KirstenL4W

In the interest of just getting a post out there yesterday while in the midst of computer hell, I didn’t quite explain what the problem was.  So here’s an explanation:

I usually use the laptop in the living room, connecting to our home network via a wireless connection.  The laptop has Vista, btw, which is of an important note because it is the only one of our 4 computers running Vista.  The others are XP.  Anyhoo, all indications were that I had a very strong internet connection, and I was even able to get the weather widget to work, but trying to actually access the internet using Firefox or IE was an effort in futility.  If I was lucky enough to get a website, it was after a long wait and there was no guarantee that graphics would be included.  Again, just as a reminder, the laptop was the only computer afflicted with this strange illness.

The computer had been sitting idle since Sunday evening, so it had been close to 48 hours that it was powered down.  There was plenty of battery life left, and everything else appeared to be working normally.  Vista even thought my connection was fine; the diagnostic check recommended that I contact my ISP.  Since Boyfriend was online playing his Silly Little Game, I knew that the problem was not with my ISP, it was in the laptop, somehow.

At Boyfriend’s suggestion, I installed some new anti-virus software. (Side note: I have run a computer for many years without any such software; when I finally did install some it only found some tracking cookies.  In all my years of computing I have never had a virus.)  After the hour or so of updating Vista, uninstalling the Norton that came with the laptop, installing TrendMicro, and doing a scan, only a few tracking cookies were found.  Performance was not improved.  Some more diagnostics ended up resetting the internal wireless adapter, which solved the problem … for about 5 minutes.

Boyfriend did a hard restart, which helped a little, but it was still very slow (not super slow, as it had been), and I was still getting some sites without graphics.  I had already given up by this point and was all by my lonesome in the bedroom on my desktop.  I did start the disk defrag, but as of 5:30am it was still running, so with the screen saver and power saver settings, I don’t know if it stops running when it goes into power save mode.  There’s no way to visually check the progress of the defrag on Vista, either.  However, the internet issues were pretty much gone this morning, since I was able to check my email just fine.  This is so perplexing.

Boyfriend mentioned yesterday that his satellite radio was not able to access a signal.  Since it’s in the truck and there aren’t that many natural barriers to the signal here in Las Vegas, I’m wondering if these events are related.  The Pentagon seems intent on shooting down a wayward satellite, and with a 10 second window to push the button to send a heat-seeking missile to an object that is not outputting any heat, along with the coincidental news coming out of Cuba this week, I’m wondering if the electronic issues of late are a signal that the end of the world is coming.  But don’t listen to me.  I’m not a conspiracy theorist or anything.

At least my iPod still works normally.  I don’t know where I’d be without that.

Something that is a new experience for me since moving to Wordpress is pingbacks and trackbacks. For those who don’t know, these are, to the best of my knowledge, links to your content on another website. I’m not talking about blogrolls - no, this is when your work is quoted, in part or in full, on another website and links back to your site, which is how it gets picked up in your comments as a trackback.

My Music on Mondays posts seem to be the most popular posts for this. Yesterday I checked my comments to see 3 of these, my highest number yet. I’m sure they will spiral out of control as I get more and more popular. Check this out:

Now, I always check these out, just to make sure that at the very least there is a link in there and I don’t have to bitch-slap anyone. But what I don’t get is the name. It’s always different. See those bottom two? Despite the URL, they are the exact same website, yet on one I am “The Gossip Girls” and on another I am “Barbara”. I don’t get that. I mean, I can see how the first one is a trick to get more people to the site with the name of a tv show, but Barbara? Not sure about that one. In all cases, though, the links to go my site.Right now this is a slight annoyance and also somewhat amusing, but at least (to my knowledge) no one has copied my site. Sites like Copyscape can help you figure out if someone has.

When I moved in with Boyfriend, I had to find somewhere to put my desk.  The living room wasn’t an option because his desk was already in there, and the only corner where it made sense to put mine was taken up by a fireplace.  So that left the bedroom, which used to be spacious before I moved in.  Now my desk is crowded in the far corner of the room, without enough room for a proper chair.  I sit on an overturned trash barrel with a pillow on top in lieu of a proper stool.

Since my desk is so out of the way, Boyfriend really doesn’t like it when I spend time on my computer.  He has 2 laptops, one of them a brand spanking new HP Something that runs Vista.  Since the arrival of the HP, I’ve been using that a lot more because it allows me to spend time with Boyfriend - we can both be on the computer yet in the same room together.  It’s been nice, but there are lots of things on my desktop that I still need - all my iTunes, my personal finance software, all my files that I do stuff with - and at this point it’s just going to have to stay that way, because I don’t see us getting a server or even an external hard drive anytime soon.  I prefer to have everything in just one place, anyway, so I’ve kept it all on my desktop.

Since I spend so much time on the laptop, however, I figured it would be wise to try and merge some stuff.  I have zillions of bookmarks on my desktop - not that I use them all regularly, I admit that they could use some cleaning out - but I wanted the bookmarks for my main computer with me on the laptop.  I went online to see what extensions Firefox had, since I had heard they had one that syncs bookmarks.  I downloaded Foxmarks on the desktop and laptop and went about doing my thing, being careful to keep the ones I already had on my desktop as the dominant set.  This is when the trouble began.

