One Man's Ramblings, v.2

Loads to catch up on.

2011-08-02T19:35:00.001-05:00

A lot has happened during July.

I spent a week in New Orleans, visiting my Dad and helping my Mom with stereo and computer issues.

Once I returned to NJ, my friend Jed flew up here and visited for a week.

During that week we took Nate & Maren to the annual West Orange family fun night at the town pool, we took the whole family to the beach at Point Pleasant, and the two of us spent a day in NYC.

Additionally Jed & I got to spend some time playing Magic:The Gathering, videogames, talking sci-fi, TV, and politics, and Jed taught Nate how to play Magic as well.

We baked an apple pie and chocolate chip cookies, and I sent Jed home with about 30Gb worth of music.

I took Jed & the kids to the monthly NAVA meet, and we just about identified every dinner establishment in the tri-state area that closes on Mondays.
All in all, a fun, exhausting week. Photos at Flickr.

Tomorrow, back to work.

Learn something new dept., July 2011

2011-07-03T12:13:00.000-05:00

Began building an Exchange 2010 server several months ago. Was sidetracked and never finished up.

When I returned to the project on Friday I found that the Information Store service refused to start. The Event Viewer showed:

Event ID: 301

Failed to mount database 'Mailbox Database 0696636359' on Exch2010.jacobshome.local (Duration=00:00:00.3719227, ErrorMessage=An Active Manager operation failed with a transient error. Please retry the operation. Error: A transient error occurred during discovery of the database availability group topology. Error: Database action failed with transient error. Error: A transient error occurred during a database operation. Error: MapiExceptionNetworkError: Unable to make admin interface connection to server. (hr=0x80040115, ec=-2147221227)

During the original work on the machine, I'd installed an eval of Forefront Server Protection. That eval is long-since expired.

I uninstalled the Forefront Protection (no reboot was necessary), and the IS service started right up, no muss, no fuss.

Hope this helps somebody.

The Joy of nice machinery, the Agony of defective nice machinery

2011-03-23T23:40:00.000-05:00

A bit bummed. Saturday afternoon a really nice Asus laptop was put up for sale, for a very low price, over at Woot. It was priced about half of the normal price, but was a refurb, with only a 90-day warranty. Jess' laptop was near-death, so we ordered the Asus. Surprisingly and impressively, it arrived today. Unfortunately, the wireless card on the machine doesn't work at all. The hardware and software behave as though the card isn't even physically present.
I've just submitted the necessary docs to Asus Customer Care, and assuming the docs pass muster Asus will let me ship the laptop to them for warranty repair. The machine is gorgeous though, and assuming it's repaired I'll still be thrilled with it; just disappointed I need to wait a few more weeks before we can enjoy it.

Getting Better

2011-02-09T01:40:00.003-05:00

Once upon a time, our den looked like this:

A couple of months ago our trusty old TV decided it was time to shuffle off into the light. Soon after, our den evolved, to look like this:

Even before purchasing the new TV the plan was to route the wires behind the wall. So, as soon as scheduling permitted, my father-in-law and I cut holes in the wall, installed junction boxes and wall plates for the various AV jacks, and the den looked like this:

Still, something was wrong with the picture. Obviously some improvement was still necessary, but what ever could it be ? Hmmmm….

How about….
Some new furniture, more suited to the situation? Maybe.
Cleaning the room, and discarding a lot of junk? That's a promising thought too.

How about BOTH? Eureka!!!!
I present, the den, take 2:

Still not perfect, but much improved.

Karmic payback can be a bitch.

2010-12-11T00:07:00.001-05:00

Over the last couple of months I've spent a lot more than usual. There were some unplanned home repairs, but some of the expenses were nothing but indulgence, and could easily be considered unwise.

I think God, Karma, or whatever is making sure I know that nothing comes without a catch.

Our old TV was showing definite signs that it was about to die. The cumulative wisdom I found online seemed to suggest the best deals on TVs occurred just before Black Friday, so I went ahead and got myself a new 50" TV just before Thanksgiving.

High on electronics shopping, judgement obviously taking a vacation, I then ordered a new Playstation 3 on Black Friday. While waiting for the system to arrive I went to a friend's videogame store and bought a copy of Bioshock.

Why is any of this bad? Why am I complaining about getting all of these neat toys?

The PS3 arrived 2 days ago. I began playing Bioshock last night, and played some more tonight. Bioshock looks like a neat game, and so far I'm liking it a lot, and would like to keep playing it.

BUT IT'S MAKING ME SICK. After about 30 minutes of gameplay, I am suffering major motion sickness, and have to stop, or I'm afraid I'll vomit. When this occurred last night I figured I'm overdue for a bout with the flu, and I was very tired, so maybe I was getting sick. But I woke up this morning feeling fine. Then after playing for another 35 or 40 minutes tonight I again felt very queasy. It's now been about an hour since I stopped playing and I'm still feeling sick.

I've never had any problem with motion sickness, so this is a new and seriously unpleasant and disheartening thing for me.

I read a post online about this, and a suggestion was to play for short lengths of time, and gradually build up a tolerance, essentially teaching my brain to handle this better.

All I can say is ARGHHH!!!

Funny PS: I'm not making this up, but about 30 seconds after I posted this, Reese Witherspoon used the phrase "karmic payback" on David Letterman.

Things I'm grateful for.

2010-11-25T15:25:00.000-05:00

Wow, I can't believe I haven't updated this for three months.

I'm going to keep this short and sweet. Listed here, in no particular order, are things I'm thankful for:

Cliched as it is, I'm thankful for my family.

I'm thankful thagt after the last two years of struggling to make ends meet, I'm now earning a living and capable of paying my bills.

I'm thankful for Abbey Road.

I'm thankful for Alice's Restaurant Masacree. I discovered this song about 20 years ago at Michael Cohen's house on Thanksgiving Day, and have ritually listened to it every single Thanksgiving day since then. It doesn't grow old.

I'm thankful that tending to the leaves in my yard during the fall, and tending to the snow in my yard during the winter doesn't debilitate me as much as it did when I first started tackling those things 12 years ago. Practice and almost-regular visits to the gym have noticeably increased my stamina.

I'm thankful for generous relatives.

I'm thankful for The Princess Bride.

I'm thankful for the luxury of getting to drive anywhere I want, whenever I want. On the horizon, our krewe will be heading to Metairie,LA, for example.

That's all. And remember, you can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant (excepting Alice).

Seen this morning on HuffPo

2010-08-31T08:15:00.001-05:00

That's the drag about being on the Left. You have less power than a gnat with a bad leg, but everybody accuses you of running the world.

-- Zogimperator

Goodnight Iraq.

2010-08-18T22:38:00.000-05:00

I turned on the boob tube tonight and learned that the last US Comabt Troops are exiting Iraq now, as I type this.

Yes, 50,000+ US Troops will remain in Iraq. And yes, our government and politicians still do things I disagree with.

But seeing our combat presence in Iraq finally leave evokes in me feelings of relief, happiness, and pride in our country.

Trouble syncing Windows phone to PC? Me too.....

2010-08-18T01:36:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I discovered Microsoft OneNote, and almost immediately decided this was a really, really neat program. I wish I'd investigated it when I first encountered it a few years ago.

OneNote can sync with my Windows Mobile phone, but that wasn't happening. Eventually I discovered my phone hadn't sync'ed at all with my laptop since mid-July. (My email/contacts/calendar items sync wirelessly via T-Mobile, so I very rarely try to sync the phone with the PC.)

I spent a lot of time yesterday, and a few more hours tonight trying to resolve the problem. The computer runs Windows 7, so I've got Windows Mobile Device Center v6.1 installed. The phone is a T-Mobile Touch Pro 2, running Windows Mobile 6.5.

I tried every solution I found online (via Bing, Google, T-Mobile, Microsoft, and HTC). No luck.

I found and unpackaged the USB cable originally provided with the phone and tried it. No luck.

After a few repairs and reinstalls of Windows Mobile Device Center (WMDC), several reboots of the PC and/or the phone, a system restore, and restarting services on the PC, all to no avail, I was beginning to lose hope.

Finally I set ActiveSync on the phone and WMDC to sync via Bluetooth. The sync started successfully and is still going. Hopefully it will eventually complete, and hopefully afterward the phone will sync via the USB cable as well. Here's hoping....

......

.......

.....

Another reboot later, and I can report that I still cannot sync via USB cable. Bummer.

I guess I just need to sync via Bluetooth when I need to sync.

Now I need to get to sleep.

A similar letter to Best Buy

2010-07-27T19:47:00.000-05:00

Earlier this evening I read about Best Buy's donation to Minnesota Forward. I am writing this email to you to express my enormous disappointment with this decision.

Since Best Buy opened their first store in Louisiana several years ago I've liked shopping at Best Buy for electronics. I've taken my parents there when they wanted new AV equipment or computers, bought countless printer cartridges there, and have bought videogames and music CDs at Best Buy for as long as I can remember.

I am now seriously considering a personal boycott of Best Buy stores. Don't think I'm singling Best Buy out. I read that other corporations including Target also donated to MN Forward and I've sent a similar letter to them.

I am vehemently opposed to Rep. Emmer's immoral stands and offensive, un-American statements on many topics. Even if I agreed with him however, I think it is improper for a corporation to donate corporate funds to a political campaign, even if the donation happens to be legal.

I don't see any way for Best Buy to somehow 'ungive' the donation already given, and that would be dishonorable even if it could be done. While you cannot undo what has already been done, I'd very much like to see Best Buy donate an equal amount of money to an organization supporting Mr. Emmer's opponent, to try to mitigate the MN Forward donation.

Thank you for your time, and I sincerely hope I can continue shopping at Best Buy in the future.

My letter to Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel

2010-07-27T19:26:00.000-05:00

Earlier this evening I read about Target's donation to Minnesota Forward. I am writing this email to you to express my enormous disappointment with this decision.

Since discovering Target stores in the late-1990s I've liked shopping at Target and turn to Target first for almost every type of product I shop for. I go to Target for housewares, clothing, electronics, music CDs, small furniture, toys and pet food.

I am now seriously considering a personal boycott of Target stores. Don't think I'm singling Target out. I read that other corporations including Best Buy also donated to MN Forward. I intend to send a similar letter to them.

I am vehemently opposed to Rep. Emmer's immoral stands and offensive, un-American statements on many topics. Even if I agreed with him however, I think it is improper for a corporation to donate corporate funds to a political campaign, even if the donation happens to be legal.

I don't see any way for Target to somehow 'ungive' the donation already given, and that would be dishonorable even if it could be done. While you cannot undo what has already been done, I'd very much like to see Target donate an equal amount of money to an organization supporting Mr. Emmer's opponent, to try to mitigate the MN Forward donation.

Thank you for your time, and I sincerely hope I can continue shopping at Target in the future.

Letter to Newsweek - regarding the common opinion about upcoming November elections

2010-07-16T08:21:00.000-05:00

Lately I seem to frequently read or hear in Newsweek and elsewhere about low poll numbers for President Obama and Democrats in Congress. The low poll numbers seem to me to be in response to imprecise questions such as “Are you happy with President Obama’s performance on the economy?”, or “Are you happy with his handling of the BP Oil Spill?”.

The poll results published for mainstream consumption never seem to mention any follow-up questions, such as WHY the respondent feels the way he/she feels. Yet the results are routinely presented to suggest the country is likely to vote out a substantial number of Democratic candidates this November, and the presumption is that those seats will be taken by Republican candidates.

I haven’t seen any mention of another possibility though. What if a sizeable portion of voters feel as I do? I am unhappy with President Obama’s performance on nearly every issue, and far more unhappy with most Democrats in Congress, but will most likely vote for them all again. As opposed to the very vocal right-wing speakers on political television programs I feel that President Obama and Congress have consistently not gone far enough with their actions. If my choice is between somebody that will do something absolutely opposite to what I desire, or somebody that will take a baby-step towards what I desire, the choice is clear. It is not at all a wonderful choice, but there’s not a lot there to struggle with.

If a polled voter is unhappy with a particular officeholder’s performance, that doesn’t necessarily mean the voter will vote for the challenger. Assuming that is a mistake.

Shopped for a clock radio lately?

2010-07-09T20:12:00.000-05:00

A few years ago I decided my very old AM/FM clock radio had served an honorable term of duty and should be put out of it's misery. I replaced it with a fancy clock radio with CD player that I purchased from Linens and Things as they went out of business. The fancy model was an Emerson, but it seemed like a decent unit and I bought it against my better judgement.

The clock-radio never worked right, and I finally decided recently to just junk it and get something that works properly. (If anybody reading this is researching an Emerson model CKD5811, DON'T BUY IT. STAY FAR AWAY FROM THIS DEFECTIVE, POORLY ASSEMBLED PIECE OF MEDIOCRITY.)

I spent some time today researching online, and then driving around shopping for a CD/AM/FM clock radio. (I never even looked for AM, truth be told.)

iPod docks have just about eliminated CD clock radios. There are very low-quality cheap clock radios with CD functionality, and there are $250+ clock radios with CD players from the likes of Bose and Cambridge Soundworks. Other than one less-than-impressive $40 Sony there are no other CD-clock-radios available.

Rather than spending a ridicuolous amount or buying another cheap piece of junk I'm skipping the whole thing.

Listen up any potential decision makers at Panasonic, Pioneer, Sharp or Aiwa: If you produce a decent-sounding, decent-quality, stereo clock radio, with CD-player, for under $100 I'll buy it. And I'll bet I'm not the only one.

When I asked for a TV-remote/cellphone combo unit you ignored me. I'm giving you another chance here! :)

Lebron James announcement

2010-07-08T20:30:00.001-05:00

I'm not at all interested in pro basketball. Currently with a group of guys watching the Lebron James announcement on ESPN. Tonight's the first time I've ever seen Lebron.

He looks like a black Kelsey Grammar.

Is it wrong to like blue?

2010-07-06T13:33:00.000-05:00

So the Uruguay v. Netherlands soccer match just began. All I know about either team is how to spell the country’s names. Is it wrong to root for Uruguay, solely because I like the sky-blue jerseys more than the orange jerseys worn by the Netherlands players?

A Very Brief Comment on NJ Governor Chris Christie

2010-07-06T11:11:00.003-05:00

For whatever it's worth:

On April 3, 2010 I sent a very short email to the NJ Star-Ledger and cc'd Governor Christie's office. (I realize I usually write a lot. To prove the letter is short, I've pasted it to the bottom of this post.)

Today, July 6, 2010, I've received a brief, canned response from the Governor Christie administration, and nothing in the response suggests my letter was ever even read. Not much of a surprise, but still disappointing.

I'm not writing about my own opinions concerning Gov. Christie in this post. I might do that some other time.

------------------------------------------------

My message to them:

For as long as I can recall there has been discussion and hand-wringing about our state's financial situation. Perennially there are excessive expenses, and insufficient revenue.

A couple of years ago I heard a news story regarding a plan in Utah that had the state operate with a 4-day workweek. (http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-06-30-four-day_N.htm)

State workers would work an extra 2 hours each of the 4 days, and then have an extra day off, resulting in no total reduction of hours worked.

I think this is very much worth exploring, and has the potential to save significant money, as well as reduce environmental impact, wear and tear on our highways, etc...
Thanks for your time.

--

Their response:

Dear Mr. .....:

Thank you for your views and suggestions regarding the Fiscal Year 2011 Budget. I appreciate hearing your ideas to help restore fiscal sanity to our State.

Given these tough economic times, we had some very tough decisions to make in this year's Budget. We had to balance the need to get our State's economy back on track by not raising taxes and making sure we only spend money we have. At the same time, we must never forget our obligation to protect the most vulnerable of our State. That is why the Budget that I signed on June 29 reduces spending by nearly 9 percent, demands a higher level of efficiency and accountability across state government and maintains funding for critical programs.

I believe that while the choices we made in this year's Budget were tough, they were necessary. Today's sacrifices in which we are all sharing have put our State back on a path to lower taxes, more jobs and a place where we can all afford to live.

Again, thank you for writing. Best wishes.

Sincerely,
Chris Christie
Governor

July 4th musings

2010-07-06T00:26:00.000-05:00

Between viewings of various fireworks displays this weekend I spent a little time thinking about the state of the country, and my feelings about things.

As is obvious to anybody that knows me, I was truly distressed during most of this past decade. I felt (and still believe) that our country was hijacked by truly evil and villainous people determined to destroy everything America stood for, and I felt powerless to do anything about the situation.

When I learned of President Obama's election and then again as I heard his inauguration speech last January I felt enormously happy, relieved, and joyful. I can't really describe just how optimistic I felt.

Since then I've been consistently disappointed, watching as President Obama and his Administration compromise on issue after issue. Many times I've felt that the left-leaning members of our country have been betrayed.

But at the same time I've always wanted to give Obama the benefit of the doubt, and I've tried to find ways to do so.

This weekend I think I came to a mature conclusion. Or else I'm just a naive sap. In the interest of happiness I choose to believe the former.

I concluded that while a lot of issues haven't gone the way I'd like, and while I think Obama and the Dems in Congress have given up a lot more than I think they should have, a lot of good stuff HAS been accomplished in a relatively short time.

So while things haven't gone as far as I'd like, things are definitely moving in the right direction, and I hope to see more positive progress.

Possibly coloring my perception is that I'm personally having a pretty good year. Answering Reagan's soundbite, I AM better off than I've been in many years.

After nearly a decade of honestly worrying that I was witnessing the end of our country, I am sincerely happy and relieved to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!!!

And now I need to go to sleep. Work resumes in about 7 hours.

:)

Weird LAN problem - wireless router degrades LAN performance

2010-06-24T10:37:00.003-05:00

I'm suffering a strange LAN performance problem I can't figure out. I'm hoping somebody somewhere on the 'net might read this and offer a potential solution. Here goes....

I use Verizon FIOS for my internet connection. My service level is 20Mbps/5Mbps. My main PC is a alptop with a built-in 802.11n card. The card, according to Win7, is an Atheros AR9285.

Verizon FIOS supplied an ActionTec 802.11g router.

The wireless card in my laptop is DISABLED. The laptop is connected to the LAN using an ethernet cable, plugged in to the back of the ActionTec router.

Speed tests performed at http://www2.verizon.net/micro/speedtest/java/# consistently display results of 19.5+ Mbps / 6+ Mbps.

About a year ago I purchased a Belkin N150 router. I configured it as an Access Point and plugged it in to the back of the ActionTec router. I had found the ActionTec router to have unreliable wireless, and the Belkin's 802.11n would provide faster speeds and greater range.

A couple of weeks ago I started seeing frequent weird network drops. On my laptop network connectivity would seem to just stall every few minutes, although Windows diddn't report that the connection had dropped. A few minutes later the connection would work again. If I disconnected the Belkin router from the network the problem disappeared.

I did a lot of troubleshooting, and ultimately found that if I used my laptop wired, with the wireless disabled, and disconnected the Belkin from the network, the problem disappeared. This would suggest the Belkin is broken somehow.

I've upgraded the Belkin firmware to the latest version. I've reset the Belkin to factory settings. Still, anytime the Belkin is on the LAN, my laptop gets terrible network performance. The speed test results drop dramatically, down as low as 0.54xx download speeds in some instances. The moment I disconnect the Belkin the network performance returns to 19.xxxMbps downloads.

There is something that makes the culprit less obvious, though. With the Belkin connected to the LAN, another laptop in the house sees no troubles at all, and still gets perfectly good network performance.

On my laptop I've reset the TCP/IP stack. I've deleted all entries from the ARP table. Of course I've rebooted multiple times. It just seems like my laptop is suddenly allergic to the Belkin router.

I'm stumped, and would really like to use the Belkin router if I can just resolve this.

Anybody out there have any idea what might be causing this?

Who matches the funds?

2010-06-24T10:18:00.002-05:00

For several years now I've received frequent solicitations from various groups aligned with the national Democratic Party. Many times the solicitiations state that if I donate within a certain time period my donation will be matched, doubling its effectiveness.

I don't think these messages have ever stated who will be donating the matching amount.

I can speculate (i.e., guess) as well as anybody else. I want to know what person or organization matches the donations received.

On The Road Again...Just Can't Wait To Get On The Road Again...

2010-06-13T23:58:00.002-05:00

At the end of July my family is going to a tiny resort town on the northern border of Georgia to attend a family reunion. Tonight I finally stopped procrastinating and spent some time online analyzing airfares and trying to choose which airport to fly into, given that there are 4 different commercial airports equidistant from the resort. The resort is about 2 hours from any airport.

After my analysis I concluded that my cost to fly was going to be approximately $368/person. For my 4-person family, that comes to $1472. That cost doesn't include any addl taxes/fees we'll undoubtedly end up seeing. We'll also have to rent a car. Let's call that an addl. $40/day though I think it would end up exceeding that by a lot. So the transportation costs are now up to $1592, so I'm calling it $1600.

Now let's figure travel time:

Home to airport -- 30 minutes
Arrive 90 minutes early -- 90 minutes
On plane, In-air -- 120 minutes
Wait for luggage -- 30 minutes
Drive from ATL airport to resort -- 136 minutes
Rent car -- 30 minutes

TOTAL: 7 hours, 16 minutes.
And that doesn't account for any time driving in circles as I try to exit Hartfield Airport, or trying to find the resort.

So, $1600, 7:16 travel time.

OR

Gasoline to drive the MPV 782 miles, 22mpg = 35.54gallons at $2.65/gallon = $94.20.
Travel time = 12:55

SO, As I see it that comes to about $1500 for about 6 hours, or $250/hr if my math is correct.

!!! ROADTRIP !!!
:)

(EDIT - was comparing air travel expenses round-trip to car-travel expenses one-way. The proper comparison would be approx. $1600 vs. approx. $200. My conclusion doesn't change a bit.)

Three Cheers for Sears

2010-06-06T23:12:00.000-05:00

For as long as I've been a purchasing member of society, I've never really seen any appeal to shopping at Sears, with one notable exception.

I've always believed that if a person is buying tools, the person should buy Craftsman tools, from Sears of course. Craftsman tools are quality to begin with, and they have an unsurpassed (and unsurpassable) guarantee. Craftsman tools have a lifetime guarantee, and the few times I've need to swap one out the process has been completely hassle-free.

The latest episode occurred today. About 20 years ago I bought a 50-piece Craftsman ratchet and socket set from Home Shopping network. Honestly, it was the first time I'd ever seen Craftsman products sold outside of a Sears store.

A few months ago I discovered the entire set was covered in some nasty rust. Chrome wrenches, ratchets, screwdrivers, and sockets aren't supposed to rust. I thought of this while in Sears yesterday buying some deep sockets to work on the MPV. So I asked a clerk and he said that yes, I could still exchange the socket set after all these years.

So I returned toi Sears today, carrying the rusty set. It was no surprise that the store didn't carry an identical product. I was surprised at the way they handled the exchange. First, I found a similar socket kit (Retail - $39.99). That kit only had two wrenches however, and my original set had 6 wrenches. So the clerk let me pick out an 8-wrench wrench set as well (Retail $29.99). At that point I was almost completely whole, excepting a magnetic screwdriver handle with a set of interchangeable bits. I felt like I was pushing things though, so I went ahead and paid for the screwdriver & bits myself.

Still, the process was completely hassle-free, and Sears gave me a new $30 wrench set and a new $40 socket set in exchange for an approximately 20 year old socket set that had rusted.

I've got a new appreciation for Sears.

My new favorite network

2010-06-06T20:47:00.000-05:00

In my previous post I wrote that I'm loving Doctor Who. Doctor Who airs on BBC America, a network I'd never previously watched.

During Doctor Who there are frequent promo spots for other BBC America programs that look like they might be entertaining - 'Ashes To Ashes', 'The Graham Norton Show', & 'Gavin & Stacey' come to mind. I haven't seen any of these yet but they look good from the ads. The network also shows 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' often (my favorite Star Trek series), and a very funny car review program - Top Gear.

