Pauls Rants and Revelations

I recently read a press release about a company I thought was quite good. “Thought” being the operative word.

In it, they said they wanted to”spread their services to all corners of the globe”.

Now normally since we hear this term often we think nothing of it. But if you think about it with the same amount of brain power it takes to estimate a waiters tip, you’ll see that it is a misnomer and a fairly un-intelligent thing to say.

A globe, in fact, has no corners. It has no sides either. It’s a globe. A spherical shape that technically has no beginning or end. So why do we keep saying it?

A better way to say it is “all parts of the globe” or, to be melodramatic,  “to the far reaches of the world”. At least that way one would be factually correct.

Just a  random thought to get your brain juices working.

-Cheers

I am seeing more and more on the streets people carrying around skateboards. At first I thought “Cool. The more skaters the better.”

But upon closer inspection I found that they weren’t actually doing anything other than walking around with them. This got me a bit confused so I watched a group of them while at the local Starbucks (which should have been my first clue). The entire time they sat there with their boards close at hand. They didn’t ride them or do any tricks, just sat there. Then when they got up to leave, they didn’t ride away as I was expecting. They walked.

No mind, there was no posted “Skateboarding Prohibited” signs in evidence. So I can only surmise that they were not actually skateboarders. They were pretending to be just because it make them look cool. This was also confirmed by their choice of clothing. Very high-dollar threads that no one in their right mind would want to get ruined by failing at a trick.

My question about this is when did it become a fashion accessorie to carry around a skateboard? It is almost useless to them just carrying it around so why do it? For the chicks? No, as they were a group of guys and the girls were wrapped up in their own stuff. So if not to get chicks, then why?

Its sad, in my opinion, that a noble sport (yes, it is noble) such as skateboarding has fallen from something that was once considered “punk” to now be considered “hip”.

I mean you don’t see people walking around with snowboards or fencing blades, do you?

As one who use to skate religiously, I can only hope that this is a phase in fashion. If not, then I can only assume that this ridiculous trend will continue and those who participate in it will fall by the wayside when they finally realize that looking the part is not enough.

-Cheers

I went to Starbucks for my weekly dose of superficial culture and I saw something that I was not really expecting. It was a shirt.

Now, I know most people wear shirts when they go out, but this one said “Im not with stupid anymore”. At this I thought, “That is cool. Good for you.”

I went up to the woman to tell her that I was glad she wasn’t with who ever “stupid” was, when I overheard her talking to her friend. It was a brief bit of conversation that I gleamed but it was enough to confirm that this “stupid” person had definitely left some of their idiocy behind for this girls use (yes, she went from woman to girl in a blink of her vapid brown eyes).

It was quite sad, really. I guess she didn’t rid herself of ’stupid’ fast enough. Which just goes to prove, that if you are with stupid (often evidenced by a cheesy t-shirt saying as much), you should immediately remove yourself from their presence and go to the library. Studies have proven that Stupid-itis is easily cured with large doses of knowledge taken often.

In fact, you should probably just go to the library now. A good defense is a good offense and all that.

-Cheers

The more I use this machine, the more I wonder what took me so long to start using one.

I installed XP on a Parallels share and it runs much better than it did on a native machine. It takes about 20 seconds to start up and I have not had a problem with it even after installing all the CS suite programs and other fun things (it even plays Peggle rather nicely).

Apart from the work standpoint, I also am amazed (and relieved) about all of the communications programs I use and that I won’t be having to kill off any accounts. Using Adium for IM and Skype for calling I am still connected to the world and for email, plain old Mail works just fine.

I am a bit lacking in games but really the only games I play are Half Life, TFC (soon to be TF2), and a few other mods for same and I can run those off of my XP share. So really I’m not giving up anything. Hell, I’m even thinking about adding a Linux share so I can start really playing with that too (Boss, please let me know what flavor you run as I forgot already).

The point of this rather long winded diatribe is not so much to tell you how cool my Mac is, but rather to let those folks wanting to switch but fearing loss of data or ability to know that there is really nothing to fear.

Leave a comment if you have any questions or suggestions.

-Cheers

Its quite sad. 10 years ago we seemed to be quite a decent country. But nowadays more and more news articles come out describing events and happenings that I would not have believed possible in this country.

Heres a quick list just from today:

• 1000 people issue a citizens arrest on Pres. Bush
• A high school girl has her wrist broken by a security guard for dropping cake
• Bush caught lying about 9/11 (with video)
• Chicago cops are investigated for 5000 incidents of abuse
• High school student suspended for wearing John Edwards tshirt.
• Religious group get $100k to improve science with creationism views

The headlines were enough to make me gag, but actually reading the articles made me rather revolted. I am not even sure, from reading the articles among other sources, what the hell is even going on in this country. All I can see is a lot of our countries allies are pissed and our enemies are laughing. Our citizens are angered and our politicians are deaf.

About the only good thing to come out of the news today s a rather good article from the Consumerist about how to properly write to congress and say your piece.

I think I’ll do just that now. Here is the Consumerist article if you are interested.

-Cheers

I just don’t understand racism. I mean, there are people I don’t like, even whole groups of folks; but it’s not because their genetic disposition for skin pigmentation (its mostly because their assholes, pure and simple).

I heard on the radio this morning that a white supremacy group is having a concert here in Portland in the next week or so. They wanted to raise money for something or other related to their misguided goals so they decided to have a concert in a city populated with a large grouping of gays, lesbians, blacks, Indians, and who knows how many other types of people.

