So Far

I have managed to waste 5 hours...only 3 to go!!!

Another dream from a couple nights ago

I had another dream where I was married to Greg Sanders from CSI:Regular (to which my sister said in real life "That wouldn't be too bad!"). We were totally and completely in love and were really happy. For instance, we were always holding hands and if we were in the same room but not next to each other we'd just look at each other smiling. When I woke up I felt that that's the kind of relationship I hope I eventually have.

 

I wonder how many blog entries I will have today. So far it's proving to be a very bland day work-wise.

[opera voice] ooooooooo!

Recent research conducted by Yahoo! and Ipsos reveals that while 12% of surveyed Yahoo users know what RSS is, only 4% of surveyed Internet users use it (PDF) (and know they use it). Podcasting is also reviewed, with the conclusion that 2% of surveyed people use it. The increasing number of blogs should go with an increasing number of syndicated readers, as they are now an important part of the web.

 

I am one of 4% who use RSS! However, I do not use Podcasts because I currently think they are dumb.

The Ultimate Dream

Warning: Sci-fi talk to commence.

 

I had a dream in which, ok, I'm just going to say it, I went off-world with SG-1. We got into a scrape where, as always, we almost died. There was a large structure we were running around, and we were being chased by a giant holographic skull. The skull was going to eat us. Daniel decided that he would sacrifice himself to save the rest of us. So he got the attention of the skull and its human counterpart, who was a guy wearing a business suit. Daniel quickly put on a dressy outfit, and I asked him why he did that, and he said, "would you want to die looking terrible?" I said "I guess not." Then he ran off, with the skull after him, and the rest of us shot off in the other direction. We got into this elevator and as the doors were closing Daniel appeared, running at full speed.

 

Daniel: We have to go! The skull ate the Unas, but it's not going to be satisfied for long. [Note: The Unas was supposed to be the suit guy, but he was definitely not an Unas according to the show; those guys look like monsters and can only speak in grunts].

Sam: Why did it do that?

Daniel: It must have been upset with it. Unas leave a bad taste in the mouth, so there is some time before it comes after us, but we need to go fast.

 

Then we got in the elevator...and...he kissed me! And it was the most wonderful kiss that lasted forever, and he started speaking French (he is a linguist, you know, and speaks like 15 languages), which made his lips the perfect shape for kissing.

 

So that dream will be replaying in my mind for a while...ha! Tomorrow night: a dream about programming. It appears that living alone has descended me into almost total geekdom.

Feeling slightly better

I’m just trying to tell myself that I couldn’t have done anything differently today…just going to go on with my life.

I’ve done a little programming today and it has gone pretty well. I’ve decided that that’s going to be my main free-time activity until it gets done. I promised readers of my site that I’d try to get a review/setlist insert script done in January (which would automatically allow the user submissions to be added, and I’d just have to hit “ok” or “delete” instead of doing the entire thing myself), and besides, I’ve procrastinated long enough getting the crod to work. The site now is possibly the most inefficient code possible. But nothing else would work. What I’ve written so far in Python is approximately 600% less code than the same functionality in PHP.

I bought some paint stripper to use on this chair that my grandma painted. I hated the chair because a) she did a terrible job painting it and b) it was the ugliest imaginable color. I used it a little tonight. It was an interesting experience. I was reading the canister and it says “warning: this product is proven to cause cancer” or something. Huh?! Yikes. Welll, not much different than cigarettes…speaking of that, there’s this commercial that pisses off my sisters and me: “Secondhand smoke…still want to breathe it?” Uh…does anyone want to breathe it in the first place? Anyway after reading the directions I tried to take off the cover and couldn’t. I just couldn’t. It’s like a childproof thing like on pill jars but bigger. And the canister is squarish but not big enough to allow your hand to really get down in there to grip the cover. It reminds me of how sometimes you can’t get in to screw in/out coax cables from a VCR or whatever. Finally I gave up and took a screwdriver and punctured a hole in the can. Haha. Probably fairly dangerous, but hey. I live for danger. That stuff works wonders, but is very toxic. Accidentally got some on a finger or two and it immediately began to burn my skin off. Ouch!

God, my apartment is a total mess.

