April 29, 2006
Not wanting to fall back asleep with the heat on (sitting up? oh yeah, no problem for me), I turned on the TV and looked for something besides those inane infomercials for Jack LaLaine's Power Juicer and the revolutionary new Me Gym.
So I settled on a couple of gardening shows, which was ok, but what I remember is one particular commercial I saw for some dog food. In it, a guy's sitting on the couch reading a book, when his dog comes in (big, beautiful white short-hair breed) and noses his head under the book. The dog is obviously saying "pet me". The guy half turns and goes back to his book, and the dog climbs up into his lap.
Next shot, the dog is laying on the guys lap like an oversized baby while he scratches his belly. Next shot, the dog is sitting in the guys lap with both feet on his shouldeers, washing his face.
The tagline for the commercial was something like "He's more than a dog, he's your best friend".
The commercial closed with one of those time-elapsed bed shots showing you sleeping at different points of time during the night. First, the guy is laying there and the dog is in the bed too, with his head on the guy's hip. Next, the guy is still laying there, but the dog has leaned into him back to back. Finally, the dog is all sprawled across the bed, and the guy (still asleep) is scrunched against the edge of the bed.
Very funny. Very true.
After a while, my back was unkinked so I headed to my own bed. Our dog Trix was curled up on my side of the bed with no inclination to move. I wound up wrapped around him, arm across both the dog and Liz, more crossways on the bed than anything.
Very true.
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07:26 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 28, 2006
See, I am currently working as a COBOL programmer. I know, I can hear some snickering and even a gasp of disbelief or two. They don't even teach COBOL in school anymore. Which is all well and good, except that there are literally billions of lines of COBOL code out there in the real world, being used every day, and working perfectly well. The only problem is that it's "old", and to many people in today's technological world, "old" = bad.
It's not always true, and luckily for me, I was able to fall back on the ol' COBOL skillset when my last position disappeared because a "new", "good" system was implemented (one that still doesn't work very well two years later, but that's another story). I did mainframe database systems for years and years before this.
But I don't necessarily want to be a COBOL programmer for the rest of my working life, although I probably could. I'm actually a young whippersnapper compared to a lot of the COBOL programmers still working, and that pool of talent is shrinking faster than the remaining need for 'em. One of the best skills to have for the massive Y2K effort was COBOL. Business needed them, and paid dearly because they needed them badly.
So I've been taking classes and doing a lot of home-study. HTML and CSS. I've got a test database built in MySQL and I've started accessing it via PHP to create dynamic web pages. Not a biggie to the guru's out there, but for a mainframe guy this stuff is a whole new way of looking at the world. Kinda like what you went through learning Visual Basic if you knew plain ol' vanilla Basic before that, or OOP when that became the way to go.
Next up is XML and Java, and my company has told me that VB.NET is hot right now.
But at this moment, I've got my NHL Playoff database and I'm learning how to do strange and wondrous things with it. Up top is a standard HTML table, but at some point it might evolve into something interactive. If I figure out how soon enough.
Baby steps... that's how to take it... baby steps.
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05:48 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 25, 2006
Because I had an appointment late yesterday afternoon, I didn't have time to raise hell at the store itself. We walked in and a very nice, very knowlegable young man handled the problem. First, new - correct - media. Good deal. Next, I wanted a new camera as well because I might've damaged something trying to put the incorrect cards into the slot (I used a bit of force because we were assured that we had the correct card, so, it *had* to fit, right?). The kid said we'd test the camera first, because he really didn't think I could've damaged it that way. I'm a reasonable guy.
No joy. Camera broked. He went to get another. Got that one out to test it, and it wouldn't initialize correctly. The lens mechanism was jammed or some such right out of the box. He went to check the inventory, but that was the last one they had in stock. I allowed him to steer us over to the camera display to see if we could find an acceptable substitute, but I was pretty picky, finding nit-noid fault with everything he suggested.
With great sadness I told him that I wanted a refund for everything. He was sad too, and apologized to Mookie because now she wouldn't have a camera.
That's when I let him know that a rival chain had an upgraded model on sale, and that we were headed right on over to pick one up.
Memory cards? No, refund those too, because rival chain had 'em for the same price, plus a rebate.
Hanging up on this customer cost them a sale this time, and we won't be going back. I hope that jackass got his jollies doing it, because the last laugh will be mine. I've made it clear to corporate that, as a professional who deals with customer service every day, I know that pulling a stunt like that is a firing offense. I want that nitwit terminated.
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11:02 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 24, 2006
Lot's been happening around the ol' homestead. In no particular order:
1. Mookie is home from school for a week or so. Then she jets off to London for her theater junket. We shall have a house full of college girls staying over on Tuesday night before they leave. I have already been warned.
2. My wife and Mookie went out yesterday and bought a new digital camera for the trip. They already knew what model they wanted, but the knucklehead who worked there would not let them see the box ("I have to personally carry it up front to the register"). He also sold them the wrong media cards, which my wife would have realized if she'd have been able to read the box. So as annoying as it is having to go back there to exchange the memory cards, when my wife called to complain about it, the department manager copped an attitude, started mouthing off and then hung up on her.
