Aaack...

I know...I know...I started something and it stands out there unfinished. But I have a good excuse: the dog ate my homework. No, actually I do have a good excuse: computer problems. First, my 6 month old ASUS stopped recognizing its hard drive. I ordered a new one (a great big 2TB Samsung SATA), but, when it arrived, there was no joy. The ASUS still wouldn't recognize this one either. So, I took drives and computer to Roger at PC Warehouse (Roger has helped me in the past with computer repairs beyond my ability) and he confirmed that the computer was, in fact, OK, and that it was the drives that were not working correctly. Fine.

I sent the Samsung back to the vendor with a request to replace. The replacement arrived and it too would not work. The ASUS BIOS kept giving me varying information about the capacity of the drive. It got it right about 3/4 of the time. But, when I tried to load Windows from the DVD, the setup program steadfastly refused to recognize the drive. So, with tears in my eyes, I sent this one back to Samsung with a request for a drive that actually has been tested and is known to work. When that one comes, I'll put it in the ASUS and determine once and for all whether it is the drive or the computer that is failing on me.

Howver, this is not the end of my problems. While the ASUS is doing a strong imitation of a doorstop, I have fallen back to using my 8 year old (MOL) Dell as my primary computer. Until yesterday. Yesterday, we had a power outage that, for the computer at least, lasted about 5 hours. (I unplugged it when the power failed, then spiked on and failed again. I didn't want surges to damage anything...) So, when I got home from work for dinner and plugged it in...nada! My guess is that the battery backup for the BIOS failed. (I am guessing that because I did get a warning about low battery the last time I turned the machine completely off.)

So, I am now down to my Linux laptop. All my stuff that I had on my Windows machines is locked up on HD's that I cannot get to. This is what I get for ignoring battery warnings and for not having this machine connected to my Windows network.

I'm going to give Roger a call to see if there is anyway he can get the old Dell back up and running. If that is a "yes", maybe by the end of the week, I'll be back in business. Also, the suspect HD reached Samsung yesterday, so, maybe, I'll have my replacement back by the end of the week as well.

Oh yeah, and my desk chair also died. I am not having a good month so far...I will get back to discussing the failings of the Tea Party as soon as I get past all of this...damn.

Tea Party agenda

Thomas Jefferson said, “"I hope that we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country,” As proven by the rise of the Tea Party, which gains virtually all of its real economic strength from corporate sources, we haven’t yet succeeded in this goal.

OK, My bad…I didn’t pay as much attention to the Tea Party and Sarah Palin over the past few months as I should have. I especially didn’t pay attention to their so called Contract with America, and I should have. I should have because it is one of the most seditious documents ever foisted upon the American public. Of course, the only reason most Americans did not reject it outright is because these are the same people who have been dumbing down our public education system over the past generation or so. When I went to school in the middle of the 20th Century, we were taught more than just facts. We were taught how to solve problems and how to judge the written word. However, these same folks who now control the strings of the Tea Party are the same folks who have been leading the attack on our public education system over the past generation or so. And now we are seeing the fruits of this dumbing down process: the American public can’t recognize when it is being raped and sold down the river into perpetual servitude.

So, since it appears that there is a significant portion of our electorate which cannot engage in critical thinking when it comes to…politics, I will try to do it for them, and I’ll do it in order. (All of the following is quoted from The Wikipedia article on the Tea Party.)

Number 1: Identify constitutionality of every new law: Require each bill to identify the specific provision of the U.S. Constitution that gives Congress the power to do what the bill does. (82.03%)

Well, this is just plain stupid. First of all, if a law is questioned about its Constitutionality, the correct course of action is to take it to the courts. That is what the Federal Court system is for. Second, if you take a minute (because that is about all the time it takes) to read Section 8 (Powers of Congress) you’ll see that it is broad and vague enough to cover a great deal. For example, take this: “To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;” Basically, this gives Congress the right to enact laws that govern any economic activity whose effects cross state borders. That, my Conservative friends, includes activities which pollute the air and any lakes and/or rivers which touch two or more states. More to the point, every prospective law introduced to Congress goes through a vetting process which included a check of its constitutionality. Again, sometimes laws are passed which do not meet the criteria of constitutionality as set forth by the Supreme Court. Which is why we have such a court and which is why laws that don’t pass that Court are quashed. If you have a problem with constitutionality, take it to the court.

