Today is:

New style (Gregorian): 10 August 2000
Old style (Julian): 28 July 2000 C.E.
Fixed: 730342 R.D.
Astronomical (at noon): 2451767 j.d.
ISO: Thursday, Week 32, Year 2000
Coptic: 4 Misra 1716 A.M.
Ethiopic: 4 Nahase 1992 E.E.
Islamic (until sunset): 9 Jumada I 1421 A.H.
Persian:20 Mordad 1379 A.P.
Baha'i (until sunset): `Izzat Kam'al, B'ab of V'ahid 9, Kull-i-Shay 1 B.E.
Hebrew (until sunset): 9 Av 5760 A.M.
Chinese: cycle 78, year Geng-chen, month 7, day 11
Hindu Lunar (from sunrise): 11 Sravana 2057 V.E.
Hindu Solar (from sunrise): 25 Karka 1922 S.E.
French: Decade III, Tridi de Thermidor de l'Annee 208 de la Revolution
Mayan (long count): 12.19.7.8.2

Everything Day Logs
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Everything Snapshot

Time: Thu, 10 Aug 2000 00:02:56 GMT
Everything server: Apache/1.3.9 (Unix) Debian/GNU mod_perl/1.21_03-dev
Number of nodes: 645706 (1376 new since August 9, 2000)
Number of users: 17713 (37 new since August 9, 2000)
Number of links: 2876624 (23286 new since August 9, 2000)

Node to user ratio: 36.454 nodes per user
Link to node ratio: 4.455 links per node
Link to user ratio: 162.402 links per user

New Nodes: [butterflies melt in the springtime] [the coming of archy] [ohayoo] [Stories from CompUSA: 4] [Turn Off Your TV] [Birthdays which happen to coincide with horrible historical events] [Blue's Clues] [Just because Linux is Free doesn't mean Linux Software has to be Free] [the girl you want to be your girlfriend] [Elixir Studios] [Birthdays which happen to coincide with horrible historical events] [i'm leaving] [mushroom] [exciplex] [HDTV]

Users Online (34): [Pseudo_Intellectual] [knifegirl] [hamster bong] [Uberfetus] [coffy] [Electricsound] [emil greer] [icicle] [MasterYoshi] [m1a9366b] [WarMachine] [gnarl] [dolphinboy] [Jeeves] [moa] [mcc] [Cow Of Doom] [Citizen Aim] [Gorgonzola] [Michalak] [--OutpostMir--] [Wuukiee] [godling] [Space Butler] [barbie] [TheNastyCanasty] [Atriol35] [salo] [heckley] [ChrisMDP] [DaveF] [Jeff Duntemann] [genetikayos] [ert]

JeffMagnus node count: 4021 (1 new since August 9, 2000)
JeffMagnus experience: 9310 (25 more since August 9, 2000)
JeffMagnus experience to node ratio: 2.315 XP per node
JeffMagnus nodeshare: 0.623%
JeffMagnus node of the day: http://slashdot.msn.com/

Having been driven quite insane by the ridiculous quantities of reputation amassed during his attempts to fully integrate the softlinks within a single node, Pseudo_Intellectual, last seen riding an ostrich into the sunset, was incapable of writing a day log for today. Our editorial staff has instead seen fit to cobble together the following day log from his notes, which seem to entirely consist of quotes from outside sources, primarily accrued from friends on the revived tabnet discussion board at bonk.dynip.com:

Subject: canada roxx
Posted by meija (tabber elite 500)
Posted on 7/2/00 02:08 AM
From IP 24.115.75.211

i took a short trip downtown today to put up some posters for a show that i'm putting on next weekend.

on the skytrain beside me was a lady and her 5(?) year old little girl, as we're passing science world and false creek the lady points out to her kid

"wow.. look.. isn't canada beautiful.. do you see that?"

"yes mommy.. mcdonalds"

An excerpt (the posting of which is dedicated to junkpile as specified in the margins) from With My Foot In My Mouth from Dennis Lee's book Nicholas Knock and Other People which our records show he recently purchased at a used bookstore along with other seminal works of children's literature:

I'd like to come and
rub your back;
I'd like to feed you
crackerjack

and send you messages
in code
and walk along you
like a road

and bathe you till your
fleas are gone
and stuff you like
a mastodon,

and let's go play
in Kendal Park;
there's still an hour
before it's dark.

Finally, he wanted to draw attention to two citations (one extensive, one a one-liner) from his friend PlaceboMan, who is presently trekking through the wilds of Australia:

Where are you from?

"I'm from Illinois. Well, actually I'm from Massachusetts, but I spent the last four years in Illinois going to school, and I'd just like to forget about my life before then. It was pretty boring. I've been here for a week and am never going back."

How long are you staying?

"My Visa's good for four months. After that, I'll either get an extension or an onward ticket."

Where are you going in Australia?

"I don't know. North, first, I guess."

Where are you going after Australia?

"I don't know."

Any plans at all?

"No. None. All I know is I'm not going back to the States. I don't even know what I'm doing tomorrow. Except laundry."

and

Wow, even if I do meet people it's only for a day or two before they or I head off in another direction. It's a funny, lonely world.

Update! Our team of trained professionals is as we speak on their way to answer a call of an ostrich sighting. We may soon have this subculturally essential individual back in our care, at which point the long and tricky process of rehabilitation can begin.

Your well wishes are appreciated, but please, hold your upvotes back for fear of exacerbating an already difficult situation.

in our last episode... | p_i-logs | and then, all of a sudden...

Above the din of the crashing thunder and howling wind, I hear cracking, snapping.

