright orange flags at both sides of a crosswalk. There's a little bucket at each end for them to be stored in and when you cross the road you grab one.

I seem to remember the flags here disappeared in about two days. I'm sure someone just swiped them. At this point there's no sign they even tried it.

One of the more interesting crosswalk things I've seen is one with a motion detector set up at either side of the road. The crosswalk is between blocks, and in an area with a number of elderly people. If someone is standing there waiting to cross the street, it senses it and a 'caution, person is crossing the road' sign lights up. There are also lights set into the pavement along the edges of the crosswalk (I'm wondering how those will last through the snow and a few plows). It seems to work pretty well, though it gets a number of false positives. This seems to be a much better solution to me because the flashing lights at least make someone driving along the road more aware that someone might be stepping out in front of them. And you don't have to worry about someone walking off with your flags.

It's beginning to feel like Christmas
Slowly but surely I'm getting into the mood. This year it's not real overpowering though. It's more a kind of subtle happiness that seems to be seeping into my life.

This morning on my way out to Natick I felt so at peace. Even when on the road and having to deal with traffic, a time when I normally get all stressed out. Shopping went quite well too. I got to finish up a large chunk of my shopping with only two stops. Tomorrow I'll be sending things off to various parts of the US. Wow, I'm actually ahead of schedule!

Something new
Yesterday I got the Smartmedia reader and have decided to start adding in pictures from my life. Something to add a bit more to the blogging experience. To start things out I thought I'd put up a picture of the place I live. Five years ago yesterday I moved to Boston. Around a month and a half after that I moved into the place I'm in now. It's a bit small, but it is home. I have a feeling I'll be outgrowing it soon. I just need to find a new place that I like, possibly with some roommates that won't drive me insane.

And I'm not even going to think about moving until I've got my new lung.

BRRRRR
Damn did it get cold last night. I went to my a christmas party last night and by the time I left at 2:30 am it was FREEZING out. By the time I got to my car I was a coughing maniac. The party was lots of fun though and so it was worth it. Today I hope to finish up some more christmas shopping for folks. I've got almost all the family stuff taken care of and will then need to move on to friends.

Just last week, I was complaining about the lack of Smartmedia readers that had OS X support. MicroTech has just released drivers for their Zio! Smartmedia reader.

The moment I found this out I zipped out to Microcenter and picked one up and came home to try it out. It works like a charm! I think I'm going to start regularly posting pictures to the site. Maybe one a week, of just something from my life currently. Maybe I'll take requests of people for things to take pictures of.

They still sell these?
Today's spam of the day has the subject 'GINSU KNIVES 2000 BLOWOUT SALE! AS SEEN ON TV! '. I was amazed. I didn't even think they still made Ginsu knives. I haven't even seen a commercial for them in YEARS.

Poor sleeping habits
Lately I find I wake up at least twice during the night. What this means is that I end up getting sleep, but only in around 2-3 hour blocks. As a result I'm not sure just how much quality sleep I'm getting these days.
The worst part is when I wake up at like 5am during the week, because then I'm really screwed. Going back to sleep ensures that I won't wake up till 8, and staying up means that I'm sluggish at work all day.

Weird Afternoon Dreams
I took a nap this morning and had this very weird dream. It started with this large glass box. There were a bunch of men let into it and it was then locked. The men just kind of walked around a bunch and it was supposed to be some kind of psychology study. Then my dream shifted to this weird jungle. All the men were there and had spears, but they were still moving like they were in the box. Then it was back to original place with the box. There were some people arguing about letting the men out of the box because of what would happen. While that was happening the men started all walking around the edge of the box in a circle. Then they let the men out of the box and as each one stepped out he'd age like 50 years. Right around then I woke up.