When I finished syncing (spellcheck says that is right, I don’t know) them, I had a whole bunch of blank bookmarks on the laptop.  That wasn’t right, so I set about deleting them.  Once that was done, Foxmarks wanted to sync again.  I chose no.  Throughout the day, it kept wanting to sync.  Tired of the popup, I finally clicked yes, thinking that because I had set my desktop bookmarks as the dominant set, it would shut this thing up once and for all.  Boy, was I wrong.  All those blank bookmarks were the folders that I had to organize stuff.  All the bookmarks I previously had in folders were gone.  Now all I have is the miscellany that I had floating at the end, waiting to be organized.  Everything else is gone.  I don’t even remember half of what I had, but it’s all gone.  I know I had clothing stores and shoe stores and all sorts of other stores that I liked to visit.  Some of those I’ll never find again, so no more window shopping for me.

Now that I’m completely fed up with the Great Bookmark Syncing Fiasco, I’ve uninstalled Foxmarks and will never try that again.  Perhaps a site like PortaPortal will be a bit better, or not.  Perhaps I will just keep separate bookmarks on each computer.  I don’t know, I haven’t figured that out yet.  I’m still hurting from losing all my cool bookmarks.

Generous Curator

You are a Curator

• You are straightforward and real, down-to-earth, and have a healthy respect for order and stability. These attributes, complemented by your desire to be surrounded by things of beauty, make you a CURATOR.
• You don’t feel the need to try everything new that comes along – you know what you like and what you want.
• You are a no-nonsense person, not someone who falls for pretensions.
• Being strongly grounded in the here-and-now, you are practical and realistic about yourself and your life.
• You find comfort and calmness in your habits and routines.
• Although others might not know this about you, you strongly appreciate aesthetic qualities, noticing whether something is well-designed and stylish.
• You have a refined sense of taste, and you want your environments to reflect your preferred style.
• There are times when you feel insecure and vulnerable, even though you know deep down that you are a good person.
• You aren’t narcissistic – you allow yourself to be realistic about your positive and negative qualities.
• You’re not one to force your positions on a group, and you tend to be fair in evaluating different options.
• You are balanced in your approach to problem-solving, not letting your emotions hold you up.
• You prefer to have time to plan for things, feeling better with a schedule than with keeping plans up in the air until the last minute.
• You do your own thing when it comes to clothing, guided more by practical concerns than by other people’s notions of style.

If you want to be different:

• It wouldn’t hurt to indulge your imagination and creativity sometimes. These are skills like any other, and develop with practice, so try to carve out some time for them in your life.
• Try to quiet your inner feelings of doubt – you will be more successful if you can overcome these worries and focus on your many strengths, such as your responsible and honest nature.

You are Generous

• Your awareness of those around you, along with your nuanced perceptions of the world at large, makes you the GENEROUS person that you are.
• You value time to yourself and understand how rich your private world can be—you know that you don’t have to go wild to have a good time.
• You are excited and energized by ideas and often enjoy things more through observation than through experience.
• This tendency gives you an appreciation for different perspectives and opinions about the world.
• Being as aware of others as you are doesn’t mean you find it easy to trust them immediately—this is something that happens more slowly for you.
• Despite this, you are aware of the complexities of many situations and are reluctant to pass judgments on others.
• Although you have fewer friendships than some people, those that you have are meaningful and are important to you.
• You value spending time alone—it is while reflecting on the world around you that you often learn something new about yourself or begin to understand something that’s been bothering you.

If you want to be different:

• Given how attuned you are to others’ thoughts and feelings, you might find that trusting people more is a way to broaden your perspective even further.
• While you know how much can be learned from observing the world around you, remember that much of life can be lived by experiencing it, not just by understanding it.

On Monday, Snoskred posted about Do Follow. I had been wondering about that, about which is better, because everyone who has an opinion on it thinks that their way is the best way. Basically, Do Follow/No Follow is about linky love and spam. Those who are Do Follow code their blogs so that when people leave comments, the search engine 8-legged things that go out and find links will find them. Those that are No Follow code so that the links aren’t findable (is that a word?) and they won’t get spam. I coded mine to be Do Follow long before I really knew what it was.

For those people who are really obsessed about their search engine ranking and how they rank on various social networking sites, they’ll want to be Do Follow. Snoskred’s friend Sephy has a post about how to do this. On the other hand, those who are so paranoid about spam that even with comment moderation and the silly word verification thing, they want to do everything possible to prevent even one iota of spam getting through to their comments. There are ways to do that too. If you’re on Blogger, don’t do anything, since your code is No Follow by default. The spambots can be overcome with simple comment moderation. I moderate, but I don’t do the word verification thingy. I hate it myself, so I don’t subject people to having to drink to see that straight enough to fill it in. But I moderate only because I want to know what’s going on my blog before everyone else does. Hey, it’s my blog and I can moderate it if I wanna.

