Few things can crack me up like the Muppets, enjoy!
Habanera
Ode To Joy
Classical Chicken
Stars and Stripes Forever
Banana Sharpener
The (Work) Year In Review
Today marks my first year anniversary of my current job, and frankly, I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. Between whiny customers, sometimes-clueless coworkers, having to work a different schedule every month, the mention of possible lay-offs, and having to work Christmas Eve, its been a heck of a ride.
Yes, I’m still bitter over the Christmas Eve thing…NO, I don’t plan on letting it go anytime soon.
In any event, I got a raise (4%) which was nice, and my manager also dangled the carrot of getting out of support in front of me. They’d rather have experience stay within the company instead of just walking out the door. We’ve had a few code monkeys escape from the cage lately (mostly to Rackspace, I hear) and so they’re probably playing “prevent” defense right now.
This company is particularly sensitive to turnover because they make a niche product. The technologies they work with are so inherently different that finding someone with expertise in all of them would be nigh impossible, in my opinion.
Anyways, the odds of my leaving have dropped somewhat. If I can get out of support, I will definitely hang around for awhile longer, if nothing else, to get some more experience and maybe land a certification, which would make me much more marketable should I decide to leave.
Or should I say when I decide to leave? 😉
I’m Walkin’
Its been an interesting week, and its barely Tuesday!
I dropped my car off at the dealership this morning to get some work done; new brake pads for the front wheels, an oil change, and this year’s inspection sticker. The dealer’s shuttle then dropped me off at work. The original plan was to hitch a ride in the afternoon to pick it up, and be on my merry way knowing the Reliant would stop when I wanted it to.
Needless to say, The Plan got thrown out the window at about 4:45…
I get a call at about that time from the guy from the service department. I figured it was good news, my car was ready to go…BUT as it turns out, while changing the oil, they found a transmission fluid leak. Well, nuts. The good news was that since the car is still under warranty, the fix will not cost me anything. The bad news? No car until tomorrow. Crap.
I leave the dealer with my apartment keys instead of my car (note to self, give them the spare key next time) and I decided that I would walk to work tomorrow morning. I probably could call in a favor and get a lift, but I’ve actually thought about doing this before, especially since its not too too far away. According to Google Maps, its about .83 miles, so I’ll be getting up bright and early tomorrow. If all goes well, I’ll get there before it gets too warm out, and I’ll hit up a coworker for a lift to pick up the Reliant hopefully during lunch or after work.
Should be fun!
XP-dited
I installed Vista on the ol’ Edputer about two months ago, and once I got over the initial reaction of “This is IT?” I grew accustomed to Microsoft’s latest. It had some good things (power saving seems to actually work now, organization of user folders actually makes some sense) some annoying things (WTF was wrong with the old way of navigating folders?) and some bad things (no keyboard shortcuts make Randomizer MAD) but overall, it was alright.
I had no hardware compatibility problems; my scanner, printer, and other hardware worked just fine. With the exception of one piece of software, everything worked well there, too. I was pleasantly surprised to find WinAmp 2.91 was still functional. I didn’t try any games, but that’s what consoles are for, anyway 🙂
The deal-breaker was performance: even after upping my RAM to 2GB and optimizing the daylights out of it (i.e. turning off most of the extra bells and whistles) Vista was just too much for my so-called “Vista Capable” PC. One format and install later, and its back to good ol’ XP.
When I buy my next PC, I will probably go with whatever flavor of Vista it comes with, but as far as Ol’ Faithful is concerned I’ll stick with XP. Of course, there’s also Mac, but I’ll need to save my quarters for one of those.
The Lump That Roared
I wake up Saturday morning to find a bruise on the inside of my foot about 3-4 inches long. Strangely enough, it doesn’t hurt, but as I am diabetic, I freak out and decide to see the doctor ASAP. I am fortunate enough to get an appointment on Monday afternoon and ask for a half day off. On my way to the doctor, I’m stopped and waiting for traffic to ease up so I can jump onto the freeway, and then: THUNK!