I have NO idea what that is supposed to mean, but it was fucked up.
(And I don't care if it sounds completely incoherent)

I recently have picked up a few anime soundtrack CDs. The Cowboy Bebop one mentioned yesterday, and then one for Love Hina. While the Cowboy Bebop one has most of the song titles listed in english, there are a few that are using Japanese characters. The printing on the Love Hina soundtrack is almost all in Japanese. My first goal would be to find translations of all the song titles. My second would be to find the titles printed in Japanese on a web page so that I could try cutting and pasting into iTunes. I'd posted earlier about how iTunes and the iPod seem to understand Japanese, this would be a great way to play with it some.

CD Review
So I know I mentioned that I had stopped by Tokyo Kid to pick up the Cowboy Bebop soundtrack for 'Knockin' on Heaven's Door'. Once again Yoko Kanno rocks my world. She is a composer who has done music for various anime shows. Once again she's done a great job on this CD. It's a double CD and fits the whole feeling of the show. Lots of very jazzy tracks that are just wonderful to listen to in the car. If you're a fan of Cowboy Bebop or any of her other stuff I highly recommend it.

feh
Okay. I'm definitely still kinda fighting some kinda bug. Got home today a tiny bit early and slept for a few hours. Now I'm up and hungry, but nothing appeals to me.
What sucks about feeling ill like this is that I don't feel really unwell I just seem to be getting exhausted really easily. Bah. (And yes, I'm whining. It makes me feel better.)

Back at work
I'm back at work today. I still feel a bit like ass, but I was kind of sick of being in my apartment. I figure if I can make it through most of the day that will be doing good.

I've got tomorrow off and plan to be finishing up my shopping then. I figure I can get most of it done in the Harvard Square area. Then on Monday I can ship stuff out with a week to spare! Woohoo!

SCORPIO (Oct 23-Nov 21) - Week of December 13, 2001
If you're an elementary school teacher, it's a perfect moment to think about moonlighting as a nightclub singer -- and vice versa. If you're a physician trained in Western medicine, it's a favorable time to investigate alternative healing traditions. If you're a physicist, I recommend you read some mind-boggling poetry, and if you're a starving artist, study the Wall Street Journal. In other words, Scorpio, open up a channel to what you've been missing. Explore the gaps in your education. Entertain possibilities you've barred from even crossing your threshold of awareness.

(-- Courtesy of Free Will Astrology --)

Okay, I'm a geek
I just added searching to my site. It's down by the bottom on the right. It's pretty cool, though it includes some pages from my old site. I'll have to do something about that. Searching provided by Atomz.

An Annoying Need for Bank Cards
So last night I stopped by Harvard Square on the way home. I wanted to hit Tealuxe to pick up some tea for presents along with some other places. On my way there I stuck my nose into Tokyo Kid to pick up the soundtrack for the Cowboy Bebop movie. When I went to pay, I realized I'd left my bank card at home. I ended up putting it on a credit card, but was annoyed because I don't want to put anything on my charge cards right now.

Then as I leave the story I realize another problem. I have no cash and I parked in the parking garage. I walk in circles. Think. walk in circles some more and head down the street to the bank. Which, in Harvard Square is open till 7pm. I get down there, talk to the nice customer service lady, who is nice enough to look up my savings account number and take out enough cash for parking and laundry quarters. But by now I just want to get home since I've wasted too much time. So I went home grumpy and still need to get out later this week to finish up my shopping. Thank god I have Friday off.

Feelin like Ass
I feel like ass today. I'm not sure if it is tiredness or illness, but I've decided to just throw in the towel and crawl back to bed. More updates when I awaken again.

Dogs in Elk
From a while ago, but I was just pointed at this classic sets of posts about... well... dogs in elk.

A misspent youth
Google now has the past 20 years of usenet online. The oldest post of mine I can find is from 1989, but I know I was reading it for a while before posting. I remembered being scared to post because people were much more ruthless back then.

Anyways, for those of you were on way back when, check out Google Groups.

Stuffed Goodness
I want to get a stuffed Totoro. They actually have them at Tokyo Kid, and I keep thinking of getting one. I think it would go great with my Ryo-Ohki (Though mine isn't as cool as that one, it doesn't have the gem on it that lights up. damn.).