I know it is the bridge. The bridge on which I stand and have stood since I retreated to it almost exactly one year ago. I could never exist on land... but, up here, in the air... I thought things could be so different.

And they were, for a while. The breeze cooled me. The beams, cords, and pillars were there to support me. But a bridge requires land on two sides. Continental drift assured me that my home would be finite; I knew it was only a matter of time. But could I have predicted the hurricane which now bears down on me? Should I have known that something which takes years to build can be destroyed in a lightning flash or a gust of wind?

You can try and change the land as much as you want. You can build your dams, your cities, your bridges. You can construct a building so tall that it scrapes heaven, a towering monument to what you think belongs to you. But in the end, Nature will claim what is rightfully hers. Including you.

The air is just like the land, except there's farther to fall.

I look down at the water below...

Well today started out relativly fun, got annoying, and then better.

Wrote a buncha emails i had been putting off. Wrote my girlfriend a letter (yes, ink on paper), and then came to find out my mother was online, and not going anywhere for awhile. So after around 4 hours of being bored out of my skull, i got to go online, and promptly leave. Headed down to a friends house, hung out, went swimming, went to nicks to play cards. I did OK. Seeing as the kid i was with is awsome at anything cards, he had tons of chips. I had the second most, which was half of his, the 3rd kid had about a quarter of mine, and thats just because he didn't play the last hand (high stakes), and we broke the 4th and final player. fortunatly, it was all just chips.

The kids mom whose house i was at finally came home, and i got payed for walking their dogs 5 times, although i only did it 4. (Valid excuse, for which i told her, it was a compromise, she wanted to pay me the full 6 times) Oh well, i now have 25$ which i have already spent 2 times over. Whoops.

I come home to the box that hosts my email, and my domain, being down. Then the IRC box (same network) starts not connecting properly. Fun stuff, about 3 bad things happened all at once. And now, i go to call my girlfriend.

Husband is on vacation and we've been relaxing around the house. Number One Son has returned from Church Camp and is now trying to get organized for college, he has orientation on the 17th the same day Number Two Son starts his first day of High School

I had my doctor's appointment yesterday and told him I was there Saturday waiting in the parking lot for my appointment on the 8th. (See: August 6, 2000) He explained that it sounded similar to some known problems about memory where a person could look at a tool and tell exactly what it was used for, what it was made of and give many details but could not make the connection in the brain as to what the name of the tool was. He said the neurological tests might uncover more clearly what the problem is because the memory lapses are random and I can't tell if there is some type of pattern. So far as scheduling the neuro tests, I called because I hadn't heard in several weeks . The doctor, my rehab counselor was to call went on a vacation, had been in an accident and wouldn't be back to work for quite a while. I waited patiently through the couselors long pause while he decided that perhaps he should try contacing another doctor. Finally an appointment was made for sometime in mid September. I wonder sometimes about the people with more difficult disabilities than I and how long it takes them to sort out all the delays in the process of going back to work..... They tell me to do one thing and they'll set up this and that appointment, if I never called and followed up on what they're supposed to be doing I don't think I'd be going anywhere. Right now that's okay with me because I'm still hesitant about the whole idea of being back in the working world. Slow is good, I don't want to get overwhelmed.

I have problems simply grocery shopping. At times I will see that we need something and buy the item, then the next time I shop I'm still under the assumption that we still need it. It's not until someone points out that we've got five loaves of bread in the house that I'm even aware. The message just doesn't get from one place to the other. This time its toilet paper...12 rolls in the boys bathroom and another 5 in ours. We joke and laugh about it in good fun, but I don't know how this will translate into the real world.

Anacreon did a great job of putting my Corinth node to shame so I spent some time updating and linking that node and a few others this morning.

Made it to the gym this morning Howard Mumma was there and waiting all excited to tell me the good news that his book Albert Camus and the Minister is up for an award in Canada. He's competing against two other authors, one a Roman Catholic Cardinal and the other is a philosopher from Oxford. He said he was sure he'd win third place, but I strongly disagreed with him. What he tells in his book is not available to the public in any other way. Camus, Howard said, was heavily influenced by Jean-Paul Sartre and Friedrich Nietzsche . Disillusioned with the evils of the Holocaust he happened upon Howard who was pastoring the American Churh in Paris and invited Howard out to lunch. The book is based upon a series of coversations between them.

Spoiler alert

Camus asked Howard to baptize him as he had accepted Christ. Howard refused, the church recognises one baptism for the forgiveness of sins and Camus had been baptized as a child. Howard suggested that Albert accept confirmation in the church. Camus declined as this would mean he would be joining a church community and felt that was too public of a commitment considering his existentialist folllowing. Albert Camus was returning from dropping Howard off at the airport who was going back to his pastorate in Ohio. Camus had his fatal car accident on the way home from the airport and it was conjectured at the time that it was suicide.

I asked Howard, 'When Camus accepted Christ wasn't he saved?
Howard says he will never know for sure if it was the refusal of baptism that may have been the cause.
He mentioned that there are Christian existentialists and there are Pagan exitentilalists. I don't know what he meant by that and no time to ask as gym class was starting. The book will be released to college campuses this fall.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
Hebrews 11:1-3 (KJV)

Devotion

Morning...

09:18

I got the damn sound working on the new machine. Turned out that I had compiled the ESS Solo1 driver as module, even when I clearly remembered I had compiled it in. Weird.

I also used eXtace first time for loooong time - now it's available as a Debian package! I think I last used it in GNOME 0.12 =)

12:03

The webcam I've been working with now has text adding thanks to Gd library. Now if I only could get a camera... =)

I started browsing VCL again last night, too, again a few pages of new pictures since then...