Now, there’s more to this Do Follow/No Follow thing. Whenever someone new visits my blog, I like to visit theirs (if they leave me the means to) and see who they are. I’ve picked up many new blogging friends this way. It also give me a chance to reply in the most appropriate manner. Which brings me to…

You comment, I reply. As you may have noticed, I have been doing my best to reply to everyone who leaves a comment on my blog. The best way for me to do that is to comment on my own blog, so it becomes like a conversation. I don’t do it so much to increase my traffic or anything like that. I just think it’s a really nice thing to do. Someone is talking to me. I should at least acknowledge their contact, right?

The one thing that I’m kinda bad about is commenting on other people’s blogs. I don’t feel obligated to comment to every post every one in my feed writes. That’s a fast track to a full-time, very unproductive job - kind of like forwarding all that “forward this for good luck” crap I get in my inbox. I do try to comment at least every few posts, to let you know I’m still reading. When someone new comments on my blog, and I visit their blog, I don’t necessarily comment unless their blog and its content resonates enough with me to want to. Simple as that.

I enjoy blogging. I don’t decide whether or not to comment on someone’s blog based on their Do Follow/No Follow/iReply status. I only comment when I have something to say, simple as that. Also, at this point I’m not too concerned with rankings. I mean, if someone refuses to read my blog because I don’t have a Technorati rating star level 74 or something silly like that, well, I don’t need ‘em. But I do want to be a good blogger, that’s something that’s going to make me happy about my blog, so that’s what I’m gonna do.

Read more about the Do Follow movement here.
Read more about the iReply movement here.

Now, Snoskred, what do you know about the whole co.mments thing? Is it extra work to the point that I’m better off just trying to remember where I commented to see if people reply, or is it a Google Reader-like miracle?

A couple posts back, I put forth the question Am I A Good Blogger? So many blogs about blogging make it sound like those of us who have personal blogs are doing everything wrong, according to the Bible of Blogging. We’re can’t possibly be serious about blogging if we don’t have a niche. We’re told that our blogs are boring, that no one wants to read about our personal lives. We’re told that blogging is a business, not a hobby for us little people.

My post brought lots of thought-provoking comments. Devilish Southern Belle referred to her site as a “vanity site.” I like that. After all, aren’t most blogs about vanity? I haven’t found too many altruistic blogs out there. It seems like everyone blogging is either talking about themselves, talking about how much money they make blogging, or talking about what an expert they are on being a way too cool super popular blogger.

Diesel has a rather funny personal blog, and had some interesting observations about StumbleUpon. He takes the best of the “good blogger” advice and makes it work for him.

Snoskred did an entire post based on mine. She brought up some good points. Getting my own domain has been at the back of my mind for a while, and eventually I would like to build a bigger website. I like what Jordon’s done with his site, so something along those lines would be good - not a hugely in depth site, but a few extra pages to show who he is and what his interests are is pretty much the kind of thing I was thinking about. Of course, I would need to learn a lot more about different platforms and how to actually run a whole website. That will come with time - having the time! But back to the issue at hand…

I read a couple of blog posts that made me feel better about my blog and where it’s at. The first one is from SuperBlogging and is titled, “Your Blog Can Be Whatever You Want It To Be“. All I have to say to that is Amen, brother. And this morning I read (thanks to Snoskred) this article entitled, “How Do You Measure Your Success As A Blogger?” Look at the very first bullet point. “…is it by personal satisfaction, knowing that your needs are met? That your sense of community has been satisfied?” It’s extremely rare that a blogger will write a post about blogging that actually considers the needs of the individual blogger. And yes, this is exactly why I blog.

I started this blog as a personal journal and quickly branched out into all things about me (hence the title of my blog). This blog is me, through and through. It’s not about lining my pockets, and it’s not about making the rest of you feel like you need to scramble to keep up with how great I am. It’s just me, and now that I’ve been at it awhile it’s about the friends I’ve made too. I’ve kept in touch with friends and family, gotten re-acquainted with old friends, and made new friends along the way. Knowing that there are real people on the other end of the internet makes it worthwhile, and even if no one is reading, just getting things out in the open is worth it, too.

I spent a decent amount of time today reading various blogging tips blogs. I’m always interested in what I can do to make my blog better, but it’s also got to work for me. I’m not an A-list blogger and never will be. I’m not an expert on anything and don’t claim to be. I only have one niche - ME, as evidenced by my blog’s title.

I’ve played with my blog’s template and gotten it to where I’m satisfied with it. I have a lot of ideas that I’d like to try, design-wise, but lack both the time to try them out and the expertise to figure it out.

My pagerank isn’t where it could be. I don’t have time to dedicate to heavy social networking, like Digg, StumbleUpon, Technorati, del.icio.us, etc. If I did I’m sure I’d have more readers than I do now. As it is, I don’t even track my stats, so I have no idea how many readers I get. I do have counters and such, but I don’t have time to pay attention to them.

The biggest mistake I make, according to all the pros out there, is that I don’t have my own domain. I can’t be a serious blogger if I don’t, right? Sure, I’m here on Blogger, and I am serious about my blog. I’m just not serious about making this my full time job (full time hobby would be nice, though). I’ve checked out other blog services. I have a LiveJournal that I rarely post on but visit at least 3-4 times a week to see my friend’s blogs. I like Blogger in that it’s the only free service (that I know of) that allows full customization of the html and css code. Free is good for me. Now, I can get my own domain name and continue hosting it on Blogger. I can also get a domain, have a bigger website, and link to the blogger blog. That’s still a thought. But I like Blogger, it’s been good to me, and I have no intention on leaving it just yet. Besides, the work to move everything is just too much for me, and I’ve already established that time does not grow on trees.