Bad move. Now they have to deal with me. And I've already got corporate's customer service number and a whole evening worth of stewing built up. In fact, I think we might check to see if that camera is available at another store. With luck, Mookie gets her camera, the first store loses the sale (and if the Gods are smiling, chucklehead works on commision), plus I get to be a condescending jerk while I deal with the mental defectives at the original place. Believe me, if I see the salesguy who made the first screw up, he will be referred to as "that idiot" frequently and to his face.
Mistakes happen. This one could have and should have been prevented. And their version of "customer service" made what should have been a minor thing into a huge deal to me. It's personal.
3. The rocket launch this weekend was rained out, for me anyway. I know Russ went on Friday and saw some cool flights (and shreds), but Friday was "experimental" day when the guys who make their own motors fly, and I couldn't take the day off. Saturday rained like a mother all day long, and since the field is a plowed farm field, there was no way I was going to go on Sunday. I prefer music with my mosh pit.
4. Robyn and her new boyfriend and another friend were up on Saturday. Nice guy, she's happy.
5. I used the smoker again on Saturday. Yes, in the rain. I did a whole chicken (which cooked faster than I thought it would), and a roast (which cooked slower than I thought it would), and grilled zuccini, asparagus and pineapple. Toss a loaf of home made bread and home made mac & cheese on the table, and it was some pretty damn fine eatin'! We sent a good bit home with Robyn, and we still have a fair amount of leftovers.
6. Other stressful happenings which I'm not going to get into. These collectively could be filed under "no hilarity ensued".
More later. I mean, more posting... I'm done bitching. I think.
For now.
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05:20 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 20, 2006
Posted by: Ted at
04:58 AM | category: Square Pegs
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No insult taken. I'm not sure what the issue is. The table is about the same size as the banner in FF and IE here at home. At work we have IE only, and the text is huge. It's not a matter of the view size medium/small... because everything else on the page displays correctly (I tested that). It has something to do with how it's treating the headers and the css.
April 17, 2006
Poor dog, it's not his fault. But when he's in a panic there's just no calming him down, so the best I could do was to lead him into the other room and just be there with him so that Liz could get some sleep. Things finally calmed down, but it's been a long time since I've been pissed off at my alarm clock just for doing its job.
My behind was dragging this morning.
I've talked before about the giant maple tree in my backyard who's sole purpose is to provide enough shade to make growing grass impossible. Keep that in mind, I'll be getting back to it.
My wife, sweetheart that she is, brought a new DVD that she had burned into the den this weekend. She "tivo's" stuff from the satellite dish ("tivo" is quickly going the way of "kleenex" and "aspirin", genericized until the brand name loses its specific meaning), and then burns them to disk.
This DVD was lovingly crafted for me. On it was Thunderbirds, SpiderBabe, and Twenty Million Miles to Earth. Thunderbirds is the recent live-action movie based on the original SuperMarionation series of the 60's. Twenty Million is one of the better Sci-Fi monster movies of black-and-white days, full of Harryhausen stop-animation coolness and a plot that actually makes you care about and feel sorry for the monster. Plus, he's stomping Rome, which is a nice change from Tokyo. Lileks mentioned the movie once, and used a still from it as his banner.
The third movie, SpiderBabe, was a mystery to me. I knew that Liz did channel searches for things like "hockey" and her favorite shows. It turns out that Liz also does a regular check for any Misty Mundae movies coming on (gotta love a woman that'll do that for you). SpiderBabe is one of her latest, very much in the same style of Lord of the G-String and Play-Mate of the Apes: softcore porn featuring plenty of girl on girl action in a low-budget flick that closely follows the plotline of the original movie that it's parodying. Parodying? Is that even a word?
I had the movie on in the background while I was doing some other things, and noticed some familar faces from other movies. I noted something of a trend here too, because Misty gets bitten by a radioactive spider (of course), which is similar to her getting bitten by a mutant spider in Bite Me! Keep that in mind, I'll be getting back to it.
Remember that tree? Ok, good.
Liz also burned all twelve episodes of Showtime's series Masters of Horror onto three DVD's for me this weekend. I was kinda ticked off because there were thirteen episodes, and I didn't get the last one. I recently saw in WalMart that they're releasing them in pairs, one episode per DVD, but I think the price is kinda outrageous. Still, I'll have to get that thirteenth episode, just for completeness' sake.
Then in an email, Blue casually mentioned that the missing episode really was missing. I did a little googling and discovered that the thirteenth episode never aired in the US because it was a little too intense. It did show in the UK, and word is that it's pretty good and yes, pretty intense. I hadn't heard about that before, so thanks!
And on Sunday, Liz calls me into her sewing room (where she does her DVD magic) and tells me that Misty Mundae is in one of the Masters of Horror episodes, billed as "Erin Brown". It's definitely her. She plays a lesbian (natch) who gets bitten by a weird bug (definitely a pattern here). I absolutely loved the nod to her "other" movie career because in this her character's name is "Misty". Good fun.
