o/` Simple Minds – Don’t You Forget About Me o/`

I love linux. There are so many things I can do with linux that I couldnt even begin to dream about with windows.

On that note, a friend of mine this weekend decided he wanted to install linux. Ok… but it seems that he didn’t want to take the time. I don’t know what he expects from linux, but it seems most of what he does on the computer is chat and anon. filesharing… so would linux be beneficial to him? In the end, I doubt it. It all depends on what kind of computer user you are, I wouldnt dream of recommending it to everyone! As for me, I couldn’t go back to windows.

Now I had a very frustrating experience this weekend. This person in IRC asked for some help with an mirc script (ugh) but it was something pretty simple, so I took a couple minutes and wrote something up for him. Once pasted he said “oh, someone else got it for me, sorry” … wtf? I just wasted my time doing something for him, and I don’t get a thank you, i get a “sorry someone else did it first” … sometimes I think he views himself the center of the universe. I made it clear to him I wouldn’t waste my time helping him again. So I decided I’d make up a simple ranting list of things I despise when people ask me for help… but first I will make it clear that I LOVE teaching, I enjoy taking the time to help people who are having problems, maybe it’s a vanity thing, I like looking smart, hee. Now on with the list (these mostly have the theme “dont fucking waste my time”):

1. If you want my help, ask nicely then hang around so I can help you… don’t go into 345 chat rooms asking other people the same thing so you can come back in time to see that all the work I’ve done for you is useless because you already found the solution.

2. Sure I’ll help with windows where I can… but if your trouble has to do with a virus you got for a stupid reason (not scanning with antivirus software, using kazaa, etc) I’ll send you to the Symantec website and you’re on your own.

3. Always, ALWAYS do a google search for your trouble first. Of course if you are are a total newbie I’ll excuse this, since it’s sometimes difficult to find help for things that seasoned users take for granted (and sometimes you dont know enough about the context of the problem to search for it)… but by using google you not only prove to me that you can fix a problem yourself (I REALLY respect that), but you look much smarter if you only ask questions you are really stumped on. I’ve half-joked in the past that success with computers is directly proportional to your ability to use a search engine.

4. If I am going to take the time to help you, you better be willing to take the time as well. I don’t appreciate it when people want me to help, but complain and don’t want to take the time to fix something, I am not willing to admin your box for you unless you pay me %)

5. It’s always on MY TIME. Don’t expect me to come online when it’s “easiest for you” I am the one spending time helping you, that’s sacrifice enough. You come online when I’m here, if that’s impossible then you just have to deal with through email/journal/message board help when I get to it.

I should put this on my website… I wish I didn’t need to, but I’ve run into all these problems with people in the past, it’s amazing what people will ask and expect from me.

Anyway, I had a great weekend. Which is really cool because we didn’t do much, I just felt really happy and healthy %) On saturday night we went over to our friend’s house (Barry and Rae) so Rae could tech me to knit. Got there around 7, stayed til a little past midnight… and I can knit now! Woo! Ok, I can only do two stitches (well, there are only two in knitting, and knit and a purl) and I don’t know how to do anything like knitting through a backloop (eek!) but I can do simple things, which is really cool, I couldn’t do that on friday and I can do it today! Maybe it’s that sense of acomplishment and “Creating something *real*” that put me in such a good mood. I spent a coupl
e hours yesterday practicing %) Yesterday we went grocery shopping, it went well, the store wasn’t too busy, the cashier and grocery bagger did their job (unlike our last visit with the evil old bitches). I like when I leave a grocery store still in a good mood, it doesnt happen often.

After shopping I did some knitting, we ate dinner (boca burgers, they are veggie burgers since we don’t eat beef… we tried the ‘flame grilled’ ones, soooo good!), then Myk suggested we take a walk since it was so nice out. It was great! Absolutely perfect weather for a walk, and I always enjoy taking walks with Myk %) The rest of the night I spent doing knitting… trying a few different things, I guess I’m doing pretty good, I can fix most mistakes I make. And it really is relaxing. Oh and I started making my disney soundtracks into oggs … I had gotten away from listening to them when I lived with my ex (asshat!), just because he teased me all the time about even owning them… even if myk raises and eyebrow at me and laughs it’s understandable, it is funny that I still enjoy such things, but he knew that from the beginning.

Speaking of music, Myk set up minute (our firewall/gateway/webserver/mailserver/media server) to play music through our stereo! The stereo is in the livingroom, so we can play music on minute (mpg123/ogg123 + screen) and hear it in the livingroom, it’s so cool. Now I don’t need to take up a bunch of processor power on my own computer (cool because when I do things like make oggs or play with x things get slow) AND I can hear music no matter where I am in the apartment. Myk is so smarty…and great with music stuff.

So we’re going to a lan party on saturday *is so excited* … we picked up some chocolate chips at the grocery store so I can make chocolate chip cookies on friday for the lan party ’cause I love cookies, and everyone else does too, hehe… I have no doubt they will all be eaten %D So yeah, lan party… it’s at our friend Brent’s house, his wife is on vacation so he has the house to himself, and the first thing he thought of was having a party, hee. This’ll be a great beginning to May %) Of course next week I have that procedure done to remove the irregular cells, that wont be so great… but at least we get to go to a great lan party first.