What do I do? As far as publicizing my blog goes, I make sure I let my friends and family know it’s the best way to keep up with my goings on. This past year I put labels in all my holiday cards to advertise my blog. Also, as of 5 minutes ago, my blog address is in my email signature. I’ll also check out the message boards I visit frequently and make sure it’s in my signature there also. I’m not looking for a huge audience, but the people who are interested in me, like friends, family, and internet friends will likely want to know if I have a blog and where to find it.

Link-Love and Comments - sure, I practice this. If I like your blog, I’ll link to it. I don’t expect reciprocal links, though blog etiquette says this is the thing to do. Comments are also nice. I try to comment as time allows, but I don’t feel compelled to comment on every single post you have. If I have something to say, I’ll say it, but even in person, I’ve never been one to talk just for the sake of talking. I’m also trying to reply to comments more. I enjoy this kind of dialogue.

Now, for the feedback. What do you all think of my blog? Is there anything that doesn’t work for you? Does it load ok? Let me know, and if it’s a load issue, let me know about what OS, browser, and all that technical stuff that you have so I can pretend to know what to do about it.

Is there some sort of feed website where I can subscribe to all my favorite blogs and have all new posts on said blogs delivered to my email? I’d like to do this from one single source rather than a rag-tag collection of feeds, and I’d really like them delivered to the email address of my choosing, rather than having to visit yet another website (if I can do that, then I’d just read all the blogs). I’m trying to streamline things here so that I can easily keep up with everyone.

On a side note, does anyone know how I can smack the idiot know-nothings who don’t know what the hell song they’re sharing on L!meW1re? I get so annoyed when I see a song by an artist, thinking that particular artist covered a song I already like, only to find out that it’s not a cover, it’s the original version, and some idiot put the wrong artist to the song. Then again, I suppose the people who use L!mew1re are the same idiots who pimp out their MySpace pages so that they are rendered unreadable by the general population.

Why is it that when one receives an offer to participate in a 419 scam, the dollar amount is very even? I received one of these offers today, and the amount that has been deposited that needs to get out is an even US$17,000,000. I love reading the creative use of the English language in these notes too. This particular amount has been “domiciled with the Finance/Security Company overseas”. And if this guy’s health is so bad, how is it that he cannot make a bank withdrawal, but he can spend so much time and effort on trying to get someone to participate in his scam? And here’s my favorite: why oh why did this scam offer come by FAX???????????????

Email the spammer - flood his inbox!
y_plotnikov@moscowmail.com
y_plotnikov@mail.ru

I love this stuff, really I do.

I just received this email:

From: “DAVID JONES” infodepth80@bellsouth.net
To: d@jones.net
Subject: RE: HELLO FRIEND
Date: Thu, 5 Apr 2007 12:10:26 -0400

Dear Friend,

Good day to you. I may have to trouble your sense of personal achievement and reward for an opportunity properly taken advantage of. I am Mr. David Jones, a representative and attorney to Kenneth Lay, the former chairman & CEO, Enron Corp.Industry: Energy & Natural Resources Home, he was jailed and facing trial on charges of corruption and embezzlement of funds but, presently death now. While in Power. He deposited fifteen million united states dollars ($15,000,000.00) with me when he was in power as the chairman.

I am contacting you because I want you to deal with the bank and claim the money on my behalf since I have declared that the Funds belong to my foreign business partner. You shall also be required to assist me in investment in your country. I hope to trust you as a God fearing person who will not sit on this money when you claim it but rather assist me properly to share in this ratio, 60% to me and 40% to you. When I receive your positive response I will give you viable information relating to this project i.e. the Finance institution where the money was deposited and the required documentation that will enable you lay claims to the funds, which is very important. What I need is for you to indicate your interest that you will assist us by receiving the money as the beneficiary .

Once I have your details as stated below, the finance institution will contact you for Release of the funds to your account. As soon as payment is effected, and the amount mentioned above is successfully transferred into your account, I intend to use my own share in acquiring some estates abroad. For this too, I will need your assistance to acquire and manager the properties and you will be paid based on a certain percentage agreed on by both parties. I guarantee you that this transaction will be executed under a legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law. Please get in touch with me urgently by E-mail:(djones050yahoo.co.uk)and provide me the following:

1. Your Full Name
2. Your Telephone and Fax Number
3. Your Current Contact Address.
I look forward to your prompt response.

Best Regards,
Mr. David Jones.

Now this is a new one. This is not some fictional, foreign dignitary. No, this time he went for a disgraced CEO, The government has picked over every detail of Lay’s life. The feds probably know more about what he likes for breakfast than his wife did. So this spammer, the alleged Mr. David Jones, somehow thinks that I will believe all this and want to give him the $30 or so I have in my checking account.

Gotta love them spammers that give you a laugh.

Edited to make email links even more attractive to SpamBots. MWAHAHAHAHAHA!