Oh that reminds me, the pictures I took are developed. I may be able to post them, but I might have issues, so we’ll see. I’ll take a look now.

edit. I don't think anyone reads this who I didn't email, but I posted the pictures on facebook.

Go away or I shall taunt you a second time

I am in the foulest mood right now. You guessed it…Mom. The disease that plagues my life.

She ruined my day and my sisters’ day…we wasted the entire day on her stupid “birthday party.” I don’t even want to talk about what went down.

I had sort of a breakdown once I got home and realized that my energy lately has been spent trying to please her and my grandparents and that whole side of the family. I threw a basket and some winter clothing, and broke a CD in half. It was kind of hard…those things are resilient. Except when you hit them with a metal baton. And I am supposedly seeing them all again on Wednesday. Fuck that. And I have to watch their fucking cat for a month.

I am so mad. I am pissed at the entire world. I think that for a while I’m only talking to my dad and my sisters. Except for the stupid cat I was guilted into watching for a month.

I hope that none of you EVER have to deal with family members as fucked up as mine, especially my mother. I would never wish it on my worst enemy.

News today

No different than any other day.

 

So today is/was my mom's birthday. Yesterday we were going to go over to her house but decided not to. Today we were going to have a birthday party for her and my grandma's, which I was really not looking forward to. However, she decided not to show up. She went to the Mall of America. Wonderful, huh? Also, she neglected to mention that to us. We found out my my grandma calling us. Then we had to go out to eat with them and their friends, which was possibly the most boring and pointless meal I have ever gone to. Some choice conversations: when did you come home, when are you leaving, and my favorite: how much do you pay for gas? I was sort of stunned at that and couldn't answer for a second. Well, actually, I get it free. What the hell? I live an hour away in the same state. We like to predict questions I get asked bec. they're always the same. I am surprised I didn't get questions about groceries or comments on how my wall is red. However, we did get comments on how we take showers daily. I actually wasn't expecting that one, but I wasn't surprised.

 

Later my mother called our house and yelled at Suzanne and informed her that she would not be there for her birthday party tomorrow (rescheduled). I was so mad. I may throw out her birthday present. We proceeded  to have a long discussion with my dad on how much we dislike her.

 

Get this. Her stupid boyfriend has parents that are both in nursing homes. One of them died about 4 days ago and he didn't know about it! The stinker is that they went to visit him on Christmas day. And her stupid boyfriend (HSB for short) told lies about him to my grandpa, who later found out they were lies because they were directly contradicted in the newspaper obituary. My grandma saw the obituary and called my mom, who was with HSB. They both did not know. Ok, so maybe he had a bad relationship with his family, but they did allegedly go see him last week. Who doesn't find out their own father dies? We were so freaked out. I hate HSB more than I can convey to you right now.

 

My dad was like "I don't want to make any judgements on him because I don't know him" and I was like "we'll help you! He's stupid!" And later he said "I don't want you guys being over there when he's there." Which will be good I think. He's basically over there all the time. My mom gets pissed when my sisters aren't there, but 1) HSB is always there, which means we can't/don't want to be there, and 2) she's doing something with him so can't be with us...

 

Aaaaaggghh I can't even express how annoying my family is. We joked in the car that HSB's family might be more messed up than ours, and that's hard to beat.

 

There was simply no reason to call and make my sister cry. That's the bottom line. Nobody did anything. And even if we did, would we really want to do something just to make someone mad? That's like her mission in life. To feel like and prove beyond all measure of reason that everyone is out to get her. What a bitch.

 

We're supposed to go over to my grandma's anyway (who by the way told us on the phone to give my mom a break because she's going through a hard time--what a load of shit) but I just don't want to. Period.

Oh yeah

I also found out that those phthalo-whatever CDs might not even be writable in some machines. They say that it's the worst-case scenarios that make a case for each dye--meaning that the supposed fading one might fade faster but also works better with more machines. The other one might freak out when writing at low or high speeds.

The longest damn day of the year

...might just be today.

 

More information on CDs. I found that that Wiki article may have overstated the issue a bit. I guess, in general, they say manufacturers (not brands) make the difference. In practice though, it's a lot easier to blame brands, since they're the thing you know. Brands sometimes change manufacturers, too, so how do we know?