Ummm… oh I am deciding to redesign princessleia.com … not drastically, but I am so bored with how it looks now. I did some work on it on saturday, *digs up a screenshot of how it currently looks* (it’s living on the home LAN at the moment, s’why the php stuff is broken in the poll)

http://www.princessleia.com/images/MyImages/screen/testpage2.jpg

It might be a bit busy with all those vertical tildas … I might get rid of the center two rows, but I really like the new logo and the purple rose %) I think I’ll play around with the placement of the quote thing as well. *shrugs*

So today I’m going to make more oggs of my soundtracks, and I’m going to play around with the new look of princessleia.com … also I’ll get to work on the new clockbot.net … which as I mentioned before will be the site for “Clockbot Computing” … our little consulting business. I think the biggest hurdle will be finding enough content for it. I’m going to write a form that people can fill out to email us to ask for quotes, a section linking each of our resume’s, a section completely describing what we offer… *shrugs* should be a fun project.

But right now I need more coffee and a shower *wanders off*

o/` Peter Murphy – Things To Remember o/`

Well the great news is I heard a on thursday that atomfilms is releasing one of the cracking contraptions shorts for viewing per week! The Autochef this week… I updated wallaceandgromit.net to reflect it:

WallaceAndGromit.net News

Having a fan site is so much fun %)

Oh and this evening I am going over to a friend’s house and she’s going to start teaching me to knit, woo! I am going to try to make a One Skein Knitted Scarf… hopefully I’ll catch on quickly, I havent learned anything new like this one-on-one from someone in a long time. Should be fun anway, I’m looking forward to it.

Yesterday was pretty much a waste. I cleaned the apartment, spent about an hour cleaning out that “new” case of mine… it had all sorts of label stickers on it for different things, and getting the sticky stuff off was a nighmare! (Yeah, I’ve tried all the usual things…). It looks fine now, even if it’s still a little sticky in some places. Then I… well I don’t know what I did, what did I do all day? I really didn’t chat much, never even got around for going for a walk! Anyway, at least the apartment was cleaned %)

My father called around 3, just as I was going to go out to take a quick walk before Myk got home (he usually gets out of work at 3:30). Ugh. I hadn’t talked to my father in a few months, ’cause I dont call him.. hell, I dont call any of my family unless it’s a birthday or something… emails suffice. So after he got over his whole “you never call thing” he started back into the “when are you visiting” thing. This is mostly why talking to my father puts me in such a foul mood. He wants to press what HE wants to talk about and doesnt even listen to me. I had never gotten around to telling him about the irregular cells that they found, so I told him, and TOLD HIM that I wouldn’t be able to travel in early May because of it. And 10 minutes later in the conversation he asks if i can come up before memorial day! HAH! Not only that, he didn’t seem concerned at all, the only thing he asked is “are you covered under insurance?” … come on! Again and again he was pressing the issue of me coming to visit, each time I tried to change the subject he wouldnt listen to me and would just come back to me visiting. I tell him I have medical issues that need to be resolved, that we are moving in the near future, that we just bought a new car, AND STILL he asks if we have money to visit! Then when he finally understands that we don’t he suggests that I borrow some money!!! Borrow money from a bank for a vacation!? He is obviously living in a fantasy world now, and it makes me so angry. I realize that he’s in alcohol rehab, and part of that is the whole “repairing of old wounds” but he’s putting on this act, trying to be like his father… he wants to meet with my sisters and I to give us some lecture on the future and our place in it. Thanks dad, trying to be the father now that you never were when I needed it. I don’t blame my father for how I turned out, or any of my ‘issues’ … most people have had much worse life than me, I’m not going to complain about my place in the world… but I despise that he feels he can still talk down to us, he can still treat us like we are 13.

I’m sure I’ve mentioned many of those things here before %) But it just bothers me, and makes me upset.

I printed off my first “bill” for the seawinds realty people yesterday. We decided on the name “Clockbot Computing” for our little ‘business’ .. and probably this week sometime I am going to start working on a design for clockbot.net for clockbot computing, woo! I love making webpages (% Hehe… So yeah, I am not sure what to have on it yet… clients (ok there has been only one), resumes… ummm, yeah that’s about where my ideas end %) But I’m going to try to use sorta the same clock motif as i did on the old clockbot.net (no longer around, it just points to be
vilacqua.us now).

Anyway, I have spent more time on this than I wanted to, so now I go start my day. *wanders off*

o/` Everything Is Wrong – Moby o/`

It’s amusing that after nearly a year and a half (december 2002 – april 2003) of looking to buy a new monitor, *3* fall into our possession within 24 hours. We bought this beautiful 19″ Dell the other day from the guy from the plug list. Then yesterday, Myk comes into work and sees three 17″ monitors sitting in the general “i’m giving this stuff away” pile at work. He inquired about them, then grabbed two of them, woo! They are Dell M781p Color Monitors, and each weight about 33 pounds, so they’ll be great for lan parties! Of course now we have 5 monitors %) Funny how things always turn out like this.