Now someone just needs to sell a stuffed Tama from Love Hina and they can all sit on top of my computer.

Paypal
I was talking to some friends online and they were talking about how PayPal sucks. I had only really used them for three things and hadn't had any real problems with it. They pointed me at Paypal Warning, a site which documents problems a number of people have had with them. I think what I found disturbing was the thought that paypal is looking at what you are using their services for and selectively policing (and not intelligently either).

Things that make me smile
I've been DJing for a few years now, and in that time I've put out a few CDs. The other day an acquaintance of mine IM'd me with something that just made my day (week, and month) (screen name changed to protect the innocent :)):

mt: hey! quick note no time to chat, but...
mt: the other night i was biking from an tua nua and i asked blake if he had a good, fast cd i could borrow for the ride home, and he lent me your 'spring' cd
mt: which completely saved me, as it made me bike oh so fast, gave me much inspiration....
mt: i enjoyed it soo much that i actually biked from beacon street home to JP, and then thought "i am not done yet...hmm, where shall i go?" (listening to the CD all the while of course ;-) so decided to bike to the mass ave bridge, and then around here and there, and i made it home at 4 am, so i wanted to say 'thanks' for providing me with such a good cd, i am listening to it today as well...(i think i catually have a copy of 'spring' however i am weird with cds, a lot of times i am not into it initially but then the next time i check it out i think "hey why haven't i listened to this before?!?!?!" so anyways thx a bunch, hasta luego....:-)

I don't wanna grow up
I wanna just be a kid. I don't wanna go to work today. I'm already going to be a bit late. I just don't feel motivated. I'm tired, cranky, and not in the mood to be troubleshooting. I think I'll plan out my vacation schedule today. And I think at least one day off should be included this week. That way I can finish up my Christmas shopping.

And while I'm whining I just want to add that I hate it when the air gets so dry. I feel like I just spend my whole life drinking water. Right now I feel like a dry sponge.

Puppets are cool!
I wish I was a kid again sometime. Manhattan Toys has some of the funkiest hand puppets I've seen. My favorite I think is Morphing Marty (there's a Morphing Maggie also).

Work day from hell
Work is hell today. So not many responses. I feel bad, my on call employee was being paged about once an hour all weekend. So I've been trying to track down problems since I got in this morning.

"Honey, those aren't children...
they're packets of cream cheese." - Space Ghost

Movie Report
I went to see Oceans 11 tonight with some friends. It was pretty cool. I liked it more then I expected. I need to rewatch the original because I haven't in a good 10 years or so.

Are you living in the real world?
I just got done watching the Cowboy Bebop movie, Knockin' on Heaven's Door. I definitely dug it. It's got that classic Cowboy bebop feel, but is a full length feature. Once again Yoko Kanno has created a beautiful soundtrack. I am hoping that I can find a copy of it sometime soon.

I am so hoping that this comes to a local theatre so I can see it on the big screen. Hopefully, soon enough it will be available on DVD also.

Wow
It is white outside. This is what really got me thinking about getting a Smartmedia reader for my Macs. I wanted to quickly snap a picture or two of the snow outside so that I could share them with people online.

I currently have a love/hate relationship with snow. I love it. I've always loved winter and snow and how peaceful it looks right after it has snowed. But currently, snow is a pain in the ass for me to get around in. It is exhausting, and I don't even want to think about what cleaning my car off will be like.

(Anyone driving by Broadway in Cambridge today?)

A picture is worth...
I decided this weekend that I need a way to get the pictures from the Smartmedia card my Digital to my macs running OS X. I've looked around and there are a few readers here and there, but the ones that look like they are the best supported are some of the most expensive.

Has anyone else played with this much?

New Section
I've started a list of the DVDs I own. It is still under works at the moment, but hopefully will be finished in the next few days. I hope to eventually add in small mini-reviews of various movies I've seen to it later.