No offense to anyone who is on MySpace (especially those on MY friends list!), but most of the people on there are not the sharpest tools in the shed. My intro clearly states that I do not collect friends and I will not just randomly add people just because they asked. I checked my email earlier today and saw that I had 2 friends requests. One was from Adam (172640993 if it’s still up), who is a 22 year old Leo. The other one was from Jonathan (172639018), a 23 year old Capricorn. Now get this - both profiles were exactly the same, right down to the friends lists (which included Jenna Jameson). What kind of idiot does this person think I am? I also got a friends request from a local crap band. Just because I live in Las Vegas and clearly don’t have the same taste in music as you do, which anyone would know if they looked at my friends list, doesn’t mean that I want to add you so that I can have some God-awful music blaring from my home page.

MySpace has its purpose, I suppose, but I just don’t understand why any intelligent, internet-savvy person would want to use it. The only reason I’m on it is to keep in touch with my nephew, and he never emails me anymore (because he’s 13 and 13 year old boys don’t email their aunts).

3/30/07 7:09am update - I just checked my email and “Donald” (173334809) who is 21 and a Cancer, just tried to add me. I sent a message to MySpace to report the abuse, gave them all 3 user numbers, and told them to do something about the bots. We’ll see if anything happens (yeah, right).

I read some really great posts today. I love it when reading blogs makes me laugh out loud.

First, I was greeted by a comment from Mist1 regarding the post below this one. She always makes me laugh. I read one of her posts to my mom on the phone one day and an amazing thing happened. My mom actually stopped talking long enough to listen to what I was saying. Then she started talking again, but she did say that Mist1 should have a newspaper column or something, a la Dave Barry. I think my mom should spend more time reading cool blogs instead of the newspaper.

Mr. Fabulous has this post and this post in which he answers a lot of mysteries of the universe. Once I stopped laughing I realized that I had a huge smile on my face because of this newfound knowledge. Thanks for setting the record straight, Mr. Fabulous.

PARLANCHEQ is always finding bizarre stuff online and posting it on her blog. Today I was greeted with jewelry made out of dismembered Barbie dolls. It was so unique that I was able to put away the fact that the concept is revolting. And of course I thought of some of my friends, like Crowjoy, who loves unique artsy stuff and sometimes uses a headless Barbie doll as her avatar, and Dr. Hula, who recently told me that she wants to have a kid just so she can have a Vegas Showgirl themed baby shower. The Barbie chest necklace that PARLANCHEQ featured in her post, with pasties on every dismembered torso, made me think of Dr. Hula. And of course, I smiled because I always smile when I think of cool friends.

Now on to Memoirs of a Gouda. Allie, all I can say is you will soon be owing me a new keyboard. I love your blog, but it forces me to spew whatever I happen to be eating or drinking from my nose directly onto that invaluable piece of hardware that I use to input text directly into my blog.

I have many more wonderful blogging and RL friends whose blogs I look forward to reading daily, and they are all listed in my sidebar. Today, the humor stuck out and really made my day. Thanks to everyone in the blogosphere who makes reading and writing blogs so enjoyable.

I don’t know how many of you listen to radio online, but I’d be willing to bet that the typical blogger has at one point or another listened to something online. I myself am a big fan of Radio Paradise. Almost the entire time I worked at MRI, I listened to RP. Now at my new job, I am once again allowed to stream radio. As soon as I found that out, I was online in musical heaven as fast as my connection would allow.

Let me tell you a bit about RP. They play music 24/7. They play hits, and they play stuff no one has ever heard of. They play such a wide variety of music that you just can’t put them in any one category. I mean, check out their playlist. I have discovered so much new music through RP alone. RP has done more to bring new and wonderful music to my life than any other single source - and probably more than all other sources put together. They survive from donations from listeners, so it’s totally free and listeners only give out of the goodness of their own hearts. The best thing about RP is the amount of information available. The song currently being played is always on their website, they keep a readily available playlist of the last 24 hours, and EVERY SINGLE SONG has a forum so that it can be discussed. Oh, and the information on what album the song came from, and links to other songs and albums by that artist, are easy to find. I mean, that’s got to be the easiest way to discover new and exciting music ever.

Now, what do I have against FM radio? Personally, when I am listening to the radio, I want to listen to MUSIC. How many of you out there can listen to music on your morning commute? Not I. Insted, I am subjected to the antics of juvenile DJs along with too many commercials for my liking. On a typical half hour drive to work, I’m lucky if I can hear one song. And I guarantee you it will be the same song every day. Who do they think I am? Ok, I understand that advertising has its place, and that all the commercials allow us to listen to FM radio for free. And stations like the new Jack format (or Fred, or Bob, or whatever they call it in your town) is a start, since they got rid of the silly DJs and play a wider variety of music. But once you get sick of that, where are you going to discover new music? In fact, the only FM station I listen to on a regular basis is my local NPR station, not because I like sleepy elevator jazz, but because I can listen to commercial free music on my way into work. And the jazz does keep me more relaxed during the commute than something a bit more upbeat.