Myk also was able to bring home a case that the same guy was giving away. It has a motherboard for a pentium 3 in it… has a nice onboard NVidia TNT card… but upon inspection it looks like it’s toasted %( That’s ok, it’s a nice board but I have a perfectly fine one I can put in there. The case is also missing the top, and some of the panels that go in the front when there arent drives there. But it’s a case none the less, and I needed a case! See, I want to put my old motherboard (450mhz p3) in there. I have a power supply, harddrive (little 3 gig), ram (tons of ram, too much ram…), an old graphics card (8 mb pci card, but i am not going to be running x on this box, so it doesnt matter)… no sound card, but it wont need one. All I need now is a floppy drive and a cd-rom.. funny that we don’t have any laying around. *shrugs* I am sure we can find some without going to too much trouble… I dont need it right now anyway. This computer will pretty much be a test box, I’ll be able to play with stuff on it, do things I don’t feel like doing on my computer (ripping oggs for example, takes up a lot of resources, and that’s annoying when I am doing work. And I can install debian on it and do tests without worrying about screwing things up on my main system %)

I figured out how to get gpm and the normal x mouse to play nicely %) I never really worried about this problem, I don’t often use a mouse in a virtual terminal, so if I needed it i’d just /etc/init.d/gpm start … then turn it off before going back to x. See, what happens if you don’t, is while you are in x, both gpm and the x mouse server fight over control of the mouse’s movements, so the mouse jumps around a lot and clicks things it shouldnt, obviously very annoying. Anyway, I realized yesterday (after Myk had dones things to try out new resolutions on my new monitor) again how annoying it was, and decided to go ahead and see if there was a way to get them to play nicely together, so I don’t need to worry about problems if I forget to turn it off. To my surprise it was only a simple google search away.

First open the /etc/gpm.conf, inside it should have a few settings, comment out the ones that would conflict with the following:

device=/dev/psaux
repeat_type=raw
type=ps2

(In my case type=autops2 was there, and I had to keep it as this instead of changing it to type=ps2.. otherwise my console mouse went crazy)

then in XF86Config (or XF86Config-4) I had to change the “Configured Mouse” from /dev/psaux to /dev/gpmdata

Then restart x and gpm. So easy! It’s funny when little problems like this go on for so long and it’s so easy to fix.

I emailed our friend who said she’d teach me to knit. I feel really bad about taking over 2 weeks to get back to her, ugh, I suck. But hopefully we can arrange to get together this weekend to work on things %) Next weekend we’re going to a lan party, and the weekend after that I’ll be in no condition to leave the apartment (that’s the weekend following the procedure to remove the irregular cells). And I’d really like to know a bit of knitting before I go in for that procedure. We’ll see %)

Now I’m going to go get some work done and take a walk later *wanders off*

o/` I’m Deranged – David Bowie (Lost Highway Soundtrack) o/`

Subject: [PLUG] monitor for sale
To: plug@lists.phillylinux.org

I have a Sony 420GS monitor for sale. It’s a 19″ trinitron in
very good condition, that sits on a server rack, off most of the
time. It has a tilt and swivel base, power saving auto-sleep,
and a front video jack for easy connection to a laptop.

I’m selling because a 15″ monitor is fine for the server rack;
the 19″ will be better on somebody’s desk.

Pickup is in Center City, at buyer’s convenience, and I am asking
$75, or best offer.

—

This was posted to the plug list yesterday afternoon. Didn’t take Myk long to email the guy and say we were interested. We’ve been thinking about getting me a new monitor for a long time, since I was using Myk’s old Compaq 13″ (before that I had an even older 13″ hewlett packard one). But we just never found a good deal one one, until now. This monitor is almost identical to Myk’s… Both Sony Trinitron 19″. So he emailed us back and said we could come pick it up whenever we felt like it, yay! Ended up driving into the city last night, to get there around 9 to pick it up I was so excited! Drive home took about an hour (center city is far from where we live, that’s why we havent made it to PLUG meetings recently). I was really tired when we got home, but I stayed up so we could set up the monitor. I was a bit disppointed that I would have to reboot to set it up (almost 3 weeks uptime, I don’t get that often because of booting into windows, going to lan parties…), but then Myk says “naw, you can just plug it in.” So, *while x was running* we unplugged the old one and plugged the new one in. It worked, TAKE THAT WINDOWS!!! Of course it took a bit of configuring to get it to display a kickass resolution… Hehe, but yeah, things are working great, I am so happy! The internet is a much differernt place at 1800×1440 *giggles* And of course I had to redo my background and make everything pretty with my new setup… and take a screenshot! So, cluttered and unreasonably busy is the screenshot: Desktop Cluttered To Show Off

Yeah, so that rocks, I love my new monitor! I’ve never had one that’s this big before %)

I dicovered `dict` recently. It’s a command line dictionary program, you just type `dict word` and it’ll look up the word you want by querying a (or several) dictd servers… you can set up which servers you want it to use in /etc/dict.conf (by default it uses dict.org … which is fine as long as you have nice net access). Anyway, it’s really really great. Previously I was going online all the time to website dictionary site for definitions or, more often, spelling.. since most give suggestions for spelling, just like dict does! Of course now my .bash_history will show all the words I can’t spell ;) hehe.