Note to Blue: Misty Mundae appears in the episode "Sick Girl", about the entymologist and the odd package from Brazil.
Note to everyone else: This series rocks. Being Showtime, you get major gratuitous nudity plus fairly gruesome gore, and the stories themselves aren't terrible.
In other news, I waited for someone to happen by and hand me my sign because I did something Pretty Damn Stupid on Sunday morning (yes, that's capitalized on purpose). I was up early so I let the dogs out into the backyard. I started some laundry and then wandered out back and checked on the new smoker, wanting to bring it under the eaves since it looked like rain. I took it apart and felt the charcoal pan for heat (it was cool to the touch), so I carried it out behind the house and dumped it at the base of the holly tree near my back fence. I've been using that tree as my personal compost heap for 16 years. Turning the pile, adding to it, and putting the rich end-product back into my flower beds.
A little later I went down to throw the laundry into the dryer, and saw smoke come pouring over and through my back fence. I knew immediately what was going on, so I quickly put on some shoes, grabbed the back yard hose (on full blast), and dragged it out the back gate.
Sonuvabitch if that compost heap wasn't merrily smouldering away. Like one of those peat fires that burn for years, I didn't see any actual flame, but there was lots of smoke. My neighbor had spotted it too and beat me there by less than a minute, so we stood there and bullshitted and put out the fire I started. When I mentioned the new smoker, he said it was a good one, "big enough for a whole tree".
After a bit we heard sirens in the background. I was hoping that someone hadn't seen the smoke and called the fire department because I felt dumb enough already. When they sounded closer I told Mike that he should head back inside so as not to be there when the firemen came around behind the houses.
The firefighters never did show (sorry Susie), so I drenched the pile thoroughly and turned it a couple of times with a pitchfork to make sure everything got a soaking.
Later, I told Liz about it. She asked which tree it was that I tried to set on fire, and when I told her she only said "wrong tree". Referring to the maple. You did remember, right?
Posted by: Ted at
06:15 PM | category: Square Pegs
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April 15, 2006
So I started poking around, confirming that I do indeed have access to PHP and MySQL here on Rocket Jones, and I got curious about the various stats counters and routines offered. Looking at the last 300 visitors, I quickly realized that a *lot* of people are hotlinking to my San Jose Sharks logo, and most of those bandwidth thieves are MySpacers. One bozo even hotlinked one of my graphics and was using it as his forum avatar, and this chucklehead was a prolific poster on some, ah, interesting, forums.
Luckily, we have hotlink prevention tools here at Munuviana, and I arranged it so all those dOOdz get the ol' red-X from her on. They're lucky I didn't redirect their links to something, ah, interesting.
Posted by: Ted at
08:02 PM | category: Square Pegs
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April 11, 2006
Thanks.
Posted by: Ted at
07:44 PM | category: Square Pegs
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April 10, 2006
"Of course, the age-old tradition that a star must appear even if he or she is practically dying is an excellent one, but it can be carried too far. I one played a performance of The Knight of the Burning Pestle with a temperature of 103 and gave sixteen members of the company mumps, thereby closing the play and throwing everybody out of work. There may be a moral lurking somewhere in this, but I cannot for the life of me discover what it is."
We saw Coward's Private Lives this weekend. Mookie was the lead costume designer and recreated a 1930's era evening gown from photographs she found on the internet.
Update: Rachael sent the picture that she used to recreate the dress. Her version was vivid red and done in some satiny material. (in the extended entry) more...
Posted by: Ted at
05:27 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 06, 2006
Pretty damn creepy, eh?
Posted by: Ted at
07:29 PM | category: Square Pegs
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April 04, 2006
So I made a list and checked it twice. It wasn't full of odd or unusual items, just a few tools and doo-dads that I'll be needing as I move up to bigger rockets, plus a couple of things for household repair chores.
After a half an hour, I'd managed to find one (!!!!) item from my list, and that item cost less than a dollar. Quite a bit less. I'm used to this kind of futility from Home Depot (it's got a French word in the name, which explains the extreme suck), but Lowe's was really letting me down.
Liz was trying to guide me out before I burst a vein because I was so frustrated and pissed off. Even the "friendly, professional help" wasn't. And I swear there were only a few people out on the floor. It was like assigning six ushers to cover the Super Bowl.
Making one last attempt to find something, anything else on the list, we veered off the main aisle and ran smack into the barbeques. I'm now the proud owner of a new charcoal smoker, which is something I've wanted for a while. So I'm happy about that, even if I'm still annoyed about not finding the rest of the stuff I went in there for in the first place.
Posted by: Ted at
08:38 PM | category: Square Pegs
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Stop Global Whining
Posted by: Ted at
05:07 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 03, 2006
But I think she realizes that I love her, because I let her sleep with my care bears sheets.
Posted by: Ted at
05:30 AM | category: Square Pegs
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