Now, what about other formats such as satellite radio? I admit, the appeal is great to subscribe to XM or Sirius simply to have a wider variety of music to listen to without commercials, but RP has one thing over these and other online options such as Launchcast - RP is format-free. If I were to listen to a satellite option, I’d still have to choose a format or station where they have selected a niche-genre of music to play to me. RP doesn’t do that. They just play it all. I like that. I like that I don’t have to pigeonhole my musical tastes like that. I mean, let’s put it this way: you can eat at an Italian restaurant all the time, enthusiastically trying every new dish they throw your way, but how will you know if you like anything else unless you visit the Chinese restaurant across the street? It’s the same thing. Just as my culinary tastes are not firmly set in any one particular cuisine, neither are my musical tastes firmly set in any one musical genre. I listen to Mozart. I listen to Metallica. RP will play both, right in a row. How cool is that?

I don’t profess to be politically savvy, in fact, I’m more of a political idiot. Not really, but politics is usually somewhere I just don’t want to go. But this threat - that silly new laws about royalties will bring an end to US-based internet radio - just, well, sucks. So what can be done? Start a blogstorm, Digg it, slashdot it, just get the word out. If the people want it, perhaps we just might get it. It seems to me that these moves undermine the freedom that we as Americans are supposed to enjoy, but having no other options than to listen to the same manufactured drivel day in and day out on commercial radio smacks of - dare I say it - Communism. These laws that are being passed are not for the benefit of the people, they are for the benefit of Big Business. In a country where one is supposed to be able to be an individual and the small and meek can be heard, having no choice but to support Big Business does not uphold the fundamental liberties that we as Americans are supposed to be enjoying. So let’s get what we want! The internet radio stations are willing to do what it takes to stay legal, but lets get laws that are fair and unbiased. And while we’re at it, let’s outlaw corporate lobbying.

Go to Radio Paradise, right on their front page they have a story with links to resources. And read their forums - there’s a very active and intelligent discussion about this issue going on here, with LOTS of good ideas and links to how you can help. Worth the read, even if you only read a few pages.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to finish out my workday listening to Radio Paradise.

You’ve made your blog private and open to certain readers only. I would be very much obliged if I could make it onto this elite list, however I do not know your email address to ask you directly. I find it very cathartic to read your blog, and even though we live half a world apart, I enjoy the closeness we share through our experiences. You can leave me a comment, and don’t worry about whether or not it contains personal information - I won’t publish it.

Thanks,
Kirsten

I slept really well last night, which makes up for the lack of sleep or any sort of schedule the past few days. Of course, my sister called and woke me up this morning to pretend to bitch about the picture of her pregnant belly that I posted from my vacation. After that I went back to sleep for 3 more hours.

So what did I do today? I got the slides done for church. I finished posting all the widgets for my blog. I labeled all my posts (boy, was that a chore). I chatted with Officer Friend. I chatted online with other friends. Helped VegasRic proofread a site he’s working on (I really wish he’d let me help more, all the proofreading did was add to his to-do list)

I did laundry today. Someone almost burned down the laundry room by stuffing a comforter in one of the washers. Last week I neglected doing laundry and went out instead, and nearly got myself killed. Tonite I stay home and do laundry, and someone almost burns the place down. Can’t win. I don’t know if I’m supposed to do laundry or not.

I changed my cell phone plan today. Every time you do something like that you are subjected to another year on your contract. Between changing plans and taking advantage of free upgrades, I think my cell phone contract runs for another decade. But the accident this week and my recently exploded social life made me run way over my minutes this month, so for the next 3 days it’s only text messages. If anyone calls me, just leave a voice mail and I’ll check it on Wednesday, when my new billing cycle starts.

Also did some banking today, watching my bank balance dwindle. But I’m working about 30 hours at the store next week, so that will help, especially if I’m to be away for a week getting my new car.

And one more thing - if anyone has a subscription to my blog, I’M SORRY! I tagged 163 posts today, so your feeds have probably been going beserk. It won’t happen again, I promise.

That’s about it for now. I’m getting good at typing with a cast on, but it’s still a major pain in the ass. Or hand, rather. You’ll just have to deal with shorter posts for awhile.

No, not really. It rained today. I haven’t seen that much water fall out of the sky in such a long time. Plus the temps were only in the low 70s, so it was cool out too. It was a nice cozy cool and it made me feel all warm inside. It was nice to have some variety in the weather. The only thing that would have made it better is if I could have stayed home with my blanket wrapped around me.

Google has had some gadgets that you can add to your Google home page, but they’ve only been available for your Google homepage. Until now. I recently found out that they’ve added over 1200 gadgets (some redundancy is expected) that you can add to your webpage! Yay! So I went here and got myself a new Magic 8 Ball. I like it better than the one I had before; this is the one I’ve wanted all along. I’ve also cleaned up and re-organized my sidebar a bit. Now if I could only get around to doing that with my bookmarks…

I’m talking with The Man again. He explained to me what happened. Without revealing anything about him, and making a long story short, he thought he was doing a good thing and got fucked over. Now he’s just trying to un-fuck his life and get on with things.

I have that interview tomorrow morning at my friend’s place. I have a really good feeling about this one, so wish me luck. I really want this one to happen, because I am so ready to move on.

I think that’s about enough for now. I know I had more to write, I always do, but then I get online and have 4 or 5 tabs open and I’m doing at least that much, so I get distracted and lose my train of thought. Oh well.