I got my books from barnes and noble yesterday, woo! It’s funny how inconsitant their packaging is, and delivery. This time it was USPS Delivery, which is pretty normal, but a confirm was requested (but not needed apparently, the box saif “carrier leave if no response” … well, the asshat that my mailman is didnt even knock, he just circled the “no response” thing and left it on my doorstep. How do I know he didn’t knock? During the 2 hour time period that it could have been dropped off, I was at my desk, with is about 6 feet from the front door. The mailman won’t pick up mail either, what is with all these people who don’t feel like doing their jobs lately? *sigh*

I took a 2 mile walk yesterday, it was nice… the weather was beautiful, about 68 degrees and sunny. While on my walk I got to thinking about logging all my exercising activity. I don’t have a scale in the apartment to check my weight often, but that’s ok, since the point of starting to get more exercise is not to lose more weight (i am not sure that’s possible), but to get into shape. So then I thought, maybe I should keep track of what I eat too, yeah, and put it in a database and put
it on my website and…!!! Then I realized I was going too far %D Yeah, if I go as far as logging all my exercise and food habits, AND putting them in a database to display on my webpage, then I have far too much free time. I will keep it simple, exercise logged in a database.

We went out to the mall yesterday right after Myk got home from work. He needed some new nice pants to wear for interviews, or while having meetings/appointments with higher level people in the company. And I was dressed in some big shorts (they used to be Myk’s), a Star Wars T-Shirt, and my sneakers with the Rainbow Brite shoelaces… ’cause we didn’t really plan to go to the mall when we left home, we were just going to drop some old clothes off at the Salvation Army. We must have looked very silly together. Me looking like a ragamuffin, and Myk still dressed in his nice work clothes. So we’re walking through Strawbridge’s and I started feeling really bad about how I looked… thinking about how I shouldnt even “run out” anywhere without looking nice. Then I stopped myself. Why did I feel this way? Is it some need to continue to impress Myk, to show him I’m growing out of looking like a ‘kid’? Why should I grow out of that before I’m comfortable to? Well I shouldn’t! He is dating a 21 year old *geek* … my lack of care when it comes to clothes is part of the bargin, and my nickname has always been PrincessLeia2, he’s HAD to expect the star wars shirts. So if/when I do decide I want to wear more “adult” clothes for all outings (i am not so silly as to go to a nice dinner in a t-shirt), it will be fully my decision.

I got some spam in the real mail yesterday, it was for a cleaning company, and their “line” was “Life’s too short to clean your own house” … now I understand what they are getting at, I completely understand the point of saying that, but wouldnt that offend people? It surely offended me. I guess I sorta read it as “life’s too short to clean YOUR OWN house” … *shrugs* I think anyone with an attitude like that would already have someone cleaning their house for them %)

I have been thinking for some time now… just kept forgetting to write about it… I would probably be an alcoholic if I was single. Maybe it’s just the past two months of relative dryness (over 2 months since I’ve had enough to drink to get drunk) that’s causing these cravings. But I just want to DRINK! I watch Fraiser, and if you notice, on that show they drink all the time… I keep wanting to be like that. It’s interesting to watch this happen to myself. It’s like all the things everyone said about my father’s alcoholism, and all the addictions that run in my family, and how it might be passed on to me are true. Luckily I notice this, and although it might be a lifelong battle (oh I hope not), I won’t slip into the trap of alcoholism! It’s especially amusing because I’m not depressed, I’m not having trouble, I’m not anxious… things have been going great, I just like to drink… I guess I have to be glad I have Myk to keep me in check.

I have anxiety issues. Not just shyness, but serious issues with anxiety, and I honestly think I should look into seeing a doctor about it. It’s funny, I don’t notice it when I am at home, or just spending time with Myk, online with friends, but as soon as I get into a social situation where I feel the need to impress, or into a work situation where I feel I need to do something that might be above my ability I tend to freak out. I have to constantly rationalize everything so that I don’t blow all my troubles out of proportion… and it’s scary. Sleepless nights because of worrying, being overly nervous, those things arent cool at all, and I am sure they chop years off of my life expectancy, since it’s so physically taxing to feel this way. It sucks, I wish I could just be a normal functioning person in society instead of being so fucked up all the time.

On that note I am going to take a walk, it’s only about 50 (F) degrees out, but that’s fine %) *wanders off to take a walk*

o/` Blind Melon – No Rain o/`

-$n00b- ok it’s saved, now what?
-pleia2- now, just type: update-menus
-$n00b- hmmm
-pleia2- did it do anything?
-$n00b- it didnt work
-$n00b- i will try rebooting, brb
-pleia2- gaah
-!- $n00b has quit [Quit: rebooting]
-pleia2- don’t reboot!
-pleia2- dammit!