Top Gear has three smart-ass car reviewers drive various cars and give tell their opinions about the cars. The show is very funny. In fact, I was watching an episode just now, and had to stop in the middle to write this post. The cast was tasked with reviewing 3 small economy cars. This was likely to be dreadfully boring - driving a Honda Fit around a racetrack doesn't promise excitement. So the three guys on the show recruited their mothers for the test. First, each of the guys drove the cars to the track, and parked them in a line.

Next, each of the mothers had to get into one of the cars (simultaneously), and get everything configured and adjusted appropriately for them to drive the car. They had to adjust the seats, the mirrors, and change the radio from the 'younger' station to a classic rock channel.

The first one to start the engine and begin driving would 'win' the race.

If you can pull the show up - Top Gear - on your On Demand and watch this episode, I recommend it. You'll laugh. (On Verizon FIOS OnDemand the show is listed as episode 6.04. )

:D

Who???

2010-05-31T23:59:00.001-05:00

So, I've been watching Doctor Who lately on BBC America lately and I *LOVE* it! I like both the new Doctor and last season's equally.

Also, assuming this post appears, this will be my first post made from my phone.

Happy Memorial Day!

I'm back, back in the blogging groove....

2010-05-19T21:36:00.004-05:00

Wow.

Two Months.

I knew I hadn't updated this in a while, but I had no idea it had been this long. Oh well, I'm updating this tonight, so until Doc Brown meets me and gives me the keys to his cool ride, this is the best I can do.

Current goings-on in my life:

Work - I've been busy lately. In fact, as I type this I'm building a server to run Windows Server 2008 R2, and Exchange Server 2010. I need to learn Exchange 2010 and setting up my own server is an effective way to get started. A coworker gave me a year-old motherboard/CPU (AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+)/VGA (512Mb GeForce 8400GS) bundle he'd replaced, and I supplied the hard drive, case, and DVD drive. I only needed to buy the RAM - 8Gb, PC-8500. Admittedly the machine has no applications installed yet, but is a FAST system, and will hopefully remain so after it is actually bearing a load. The installation didn't go at all smoothly though, and the machine is suffering weird crashes, so I'm worried about the hardware - I'm worried there may be an issue with the RAM - the modules were a little too thick to fit easily alongside each other in the motherboard.

Other than the possible hardware issue, work is humming along lately. We've been busy and clients seem happy.

Town - New Jersey regularly has 'School Elections'. School elections are elections in which voters choose who is elected to their local School Board, and whether or not to approve of the coming year's school budget. Despite our insanely high municipal property taxes, the school budgets nearly always pass. (NJ has the highest property taxes in the country, and our town's property taxes are among the highest in the state.)

This year, headlines were made when voters in about half of the towns in NJ rejected the school budgets. Our town was one of those. NJ law stipulates that if the school budget proposed by the school board fails, the proposed budget is then reviewed by the Town Council, and the council then decides whether or not to approve the budget as-is, or make changes. Monday evening there was a joint meeting with the Town Council and School Board, open to the public. I attended the meeting. The school board brought their accountant, who tried to explain the budget they'd presented and defend their choices. The town council brought their accountant, an independent firm hired to audit the school budget and make recommendations.

Both accountants went back and forth, spewing numbers (seemingly with no consistency) back and forth. Personally, I thought that neither accountant knew what he was talking about. It seemed to me that they kept stating different numbers, never the same amount twice, and if they couldn't explain anything in a comprehensible manner than I don't think they understand things well themselves. The only thing of value I took from the meeting was that I don't envy the job of the council members. The council was required to decide what to do about the budget by yesterday. I've just read an article online that didn't cover the new budget in detail, but did state that the council pared $2.5 Million from the $118 Million budget. Seems like a pretty small reduction, in my opinion, but I guess it's a step in the right direction.

Family - On Sunday Nate & I joined about 15 other people and went on a Nature Hike organized by the Environmental Committee at our synagoge. We hiked up Pyramid Mountain. The trip was a lot of fun. The two of us wolfed down 3 Peanut Butter & Jelly sandwiches, 3 Almond Butter & Jelly sandwiches, 1 banana, and some Cheese Chex Mix before beginning the hike. We then trekked up the mountain, pausing about halfway up to stand near a cliff and look at the NYC skyline. After a few pics, we continued to the top to see Tripod Rock. Once at Tripod Rock, we sat down and listened as the park guide told our group about the rock. Once the group had rested and learned about the rock, we stood up and walked back down to the bottom of the mountain, where everybody disbanded and drove home. The day was fun, relaxing, and good exercise, with perfect weather. The absolute best part, though? When, in the car on the way home, Nate said he had a good time and asked if the two of us could go hiking again!
Home - (Outside) After several years of first ignoring, and then losing in my battle against a pitiful, dying yard around my house, my efforts and enormous quantities of grass seed are finally showing results. While there are still some thin patches, my yard is mostly grass now! Still to-do: trim the hedges, cut and dispose of a huge pile of fallen branches, and certainly not least, tear down and rebuild the deck before somebody falls through.
Home - (Inside) A couple of weeks ago I pulled out an album from my collection, one I'd never actually listened to. I was psyched - it was a Lou Reed double-album set and I was in the mood to hear some Lou. The album skipped so much I couldn't listen. Disappointed, I put the previous album back on the turntable and listened to Springsteen Live (Badlands, to be specific). Today I felt like hearing a particular Jimmy Buffett album that I don't have on CD, only on LP. This album also skipped terribly, though there is nothing visibly wrong with the album. I suspect I need a new stylus. I emailed an online turntable supply store (LPGear.com) and asked about my turntable and a replacement stylus; hopefully I'll hear back from them soon. Worst case, I've got a second turntable hooked up to my PC in the basement (useful to rip LPs to MP3 files), and might be able to take the cartridge from that turntable and use it on the turntable in the living room.
Health - very little to write here - I've been very, very bad about working out lately, and need to get back in to the gym.

I'm sure there's more to write about, but for now I'm done. If I don't return for a while, enjoy the summer!

American On Purpose

2010-03-17T00:58:00.006-05:00

A short while ago I discovered The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. I've probably been watching the show for, at most, 2 years now. I like it and try to stay up late enough to watch it, although that doesn't happen consistently. I LOVE the theme song.

Last fall Craig Ferguson released an autobiography - "American On Purpose". I checked it out from the library this past Saturday, and have just finished it about 20 minutes ago. It's great, and I recommend it to anybody.

Most of the book is interesting, moving, or dramatic, but occasionally there are truly funny bits. Here's one:

Robbie and I became roommates when he found a sublet that was available in a large basement flat near the art school. The place was available for a year, and the only problem was that while the owners were out of the country we'd ahve to look after Ken, their enormous white cat. Ken was a sonofabitch, he must have weighed forty pounds and could actually open the refrigerator door by himself. I would never have believed this had I not seen him go into the kitchen, open the fridge with his big, meaty paw, and steal a cooked chicken that Robbie's mother had sent as a care package. I yelled and tried to catch him but he grabbed the chicken and jumped on top of the cupboards, out of my reach. He stared me down defiantly as he enjoyed his lunch. He hated me, and I, in turn, loathed and feared him. Sometimes I would wake up in my small damp bedroom and find him staring at me, a look of smug pity written on his whiskery face. I always felt Ken was judging me, and I think I was right. Ken thought I was a lazy alcoholic stoner who would never amount to anything other than babysitting cats, to whom I was an intellectual inferior, and I don't suppose I can blame him, given the evidence. My continuing distrust of cats stems from my dysfunctional relationship with Ken.

A thought I had recently about the Big American Health Care Debate

2010-03-17T00:47:00.002-05:00

For the last year or so there has been a lot of talk about the manner in which health care is handled in the United States. The term 'Health Care System' is often used, but calling the chaotic mess that currently exists a system seems like a whitewash to me.

The one component of the proposed reform that bothers me greatly is the mandate - the idea that everybody will be forced to buy insurance under the new laws. This seems like a very, very bad thing to me and is very discomforting.

I realized a few days ago that I've been buying insurance for myself (& my family) for most of my adult life, and for at least the last 12 years, if not longer. The mandate won't affect me directly. If anything it may help me if it has an affect of bringing rates down. (Unlikely, but why not dream a little? :) )

My aversion to the concept still exists, but I think about it more deeply now, pondering why I feel strongly about the issue. My best guess is that it offends my sensibilities similarly to seatbelt and motorcycle helmet laws, although it doesn't feel the same. I avoid absolutes, but generally I oppose laws regulating personal behavior, and laws that seek to protect people from themselves. I believe every person should be allowed to do whatever he or she wants, provided it doesn't hurt somebody else. You should be permitted to be an idiot, if that's your choice.

Back on the Wagon - Followup

2010-03-11T22:28:00.001-05:00

Since my previous, I haven't been to bed before 11pm a single time.

BUT, I have gone to the gym to work out 9 out of the last 10 days!

Getting back on the wagon.

2010-03-02T17:46:00.002-05:00

In November 2008 I began working out for the first time in my life. I regularly visited the fitness center in my local JCC and exercised 2 or 3 times/week. A couple of times I didn't get to the gym for over a week, but that was a very rare occurrence.

Then for no particular reason other than lack of motivation I stopped going in mid-January of this year. (Last visit was January 19.) Compounding things, between Mardi Gras Kingcakes, Saints Superbowl party wings/chips/etc.., and Purim baskets (Shalach Manot), I've been eating a ton of junk food lately.

I decided last night to renew my efforts at going to the gym. My plan is to be in bed before 11pm every night, and go to the gym almost every day. We'll see if this really happens.

So far, last night I was in bed by 11:30p and fell asleep with Rachel Maddow. The alarm went off at 6:45, I was at the gym at 7:15, and I am now ready to go to sleep (at 6pm, for anyone keeping track!).

From the Learn Something New Department

2010-02-28T21:06:00.004-05:00

About 10 or 12 years ago I began using a little-known (at least in the USA) proprietary e-mail program called "The Bat". I used the program for years, but over time I became more & more immersed in mainstream corporate and IT environments, and I concluded life would be indescribably more simple if I just used Outlook for all of my e-mail accounts, both personal and business. (I still intend to segregate business and non-business emails within Outlook.)

So I needed to extract my decade+ worth of messages from The Bat and import them into Outlook. That task was nothing I looked forward to, so for over a year I've been using the web interface from my ISP to manage my personal emails, while I put off the necessary task of exporting my data from The Bat.

Tonight I need some information from an old email message buried somewhere in my The Bat data, so I finally bit the bullet and have begun trying to move the data into Outlook.

Here's where things get interesting. To be clear, I'm using the word interesting to suggest "What a damnpainintheneckwhyohwhydidMicrosofteverdosuchastupidthing!!!!!%$%#^&@*)".

I don't think it's possible to export the messages from The Bat directly into a format Outlook 2007 can import. I AM able to, with some minor futzing around, to export the data from The Bat and import it into Windows Live Mail. (I have Windows Live Mail, not simply Windows Mail, because I needed to examine it for a client.)

So with a moderate amount of effort I've moved a specific subset of my messages into Windows Live Mail. So far, so good.

Windows Live Mail is a Microsoft product. Outlook 2007 is a Microsoft product. Neither product is particularly exotic, and it's a no-brainer that I should be able to export messages out of Windows Live Mail and import them into Outlook 2007.

As a matter of fact, that IS easily done. But there's a really, really aggravating screw-you in the process. Unlike every other computer program I've ever used in my life, when I export the data from WLM, I am not asked where I want the exported data saved, and I am also not informed as to where WLM is going to save the data for me.

SO tonight I ran the export repeatedly, trying to sleuth out where exactly the data was being saved. I searched my hard drive for .pst files. (A .pst file is the file format Outlook uses for local data.) I checked time stamps. I made sure I turned on hidden file visibility.

Finally, I looked at a Microsoft user forum focused on Windows Live Mail, and found my answer. WLM helpfully took the messages I was trying to import into Outlook, and added them into the PST already being used by Outlook.

The result is that I now have 13,622 messages, spanning approximately 13 months, stored in the same Inbox that holds my business email messages from the last 12 years. Everything is mingled together, nice and cozy.

ARGHHH!!!!

I'd already set up a brand-new folder, specifically for the personal emails. And while I was trying to figure this out I probably ran the export at least 4 times, so I may have about 55,000 of these messages when you include duplicates.

For those of you that aren't familiar with the way these processes USUALLY work, the program I want to export the data FROM will typically ask to where do you want to save the exported data, and that program will create a file in the spot you specify. THEN, in the program that you want to use the data going forward, you would import the data yourself, specifying where you want the new program to maintain the data.

For WLM to take it upon itself to just put the data into Outlook for me, without telling me where the data would be inserted, is REALLY, REALLY RUDE.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: As it turns out, Windows Live Mail exports the messages into whatever the default 'drop-point' is for Outlook. As my Outlook was configured to place messages into the server-based mailbox by default, that's where the exported messages were placed.

And as it works out I ran the export a total of 5 times - adding about 60,000 messages to my Inbox. Aside from the additional clutter and the undesirability of hqaving my personal and business communications mixed, Outlook then couldn't send/receive within a reasonable amount of time as it was busy trying to upload 60,000 messages to the server during the sync process. I cancelled the sync and spent well over an hour trying to find all of the personal emails and move them to the appropriate folder.

WLM Developers -- BAD. BAD. BAD! THINK!

Let it snow, let it snow....

2010-02-16T14:22:00.005-05:00

So I moved from the New Orleans area up to the frigid & often rude northeast almost 12 years ago. Yes, property taxes are insane, strangers are less friendly, and anything automobile-related is downright hostile. You can add to the list of negatives the aggravations associated with snowfall - it's cold, damp, impacts traffic, requires painful and tedious shoveling, etc...

BUT, most people will admit, it's very pretty to look at:

I took the above pics walking around my house today. After a snowfall the entire world just seems more tranquil and serene. The world, when the kids aren't home, is quiet. Mardi Gras raucousness is surely something to appreciate and celebrate, but if I can't be down South partying as Argus rolls by, I can enjoy the snow up here.

(Full disclosure: I'm not, of course, blowing off Mardi Gras entirely! I've had authentic King Cakes sent to me, & this evening will be taking my family out to dinner at The New Orleans Steakhouse in Jefferson, NJ for the third year in a row, to attend their Mardi Gras party.)

Too Good To Be True?

2010-02-05T15:46:00.004-05:00

Over time I've accumulated a lot of old computer junk. Some was purchased, but a lot was given to me by others after the particular item was replaced due to malfunction, old age, or obsolescence.

Printing in our home has been a mess for a long time.

As this week began, there were 10 printers in my house:
* HP 612C - given to me when a friend replaced it - no clue as to its condition
* HP 682C - was Jessica's, purchased in the late-90s. This printer worked up until a housecat attacked it while it was printing something a few years ago. Since then it had paperfeed issues.
* HP 3620V - given to me, never removed from box - unknown condition
* HP LaserJet 5L -- frequent paper misfeeds
* HP PSC500 All-In-One -- Untested - got this as part of a bundle, used, from CL or Freecycle a long time ago - was reported to work perfectly, I've never opened it. (includes box)
* Canon Pixma ip4000 -- works sporadically - I think it needs a new printhead ($50). When it prints, it is a beautiful printer.
* Okidata OL600e - needs drum and paper pickup rollers. As-is it provides a readable, but marred printout, and has paper pickup issues.
* Primera inkjet CD printer -- hasn't been used in 5 or 6 years, probably.

AND

* Lexmark Z52 with unopened black ink cartridge -- works perfectly, but there is no Win7 64-bit driver for it. This has been used regularly by Jessica (from WIndows XP) for sometime now. We bought the printer shortly after Nate was born in 2001.
* Okidata OL400e -- works great if something small is placed underneath it to press up on the paper tray, otherwise has paper misfeeds (needs revitalized pickup rollers) I keep a small notepad underneath it and it works flawlessly. This printer has been used regularly by me from my Windows 7 laptop. I bought this printer new in 1993 or 1994.

In order to print to either of the printers from our laptops I had to print through a Windows 2000 desktop on my network. I've never found a USB printserver that worked properly, and the Okidata is a parallel printer so it wouldn't connect to modern equipment anyway.

The desktop is 10 or 11 years old and I'd like to decommission it altogether.

The final motivating factor was a recent purchase of a ReadyNAS storage unit. The ReadyNAS has 1TB (mirrored) storage, so I can move all of the data on three un- or underused desktops in my house on to the NAS, and then get rid of the three desktop PCs. That will reduce noise, heat, clutter, and electricity use in my house. PLUS, the ReadyNAS has a printserver built-in. Considering this isn't a low-end budget device I'm hopeful the printserver might even work.

So yesterday I posted an offer on Craigslist. I described 8 printers I had (forgot abotu two of them at the time), and wrote that I'd like to trade all of them for one decent USB printer that was Windows 7-compatible.

This afternoon I completed the trade. I gave the 10 above printers to somebody, and in return he gave me a brand-new, still factory-sealed in the box Hewlett Packard CD055A.

He and his girlfriend came to pick the old printers up and seemed genuinely happy about the haul, explaining that they planned to recycle the old printers. Obviously I was thrilled to get a good, new, printer that I can use on the network from all of our computers.

Plus, the printer has wireless functionality built-in so I don't even need to use the printserver on the ReadyNAS if I don't want to do so.

Everything seems too good to be true, but so far all seems OK. Admittedly I haven't removed the printer from the box yet, but I expect it to be exactly as if I'd brought it home from Staples myself.

It will be a mystery for me.

Been a long, long time.

2010-01-28T23:41:00.002-05:00

Wow. The last time I added a post to this blog was nearly three months ago. In that time a lot has happened, some things more notable than others.

At a Mens Club meeting, I *think* the second Tuesday in November, I bet a friend that the Saints would play in the Super Bowl. I didn't intend to make the bet, just sort of got talked into it, and for the stakes of the bet we agreed the loser would wash the winner's car. All season I was worried the Saints would choke. Hasn't happened yet!

At a NAVA last November I discovered a Playstation 3 game called Gravity Crash. I immediately fell in love with the game, and now badly want a Playstation 3. During the last 3 years I felt this way about the XBox 360 after playing Geometry Wars, and later felt the same way about the Wii after playing Wii Sports & Wii Sports Resort. In both earlier cases the urge passed. I assume the PS3 urge will pass sooner or later. I'll get the systems eventually anyway, once new, more advanced models are released.

I was laid off by ISS Group, and immediatley afterward (all pre-arranged) contracted by Cloud Strategies. With Cloud I'm a 1099 employee and therefore responsible for my own healthcare, savings plan, taxes, etc..., but this will hopefully work out well. Cloud Strategies helps businesses implement Microsoft BPOS, a very exciting suite of products from Microsoft including Exchange Online and Sharepoint Online. One perk is that I work out of my basement office now, so I use far less gasoline. I do get substantially worse mileage now, however, seeing as all of my trips are short.

Nate and Maren got far too many gifts for Chanukah (Thanks everybody!) and have been loving them. Nate especially enjoys his Legos.

Our family drove to Orlando in late-December and got to see many relatives that we don't see often enough. On Christmas day a bunch of us visited Disney and had a blast. WDW stayed open that day until 1am, and we didn't leave until closing. My back and feet hurt as much as they ever have, but it was absolutely worth it.

(Pics Plug - I've uploaded pictures of our Florida trip to my Flickr site. I haven't edited or weeded out any of the pictures (haven't even rotated them) so you'll see the raw shots. But some of the pics are nice nonetheless.)

One Thursday in mid-December I signed up for a new contract with T-Mobile and bought myself a brand-new G1. Realizing I was working with a new company that was a close Microsoft Partner and it may be a BAD THING to carry around a Google phone, I returned the phone on Saturday and went back to my old T-Mobile Dash.

Speaking of the Dash, I got my Dash in the summer of 2007. I was excited to have a Smartphone, and hit the 'net to find a z-machine for the phone. Z-machines are programs that run old-fashioned text adventure games like Zork and Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy. (Text adventures are now called interactive fiction, or IF.)

Z-machines were available for every computer device imaginable - Palm Pilots, the Sega Dreamcast, PCs, MACs, Playstation 2, etc... I was shocked and disappointed to discover there was NO working z-machine for my T-Mobile Dash. Windows Mobile smartphones were simply excluded from the party.

A few weeks ago I ordered a new HTC Touch Pro 2 (and the expected T-Mobile contract, of course, to get the phone for free). The Touch Pro 2 is a touchscreen Windows Mobile device, so there is a Z-machine for it. In fact, the best Z-machine I found for it is able to run on the Dash too! I wish I'd known about the program when it came out last summer. For anybody interested, the program is called "PocketZax", and so far it has worked perfectly fine for me.

My big Chanukah present was the Beatles Remastered Boxset - Mono. I've been loving it. The set was supplemented with 2 of the three Stereo-only remasters. All that is lacking from the collection is Let It Be, and I'll probably pick that up the next time I'm at Target.

Last weekend we threw Nate a Lego birthday party. I hung various Lego spacecraft from the living room ceiling, I made brownies that looked like Legos, and all of the party guests made their own Lego racer. Pictures were taken and are at the Flickr page.

Lastly, but not at all least, THE SAINTS MADE IT TO THE SUPER BOWL. So as soon as there is acceptable weather and scheduling permits, I'll have a nice, shiny car thanks to the efforts of my friend in the Mens Club. Thank you Drew, Sean, Reggie, Garrett, Mike, Pierre, Deverey, and all of the rest of you. There aren't words to describe my emotions last Sunday night! But I might have pulled something deep inside trying to stifle my screams so I wouldn't wake my kids.

I'm sure there is more to write, but this should suffice for now. Have a happy February. (SUPER BOWL!)

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes...

2009-10-29T20:47:00.002-05:00

Musical Laptops:

About 6 years ago I bought a Dell Inspiron 8500. This was a very good laptop for its time, in my opinion. As time went on the machine kept on truckin', and I bought a new battery for it last year. Early this spring I bought additional RAM for the machine, bringing it to the laptop's 2Gb maximum.

Then, soon after adding the additional RAM, the motherboard failed, in a unique-to-Dell way. Dell incorporated into the Inspiron 8500 a circuit that checks whether the AC Adapter plugged in to the laptop is a Dell AC Adapter, or an AC Adapter with somebody else's brand-name on it. If the AC Adapter is NOT a Dell, the laptop will not charge the battery, and will run at 50% speed.

On my laptop, the circuit failed, resulting in a laptop that won't charge batteries, and runs too slowly to be usable, even with proper Dell AC Adapters.

Once I concluded this was something that wouldn't be fixed, I found a terrific Thinkpad T41 for sale on Craigslist, and bought it with a fairly large amount of accumulated change on my dresser. The Thinkpad was great. It was the right size, powerful enough, felt great to type on, and had a great set of features. Last week it died.

Once I gave up hope of repairing the Thinkpad, I spent an enormous amount of time researching and shopping for a replacement. This is certainly not the right time for me to be indulging on expensive luxuries, and I very nearly traded my old Dell in to Staples for a $75 trade-in credit, that I planned to use toward their $350 Acer, a very low-end laptop.

I then considered that whatever laptop I purchase will be a tool I use to earn my livelihood, and it isn't unreasonable that I equip myself with a decent toolset. Also, a friend of mine pointed out that I can be 'finicky', and if I did buy the bottom-of-the-line laptop, I'd feel irritated about the machine every single day.

So I decided to get something better. I didn't get the top-of-the-line, $1100-1200 models I'd looked at over the last week. I did get something that was a little bit pricey though.

The machine arrived today, and I LOVE IT. Soon after I'd opened the box, I concluded I made the right decision. What did I buy?

The Asus UL80V.

This laptop is undeniably neat. It is light. It looks good. It isn't the fastest thing out there, but it was a lot cheaper than the absolutely fastest stuff out there, and it gets amazing battery life, even if the real-world battery life turns out to be only half of what Asus claims. (I haven't had the laptop long enough to test the real-world battery performance.)

