Dongle is fun to say
The other day, I found the serial port dongle for the Newton, which I figured I’d keep around just in case one of the special keyboards popped up cheap on eBay. Then today, while unpacking… I discovered that I already HAD one of those keyboards, and somehow never even knew it.
trenn and I used to joke that the federal government had hidden the Ark of the Covenant in a cardboard box in his living room, it being less likely to be found there than in Warehouse 23. But now I’m actually finding undiscovered technology in my stuff. Any chance that there’s a brand-new desktop Mac stashed anywhere in there?
(Oh, and of course after I discovered the keyboard, it took me another 45 minutes to re-find the serial port dongle. Working great, though!)
Moving forward, but glancing back
Sunday, I locked the door to the Portsmouth apartment for the last time, and turned the keys in to the main office. It’s weird, looking at the place all empty and echoey. That apartment was home for 18 months; having spent most of the first 30 years of my life in one dwelling, I always find it strange to leave.
We’re having folks over on Saturday night, so the new place has to be presentable. That’s an interesting task, as our five rooms of this ‘n’ that have to be shuffled into a house which still has plenty of Starr’s parents’ stuff in it. Of course, since some of that stuff includes objects such as big flat-panel TVs, I can accept the challenge, but it’s still a lot like trying to work the new expansion cards into your favorite CCG deck without going over the card count.
In other words, I’m still exhausted. There’s a bright side when I pass my old exit every day and remember that I don’t have to stop at the apartment for anything, but with the work we still have before us, I predict that Sunday will be chock full of slacking.
Anyway, let me tell you about the awesome computer I set up in the study this week. 8 MHz processor – 4 megs of RAM – 20 meg hard drive! The 9″ screen will display images in a palette of two colors (black or white), and the entire operating system fits neatly on an 800K floppy.
I love that old Macintosh SE; it was a much-appreciated gift from rattrap back in (I think) 1991 or so, and I got a lot of Starfleet paperwork, creative writing, and Hypercard gaming done on it. Eventually, my dad bought me a Mac LC III which introduced me to the amazing world of color graphics; the LC III is long gone, but the SE booted up happily on my shelf and is right now running MacWrite II, A Mess O’ Trouble, and the Dark Side of the Mac screensaver. Very decorative and retro. (The clock battery inside is long dead, and I’m not sure it’s worth cracking the case just so I don’t have to fix the time on every reboot. Otherwise, it’s humming along nicely.)
And may I also wish a Happy Birthday to shrewlet, who may well have found the Answer to the Ultimate Question…
The Obligatory Holiday Post
I can think of several things for which I’m thankful today:
Everything is out of the apartment now except for some random cleaning supplies, and a couple of lamps and a vacuum cleaner that wouldn’t fit in the car last night. This will be taken care of this weekend when I drop off the keys. For this I am very thankful to Starr and, well, me. We’ve both put no small effort into all these boxes.
I am thankful to Starr for many things, in fact; but they’re all mushy and I’ll save that for some other time.
I am thankful to Starr’s parents for allowing us to use their house for the next year or two. We’ll be very comfortable here, and we’ll be able to save up some money which we’ll need to get our own place. (Midori is thankful to them for the gas fireplace, which is one of the best things the furless monkeys have invented since domesticated catnip and the chewy kitty treat.)
I’m thankful to NASA for giving me the opportunity to show me what I could do for them, and to rattrap for encouraging my developing Macintosh skills in the first place. I’m also thankful to the designers of the Apple Newton, whose long-cancelled product inadvertently provided me with some “hardcore Mac expert” cred in the most recent planning meeting.
I am thankful to the grocery store owners and workers who allowed their stores to be open this morning, so I could acquire the remaining bits of a quiet Thanksgiving surprise dinner to serve Starr, who once again works a holiday.
I’m thankful to the creators and operators of LiveJournal, without whom I’d never be able to keep track of what’s going on with all my friends. My peeps are a complicated, intelligent, opinionated, goofy bunch – which is exactly how I like it, and my life would be horribly diminished without them.
I’m thankful to all the people that I like and love that my emo side is awfully disappointed this holiday. I’m supposed to be, and fully expected to be, horribly dissatisfied with my life at this age. Problem with that is, there’s so much good in my life right now… how can I let the few speed bumps slow me down?
Are You Experienced?
While installing OS X Leopard on a customer’s computer, we chatted about fine-scale modeling, digital video production, and modern professional typesetting. Suddenly, it struck me: I’m not making this stuff up, I actually can speak with some authority on these topics, cause I’ve done them, and made plenty of mistakes while I was at it!
Some facets of my life might have been easier had I been able to take a more direct path to where I am now. Thinking about that can sometimes disgruntle me a bit. It’s cheering to be reminded of how much I’ve managed to learn, and how much fun I’ve had on the way. When I look back to consider what I’ve actually done with my life, the answer turns out to be more than I thought at first glance; and that somehow makes me look forward to the future even more.
Nice when a bit of unexpected perspective is not bitter, but a treat!
Sun, sea, and soreness
Someday I will learn to keep a stash of ibuprofen at my desk.
Saturday I wanted to do anything but sit on the couch and stare at the DVR. Handily, there was plenty going on in the area, and we ended up catching a free blues festival at the 17th Street oceanfront. Less handily, we ended up parking at the 23rd Street oceanfront and I got my exercise for the weekend in 95-degree weather. I can’t believe I’m not sunburned. But, the music was excellent.