 

There are some articles that I read, as well as a huge-ass thread on cdfreaks.com. It looks like actual CD performance varies a lot and almost everyone has a different favorite and least favorite (although Verbatim seems to be a popular least favorite--those are those ones that look like an olde tyme record). Memorex is also considered bad...and it's also one of the easiest-findable brands possible. Sorry I couldn't word that better.

 

As far as wear, it's hard to tell how many years things actually last, because CDs haven't been around that long. You're supposed to keep them away from light and other kinds of radiation. I think that for hard-core archiving, it's best to get really good quality ones, which you can generally tell by price. There is this holy grail of CD-Rs called Mitsui Gold, which are apparently really hard to get. Those have that phthalocyanine, or whatever it's called, coating on them. People don't seem to mind paying a bit more (around $1-2 per disc, I think) in order to know stuff will keep very well, won't have errors, etc.

 

I'm not sure how easy it is to tell what characteristics CD-Rs have before you buy them. However, there are several programs you can get which give you info (the info is called ATIP). The ATIP info includes dye type and manufacturer and stuff like that.

 

I have always really liked Imation. I also like Sony. The reason is that they both are really simple looking on the top. And also because Imation has clever ads. I think I'll try that ATIP info stuff and if it looks good I'll just stick with that. I might look into archival CDs for my website stuff and pictures and music I want to...archive...but for regular old CDs Sony and Imation will probably be ok, as long as I can find them.

 

Dammit, I had this whole Geek Code thing done and had a link and everything, but it kept cutting off the last 1/3 of it. Screw it.

Funny and Sad

From and Onion AV article on Least Essential Albums of 2005 I found this:

In his once-remarkable posthumous work ethic, Tupac Shakur somehow failed to put out a new album this year: It appears that dying in 1995 is finally starting to catch up with him.

Hehe.
 
LEAST ESSENTIAL RINGTONE-BASED CROSSOVER THAT BROUGHT COLDPLAY DOWN A NOTCH

Crazy Frog, Presents Crazy Hits
(Universal)

A massive hit in England—the country that brought the world Jive Bunny, remember—Crazy Frog's version of "Axel F" (better known as the Beverly Hills Cop theme, which every seventh-grader with a home synth was playing in 1984) stopped Coldplay's "Speed Of Sound" from hitting number one in the UK. The song was originally a cell-phone ringtone, but the annoying little amphibian took on a life of its own with Crazy Hits, managing to make the most easily digestible dance crap from years past even more radio-friendly. Original version of "Who Let The Dogs Out?" too street for you? Let Crazy Frog make everything all right.

 

Sad in so many ways.
 

Burn #4,509

Burned myself again today, this time on the right pointer finger. It is a steam burn. I was melting some wax and as I went to take the bowl off the pot of boiling water, the steam shot out and burned me through the oven mitt. Good thing I didn’t have a good grip on the wax because it could have been a lot worse. I just whipped my hand away really fast. It really kills and I’m not sure how I’m going to sleep tonight! I’ve had it in ice water for about 4 hours. I’m not sure how to deal with it because it’s sort of internal and ointment isn’t helping much. Owie.

Arrgh

Wow, I had semi-forgotten how frustrating programming can really be.

On the other hand, thank god for the internet. How did people know what to do without the internet?

Finally I got my first tiny Python page to work. You would not believe how long that thing took. Not to mention resources…1 book and at least 25 websites. I wish that everything would just work on every platform and every file type and encoding. I had to change how my file saved, how it uploaded, put it in a specific directory, put in a file handler on the server, change its permissions, and finally, after all that, something was wrong with the 5 lines of code I copied for a test. #$)*@*$!!!

http://www.easytoplease.net/cgi-bin/test.py

Damn! (Information on CD/DVD media)

So I was looking around to find out the difference between DVD+R and DVD-R and found out something even more exciting. Rewind back a few years to when I was still in H.S. I read a newspaper article that said that CDs might actually be very unstable and could fade within a few years. How alarming. Well, FF back to present time.