They basically proved, before they even got stated, just how dumb they are. Perhaps if they had it in a venue that caters to their beliefs it would make more of a message for them, but their choice of location proves how blindly idiotic they really are.

But on the whole, I still am not understanding why people are racist. It’s not like there are great genetic differences between those of varied colors. As far as genes go, their skin is the only thing different so really are people who are racist also just as superficial? Probably. The facts certainly point to this conclusion.

The whole thing just gets under my skin (no pun intended) but I just can not think of an argument to convince these folks that color is not a bad thing. Maybe if I pointed out that Jesus was dark skinned it would open their eye (hey, he lived in the desert, so he at least had a heck of a tan on him) but they’ll probably just go on thrashing about to their crappy, loud music with 3 notes and no rhythm.

I almost feel sad for them. Almost.

-Cheers

We just got a 3 disc set from Target of the Duck Tales cartoon. It was just in a random place on the shelf and my wife and I were almost racing to grab it once we saw it.

From our youths, and the youths of most late-20 somethings, Duck Tales was quite an enjoyable show what with the antics Scrooge and the gang get into. That and Tailspin I think did more to keep me sane through elementary school than the child shrinks I sometimes made nervous.

Anyway, if you haven’t seen it in your local general purpose mega store, you can check it out on Amazon. Also while I was searching, I found DVDs for Tailspin, Chip n Dales Rescue Rangers, and Darkwing Duck. Now all I need is a couple hundred buck to buy them all and I’ll be reliving my childhood till doomsday.

Besides, watching these is infinitely better than watching most of the stuff on Cartoon Network or Disney nowadays. With the exception of Foster Home for Imaginary Friends, both those creative companies have gone to shit in the last few years. I mean, come on, who would watch a show called “My Gym Partners A Monkey”? Who would name a show that?

Do yourself a favor if you are fan of the great brand of animation we grew up with; go out, get the DVDs, and kill the cable. Don’t let you kids be exposed to such poor quality.

Oh, and you can get Fosters through iTunes. That one is good for anyone of any age to watch.

-Cheers

No, I’m not referring to the recent posts on data recovery I’ve written. This is more towards workload. It seems I have reached my limit as I have absolutely no more room in my brain to keep track of all the projects I have to do. Its a bit more stressful as my boss is out for a few days, but what the heck? Every trapeze flier likes going without a net now and again.

At least things are not behind (terribly) and I will pretty much have everything back on track by the time the boss gets back. I just felt like venting about it a bit.

And boss? If you are reading this everything is A OK!

-Cheers

As I am now firmly in my late 20’s, I thought it about time to re-examine my life and see where I am compared to where I want to be.

For better or worse, this took about 10 minutes (which is the amount of time it takes me to walk to the nearest all0night Starbucks; go figure).

Anyways, I thought about what I have in life and what I lack. I have, in no particular order, my (mostly) perfect kids, what most would consider a trophy wife, a job I love (usually), and a sense of internal satisfaction.

When I examined what I lack, I found that the only thing missing is winning the lottery. My wife said, strangely, that this will happen very soon as she has a “special feeling” about this ticket which is totally different than the other special feelings on the last 50 or so tickets.

So, from where I thought I would be, I can firmly say that I will never be an astronaut, my rock star dreams were really just dreams, and being a ninja in todays world is just plain not practical. I can also say, with equal firmness, that I am perfectly fine with that.

Can you say that same?

-Cheers

Is there any business nowadays that is interested in helping you out rather than making a buck?

We are needing a new tire for the car. We just need the one tire. Thats all. However, when I shopped around for a deal I was at the very least disappointed with the service I would be getting from the major tire chains.

For instance, Company A (whom I will not mention because their name makes we angry enough to turn into the Hulk) said that they could replace it for $84.95. I though “great” until they told me that that was the price per tire installed. I told them I just need one tire and they said they cant do that; that they would only replace all 4 tires. Bullshit, I told them. I’ll go somewhere else.

So I call Company B (same reason as the company above) and they say they can do it for $60 installed. They also said they only do all four tires. I asked to speak to the manager to ask the obvious question, “WTF?”, and he said that it was their company poilicy to only do all 4 tires.

Well, that company won’t be getting my business thats for sure.

So now I take it to the local Saturn dealership. They said that can do just the one tire (bonus) and I even has time for an oil change thats needed. The price though, will be $138 for the tire and mounting/balancing. With the oil change, that will be $165 total. A somewhat shocking price at the tire thats been sitting in a warehouse for ages and is for a 2 year old vehicle. But as the price is less than what I would be charged everywhere else, I have to accept it. But I don’t have to like it.

At the time of this writing I am sitting in the dealership waiting room waiting for the tire to be brought from the warehouse (at least they have free wifi). I expressed my gripes to the service tech who checked in the car but I can see that he has been doing this for a long time as he took the rather lofty position of “this is how it is, take it or leave is”. Well, I have to respect a man who knows his business.

To get back to the point of all of this ranting, I am wondering where in the world is a business that will give you just what you need and not charge you an arm and a leg for it? Tire companies will give you a deal only if you buy 4 tires; Software companies will sell you a “package” that contains crap you would never buy but have to install anyway to make the desired software function; you can get a 4 piece chicken nugget pack only if you buy a happy meal; its starting to wear on me truth be told.

I think that only place that I go to that gives me exactly what I want is the coffee shop. I tell them I want a half cup of espresso with caramel, raisins, milk, and 2 pepper mints ground in, and I get it. That is the only business that I can think of where I get what I want (or need) exactly.

Any other examples of this? Am I wrong (or right)?