13:42

Tried playing the Nike Football video clip again ("It's just a ball." "No, it's rounder."). I love that commercial for some reason =) This time, I could play it at double size with sound, and the machine wasn't bogged down.

Oh, and check out http://www.cobolscript.com/. COBOL. Script. Do the math. \=S

16:46

Found a long enough TV antenna cable, so I encoded the opening titles of Enemy of the State movie. Wonderful opening titles! Mirrors some paranoia about the THEM! =)

Oh yeah, new Pelit in mail. With it, a CD-ROM containing something called "Santageddon". According to http://www.santageddon.com/ (the site is in Finnish), looks like this is gonna become a war between Santa Claus and Se-Num, as represented in glorious 3D!

I think I'll participate. Today, I'll go for Half-Life; Tomorrow, Santageddon. =)

18:41

Cool. Looks like my Memepool submissions are getting through anyway. =) I'm now upon Win98, downloading half-life_1016_to_1100.exe.

<RANT>IE5's downloader sux0rz d00d! I mean, I opened ftp.edome.net to IE5, then went to game upgrade section, and said "save that to disk". Guess what? The download window doesn't say how many bytes it has copied, just how many minutes it estimates it will take. And when I closed the FTP window when about 6 megs out of 27 or so had been copied... poof! Guess what happened. Yes, it closed the download as well. And no, this isn't wget with the handy -c switch, this is IE5 with no obvious disconnection recovery whatsoever...</RANT>

21:04

"Let 'frags, frags, frags' be our motto!"

- paraphrasing Black Adder

Well, the game went nice, after about terabyte of downloaded files. eDome TFC servers were quiet. Counter-Strike bombed, probably because the servers use 6.x beta and I have 6.0 - and no 6.0->recent patches in sight, dammit! I'm not gonna download 57 megs, I'll rather buy some mag with a cover CD.

23:37

Well, I'll just paste my post to r.g.r.n here - it probably tells the end of the day pretty well:

From: wwwwolf@iki.fi (Weyfour WWWWolf (Urpo Lankinen))
Newsgroups: rec.games.roguelike.nethack
Subject: YASD: A Really Lucky Game
Date: 10 Aug 2000 20:33:53 GMT
Organization: University of Oulu
Message-ID: 
User-Agent: slrn/0.9.5.4 (UNIX)


  1      59137  WWWWolf-Bar-Hum-Mal-Neu starved to death in The
                Dungeons of Doom on level 11 [max 12].           104 [104]

DA-AAAMN! What a *horrible* way to go.

Considering this was about the *luckiest* game I've ever had. I mean,
I had AC -7 and 104 HP when I died. At one point I had a big bunch of
+2 armoury I had just *found*. And I got to wish for B+2GDSM. Had a
really really cool bunch of stuff (but no BoH).

This was the same game I mentioned ages ago, now I dared to continue =) 
I had problems with a throne room that had a troll, and asked how I
would get rid of it. Well, I went up to gain some levels. Got food
poisoning. Used some Good Cure Items. "Nothing happens." %&$#&!
#prayed. Okay, cured. Soon got hungry. Nothing to eat in sight. Then a
floating eye came from around the corner. Guess the rest.

And in the list of items, I had tins and rations in the
bag... Doh. Lesson learned: NEVER save your game for longer than
month, you start forgetting obvious things.

Well, better luck next game...

---

Other day logs o' mine...

The Waiting Game

It should be here by now. On any normal day, the post would have arrived before ten. Although, the envelopes do say Do Not Bend, and I'd imagine there are quite a few on the postie's route. And he takes that kinda thing seriously...

But apparently Charlie, the regular postie, hasn't been on his route this week, and his replacement hasn't been getting to us till around three in the afternoon. But I don't wanna wait that long. These are my exam results I'm waiting for!

So, I tried plan A. Phone the delivery office and see if the mail was still there. It left about an hour ago, because "the temporary postman is running about two hours late." So, now for plan B - head down to the school, since they also recieve the exam results today - and see what I got. It'll also be the third year in a row that I missed out on ripping open the big brown envelope - the last two years, I've been in America and had to phone home to get someone else to check...

The results are kinda important - I need at least a B in Technology to get into the university course I'm aiming for. If not, then I probably have to look for a new course..

meanwhile...
They just said on the radio that a community group somewhere in the city has a wee bit of an internet cafe going, and they need someone to pop in from time to time to look after the Macs. So, I gave 'em a call and volunteered my services.. I guess it beats wasting time on my own machine of an evening :)

---

I wandered out towards the school, and happened to pass a postman on my way there. He was just picking up some more mail from the drop box, and I asked if he would mind giving me my results. He obliged, on the condition that he saw how well I did. I did well. An A for Computing, and an A for Technology. More than enough for Product Design Engineering (when combined with my results from last year).

In a fantastic mood, I skipped (well, not quite) to work, and even bothered to stop and listen to what the Oxfam canvasser had to say, and agreed to donate £3/month. Except it turned out I couldn't, because I'm under 18. So then I set out to buy a Big Issue, but the seller I passed on the way to O'Brien's for lunch had gone by the time I was on my way back. Oh well, I'll get one tomorrow..

This evening, on Rach's suggestion, I called David to remind him to call Hazel - it would appear that Rach has been trying to set the two of them up. I'll be seeing Hazel tomorrow, I wonder if she'll mention anything..

Yesterday, I discovered I was completely addicted to Gravilux.

See http://www.snibbe.com/scott/dynamic/gravilux/gravilux.html

It is nifty. It runs as an applet, and by changing the size and fiddling with the params, I have been making art for my desktop. Must stop. Must stop.