Apparently CDs actually use organic dye in the bottom part (where the data is). I guess that when you write data to them, depending on what kind of CD it is, it has to absorb a certain wavelength. DVD+Rs are purple (at least, mine are), and will absorb different wavelengths. I don't know which wavelengths. But I do know that short (red) wavelengths shoot out for DVD-Rs.
 

Anyway, here is some information I found interesting regarding CD-Rs.

There are three basic formulations of dye used in CD-Rs:
1. Cyanine dyes were the earliest ones developed, and their formulation is patented by Taiyo Yuden. Cyanine dyes are mostly green or light blue in color, and are chemically unstable. This makes cyanine discs unsuitable for archival use; they can fade and become unreadable in a few years. Many manufacturers use proprietary chemical additives to make more stable cyanine discs.
2. Azo dye CD-Rs are dark blue in color, and their formulation is patented by Mitsubishi Chemicals. Unlike cyanine, azo dyes are chemically stable, and typically rated with a lifetime of decades.
3. Phthalocyanine dye CD-Rs are usually silver, gold or light green. The patents on pthalocyanine CD-Rs are held by Mitsui and Ciba Specialty Chemicals. These are also chemically stable, and often given a rated lifetime of hundreds of years.

Although the CD-R was initially developed in Japan, most of the production of CD-Rs had moved to Taiwan by 1998. Taiwanese manufacturers supplied more than 70% of the worldwide production volume of 10.5 billion CD-Rs in 2003.

Unfortunately, many manufacturers add additional coloring to disguise their cyanine CD-Rs, so you cannot determine the formulation of a disc based purely on its color. Similarly, a gold reflective layer does not guarantee use of phthalocyanine dye.

 

Isn't that freaky? I was wondering whilst reading that why some CDs can make the bottom neon orange or something. Well, I'm going to try to do some additional research to see if I can figure out what manufacturers use what, because I don't want my shit to disappear.

oh my god

i had to email this guy when something was fixed, so i did. it was a promotion thing that wasn't working. we can't fix it right away so i said, "at least the promotion is only good for a few more days!" because it said dec. 31, 2005 was the ending date. then i sent it. then i realized it said dec. 31, 2006, so i sent another one saying "oops, i mean a year and a few days." then i sent that and noticed it said jan. 31, 2006. so i had to send another one.

 

i am such an idiot! well, at least i wasn't talking as i said that!

 

earlier i asked a lady if i could call her back and she said "sure, do you have my phone number?" i said, "no, do you know your extension?" what the hell? do you know your extension??? god.

Oh MAN!

Ok, so there is a good side and a bad side to being sick.

 

Bad side: It sucks.

Good side: when you get around to eating again, it tastes better than ever before. I had some pizza last night and it was the best thing I've ever tasted. YUMMY!

 

I'm in an uncharacteristically good mood today. It's funny because last night I was in an extra bad mood. I think my good mood has to do with the fact that I've been less of a moron today. The other day I was having to go around explaining stuff to people, and wasn't doing a very good job. I like to pull off the impression that I know what I'm talking about, but when I have to actually speak, I can't do it at all. Writing, on the other hand, makes me look so very good.

 

This morning I figured out this weird problem I got a call on the other day and was proud of myself. I put in a note on the work request and was very happy at how it sounded:

 

Upon further investigation, I found out that there was a manual data feed on Dec. 2 that contains all of those strange Agents/Offices. The feed is peculiar because the agents are almost all female and there are 9391 of them (I believe there are around 1700 in actuality). 

The feeds that have been going through otherwise look normal. I believe that all of the other offices are still there, hidden within the other mysterious ones. I checked for two of them and found them.

I will check with Anita on Tuesday to find out where these records came from, if we need to get rid of them, and how to get rid of them.

 

Sounds professional, huh? I've found that if I have some time to look up the issue, then I can pretty much figure out what's going on. However, I sometimes can't actually fix it...but that's besides the point.

 

All y'all who have asked me for computer help before: you prepared me for this job. Actually, in my interview they asked me if I would be ok with answering the hotline. I said that I get asked computer questions all the time and that I have gotten pretty good at problem solving. It seemed to work.