Number 2: Reject emissions trading: Stop the "cap and trade" administrative approach used to control carbon dioxide emissions by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of carbon dioxide. (72.20%)

This has nothing to do with constitutionality, this has to do with the cost of not polluting our environment. The Tea Party is simply fronting from their masters here. Besides, this is a market based method for controlling pollution that does not require government funding. What the Tea Party is proposing is simply another government program designed to benefit the wealthy and powerful at the expense of all the rest of us. Check the link to “cap and trade” above if you need more information on the subject.

Numbers 3 & 4: Demand a balanced federal budget: Begin the Constitutional amendment process to require a balanced budget with a two-thirds majority needed for any tax modification. (69.69%)

Simplify the tax system: Adopt a simple and fair single-rate tax system by scrapping the Internal Revenue Code and replacing it with one that is no longer than 4,543 words – the length of the original Constitution. (64.9%)

These two are actually part and parcel of each other. Of course, the agenda here is the eventual repeal of any taxes that impinge upon the wealthy, which would leave the government without the means it needs to govern effectively. That would mean that the rich could begin to carve up this country into their own personal fiefdoms. In which case, just guess who would end up down at the bottom of the socio-economic-political ladder? That’s right, the other 95% of the population, and that, I would guess, pretty much means you, gentle reader. One of the things our Founding Fathers were united in their rejection of was the creation of an aristocratic class. Dump progressive income tax and estate taxes on the great fortunes, and it would take only a generation to create such an aristocracy. Think about it.

OK, we’ll continue this in my next post. In my next post I will look at items 5 through 7.

Amazing stuff

If we are smart, there is a way out of the environmental mess we have gotten ourselves into. I was watching one of the handyman networks...DIY I think, where they were talking about some emerging technologies that (IMHO) hold a great deal of promise. The first thing they showed me was solar panels made pretty much out of the same stuff they make car bumpers out of. Basically, the photo-voltaic cells are embedded in plastic which is then molded into whatever shape is needed. The sheets on the show were made to follow the profile of barrel tiles, but, if you can do that, then you can make 'em fit any roof profile. These things are weatherproof and have and estimated life of at least 35 years. That means the homeowner gets about 25 years of straight profit from his roof.

The other product highlighted was a heat pump designed to remove heat from the fridgid air of our northern latitudes in winter. They showed a unit that could heat/cool and 1800 ft^2 home for about $1000 per year. In other words, this heat pump is a hugely more efficient use of energy. Instead of using fossil fuels to heat one's home, use electricity, preferably created by those solar panels on one's roof, to run this heat pump. Even if you are using electricity produced by burning fossil fuels, it is still more efficient than using that fuel in individual home furnaces.

Now all we have to do is get the Tea Party to see the light.

We're doomed...unless we can keep them the hell out of Washington, D.C.. Come November, do your part by voting AGAINST all Tea Party candidates. I don't care who you vote for as long as you don't vote for anybody endorsed by the Tea Party and/or Sarah Palin.

Another bit of proof that your banker is your friend.

The time between when you write a check and when the money is taken out of your checking account (also known as float) is now down to zero. If you write a check at someplace like my employer (a major big box specialty retailer), the check goes into the cash register and “BOOM” the cash leaves your account. Right then and there. There is no more two or three day grace period for checks.

However, this is still not true for the checks you deposit to your account at the bank. Show up with anything other than a paycheck or a government check, and you have to wait a few days for the money to show up in your account. That means that the bank has free use of your money from the time you deposit the check until the time it finally appears in your account. Now, you can’t tell me that banks that process E-checks for merchants can’t do the same for their customers. If I don’t have a float period anymore, then the banks shouldn’t have one either.

‘Nuff said….

Junk Mail

There is something wrong with this: I just went and looked at the Junk Mail folder for Thunderbird. This is the junk mail that gets through the filtering process provided by my various mail servers. Thunderbird has instructions to delete junk mail after 30 days. That provides me an opportunity (seldom taken) to review what is in my junk folder just in case Thunderbird made a mistake. Today was one of those rare occasions that I did look, but I wasn’t looking because I thought Thunderbird made a mistake. No, I was looking for another reason entirely.

I went and checked my junk mail folder because Thunderbird told me there were 862 unopened emails in that folder. That is 862 offers for Viagra and other worthless dreck. That 862 doesn’t include the regular ads I get from places like Amazon, Buy.com etc.- ads that I glance at before moving one.