My project leader is away for two weeks (getting married). This means that I have to manage my own time. Hurrah. I have several things to do, but the biggest of which is still my University project.

In the news, the lynch mob is still running round the Paulsgrove housing estate in Portsmouth (UK). They are demonstrating outside the houses of local residents whom they think are paedophiles. Some of them probably are (or even were), while some of them are not, nor ever have been. This whole thing is the fault of the News of The World, a tabloid paper which started (and then, happily, under pressure from the police, aborted) a policy of naming hundreds of 'known paedophiles'. This was (IMHO) very very wrong.

1. The list contained factual errors. Mistakes in names, addresses etc. As a result, innocent people are being hounded.
2. Some people have similar names and/or addresses to people on the list. These people are now being persecuted too.
3. OK, so some of the people on the list were paedophiles. They were known to the police, who at least know where offenders and ex-offenders are. By driving people of a community, all you do is displace them to someone elses community, where the will not make themselves known the the relevant authorities. They are driven 'underground'. This can't be any better.

Anyway, I used to live near Paulsgrove. I'm glad I don't now. Apart from the crowds creating noise (and car-fires, and rock-throwing, and the heavy police presence brought in to monitor these demonstrations) I would be embarassed to say I lived in this area, now synonomous with intolerance and hatred.

For more info on the demonstrations at Paulsgrove, see http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_865000/865289.stm

13:08 EET

My older grandmother called the house again at night. She just turned 89, and is in quite good health for her age. But unfortunately she has now become something of a hypochondriac. When ever she is left alone for a while (her husband passed on years ago), she starts imagining non-existent pains and seizures, causing him to call every relative that hasn't yet started to pulling off the phone cord at night. If granny can't reach anybody, he'll order an ambulance to the hospital, where they find out she really isn't physically sick and send her back. Next night, the whole episode might occur again.
The whole ordeal is quite sad, actually.

But speaking of last night, the music project I am working on for a friend is advancing nicely. But after playing around with a software synth for a while I noticed my 450MHz home PC is too damn slow. Handling 8 oscillators and 4 filters each modulated by an LFO slows things down quite a bit! :) Softsynths have progressed incredibly in the last few years though, I use them as much as my real synthesizers nowadays. (!)

Hmm. I just noticed I have been sitting here for 2 hours with my headphones on but nothing playing. The noding just took me away.
(...)
Oh, great. I forgot my minidisc folder at home. One of those days, I guess.

Being an impulsive person is strange sometimes. Last night I started feeling an urge to buy some dry white wine for the weekend. Not for getting drunk, just for the flavor. I've never been a that much of a wine person, but then again life is short and one should try as much new things and possible, right? I know I will never become one of those snobbish wine connoisseurs, but I sure as hell wouldn't want that either.

Sheesh. I arrived at E2 just in time to witness an another democrats vs republicans vs KKK vs DMan vs everybody vs XP vs EDB -situation.
Why can't we all just get a bong?


14:37 EET

WTF?
I just searched for an old writeup of mine, and found out it's no longer there. Nuked? Why? For what I remember, its reputation was positive and it wasn't offensive nor otherwise awful. The writeup wasn't that funny and it surely didn't contain much factual information.. but that description fits to about 97% of my work! So why was that particular piece destroyed? An explanation would be nice.
Now I'm wondering if many other poor defenseless writings of mine have suffered the same fate, without me knowing it.
Paranoia!
Fear!
Should I start to backup all my writeups from now on, in case somebody decides E2 is not everything, but everything *they* like? Argh!
Maybe I'll just re-submit the thing right now? And again after it gets removed for the second time? What would you do then? *manical laughter*

Ok.. calm down.. relax.. breathe..
There, I'm all normal again. Never mind that last bit.

Just had a kickass lunch, consisting of a panini filled with ham, with some Pepsi Max to wash it down with. I gotta tell you, the paninis are to die for. Too bad it took me this long to discover them, but better late than never. Now I'd better to do some real work before my bosses notice I'm not doing anything besides noding here. Will I get fired because of Everything2?


23:52 EET

Well, since experience has shown that following those little impulses usually pays off, I visited Alko and got a bottle of Le Lys from Buzet. And it's good. Dry, but not vinegar-like.
"...Like I know what I'm talking about!" - George Costanza

Thanks to jessicapierce for trying to investigate what happened to my removed writeup. I guess it's backup time for now on. Thanks a lot to the dumbass responsible for destroying the piece. I hope you enjoyed it.

Today's Writeups
Korg Poly-61 | Korg Poly-61M

Track of the Day
DJ Tonka - Old School
The best tune on the only minidisc I've got with me. It rocks.

Yesterday | Dizzy->Day_Logs() | Tomorrow

---

A Storm in a Teacup

I watched The Perfect Storm last night. I wouldn't have seen it, but my Mother wanted to watch it, and she paid for my ticket.

I've become all too used to these boring Hollywood factory films. Stamped out from some focus group, committee designed template of a script and aimed at some strange lowest common denominator audience. Cliched dialogue, obligatory special effects and bland performances by generic actors. I know that it is based on a true story, but so are those awful TV movies. I know that I'm supposed to feel sorry for those fishermen and coast guard who really died in 1991, but that doesn't mean that I will like the film.

My annoyance was compounded by my local cinema's sound system. All the music tracks crackle and have a strange thumping every 15 or so seconds. I plucked up enough courage to complain at the start of the film; although the manager said he would look into it, the problems persisted. I'm worried that the X-Men film will have the same problems next week.

A Monopoly on deafness

Before we went to the cinema, I talked to my Brother about my recent hearing problems. He dismissed out of hand my statement that our general ear canal difficulties may be genetic. I was surprised by his vehemence, he was very angry with me - even implying that I was not really ill. It was shocking to think that he could be quite so nasty. He's been so angry and depressed lately.