Add in that walking to yesterday’s five-hour cleaning spree in the apartment (2.5 rooms done, yay!) and I am an achy Borg today. Still, I’m pleased with the reasons I got that way, so I’m calling it a win.
Saturday night we ended up as guests of Starr’s parents at a mildly pricey Italian restaurant. The kitchen messed up my order once, and delayed the second attempt; the manager finally comped me the dinner and I think overdid my dessert as apology. With two large cannoli on a plate before me that evening, I’m pretty thankful for all the unplanned exercise.
Today is my mom’s birthday, At first, I was fretting over whether she’d even want to talk to me, but that’s not the right attitude. I want to talk to her, and I’m still commmitted to getting this whole situation worked out in a way that gets her as much of what she wants as is sane.
Good news for today? I just found a bottle of ibuprofen in my glove compartment; and these 90-minute OS X Leopard installs give me lots of time to tap away at the Newton.
Stand back, I’m doing… stuff.
Most weeks I wait impatiently for my Kingdom of Loathing turns to build up to a useful level. This week, I’ve been sitting at the max of 200 turns for days, but I don’t have time to mess with it. I guess it’s a sign I’m using my time well… KoL isn’t exactly productive… but on the other hand, you can’t be productive all the time. Makes Jack a dull boy, you know.
On that note, I am going to watch a movie this weekend. Either in the theater, or from my list of DVDs to watch or re-watch. I don’t remember sitting through an entire movie since we watched “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” together.
One of the two 400MHz CRT iMacs that have been sitting in my office gathering dust since I left Decipher has found a good home – it’s in the possession of Starr’s youngest sister. She’ll probably want to give it an external FireWire HD and/or a memory upgrade before long, it’s only got a 10GB drive and 256MB of memory. But it’ll do Word and Photoshop and play DVDs, and she seems thrilled with it, so happiness all around. I need to find some old games to pass along that don’t involve serious mayhem.
Speaking of productivity, I am attempting to do something personally productive at least once a day. Either spend at least an hour on a personal project, or sit and write something with some thought in it (thus the recent outbreak of philosophising every week or so in my LJ). It doesn’t come easy: I am a slacker and procrastinator. But time moves with or without me, and I’m not going to be left behind.
The Ringtone Choir Invisible
Cell phone is absolutely D-E-D. Dammit.
I need to either go to the Sprint store tomorrow and get a new Motorola RAZR, or succumb to technolust, and go to the AT&T store and get an iPhone. Which would cost more. But I do want one.
Arrgh, the eternal balance of thrift and desire.
Must – Control – Jaws – of Death…
The cat wishes everyone to know that he was highly paid for this television appearance. The hamster… would like some more carrot bits please.
Game blogger Tobold suggests that WoW players would reach endgame with far better raiding skills if there were quests where you had to practice raiding with sets of NPCs. Aside from the time pressures, one reason I don’t do instances is that I’m not very good at them, and I think this is a fine idea. When I do have to hit an instance dungeon for a quest, I usually end up in the company of several far-higher-levelled guild mates, and my presence becomes a bit unnecessary. This idea would mitigate the problem a bit.
rhaps and shrewlet are coming down this weekend, which is a good thing because my Technicon experience was extremely rushed. I envy Rhaps’ new iMac, which is the same model as my Mom’s. But I’ll have my Mac Pro soon enough.
Paying bills, finishing paperwork, getting all sorts of ducks in a row this week. (They were sitting out front again this morning, enjoying the humid weather.) It all feels good. Also: new blender yay 🙂
Technicon 25 Pre-Show
I have driven to Orlando. I have driven to upstate New York. In neither of those cases was I responsible for the steering wheel the whole time, if at all; so, yes, a five-hour drive can absolutely wear me out!
Since NASA Langley is practically sitting on I-64, I packed the car on Wednesday night and headed right to Blacksburg from work Thursday. 64 and I-81 aren’t too unpleasant on a Thursday evening; my CD player may be broken, but the iPod plays through it nicely except for the pauses when it tries to eject nonexistent CDs.
Unfortunately, my transmission started throwing fits around Afton Mountain (who could blame it?) slipping and locking into third gear three times on the trip down. Pulling over for 10 minutes each time seemed to reset things, but that’s no way to run a railroad.
I made it safely to the Microtel, where I was informed that the wireless access was a bit spotty on my floor 🙁 Nevertheless, in an effort to adjust my sleep rhythms for the weekend, I stayed up for a couple hours unsuccessfully farming Primals in Zangarmarsh, only getting kicked off the server three times.
Friday I headed down to see my Mom (one of the main reasons for my Thursday travel), which was lovely. We traded Xmas presents and had good conversation over a mildly disappointing lunch. Interestingly, I’m still on a hot-rodded Mac G4 tower, and she’s got the latest and greatest iMac Intel Core 2 Duo, which she took great glee in showing me.
Went to the lube place, got the transmission flushed, and had them look at my rear tires, which were making unhappy growly noises. Yep, they needed replacing. Technicon was getting expensive already…
Tweets for Today
- 09:17 Memo to me… you will need clean laundry for MarsCon, including any costumes you plan to wear. #
- 10:03 No “Star Trek Online” MMORPG from Perpetual Entertainment. I wish I could say I was surprised. #
- 11:47 Half the office here eagerly awaits the Stevenote and the list of Apple toys we’ll be drooling over in 2008. #
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