So I might have spent more than I should have, but I'm thrilled with the decision.
==============

On the job front:

I'm still with ISS Group. But for the last several weeks I've also been working with a new company, Cloud Strategies. At year-end, I may be working at CS instead of ISS. Cloud Strategies is a consulting firm, with a focus on helping businesses evaluate and implement Microsoft's cloud-computing product, Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS). In September I implemented BPOS at ISS Group, and I've been very impressed with the product, and also the support Microsoft offers behind it.

If you've got a small (or large) business and you've been frustrated with the cost and/or headaches associated with maintaining your own Exchange and/or Sharepoint servers, I encourage you to investigate BPOS. The product is surprisingly easy to get started with, is inexpensive, and free 30-day trials are offered.

==============

Changes In Latitude...
Sunday afternoon I'll be helping to coach Nate's soccer team as they play a double-header. So far this season the team has played three games, winning 2 and tying one. Sunday evening, after Nate has showered and everybody has had dinner and changed clothes, we are hitting the highway! I've just paid off my car, and while it sits in fully-owned glory in my driveway, we're minivan-ing it to Chicago, to visit Jessica's sister Elissa and her family. I'll be working out of their home for a week, and next Friday we're beginning the drive back to NJ.

In December we plan to travel again, either to Orlando or NOLA. The destination will be determined soon, hopefully.

==============

The New Orleans Saints!!!

This year's Saints are phenomenal. They looked great in pre-season, and they haven't choked yet. Watching and listening to the Saints games this year has been thrilling. I hope this ride continues for a few more months!

More next time...

Trying (hard) to exhibit Best Behavior

2009-10-01T11:13:00.003-05:00

There's one person that drives me up the friggin' wall! If he falls off the face of the earth and I never encounter him again, I'd be OK with that.

BUT, I shouldn't rant to other people about this jerk. I should keep it to myself. Bitching about him would be impolite, immature, unprofessional, and really, unkind to him. And with Yom Kippur still fresh in my mind I'm trying to improve my behavior.

BUT, I've got to vent somehow. This guy is a reall ass, and I can't easily hold my aggravation in.

So, I'm not naming names, and I'm only writing about this here.

Arrgggghhhhhhh!!!!!

CRM E-Mail Router with Microsoft BPOS?

2009-09-01T16:20:00.003-05:00

I'm working on migrating our company to Microsoft BPOS. Honestly, this is the first business-related activity I've found exciting and interesting in a very long time, and I think the whole BPOS offering looks fantastic.

I have a concern though. We operate a Microsoft CRM system in our office, and use the CRM E-Mail Router with automated workflows, to send various system-generated e-mails. This afternoon I tried to find a definitive statement online that would indicate whether or not the CRM E-mail Router will work with the Exchange Online service provided by BPOS. I found nothing definitive, and almost nothing anecdotal.

I did find one old reply on a message board that stated the configuration wasn't possible yet, but might be available soon. (That was from April, 2009.) I found one other mention, here: http://www.dynamicscrmtrickbag.com/2009/05/05/bpos_happyending/, that states the configuration isn't a choice.

Maybe I'll get lucky, and the MS team that responded to Richard Knudson will let me know whether or not I can use the E-Mail Router with Exchange Online, and if not, when that will be possible.

Or maybe not. But you can't blame me for trying, right?

How I skinned my knuckles (or, another car story...)

2009-08-06T14:35:00.003-05:00

I've already bored you with my previous car issues in the previous post here, so I won't repeat that.

Prior to this week I hadn't been to the gym since July 13. This week I was feeling pretty guilty about that. Over the weekend I decided to start August off right. I fixed my car, fixed the kitchen light, mowed the yard, and declared out loud that starting now things were going to get better - all things, but primarily my job and financial situation, if only through force of will. I was going to be positive, look up, etc...

Monday morning I woke up early and went to the gym before work.
Tuesday morning I woke up early and went to the gym before work.
Wednesday morning I woke up early and went to the driveway, entered my car, and discovered my car battery was dead.

I jump-started the car and drove to my mechanic's shop. He verified the dead battery, and then told me his batteries were expensive, and the $80 battery I'd found on the AutoZone website would be perfectly good. So I drove to AutoZone and bought a new battery. I then jump-started the car again, thanks to the friendly guy in the early-90's 626 parked next to me, and drove home. I changed the battery in my driveway (skinned my knuckles while removing the old), cleaned up and drove to work before lunchtime, stopping along the way to give my mechanic a $20 as thanks for all of the help he's given me lately for free.

It's a good thing I chose to be positive about all of this!

A GOOD Day

2009-08-02T02:26:00.002-05:00

A few Sundays ago I was driving home one evening when the Check Engine light on my car illuminated. I had no idea whether this was something safe to ignore or postpone, or something that needed to be repaired pronto, before it damaged the engine further. Despite the light, the car drove perfectly fine, and got perfectly fine gas mileage.

The next day, Monday, I needed to be in my office 30 miles away. Instead of waiting, and bringing my car to my usual mechanic, I took the car to the service station across the street from my office. <<<---- THE BAD GUYS - Sparta Shell, Woodport Rd, Sparta, NJ.

Around 1:30p or 2:00p I called the service station, and was told they'd cleaned my Mass Airflow Sensor, driven the car and the light stayed off, so the problem was fixed, and the cost would be $131 + tax. I had them do an oil change for another $30 or so, and picked the car up at around 5:30p.

This is a good time to mention that a couple of weeks before this, I needed a brake job. All 4 rotors were all used up, and I had the two rear rotors replaced. My mechanic told me then that I could probably get another month or so out of the fronts. Also, the afternoon of the Check Engine light repair, the driver-door window motor on Jessica's van failed, and we needed to have that replaced as well. I tried to do the job myself, but once I had the door panel removed, I couldn't figure out how to properly remove and replace the window mechanism, so I had to admit defeat and let my mechanic handle that job.

SO, to do a quick tally, so far in our story I've had my rear rotors and brakes replaced, replaced the window motor in Jessica's car, and now had the Mass Airflow Sensor in my car cleaned, all in a span of a couple of weeks (the last two within a few days of each other).

On my way home after picking up my car, the Check Engine light illuminated again. I phoned the Shell station, and they said that the problem must be the Oxygen sensor then. I could bring the car back, and they could replace the Oxygen sensor, but the cost of the replacement sensor was pretty high (like, around $200), and there was a Mazda Service Bulletin stating that the sensor may break when removed. If that happened, I'd need to pay and additional $90 labor for them to drill it out. I declined their polite offer to shaft me further, and decided it was time to take control of the situation.

For many years I'd wanted a code reader, a device that would let me identify myself the codes thrown by the car's computer. This was the final straw. I bought an inexpensive code reader from Auto Zone, and pulled the codes stored in the car's computer. For anybody interested, the codes were P0171, P0174, and P0138. (2004 Mazda 6, 3.0L, 5-Speed)

The 171 and 174 indicated a Too Lean condition, and the 138 was related to an Oxygen sensor.

Armed with this info, I posted a couple of messages to a Mazda 6 forum. I included as much detail as I had, and waited for helpful suggestions from the more knowledgeable regulars. And waited, and waited. I was almost completely ignored on the forums. I did learn that an air leak in the various hoses under the hood could throw the codes I was seeing, so last week I spent some time under the hood, trying to find any holes in the various tubes and hoses. I found nothing.

So Friday evening I visited AutoZone again, this time intending to bite the bullet and buy replacement Oxygen sensors. I spoke with a counter rep at the store, and learned that there are several different O2 sensors on my car, they are expensive, and I'd only be able to get to one of them myself (the others are located in places I can't get to). Lastly, I wasn't even sure which one(s) I needed to replace.

This morning I gave up, and drove over to my regular mechanic. <<<---- THE GOOD GUYS - Clairidge Sunoco - 195 Pompton Ave Verona, NJ 07044-3017 - (973) 239-7950. I explained the full background of the situation to Tim. He looked at the codes I'd pulled, and checked them online with some sites he belongs to. He then looked under my hood.

In no more than 5 minutes, he found a hose near the top of the engine, near the base of the windshield, with a large split down the length of it, in the back. The split was impossible to see, but easy to feel. The hose was only about 3 or 4 inches long, and easy to get to. I thanked Tim and drove home.

Later this afternoon I returned once more to AutoZone, where I was given a replacement piece of hose for free. After I replaced the hose in their parking lot, the folks at AutoZone even let me use the washbasin and Orange cleaner in their back room to wash up before getting back in my car.

The car is finally fixed. Not seeing the Check Engine light lit up is a beautiful thing.

Other happenings today in our home -

* I took down a flourescent light fixture in our kitchen, took it Home Depot and bought a replacement ballast for the fixture, and then replaced the ballast and reinstalled the light fixture, fixing the kitchen light.

* I mowed the yard, providing much needed relief to my neighbors, I'm sure.

* I whipped up an excellent batch of homemade red beans (Thanks Noah!).

* Jess, Nate, Maren and I went to Jessica's parents' apartment, and played with their Wii. We recently gave Jessica's Dad Wii Sports Resort for his birthday. This afternoon we played Sports Resort a lot, and had a lot of fun. Maren bowled, and all by herself scored many spares and strikes. She's probably much better than me. (I played Frisbee Golf when it was my turn.)

* Jess, Nate and Maren went swimming at my in-laws' apartment pool.

* Jess, Nate and Maren went to the West Orange Family Fun Night at the town pool.

All in all, it's been a busy day. And my CAR IS FIXED! Yay.

Next weekend we are driving to Philly, and I'm very happy the car is solid again.

From the Learn Something New Department

2009-07-28T18:43:00.007-05:00

Dynamics CRM 4, IFD, and Mobile Express - For Dummies

{NOTE: A LOT of the below content is a rehashing of already available documents, guides, and kb articles. I'm re-writing it, in an informal style, because various bits and pieces weren't perfectly clear to me in the proper documentation, or weren't emphasized enough for me to 'get it', etc... }

In the course of my job I am sometimes called upon to install, fix, and otherwise manage Microsoft Dynamics CRM. At least in part due to the business climate over the last several months (presumably), I have had very little to do concerning CRM since last Fall.

So, my CRM knowledge has grown a bit rusty, and when I was tasked with some CRM work late last week things were challenging. I decided to document here tidbits from my recent work both to aid my own recollection, and provide the info for anybody else that may encounter similar troubles. Hopefully this may help.

The task was to implement Mobile Express on an existing Dynamics CRM v4 server, so that remote users could view CRM data on BlackBerry mobile devices.

* CRM 4 Mobile Express DOWNLOAD

* CRM 4 Update Rollup 5 DOWNLOAD

Installing Mobile Express is a pretty easy process, but things may not go smoothly, so I'm here with some tips.

IMPORTANT: The Mobile Express installation includes CRM Update Rollup 5. On two different servers this caused problems for me, and the problems were avoided easily by simply installing Update Rollup 5 separately, first, and then installing Mobile Express afterward.

* The installation of Update Rollup 5 required a reboot on my two servers.
* The installation of Mobile Express also required a reboot on my two servers.

On one of my servers, after installing Update Rollup 5 the CRM site no longer worked, only displaying an error that the GUID {servername}$ could not be found in the Global Catalog. Any error involving AD and the Global Catalog is very, very frightening to me. To remedy this problem I simply uninstalled UR5. Later I reinstalled UR5, and all was fine.

Somehow I overlooked an important requirement while reviewing the documentation for Mobile Express. Mobile Express REQUIRES your CRM server to be configured for Internet Facing Deployment (IFD). Without IFD, some devices may work, but others won't. In my experiences, my T-Mobile Dash, running Windows Mobile 6, worked. An iPhone worked (something I can't explain at all!). A pair of AT&T PocketPC phones, running Windows Mobile 6.1 Pro did not work, and most importantly, a BlackBerry Storm and a BlackBerry Pearl did not work.

Mobile Express requires IFD in order to work properly.

IFD is a system designed to let users view a CRM system that exists behind a firewall from outside of the firewall, without the use of a VPN. You should use SSL security with this arrangement, but that is not required.

DIGRESSION: It IS strongly encouraged, though, and I personally consider it unwise to ignore this advice. If you implement an IFD system for you CRM server, and you don't put SSL into the mix, than all of the traffic going back and forth between you server and your remote users will be transmitted across the public internet in clear text. Anybody can point a network sniffer at your IP address, collect all of the data going back and forth, and view the entire session. If usernames and passwords are transmitted in clear text, you've just given away the store. If, on the other hand, you use SSL, the entire session is encrypted, and it becomes impractical and unlikely that anybody will decrypt the transmission. Every bit of documentation you find will recommend you use SSL, and I agree as strongly as I can. As for how to implement SSL on your server, you'll need to find that information elsewhere, sorry.

Now, back to IFD...

IFD works its magic by identifying where a user is located when that user attempts to log in to the CRM website. If the user is on the same local network as the CRM webserver, the CRM server prompts the user to authenticate (to login) using NTLM Authentication (Windows Authentication). NTLM Authentication will display a login dialog box on your screen, with OK and Cancel buttons:

ASIDE: NTLM is a Microsoft protocol, and it's very unlikely that non-Microsoft clients (Linux, Mac, Opera, Safari, Mozilla, BlackBerry, etc...) will work with NTLM. NTLM does not work across the internet.

If the user is on a different network, as a remote user will be if coming in from the internet, than IFD will prompt the user to login using Forms-Based Authentication (FBA). You'll know you are encountering FBA because the login is NOT a dialog box, but instead looks like a webpage with username and password fields, and a SIGN IN button:

Without IFD, a CRM system would need a user to login using NTLM, and as NTLM won't work across the internet, the authentication would fail and remote users would be shut out. With IFD, the remote user is able to login via FBA.

So, how does IFD work, and how does the unfortunate administrator set it up?

If you haven't yet installed your CRM server, you can configure your IFD in an .xml file, and have the CRM installation process refer to the .xml file during the installation. Most likely, though, is the scenario where the CRM system is already in use, and you want to add IFD functionality. For this, Microsoft has made the IFD Configuration Tool.

Get the IFD Config Tool here: DOWNLOAD

[MS KB explaining how to use the tool: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/948779]

The tool, CRM4IFDTool.exe, must be run from the Tools folder, within the CRM Program Files directory. (On my server, the path was C:\Program Files\Microsoft Dynamics CRM\Tools.) The tool is fairly minimal. The interface is one dialog box, that's it:

There is a drop-down box that lets you select whether the server is running On-Premise, or IFD & On-Premise. This effectively turns IFD on or off.
There is an area for you to enter IP addresses and subnet masks. THIS IS IMPORTANT. IFD needs to know whether or not a user is local, and it does this by looking at the IP address of the incoming user request. You must enter a local IP address and subnet mask here. The specific address isn't important. It only matters that you enter an IP address and subnet that is on the local network. If your environment has multiple subnets, you should add an IP Address/Subnet Mask for each of your subnets.

Below the list of IP addresses are a few textboxes describing the AD and IFD domains. You need to specify whether your remote users will be using HTTP:// or HTTPS://, and in the IfdAppRootDomain box, you should enter the public domain of your site. Notice the large box at the bottom-left of the CRM4IFDTool. It lists the Organization Name for your CRM system. (You may have multiple Organizations.) IFD will add either HTTP:// or HTTPS://, and the Organization name to whatever you enter in the IfdAppRootDomain box, and redirect remote users to that URL.

So in the example screenshot of the tool above, as configured a remote user would be sent to https://AdventureWorksCycle.yourdomain.com. THIS IS WHERE DNS COMES IN. The URL that IFD redirects remote users to must be resolvable from outside. You need to make sure the URL is publically resolvable, and publically accessible. In other words, public DNS servers need to know about the URL and know what public IP address it should map to, and you need to make sure that URL will get through your firewall and get to your CRM webserver, whether via HTTP or HTTPS, depending on whether or not you've implemented SSL. You ALSO need to make sure your networks internal DNS is configured to resolve the address, and get the users to the CRM server. The right-most Ifd textbox, Ifd SDK Root Domain, will most likely be identical to the IfdAppRootDomain value. It is only different if you've got your CRM server's Operations split among different servers.

Below the Ifd textboxes are the AD textboxes. The values entered here correspond to how the users on the internal network will get to the server. You'll probably just enter HTTP://, and the CRM-servername and port # here.

Next, you can use the 'Check DNS' command in the Tools menu to verify the values you've entered resolve before you save your changes. To effect the changes, click on the File menu, and choose 'Apply changes'.

When you apply changes, the following occurs:
* A value is changed in the CRM website web.config file.
* Anonymous Access is enabled for the CRM website
* A registry key is added to the registry of the CRM server, containing the internal network IP Address/subnet mask, for use by IFD
* The Ifd values in the CRM4IFDTool textboxes are added to the MSCRM_CONFIG database

When I used the tool this morning, NONE OF THE ABOVE OCCURRED. I applied my changes repeatedly, and the tool consistently did NOT make the necessary changes. If that happens to you, you can manually make the changes:
1) First, the easiest: Edit the web.config file, found on the CRM webserver, probably at C:\Program Files\Microsoft Dynamics CRM\CRMWeb. Within the file, find the line "authentication strategy=..." and change it to "authentication strategy="ServiceProviderLicenseAgreement".
2) On the CRM webserver, use the IIS Manager and open up the properties of the CRM website. Enable Anonymous Access to the website. Leave Integrated Authentication enabled as well.
3) Within the registry of the CRM server, run regedit and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSCRM. Add a new string value, named IfdInternalNetworkAddress. The value of this key should be a local IP address, then a dash, then the subnet mask. Make sure there are NO SPACES before, after, or in the middle of the value. Example: 192.168.1.200-255.255.255.0 .
4) To add the necessary values to the SQL database, start up SQL Management Studio and connect to the SQL Server running your CRM databases.
a) In SQL Mgmt Studio, expand 'Databases'.
b) Find the MSCRM_CONFIG database and expand it.
c) Expand 'Tables'.
d) Find the table called 'dbo.DeploymentProperties'.
e) Right-click the DeploymentProperties table and select 'Open Table'. (NOTE: Changes made in the table are immediate. BE CAREFUL.)
f) Look in this table for three records with a ColumnName beginning with 'Ifd'. IF THEY ARE MISSING, you need to add them, using the SQL Query Editor:
g) Click on the 'New Query' button. When the query editor opens, verify the tab at the top-left of the editor is labelled with the name of the DeploymentProperties table.
h) In the query editor, enter

INSERT INTO DeploymentProperties (Id,ColumnName,NVarCharColumn) VALUES ('whatever value is in your other records','IfdRootDomainScheme','HTTPS')

INSERT INTO DeploymentProperties (Id,ColumnName,NVarCharColumn) VALUES ('whatever value is in your other records','IfdSdkRootDomain','your Ifd Root domain')

INSERT INTO DeploymentProperties (Id,ColumnName,NVarCharColumn) VALUES ('whatever value is in your other records','IfdWebApplicationRootDomain','your Ifd Web App Root Domain')

Press the 'Execute Query' button, and the three records should be added to the DeploymentProperties table.

Once all of the above is accomplished, your CRM system should be accessible from outside of your firewall. When a remote user wants to view CRM, he/she should go to https://{organizationname}.yourdomain.com. Your CRM server will receive the request, and send them a Forms-based Authentication page to prompt for login credentials. The user enters the creds and signs in, and is then able to work with the CRM system.

Assuming the above is all installed/configured and working, Mobile Express is a piece of cake. The install is pretty much nothing but clicking Next, and then Finish. After Mobile Express is installed, it can be configured by going into CRM, then Settings, then Customization. You'll find a link for Mobile Express Customization, and clicking that will take you to a page that allows you to configure Mobile Express. Mobile Express can be accessed by going to whatever your CRM URL is, with a "/m" added to the end. Using the URL in our previous example, you'd go to https://{organizationname}.yourdomain.com/m.

If Mobile Express doesn't seem to work, pay attention to the login prompt, and verify you are getting a Forms-based authentication page when logging in from a remote network. If you are seeing an NTLM login prompt, than IFD isn't working properly, and Mobile Express won't work right either.

Pop Culture Docs

2009-06-18T17:56:00.005-05:00

I just came across the following posted to Slashdot, and thought this makes a fun little pop-culture quiz. Thanks to mr_mischief, whoever he/she may be!

I plan on trying to identify which tv show/movie/book each of the doctors is from, though I doubt I'll know more than a third. If you think of others that aren't on the list, add them to the comments field, and I may update the list.

I suppose I can also link to an 'answer key' once I have all of the answers.

May this mindless challenge divert you, at least momentarily, from dreary worldly concerns. GO!
=============================================================
POSTED to Slashdot, by mr_mischief (456295) on Thursday June 18, @12:22PM (#28375437)

Dr. Dana Scully
Dr. Niles Crane, Dr. Lilith Sternin
"The Todd" Dr. Todd Quinlan, Dr. Bob Kelso
Dr. Dolittle
Dr. Wallace Breen, Dr. Eli Vance, Dr. Isaac Kleiner, Dr. Gordon Freeman
"Little Doctor"
Dr. Strangelove
Dr. Mario, Dr. Wario
Dr. Wily
Dr. Schabbs
Dr. Bunsen Honeydew
Dr. Heathcliff Huxtable
Dr. Joel Fleishman
Dr. Marvin Monroe, Dr. Julius Hibbert, Dr. Nick Riviera
Dr. Ross Geller (come on, it's not a geeky show, but he's a paleontologist and a major geek himself!)
Dr. Sam Beckett
Dr. Zachary Smith
Dr. "Doc" Daneeka
Dr. Sam Weizak
Dr. Abraham Van Helsing
Dr. Faustus
Dr. Rumack
Dr. J.S. Hirsch
Dr. Robin Van Dorn
Dr. Emmett Brown
Dr. Julius No
Dr. Xavier
Dr. Wellington Yueh
Dr. Ira Kane
Dr. Richard Kimble
Dr. Egon Spengler, Dr. Raymond Stantz, Dr. Peter Venkman
Dr. Lexus
Dr. Robert Morgan
Dr. Howard, Dr. Howard, and Dr. Fine
Dr. C. A. Rotwang
Dr. Zaius
Dr. Frank-N-Furter
Dr. Malcolm Crowe
EMH Program AK-1, Dr. Christine Chapel, Dr. Phlox
Dr. Clayton Forrester
Dr. Frederick Frankenstein
Dr. Heywood R. Floyd
Dr. Sheldon Cooper, Dr. Eric Gablehauser, Dr. Leonard Hofstadter, Dr. Rajesh Koothrappali, Dr. Leslie Winkle
Dr. Stephen Franklin
Dr. Temperance Brennan
Dr. Benjamin Kyle
Dr. Spencer Reid
Dr. Simon Tam
Dr. Lawrence Kutner
Dr. April Green
Dr. Maureen Robinson
LTC Henry Blake, MAJ Frank Burns, MAJ Sidney Freedman, CPT B. J. Hunnicutt, CPT Oliver Harmon "Spearchucker" Jones, CPT "Trapper" John Francis Xavier McIntyre, COL Sherman T. Potter, MAJ Charles Emerson Winchester III
Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard
Dr. Carson Beckett
Dr. Kate Heightmeyer, Dr. Jennifer Keller, Dr. Rodney McKay, Dr. Elizabeth Weir, Dr. Radek Zelenka, Dr. Samantha Carter, Dr. Janet Fraiser, Dr. Daniel Jackson
Dr. Tim Marcoh
Dr. Ritsuko Akagi
Dr. George Claw
Dr. Victor von Doom
Dr. Robert Bruce Banner
Dr. Otto Octavius
Dr. Feelgood
Dr. Bones
Dr. Demento
Dr. Horrible

UPDATE:
I just tried this challenge myself. My initial results were 25 that I did know, 35 that I did not know, and 5 that I thought I knew, but was unsure. Of those 5, I was wrong on 4, and the other 1 was a multi-doctor entry that I knew the 'world' of, but named the wrong specific origins of each doctor. I haven't yet bothered to actually verify my accuracy on the picks I think are right.

I'm So Excited (and I just can't hide it...)