All I can do is shake my head and marvel at the venality of the human race. First, the greed, avarice and lust (3/4 of these have to do with sex in one way or another) of the people flooding the net with these broadcast emails. Second, the stupidity and/or desperation of the people who actually answer these ads has to be enough to make it profitable to keep sending them out. And that is the key. If people just stopped answering these things, sooner or later the spammers out there would run out of money, or just get discouraged from the lack of results, and they would stop.

Yeah…like that would ever happen.

Teacher Unions

Yesterday, there was a piece, actually the cover story, in the Times Sunday Magazine about education reform and teachers' unions which I think provides a pretty good look at the need for educational reform and the role the teachers’ unions have in blocking truly meaningful reform. What I come away from the article with is that the major impediments for the unions are accountability, teacher evaluation and tenure.

The unions fight tooth and nail to preserve tenure, seniority and the lack of accountability on the part of teachers for student progress. In effect, the unions are working hard to protect the jobs of poor and mediocre teachers. The problem is that there are too many of those in the unions to make it easy to get around them. Remember the old saw, “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.” or, “If you can’t get a real job, you can always teach.” Teaching was always considered a fall-back option for new college graduates looking for work. In the past, too many positions in the public schools have been filled by…well, let’s just say that they were/are not our best.

The thing is, if you are a good teacher, if you are one of those people who former students remember fondly as being agents of change in their lives, then you shouldn’t have to worry about any of this. And, from what I can see of all the reform efforts, if you are a good teacher, you will end up being paid well; at least better than you are being paid now.

So, what is needed is a new type of teacher’s union. This union should be limited to good teachers. And don’t kid yourselves, the teachers out there know which among them are good and which are mediocre, or worse. Give the teachers in these unions grievance mediation tools, protection from abuse, of any kind, from supervisors and the ability to bargain for anything not connected to tenure. Set up an evaluation process which utilizes independent evaluators who have no connection to the teachers/school district being evaluated. Then let’s see what kind of data we get from tracking teachers who are considered “good” to “excellent.” I’ll bet that a few years of headlines detailing the progress and benefits to the kids this arrangement brings will be enough to sound the death knell to the unions which protected the incompetent teachers.

Copyright, continued

Ars Technica has another article. posted today, about copyright infringement/piracy. Now, while I have no problem with creative people getting compensated for their creativity, I do have a problem with how we, as a culture, are dealing with this. First of all, most of us do our jobs using some degree of creativity to get things done, and we don’t get paid in an ongoing stream for past work. I also have a problem with people who did not create anything owning copyrights and extracting ongoing revenue streams out of them.

As an example, take the music industry. A better model for this industry would be for the labels to charge the artists for recording and marketing without having any ownership rights in the created product. It would be up to the artist (or the artist’s business manager-a paid employee of the artist) to manage the income flow. The artist could then pick and choose which services he/she/it (bands) wanted to purchase from the label. I would much rather pay the artist directly for tracks and cut out the “suits” completely. With the evolution of the Internet, this business model is much more sustainable. In fact, as far as the music industry is concerned, I think this is where the future lies. For now, I buy my music on a “per track” basis from Amazon. I’m not thrilled, but it is the best I can do right now.

Arrrgggghhhh

I swear that I am going to go postal one of these days. For the past week, it seems that almost every one on the road has forgotten all they once knew (which of itself was precious little) about the art of driving an automobile. Consequently, all of these people drive very, very badly, and that, in turn, causes me (who is stuck behind them) to begin to curse uncontrollably. This is not good. I refer you to John Brunner’s book Stand on Zanzibar and the term “berserker”.

Actually, to digress, the above book is really, really good, and it gets more relevant by the day. It was originally published in 1968, and it was disturbing then. Now, with the world’s population doubled from that time, we are getting closer and closer to the kind of future Brunner envisioned. Anyhow, I highly recommend this book…just as I highly recommend not driving in New Jersey.

*Gah!!*

Economic Recovery

It strikes me that, as fast as the private sector is adding jobs, the public sector is shedding them. Either that or freezing salaries/wages or instituting involuntary "furloughs". Anyhow, any good being done in the private sector is being undone by the fiscal conservatives in public office. Also, as was so elegantly proven during the Reagan years, trickle down economics just doesn't  work, so all those huge pay packages and bonuses going to the top couple percent of the population just plain doesn't make its way to the general economy.

And all of this explains why something like 80% of the population does not trust the economy or the earnest protestations by both the government and the mouthpieces of the rich when they tell us things are getting better. From where most of us sit, things are not getting better.