 

At first I was terrible on the phone and asking questions to people, but over the couple days I've gotten slightly better. It helps a lot that the people calling are generally really nice. It's only a groups of like 15 people that call. I think I am in love with one of them because the other day he started humming that "circus-y" tune that always plays when seals are balancing balls on their noses or elephants walking on tightropes, you know which one I mean? I still feel dumb running in and asking my manager every single time someone calls, especially because sometimes I forgot to check something beforehand. But hey, I'm in a time crunch. And he said to ask him. Whatever, hopefully I'll get better soon.

 

All in all, it's way, way better than I expected, which is a huge surprise. I've been dreading doing this since I heard about it in my interview back in August.

 

Another reason things are going well: a woman came in to give me some stuff today and said "Hello, Miss Elizabeth!" And later I had a small chat with another woman and that kind of thing makes my day.

 

Things that made yesterday a bad day: My mom did yet ANOTHER stupid-ass thing to my sisters. I'm seriously starting to have a conversation with myself on whether it would be good to actually cut ties with her. The problem is that you never hear anything good about that, and you always hear of people on their deathbed wishing they had worked things out. Well, you can't work things out with someone who's insane. But honestly, I don't know what else to do. She gets worse and worse and you cannot reason with her. I have seriously never met anyone like her. She is a piece of work.

 

Well, that's all for now. I'm going to take a picture of my new watch later, which I bought last night with a gift card. It is beautiful!

Christmas

I thought I'd write about my Christmas now.

 

On the 23rd we had a tiny "Dad's house" Christmas which involved a spaghetti-type dish and opening of one present. I gave my dad a cake plate, which he has been wanting, with "Dad"-shaped cookies inside. He gave us MP3 players, which are awesome. (They aren't Ipods). The size is insane to me...they're like 1 inch by 3 inches or something. My youngest sister got really frustrated because she thought that if you had an MP3 player you could get whatever song you want. What a surprise it was when she found out you had to either buy them or get them from a CD you already own. She succeeded in breaking a chair, throwing her MP3 player twice, and having 3 tantrums. Finally she was able to get some songs on it and she now listens to it constantly.

 

On the 24th we went to my mom's house and spent a pointless hour there waiting for her to get ready. I did my hair that morning in a "fancy" updo with a flower on the side and got many compliments. I think that's probably the best my hair has pretty much ever looked. I also had a new outfit and jewelry, which got compliments also. We had a huge lunch and then my grandma was like "lets have dessert now." That propmpted me to leave the room. How could you possibly eat more? That may have been the point when I started to get sick. Later we went to church at our new church, which was interesting. I liked it more than usual because I sat with just my sisters. We laughed at a lot of stuff. Then we came home and had supper (seriously, it was less than three hours after the huge lunch and dessert. What the hell?). Needless to say, I did not eat much. It was a really weird supper, too. Then we started opening presents. The kids went insane and started opening everyone's presents. You'd think that if a child is 7, they would start to be a little calmer. Nope. Sam, who is 4, was the worst, which is weird because he's always so calm. I think he overloaded on sugar. My uncle dressed up as Santa and ran around the house with jingle bells like he does every year. And, just like every year, it scared the kids senseless. For the rest of the night Paige kept saying "Santa scare me!" until it became the thing she said for anything. "Want some food?" "Santa scare me!" "Goodnight, Paige!" "Santa scare me!" "Bye, see you later!" "Santa scare me!" I got subscriptions to Spin and Rolling Stone (and 1 copy of Q--my aunt mentioned [an astute point, I might add] that Q costs an exorbitant amount to subscribe to stateside, so none for me! I've looked into it myself actually.) I also got a couple items of clothing, some bath and kitchen stuff, and candle making stuff. My sisters and I all had little packages from my mom's dumb boyfriend that we were afraid to open. So we all sort of saved them and then quickly opened them (it was a bracelet). I said something like "thanks, it's pretty and even goes with my outfit." Ew, I hate him so much. He has this mustache that is so ugly: he shaves the upper half of it. Why would you do that? Plus, it was crooked.