Brotherly Love

I think my Brother is turning into a workaholic. He is only 19, yet he works from 7:30am to 6:30pm and brings work home to read in the evening. He should be going out, but falls asleep almost immediately when he gets home. He is lethargic for most of the weekend and is uninterested in things that used to make him happy (music, films etc.) Every time I visit my Mother's house he is irritable to the point of ruining an otherwise nice weekend.

I'm really beginning to worry about him.

Addiction Redux

I took some painkillers last night. This is a complete failure for me. I promised myself that I wouldn't touch them again, but after walking to my Mother's I just asked her for them casually. This was really quite stupid as I took them on an empty stomach and made myself light-headed, frantic and nauseous.

Even these adverse side effects are somehow of little importance to me. I went to sleep easily last night and slept very well - the best for many weeks.

It's going to be a very difficult day today.

12:10 BST

My training in the ways of The Order of the Rackmount continue today. I've discovered that broadcast racks are different to computer racks - just enough so that computer rackmount kits don't fit properly into a broadcast rack.

Mental Note: write a node about the possible Mojo Nation economy.

18:10 BST

well that was an Anti-Climax

I went to the doctor's surgery to get my ears syringed. I was expecting some wierd medical equipment to do the job, but instead got a nurse with an cake icing squeezy thing! A quick squirt of warm water and I was done. Except that the nurse sent me to a doctor because I seem to have a proper ear infection (rather than my last doctor's visit in which she said "you're just blocked up")

So I now have some sofradex sterile ear drops. I have to use them for a week, then go back to the doctor's. My colleagues are beginning to look concerned; 3 doctors visits in a week, with at least 3 more to come. My manager asked if I was OK in a "Please don't be ill, you're the only one apathetic enough to take the shit I give you" kind of way.

Yay for Me!

I gave in and took some painkillers last night (see "addiction redux" above). But I restrained myself from buying a load of pills when I collected my ear prescription! Whee! Hooray!

I feel very proud of myself right now.

If I can be arsed? What in the world does that mean?

Not much to write here. I had my wisdom tooth extracted on Monday, and I've just been at home, medicating myself with Ibuprofen and codeine, watching CNN, studying for a certification, sleeping, and reading James Ellroy. I've been consuming banana and soy milk drinks, Saltines, and tomato soup. Feh. The swelling's gone down, though.

I feel like going to a baseball game...but I do not feel like going back to work.

Rob Brezny's advice Cancerians this week: Float naked in a lake or sea. Sleep all night under the oldest tree you can find, lulling yourself into dreamland with your oldest memories. Imagine what your parents were thinking in the hour when you were conceived.

Hmm.. I've not really anything exceptional to say, aside from the fact that I really like Pseudo's daylogs as of late. (As well as others, of course.) I read through the BC noder gathering adventures yesterday morning, first time in a while that I've been able to get through that many nodes and still be entertained.

I went to work yesterday.. some silly little stories I could mention there. Saw a great dane.. I love those dogs, so cute. I've to go to work today, too..

Minimal (or is it phenomenal) amounts of stress built up, but I'm still hanging in there.

My bra is in the dryer.

I miss you.

More later.. er, oops, I meant to click don't display in new writeups. :)

To read about this sordid state of affairs August 9, 2000

Another day Another cry

Well I've almost gotten everything out of my ex's apartment. She was very considerate yesterday, she had gathered all of the stuff for me that I had forgotten about, she's being very adult about this whole mess, prolly cause it's her fault. Noder anm helped me again yesterday. Before I left she gave me a letter, and some other things she had saved over the course of our relationship. I gave her a hug, and I left.

Things went ok, we went in we went out. It's gonna be ok I think, she gave me the little coupon she got for getting JarJar Binks nuetered (not sure on the spelling there). And she said goodbye, and she kissed me on the cheek.

I was fine and I was free, and I didn't have someone constantly nagging on me. It feels good, and I'm not even very lonely, thanks to JarJar Binks.

I got my computers setup last night. My server goes up tonight, with the installation of the phone line. When I got home last night I noticed that my mother had stopped by, becasue there were groceries everywhere. She believes that you should always start anew when moving into a new home. She's a great mother. I'd like to thank (now that I'm thinking about it) my parents, for their support and love through this whole affair, they've been great to me, but I guess that that is their job.

aach! what is happening?!

---

Chatterbox humour:

<kenata>: Posthumous are you always a prick!

---

so, spent the evening with her, talking almost non-stop. it's interesting to see how our opinions about the serious subjects differ; at least neither of us is hard-headed enough to start an argument of it, though.

After dinner, played around the apartment. the rest is history.

I think that I'm sort of, strangely, missing my linux machine. It's still there, of course, but doesn't work with the WinModem that I use for 98, so no fun-net stuff can be done; the least of which being downloading drivers for the new video card so i can run X.

Obtained, through nefarious means, a copy of Partition Magic which tonight shall be used to beef up the drive. Got an email from cousin julie, who lives in the area, and after an entire summer of living in Chicago we are finally going to get together this weekend.

Work still is slow.

boring!!

After being awake most of the morning, not being able to sleep very well last night, I'm exhausted. Last night I was unable to write much more then idle chit chat so I finished the day horrible day log of yesterday, this morning. Now I get the pleasure of calling several lawyers in hopes of finding one that will work pro bono or is willing to wait quite a while before I pay them a dime. Oh yeah I'm loving life today. . . Not!
I probably won't update this, but ya never know now do ya till it's all just history anyway.