It’s funny when people come from using windows and to learning linux. Rebooting at the sign of a problem is one of those habits that is just so hard to break %) I tend to get frustrated when people do this… but then I remember that I was the same way. And of course that’s bad, not only do you destroy a big draw to linux (no needing to reboot often), but you don’t learn how to reset and fix things properly if you reboot at every problem, and it’s obviously not a good habit to get into. And neither is reinstalling all the time. I hear windows these days requires a reinstall every few months or so (ok, if you were an exceptional windows admin, or a casual user, this may not apply). Linux isn’t like that. I had a windows admin friend of mine who tried linux reinstall redhat something like 8 times in a week because “things werent working” .. he seriously said at one point “I got the whole install process down to 9 minutes!” err…

I got an email from the wife of one of my ex-boyfriends today. We’re on friendly speaking terms (the only ex out of three I am on speaking terms with), I sent them an ecard, so in reply to the ecard they had a quick thanks… and a computer question. Seems she opened a spam email, and now her homepage is set to a pr0n site. She’s changed it back, but when she reboots it’s back. A quick google search found some solutions, but the most probable requires editing the registry, and not only am I unsure what version of windows she is using, but I have no idea how familiar she is with the registry (has she ever even seen it?), so I gave her a few tips, like making sure she has all the windows updates (it’s amazing how many people don’t do these), get some anti-virus software, and a few other things… hopefully one of them will work, if not she can probably come into IRC and I can guide her through editing the registry. Oh and of course I told her to start using Mozilla instead of exploited evil IE. Bleh @ supporting windows!

So this all made me think… people say so many things about how difficult linux is to use, and sure, it takes some time… but if everyone grew up using a linux box I’m sure they’d go into windows and go crazy at how unstable and silly it all is. Rebooting for every update? Rebooting just because things get weird? Rebooting to install a mouse! Half the time my USB doesnt work until after a reboot, if I unplug my camera from it and plug it back it it wont see it, arg! Windows is so bad %) Yeah, so I am sick of windows problems, I am so intolerant of it these days.

We were at the grocery store last night just picking up like a dozen things we needed, and we go to check out, and first there is this guy in front of us trying to pay for two things with a credit card that isnt working. Now the store is busy, so we decide not to get into another line, so we wait and wait, til finally the guy pulls out some cash that he’s had all along, and gets on his way. By this time Myk and I are fairly crankie (hate people, hate waiting in line) and I go to bag the grocerys, and there is a woman there to do it for me, great! She then proceeds to put those little “Paid” stickers on a couple items… two six-packs of mt. dew bottles, and while they do have handles, the handles suck when you want to carry in 6 bags of groceries, so I asked her to put them in bags, simple request right? This woman get’s all bitchy with me “You want them in BAGS?” she says … “uh, yes. Please.” she pulls out a pile of bags from under the counter and starts throwing stuff in the bags. Seriously, you should have seen it… before I could say anything the cashier holds up a coupon we gave her and says “you didn’t buy this” … I point to the 2-liter of soda and say “yes, it’s right there” … she stares at the co
upon for another few seconds then says “oh, it says you need to buy two” … I had used a coupon like this before, but maybe I was somehow mistaken, so I’m flustered because of the crazy bagwoman and I said “ok, forget it” and take the coupon from her “do you want to get another?” … “no, just forget it.” We finally leave the grocery store, drive home, and after unpacking the groceries (my tomato was on the bottom of a bag, my cookies half crushed, grrr) I pull the coupon out of my pocked and read it “55 cents off one 2-liter of Dr. Pepper” RAR!!! I hate grocery shopping. I hate stupid women who cant read coupons and get pissed when I ask them to do their job. Makes me crazy.

So I was messing around with converting mp3s to oggs this morning, wrote a little shell script to convert them one at a time:

#!/bin/bash
mpg123 -b 10000 -s “$1” | sox -t raw -r 44100 -s -w -c2 – “$2”
oggenc “$2”

./mp3toogg filename.mp3 filename.wav to run it, where filename.mp3 exists, and filename.wav is to be created (oggenc calls the new file filename.ogg automatically unless you tell it otherwise). Of course this does the files one at a time, which would be silly, since I have over 1500 mp3s. Plus, sox takes quite a bit of processor power… and I’ll be doing the conversion on a 300 mhz box. So if it’s slow on 2.0 ghz, I shudder to think how long it’ll take on poor minute (the media server). Yeah, so does anyone know any better command line (no x on this box) way to convert from mp3 to wav to ogg?

And no, I don’t need a lecture about losing quailty when I convert them. I realize what I am doing, and I realize the sacrifice… I will be careful not to convert if they will sound bad after I will listen to them before deleting the mp3, and I’ll just rerip the music I have from CDs to ogg, it’ll probably take just as long as actually converting anyway.

Anyway, I am going to go take a walk now, try to find some things to work on. I’ve been going in circles lately, no direction, I need more projects! Everyone I talk to has a “to-do list” … and being unemployed I’ve finished mine, any bright ideas? *wanders off*

o/` Fisher – Missing o/`

Well I got the book reviews typed up AND the books section of my website updated finally! It only took a few months ;) Hehe… anyway I will post the new reviews here now (if anyone cares to read them…)

Children Of Dune, by Frank Herbert, 408 pages
Like the Dune books before it, this does not disappoint. It takes place nine years after ‘Messiah’ ends, and tells of what has become of Muad’dib’s children. New characters are introduced into the story, while old are explored further, as with the previous books, the character development is excellent, and the story amazing. Whole new levels of the consciousness when exposed to the spice of Arrakis are explored, and chapter after chapter Herbert dives into the intense mind games that Muad’dib’s son confronts… this makes for a complex, yet enthrallingly interesting story. Very good.