SCORPIO (Oct 23-Nov 21) - Week of December 6, 2001
The paycheck my feminist friend Riana earns as a stripper is 10 times what it was when she took care of senior citizens. Her increased income and leisure time allow her to devote herself to writing poetry with an intensity that was impossible before. Since she made the job transition, she has published two books. But is there a price to pay for using her body in a way that's at odds with her politics? Has she lost her self-respect? Has her soul been twisted? Not as long as she mines the contradictions for her poetry, she says. Now let me ask you, Scorpio: If it's true that any job you do requires some compromise, what kind of job and compromise would best serve your creativity? Begin this meditation now, and keep it burning brightly throughout 2002.

(-- courtesy of Free Will Astrology --)

Sudden Massive Roadtrip
Okay, well not that massive. I had picked up some memory for my parent's computer a while back and hadn't yet installed it for them. I also wanted to get them all set with running Office X. They had been getting stuff from friends in Excell and Word format and didn't have a good way of opening it up.

It felt nice to get out of town for a bit, even if it was very spur of the moment.

New Hair!
Whee! It feels good to have short hair again. I feel back to normal now.

That hair thang
I'm finally getting my hair chopped. I'm a good 3 or 4 weeks overdue and my hair is being a bit unruley. I'll see if I can put up a picture of me after.

There's something about going to get my hair done that I just find very calming. I always feel so happy after.

More on home network appliances
So I was thinking more about the box I posted about just before. While this box is quite cool. I think I want something that has more features. Imagine the things you could do with something like this. First, you put a hard drive in it and give it the features of a TiVO (Actually having it linux based like TiVO is would be a great help in this). Then you give it the ability to play back mp3s. Add to this other features that would be useful with a box that had a connection to the internet. Maybe it could go out and grab news headlines for you to read on your TV. There are a lot of interesting possibilities.

The home network grows stronger
This box from Turtle Beach looks pretty damn cool. It hooks up to your stereo to play back mp3s, but it also has an ethernet connection and can play music off of the net or your own computer.

Pretty slick I must say. And given that I'm getting more into the whole mp3 thing with my iPod this could be a nice addition, if it didn't cost quite as much.

Seen online
Poonlarp comes tumbling out of the mural on the wall, landing on the carpet with a soft *thud*
Poonlarp has arrived.
A hairy paw emerges from under the bed and swipes at Poonlarp's leg.
Poonlarp says "THAT'S NOT A LEG"

(Poonlarp is a 'bot that terrorizes a MUSH I hang out on, sometimes it comes out with the damnedest things)

The price of MicroSoft
Dan Mitchell's Radio Weblog has A Question for MicroSoft. This is something I've run into myself recently. Office X for OS X costs around $4-500 dollars IIRC. A friend of mine told me that you can only have run copy running at a time. It can detect the serial number of other versions running on the same local network. I have two computers in my apartment, so does this mean I need two copies?

The flip side to all this is that officially, it has always been the case that if you have a household with three computers being used by three different people you have three copies. Most software licenses are written this way. The problem is that up until recently most home software didn't care if you installed it on more then one machine. I'm wondering if people will just stop upgrading as often because of this.

So that's how they do it
As I've mentioned here before, I've been becoming a bit of an anime geek since I got my DVD player. So I was happy to find a site where you can learn how to draw anime. It looks quite easy so far!

(-- shamelessly pulled from Nari --)

More Power
Once again I forgot to bring my power adaptor for my laptop into work. I seem to do this about once every other week. So I decided that I'm going to go pick up a second power adaptor in a bit. I figure I can have one at home, that always stays at home, and then one that I keep in my laptop bag.

Voices from the Past
Last night at around 9:30ish, the phone rang. Not my cell phone, the real wired one. Most of the time I never answer this phone because it is telemarketers. This is the number I give out when I register software, fill out a form somewhere, etc. It has messages on the voicemail that I've never even listened to probably. But when someone calls after 9 it usually means that it is someone who doesn't have my cell phone number and is someone I know well.