---

3:11 p.m.
Well what do ya know I did find something more to write about today that I figure will be of amiusement or at the very least semi-enteratining for those of you who actually read these day logs.

imagine

Have you ever cried so hard you ended up laughing maniacaly? I managed to do so not once, not twice but three times in a row at the most inconvenient time. I guess I'm a wee bit tense today. A total nervous breakdown would probably feel really good right about now, except I don't think I'm capable of losing control like that. I have tried...this annoying self preservation mechanism, seemingly hard wired into my brain always takes over just when I think maybe I've had enough of this life. It laughs at my weakness telling me whatever the sitaution is it can and probably will get 10 times worse. Then this self defense mechanism digs in and holds it's ground no matter what comes my way. Maybe someday it will fail afterall, I don't know I guess anything is possible.

A Lap Dance Is So Much Better When The Stripper Is Cryin'

Factgirl's fact of the day:

Mastubating will not cause you to go blind.
          Viagra, however causes the blood vessels in your retinas (and your naughty bits) to swell.
          Project: Next time you go to the DMV, watch the men to see if they cheat on the eye test and snicker knowingly.

The television does not emit enough radiation to make you go blind.
          Sitting too close does, however, exopose you to the threat of Verizon Comercial Madness or VCM.
          Project: Play a game with yourself: see how many Verizon comercials you can spot in one hour.
                      Then try to beat that number!

Watching TV in the dark won't make you go blind.
          Watching something with your eyes held perfecly still will make you see a purple hazey image.
          Your rods and cones need you to move your eyes constantly to keep up their supplies of chemicals.
          Use up the chemicals and poof! Welcome to Jimi Hendrixville, population, you!
          Project: Masturbate while sitting too close to the TV in the dark. Enjoy.

-its a fact!

Warning: This is a completely self-indulgent day log.

I have been too too busy at work to spend any time having fun on E2 for the better part of 2 weeks. Unfortunately, I don't see an end in sight. My work is boring and repetitive as hell, but vitally important to the customer. And for some damn reason, I care. I tried not to, but I think they brainwashed me. I feel guilty about spending this much time to node this and I am on my lunch break! AAAAACK!

Well, to more important things than work and the real reason why I had to write this and why this is a completely self-indulgent day log: I fear my 11 year marriage may be coming to an end. SHIT - I can't even type this without the tears pouring down my face - thank god no one sits in this room with me.

We had a really big fight last night. It didn't even last that long, I just yelled and screamed that he just didn't get "it" and stomped out of the room after he said I was being unreasonable. Me - unreasonable. I HAVE NEVER BEEN UNREASONABLE IN MY WHOLE FUCKING LIFE. I can always see everyone else's point of view. I can even see his POV. He wants to do something on Sunday and I said no. He is not getting what he wants. And usually I will give in and let him do what he wants. And at this point since I don't want to be around him, he probably will get what he wants anyway on Sunday.

Sorry if this is totally confusing you. I'll try to explain. My husband has a truck - a GMC Typhoon. He has spent nearly every weekend this summer either working on it, working on someone else's, going to car/truck shows, or going to the race track. We planned on taking vacation Friday and Monday to make a long weekend this weekend and go away somewhere, spend some quality time together. However, when I called to make reservations at the beach, there was nothing available for under $200/night. Then I spent another night trying to find a hotel in Mystic, CT with no luck again. After 3 days of trying to find someplace with availability, that wouldn't cost us an arm and a leg, I gave up and suggested we just find some local things to do. Like going to a park, or the county fair, or antique shopping closeby. He agreed. I said further that I didn't want to do anything truck related - just us, not us & the truck. Again he agreed.

So last night, he came downstairs after reading his e-mail, and announced that I can be mad at him. Instantly I know that he has agreed to do something truck related this weekend with someone. And I was right. He said that someone has a piece of equipment for just this weekend that can tell where a vibration is coming from on a vehicle and this guy is coming over on Sunday. I just had enough at that point. I am tired of coming second after his truck. I wanted to spend this weekend reconnecting with him. He has spent so much time away from me with his damn truck that I just didn't (don't?) feel like we were "we" anymore. And I said no, he could not do his truck thing this weekend. And then he told me I was unreasonable.

Well fuck off. I have been "reasonable" all summer and all it got me was left alone on nearly every fucking Friday night, Saturday and Sunday.

He slept in the guest room last night - not because I kicked him out. He was already in there when I came up to go to bed. So I guess he's pissed off at me. He took his stuff into the spare bathroom and got ready for work this morning. He hid my keys last night (I guess he thought I might try to leave last night) so the only exchange of words this morning was me asking for my keys.

But as I have thought about this all day, I just don't see a resolution. I hate his truck, he loves it. Even if he sold the truck he would find some other vehicle to work on because that is what he likes to do. And I honestly don't want to take it away from him, I just want him to pay more attention to me than he does the doormat (which of course he does when he wants sex...but that is about the only time). We have even had this argument before...and here we are again, so nothing changed.

I just wish I knew what to do at this point. I actually thought about suicide last night as I cried alone in bed. I dismissed it pretty quickly because I don't want to cause anyone else pain. (Sounds pretty reasonable, HUH?) I even thought about packing a suitcase and going to a nearby motel for the weekend alone and leaving him a note saying I would be back on Monday. And maybe this is still a good idea, but I will just be miserable all weekend. I guess I'll just see what happens tonight.

Thanks for letting me vent...again.

Well,today I found a new favorite musician,Billy Bragg.It started with his rendition of "Internationale".After downloading that with Napster,I went to his website and promptly found a few more songs I liked,such as "The Red Flag","The Space Race is Over","Christ for President",etc.