Speaker For The Dead, by Orson Scott Card, 382 pages
This, the second book in the Ender’s Game series, takes place 3000 years after the first, where the miracle of fast space travel has allowed Ender to survive. The planet of Lusitania is now shared by humans and a race of intelligent beings known as “piggies.” Research is done on these piggies, and as the story progresses, a very interesting portrate of what they are and intend emerges. Ender comes into the story as he is called to “speak” for a departed member of Lusitania, and his life takes a turn that may prove to bind him to the people of Lusitania and the piggies. Very good story, as always, Card manages to masterfully develop all his characters, and the story itself contains something of interest to science fiction and fantasy fans of all sorts.

Guns Of The South, by Harry Turtledove, 556 pages
This book is about a group of radicals from the distant future coming to the civil war time and helping the south win the war by supplying them with AK-47’s. The physics of how the time travel works are never explained, but even with my lack of civil war knowledge I found myself captivated by this book. It really sheds light on how things were at that time in history, how brutal things were, and how amazing that it’s merely two lifetimes since that time. I do have an interest in history, which may have compelled me to read this book, but I do believe almost anyone would enjoy it. Well-written, and while some of the historical things may not be perfect (the author admits this), the general idea of the whole book is intact. I’ll be reading more of Turtledove’s alternative history.

Moving Pictures, by Terry Pratchett, 337 pages
This book is another in the Discworld series, it tells of a strange, magical, occurance that allows ideas of another place and time to drive into Discworld. What kind of ideas? In this case, the “idea” of “Holly Wood” (or Holy Wood, as it is known as on the Disc). Armed with cameras (a box with artist goblins drawing really fast inside), a dream, or just a hunch, people flock to Holy Wood to become famous. A milkmaid and an “almost wizard” are unlikely stars in this parody of Holly Wood. The directors are artful, the producers are scam artists, and the actors are just trying to find their way, and they all are literally star-eyed (“what’s wrong with your eyes?”). As if that wasn’t enough, there are talking animals. I enjoyed this book, finished it rather quickly, and I can’t say that I was every bored, another great one by Pratchett!

The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien, 287 pages
This book is a fantasy classic. Set in the world of Middle Earth, it tells of the adventure of Bilbo Baggins, the hobbit. In this magical world, wizards, dwarves, elves, and goblins co-exist (if not always peacefully), and Bilbo is swept up into an adventuer to reclaim gold from a murderous dragon. Along the way, he discovers a magical ring, which becomes much more important in stories to come (Lord of the Rings Trilogy). I love this book, and I’ve had exposure to it since before I can remember. As a young child I listened to the audio tell
ing of the story on my father’s records, and when I was old enough, I picked up the book and read it myself. The story has never failed to enchant me. Maybe part of it is that you never merely read this book, but are “told a story”, Tolkien’s narrative speaks directly to the reader in a way that makes you truly believe the story, as fantastic as it is. If you haven’t read this book you MUST put it at the top of your “to read” list, it’s not one to miss.

I did end up starting to read Fellowship of the Ring yesterday. As I was reading it I was trying to compare it to the movie, thinking… did the movie really do justice to this book? And I think I decided that, for the parts the movie covered and didn’t make up, I really was pleased with the portrayl of the characters and events. The scene where Gandalf makes Bilbo leave the ring with Frodo was done really good in the movie I thought… I am saddened by people who never get a chance to read the books tho. I have really taken for granted that I have been exposed to Tolkien since I was very young (my father was a huge fan), I could tell the story of Bilbo Baggins from memory, and it’s sad that people who decide just to watch these new movies never get a feel for who Bilbo *is* … the movies are all about Frodo, Bilbo is forgotton as an “old guy” character in the movie, wise, undoubtable cool, but you know almost nothing about him. You don’t see that he wasn’t always an adventurous hobbit, you don’t see him as an “unlikely hero”, you dont see him as that hobbit that was concerned about leaving his burrow without his handkerchief! Everyone should read these books… I love them so much *carefully huggles her old Tolkien books* (these books used to belong to my grandfather, paperpacks from the early 70s… falling apart, hehe.

I am doing lots of laundry today. Not because we have dirtied a lot, but because we emptied out the closet this weekend, trying on clothes, seeing what we could get rid of, checking out what we don’t wear often. See, I hate clothes… no, I don’t want to go around naked %P but I hate shopping for clothes, I hate organizing clothes, I hate washing clothes, I hate having piles and piles of clothes! And try as I might, each time I move I get rid of more clothes, but I kept moving in with family, and my family is notorious for sharing and ‘passing on’ old clothes (this is why I hardly ever got new clothes growing up, they all came from my cousins), so I move in with an aunt or an uncle, and it’s time for them to clean out their closets and give clothes to me. I try to turn down their offer for clothes, but they always find some portion of my wardrobe that needs replenishing “you need more shorts and sweaters!” “but I dont wear shorts and sweaters!” “well you might want to sometime so…” Ugh %) So not to be rude, I always accept a small pile of clothes. Anyway, clothes. We realized that we have piles of clothes that we want to keep, but have been sitting on the shelf so long that they are dusty, and dust stinks! So I’m doing about five loads of laundry today to get all of our clothes clean… fun stuff… I keep sneezing because of all the dust!