ETA: The 8-Ball is out for now. I just can’t get it to display properly. When and if I get it figured out I’ll consider putting it back.

More internet woes - my freaking connection keeps skipping out on me. It’s really annoying to have to reset my modem every half hour. Sometimes it’s that frequent, other times I can go a few hours without a blip. The funny thing is that my modem appears to be working normally at all times, at least according to the lights on the front of it. These little hiccups are driving me mad. I called the cable company but of course it’s all fine, so they don’t have a clue. Gah.

I’ve been driving my sister mad with text messages today. The first one asked if she remembers Lisa Frank. She called me and said she did, and asked why. I told her it was a random thought I had. Then this afternoon I texted her with the headline “DNA Tests reveal that Elvis is from Uranus” She called me immediately and said, “Not my anus, your anus!” I told her I was just in a goofy mood. Then tonite I told her that I like Crayola crayons. She called me back and said that I need to find something else to do when I’m bored. This is too funny. I can’t wait, really I can’t. She gets online tomorrow, so there is a time issue. Sis, if you’re reading this, read down to the next post then be sure to STOP. Do not go any further until I tell you. If you do go further, then you totally suck and are so not worthy, you impatient little beyotch.

Today I managed to line up 2 interviews. The first one I’ll probably skip, because further research tells me that first of all, the call was unsolicited. I did not send this company my resume. Also, online research into this company tells me that it’s a bit of a sham. It’s insurance sales. No thank you, I’m looking for a legitmate job that has a bit more security and stability in pay. The second interview is with my friend’s company on Friday. The sales manager there is so busy she’s going beserk, but managed to find a time that hopefully she won’t have to change. Something tells me that will be the one. I haven’t heard back about any of the other jobs I interviewed for. One of them was listed in the local paper again this past weekend, and another one, the government one, was extremely time sensitive and it’s been 3 days. I was under the impression that they would be making a decision almost immediately, so after 3 days I have a feeling that one will not go forward for me.

Well. It’s getting late so I think I’ll finish up here, get some things picked up and get to bed. Later gators.

It seems I’m getting a lot of visitors to this post via Google. That particular charge, which I put in that post excatly as it was written on my credit card bill, and like me, many people are turning to the power of Google to figure out what the heck it is. As far as I’ve been able to tell, it’s a company in Singapore that sells phone cards. I don’t know if it’s legit or not, but someone is buying $10 and $20 phone cards through that company with our credit card numbers. Like one of my commenters said, it sometimes happens that crooks will actually go through random numbers and see if they get a hit. Heck, we do that in my line of work - not with credit card numbers, but phone numbers. (I’ll explain. We’re headhunters, and when trying to recruit people we have to try and get names and to the right person through a gatekeeper, aka receptionist. This tactic isn’t very successful, especially if you don’t know a name. So what we’ll do is after hours, call the main number to a company and the phone tree. 555-1000. Then, if there’s no directory, we’ll start dialing numbers - 555-1001, 555-1002, etc. to see what the voice mail messages say. It’s suprisingly successful.) So it appears that’s what is happening here. So, if anyone gets that weird charge on their credit card bills, it’s fraudulent! Don’t take no for an answer! Make sure you get the fraud department, make sure they close your account and issue you a new card number, and make sure they send you the fraud paperwork.

I got a new card with a new number, my online stuff was transferred to the new number, and I got the paperwork, which I sent in right away. It’s a simple one page easy to understand form, and since the only other thing I was using that card for was my storage unit it was very easy to see what charges are fraudulent. Be vigilant and check your statements carefully!

Good luck to all who have this problem.

Ok, I admit it. I’m a Windows user. Blame it on circumstance - and money. It all started in late 1998 when I came home from work one winter evening. As I was walking through the dark dining room to get to my bedroom, I sensed a large presence in the room with me. I turned on the light and saw a few large boxes taking up the space. Oh, great. Being of the younger generation, I knew that I would be the one who would have to show Dad how to use the darn thing. Problem was, I had very little experience on computers myself at that point. Luckily, I could learn in a hurry. I was at the time working for a temp agency, in their office, and they offered free computer training to all their employees. Since the next day was New Year’s Eve, and we’d have a very slow half day, I asked the boss if I could get on there to at least have a starting point. I learned enough in those couple hours to at least figure out how to turn the thing on and start doing something. But it was definitely a case of the blind leading the blind.

The very little experience I had on computers was using pre-Windows operating systems, mainly DOS. I started in elemntary school (4th and 5th grade) on the Apple IIE learning Basic, typing in commands to make a box or circle or something silly. Back then, I figured computers were a cool toy that didn’t really do much. By high school, I was still using Basic but had moved up to WordPerfect to type the occassional paper. College was pretty much more of the same, and I even got a taste of online then. I used to type in commands to connect to a telnet BBS. I even met a very good friend on there, in a very roundabout way. I was meeting people online before anyone knew how freaky that could be. But back to Dad’s computer. This ran Windows 98. I knew nothing about Windows before that mad rush training session. I knew it was popular. I knew it was run by some hippie tech geek guy in Washington, on the other side of the earth. I knew people bought it like mad - Windows 98 was like the Tickle Me Elmo of its day. Problem was, I had no idea why.