Oh, by-the-way, the organizers of the "Tea Party" are part of the problem, not part of the cure. They are, in fact, all in favor of concentrating wealth to the detriment of the quality of life for the vast majority of the population. Give them their way, and the middle class will vanish from America. We will become a nation of aristocrats and peasants/proletariat. The trend markers are already there; one just has to take the blinders off to see this is true.

The sun room project

So, it is official: it is one year since we closed on our refi and immediately cut a check to the people who had sold us the sun room. It was not a small check. We had used the refi to clean up about 90% of our credit card debt and to pay for this addition to the house. The room was to be built where our patio was. I had plans to re-use the stone to make a new patio between then sun room and the pool. This is one view of the patio, and this is another.

I figured that, after giving the builders almost 50%, I would have a sun room up in three to four weeks. We would have the room built by June and the patio re-laid by 4th of July. Silly me!! May went, and there was no room…hell, there was no communication. Ditto June, July and August. Needless to say, I was getting a little perturbed.

By September, my calls to Tristate Building Specialties of Lakewood, NJ were getting strident. I was at the point of demanding our money back, when word trickled down that they would be arriving soon to prep the site (that meant getting rid of the patio and sinking the foundation piers.) Actually, the above pictures were taken in September just before work was due to begin.

The next post in this series will show the first flurry of work.

RIP Moore’s Law?

Well, this is interesting. From what I can glean from tthis Ars Technica article Moore’s Law, which has defined computer hardware miniaturization since the late ‘60s, is pushing up against physical limits. The speed/power/memory-doubles-every-18-months equation is finally running up against its limits. That is going to have major economic and psychological ramifications across our society.

My, my….

Quarterly Traffic Report

Well, here in Central New Jersey, the already crowded traffic conditions are being even further exacerbated by what seems to be a new infusion of really bad drivers. These road hazards come in every age, sex, nationality and ethnic category. In other words, poor driving cuts across almost every demographic known or extant.

Of course, I have a bias when I talk about poor driving. To me, good driving involves getting from point A to point B in the least amount of time safely practical. That means, if there is an empty road in front of you, you crowd the speed limit by five mph or so. It does not mean that you drive like a TransAm driver, it means that you go as fast as you can safely pilot your vehicle. (Note: “Safely” means avoiding both collisions with other objects and avoiding encounters with the police. Safe driving also means avoiding traffic tickets.)

I’ll admit that I tend to drive a little too fast. I’ve been lucky in that I have not actually gotten a speeding ticket in the past 30 years because there have been times when I’ve been caught pushing the envelope some. There have been a couple warnings and one instance where I was given a non-driving ticket (obscured license plate) in lieu of a speeding ticket…but I still have lucked out with 0 points against my license for over 30 years. However, for the most part, I drive well, if a little fast. I try to flatten corners and I try very hard to drive in the future. By that I mean that I am always thinking about what is coming up…what will I have to do or react to five seconds from now…or a minute from now.

Yesterday, I was driving on a multilane highway, when a car in the far left lane suddenly swerved across three lanes of traffic in order to make an exit that was well signed for the previous mile or so. The traffic circle that is between my home and my place of employment has at least a couple accidents a week because somebody does something stupid. I treat Yield signs with the utmost suspicion because most New Jersey drivers pay either little or no heed to them or far too much heed. Too often I see drivers sail through Yield signs with their eyes firmly fixed on the road in front of them, paying no attention to what is coming into the intersection. Either that scenario or the opposite where drivers treat Yield signs as a form of Stop sign. In either case, those drivers are asking to be involved in a collision. 

*sigh*

Driving used to be fun. It isn’t so much anymore….

E rides her bike

My granddaughter finally learned how to ride a bike. It took coercion. But, after considerable output from a world class drama queen, we got to see and then we got to see and finally, as her grandfather tried to keep up on foot All in all, a pretty good day.

The Evil Empire wins again.

OK, I admit that I am biased against Microsoft. I think they are too powerful and some products, like Vista, are deeply flawed. However, sometimes they do get it right. Windows Live Writer here, is a case in point. I now can open a blank window with just a mouse click. I can insert links and pictures into my post with just a few more mouse clicks. And, when I am finished, one more click publishes and brings up my blog in a separate window. Microsoft did, indeed, get this one right. I’m hooked…and this is from a confirmed Microsoft basher.