Another thing we did while going through clothes, was discover that we do need some more. Mostly just stuff like underclothes, the kind of things you need to buy every couple of years. I think I need a couple more non-flannel, non-sweater long-sleeve shirts (since I only have one, and I tend to wear it often). We’ll probably go out sometime this week and go clothes shopping, ugh %( Did I mention I hate shopping for clothes? It’s worse than shopping for shoes! Anyway, I am going to be smart this time and buy some nice socks, last time I got socks I was living with my aunt, and we bought a huge back of cheap socks at Wal-Mart, which, not surprisingly, made my skin break out if I wore them too long or too often. I kept these socks, just for “running out to the store if i have no
thing else” but finally threw them out last night (the shirts and pants and stuff go to the salvation army).

Yay I talked about socks.

My mother called last night. Actually, my little sister (Annette, 14) called and told me she was getting married to a 14 year old skater guy. Just trying to get me going I guess, didn’t work, I just laughed at her. In all it was a pretty uneventful phone call, my mom just had time to say “Happy Easter” and tell me that Heather (the other sister, 19) came up for easter and they all had a nice time. Ah easter at the egg farm, boy I guess I just don’t know what I am missing *grins*

Anyway, I am going to go do summore laundry, and make sure the closet is all clean so I don’t put clean clothes back onto dusty shelves %) *wanders off*

o/` Will Ackerman – Sound Of Wind Driven Rain o/`

My entries have been so boring lately. Anyway, yesterday was relaxing, finished The Hobbit … I really am determined to get those reviews typed up tomorrow, and update my reviews page on my website. In the evening we rented Pulp Fiction and ordered some pizza (white pizza with spinach again, mmm) and buffalo wings. Pulp Fiction was really good, I had never seen it before… lots of crazy things tackled in that movie… and while Bruce Willis still annoyed me, I found myself not as replused as I usually am to John Travolta. I was more impressed with the movie than I thought I’d be, Quentin Tarantino rocks.

After the movie Myk and I played some ut. He has the ut server back up on ut.clockbot.net … just regular old ut. I really missed that game! I think I have finally decided that I don’t like ut2003. I mean sure, it’s a good game… but I miss my sniper rifle! And I guess it’s just ut + prettier … and I don’t need the game to be that much prettier, especially if to make it prettier you sacrifice preformance… I’ll enjoy it in 2 years when the hardware catches up with the game %) Anyway, yeah, ut… I love ut.

Went to bed around 1… I was tired. Today we arent doing anything. I’m trying to decide if I want to leap right into re-reading The Fellowship of the Ring or if I should read another book first (maybe Xenocide) *shrugs* Wow my life is boring %D

I am going to go do my daily rounds of checking mailing lists and sending emails where they need to go… so I hope everyone has a nice Easter with family, friends, pets, your computer or whoever you are spending it with %) Take care! *wanders off*

o/` Peter Murphy – The Line Between the Devil’s Teeth o/`

Last night was really nice. Myk’s mother came over with her boyfriend, and we all headed out for the Indian food place down the street, yummie. Dinner was great, Myk’s mother brought a couple of bottles of really tastey red wine, and everyone enjoyed their meal (she and her boyfriend had never tried that sort of indian food). The service was great, as usual, and we really had a nice time. After, we came back and sat around drinking coffee and talking til about 9:30. After they left we cleaned up, watched some tv and went to bed… I wasn’t feeling so great, still am not, i wonder if it was something I ate, I hope I’m not getting sick or something.

Myk’s mother also brought us some home made chocolate cake, mmm, I love chocolate cake.

Probably will just stay in this weekend, no real plans with anyone for easter *shrugs* most friends are out of town or busy because of the holiday. That’s ok, I am completely happy just staying home and snuggling with a comforter and good book. Speaking of which, I am rereading the lord of the rings books, starting with The Hobbit … I actually started rereading “the trilogy” a couple years ago to anticipate the movies, but I sorta lost interest because I didnt have the time then, but I do now %)

I really dont feel like being at the computer anymore right now, I think I am going to go finish up a couple things and go lie down. *wanders off*

o/` Mediaeval Baebes – I Am Eve o/`

-@Time- survival is relative to your blackmarket worth.
^^ from this morning in irc, it makes me laugh

I chatted with my 14 year old sister Annette yesterday afternoon. I noticed that her “buddy icon” on aol instant messanger was of Eminem, *sigh* I also realized that I have no exposure or knowledge of wigger slang, I’m not sure this is a good thing or a bad, but I couldnt understand what she was talking about sometimes (bad grammar and spelling aside). She had to explain most of the phrases and words she used, it was a very confusing conversation %)

I spoke to my mother recently, and I don’t remember exactly what the conversation was about, but I said something like “Bah, at 10 years old I wasn’t really world-aware” to which she responded “sure you were, you were taking care of Annette.” *Sigh* I was trying to forget such robbing of my childhood, MOTHER! Funny that she’d make a point to remind me of that tho, but it got me thinking… maybe having to take care of my youngest sister so much is what caused me to have this forever attachment to “cute things” and toys, like I was forced to grow up fast, so I’m making up for it now. Heh, I dont think I’ll ever fully grow out of this *takes the stuffed animal camel off her monitor and snuggles it*