 

We had to sleep at my mom's house that night (which involved getting guilt-tripped twice and sleeping in a gross-smelling place because they both smoke). We woke up and had a huge breakfast (nice that we had to eat in 2 hours at my dad's, of course). We opened Santa presents and one was gloves, a scarf, and a hat. My mom said, "Dad's going to think that you got gloves, a scarf and a hat for Christmas" (in this tone that she always uses in order to get us to feel like we have to say she's superior to dad). Suzanne went, "Well, we did!" None of us understood what mom meant and we laughed so hard in the car about it. (The next day she called to ask what kind of meat we had and if it was good. What the hell? Mom, your meat is so much better. Happy now? By the way, it isn't.) Anyway we went back home, the whole way laughing our asses off about how weird mom is. We joked a lot about this thing our pastor said in church: "I see parents' faces glowing today because their kids are home." We were like, "no way, our mom would so rather not have us except that we wield her some power over dad." It is funny in a sad way.

 

Whoa, someone just freaked out and was screaming on the phone to someone. Is it just me or is this day going by so slowly it's practically going backwards? I swear I've been here for way more than 3 hours. Arrrrggggg.

 

People came over to our house around 12 and by that time I was feeling really horrible. I didn't really eat much. we joked that my mom's dumb boyfriend poisoned my breakfast. Although I don't know why mine, because I am probably more civil to him than most other family members, because I have a hard time being outwardly mean and I'm actually somewhat nice to him, as much as I can be while hating his guts. He is incredibly racist, among other things.

 

I got a flash drive like Brighton's, and instead of being happy all I felt was terrible because I broke hers. I will never, ever be able to forgive myself for that. Brighton, if yours is 256 MB, I will switch you. I used mine to transport some pictures I scanned and it worked well. I got "The Brothers Grimm" DVD, some books, some more kitchen stuff, and some art stuff. 'Twas cool. You know, it just occurred to me that if my biggest regrets in life are breaking Brighton's flash drive, getting chapstick on her clothes (that's right, I will never forget that either), and pretending to send secret admirer notes to this girl in 7th grade, then I guess my life is ok, because after all, I have never killed anyone or anything like that.

 

I had the 26th off and spent it lying around feeling bad and then had to drive back up here, and my sisters came with me. I feel bad because they haven't been able to go anywhere and have been cooped up for over a day. Well hey, they wanted to come. And there's no way I was going anywhere yesterday. I guess my dad is coming to get them tonight. I wish I could have watched Stargate SG-1 Monday and also the episode from yesterday, but I couldn't. :( :( :( You know, that show has almost become my life. How sad is that? I was thinking today, again, that my life is so pointless. I mean, seriously, thinking back on all the promise I had in school (before college) is sad. Then I went to a really good school and did as well as I could, and graduated, now I have this job...and...nothing. I don't really have anything to look forward to or aspire to like I did before in any way. I mean, I'm hoping to overhaul my website soon, and continue learning Icelandic, and see Coldplay, but so what?

 

Oh well.

Haha

I was just looking at Wikipedia in Icelandic and looked up Sigur Ros. I found this:

Jón Þór Birgisson (Jónsi) - söngur, gítar
Georg Hólm (Goggi) - bassi
Kjartan Sveinsson (Kjarri) - hljómborð (frá 1999)
Orri Páll Dýrason - trommur (frá 1999)

 

I just love how guitar is gítar and dummer is trommur.

 

(commencing dying now)

Tip

If you have stomach flu, or something resemling it, and you also seem to react to sugar, don't drink Sierra Mist.

 

That is all.

I Am Dying

So, for some reason I got violently ill this Christmas...although, now that I think of it this happens every year. Anyway, I am sitting at work right now and dying slowly. Is there anything worse than needing to throw up, I ask? I can't think of anything.

 

My stomach and intestines have been churning and bubbling for the past 3 days. Owwww. And let's say this. You know vomit, well, you know the version that comes out the other end...I've been doing that every hour for 3 days. I had no idea that much stuff was in me. I think my insides are nearly gone, except that I still feel ill and that means something has to be there to still hurt.

 

I would have called in sick today but I have to do the hotline for the first time. It has been pretty slow. In between my two calls I have been writhing in pain and agony. I hope someone is happy that I came in because I sure am not.

P.P.S.

My “Fix You” single has a “Made in England” sticker on the front. Is that not perfect for me?