Computerjargon.com

God doesn’t like Powerbooks. My favorite quote from the news clip:

“What can we learn from this? In a kickboxing match between Jesus and Jobs, Steve would win.”

Have you ever seen 5 cubic yards of river rock? My dad had the best guess/estimate of what it might look like: an 8 foot diameter, waist-high pile. That’s just about what it was too when they dropped it off Friday morning.

I started this yard project in the early summer, rock in everything the dogs had managed to trample, pound, and kill. I laid some edging from the back part of the garage around the entire back of the house. After spending three days installing the edging it took me another 2 months to actually get the rock.

But once I did, I went gangbusters. There’s nothing more satisfying than throwing rock on top of a down trodden mud pit. I spent two days playing with my new rock, throwing it anywhere and everywhere I could. I still have a waist high pile of rock, but now it’s only 4 feet in diameter. I’m pretty sure my neighbors think I’m nuts. I know the dogs do.

So that was my weekend, installing a new rockbed in my yard. Feel free to stop by any time soon and fling some rock yourself. I’ll be installing more until I’m blue in the face.

Speaking of music, have you read the story about the Grey Album? It’s a DJ mix of Jay-Z’s latest Black Album and the Beatles White Album. Sounds spiffy, eh? Well, once EMI, the owners of the White Album caught wind of the unique project they put the kibosh on the Grey Album release. Supposedly it’s floating around the internet’s nooks and crannies. I feel a hunt is on.

I harvested a hard drive out of a Linux machine I wasn’t using to replace my dead disk in my main machine. I discovered the dead disk was an IBM Deathstar. “Son of a..!” came flying from my mouth.

See, problems with an IBM 60 gig hard drive are very well known and well documented. In fact, I had one of these die on me 3 years ago. I knew what to expect. And I knew I needed to replace it. But it must have slipped my mind shortly after I acknowledged that I had a shit drive in my computer.

Luckily, though, the infested disk is now out of my machine. All is well again in the Jason Complex.

I had my switch blow out on me yesterday while I was at work. Which meant all my internet traffic ceased. This is the second Linksys switch I’ve had burn up on me in 4 years. I’m thinking of stocking backups just in case.

An odd side effect of this all seems to be the loss of a hard drive in my main computer too. I haven’t lost any data….yet. I’m in data recovery mode. It seems when it rains it pours.

I finally got to see Napoleon Dynamite this weekend. Being a geek/need/dweeb/dork I figured I could relate to the struggles of a misunderstood teen. The movie was hilarious with it’s dry sense of humor. It was an odd movie, much like the Royal Tennenbaums.

Courtney put it best when a gaggle of teenagers in the theater had trouble controlling themselves, “When you come to see a movie about dorks, you’re bound to have dorks in the theater.” It made me feel old whining about the rackus noise of the kids. So instead I sat back and appreciated the fact that for 1:30 hrs I was 16 again.

http://papernapkin.net/

From it’s home page:

So here’s the scenario: You’re out at a bar, riding transit, or even just walking down the street, and some bozo who desperately wants into your pants starts up a conversation with you. Rather than make a scene or make them upset, you’re polite and at least nod at the proper times. Then, of course, they ask you for your number. Except this is 2004, so maybe they ask for your email address instead.

That’s where Paper Napkin comes in. Give them anyname@papernapkin.net (or paamail.com, to be less suspicious), tell them it’s your address, and when they write you, they’ll automatically get a response telling them how badly they’ve been rejected.

I blantantly stole this from Courtney, who got it from Michelle. Transcripts of OnStar commericals that didn’t make the cut. Funny stuff.

What happens when I get a new camera? That’s right, dog pictures. I purchase a Canon Digital Rebel 300D and I’ve spent the last week chasing the dogs around the house. They seem to be the easiest target for my “artform.” Sydney is a very photogenic dog while Dottie won’t sit still for longer than 3 seconds. I will need to venture out of the house to get some better photos. The dogs are only entertaining for so long.

I had to belly up and admit today that I wrote some code which has brought an application to it’s knees. There’s nothing like having someone look at your code and laugh at your mistake. It is all in good fun. I figure it’s better to accept responsibility and find a fix rather than finding a scapegoat. People aren’t typically looking for blame, they’re looking for a fix. So as long as I can find a fix, then the blame game sort of fades into the background.

Good news, passed on by Drew, the Onion is on it’s way to the Twin Cities.