Anyway, I was talking to a friend recently, and he asked about the position of some country in Europe, and I instantly pulled up a map. That made me regret not knowing it off the top of my head, and I mentioned that, and how I was sick of being one of those “dumb americans.” … “You care too much what other people think” … what does that have to do with learning geography? I thought about this, and wanting to learn, wanting to know everything %) has nothing to do with what other people think. I just hate feeling stupid, and if I don’t know much about a subject, then I feel stupid…

This week was pretty awful for sleeping. See, the biggest problem with Myk and me is that we both are light sleepers and insomniacs. Myk takes medicine to fall asleep, I just try to be tired as I can before I go to bed.. but we both still move when we sleep, so we wake each other up. Bleh, it sucks, so sometimes we get weeks like this one, where we lose so much sleep from this. It’s frustrating, and there are few solutions. I like sleep so much, why must it elude me so!

So redhat sucks. I had a really bad day yesterday (lack of sleep was a big factor), and I am trying to help a friend of mine with his newly installed redhat 9… and I just can’t seem to get anything right. I am sure I looked really stupid. I guess my trouble was pretty much my lack of redhat knowledge, and I shouldn’t be ashamed of that, why would I need to know about redhat 9? The only redhat I ever used was 7.2… So here I am, on a debian box, trying to think like a newbie, and KNOWING that redhat had happy-clicky programs for everything I want to do, just know knowing what they are, it was very frustrating… I mean I know how to change window managers with .xsession and .xinitrc, but i dont know where to begin to look for the redhat happy clicky way %) So anyway, we wanted to try a new window manager, since his computer is waaaay too slow to run gnome reasonably (233 mhz, 64mb ram, eek!). I had thought fluxbox would run ok, and be pretty (instead of wtm, ugh)… so blueminder found an rpm for it, and we helped him go about installing. We got problems with dependencies, ugh. I wasnt really in the mood to deal with that mess %D So when he mentioned that he found an easy desktop switching utility I suggested he try another window manager that he already had installed (KDE or twm), decided to try out KDE ….. 10 minute later “I’m in windows, i got errors when i tried to go to KDE” ugh! I so I ask myself “how do we change window manager back? But I had no experience with the graphical login, or how it worked so when Tarist wandered back in (he’s used
rh9) I inquired as to an easy solution to this problem of switching back to a working wm. Of course I felt stupid, and felt bad… but i also had to go because it was getting late, so I left Tarist with him. Bleh, anyway, as soon as I came out of my crappy mood slump I had thought of a bunch of ways to switch it back, I just wasnt in the mood for it earlier, heh. Anyway, times like that make me feel dumb %D … oh and Tarist introduced me to Redhats apt rpm system, it sucks… ok, I am sure it works great, but it hardly has anything in it! %)

Bleh, I’m tired, and I have wasted most of today… I must get more than I think done early in the morning, ’cause the couple hours of cleaning on friday mornings always seem to ruin my ability to be productive for the rest of the day… *looks at the time* arg. Tonight Myk’s mother is taking us out to the Indian food place down the street, woo! It’s sorta an early easter dinner, since she’s spending Easter with Myk’s brother. It should be nice %) *is so excited* I love that place, I love indian food! … but right now I need to stop messing around here, and maybe poke around the FreeBSD shell account that a friend of mine gave me on his box, just so I could get a taste of BSD ;) (I expressed interest a couple weeks ago *shrugs*). *wanders off to work on some things*

o/` U2 – Where The Streets Have No Name o/`

Yesterday I ended up doing a bit of work on the journal section of princessleia.com, I’m up to November now, woo! I think I will spend some time today doing that, ah repeditive mindless work… It’ll be worth it in the end tho. I took a walk too, and it was SOOO hot out, I guess it got up to about 83 yesterday, of course you wouldnt believe that now, looking outside at the gloomy cool weather ;) yay for strange spring weather.

Not yay for my allergies tho, I am actually doing ok today, but yesterday evening was awful, I was hot, and ended up being a bit crankie because of my stupid allergies (I didn’t take benadryl yesterday during the day, since it makes me so insanely sleepy!). Went to bed around 11.

Today has been fairly boring, wrote up some instructions on how to use the irssi script mail.pl .. it doesnt describe itself very much, so I had to go through a bunch of trial and error to get it running in the first place (and a few irssi restarts, doh!), so I figured before I give it to Time to use I should write some instructions so he doesnt have to waste the same amount of time I did. It sets up a bitchx like mailchecking system, only it’s much cooler, you can add a bunch of mail folders, and customize it a ton, and it checks all mailboxes at a regular interval (default is every 60 seconds, but you can edit that), anyway, it’s a great script, and I almost don’t know how I lived without it %D

Man I’m tired… I woke up early this morning and wasnt able to fall back asleep *sigh* S’ok, as long as I stay awake til 10 pm, I shouldnt have any trouble sleeping tonight, in the meantime… *zombie*