2009-05-07T00:01:00.004-05:00

About 5 years ago I purchased a Dell Inspiron 8500. For the most part I've been happy with it, and it has served me well.

A few months ago it developed a problem that is, practically speaking, unfixable. The laptop will not charge batteries, and will only run the CPU at 50% of it's maximum speed. This means the laptop must be plugged in always (even with a new battery), and the Pentium 4 2.4ghz processor only runs at 1.2ghz.

The problem is due to a defect on the motherboard. In fact, searching the internet reveals that this is a VERY widespread problem. A replacement motherboard would be about $300, and isn't a reasonable purchase in my opinion.

So I've been looking to replace the laptop, but a new laptop simply isn't in my budget.

Well, for years I've known of ThinkPads, and known they are considered the creme de la creme of laptop computers. Last night I found a ThinkPad in excellent condition on Craigslist, and bought it tonight. It wasn't inexpensive, but rather than taking money out of my bank account I cashed in some of the change collected on my dresser, and that covered it.

I may try and sell off my old laptop to cover part of the cost; I haven't decided yet.

But on to the good stuff:

Thinkpad T41, model 2373
Excellent keyboard!
Cool light that illuminates the keyboard, so you can work in the dark. (Doing this right now, as Jess sleeps right next to me!)
The whole laptop just feels solid. It feels like it is of much higher quality than my Dell.
Compared to the Dell, the machine seems quick. The specs on the two machines are actually fairly close, with the Thinkpad a little bit faster. I think the difference is the 50% CPU speed the Dell is running under.

An extra bonus is that just a few weeks before the Dell began having the charging problem, I bought 2Gb of memory for it. The IBM uses the same memory, so I can use the RAM from the Dell to take the IBM up to 2Gb, and leave the Dell at 1Gb for whoever ends up with it.

I've been using the ThinkPad all night, and love it.

(EDIT - May 12, 5:30pm - Discovered yesterday the TP includes built-in Bluetooth. Nice.)

FIOS install notes, continued

2009-05-06T22:55:00.003-05:00

More notes about the internet portion of the service:

* The wireless component of the Verizon-supplied router is junk. As described in the previous post, it doesn't work properly with the Dell wireless software. Additionally, the signal strength on it is pretty weak compared to the standard Linksys WRT54G found all over America.

* Dial-ups - Not included
* Webpage - You get 10Mb, and addl space costs extra.
* Webmail interface is pretty good, but has ads on the page, and has some annoying bits. One example - If left alone for around ten minutes or so you are logged out, and must re-log-in to check for new mail. I haven't found a way to disable or increase the time-out period.
* Newsgroups (Usenet) - Not included
* FTP - BLAZING FAST
* Bittorrent - pretty fast as well
* DNS - I don't recall the term for this, but some ISPs override the proper DNS protocol of the Internet, and effectively hijack DNS when they think it won't hurt anything. Specifically, if I'm web-browsing, and enter an address that doesn't exist (usually due to a typo), then instead of my seeing a proper and informative (to me anyway) error presented by my web-browser, Verizon will show me a Verizon-branded page with suggestions for where they think I was trying to go, or where they recommend I go. This VIOLATES internet networking standards, and as an IT professional that relies on accurate, predictable, and informative error messages this sort of thing is a major annoyance. Many mainstream ISPs do this - Verizon isn't the only company doing this, but it is a bad practice and should be stopped.

I think that sums up my comments on the internet service. If I think of more, I'll add them later on.

TELEPHONE -
There's not much to say about the phone service. It works. It sounds fine. The install includes a battery back-up mounted on the wall in my garage, that provides phone service for up to 8 hours in the event of a power failure - pretty slick. The service includes Caller ID, Call Waiting, and Voice Mail.

* Verizon took nearly two weeks to get the Voice Mail working properly. During that period I called Tech Support about the voice mail at least 4 times. On every single call the support agent I spoke with was friendly, seemingly competent, and every single time I was given a different explanation for the problems. Some of the explanations seemed believable, others seemed as far-fetched as Howard The Duck. During all of this I was also having issues with the TV part of the package, and increasingly losing the Wife Acceptance Factor battle, so I was growing more and more frustrated when one day the voicemail mysteriously started working properly. Go figure.

* Speakeasy had a kludgier VOIP service, apparently contracted out to another provider, but they offered many more features and flexibility with the service. The feature I miss most is email integration. With SE's VOIP, you could control all sorts of phone-functions from your PC - you could view real-time logs of phone activity, place calls from the PC, pulling phone numbers from your Outlook address book, have voicemail messages emailed to you, etc... Verizon offers none of these features.

TELEVISION -
* Before ordering FIOS, I compared my existing situation to both Comcast Cable and Verizon FIOS. I compared features and price, and compiled a comparison chart.

While researching the options, I phoned both Comcast and Verizon to ask questions about the services. The Comcast agent was clueless, compared to Verizon's phone-rep, and this influenced my final decision. Well, multiple Verizon reps told me before I ordered, as well as after the service was installed, that TVs that lacked a digital set-top box would only receive channels 1-49, essentially local channels and public access, and nothing else. The Verizon website states that a cable-ready TV tuner will only receive local channels - 1-49.

At the end of the installation, I discovered the TVs received no signal at all without the set-top boxes. The installer suggested that I might need to use a digital adapter like those the government has issued coupons for. These are the adapter boxes necessary to receive digital broadcasts on an old analog TV.

So I hooked one up, and still received no signal.

After a few calls to Verizon, I found a tech support rep that seemed to know what she was talking about. She told me that only QAM256 tuners would work, and that Verizon had very limited tuners available and with those I would get only the local channels, but because I couldn't use the TV without one, Customer Svc would provide them for free. Naturally Cust Svc was closed.

The next morning Customer Service insisted they couldn't provide the boxes for free; they were $4/month each. But to compensate me for the aggravation, they agreed to credit my account with a $30 discount for 6 months. Fair enough. (This was much longer and harder to achieve than it sounds. I was on the phone for a LONG time.)

So I ordered 6 adapter boxes. (Technically, DCT-700 units.) I already had 3 set-top boxes. The DCT700s were for various VCRs and TV Tuner cards in PCs.

Two days later I received the adapters, hooked them up, and hated them.

Ultimately, I gave up on the idea of setting up a DVR on a PC (Goodbye MythTV). We abandoned the possibility of recording TV on our VCRs. And I returned all 6 digital adapters, and added a Verizon DVR set-top box instead. The final result will be a little bit cheaper than when I had the 6 adapters, and is much easier to use. It also takes up less space and most likely consumes less electricity.

*OnDemand - the free OnDemand offerings are lousy compared to Comcast.

*Picture quality - MUCH better than Comcast.

*Set-top box - comparable to Comcast (both use Motorola equipment), but I think it is slightly better.

*Many more music channels than Comcast.

*Seems to have a TON of HD offerings, but I don't have an HD TV and don't really care about this.

======================

Now, 3 weeks after the install (installed April 13, 2009), I've figured out the wireless quirks, settled on the right equipment for my TVs, and the Voicemail problem has been fixed. Now that everything is working, I'm perfectly satisfied with the service, and would recommend it.

Reports from a recent Verizon FIOS installation

2009-04-27T08:26:00.003-05:00

Last Monday I worked from home while a Verizon technician installed FIOS service at my house. I"d placed the order in late-March, and was eager to check out the promised upgrade in speed for my internet connection.

My FIOS package includes Internet, television, and phone service.

Internet -
I ordered the 20/5 internet service (20Mbps download, 5Mbps upload). The package also includes 10Mb of webspace; I added an additional 50Mb of webspace for another $4.95/month.

I didn't notice any dramatic increase in speed while web-browsing. This is probably due to a couple of factors. When surfing the web, the pages you view are sent to you from web servers located remotely. Those servers are attached to the internet through an internet connection, just as your own PC is attached through your own DSL, cable modem, etc... Even if your connection is the fastest connection possible, you won't receive data any faster than it is being sent to you, so if the connection at the other end is slow, you'll wait. Another probable explanation why I didn't notice blazing speed at first is that my main desktop PC at home was purchased in 2000, and isn't a real powerhouse. So, web-browsing didn't bowl me over, but was perfectly acceptable.

I maintained a couple of websites on the Speakeasy servers. Before cancelling the account, I needed to retrieve the files from SE's servers, and upload them to Vz's servers. The FTP transfers were unbelievably fast! That DID blow me away.

Then, a few days ago the latest version of Ubuntu was released. I started up a uTorrent session, and managed to get a full copy of the new Ubuntu .iso very quickly. And with my increased bandwidth, the torrent activity doesn't impact the phone, so I've been sharing the Ubuntu iso for several days for others that need it.

A couple of years ago I registered an account at DimeADozen.org. DAD is a torrent sharing site for concert recordings. DAD enforces a strict upload/download ratio, mandating that users upload as well as download. I always had trouble sharing enough to maintain my ratio, due to my pitiful upload speeds with Speakeasy. Once FIOS was hooked up, I logged in to DAD and started sharing a few concerts until I'd uploaded about 20Gb, putting my ratio well into the green.

Part of the FIOS installation required the replacement of my trusty Linksys WRT54G wireless router with Verizon's branded Actiontec router (MI424WR Rev.D). The Actiontec takes a coax feed from Verizon, and splits that out to all of the computers in the home. It broadcasts wireless, including WPA2, and also has a 4-port 10/100/(1000?) wired switch built-in.

The management GUI in the router is very-full-featured, and pretty nice, although it isn't perfect. I've got to admit I was very, very surprised at how much flexibility and control the user is permitted. I'd expected Verizon, the giant corporate overlord, to lock that sucker down tight.

The Actiontec introduced a problem with my wireless network though. After it was installed, 3 of the 4 laptops in my home could no longer use the wireless internet connection. Those laptops could establish a wireless connection, but would then drop the connection in under 5 seconds, and then immediately begin connecting again. This cycle would run continuously unless the wireless was disabled. The signal strength was perfect. The 4th laptop was fine. (Note - 2 of the 4 belong to my employer, don't get jealous!)

After trying all usual approaches (change wireless frequency (channel), reset the router, update the wireless driver software on the laptop), I hit upon an unlikely solution. Configuring the laptop to use the Windows wireless software instead of the Dell wireless software solved the problem.

(Will continue later, with additional comments, concerning the phone and TV service.)

Uncommonly good

2009-04-06T10:08:00.004-05:00

Following my occasional and usually depressing ritual, I sauntered over to my 401k management webpage this morning, curious to see just how dreary things looked today. While there is still much lost ground to make up, I was happy to see something very unusual:

Go, Baby, Go! Daddy (and children) could use new pairs of shoes, really!

Learn Something New, March 2009 Edition

2009-03-20T17:52:00.003-05:00

BlackBerry Server installations.

Judging by the hits I found on Google, it seems very, very common to encounter this error when starting the BlackBerry Manager software on a BlackBerry Server:

"Failed to open the default message store using the MAPI profile "BlackBerryManager". Please review the log for details. You will not be able to send messages from the BlackBerry Manager by email".

This seems common among new installations (like mine), and probably among installers that don't know anything about BlackBerry (like me).

I found countless responses on forums to people encountering this error. All of the responses were friendly and informative, and all of them explained that the BlackBerry service should run as a particular account, and that account needs specific user permissions (on the BlackBerry and Exchange servers), and also needs particular permissions in Exchange.

That's all nice, but even having configured everything properly, I still received the above error whenever I'd start BlackBerry Manager.

SOLUTION: If the BlackBerry Manager software is run by the BlackBerry admin account (normally BESadmin), there is no error.

I had logged in to the server as an administrator, and then tried to run the BB application. If I used the 'Run As...' option to start the BB program as the BB admin account, the program started fine. If instead I just ran it normally, as an account that was NOT the BB admin account, I did see the error.

Maybe this will help someone out there.

Have a nice weekend.

My new personal savings plan

2009-03-03T21:11:00.003-05:00

He-who-should-not-be-named suggested them, Obama made a skirting reference to them, and now I've devised my own spin on the matter - my own Personal Savings Plan. Now, my idea is nothing as exotic as some tax-deferred, annuities-based, windfall-whatzy-dinger sophisticated financial derivative instrument.

No, I've come up with an idea brilliant in its simplicity. I charge myself $1 to spend money. That's it. Every single time I spend anything, whether it's a $0.50 candy bar, a $0.99 MP3 from Amazon, the water bill, or a mortgage payment, I charge myself $1.

I take that $1 and move it to my left pocket. When I return to my bedroom later that day or evening, I take the money from my left pocket and stick it in my change cup on my dresser.

I've been doing this for about a month, and I'm averaging about $10/week. Granted, that's not a huge amount, but it's more than if I wasn't doing this, and had I begun saving this way when the Wii was released, I'd have enough saved to purchase one by now.

And this is easy enough to actually do. Plus, unlike my 401k, the money saved won't decrease in value to 2005 levels. What goes into the savings cup, STAYS in the savings cup. (Apologies to the Las Vegas tourism commision.)

A small thing I found funny.

2009-02-18T12:12:00.002-05:00

Yes, I know Obama is a good guy, and that 'Change' (as in ' is coming to Washington' ) could be translated as 'Competence' just as easily as any other meaning. But this was too easy a dig....

I just read this on the Recovery.gov website FAQ:

Q: Who runs Recovery.gov?
A: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act establishes an oversight board of inspectors general (the watchdogs of government) called the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board....

The RAT Board ?????

$787 Billion dollars will be doled out, overseen by the RAT Board.

Hee hee hee...

Odds and Ends

2009-02-04T23:42:00.004-05:00

Latest happenings -

On January 19, I took, and passed, Microsoft's MB2-633 certification exam, focused on Installing and Implementing Microsoft CRM v.4.

***************************

Last Tuesday I was fortunate to attend a seminar covering Enterprise Storage Performance Assesment. The speakers were very interesting, especially Richard Lary, CTO of TuteLary, LLC. All attendees were given 8Gb iPod Nanos!

I've spent the last few years unintentionally collecting an assortment of cheap mp3 players. I have a 30Gb Dell DJ, gen 2. It has ample capacity, but the firmware is lousy, and Dell killed the product after about 2 years, so it's unlikely any new firmware will ever see the light of day unless the Rockbox people make something happen.

I have a Coby 512Mb player that I bought a few years ago because it was $9, and I could use it as a USB memory stick.

Five or six years ago I bought a Rio One for about $60. It has 32Mb built-in, and also a 128Mb compact flash card slipped in to attain the max capacity of 160Mb. The firmware on that player wasn't so great either, and by today's standards the player is physically enormous, about the size of a pack of cigarettes.

A few months ago Slickdeals.net listed a couple of different refurbed Sansa MP3 players for about $13 - a 2Gb Sansa Express, and a 1Gb Sansa Clip. I bought one of each, and I have to admit they are very nice players, without a doubt the best of every player I had up until last week. The Express can be expanded to a max of 4Gb using a MicroSD card.

Finally, I can use my T-Mobile Dash as a media player, with a maximum of about 2Gb of storage.

Then last week I was given the iPod Nano. First, let me get the negatives out of the way:

8Gb Capacity - I've got several hundred CDs, as well as mp3 files I've downloaded, both legitimately and otherwise. I need at least 40Gb to store ALL of my music.
Proprietary iPod connector. I don't believe there is any technical reason Apple couldn't have used an industry standard mini-USB connector for the iPod's connector. But instead the iPods use a non-standard connector that requires special iPod-only cables and accessories. If I lose or break the included cable, I've got no way to transfer data to/from the Nano, and also no way to charge the Nano, until buying a likely-overpriced replacement.
REQUIRES iTunes. I spent nearly 2 full days trying to make my Nano work properly in a Linux world. I tried various methods, including using OpenSuse 11.1 and Amarok, straight file copies (drag and drop), and even installing VirtualBox and Windows XP SP2 with the intention of installing iTunes there. I finally gave up and swapped my Windows XP hard drive back into my laptop, in order to use the iTunes installed there. Upon attaching the iPod I was informed that I would need to upgrade the installed iTunes in order to use the iPod. I THEN learned that I couldn't install the new iTunes because I was out of hard drive space. The aggravations continued through the third day until I finally managed to free up enough space that I could not only install iTunes, but also successfully sync with the iPod. AAgghhh!!!

NOW, the POSITIVES:

The iPod Nano is undeniably, unbelievably COOL! I don't mean cool in the sense that it enhances your image or popularity. I mean it is a neat device. It's fun to mess around with. It appeals to my appreciation of fine engineering, electronic gadgetry, etc... The device is great.
Cover Flow - I've seen this on TV ads, but didn't really appreciate it until playing around with it in person.
Capacity - yes, this is listed in negatives also. 8Gb is not enough for me. BUT, 8Gb is 4 times greater than my 2Gb Sansa, and aside from my unreliable Dell DJ, the largest capacity player I've got.
Games - yep - the iPod can play games, and includes 3 impressive games.
Photos - the player can display photos and videos. It can tell when the player is turned on its side, and reorients the screen appropriately.
Shake to skip - if I want to skip a song, I can shake the player to jump ahead to the next song. I haven't tried this yet, but it sounds pretty neat.

***************************
At the ripe old age of 40, I've begun hitting the gym. Since the last week of November I've been going to the West Orange JCC fitness center regularly. Working out isn't as boring as I expected it to be, and I feel pretty good. Sometimes it's a downer when I see other folks in far better shape than I am. One time, while waiting for a turn at the bench press, I noticed the behemoth I was waiting on was using much larger weights than I use. When he finished, I compared what he was lifting to what I lift. I ordinarily bench press 55lbs. This man(?) was lifting 270lbs. Yikes!

***************************

SiriusXM -

In late 2003 I subscribed to Sirius satellite radio, and immediately loved it. I evangelized for the service to anybody within earshot. I bought receivers for my car, my wife's car, and my house. I gave a receiver to my Dad, my father-in-law, and my brother. I stopped listening to terrestrial radio entirely, and rarely listened to my CDs.

This continued until this past November, when Sirius and XM began to merge their channels and staff. Since then I've been hugely disappointed with the service and the company. My favorite station was eliminated, and I'm not thrilled with the replacement, but am still trying to give it a chance. My second-favorite channel is still around, but seems blander than it was previously.

I used to be able to email the on-air staff, and they responded. Over the last few weeks, every email I've sent has been answered (sometimes automatically) by 'Customer Care', with no mention that the email was or wasn't delivered to the actual staffer I tried to contact. Given that I've not received any replies from the on-air staff, I think the messages are not being delivered to them.

I recently received an email from Sirius declaring that there will now be additional charges to listen to the internet stream, and the monthly rate is also increasing. I can 'lock in' my current rate, at least temporarily, if and only if I buy a long-term contract now.

Through a roundabout way, I managed to finally reach a handful of the DJs via email outside of the proper channels. The DJs are all very friendly and receptive, still. It's Corporate that is being so awful. I'm torn as to whether or not I want to bag it and cancel the service.

***************************

Laptop troubles -

I don't know when this started, but my laptop is no longer capable of charging batteries. I've got an Inspiron 8500; I think it's about 5 years old. For the most part it runs just fine. BUT, Dell designed the unit so that if you connect an AC Adapter other than the official Dell adapter, the laptop runs in a low-performance capacity (i.e., slower), and also does not charge the battery. My laptop now runs in that condition, even with the proper AC Adapter. The BIOS reports 'Unknown AC Adapter'.

I've tried 3 different batteries, and 4 different AC Adapters (all Dells). No luck.

I suspect there is a bad connection between the power jack and the motherboard, but I am nowhere near skilled enough with a soldering iron to repair this. It's a bummer.

***************************
Over the weekend I watched the Super Bowl with my father-in-law and Nate, while Jess and Maren stayed at home. The game was, of course, very exciting. Nate, unfortunately, wanted very much for the Cardinals to win, and became pretty frustrated through the course of the game. Oh well. He liked the Bridgestone commercial with the Potato Head couple.

***************************

More later.

(239) 482-3803

2009-01-13T15:20:00.002-05:00

My home received a phone call from (239) 482-3803 today. A silent, 2-second voicemail was left for me.

A quick and simple Google-search on the number returned a 4-page message-thread listing other people's experiences with this number, explaining that the callers are trying to scam people somehow. http://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-239-482-3803

I haven't returned the call, and advise that anyone receiving a call from this number ignore it, and don't bother talking to the people at the other end of the line.

A screenshot with CONTRAST

2009-01-08T10:09:00.002-05:00

I don't know what the best term is to describe the conflicting feelings this screenshot provokes. Cognitive Dissonance is the best I've come up with.

I've had that wallpaper on my monitor for a while, and just noticed the juxtaposition of it, with the weather applet running in the corner.

Learn Something New, January 2009 Edition

2009-01-07T00:09:00.002-05:00

For several years I've been tinkering with Linux. I'm not at all an expert, but I often have fun playing around with various distributions, and for the last few years I've tended to lean toward Suse (since Suse 9.0, I think).

My Dell Inspiron 8500 laptop came with a 30Gb drive, that I immediately re-partitioned when I received it, allotting 15Gb to Win XP, and 15Gb to Suse 9.1. Over the last several months the computer grew increasingly awkward to work with due to my filling the drive, and reluctance to delete things - I'm a pack-rat in the computer realm as well as in Real-Life&trade .

So after a great deal of searching, I recently managed to find a 2.5", non-SATA, 7200rpm hard drive I could use in my laptop. (I found the drive at Grassroots Computers in California. I think the man that helped me was named Jeff - very friendly, very helpful.)

I was too busy to do anything with the drive when it arrived in early-December, but about a week ago I installed the drive in the laptop, and decided to install the latest version of Ubuntu. For a few years now Ubuntu Linux has become very popular, and I've read many accounts of people having no trouble at all with it.

For about 5 years I've been installing various flavors of Linux on my laptop, and have always had difficulty getting the wireless network card to work properly and consistently. I hoped that the newest Ubuntu (v8.10) would detect and use my wireless card perfectly. To be fair to the community of Linux developers, as I understand the situation the manufacturer of my wireless card has obstructed the development of the necessary software to use the card with Linux.

My wireless card is a Dell TrueMobile 1300. The Dell TrueMobile 1300 is based upon the Broadcom 4306 chip, and the Broadcom company has obstinately refused to provide any technical information to the Linux community despite several years of requests. Broadcom won't provide the needed software themselves, and have refused to provide the information necessary for others to write the software.

This is a common aggravation among Linux users. The problem is so widespread that the Linux world developed a handful of software methods to use the Windows XP drivers in Linux. There is a commercial app called Linuxant. There is an opensource, no-cost app named NDISWRAPPER. I think there are a couple of other similar apps also. Each of these applications allow a user to use the driver that was written for Windows XP on his/her Linux-based system.

Unfortunately there is another wrinkle to be considered. Typical home and small business wireless networks use encryption (security) for the wireless connections. From least secure to most secure, the possible encryption schemes include: WEP (64 bit), WEP (128 bit), WPA, WPA2.

The wireless networks in my home and in my office are both WPA2.

After installing Ubuntu on the laptop, nearly everything worked perfectly. BUT, WPA2 did not work properly. I probably could have found a solution given enough time searching the 'net, but I didn't feel like putting in the required time and effort, and I'd read about the new OpenSuse 11.1 release, and was excited to give it a try.

So Sunday evening I installed OpenSuse 11.1 to the laptop. Almost everything on the laptop worked, but again the wireless card wasn't right. In fact, under OpenSuse 11.1 the card wouldn't work at all. This was very disappointing of course.

I spent some time last night and tonight trying to find a solution, and tonight came across something so simple I assumed there were additional required steps that had been left out of the instructions. I was wrong - the fix really was as simple as the document I found stated.

The solution was found here - http://linuxwireless.org/en/users/Drivers/b43. The wireless card on my system, running a brand-new install of OpenSuse 11.1 (32-bit), and using a Dell TrueMobile 1300 (Broadcom 4306 rev 02), worked immediately after entering the single command:
sudo /usr/sbin/install_bcm43xx_firmware

That's all I had to do. I didn't have to find the Windows driver and download it. I didn't have to manually edit any configuration files, or init.d files. I didn't have to mess around with modules, or install any extra applications. The default Suse installation already included whatever it needed, aside from the copyright-protected Broadcom firmware, which is obtained by using the command above.