I pick up the phone and find my ex-girlfriend on the line. She just got back into the country from teaching overseas and wanted to say 'Hi'. It was pretty cool, we talked for a while and started getting caught up. I'm really glad that we still keep in touch to some level because she really does know me better then just about everyone else. We're going to try and do dinner or something after the holidays. But I may see if she's going to be around before then since I had already been thinking about driving down to RI to hit the mall to do some Christmas shopping.

Laser Puzzle
I just did level 17. I hate this thing.

Song Virus
From over on a MUD I hang out on:
Doug says "n-n-n-nineteen"
You say "damn you DOUG"

I now have that damn song stuck in my head.

THE LAST TEST!
Okay, here's the last test I take in a while (hopefully), but I did just have to share the results of this one, because it does fit me quite well:

I'm The 'Which Online Personality Test Are You?' Test!

Oh irony of ironies! I just can't get enough postmodernism, so of course I'm this same test I've just taken. Ho-ho!

Click here to find out which test you are!

Secret Santa Time
My friend Becky pointed me at this secret santa site. The idea is that people on the net sign up and on December 10th they are assigned some random person to send a gift to (using the Amazon wish list). They ask that you have some things that are priced under $15. I figured it can't hurt to sign up and give it a try.

One last thing I'm missing in OS X
A version of all the Palm software for OSX as well as an OS X hotsync application. I think there is at least one third party app out there, but it isn't really what I am looking for. I want to be able to sync with my contacts in Entourage.

Puzzled
I'm currently cursing /usr/bin/girl for posting about this lazer puzzle game. I just got through the 10th level, which had been driving me nuts since yesterday afternoon. It requires flash, and is quite cool.

It's not over till...
When I wasn't looking Opera released version 6.0 of their browser. I'd been running the beta of it and it was pretty stable, but there were still some minor glitches. The new version is nice. Quite fast, and it doesn't crash on my friend Ethan's page anymore. I have to say, the folks at Opera really do a great job with their browser. I currently only have one page that I really have issues with, the blogger page for entering posts. Everything works, but the text input window is really tiny.

Another Damn Test
This one is kinda cool:

If I was a work of art, I would be Vincent Van Gogh's The Starry Night. I am a tiny village at peace while overhead rages the tumult of the heavens. Objects whirl and flash around me in a fevered haze only partially reflected in reality while I remain grounded and secure in my isolation. Which work of art would you be? The Art Test

Happy Birthday Pete!
Monday was my friend Pete's birthday. He had me spin at his birthday party and I had a great time. Once again I got to spin for people who haven't seen me spin before. I need to spin out more I think. I had so much fun over this weekend spinning for people.

What I've learned today
Forks have been around for a long time. From cuisinenet.com:
11th century - The Venetian Doge, Domenico Selvo, marries a Greek princess who brings to his court the practice of eating with forks. This is regarded as a scandalous and heretical affectation, and when she dies shortly thereafter it is perceived as a just divine punishment

Creamy Mouthfeel
I just felt the need to say 'Creamy Mouthfeel'. Damn you for reminding me of that Emily.

Coffee Cake Muffins
Are quite a wonderous thing.

Ow
Spent the whole night out at a house party. I think I ended up spinning the whole time, like 8 or so hours straight. As usual, the music won, I lost. How did I ever used to do this weekend after weekend?

Link and Think

I remembered!
I remembered to say Rabbit Rabbit this morning!

One down...
My friend Ethan hosted a party last night. It was kind of a Happy Birthday to everyone who had a birthday in November party. It was pretty fun. I actually ended up behind the turntables for about 4 hours. I hadn't done that in ages and it definitely tired me out a bit.

Tonight I get to do it all again. A friend of mine is having a little house party that should be pretty fun. I'm actually just up for long enough for her to show up and borrow my turntables. Then I'm back to sleep. These things just seem to take so much more out of me.

Oh yeah, and then on Monday night I'm spinning for an hour at my friend Special Pete's birthday party at Deli Haus (oh wait, I think I'm supposed to call it Underground now or something like that).