I got love-tapped from behind by some idiot, I cross my fingers and hope there isn’t any damage to the Reliant as I turn on my flashers and to try to position my car so that others can get by. I get out to confront the other driver (or rather the guy the gal driving was with). Luckily, the car looks just fine, I can’t find any indication of damage, and I felt none the worse for wear, so I got the other driver’s name, phone number and license plate, just in case, and went on my merry way…I figured I had bigger fish to fry at the Doctor’s and I didn’t want to be late.
I arrive at the Doctor’s office not terribly late, albeit a little shaky from the hit I took in the car earlier. The doctor eventually comes in and I explain the situation to him. He has a look at my foot, pokes around a bit, and notices some slight bruising on the lower part of my shin that I hadn’t noticed before.
He then ask me if I had banged my foot on anything recently…I said not my foot, but I did knock the hell out of my shin two Sundays ago on a friend’s car (much to his delight, farking sadist) and it bruised up pretty good. Heck, for the rest of the day it looked as if I had a second knee growing out of my leg.
It turns out that when something like that happens, it can take awhile for the blood inside the bruise to travel down the leg, and when it does, it can pool in certain areas, like the inside of your foot. (ta-da!) He then said it would go away with time, there is nothing to see here, and that will be $25 for the co-pay. I bought up the hum-dinger I had on the way there, but he said I should be alright.
I think my friend owes me twenty-five bucks.
Random Review: Batman: Gotham Knight
I’m a big fan of superheroes in general, but Batman has been my favorite ever since the first Tim Burton movie. Outside of the atrocious “Batman and Robin” I’d have to say I’ve liked all of the movies and TV shows, and he kicked all kinds of ass in the Justice League animated series.
Needless to say, this means that the new straight-to-video Gotham Knight movie was a Day One purchase for me. The fact that Superman:Doomsday and Justice League:New Frontier rocked made it all the easier. All I knew was that it was going to be a series of shorts done by different directors that formed one long story, and some of those directors were going to be from Japan. Would it be called Batmanime then? In any event, the story seems to take place around the time of Batman Begins, before Batman is really established in Gotham City.
The first segment featured a bunch of kids exchanging their stories of how they ran across Batman during the same day. At first the episode “P.O.V.” came to mind, but the twist here is that we literally get to see Batman through the descriptions and imaginations of the kids, which was pretty cool. Needless to say, none of them come even close to the real thing. The overall look reminded me of Aeon Flux somewhat, but without having the super-skinny characters. The ending got a good laugh out of me, and I enjoyed this segment.
The second segment focuses on the Gotham City PD, with a pair of detectives playing “clean up” after Batman, as they take a perpetrator to jail. One trusts Batman, the other does not, its pretty straightforward stuff, but the visuals were pretty cool. Instead of being just a prison, Arkham Asylum is now literally an island of madness, and there are some pretty awesome views of Batman. Not too bad, the visual kickassery makes up for the by-the-numbers plot.
On to segment three, this one looks more anime-ish, to me, at least. The first thing that struck me as odd is Bruce Wayne looks about 20 years younger than he sounds, Kevin Conroy’s voice just does not seem to fit the character’s appearance. Aside from that, a good piece featuring Lucius Fox and Bruce Wayne, very reminiscent of Batman Begins.
Halfway done, and I like what I’ve seen so far. Our two detectives briefly return in the fourth segment (I wonder if they’re in the upcoming movie?) as we see Batman tracking down a kidnapper. Some freaky stuff goes down in this one, not much story to talk about, just Batman kicking ass and taking names to some pretty awesome visuals.
Flashbacks rule the day in the fifth segment, as we see Batman at the end of a pretty rough day. There is a interesting story that is told, though, and I have to say this has been my favorite segment so far.
Last one to go, the look is more Western, and Batman is up against an adversary the likes of which I certainly haven’t seen before…I haven’t really spoiled much yet, but this should be good…and it FARKING KICKED ASS.
I’d say overall the movie is worth watching for the casual Bat-watcher, but a definite buy for fans. Gotham Knight has some great visuals and while a few segments don’t have much to offer story-wise, the package as a whole works. It has something different to offer but it takes a look at sides of Batman that we don’t normally see.