I can now use my laptop, running OpenSuse, on my WPA2-encrypted wireless network in my home and office.

Pretty cool. If anyone from the B43 team read this, THANKS!

A Good Day

2008-12-30T01:11:00.002-05:00

This week I'm on vacation from work, but not on 'a vacation'. That is to say that I am not going into the office, nor doing any work from home for my employer, but I haven't gone anywhere and haven't planned any special activities. I'm simply taking a few days off from work. I AM trying to get as much accomplished as possible during this unusual free time.

Today was a very nice day. I planned on waking up early this morning and going to the fitness center to work out, and then going to the mall to get new glasses. At the end of the year I sometimes get new glasses to use up remaining money in my flexible spending account (FSA). As for the fitness center, I've been working out every few days for the last month or so, and it's not nearly as bad as I expected. Today, however, I overslept and didn't work out after all.

First thing in the morning I tried to determine if the optical store I usually use was in my current insurance plan. They weren't. I then called some people, searched the internet, and found an eye doctor to use that was in my plan. Her office was closed until January 5, however. Next, I called the administrator of the FSA, and learned my FSA year doesn't end until May 31, so there is no urgency as far as getting new glasses and spending the money. One task knocked out already!

At this point it was about 10:30am. I checked moviewatcher.com, and saw Bedtime Stories was playing nearby at 11:45am. Nate and I got ready, and took off for the theatre with a couple of PB&Js stuffed under my jacket. We both liked the movie a lot. It felt to me like the traditional Disney flicks I'd see when I was a kid.

After the movie, we got my car a Deluxe car wash. The car came out looking great. Unfortunately every once in a while the car wash folks break the ashtray door on my console. I don't know how they do this, but it happens occasionally, so when we got home I spent about 15 minutes in the driveway fixing the ashtray. (This isn't really a huge deal, but is annoying. I need to remove the center console and re-attach a spring to the side of the lid, and then put everything back together.)

Once I'd fixed the ashtray and put the car back together, I went in to the house, and proceeded to help Nate build his brand-new Legos set that grandma gave him for Chanukah. -- Lego Racers - Ring of Fire! Everything came out great, and Nate had a blast playing with the car. I'll try to remember tomorrow to take some pics of his latest creation and add the pictures to his page.

Once we finished with the Legos I made dinner for Jess, Nate, and I. I'd picked up some wonton soup, and we had a Cashew Chicken kit that I simply needed to add chicken to and prepare.

After we ate dinner it was just about time to get Maren from her Nana's, where she'd been having a party with Nana all day long. One of my favorite movies is High Fidelity. One of my Chanukah presents from Jess was her taking me to see the High Fidelity stage production, performed at our local Jewish Community Center. I had no idea how the movie could be transformed in to a musical, but it was great. During Chanukah Jessica gave me the Original Cast Recording from the play, and I popped it in to the car stereo on the trip to get Maren. It was great too.

As alluded to in a previous post, I'd been searching for the Logitech S510 keyboard/mouse combo all year. This item has been discontinued, and given that, given the state of the economy, and given that we are in the time period immediately after a terrible Christmas shopping season, I've been hoping to find the product heavily discounted somewhere. Microcenter is only a little farther than my in-laws' apartment, so before heading out to pick up Maren I thought I'd check Microcenter's website for the S510 and see if they had any left, and what the price was.

Once I loaded up my web browser, though, I thought to check Target first, as Target is closer. Target had the S510 on sale for $37, much cheaper than their usual price of $61. So I swung by Target and bought the keyboard/mouse bundle for myself before picking Maren up.

Next I picked Maren up, and she was unusually happy. She was just in an unbelievably great mood, and she spent the drive home telling me about everything she and Nana had done all day long.

Finally we arrived home and Jess put Nate and Maren to bed while I ripped my new CD and copied the files to my music repository.

Distilling my day to the core, I:
* Took Nate to a movie
* Got a new toy I'd been wanting for a year, on sale
* Built a lego set with Nate
* spent some quality car-time with Maren
* had a nice dinner at home
* got to listen to a good new CD

It's been an excellent day.

Ruminating on the 'death' of Windows XP

2008-12-23T15:34:00.003-05:00

Yesterday I read that Microsoft has extended the cutoff date for sales of Windows XP, again. I've seen countless articles discussing this, read a few, and had coworkers discuss the topic with me. The consensus seems to be that this is evidence of the failure of Windows Vista.

This has me wondering why Microsoft (or really, any publisher) needs to kill old versions of software at all.

Ever since I was a teenager I wished car companies could continue producing certain classics, even years later. I'd love it if it was possible to still buy a 1976 Delta 88 convertible, or a 240Z, or a first-generation RX-7, new. But as recent events show, car manufacturers incur large expenses, and it would be untenably costly for them to produce extra models. It would also run afoul of various safety regulations, certainly - a 1976 automobile won't meet 2009 auto safety regulations.

Software is different. There aren't any safety regulations concerning Windows. And the cost of producing and reproducing the software is inconsequential.

I'd think Microsoft could simply produce any version of any software they've ever produced and sold, and keep them all avaialble pretty much eternally. If for some reason a person wants to buy a copy of DOS 5, where's the harm in that? If somebody sees a compelling reason to want Vista, they can buy it and install it in place of XP, Ubuntu, or whatever they had previously.

If a person or company wanted to use XP, they still could. If Microsoft felt that XP was no longer competitive in the marketplace, they could produce a newer OS, such as Vista, to comepete with the other OSes available. If Vista, Windows 7, or whatever else bested the competing systems, then MS would make money from it. If people decided to NOT buy the newer system, they could either buy XP, or something from a different publisher. In that case, Microsoft still has a shot at collecting money.

Instead, we have a situation where Microsoft will ONLY offer Vista, and if a buyer doesn't like that, they need to either try to find some 'sneaky' way to procure XP, or legitimately buy some other OS from somebody other than Microsoft. Microsoft also has to deal with the PR and marketing hurdles in their way as they try to extend the sales-life of XP without looking like Vista was a failure.

I don't see the sense in this. If Microsoft instead sold anything they've ever sold, to anyone at anytime, they wouldn't be in this situation. I don't see a downside.

Of course, I'm not a sales/marketing person, and my brain simply doesn't work the way theirs do. Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, and Sales/Mktg are from some planet in the Alpha Centauri system.

I'm no math expert, but this is interesting...

2008-12-15T11:11:00.004-05:00

Was 'window-shoppping' online today, and glanced at a product I've wanted for about a year - the Logitech S510 wireless keyboard and mouse combo. Last spring Target had this for about $50, this past weekend they had it priced at $61. Now, that's not the direction I've been waiting for, but today I found the item online:

The image is a bit small, but clicking on it shows it full-size. In a nutshell, the item is described as ' (*regular $51 - $11 mwave instant discount = $45, while supplies last!) '. Now I'm no whiz, but how does $51 - $11 = $45? And then, for our further amusement, the price is listed as $36.76!

======================
Unrelated - I realize it's been over two months since my last update, and I have plenty to write about now. I'll hopefully get this thing updated soon with other news. I should really learn about RSS. Maybe this blog can notify any interested readers when there is a new post, and you won't have to just check occasionally. Wouldn't surprise me if it can do that....

Lots of catching up to do here

2008-11-04T22:52:00.004-05:00

Originally tried to write this last November, and never finished it:
============================================================
Wow. It's been a month since my last post. I may talk a lot, but those occasions are certainly infrequent here.

A few weeks ago I loaded my brood into the car for a weekend trip to Pennsylvania. On Saturday, October 18, 2008, we drove to Reading to attend the Too Many Games videogame festival/exhibition. We didn't get our act together and pull out of our driveway until much later than I'd have preferred, and arrived at the show maybe an hour or hour-and-a-half before closing. When we arrived, there were only 2 stand-up arcade games, the LAN-gaming section was deserted and being disassembled, and the hall was mostly empty. I was disappointed, but I did get myself a copy of Katamari Damacy, new, for $15, so that was some consolation.

While Nate & I checked out Too Many Games, Jessica took Maren to a nearby outlet mall. Once the TMG show was over, Jessica returned to pick Nathan & I up, and then the 4 of us drove to Philadelphia to meet my extended family, where we were celebrating my cousin Chaim's son, Shmoel's, Bar Mitzvah on Sunday morning.

We met everybody for a late dinner in Philadelphia. My cousin Lisa (Chaim's younger sister), whom I hadn't seen in many years, was there, and greeted me with the question "So you just turned 40?" Aaaiggghhh! But it was still fun to see her. Also there was my cousin Jeff, Chaim's older brother. I think I hadn't seen Jeff since my wedding almost ten years ago. We had a lot of catching up to do, and do it we did - The dinner ended at about midnight. We returned to the hotel, and hung out in the lobby talking until 4am!

I went to bed, and at about 8am we drove to the synagogue for the Bar Mitzvah. Once the Bar Mitzvah and ensuing luncheon and photos were finished, we piled back in the car to return home, and possibly arrive only somewhat late for Nate's soccer match.

On the trip out of town, we'd stopped at a McDonald's so Maren could use the facilities, and while there we all grabbed a bite to eat. Once back on the highway, I realized I'd left my sunglasses at the McDonalds. I called them, and they said they'd put the sunglasses aside for me, and I could retrieve them the next day on my way back home. About 30 minutes into the car trip home, Jessica realized something problematic. We had left West Orange, driven to Reading, and from Reading gone to Philadelphia. Philadelphia to West Orange didn't take us anywhere near the sunglasses!

-- Picking up where I left off, three months ago. Will try to recall the events as best I'm able to. --

You can imagine the route from home (West Orange), to Reading, to Philly, as forming the top two lines of a diamond, and the direct route from Philly back home as forming the bottom two lines of the diamond.

In order to get back to the McDonald's, I essentially drove from the bottom point of the diamond, near Union, NJ, straight up the state, right through the middle, on two-lane state highways, to get back to the McDonald's, located at the last exit off of Rt. 80 before leaving NJ. The drive took most of the day, and was very scenic, travelling alongside the Delaware River for a while. We stopped for lunch in a neat little town along the way. It was small, had lots of antique shops and restaurants, and was near a railroad bridge and, I think, Rt. 31. I *THINK* the city was Phillipsburg, and I *THINK* we ate at Rocco's.

After a very nice drive, we made it to the McD's, I retrieved my sunglasses, and we headed home, arriving about an hour later.

Busy weekend, lots of fixing going on

2008-10-05T13:16:00.002-05:00

This weekend I've been, and am still in the middle of, fixing several different things.

A client software installation went less than perfectly Friday, so I've been working on that from home. I've made progress, but it isn't complete yet.

Outlook Express on Jessica's PC suddenly stopped working properly 10 days ago, and I've been trying to figure that out since last night. So far, no dice there.

AND, the most fun has been our dryer. Late last week we noticed that the dryer produces no heat. Last night I took the dryer completely apart, ultimately determining the failed part was something I could have removed and changed by just removing a small panel on the front. (A thermal fuse. Also, it's advised to replace a thermostat along with the fuse, so I'll be changing the thermostat as well.) But, the work was already done. I took advantage of the situation and vacuumed out every nook and cranny of the machine. It's MUCH cleaner now, inside and out. I'll order the replacement fuse/thermostat tonight from RepairClinic.com, an outfit that gave me outstanding service a few years ago when I performed a different repair on the same dryer, and should receive the parts Wednesday.

Something tells me I won't be allowed to reassemble the dryer on Thurday during Yom Kippur, so the repair job is probably not happening before the end of the week.

Gotta go to soccer now - Nate's team, the Sharks!, will be taking on the Rams today.

Visual Studio 2008 form-design tip for the inexperienced

2008-10-02T13:59:00.003-05:00

I've just encountered a seemingly trivial hurdle, and thought I'd add the solution here in case others run into the same problem. Google searches turned up more complex solutions, to more complex problems than what I was running into.

When I dragged a label control on to a form, the label was not re-sizable. I could play with the size properties - height, width, Max/Min heights and widths, all I wanted, to no avail.

Turns out, there is an 'Autosize' property. Once I set that to False, I could adjust the size of the labels normally.

Making up for lost time.

2008-09-25T23:31:00.003-05:00

I've gone a month since the last time I posted here, and this is the third post tonight. It's Feast or Famine!

Last June I decided I wanted to learn C++, in order to port a software app to my smartphone. As expected, I never really followed-through, and the project went nowhere.

For the last couple of weeks things have been frighteningly slow at my job, so instead of spending my days reading Slashdot and waiting for the phone to ring, I decided to try and learn C#. (Why C#? It's what my company is beginning to use for development, and they are in need of C# programmers.)

I started with a short, slick book called 'Microsoft® Visual C#® 2005 Express Edition: Build a Program Now!'. I'd purchased the book months ago, primarily because it was $5, so I had it handy. The book was useful to teach how to use the Visual Studio 2005 software, but it didn't really teach the C# language at all, so by the end of the book I'd written several neat little programs by following the steps in the book, but still didn't know C# at all.

After I'd finished that book last Friday, I went to Borders and bought 'Head First C#'. This book is excellent! It's actually fun to read. (Really!) The book is entertaining, interesting, and informative. It's well-suited to a beginner like me. I assume that an experienced programmer woould be frustrated by the lack of depth, but for anyone trying to learn programming from scratch, I can't recommend this book enough.

I'm on page 89, and several times so far I've found a bit that was so funny I had to recite the text to Jessica. And, she actually found the bits funny too!

The authors host an online forum for readers of the book as well. The discussions on the forum discuss exercises in the book and clarify things for confused readers. There are listings of corrections for early printings. People can post questions and get answers from other forum members. People can upload their own programs for others to download and review.

The whole thing is a lot of fun.

Maybe, just maybe, I'll pursue this to a conclusion, and actually learn something...

PS: There was nowhere above to really fit this in, but Visual Studio is a very neat program. It's always fun to bash Microsoft, but I've now played around with both Visual Studio 2005, and Visual Studio 2008, and VS is just an excellent program. The intelligence this program contains is remarkable. It just blows me away.

Coach Steve (No, I'm not kidding!)

2008-09-25T23:16:00.004-05:00

A few weeks ago I received an email from a commissioner of the town soccer league. It seems Nate was on one of 4 teams that had no coaches, and the league was desperate. They were asking if anybody would volunteer to coach a team.

I replied that I was completely ignorant of soccer or coaching in general. Hell, my idea of being athletic or active in any way is walking across the den to retrieve the remote control. BUT, if they wanted me anyway, I'd do it.

So, I'm now the Coach of The Sharks, Sunday 1-2 Division, Mountain Top League In-House Soccer. (Check out that gut!)

Nate and I had to attend a family function the day of the first game, but I've got a fantastic assistant coach, and he took care of things far better than I could have. The picture above is from our second game (we won the 2nd game, fwiw). Nate had fun at the second game too.

Since becoming Coach, I've gone to a Coachs clinic and also a Parents clinic, and I've learned a bit about soccer. I'm still not really knowledgeable, but I'm not as ignorant as I was previously. And coaching the team is fun.

What's going on? (aka, I'm clueless)

2008-09-25T22:54:00.003-05:00

The talk for the last week has been the impending meltdown of the United States financial system.

I'm a pretty smart person. I try to keep up with the news, more than most Americans I think, and probably to my emotional detriment. On the other hand, I was never a very interested student during school, and I tend to have little interest or aptitude for financial matters.

As far as the financial crisis goes, I have to admit, I just don't get it. I'm not trying to be a smart-ass, and this isn't a rhetorical device to make a point. I honestly don't understand the crisis.

As far as I can tell, on a huge scale, enormous banks made a lot of unwise loans, to people that were unlikely to be able to meet their obligations and pay off the loans for their houses. Then, a too-large number of those borrowers were unable to pay the loans, and those unfortunate people lost their homes when the banks foreclosed.

So at this point in the story, the banks now have a bunch of homes, when they'd prefer to have money. And a bunch of people have to find somewhere to live.

This scenario resulted in a bunch of banks facing bankruptcy, or needing to sell themselves to somebody with deeper pockets.

Question: I have no connection to the in-trouble bank. Why/how does this affect me? Other than a general sense of compassion for a failing business and the soon-to-be-out-of-work bank employees, why would I care? Bad stuff happens all the time; what makes this a special case?

OR: I do have dealings with the bank. I'm a borrower - undoubtedly somebody else will buy the loan, so I still need to make my payments - how am I affected?

OR: I do have dealings with the bank. I'm a depositor - the FDIC will cover me up to $100,000/account, right? And if I've somehow acquired that much moolah, surely I'm sensible enough to not keep more than $100,000 in any single account, I'd think. So, again, where's the problem?

Given the above, what's the rationale for the government to step in and give $700 Billion to the banks? The Daily Show last night played a clip from, I think CNN, stating that amount equates to 2000 McDonalds apple pies *per US citizen*. I think the apple pies run 2 for a dollar. If so, and if my off-the-cuff math is correct, that works out to $1000/person.

So, $1000/person?

Seems to me, IF Congress and the rodents at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave can give out $700B to help the economy, sending $1000 to every taxpayer in the country would probably stimulate the economy, and help substantially more than giving that amount to Lehman and JP Morgan.

Again, I really don't know what I'm talking about here, and to be fair I haven't taken any time at all to try and learn about the problem yet. I've been busy, and the idea of reading economics webpages sounds about as much fun as washing the paint out of a roller after painting my den.

But sooner or later I guess I'll have to read up on this, just so I'm not ignorant when I hear the economic disaster discussed in my presence.

In a more perfect world, the crisis discussed around the water cooler would be the failure of the Sega Dreamcast, or the inability of the Saints to put Denver away last week. Oh well...

Learn something new, Windows Mobile 6 Edition

2008-09-17T17:33:00.006-05:00

I just noticed the below post in my list of blog entries, listed as a 'DRAFT'. I dont' know why it's a draft and wasn't posted. I can only state that the linked-to solution I write about didn't work for me, and until I factory-reset the phone several months later I still had the Windows Live email choice. Maybe that's why I never finished the original post...

FROM September 17, 2008:
=====================================
Last June I bought a T-Mobile Dash smartphone, running Windows Mobile 5. Last September, the phone was stolen, and the replacement used Windows Mobile 6.

While setting up the replacement Dash, I clicked on the Windows Live icon out of curiosity. Partway through the Windows Live setup I decided I didn't want to use Windows Live.

Unfortunately, ever since then there was an entry in the Messaging application to check Windows Live messages. Once I tried to delete the entry, and couldn't figure out how to do so. This afternoon I decided to look online for a solution.

I found a few pages with instructions for removing the Windows Live entry. All provided this solution:

***********
open Windows Live in Start - Programs on the device. In the Menu, select Account Options and select Switch Accounts. This will remove all emails from your device. When done, the EULA page will appear. On that screen, make sure you select REJECT. Windows Live setup will stop and you will be taken back to WL main page - The page with Live Search and the Sign-in to Windows Live link. Check in Messaging and Windows Live mailbox is gone.
***********

What's good for the Pachyderm is good for the Donkey?

2008-08-27T20:43:00.002-05:00

For several years now, I've been absolutely disgusted, discouraged, dismayed, and depressed as the crooks infesting our White House ignored, desecrated, and trashed the Constitution of the United States. It's become clear that the Constitution has become an historic relic, admired in museums, and ignored in reality.

I've railed about the above previously, and the above is not at all the point of this post. In fact, I've just watched President Clinton give his speech to this year's Democratic National Convention, and I'm in a pretty good mood. My thought at the conclusion of his speech was that if the GOP can ignore the Constitution, so should the Democrats. I want Bill to be Pres again! He's good! I consider him one of the country's greatest presidents ever, and would LOVE to vote for him again.

God knows we need someone competent and well-meaning, to begin to recover from the worst disaster to hit the United States in history.

Of course, not being a Republican I can recognize reality, and understand the above is just wishful thinking. I WILL vote for Barack Obama in November, and God (& Diebold) willing, the election won't be stolen again, and President Obama will begin to repair what's been done to us.

Learn Something New, July 24 2008 Edition

2008-07-24T16:07:00.002-05:00

Suppose you want to know who installed a program on a Windows server?

Enter the registry, and navigate to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData. You'll find branches for each user that has installed anything on the server, identified by SID. Within the branches you'll see a 'Products' branch.

Expand the Products branch, and every product that user has installed is listed, by GUID.

You're probably reading this thinking to yourself that you don't care about the SIDs and GUIDs, those don't help you at all! True, but keep reading.

Now, if you expand the Product branches, and then click on 'InstallProperties' for each one, you'll see details of the installation. One of those details is the 'DisplayName'. The Display Name describes the program that was installed. You can now, obviously, go through the list and find a particular program you're interested in. Once you've found the program, you can look at the UserData branch that contains the installed program branch, and this will give you the SID of the user that did the install.

NOW, scoot over to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList. This branch lists SIDS for each user that has a profile on the system. (Effectively, any user that has ever logged on to that machine.)

Each SID contains details that describe it, including a key labelled 'ProfileImagePath'. This points to the Documents and Settings folder for that user. These are almost always named according to the user, so if the folder is called
jsmith, then that profile is likely JSmith's profile.

Be aware that if the user has a local profile as well as a domain profile, there
will likely be two similar paths in Documents and Settings - i.e. jsmith, and
also jsmith.domainname.

Something funny...

2008-07-22T13:37:00.003-05:00

Found at the end of a blog-posting about Obama and American Jewish voters:

On the flip side, the study suggests that there is room within the Jewish community for the presumptive Democratic nominee's support to grow. As Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent noted in a review of the J Street poll, Jews are "liberal as hell."

"Seventy-four percent of us view Bush unfavorably and 83 percent of us disapprove of his job performance," Ackerman wrote. "While 76 percent of the country as a whole says the U.S. is on the wrong track, an astonishing 90 percent of American Jews say the same. Only 21 percent of us approve of the Iraq war and only 29 percent think Bush is good for Israel, and those are clearly the shmucks that kissed ass in Hebrew school and snitched when the rest of us used the synagogue phone booth and cloakroom to make out."

A symptom of Parent-itis

2008-07-16T14:51:00.003-05:00

A couple of weeks ago our family made a trek to Chicago to visit Jessica's sister and her family. It gave us a chance to hang out with my sister/brother-in-law and their new son, Ian. While gas was costly, the total expenses were a fraction of what it would have cost the four of us to fly.

While in the area, we spent a day at Kiddieland, an amusement park. This amusement park paled when compared to Disney World, but standing on it's own it was fine, and we all had a fun time. I don't really remember Pontchartrain Beach, but I imagine Kiddieland must have been similar.

I've always been ambivalent about thrill rides like rollercoasters. On the one hand, I'm usually terrified of and by them. On the other hand, when I manage to force myself to ride one, I find them thrilling, and want to get right back in line to ride again.

The rides at KL were very tame, intended for the pre-teen set. But I was as scared as I've ever been on the rides. Even the Ferris Wheel was frightening. I wasn't scared so much for myself, as I was that something would happen to my kids. Mainly, I feared that they would fall through the safety bars, given their small size, and plummet to their deaths.

And this fear wasn't exhilirating, and I didn't want to go right back for another ride.

BUT, I suppressed my fear and let Nate ride some of the rides repeatedly, most notably the 'Galleon', a ride where a pirate-ship pivoted around a center beam like a swingset-swing, rising at each end of the arc until Nate was nearly horizontal, looking down at the ground from a couple of stories up in the air.

I suppose this either makes me a good parent, letting my little birdy fly, or it makes me a terrible parent, not protecting my kid adequately. Hmmmm......

The Cost of Gasoline

2008-06-05T20:22:00.004-05:00

As is all the rage lately, I've been paying attention to the ever-rising cost of gas.