Pointy little heads

The “pointy headed” people were down in front of the post office yesterday. They had their signs beating on Obama and comparing him to Hitler…and they haven’t a clue that the conservative leaders are really the slave masters. These dupes have allowed themselves to be purchased, body, mind and soul, by the people who long for the good old days of feudalism when the lords of the manor (them) owned every thing and everyone else (us).

The more I see of the Tea Party movement, the more I think of the KKK in days gone by. These people are seeing the white America of their dreams (because that particular view of America never was a reality) fade even further into the mist, and they are watching their perceived grasp on the reins of power slip away. The laughable fact of the matter is, however, that they actually have much more in common with their perceived “enemies” (ie. Blacks, Hispanics, Asians and Indians (both kinds) than they do with their purported “leaders” (read: masters).

As an example, the cost of using mass transit in New Jersey is about to take a large step upwards. Mass transit is how large numbers of the white blue and white collars workers get to work. Their leaders get to work in limos or their own luxury SUVs, and they don’t care that gasoline will cost over $3.00 a gallon for regular this summer. Lower taxes, and the wealthy get most of the benefit while those lower on the wealth ladder end up paying the freight. But those poor, pathetic white males who make up most of the Tea Party just don’t see it.

So, you were wondering about the title of this blog….

I was up at my mother’s house the other day, when I happened to look out the window. What, you might wonder did I see? Well, how about this

or maybe his Momma

or perhaps his two siblings

Yep, we’ve got a family of a mom and three kits living under the swimming pool. A couple years ago, a family of groundhogs dug out a home there, but it seems the fox family has disposed them and taken up residence.

It’s going to be a good spring!

This is just plain wrong

So, I’m playing with Windows Live on the new ‘puter, and I stumble across this headline (I had to scroll down my home page to see that there were news headlines already there…) about J.P. Morgan’s 1st quarter profits. I think they are obscene. I also think that this is just another instance of wealth being withdrawn from the greater economy for the benefit of a very few. Personally, I would like to see these profits taxed at…oh, say about a 95% marginal rate for all profit over 100 million per quarter. Unless, of course, the bank can document that it has lent this money out at sub-prime interest rates to small businesses and to individuals to refinance toxic mortgages. If Morgan can prove that it is reinvesting these huge profits back in the economy where they are needed, then more power to them. If, on the other hand, they are using these profits to pay hugely obscene bonuses to a very few, then I say tax the profits and the bonuses at confiscatory rates. Screw ‘em!!

Shame on us

Actually, its shame on the Republicans and their fellow travelers. The hysteria surrounding the fact that we now will provide health care for every citizen is showing the world what our national character is. Those who are protesting against the bill are proving to the rest of the human race just how degraded our society and our people have become.

Those who oppose the bill because of its potential (not actuality, mind you) to fund abortions seem to overlook the fact that this is going to save lives which would otherwise be lost. Now, what they are telling us is that a potential life has more value that an actual living, breathing human being. Come again? The insanity of this is beyond belief.

The rest of the the Bill's opponents oppose it, I think, because they are selfish and don't want to share their level of access to the medical profession. So, we have a bunch of selfish assholes allied with a bunch of certifiably insane people opposing the idea that we, as citizens, have a certain obligation towards each other. Therefore, it is up to the rest of us to make sure that we defend and protect the ability of all our citizens to access good, competent Health Care services.

'Nuff said....

Health Care and Cable-TV

We really are a poor excuse for a civilized society. For a long time I had no clue how somebody could get all frothed up about making sure that their fellow citizens have a reasonable access to health care. And then it hit me: these people see health care as a scarce commodity and they don't want to risk losing their current level of access to the pie. In other words, they are purely selfish.

To which I say "screw 'em". We are all in this thing together, so we should all have access to health care. If giving the 40 million of us who don't have minimum insurance access at that level means that I have to wait a little longer for non-emergency care, then so be it.  Frankly, I think the trend over the past 30+ years vis-a-vis income distribution in this country needs to be reversed. The rich have too much and the rest of us are struggling for our share of an ever shrinking pie. The individual wealthier members of our society need to start paying back in for all the benefits they have gleaned from our "freedom". And, while we're at it, the entertainment industry (and that includes professional sports) needs to have their wings trimmed a little also.