Tails is a MUTANT!
For the geek-impaired: Tails Wikipedia page
He’s the youngest character out of Sonic’s crew, well, as far as I know, anyway. I lost track of all of the “-blank- The -blank-” characters after Sonic Adventures. According to the first Saturday morning TV show, Dr. Robotnik pollutes the fark out of the planet wherever he goes, so Mama Tails probably got exposed to something-nasty-or-other, which resulted in Tails’ deformity. Yeah, he’s a mutie, alright.
That said, it worked out well for him, after all, he’s the only fox I know of can fly unassisted (Fox McCloud has a spaceship, so he doesn’t count). At least he didn’t end up like Jeff Goldblum in The Fly or Mrs. “OH NOES I can’t touch anybody EVAR” Rouge from the X-Men or those schlong-monsters that freaks are making with the Spore Creature Creator. Heaven only knows what freaks exist in the dark underbelly of the Sonic Universe.
Yes, I’m bored.
Rock Band – Warming Up
I have been salivating over Rock Band since its release. As a fan of music-based games, the siren call of the Next Big Thing was one that was hard to resist. A few things kept me from acquiring the game for some time, though: the high price tag, reports of less-then-stellar instrument reliability, and a set list that was heavy on newer music kept me away from the party for some time.
Finally, I decided to rent Rock Band and see if it was worth my hard earned cash. I figured a play-through of the Solo career mode on guitar would give me a look at all the game’s songs. I could then make a decision based on how much the game rocked…or not.
As I detest Blockbuster, I decided to go to Hollywood Video first to see if they had it for rent. I quickly discovered that the two nearest Hollywood Video stores were shut down, and I had no desire to drive over to Leon Valley Speed Trap, Texas. I dug up my Ballbuster membership card out of the dresser (I knew there was a reason I didn’t cut it up) and hit the road. Much to my surprise, they had the PS2 version, and as I still have my trusty PS2 Guitar Hero SG controller, it was time to rock. Blockbuster still sucks, though.
Much to my surprise, I liked more of the current songs than I thought I was going to based on just looking at the track list (yeah, I know, ‘don’t judge a book’ yadda yadda yadda). I finished the game on Medium in guitar and tried singing a few songs in QuickPlay mode, and it was lots of fun. The diffculty was scaled back compared to previous Guitar Hero games, especially when compared to the Medium = Hard stuff going on in Guitar Hero III. The Medium diffculty on the singing also felt easier compared to the Medium difficulty of Karaoke Revolution. That may be attributed to the game’s focus on the various flavors of rock music, however.
So, at this point, I knew I was going to get the game, its just a matter of when…
Waiting Inside The Box
I’m not sure which is worse: waiting for the cable guy to arrive to install your cable or waiting for the UPS guy to bring your package. To me, the anticipation is like waiting for Christmas or a birthday when you’re a kid. You know something good is coming, and you just can’t wait for the day to get there.
The main difference, though, is that you know when Christmas or that birthday is going to arrive. The Cable or UPS Guy give you the day, you don’t know the exact time they’re going to show up.
I guess UPS is the worse of the two. Unless you’re really unlucky (or piss off the CSR) the Cable Guy usually gives you a four or six-hour window, but UPS might come at any time of the whole lousy DAY. Of course, Randomizer’s Dumb Luck® means the UPS guy didn’t show up while I was at work, there is no surprise waiting for me when I get home.
So instead of tearing open my new Rock Band drums like a sleep-deprived, sugar-fueled kid on Christmas morning, I sit waiting to hear the diesel-rumble of the UPS truck. I quickly glance outside the window every time I think I see a vehicle pass through my peripheral vision. All the while precious minutes that could be spent rocking tick away. Of course, this is after I spent the day at work refreshing the UPS website every 30 minutes or so waiting for those damnable words “OUT FOR DELIVERY” to go away.
Its enough to make a man go mad!
Just Sayin’
I go to the workout room to use the treadmill, and there is a woman already there working out and the TV is tuned to Food Network…isn’t that defeating the purpose??
Eduardo Soliz 