A couple of weeks ago the teaser on the nightly news mentioned something called 'hypermiling', and implied they would tell viewers how to dramatically increase your car's gas mileage by doing something simple. Of course, they didn't get to that story until the end of the broadcast, and by then I'd changed the channel.

So I took it upon myself to browse the internet and see what the series of tubes had to say about the topic. I found a couple of interesting articles online.

1) Hypermiling
2) Countering Traffic Waves

The first article basically talks about things we all already know, but most of us probably don't do in practice. Things like accellerating gradually, braking gently, etc, etc.... In other words, don't drive aggressively, and don't do quick starts and stops.

The second article examines in extreme detail thoroughness the formation of traffic patterns and behavior, and how you can prevent traffic build-ups, or defuse jams in progress.

Since March, 1992, I've calculated my gas mileage literally every single time I've filled my tank. Until a couple of weeks ago, my current car had attained 24mpg in city driving once or twice, but usually managed about 22 or 23 mpg. When I began trying out the techniques discussed in the two pages referenced above, I pulled in 24.1mpg. Two nights ago I filled my tank, and attained 27.1mpg.

I've made two changes in my driving behavior:

1) In the hypermiling article, a point I took to heart was this:

The points to take away from this page:
People who don't leave much space between their car and the car in front use their brakes more often.
Braking turns motion into heat via the friction of the brakes, slowing down your car.
Gas was used by your engine to achieve motion.

So when you apply your brakes, you are turning gasoline into heat instead of using the rest of the motion - by coasting through the space buffer between you and that car ahead, or that red light ahead - that you paid gas money to obtain in the first place.

2) The other change I've made was to flat-out reduce my speed when driving to and from work. I drive 30 miles each way between my home and my office, almost all of that on the highway, opposite rush-hour. When I began this commute, I consciously decided to set my cruise control to 70mph, as a means to save gas, and also avoid being ticketed. The traffic flow is somewhere between 75 & 80mph, and if I wasn't apying attention I'd easily hit 80mph on a regular basis. The cruise control allows me to go 70mph, and not carelessly speed up to traffic ticket land. Two weeks ago I knocked the cruise down to 65mph. One week ago I moved it down to 60mph, and began living in the right lane. But my miles-per-gallon jumped to 27.1mpg. I can now go over 400 miles on one tank of gas.

The hardest thing is staying alert and attentive. Driving this slowly, it's easy for my mind to wander.

On another topic, I've been seeing more and more businesses close their doors lately. I filled my tank at my regular gas station on my way home from work last Thursday. On my way home Monday evening, that gas station was closed, out of business. This evening on my way home, I saw another station that I don't usually pass, but it was also out of business, and looked like it had also closed very recently. I also saw an out of business diner, an out of business Italian restaurant, an out of business Ponderosa Steakhouse (also newly closed - it was open this past weekend), an out of business Blockbuster, and an out of business Hollywood Video, all just on my way home from work tonight. And that's just what I can recall right now.

Things are bleak out there.

Just watched Juno

2008-06-05T10:48:00.002-05:00

Last night Jess & I watched Juno.

I don't know if I'd go so far as to say it was worth all the hype it seems to have generated. After all, my recollection is that popular media seemed to imply this was one of the greatest movies of all time.

However, I did enjoy it, and I think it was, without a doubt, one of the most memorable movies I've ever seen. One thing I found notable was the inclusion of clumsy, awkward moments that can occur in real life, but are seldom seen in movies or television. The movie felt 'real' to me, more so than most movies.

In Hoboken

2008-06-03T21:44:00.002-05:00

Just a quick note - I've just begun reading a new book that I heard about over the weekend on Vin Scelsa's Idiots Delight on WFUV.

The book is In Hoboken, by Christian Bauman. I'm only up to about page 40 so far, but it's a very funny, very clever book. It's worth checking out (and then renewing if you haven't finished it yet).

Is the water warm enough?

2008-05-24T16:19:00.003-05:00

My wife and I just celebrated our 9th Wedding Anniversary. Neither of us had gifts ready for the other (I suppose we're a good match for each other!). However, Jess presented me with a bag filled with gifts she had meant to give me for a few previous occasions, but hadn't ever wrapped. After all the time that had passed, she decided to give them to me on our Anniversary, giving up on her intention to wrap them eventually. Me, I don't care about wrapping paper, I got new toys!

The neatest gift was the Heroes Season One collection on DVD. I popped Disc 1 in the DVD player to begin checking it out. During the beginning credits of the first episode, I saw a credit to 'Wendy Melvoin & Lisa Coleman' - Music Composers. I immediately paused the screen, and yelled for Jess to come take a look. She of course thought I was nuts, and asked who they were.

I ran downstairs and pulled out my Purple Rain soundtrack LP from 1984. (ASIDE: DId any of you remember the album included a fullsize poster of Prince and his band?) I scanned the credits on the album, and while Wendy's last name wasn't printed, Lisa's last name was, sure enough, Coleman. Turns out, the Wendy & Lisa that used to work with Prince are now doing music work for Crossing Jordan and Heroes, among other things.

Me, I just thought it was neat that I saw the pairing in the credits, and immediately remembered they were part of Prince's band 24 years ago.

Once I got over myself, we drove to dinner, listening to Purple Rain on the way there.

Mr. Fix-it strikes again!

2008-05-18T13:06:00.003-05:00

Monday morning I was at a client's office, helping them with a couple of computer-related issues. The man I work with at this particular client pulled a broken PS2 out of a drawer and gave it to me. He explained that one of his coworkers had left it there for me, as it was broken and he thought I might want it.

I was out of town for work Tuesday through Thursday, and began working on the PS2 Friday evening. On my way home from work I stopped at Toys R Us & bought a $5 PS2 game - Rayman Raving Rabbids, and a wireless PS2 controller. After we'd had dinner and put the kids to bed, I hooked up the machine and turned it on to begin testing it out.

I tested a music CD, a Playstation 1 game, the new PS2 game, a very old DVD with few special features, and a dual-layer DVD. Every different type of disc gave me a Disc Read Error, except for the Dual-layer DVD.

Somebody at Digital Press referred me to an excellent page on repairing 'Disc Read Error' problems (DREs) - http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/hardware/ps2.ars. I read the article, and then began following the steps on my own PS2, hoping to fix the problem. I was carefully adjusting the laser lens adjustment, and testing things, repeatedly until I realized I hadn't tried simply *cleaning* the lens.

I reset the lens adjustment back to where it had been before I changed anything, and then cleaned the lens. Once the lens was clean, I successfully played every different type of disc.

So, I've been playing Rayman Raving Rabbids on the unit (even if it isn't very good), and can now watch DVDs in the basement, as an added bonus.

Happy Feelings

2008-05-08T18:05:00.000-05:00

A couple of months ago I wrote here about my venerable CD changer that I'd enjoyed for almost 20 years, but that had suddenly died. Having almost no time to try and figure out how to fix it, and almost no idea how to even begin to figure it out, I reluctantly bught a new CD changer and removed the old one from the stereo system.

I did spend a little bit of time one evening with the player, trying to identify what was wrong with it, but I made no headway and ended up putting the cover back on, and offering the CD changer up on the FreecycleNJ mailing list. In my posting, I even included a link to a promising-looking webpage I'd found with information on the likely defect and how to fix it.

I saw no responses from that post. I then posted the same message to Craigslist. A young (-er than me, anyway) guy responded with interest, and I gave the CD player to him, along with the spare cartridges, remote, original packaging & paperwork.

A few nights later I received an email from him:

> Hi Steve,
> I opened the CD player and found the laser pickup is missing its lens.
> It is round clear plastic piece that about a 1/4 inch in diameter. Do
> you know where is might be?
> Thanks,
> Steven

I replied that I didn't think the lens was anywhere in my house, but I'd look. I was disappointed, thinking the lens must have fallen out somewhere in my home, and by now had been vacuumed up and thrown away. It was sad to think that the whole device was rendered worthless over such a small thing.

Then, last Friday I received this msg:

> Steve,

> I found the lens. It was underneath some paper on the table where I
> disassembled the machine.It now works after I re-glued the lens back
> to the pickup assembly. It is a really nice machine. It sounds good
> and its disc changer mechanism is very fast. I think it should last
> another 10 or 20 years.

> Thank you very much.

> Steven

Now that just made me feel warm all over. I wish I'd put in the time and effort to salvage the machine myself, but I'm happy to know that this guy now has a good CD changer and saved it from the dump.

S.S.D.D. - Same Scandal, Different Day

2008-05-08T17:02:00.000-05:00

In other news, I read an article a few minutes ago about NY Congressman Rep. Vito Fossella. It's yet another story about some politician that undertook actions that would be deemed 'scandalous' or 'immoral' by most people. I'm a live-and-let-live guy myself. In my opinion, anybody should be permitted to do anything they feel like, as long as it doesn't harm somebody else or interfere with that person also doing whatever he/she feels like doing. I think Rep Fossella should NOT have done what he did, because it was wrong to treat his wife and (first) family this way. Plus, how could he explain to the daughter with the second woman the assumed secrecy he'd need to exercise ?

As I've written before, it seems to me that the Democratic Party is often criticized for what's considered excessive meddling in commercial/business matters. BUT, I believe the Republican Party excessively meddles in personal and social matters.

IT ALSO SEEMS VERY MUCH to me that the Republican Party have an almost complete lock on the title of HYPOCRITE. With the admittedly huge exception of Bill C and Monica, everytime I hear or read of a scandal involving a politician, Democrats are always caught with their hands in the cookie jar (or freezer). Republicans, though, seem to always be caught in scandals related to sex - pedophilia, prostitutes, extra-marital affairs.

Truly, the only explanation I can find for the Republican Party managing to be known as the party of 'Family Values' all these years is that they run aaround rampantly producing more and more families!

Seriously, the only thing the Republicans seem to do well, and better than anyone else, is branding and marketing.

Are any Christians out there paying attention????

Request for Software

2008-04-28T10:49:00.003-05:00

I want a software product that will intercept my incoming emails, and anywhere there are multiple exclamation points or question marks, convert the characters to one single exclamation point or question mark. THEN, at the bottom of the message, a note should be appeneded, inidicating the replacement took place.

Ideally the app could magically work with any email viewer I use (Outlook 2003, Ooutlook 2007, OWA, Windows Mobile 6, The Bat v3), but if it only worked within Outlook 2003 and 2007 I could tolerate that.

If the app lived on the Exchange 2003 server that might be tolerable, but it would have to only affect my mailbox as opposed to all mailboxes, and even then I doubt I'd have the courage, daring, or permission from above to install it to the production email server.

This could actually be an app that many people would find useful. I'm declaring here and now that I'd offer $15 for it.

I'm simply tired of receiving emails from specific individuals that ALWAYS use ??? or !!! or ??!, !?!, !!!! in every!! message !!! they send!!!!

Feels like a Sunday Morning

2008-04-26T07:02:00.002-05:00

I woke up this morning at 5:50am. For no reason at all; I just woke up. For about 10-15 minutes I tried to go back to sleep, and then gave up and decided to see if I could find anything interesting to watch on TV.

I started on channel 2, and had made my way through the program guide into the hundreds wothout finding anything. I was nearly ready to give up when I came across a Woody Allen movie I don't think I'd ever heard of. It was called 'Melinda and Melinda', from 2004.

Ordinarily I'd have passed this up, but as there was nothing else on, and nothing to do that early on a Saturday morning, I pulled up the Info page on the movie to investigate. I like some Woody Allen, and find other Woody Allen films boring, so the fact it was Woody Allen was only slightly intriguing. The summary of the plot didn't interest me, but the info page mentioned two actors in the movie. I'd never heard of the female lead, but Wallace Shawn was the other name mentioned, and I like him, so I decided to give the movie a shot.

As it turns out, having missed the first twenty or so minutes, I only saw Wallace Shawn for about 2 minutes in the rest of the movie. And the movie was really more like 2 different movies, spliced together. Piecing together the very last scene (that did have Wallace Shawn) and the summary description, I think the idea is there are two guys (directors, maybe?) that each describe the way they would approach a movie or play about a particular woman and her lovelife. One chooses a dramatic, intense, and ultimately sad portrayal, while the other goes for cute, funny, and whimsical.

The movie that I watched is the two different takes, showing some from one style, and then scenes from the other, switching among the two every few minutes. I found the dramatic story to be a little bit dull and cloying. I very much enjoyed the lighter story.

Sometime in the late-90's I registered at the Internet Movie Database and began rating movies on a scale of 1 to 10. A few years later, Jessica pointed out to me that I almost always assign a rating of 7 to every movie I see. After watching the movie this morning, I wanted to give it a 7.

Lying in bed I thought about this. I see two ways to look at this. It could be that I seldom rate movies a low score, because I have very good judgement, and successfully avoid rotten movies. OR, it could be that I'm too risk-averse, and only choose safe movies that I know I'll like, potentially preventing myself from seeing anything that would be adventurous and ultimately more rewarding.

For example, Melinda and Melinda starred Will Farrell. It also had a bit role by Steve Carrell. I never liked Will Farrell in SNL, and every movie I've ever seen him in has looked very, very stupid. (Except for one, where some fiction writer is writing his life. That looked good, but I haven't seen it yet.)

If this movie had been presented to me as a Will Farrell movie, I'd have never given it a chance. But as things worked out, I liked his character the best, and he had the only two really funny lines in the movie.

I noticed something else interesting to me as well. In the movie, there are two instances of interracial dating. In each case, a white woman dates a black man. I think I've seen this in other movies as well as TV. In nearly every filmed case of this I can think of, the couple is a white woman and a black man. I can only think of one instance of a white man dating a black woman (Firefly and the Firefly movie, Serenity). Curious.

Anyway, as I write this Jessica and Maren are still sleeping, Nate's dressing up in superhero costumes, the morning sunlight is streaming through the living room window, and I'm listening to a GRP Jazz Sampler CD I got years ago, on my new CD player. (Thanks Mom!) It feels very much like a Sunday morning, although it's really Saturday, hence the title of the post.

Another post, from another airport.

2008-04-11T20:36:00.003-05:00

Last weekend I flew to South Florida to celebrate my Dad's 65th BDay. About this time last Friday evening, I received an email that my office had scheduled me to travel to Atlanta yesterday morning (on a 7:15am flight) through tonight. SO, I am now sitting on the floor at gate D22 in Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. My 8:20pm flight from ATL to Newark, NJ, was delayed until 10:58pm, scheduled to arrive in NJ sometime around 1:45am.

Having nothing else to do after finishing my work at the client today, I explored Fry's Electronics for about an hour (we don't have those in NJ). I then drove to the airport, returned the rental car, and began puttering around the airport at about 6:30 or 7:00pm.

Around 8pm I went to Friday's for dinner. ( TIP: A Security Agent offered me the very nice tip that there are more dining options in terminals A & B, as opposed to C, D, and E. If you're ever in the Atlanta airport looking for a bite, maybe this will help you too. )

While waiting for my meal, I got a phone call from home. My 3-year-old daughter was crying hysterically because she missed me and wanted me to come home. She settled down when I assured her I'd be home when she woke up. (So, to whatever crew is flying my plane and working Air Traffic control, you better not make me a liar!)

I finished my dinner, and proceeded to walk to my gate at a very leisurely pace. While on a very, very long escalator, I overheard a conversation behind me. A lady was telling a man about her family, including 3 children. Her husband returned home from Iraq this morning, and she was on her way to reunite with him. She mentioned that this was his second tour of duty over there. The first tour was 18 months, and the once concluded today was 13.5 months.

Maren was distraught after I'd been gone for 2 days.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

2008-04-07T14:14:00.002-05:00

(Typing this from Gate C3 at Fort Lauderdale Airport, Florida.)

The Good:
Pursuant to my CD Organization project, described earlier, I've been trying to track down another one or two large CD binders. I've got about 100 more CDs to be filed, and am out of space in the binders I already own. The last time I bought these binders was June, 2003. Since then, Case Logic has changed the construction of their large binder, and the current model (still carrying the same model name/number) seems to me to be of much lower quality, has fewer features, and is ugly. My other cases are from The CDLibrary.com. These don't appear to be in-stock anywhere, online or brick-and-mortar, and their website reports 'out-of-stock' for every product I checked. Also, I think the last time the website was updated was 2003. I don't believe that company is still operating. I've scoured the web for the old-stock model of the Case Logic case for two or three weeks and come up empty. I've checked every electronics or music retailer anywhere near me, and found no CD binders of decent quality. I almost traveled 90 minutes to South Jersey to see if I could find anything satisfactory.

The reason our return flight from Florida this weekend was scheduled for today instead of yesterday (Sunday) was that our birthday present to my Dad was a family portrait session including him. This morning we woke up early, and went with my Dad to Sears, where we visited the Portrait Studio and had a batch of professional photos taken.

The service was pretty slow, and N & M immediately got out of control. To short-circuit the sibling friction, I grabbed M and took her for a walk through the store while her Mom & her Zayde went through the tedious and slow process of reviewing the photos and selecting what to buy.

Naturally, my first stop (after letting Maren grab a rolling Dora suitcase to play with) was the Electronics department. I'd been unwilling to get my hopes up, but I looked at the aisle with the CD cases, and this Sears, located at the Town Center mall in Boca Raton, FL, had FOUR of the Case Logic case that is out of production and that I've been searching for. I snapped up two of them. Each case hold about 112 CDs, with their liner notes; I figure I'll fill one up with what I own now. It's taken me 22 years to accumulate the ~600 CDs I have now, including high school, college, time spent working at a Music Store, and time spent working at a radio station. That's an average of about 27 CDs/year. (Wow, I wouldn't have thought I'd purchased at nearly that high a rate!) I very much doubt I'll run out of capacity now, ever. (Although, having done the math I'm not so confident now.)

Finding these binders way down in South Florida has made my day. This was GOOD.

The BAD:
For a long time, I've thought there is nothing I can think of that I wouldn't rather do than yardwork. However, I've also despised air travel ever since puberty. Air travel is simply the most horrible experience that occurs in allegedly civilized life. Currently going through it again, with two young, cranky children and a wife short on patience, has me convinced that I prefer yardwork to commercial air travel.

The UGLY: The opposite of the scenery in South Florida. Granted, I don't like South Florida. I especially displike Miami. I like New Orleans. I like the brief time I've spent in Tennessee, and I like the Orlando area, so I'm not anti-south. BUT, having spent a weekend in the Fort Lauderdale area at the beginning of spring, I can say with no doubt at all that UGLY is the opposite of South Florida. And, all decorum aside, (LOW CLASS ALERT!), South Florida must be the world capital of beautiful women and cleavage. The weekend was stressful, but it wasn't ugly!

Correction to the previous post.

2008-04-07T14:11:00.002-05:00

In my previous post I stated that my observation, gleaned from overheard chatter, was that many of the guests at the reunion I attended over this past weekend that represented my parents' generation seemed to favor John McCain, then Hillary Clinton, and then Barak Obama, in the upcoming presidential election.

I've since learned that I was wrong in my observation. I was right that almost none of that generation like Obama at all, but I've learned that most of them prefer Hillary C to John M.

A generational thing?

2008-04-06T22:53:00.005-05:00

This past weekend I had the pleasure to visit Boca Raton, FL, to celebrate my Dad's 65th birthday. The celebration included about 30 guests, at events spanning the weekend. Disappointingly, most of my cousins and their families did not attend. My brother was present with his wife and daughter, and one of my cousins attended, with one of his sons. Otherwise, all of the guests were of my father's generation - aunts, uncles, and friends.

Now, in my usual circles, it's pretty much a no-brainer that in the upcoming presidential campaign, of the remaining candidates, anybody would be better than McCain, and Barak Obama is the obvious choice.

Surprisingly to me, among the chatter I heard this past weekend in a crowd that was almost entirely of my parent's generation, the sense I got was that McCain was the obvious first choice, and anyone with half-a-brain could see that Obama was the worst thing that could ever happen.

I think the contrast is interesting.

The guests at this gathering weren't unintelligent, or uneducated people. They weren't evil. I simply can't reconcile these people's political opinions with my opinions of their intelligence and character, and my beliefs and opinions of the state of the world today and our present government and politicians.

One other thing I found notable is that it seemed to me that a prevailing belief among the group was that authoritative national and world news came from Fox, CNN, and maybe MSNBC. I don't trust the presentation of the news from any of those sources, least of all Fox, the network that habitually identifies Republicans as Democrats whenever reporting on a scandal involving a Republican Congresscritter.

I believe a more truthful and factual representation of the news can be obtained from Rolling Stone, The Daily Show/Colbert Report, Google News, and actually sitting, reading, and comprehending most newspapers. I've got biases just like anybody else, routinely reading Huffington Post, and occasionally Slate or Salon, but I like to think I can recognize bias in the articles I read, even if it supports my opinion. For example, a while ago I tried listening to Air America when it was carried by Sirius Satellite Radio. After a day or two I was completely turned off by the channel. Yes, it espoused the views and opinions I shared, and bashed the people and groups I oppose, but the tone and characterizations were juvenile aqnd hateful, just like the rantings of malevolent windbags like Rush Limbaugh or Hannity. The point is, I didn't like that sort of behavior even if it was 'on my side'.

Personally, I think any clear-thinking person with even a shred of intelligence or simple human compassion or empathy recognizes immediately that the current occupier of the White House is without a doubt the worst president our country has ever suffered through, and is also a contender for the most dangerous person alive today. I think the damage done to our Nation, if at all repairable, will take literally generations to repair.

I lost all respect for McCain after 2000, when he completely sold out his principals and became Bush's biggest boot-licker and yes-man. I think McCain becoming the next president would extend the current administrations practices and priorities for another term. I already have doubts our country can ever return to what used to be an America based on the rule of law and the US Constitution. If McCain becomes President, there's no way we'll ever get any of that back.

So he's out. Not at all an acceptable choice.

Hillary seems to be the type that will say or do anything to become President, and it seems to me she wants the job more so that she can be President than for any other reason. I don't like her, and I don't trust her. BUT, I think her agenda probably/hopefully aligns with mine, at least somewhat, so if she gets the nod against McCain I'd unenthusiastically vote for her.

That leaves Obama. I don't know much in-dpeth about him. BUT, I also haven't seen or heard anything substantive about him that I don't like. I think it's unfair to judge him because of some association with somebody else. I think it's ridiculously immature to judge him due to his NAME, and I think it's childish and bigoted to oppose him because of a suspicion that he's a Muslim. I don't believe he is, and even if he was indeed a Muslim, so what?

Listening to or reading his speeches gives me more of a feeling of hope than I've ever felt from any politician in my lifetime. After everything the Republicans have done to our country over the 30 years or so, I usually feel very despondent and discouraged when thinking about national and world politics. It's very, very refreshing to feel a sense of hope. I've never tried mood-altering drugs - no cocaine, no heroin, not even Tylenol with Codeine. BUT, I definitely felt uplifted when I heard Obama speak at the 2004 Democratic Convention, or when I read his speech on race relations last month.

Maybe Obama is just a better used-car salesman than the others, and he'll prove to be jsut as much of a lyinbg dirtbag as the others. But their generation has had it's chances to improve our world, and we're in worse shape than we've ever been. Continuing the status quo, as I believe either Hillary or McCain would do, is unacceptable. If Obama is taking a chance, I think there's no other choice but to take the chance.

For the record, among all of the candidates that were originally running, I'd have preferred:

* Dodd
* Richardson
* Edwards
* Kucinich

over any of those still running, but sadly they're no longer a choice.

Another Kids say the darndest things

2008-04-04T08:45:00.001-05:00

Blog entry – April 3, 2008

A few quick things before I forget them entirely. I've had an unusually, hellishly busy time for the last two weeks, and haven't had a chance to update this here.

1)A couple of weeks ago I undertook an enormous project to organize and neatly store my large CD collection. As I wrote previously, as soon as the project was done, my CD player broke. Then something very nice happened – my Mom offered to buy me a new CD player to replace the old. Thank you Mom! Now, the old player performed well for 17 years. So far, the new player is 4 days old, but it's shown no problems yet! And Maren and I were able to listen to Magical Mystery Tour, Revolver, and also the newest Joe Jackson album. Unprompted, Maren told me she likes the new Joe Jackson song Rush Across the Road – looks like she's got uncommonly good taste.