Wow.Greate music,tounge in cheek sometimes (See the live version of "Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards"..."Revolution is only a Kurt Cobain t-shirt away"...great stuff.

Another node from the archives of --OutpostMir-- : Windows 98 manuals do not make good weapons

Thursday. A good day to be a moron.

Up early for dentist. Need crown. Dentist says "I guarantee you will not feel any pain today" and it turns out that he is NOT LYING. Make mental note to encourage other men in my life to promise same thing. Assistant is lovely woman four years younger than me who calls me "sweetie" and sings country songs while she's grinding all my teeth off. FIVE TIMES she has to squirt purple biohazard in my mouth and make me chomp down on it to get a clear impression. Two hours later I leave with a bumbling dead melon face.

Home, soup. slurp slurp choke splutter SWALLOW GASP and I feel something scrape down my throat. Potato or tooth, who's to say? I realize I haven't tongue-explored my new crown. I do. Is that what it's supposed to feel like? Is that the temporary crown, or have I just swallowed it? My tongue is still numb, I don't know what I'm poking.

possibilities:

1. If I swallowed it and don't call the dentist's office, they will be very surprised in a month when I go back for the permanent crown. "Um... how long have you not had the temporary?"   er... since about 15 minutes after you put it in.

2. If I swallowed it and do call, they will laugh. Plus, um, all that goes in must also come out, yikes.

3. If I didn't swallow it and don't call, there is nothing to worry about except I won't know that, so I'll worry for a month.

4. If I didn't swallow it and do call, they will laugh and think I am a hypochondriac freak. Guess which one comes true.

So I call. The wonderful down-home-biscuits front desk lady sweetly calls me a dork and says Come on over, hon. I go. I don't even leave the waiting room, just lean through the tiny window for her to grab my chin and twist me toward the light. The crown is intact.

I say I feel like a big paranoid dork.  Cheerily, she says "Well, y'are, hon. Go on home now."

It's not the end of the day, the time I normally write my daylogs. It's 1:46pm in the afternoon and I sit at work and at this point I don't give a damn if my supervisor sees that I am goofing off. I should just walk out of here and never look back. That's what I keep thinking as I sit here bored out of my mind. I know I could be doing better than this. I know it. I can't stand these people I am working with, their stupid pathetic little conversations about nailpolish and hair dyes and whatever! ARGH! Please, if there is a god, let something very large and heavy fall onto the heads of my co-workers so that they may be squashed and die. Demented? Maybe. I don't care.

Okay, my bitchfest is over. But I still haven't decided whether I should go through two more torturous hours or just get the hell out of here. I'm usually more tolerant than this, but I could be doing so much more. Screw this!

Doh! Here I am thinking that I should write something for today (august 10) when today just became yesterday...

Well, here goes anyway. Today wasn't a good day: I think I'm a bit sick. Imagine feeling like you have to throw up, without actually throwing up, all day? Sigh...

Still, I managed to do quite a lot today, so it's not all bad I suppose.

CU L8R!

Today: Breakfast: apple-cinnamon Power Bar and coffee. I take my assistant to lunch (in gratitude for the kudos I have received for her work). The ladies of the lab regale (and by "regale", I mean "torture") the gentlemen of the lab with tales of their pregnancies and deliveries. By the time my assistant is done with her C-section story, I'm feeling a little dizzy. I receive a box of business cards.
Evening: sub sandwich, order Dad a decent modem (replacing the 14.4Kbaud doorstop I made him discard), watch The Blob, journal.

Yesterday (WED): The fairy of sweet dreams sees fit to visit me in the wee hours (maybe 1AM), echoing the luscious scenery and sexual tension in Meet Joe Black. I'm tempted to jot down what I can... but no, I have to wake in 4 hours, so I go back to sleep. Maybe it's enough to remember simply that it was erotic. At 5:15AM I enjoy a delicious peanut butter flavored Power Bar.
Work: One customer's quality people are visiting to discuss some quality issues and audit our quality system. I get to tag along, since the quality audit dog-and-pony show properly belongs to my position. Someday, son, all this will be yours. I like to watch my other-company cognates during these visits; like me, they usually keep to the background.
Dinner: Nothing. I don't feel like eating; I feel a little empty, but nothing appeals. Part 2 of Meet Joe Black. In order to mow the lawn, I am forced to engineer a duct tape solution for keeping the loose old extension cable from falling off the mower electrical plug. Sweaty lawn work, at dusk, in NJ, naturally results in mosquito bites. (Well, one bite.) A quick shower and change into clean dry clothes, and I return the rented video.

I quit my job today.

Yes, it was coming. I knew it was. I handed in my resignation today. Excuse me while I do a little dance.

little dance!

No, I do not have another job offer yet, but I don’t care! I feel free! Freeeeeeee!!!

I finally decided what to do last night after driving around Vancouver randomly. I drove into the industrial district near all the big plants that treat waste water and make things. I got home, and I laid down in bed, and I prayed for a little while. Then, I opened my Bible, and it fell open to Proverbs 14:23. Here is what it said:

All hard work brings a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.

Its time to stop talking about getting a new job. Its time to just do it! Throw caution to the wind. Work hard at finding something else, and a better job will come my way. I can feel it.

I don’t pray as regularly as I used to, but I don’t think God hates me because I am bad about it. God knows I appreciate the turn of events my life has taken since I took another look at general Christianity. My beliefs are a lot different than most people’s, but I think God understands. God has a sense of humor.

No work tomorrow. Tomorrow is crazy doctor day. Let’s hope that tomorrow goes well. Can’t wait until next Friday... its my last day of work!!!