On New Year’s Eve, I got home from work early and did a bit of poking around my room before putting in the order for Chinese food. As I got down to the dining room, I found my dad in there with computer components all around him, empty boxes strewn about, and various cords in his hand. I’ve never seen my Dad look as lost as he did that night. Luckily, I new this part. It’s like doing a puzzle - they all only fit into one place. Today they’re color coded to make things even easier, but it wasn’t that easy then. I still managed to get it plugged in and booted up. We’d be playing with it, then stop for a few minutes to read the useless books that came with, and the screen saver would kick in. It was password protected, and we couldn’t figure out what the password was or how to get rid of it. So I put in a call to my uncle, who had recently purchased a computer of his own. He told me how to remove the password, and we were off and running. Sort of.

There’s only so much one can do with a computer that’s not online yet. By my uncle’s advice, Dad made an appointment with the cable company to get online, but that was a month out. In the meantime, I got very good at playing solitaire and teaching my nephew how to print out all sorts of silly pictures on Paint. I still have some of those pics. Here’s a tip: never let a 5 year old print anything. You’ll go through hundreds of dollars worth of ink cartridges over the course of a month.

Anyway, by the end of January the cable guy had come to the house and gotten us online. All of a sudden I was swallowed in the vortex of cyberspace. I’m still stuck there. I’d go online after my Dad had gone to bed, staying online so long that my mousing hand would freeze stiff. I wrote down tons and tons of websites to visit, and actually visited them. I set up an email account and got into online dating, much to the chagrin of Officer Friend, who insisted on running all these guys through the police department computers rather than letting my trust my instincts. I’m very picky; I may have gotten my heart broken a few times but I’ve never ever put myself in a situation where I felt that danger was at hand. Ok, going off on too many gangents right now. Back to computing.

One night not long after getting the family computer online, my stepmonster asked a favor of me. Since I was obviously at the top of the tech food chain in the household, I was the one everyone turned to whenever there was a problem, despite the fact that I’d only been computing for mere weeks. One night at dinner, my stepmonster opened up IE and a porn page came up. I was appalled. She said, “Now, I know you like looking at this stuff, but can you please put it back the way it was?” I was pissed. At the time no one knew how it got there, but I couldn’t figure out hwo to change it back. So I downloaded Netscape and we began using that. It wasn’t until months later that I learned about the various virii, spyware, and other weird shit that made IE’s homepage reset itself. At least my Dad told her not to yell at me for it, which was nice.

During this time, through various temp jobs and my new reception job at a graphic design firm, I learned that the tech support team can be your very best friends - just be sure to treat them nicely. I learned a lot about what I now know about computers by being nice, doing favors, and picking their brains. Tech geeks are your friends, trust me.

Since I was working at the graphic design firm, I was using a Mac at work all day long. Pretty soon I was more proficient on the Mac than I was on the PC. Also, late in the summer of that year, not long after my niece was born, I moved out of the house and got my own place, so I had no computer at home. My Dad had to learn to email all by himself when I moved out instead of relying on me to do his emailing for him. My mother had also purchased a computer in this time, and after awhile I got tired of my parents calling me up with every single little computer problem they had, so I decided to go out and get myself a computer. I really wanted a Mac - the pretty iMacs had just come out and I really wanted one. But, due to my family pestering me and not understading why I did not know the answers to their problems, I got a PC. For the time, it was a pretty decent machine and it served me well for 5 years.

When that computer was starting to make me nervous because I knew its days were numbered, I bought a new computer. Instead of going to the store, I decided to order one online. Yes, I bought a Dell. I know you tech snobs stare down your noses at Dell, but for an average yoyo like myself, they’re pretty great. Again, I would have preferred to get a Mac, but now I’m working in a PC environment and rely heavily on that standard, so another PC it was. I wanted to specify what I wanted, and I’d heard about their decent customer service, so online I went and picked out what I wanted. I’m pretty happy with it.

Now for the future. I still want a Mac, but one of these years when I get around to getting myself a laptop, a MacBook it will be. I may have a PC for my desktop system, but for a laptop I wouldn’t consider anything else but a Mac.

I also found this article online regarding the upcoming Windows Vista operating system. Seems like it’s got a lot of cool features that will come in handy and bridge the gap a bit between Windows and the easy-as-pie Mac OS X. I like the eye candy features like the improved graphics and widgets for the desktop, which Macs have had for a long time. And my mom would have really liked to have the improved user settings, such as online “curfews” that can be set different for every user, when she had a teenage girl foster child living with her. As for me, I’ll switch to Vista when 2 things happen: 1. most popular software will include Vista in the operating systems they’re compatible with and 2. I can afford to spend money on it and can’t afford not to have Vista due to it becoming a standard.

In the meantime, I’ll still keep coveting my MacBook.

WOOHOO! I did it! I changed my template and got my sidebar the way I want it! Yeah! I’m so happy! Of course, I’m not stupid (see this post), I did back up my old template just in case something really bizarro happens. That kind of foresight is invaluable. But for now I’m just really happy I have a template I like. Except for one little thing: the comments pages show on the old template. I’m thinking something in the code got left out. I’ll play around with that some more to see if I can fix it.