2)Work has been busier than it's ever been, and very, very frustrating. Last Monday I visited a client for a 1-2 day project. Ideally it would have been one day, but there was a small possibility the job would run into a second day. Another client engagement was scheduled for Thursday. Then, yet another project was scheduled for this past Monday. All three projects ran into major problems – two due to a Microsoft software bug that I've been working on with Microsoft Support since Friday morning, with no solution found yet, and the thrid due to miscommunication between the client and the salesman. NOW, I've got 3 clients in bad situations, with systems not working, and I had to hop on a plane for a previously scheduled family trip. I wrote things up as well as I could and handed things off to a coworker, but I'm not happy about the situation.

3)Now for the good part, the episode that makes everything worthwhile. Sunday evening I needed to drive out to my office to pick something up. The drive to the office is about 40 minutes, so this wasn't a minot excursion. Nate went with me for the ride, and while we were out near my office we went to a restaurant out by the office. On the way home I had to stop for my weekly give-the-oil-barons-more-money event, and Nate asked me “what happens when the gas pump runs out of gas?” I explained that there are holes in the ground at the gas station, and a large gas truck routinely brings more gas to the station. When the truck arrives, a large hose is connected to the gas tanker at one end, and the other end is placed in the hole, and the gas then flows from the tanker truck into the underground tank at the gas station. This led to an explanation of oil drilling platforms, gasoline refiniries, other petroleum-based products, all the way back to dinosaurs. The conversation wasn't brief, but anyone that knows me can't find that surprising. A few minutes later, Nate said from the backseat “Dad, that's why I like you so much.” I asked him what he was talking about, and he replied that when he asks me a question, I don't just answer him, I give a whole story!

Lights Out.

2008-03-29T07:41:00.003-05:00

http://www.google.com/intl/en/earthhour/

The linked page above has a good explanation of Earth Hour. For Earth Hour, people around the globe will turn their lights off tonight from 8pm to 9pm.

A definition of Irony

2008-03-23T20:37:00.006-05:00

As described in earlier posts, I spent almost all waking minutes of last weekend organizing my music CD collection. The collection is approximately 600 CDs. For the last 5-6 years, I tended to not listen to my CDs as much as I'd have liked to, because it could take me 20-30 minutes to find a specific CD. If I was walking around and thought to myself, "Gee, I feel like listening to Goodbye Yellow Brick Road right now", I'd probably not bother, simply because it would take too long to find the CD among the unorganized stacks.

Now that nearly the entire collection is organized alphabetically, I can find almost any disc within a minute or two. This is GREAT.

So this evening Maren and I listened to the I Am Sam soundtrack. I haven't seen the movie, but the soundtrack is a collection of Beatles songs, performed by contemporary musicians. We had so much fun listening to it, we decided we wanted to hear a genuine Beatles album when it was finished. I was drilling through the A-B binder, making a beeline for Abbey Road, when Maren spotted the bright, vibrant colors of the Magical Mystery Tour booklet, and declared she wanted to listen to that one.

Accomodatingly, I pulled out Magical Mystery Tour and inserted it into the CD player. The player made a noise somewhere between a whirr and a squeal, and then decided to try the next disc in the cartridge. (It's a 6-disc changer.) Well, this wasn't the result I'd hoped for. I tried placing the disc in a different cartridge, and also in a different slot. I tried other discs. I tried putting I Am Sam back in.

No Joy. Literally one week after I organized all of my CDs, after letting them sit in a chaotic mess for over 5 years, my CD player bit the dust.

As the kid in the Schoolhouse Rock song says, "DRAT!".

(EDIT: I neglected to mention, I bought this CD Player, I think, in 1988. It's been wonderful, and heavily used during many periods of my life, for 20 years! It's a Pioneer PD-M435, and I'm inclined to get the current Pioneer replacement for it, but am hesitant, only because I don't think the current Pioneer can play MP3s. Of course, I never could play MP3s on the old model, so I might not worry about that.)

So Neat! Now what do I do with it?

2008-03-22T21:58:00.003-05:00

Friday afternoon a coworker asked me to setup a server with Joomla!, a Content Management System. I'd never heard of Joomla!, and initially didn't even really know what a Content Management System (CMS) was.

I think a CMS is a system that manages all of the files that comprise a website, so no human needs to keep track of all of that stuff. For example, I may decide I want a specific color for the background, or a certain graphic at the top of every page on the site. Then, instead of having to go add code to every single page, I can just tell the CMS to do it, and it will make it happen. *I Think.* Really, I don't know what a CMS is. But whoever wrote this page seems to understand the concept.

Last night and today I took an old WinXP desktop PC that had 'gone flaky' a while ago, and had spent the last couple of years sitting against a wall in my office, unused. I installed OpenSUSE 10.3 on the machine, including PHP 5.x, Apache 2.2, and MySQL 5.x in the install. At about 10:55pm this evening I finally had Joomla! installed and seeming to be working fine. Of course, I've got no idea what to do with it or how to use it, so I can't really test it too thoroughly. It does seem very neat, though.

Shiny Plastic Platters - an update

2008-03-21T09:55:00.004-05:00

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Greatest Hits ..... Found
Elton John - Songs From The West Coast..... Found
Paul Simon - Negotiations & Love Songs liner notes..... Still missing

Spreadsheet listing of collection..... Updated, and uploaded to Google!

Still to do:
Obtain another large binder for the remaining discs. Alphabetize, store, and document V-Z, and all soundtracks/compilations.

Overrun by shiny plastic platters

2008-03-16T22:53:00.004-05:00

Growing up, I loved the ability to buy music, and replay songs I liked anytime I chose. I collected loads of records, and occasionally cassettes though I'd avoid them and buy LPs most of the time. (And then tape my LPs to listen to on my bike or, a few years later, in my car.)

As I was finishing high school CD players arrived. I wanted one as much as I'd ever wanted anything. One December weekend a 'big-box' discount electronics store in my area was having one of their frequent open-box sales, and I spent the night outside of the store, lined up on cold concrete with about a dozen other people, to purchase a display model Shar CD player for $29. At the time - 1986 - basic CD players were usually around $150-200, if I remember accurately.

I remember this occasion well. After buying the CD player, I drove to Mushroom Records and bought a used copy of Joe Jackson's Night & Day album (for $9.99, I think).

Let's jump to the late-1990's. My CD collection had grown to a difficult-to-manage size. I had a large wooden CD shelf, with a capacity of almost 600 discs. My not-yet-wife and roommate together badgered me to let them alphabetize the discs, so that they could find albums they were looking for. As things were, only I knew where the CDs belonged on the shelf, because I'd put them on the shelf as I purchased them, so they were arranged in approximately the order I'd purchased them. And I had the general location of every disc memorized. The system worked fine for me, but obviosuly it was inscrutable for anybody else. I finally relented and let the two of them arrange the discs alphabetically.

Now let's jump again, this time to the early-to-mid 2000's. My son Nathan was toddling around, and my daughter Maren hadn't been born yet. The just-under 600 CD capacity shelf was just about full, additional CDs were stacked around it, and the shelf wasn't entirely stable. My brother clued me in about a CD binder product that looked pretty neat. (http://www.the cdlibrary.com, if you're interested.) I bought 3 of the 204-CD capacity binders, and proceeded to remove every one of my CDs from it's jewel case, save the liner-notes and case inserts, and discard the jewel cases. I then began the task of organizing the discs and inserting them into the binders. After filling two of the binders, I got sidetracked, and never finished the job.

This weekend, over 5 years later, I returned to the task. I've now got three 204-disc binders, and two 232-disc binders (different brand). Half of the disc slots are consumed by the liner notes, so the binders really hold half as many CDs as they could contain. Nevertheless, all 5 binders are full, and I still have V-Z, and all of my compilations and soundtracks still un-stored. I'm estimating I've alphabetized close to 700 discs this weekend, and stored about 500 so far in the binders, along with finding and pairing the liner notes to each and every one.

I wish I'd taken a picture of my living room while I had every single CD lined up on the floor in alphabetized rows, completely covering the carpet, but at the time my back and knees ached and I didn't have the energy or motivation to try and get up and do the acrobatics necessary to tiptoe through the stacks of discs to try and get the camera.

Impressively to me, I've only discovered one missing CD so far -Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers Greatest Hits, & one missing liner notes booklet - Paul Simon's Negotiations and Love Songs. I'm hoping I'll find the liner notes booklet in Jessica's van. If the missing CD doesn't show up, I might just have to replace it; it's too good to lose.

So good it should be displayed twice!

2008-03-03T09:16:00.005-05:00

For the last few weeks I've been repeatedly badgered by a family member, explaining that an Obama presidency is not in Israel's best interests, and as an Amercian Jew I should be aware of that.

Aside from vague accusations by Far-right-wingers, all of which essentailly boil down to guilt by association, I've found no factual basis for this concern. In fact, when I looked into the matter, I found an official statement by several Jewish leaders, under the banner of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, that denounces the accusatory emails that attempt to slander Senator Obama.

I'm fed up with the BS. According to this article, John McCain was "proud" to receive the endorsement of a man on record as stating that God so loved the Jews he gave us Nazis.

Guilt by association can easily be used to slam anybody, and is a lousy way to decide who to support for the presidency.

Now, in reference to this post's title - my brother did far more and better research on this than I've got the patience for. He's written a post on this with more factual backing, but instead of copying it and re-posting it here, I'll just send you over to the original.

One last thought - not to get too dramatic, but I sincerely worry about the fate of our country. I don't find it inconceivable that the US, as we know it, could disappear by the end of the next presidential term. I find the possibility of destruction from an outside force, civil war, or a complete takeover of government by dictators or tyrants not completely unlikely. Should anything like that happen, I don't think that would be good for Israel, even if we did elect a strong 'PRO-Israel' President.

About a year ago I mentioned to somebody that I liked Bill Richardson as a presidential candidate. The person I was speaking with responded: "Richardson?? Do you know what his stance on gun control is?" I replied that things right now are pretty dire, and we can't afford the luxury of single-issue litmus tests that are used to flat-out disqualify otherwise good candidates. Honestly, I couldn't care less about his gun control position.

Maybe, in a time of a better foreign policy environment, a better economy, a more capable domestic disaster response team, a more stable geophysical environment, and generally happier times, we could focus on abstract policy positions that will affect a relatively few people. But this year is not one of those times. I don't mean to mischaracterize American Jews as a relatively few people - please don't read this that way. What I mean is that there are larger issues at stake. If America falls, how does that benefit Israel? And if America survives, but with a less Israel-friendly President, there might still be checks on the President that would help to insulate Israel from any anti-Israel tendencies. Of course, this gets us to the erosion of those very necessary checks that's been going on for the last 7 disastrous years, but if I keep going with this post much longer the Internet might run out of pages, so I'll leave that for another time.

And, in case I didn't make it clear up above - READ my brother's post!

Panasonic DMR-ES15 and a U61 error code.

2008-02-20T12:05:00.000-05:00

January 5, 2007, I bought a brand-new Panasonic DMR-ES15 DVD Recorder.

Sometime a few months ago it experienced a problem reading a disc, and displayed U61 on the display. After fiddling with a few buttons and probably unplugging it and plugging it back in (I don’t really remember what I did then), the device returned to normal and resumed working properly.

I promptly moved on with my life and forgot about it.

Yesterday afternoon, exactly 13 months and two weeks after the original purchase, the unit displayed the U61 error again, and nothing I could do would get the machine working again. After several attempts to reset it by pressing different buttons, holding various buttons down at power up, or by unplugging it and plugging it back in, I gave up and called Panasonic for help.

I spent a good amount of time on the phone with the Panasonic Tech Support agent. I let him know the machine was exactly 1 month and 2 weeks out of warranty. I let him know I’d just purchased a nice new set of Panasonic phones a few weeks ago. Nevertheless, after he’d also concluded the machine was definitely broken and wouldn’t work again without being repaired, he informed me that he thought it would be unlikely the factory would make an exception and repair it for free, but that I could include a copy of the receipt and a letter asking them to consider it.

The flat-rate for a repair was $130. I paid $97 for the unit, new.

So I pulled out my trusty multi-bit screwdriver (and searched Google) and went to work. Looking at Google, it appears to me that this is an extremely common problem with this model. There are many, many other pages detailing people that have this exact same error, with this exact same DVD Recorder. It appears to me that the unit has a design deficiency, and I’m inclined to think Panasonic ought to cover these repairs for free or at a heavy discount, or at least make the relevant repair procedures and parts available to owners of the units. But I don’t know the percentages of problems vs. OK units, and for all I know this is just a case of a small but vocal minority, so I’m not anti-Panasonic yet.

If you’ve arrived here because you also have the U61 on your DMR-ES15, I can tell you what I’ve done to solve the problem on mine. I’m not a trained repairman, I have no electronics or mechanical education, and it’s highly possible I don’t know what I’m doing, so proceed at your own risk.

First, I unplugged the device. Next, using a Phillips-head screwdriver remove the two screws on the sides (1 on each side), and three screw on the back, of the case, and remove the cover.

There is one Phillips-head screw at each side of the DVD drive, and one at the back, attaching the DVD drive to the DVD Recorder chassis. Remove each of these screws, and you can remove the drive assembly. There are 4 delicate ribbon/flex cables running from the bottom of the drive, to sockets on the circuit board. Gently slide each of these out of their sockets on the board.

Once the screws have been removed and the flex circuits unplugged, you can remove the drive from the DVD Recorder.

On the top of the DVD drive there are four more small Phillips-head screws, one at each corner. These secure the top cover of the drive. Remove these screws, and then remove the cover by lifting the back edge up, and then pulling the cover backward and up.

NOW, I tinkered for a long time on the drive mechanism, reassembling and testing repeatedly, before resolving the error on my unit. Ultimately, the solution was to carefully slide the laser head to the back of the drive. The laser was originally forward (toward the tray door). Once I slid the laser all the way back, I put everything back together and everything worked properly again.

I won’t be surprised if the problem re-occurs as I never determined the original cause of the problem, but at least I now know how to quickly repair it.

Hope this helps.

Latest Happenings

2008-02-09T23:37:00.000-05:00

1) I took Nate to a classmate's birthday party this afternoon. Before the party, he commented that birthday parties "are like school, but with fun cakes and stuff".

2) I've installed a new Logitech webcam on my laptop, and am looking to test out videochat with somebody.

3) So you didn't give the new Joe Jackson CD a try yet, even after my nagging in the previous post, huh? Well, in 2006 Lloyd Cole released another excellent CD, one I'm listening to as I type this. The album is titled "Antidepressant", and includes lyrics like:

I said I’m trying to write my novel
She said Neither am I
And either way I saw you reading No Depression
You’re doing nothing I’ll come over
We’ll watch 6 feet Under
And then we’ll maybe get around to your condition

4) I've been working on printers around my home lately. I've got enough printers to stock a small store, and none work perfectly. On the one hand it's pretty aggravating, but on the other hand I'm having a small amount of fun trying to get at least one working properly, so I can live with it. As I sleep tonight the printhead on a Canon Pixma iP4000 is going to be soaking in a bowl of rubbing alcohol. This particular printer was working perfectly, with only one minor issue - it refuses to print black, at all. I'm hoping the printhead is just clogged, and tomorrow AM whatever had been clogged up will be OK. Of course, while the printhead sits in the alcohol, about $75 worth of ink cartridges are drying out on my desk.

5) At my job I do a lot of work with Microsoft CRM. At the beginning of the year Microsoft released CRM version 4.0, and I've been doing a lot of testing with the new release. I'm testing many different scenarios - straight installs, upgrades, upgrades with 3rd party add-ins, etc... This past Friday I completed an upgrade on a test box, using a copy of a genuine, production database. Things went very well, which is always exciting.

Various tidbits

2008-02-06T00:22:00.000-05:00

Tonight I installed a webcam that I picked up a few weeks ago at Radio Shack for about $8. One more reminder that you get what you pay for. It's lousy.

**********

Yesterday I finally received my signed copy of Joe Jackson's new CD Rain in the mail. I listened to it continuously all day today at work. It's a great album. A DVD was included with the album, with interviews and behind-the-scenes type content. I haven't watched it yet, but am looking for time to do so.

Coinciding with last week's release of the new Joe Jackson album, there has been an increase in volume of messages on the Joe Jackson Yahoo Group. Following the various discussions, I've found something interesting - it seems to me that people's preferences of the songs on the new album, as well as preferences about which albums are better than others, are all over the map. What I think is the best song on the new album (or the worst) seems to vary a lot from person to person, and what I might consider a weak album is another fan's favorite.

**********

Sometime in the early 90's I drove from New Orleans up to New Jersey for the first time. One of the standard highway signs that lists Gas Stations, Hotels, and Restaurants displayed a sign for the "New Orleans Steakhouse", about 20-30 miles away from any large city in New Jersey. Now, having grown up in the New Orleans area and loving good food, I laughed at the thought of a 'New Orleans' restaurant in NJ, especially in some backwoods nowheres-ville.

For the last 9 months or so I've been working in Sparta, NJ, and drive past the New Orleans Steakhouse nearly every day. I started thinking that if this restaurant has been in business for as long as it has been, how bad can it be?

Today was Mardi Gras, and the restaurant hosted a Mardi Gras party today. So I took Jessica out for dinner tonight and we decided to give the joint a try. The service seemed inconsistent. Everybody was friendly. The waiter didn't seem like the brightest bulb in the box, and we had to wait a little too long between my appetizer and our entrees, but everything came out right, and nobody had any attitude.

There were slices of King Cake at the hostess counter, and we each had a small slice. A live band, "The Noisy Neighbors", played fun Mardi Gras music, and the food, though not up to Al Copeland or Commanders Palace standards, was still pretty good. I had a cup of gumbo that was defintely good, and a plate of Bourbon Chicken over dirty rice that was far superior to the typical bourbon chicken available at every mall food court.

During the meal some of the waitstaff and customers from the bar paraded through the restaurant second-line style. The entire waitstaff were dressed up for Mardi Gras, some wearing masks, all wearing beads, one in a Jazz Fest shirt. Somebody gave us beads to wear, and a couple of Purple, Gold, and Green festooned noise-makers.

Dinner was good, and fun.

**********

Over the weekend Jessica, Nate, Maren and I were walking past the YMCA in downtown Montclair. Nate asked what the building was, and in response I pointed to the flags hanging in front of the building emblazoned with "YMCA", and asked him what was on the flags. He answered, questioningly, "yumica ?". It sounded so similar to Yarmulke, Jessica and I couldn't help but laugh. I'd never noticed that the pronunciation of this well-known Christian organization sounded so similar to the skullcap worn by Jews.

**********

Looks like Clinton and Obama are running neck and neck on the Dem side of things, and McCain is going to win the other side. Nothing to comment here, just recording this point in time.

**********

Not at all related to the above tidbit, but our country Really, Really Needs something like Instant Runoff Voting or Approval Voting. I don't know what the best voting system may be, but our current system, wherein we avoid voting for a candidate unlikely to win because we don't want to waste our vote, is a truly bad system.

**********

Did you already forget about the new Joe Jackon CD ? Go get it, now! At least listen to it!

**********

That's all for now. Good night.

Voting Troubles, entirely unrelated to electronic vote stealers (aka voting machines)

2008-02-05T23:54:00.000-05:00

Today was 'Super Tuesday', the day much of our country had the opportunity to vote in the Primary contests that help determine which candidates will be nominated to compete in the Presidential election in November. My polling place happens to be in the old gym at Nate's school, so this morning I took him to school, and after walking with him to the entrance he uses, I then walked around to the old gym to vote.

Considering my first choice refused to run, and my second through fourth choices had already dropped out of the race, I wasn't exactly eager to vote, but I did have a definite preference, and have proudly voted at every opportunity I've had since turning 18.

When I got to the front of the line I exchanged pleasantries with my neighbor, an older lady that lives across the street from me and has (wo)manned the polling table for at least the last 9 years, as long as I've lived in my current home.

She flipped to the proper page of the voter roll book, and while my wife was listed, my name was missing. This lady does recognize me, and she did speak up to the other workers there, explaining that my name should have been there and that I've been living in the area and voting there for years. She was not antagonistic, and did speak up for me, letting the other ladies there know this was a mistake. Unfortunately, nothing she could say could change the fact that my name was no longer listed.

I asked for a provisonal ballot, and not surprisingly saw that the poll workers had no idea how to handle this situation.

Now, this was only a primary, and while I do have a strong preference in the election, I don't quite fear the other candidate, as I do the candidates of the other party. I DO believe the real contest, in November, is absolutely critical, and I want to be 100% certain my vote will count in November. SO as soon as I got to my desk after the voting debacle, I wrote a letter to the New Jersey Elections Commisioner. I cc'd a half-dozen others: the Essex County Elections Board, NJ Governor Jon Corzine, West Orange Mayor John F. McKeon, NJ's two US Senators Menendez and Lautenberg, and the NJ Star Ledger Editors.

In the letter, I included all of the gory details of what happened, and made it clear that I don't want this to repeat in November.

It was probably overkill printing out 7 copies of this message and mailing it to so many folks who probably couldn't care less, but this is important to me, and hopefully at least one of those officials will at least pay a little attention to the issue. I also was sure to add the little "cc:" bit at the bottom, letting all of the recipients know that I sent copies to the other recipients.

You can view a copy of the letter here.

(And, Hell, I just noticed that I omitted Senators Lautenberg and Menedez from the cc; line. Damn.)

Something a bit more eloquent than usual.

2008-01-10T22:01:00.000-05:00

(Originally posted at http://www.njjewishnews.com/njjn.com/011008/commDefendingSeparation.html )

The below article was written by the rabbi at our synagogue, and was the sermon he presented last weekend. After services ended I spoke to Rabbi Silverstein and expressed my feeling that he was, pardon the pun, 'preaching to the choir', and the sermon should receive more exposure. The article has now been published in the New Jersey Jewish News, but I still believe the world would be better served if the article gains some secular exposure. I think the only people that read this blog are my brother and my Mom, but hopefully I'm wrong and somebody else might come across this.

Defending separation of religion and state

by Rabbi Alan Silverstein
religious leader of Congregation Agudath Israel of West Essex in Caldwell and past president of the World Council of Conservative/Masorti Synagogues.

January 11, 2008

The results of the Iowa caucuses revealed the prominent role religion is playing in the 2008 presidential campaign. Many caucus participants were reported as saying it was “important” that a presidential candidate “share their faith.” Their feelings notwithstanding, the Sixth Amendment prohibits a “religious test” for holding public office.

It should be a source of concern to Jews and members of other religious minorities that campaign ads promoted Mike Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, as “the Christian candidate”; this evidently was catering to potential evangelical supporters in order primarily to contrast Huckabee with Mitt Romney, a Mormon. On the stump, candidate Huckabee has cited verses from Christian scripture to illustrate his civic policies and has delivered unabashedly theological sermons at churches. He also presented a holiday television message not simply extending wishes for a “Merry Christmas,” but encouraging viewers to celebrate “the birth of Christ.”

On the Dec. 30 edition of Meet the Press, the former Arkansas governor defended his 1998 charge to the Southern Baptist Convention: “I hope we…can take this nation back for Jesus.”

Widespread acceptance of this assumption — that our country was founded as a “Christian” country and must be restored to an alleged “original intent” — is harmful. It is untrue and needs to be addressed. The Founding Fathers shaped an American polity in which advocacy of policies in the name of a specific faith was to be avoided. In the words of Thomas Jefferson, “Religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God….”

What led these masters of statecraft to pursue religious pluralism and tolerance?