Nodes That I Wrote Today:
none

CD’s I’ve Listened To Today:
none

Today’s Horoscope on my Calendar - Hold everything! Out of the blue, psychic storm warnings are posted as Mercury unites with Mars and Venus loses power. Stability temporarily disappears and emotions run high. Be prepared for strange conditions in romance.

Yikes! Hopefully it will be a good evening.

This was posted and killed under a different node.
I wrote this the day after meeting Aphexious, a harbinger of the emotional rollercoaster to come.

What had I planned to do tonight?

Does it matter now?

All that I can do is prowl the house and unleash my manic aggression on the punching bag in the hallway.

How can one person, with one look knock out the underpinings of my life? I only saw her for two hours yet still she walks through my mind with those swaying eyes and all is chaos.

In the end I pass out on the with a pencil in my hand and a bottle of whiskey at my feet.

i'm gone. i'm not even like alive. all i see is the red. the blood, running in front of my eyes.

kill.

me.

can't.

install.

dsllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll...................../dsm fa[ojdflnk;gask dddddd

can't believe it happened again.....guess i don't need the firewall program after all. dsdf;lkufc

You know, I pay like a thousand something a month to live in this apartment. Should I need to put up with the fact that they have a contract with a specific Chicago-based cable company? Fuck that. I PAY to live here and have that choice. I PAY to PICK who I PAY for what services. I don't pay to have that choice made (and badly I might add; it's a shitty company) for me.

Three MONTHS ago, I called a little company called 21st Century Telecommunications, Inc. I said, "Hey, I need cable Internet access before I croak." They were all "Ok, coming right up. We'll be there in like a week or some shit."

Cable guy came an early Friday morning. After fumbling around the gates for a while (I have no doorbell or way of knowing someone's at the gate because I got a cell phone because hell, I'm getting a cable modem, right?), he came in and told me that he wouldn't be able to do it that day and that he'd send me a thing that would give them permission to come on the property to install an amplifier for the signal, because they couldn't give service to one person if the cluster was so big, and mine is so big. SO, I got that service request thingy in the mail the next week. Surprisingly speedy. I took that there thingy and I took it to the I say I say I took it to the office of my building's managers. I said, "I need this here thingy signed so that guy can give me fast fast cable INTERNET access."

Now's the part when they give me speeches about how they have a contract with a company that says that no other company can compete when it comes to cable television. INJUSTICE, MY BROTHER! I can't get the cable INTERNET because they would have to touch the lines for the TV! Holy SHIT! They told me to go with DSL, as other residents have it and had no problem installing it.

Meanwhile, I was spending much time at adoxograph's house and was living off the Internet access adoxograph has and the computer lab I worked at. I wasn't too bad off; the computer lab had zip drives, I have zip drives. It worked.

Two MONTHS ago, I called Flashcom. I said "Gets me some Internet Access mufucka!" Dude was like "It'll be about 3 weeks to check the line and make sure it works, and then another week after that our people will come on site to actually install it." One month. Two months. Last week I got a call (on my CELL PHONE; my only means of personal communication) from Flashcom. WOO! An A.M. appointment for Thursday, August 10, 2000. That means they'll be here to install around 8 in the morning and should be done by noon. I told the folk where I work now (no computer lab anymore; it's been that long), and they said it was ok to come in at like noon.

This morning I got up at 8:46a. I walked around the grounds to see if anyone was at a gate. The guy was supposed to call, but I figured I'd make sure. I noticed my roommate was leaving then. I didn't ask why he was leaving so late (he was supposed to be out of here by 8) because I convinced him to stay up with me and a buddy last night. I got back and realized that I'd gotten up an hour too early because I'd set my clock an hour ahead last night when setting my alarm. whoops. So I slept. It was a long and wonderful sleep; I was up kinda late. Slept all the way to 10:45 or so, and got up again to make a round. Nobody. There weren't even people waiting to get in the gates anyway, and there was some guy welding things, and he had the gate stuck open (still does even), so I need not worry about the gates today. I play Tetrisphere.

Dude calls. It's 12:30p, but he calls. Says he's running late and that he can still do it, but it'll be later (like 1, 1:30). So I call work and get the ok to take as long as I need and tell dude I can. Name's Saul. Real nice guy.

Dude calls at 2 and says he's on his way. Ok, at least he's coming. Saul gets here and I let him in, and he looks at the phone jack and busts it open; uses his green phone on it. Tells me there's a dial tone, which surprises me (and is the reason I'm writing this right now). Verdict is he needs to get in the phone closet or whatever to hook the shit up, then he tells me since he was so late he'll put a jack anywhere in my room.

Go to office. Secretary tells us manager's on the phone, so we wait. About FIFTEEN minutes later, she comes out and tells us we can't do it because the DSL guy is not a "recognized contractor" by the complex, and then brings up the contract with that one shitty company. I might add she does announcing in an extremely impolite manner, such as coming out telling the DSL guy "some resident keeps calling these companies--" stop to notice me sitting there. Bitch even has the fucking balls to tell me that the shitty company is merging with 21st Century at the end of the month, and that I can get DSL from them then (which they don't offer, by the way. She really knows nothing about Internet access. Thought DSL was cable. Didn't know it was phone). Then goes on about how this guy can't touch anything because, basically, they can't trust him or something. Needs paperwork. something. doesn't matter.

I lose. I guess it's just what I do best.

No DSL. I sit. I wait for things to load. I have a violently dynamic IP. I can't put up my nice new Apache server. At least the DSL guy was nice enough to give me a phone jack to plug this mysterious line into. I care not whether it is ours or who's paying for it. Today is my triumphant day; today is the day I show that I need not the 56k connection; the day I win.

Never.