First, they were acutely aware that, according to the American Jewish Committee, “this country had been settled, in large measure, by Christians — Puritans, Quakers, Mennonites, Baptists, Catholics, Lutherans, Huguenots, and many others — feeling persecution at the hands of other Christians who controlled the machinery of state, and were absolutely certain that they were doing the Lord’s will in oppressing minority sects….” They structured a nation to protect all faith groups from tyranny by the majority. In James Madison’s words, the goal was to create a society “with the mantle of its protection [extended to]…the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and the Mahometan, the Hindu and the infidel [secularist] in every denomination.”

Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, and other key founders were Deists, or adherents of the Enlightenment’s so-called “rational religion.” Having tired of doctrinal differences separating faith groups, they suggested that only affirmations that can be derived from a person’s rational faculties are essential: God exists, God is to be worshiped, the true worship of God is virtue/morality, man must resist and repent wrongdoing, there are rewards and punishments in the hereafter. Deists also asserted that while elites could arrive at necessary elements of religion via reason alone, society should provide a spectrum of organized religion to assist the religious tutelage of the masses.

In 1790, only 7 percent of American citizens were affiliated with any religious institution. The founders realized that no single church body was strong enough to prevail as an official American faith. Similarly impractical in the view of these visionaries was the option of “multiple establishment,” official support of several faiths. The only viable remaining choice in their eyes was to totally sever the government’s legal and financial support for any and all churches.

In addition, the Founding Fathers intuited that religion would thrive best amid a “free marketplace of souls,” a public square in which diverse faith adherents could persuade others to affiliate. By keeping faith groups apart from government, they would be spared the taint of political inefficiency, corruption, and bickering.

In the process, America emerged as the world’s most God-intoxicated democracy. As noted in a 1976 “Williamsburg charter” issued in honor of America’s bicentennial and signed by hundreds of dignitaries including Presidents Ford and Carter, Supreme Court Justices Rehnquist and Burger, and religious leaders Coretta Scott King and the Rev. James Dobson: “Far from denigrating religion…the separation of Church and State is…the saving of religion from the temptation of political power…. Far from weakening religion, disestablishment has, as an historical fact, enabled it to flourish.”

Thus motivated, America’s founders carefully crafted a separation between church and state. The Declaration of Independence makes no mention of God, Jesus, or Christianity. Similarly, the Constitution avoids any mention of Jesus and Christianity. The First Amendment to the Constitution further clarifies that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion…or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….” The Sixth Amendment adds that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust in the United States.”

As we approach the selection of an American president, let us reaffirm the words of John F. Kennedy as a candidate in 1960: “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute…where no man is denied public office because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.”

(Originally posted at http://www.njjewishnews.com/njjn.com/011008/commDefendingSeparation.html )

Electronics developers, are you listening?

2008-01-09T23:40:00.000-05:00

I've always got my cell phone on me. Whenever I'm in my car, I also have the remote to my satellite radio sitting next to me on the seat. If I'm at home, I have a cordless phone handset next to me.

I nearly always have some handheld device with a keypad. I think every single handheld device with a keypad should have an infrared emitter.

When I'm sitting on the couch, with both my cellphone and my cordless phone next to me, it's senseless that I should have to use the TV remote to change the channel on the TV, or grab the DVD remote to control it. If the cellphone had an IR emitter, it could be programmed to control the TV or DVD player.

If all of these various handheld devices could beam the infrared signals that TVs, DVD players, stereos, PDAs, etc... worked with, than users could use whatever device was at hand to operate the various devices. Seems very sensible to me.

Learn Something New, January 8, 2008 Edition

2008-01-08T12:25:00.000-05:00

I've got last.fm playing in the background. I heard a song I didn't know, but it was pleasant enough as background music, so I brought up the last.fm window to see who the singer was. The singer was Fiona Apple, an artist I'd heard of, but am unfamiliar with.

The brief artist biography on the page mentioned that Fiona Apple was born in 1977. A quick mental calculation told me that people born in 1977 are now 30 years old. Ouch.

My Response to The Democratic Party fundraising apparatus.

2008-01-04T13:05:00.000-05:00

(The below is a copy of my email to the Democratic Party, in reply to a solicitation they emailed to me this morning. For the record, I have donated NOTHING to them since the Mukasey confirmation.)

For 7 years I've been dismayed and disgusted to watch the Bush misAdministration systematically destroy our country. At every opportunity, and even at the opportunities they go out of their way to create, the Constitution is ignored or violated outright.

Last November I was very excited to see the Democratic party achieve amazing victories, after I'd spent aboout 5 years donating what I could afford to various Democratic fundraising campaigns. Many of my donations were in response to pleas from you, Governor Dean.

Since the historic November 2006 election, however, I've seen nothing from Congressional Democrats but capitualtion to Bush, time & time again. I have seen NOTHING positive at all in the way of results, only a lot of talk that sounds good to me, until I examine the non-existent follow-through.

The confirmation of Mukasey was the last straw, as far as I'm concerned. Until I see meaningful results, not just talk, from Congress, I will donate nothing more to the Democratic Party. I sincerely believe that the active members of the various Democratic Party offices, as well as every Congressperson, can afford to maintain & support their lifestyles much more easily than I can afford to support them, for them.

Rest assured, against any of the flat-out insane candidates running on the Republican side of the contest you've got my vote in November. BUT, until I see something concrete come from the Democrats, you will no longer get my money.

As for the Presidential campaign, my first choice was Dodd. My second choice would be Richardson or Edwards, either of whom I'd be thrilled with as my President. How about throwing some support their way every once in a while?

Sincerely,
Steve Jacobs

On Fri, 04 Jan 2008 12:45:03 -0500, Howard Dean wrote:

The Democratic Party
-----------------------
Keep the momentum from the Democrats' big night in Iowa going, and don't let the Republicans recover from last night's disastrous results. Make a donation to the Democratic Party now:

http://www.democrats.org/Energized

Dear Stephen,

The Republican Party is falling apart today - and we are in a place to take advantage of it.

Iowa caucus voters rejected the mainstream Republican frontrunners, and gave right-wing extremist Mike Huckabee a surprise victory in Iowa last night. He made a last minute surge - without money, and without staff - and has suddenly become a contender in the upcoming primaries.

Mike Huckabee had a big night, but the clear winner in last night's Republican caucus was President George W. Bush. All of the Republican leaders promised four more years of the Bush Administration's failed policies, from continuing the President's war in Iraq, to pursuing his efforts to privatize Social Security, to extending his budget-busting handouts for special interest friends.

Regardless of your personal candidate loyalties, there's one thing for certain: we can't let Mike Huckabee or any of the Republican candidates take over where George W. Bush leaves off.

We must win the White House and that hard work begins today. Will you help?

http://www.democrats.org/Energized

Seven years after taking office, President Bush's approval rating is stuck around 33 percent. Roughly two-thirds of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track.

But on issue after issue, while Democrats offer real solutions and new ideas to provide the American people with the change they want, the Republicans offer a third Bush term.

Keep the momentum from the Democrats' big night in Iowa going, and don't let the Republicans recover from last night's disastrous results. Make a donation to the Democratic Party now:

http://www.democrats.org/Energized

For three years I've asked you to help me build a party that could compete in every state and take back the White House from George W. Bush and his Republican cronies. The excitement we saw from Iowa Democrats, and the total lack of enthusiasm from Iowa Republicans, says a lot about how far we've come.

The wait is over. 2008 is here, and the elections are in full swing. Don't wait another minute to let Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, John McCain or any other Bush supporter get the upper hand on the next Democratic President of the United States.

http://www.democrats.org/Energized

Sincerely,

Howard Dean

**************************************************************
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**************************************************************

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Upward Trending

2007-11-18T13:24:00.000-05:00

I've got to admit it's getting better
A little better all the time
I have to admit it's getting better
It's getting better since you've been mine.

Last night I took Jessica out to a Hoboken club, Maxwell's, to have dinner, and then see Eric Hutchinson perform. I discovered Eric Hutchinson when he opened for Joe Jackson at Town Hall last April. At first, Eric reminded me of John Mayer, then Steely Dan, then Stevie Wonder, and finally I gave up trying to categorize him and just accepted him on his own merits. He's funny, he's got clever lyrics, and the music is good. I've had a brief email exchange with Eric, and spoke to him last night after the concert as well - he seems to be a nice guy to boot, even with someone about twice the age of his average fan!

I'd arranged to have our babysitter arrive at the house at 5pm, and she didn't demand us home at a particular time, so we had no deadline, practically speaking. I don't remember the last time we got to go out for an evening, just the two of us, and didn't have to hurry home by a certain time. It was wonderful. Jessica isn't much of an Eric Hutchinson fan, but she was a good sport and let herself enjoy a few songs anyway.

Thursday evening, Nov. 7, our fairly new Sony VCR broke. The problem is mechanical - any tape inserted into the deck is eaten up. I haven't figured out how to repair the VCR, and it's no longer possible to buy a quality VCR, but the Saturday following the breakdown I managed to buy a low-end VCR for $10, from a lady who had posted a VCR-for-sale ad on Craigslist.

Come back to this just-completed week. Thursday evening, Nov. 14, our other VCR, a high-end JVC that I bought in the mid-90's, broke. This time around, the problem is electrical - no matter what button(s) is/are pressed, the VCR exhibits no response at all. It makes no noises, nothing mechanical moves, no motors spin, no lights turn on or off, nothing. The only way to know the unit is even plugged in is that, when plugged in, the clock displays. Well, yesterday I managed to buy another replacement VCR from a Craigslist ad, this one a JVC, slightly better than the Sharp I bought last week, for $20.

In the meantime, the two good but dead VCRs are sitting in a corner while I ponder what to do about them. It's likely I'm going to rebuild my MythTV system and give up on the VCRs.

In my previous post I mentioned a dead phone, in addition to the dead VCRs. This phone is a Motorola Disney Classic cordless phone. It's a neat little phone, but the keypad had pretty much died.

Well in 1982 Atari sold a system called the Atari 5200. The 5200 was my all-time favorite videogame system. I love it, and still play it occasionally. One enormous flaw with the 5200, though, was the controllers Atari provided with the system. These controllers were outstanding when they worked, but they very rarely worked properly. Atari had engineered a new technology to use for the buttons on the controllers. There were exposed contacts underneath each button. The bottom of the rubber buttons was coated with a conductive carbon dot. When the button was pressed, the carbon dot would touch both of the exposed contacts underneath, and close the circuit, allowing electricity to flow, and registering as a button press. Regrettably, the circuits corroded upon exposure to air, and the buttons very rarely worked for long. Very soon after the 5200 arrived on the scene, the technology was improved, and many, many products use similar buttons today.

Motorola, in a fit of nostalgic incompetence, used faulty technology similar to that in the 5200 controllers for my phone. A few weeks ago I opened the phone up, cleaned the contacts and buttons as thoroughly as I could, and put it back together. No dice. I then took it apart again, and tried to paint the underside of the buttons with some conductive paint that Radio Shack sells for rear-window defroster repair. After that, the phone worked magnificently, for about 2 weeks. One day it stopped working at all, but would sometimes display weird lights, and would behave unpredictably in response to button presses. It seemed to be shorting out. It turns out that the paint on several of the buttons had come off the buttons, and adhered itself to the contacts underneath the buttons, so that several buttons were being pressed simultaneously, all the time. Again, I cleaned the circuit board contacts and keypad thoroughly, reassembled the phone, and again the buttons failed to work, rendering the phone unusable.

So this morning I again set out to repair the phone. This time, I cut tiny circles out of aluminum foil and super-glued them to the underside of the dead buttons. I reassembled the phone, and now it works pretty well. Only time will tell if the glue holds, but for now I'm pleased with the results.

That FISA bill, that included a section granting legal immunity to the telcos that helped the thugs in the White House spy on us - well, after much pressure from the public (you, me, etc..), the immunity content was stripped from the bill before the House passed it. The Senate Judicial Committee, meanwhile, decided to not take any stand at all on the matter, and will let it be debated by the full Senate. So while there's still the possibility that the final law will grant immmunity to the telecom companies for spying on us and colluding with the scourge at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, what's occurred so far is positive.

Just discovered a refreshing blog to read.

2007-11-18T00:28:00.000-05:00

http://marmitebreath.blogspot.com/

Sounds like a sitcom - an English woman and her Southern Redneck husband, living in the Midwest and raising their family. I was just hitting the 'next blog' link at the top of the Blogger page, skimming through random blogs when I came across this gem.

That's all, nothing of earth-shattering import to write about.

Feeling Jinxed lately.

2007-11-17T02:04:00.000-05:00

Recently my wife flipped our faucet-mount water filter, and the thing broke off the faucet. The faucet-mount units tend to leak anyway, so our faucet is unfiltered, and without an aerator right now, while I search for a new faucet altogether, one that will have a built-in faucet. Years ago, before I grew used to filtered water, I'd have thought it crazy to care about this, and I'd have been perfectly happy with tap water. I'm spoiled.

Thursday evening, 2 weeks ago, the battery in our minivan bit the dust, and we needed to buy a new car battery. That's OK - the car was still on it's original battery, now 5 years old, and just entering winter. A new battery wasn't really a bad idea, all things considered.

Last Thursday evening, when I came home from work, my wife reported that one of our VCRs (the one that's only a year or two old) was eating any tape inserted. OK, no sweat. Saturday morning I bought a very low-end, but working VCR off of somebody via Craigslist for $10. I still hoped I could figure out the problem with the good, fairly new VCR and fix it.

This past Thursday, exactly one week after our newest VCR died, our other good VCR died. This unit is absolutely frozen. It won't move any mechanical parts, at all. It makes no noises, at all. It exhibits absolutely NO reaction at all to any button presses. The only sign that it even has power is that the display works when it is plugged in.

It's possible the jinx might be spreading too. While sitting at my dining room table tonight, with 2 VCRs and one phone disassembled and laid out in front of me, while I tried to fix them, I saw red & blue lights flashing outside, in front of my house. I walked over to look through the living room window to see what was going on, and there were a couple of police cars parked in the middle of my street. Next to them was an Altima, headlights on, passenger door open, front end against a telephone pole and airbag hanging out of the steering wheel. I think the driver must have taken off, because one of the police cars kept driving off, shining it's lights every-which-way. After a while a flatbed came along and towed the car away, not bothering to turn off the Altima's lights. Shortly after that, a firetruck came back to the telephone pole, along with a police car, and a bunch of guys with spotlights checked out the telephone pole. Finally all of the police cars, tow trucks, and fire trucks all went away, and I was left sitting at my dining room table with 2 broken VCRs and a broken phone.

You've been warned - bring valuable possessions near my aura at your own risk.

More grumblings. Maybe I've got Seasonal Affected Disorder?

2007-11-12T17:42:00.000-05:00

Over the weekend I tried to play a game of racquetball with a friend of mine. Prior to starting the game I was slightly out of breath. Shortly into the game, I was incapacitated, lying on the court trying to catch my breath.

Since 4th or 5th grade I've suffered from a very low-level asthma. I've always just tolerated it, and considered the symptoms nothing more than a minor nuisance. The couple of times I tried to use an inhaler, I saw no change in my ability to breath, with or without the inhaler, so I don't have one. I also take no medication, other than Sudafed sometimes to control allergies.

Generally, I think doctors are a waste of time, money, and a huge inconvenience and discomfort. My personal worldview is that whatever you're dealing with, just cope with it and eventually you'll muddle through and the problem will go away.

That explains why I tend to go years between doctor's appointments. In fact, my last visit was shortly after Warren Zevon went on David Letterman to discuss his being diagnosed with terminal cancer. Warren said, if I recall correctly, "Yeah, not seeing a doctor for about 20 years may have been a tactical error." [Edit: According to Wikipedia, the exact quote was "I may have made a tactical error in not going to a physician for 20 years." ]

Warren could be a real smart-ass. [NPR's 4-minute recap after Zevon's death.] But when he said that I was motivated to go get a physical exam, and I did. According to the omniscient Oracle (um, that would be Google), Zevon's Letterman appearance was October 30, 2002. So that means it's been about 5 years since my last visit to a doctor.

After the asthma attack that squashed my racquetball match, I was pretty annoyed. Thanks to the damn asthma, I was prevented from playing the game. I was embarrassed. And, of course, I was out of breath for the rest of the day, and even now am a little bit out of breath, two days later.

So I decided to revisit the doctor. First, I had to try and remember my Doctor's name. Took a little while, but I found it. I then looked him up on my Healthcare Provider's website. Guess what? He's not a participant in the plan! Well, why shoudl I expect something good & pleasing from an insurance company, right? OK, no big deal, I'll use my wife's physician. After all, I now remember that when we switched to this plan we saw my doctor was absent, but her doctor was a member. So I called her doctor's office to make myself an appointment for a physical/check-up. AND.... they are no longer members of the plan either! BUT, but, but... they are listed on the healthcare providers' website as plan participants. Nevertheless, they've stopped participating in that plan.

SO, I ran a new search for a physician from the provider's website. I searched for any Primary Care Physician within 10 miles of my house, associated with the hospital we've used for Emergency Room care or to have our children delivered. There were a grand total of *9* results. Nine.

OK. Brain starts thinking to see if there are any alternatives. Waitaminute - I'm paying $666 per MONTH for this crap. Surely there must be a better way to spend the money. So I investigate to see if I can drop the crappy plan I'm in now, and insure myself for less. The absolute cheapest plan I can find to cover my family, a plan that would probably be far worse than what I suffer with now, is over $1000/month.

This sucks. There's no nicer way to put it.

And, if any of you are curious what provider I need to suffer through, it's Oxford Health Plans Liberty Plan. Where I enjoy the liberty of not being able to find a doctor. Whee!

Open letter to DSCC, MoveOn, DLC, DCCC, DNC, etc...

2007-11-10T16:54:00.000-05:00

Ever since it became apparent just how unprecedentedly awful and, yes, malevolent and evil, the criminal Bush Administration was, I've been giving to various Democratic and liberal organizations whenever I can afford to do so. I've never been able to donate much, but over the last several years I've probably given at least $25 every couple of months to somebody. I've donated to tha ACLU, the DSCC, the DCCC, Moveon.org, Howard Dean, John Kerry, Chris Dodd, Mary Landrieu, and a handful of other Democratic Party candidates over the last 6 or 7 years.

I was surprised and relieved when Democratic Party candidates saw so much success last November.

Since then, I've seen absolute capitulation and spineless pandering by nearly all Democrats on the national scene. Any craven thing Bush or Cheney wants, happens.

Mukasey was confirmed, and with Democratic support. Impeachment isn't happening. The Kyl-Lieberman bill, accelerating the path to another war of choice, this time with Iran, was passed, with Democratic support. Democrats are on record supporting an extension of a revised and weakened FISA bill, and granting legal immunity to telecom companies charged with illegally recording people's conversations.

As far as I can tell, the Democrats are doing the exact things Republicans before them did. The only difference is how they talk about things. They apologize for these obscene behaviors, and explain why their hands are tied, or why they had no choice for whatever reason, or why different actions would have made no difference in the grand scheme of things.

I, PERSONALLY, WILL ACCEPT NO MORE OF THIS.

I'm already stressed out enough trying to pay down my credit card bills, my car note, utilities, etc... Until I see Democratic Congressmen and Senators doing what is RIGHT, polls be damned, I will donate NO MORE to any of them. They've screwed me one too many times. SCREW THEM.

I want the Constitution restored, and I want every federal law passed since the year 2000 repealed if it impacts civil liberties, privacy, and protection of the individual against the government, for starters. I want 'signing statements' clearly and unequivocably prohibited. I want Bush & Cheney impeachment proceedings begun. I want the terrible bankruptcy 'reform' bill repealed. I want non-computerized voting machines, and a paper-trail to prove what votes are, or aren't, cast.

I want the congress to begin doing things for the good of the country, instead of for the good of the congress-critters.

================================================

For years I've been thinking about problems with our elections and I've come up with one possible solution that I wish could happen. Stagger, and maybe tweak the term-lengths of the President, Vice-President, Senators, and Congressmen. Maybe make the President/VP term 6 years instead of 4. Maybe let a Congressman/woman serve for 3 or 4 years, and change a Senator's term to 7 years. THEN, prohibit serving more than one consecutive term. NO Re-elections. MAYBE, some period of time after the end of the initial term, allow them to run again. So, for example, 6 years after a term is over, allow the person to run again.

And, all the talk about changing the law to let Schwarzenegger run for Pres? If the folks proposing this change of law truly believe this is a good change, then they should propose the law, written so that it only applies to people born *after* the enactment of the law. That will guarantee the law isn't being written to serve any specific person.

Now I have to beg off and help with the kids. More later.

From the Learn Something New department:

2007-11-08T13:25:00.000-05:00

1) If you're using Windows Remote Desktop to work on a remote windows computer, and you want to ALT-TAB, you'll find the ALT-TAB occurs on your PC instead. This is a problem, especially if there are mouse issues and you can't use the mouse to navigate. I found a solution to this:
Instead of pressing ALT-TAB, use ALT-PageUp and/or ALT-PageDown. WONDERFUL! And, to give credit where due, I learned this at http://www.tipicalcharlie.com/swapping_windows_with_remote_desktop.htm

2) If you order steamed dumplings for lunch, and then let them sit for an hour before you actually eat them, they aren't very good.

Stuff That MATTERS

2007-10-23T09:17:00.001-05:00

The below post was copied verbatim from http://www.huffingtonpost.com :

Chris Dodd

My Oath of Office

As required by Article 6 of the U.S. Constitution, Members of Congress are bound to support the Constitution. We take the following oath: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter."

As the representatives of the American people, our job is in many ways quite simple: to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic." There's no question in my mind that Democrats were given a majority in both the House and the Senate based on their promises to change the course of the country. We were elected to strengthen the nation by ending this war, restoring our standing in the world and returning the nation to an adherence to the rule of law. An integral part of that mandate was to reverse and stop the Bush Administration's assault on the Constitution.

Yet, we today are faced with the possibility that the Senate will see a renewal of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that enables the Bush Administration to broadly eavesdrop on American citizens and provides for retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies that helped them violate civil liberties and the law.

The Constitution of the United States belongs to the American people, not to the Bush administration. It is our responsibility as Senators and Congressmen to stand up and fight for it.

That's why I announced last week that I would put a "hold" on any FISA reform legislation that includes retroactive immunity for telecom companies -- and why, if my hold is not honored for some reason by the Senate Leadership, I pledge to filibuster to stop telecom amnesty from becoming law.

The need to honor our oath of office isn't limited to defending the Constitution. Anyone who has paid attention these last five years knows that there is no military solution in Iraq. We will be more safe and more secure when we get our troops out of Iraq. To continue on this failed course, to continue to fund our involvement in Iraq's civil war is, in my opinion, a dereliction of our oath of office as well.

The path forward is clear: it's time for Congress to set a date certain for withdrawal from Iraq and tie it to funding. If I could, I'd say we start bringing our troops home tonight to the heroes welcome they deserve. At the same time, we have to act to defend the rule of law and support the Constitution.

The truth is, I never thought I'd be running for President on a platform of restoring the Constitution and America's standing in the world or something as elementary as honoring the oath of office we take. But with our security at risk, we haven't any other choice. I haven't forgotten the words I first uttered on January 4th, 1975 and I will dedicate myself to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic until I take the oath of office on January 20, 2009 - this time, as the President of the United States. I hope you'll stand with me and ask your Senators to do the same as they consider further funding for the war in Iraq and retroactive immunity for telecom companies.

Learn more about my campaign at ChrisDodd.com.

Posted October 22, 2007 | 04:36 PM (EST)

Wow! A really neat toy included with Vista.

2007-10-18T22:15:00.000-05:00

I've just learned of a really, really nifty tool included in Windows Vista. NO, this isn't some hidden feature that has all of your gasoline expenses automatically paid by Microsoft. For that you'd probably need to buy the Vista Ultimately Super-Duper-Luper Edition, Deluxe.

What I'm talking about is slightly more down to earth, and even better, is *real*.

If you have Vista, click on Start, and then, in the Run field, enter 'snipping tool', and hit Enter.

I've only just discovered it, but it looks to be an excellent screen capture tool.

That's all for now. Enjoy the tip!