Here's something to think about: Cablevision has 24 million subscribers. If the average monthly cable portion of their bill is $30(and I think this is low, but let's be conservative), that means Cablevision is raking in some $720 million per month just for cable-tv services. Now consider that Cablevision, for all its numbers, still does not control even 50% of the market, so the actual amount of money that goes out from subscribers on a monthly basis is actually in the billions. And this does nothing for the advancement of...well, anything other that the wealth flowing to the entertainment sector. Now, I'm not sure how we do this, but my gut tells me that this sector needs to pay the country back for what they have been looting for the past...what? 30 years? Sounds good to me...

quick computer update

I updated Opera to version 10.51 and everything is working fine now. Whatever was slowing things down seems to have gone away. *shrug* Yeah...that's right...I fixed it...yep, all me...and I'm sticking to that version.

New Computer update

Well, I had the new computer for about three weeks when, one day, I shut it down to do a hard reboot for some reason, and, when I when to turn it back on by pressing the on/off switch on the front, I found it would not turn back on. So, I called the people who sold me the machine, and they immediately gave me an RMA to send it back. Which I did at my own expense (grumble). In due course they send me a replacement which arrived at my doorstep last week.

I plugged all the various cables into the box and hit the power supply switch in the back and then the on/off button in front. Nothing. Not a peep. Zip! Zero! I was not at all happy.The next day after work, I called the retailer and got a very nice woman on the phone who said that she would be happy to give me another RMA, but perhaps I might like to talk to tech support first. After a moment's consideration, I accepted that offer, and was promptly transferred to tech support. One of the reasons I hadn't opened the first computer to see if there was anything user fixable inside is that Asus has a seal on the case that states that the warranty is void if the seal is broken. I told this to the nice young (I assume) man who answered the tech line. He told me not to worry: he would take care of that.

With that assurance, I popped the case and the first thing that I noticed was that the power lead from the power supply to the motherboard was not connected. I mentioned this to my "mentor" who allowed as how it might be good to plug it in. When that was done, a little green light went on at the bottom of the motherboard. I was excited! However, my hopes were dashed almost immediately when pressing the on/off switch still produced no results. After poking around a bit, my guy has me pop the front panel. Well, this is something I wouldn't have thought about. Seems that the on/off button actually wasn't the actual switch. That was a little white plastic piece seated in the computer's frame. When I pressed the switch with a screwdriver, it worked...the computer turned on. For some reason the button was not activating the switch. Well, from here on it looked like I was going to have to come up with a unit specific work around, so I thanked my tech support guy for all his help, and settled in to figure out how to make the power button work.

In the course of my poking and prodding, I pushed on the switch one more time...and it popped right out of its seat. Turns out the problem was that the switch had not been fully inserted in its seat. Either that or it had somehow been popped loose. In any event, after I figured out how I could get my fingers in to where they needed to be, it only took a firm push to pop the switch into place, where it seated with a satisfying "click". Since then, it has been working just fine. It is fast and reasonably powerful, but I added something from CNN to my browser the other day when I was watching the House vote on Health Care reform that they say impoves the streaming video experience. However, since loading that plug-in, my display has been slow. I'll have to work on that next. Also, I really don't like Vista. It is just awkward and cludgy.

Life continues....

Music

Music is important to me. In fact, my most persistent desire is for my life to run with a continuous soundtrack in the background. No mater what else I might be doing, there would be good music rolling underneath. One of my great disappointments in this life is that over-the-air radio (and I am talking about FM; I haven't listened to AM since I was in high school mid-twentieth century) has degenerated to the point that it is virtually irrelevant. I listen to CD's or MP-3's in my car; I listen to my MP-3 player when I'm out of the house and not in my car; I listen to Internet Radio at home. All are vastly superior to what is currently offered over the air. (Aside: OK, there are still some radio stations out there who play good music. Most of 'em are college stations. But, for the most part, they are all down at the bottom of the frequency range and of lowish power.

So, for the past six or seven years I have been listening to Radio Paradise over the Internet. Bill and Rebecca Goldsmith have been programming great music over the Internet for the last ten years, and I am truly grateful that I found them. I find Bill's programming matches my musical tastes about 80% of the time...and that's a pretty good average. The one thing, though, that I have been becoming a little uncomfortable with for the past year or two is that I am only hearing what Bill plays. Back in the day, I listened to WNEW-FM out of New York City. There were at least 7 or 8 distinct personalities playing music back then, so you would hear different stuff virtually all the time. Sure, they had a basic playlist, but it wasn't like today where the playlist is engraved in stone. Back then, the station's basic playlist may have accounted for 50% of what was played. The other 50% was made up of emerging acts, old stuff that hadn't topped the "Hit Parade", tracks off albums that were not the big hit pieces and weird shit that came out of who knows where. Thing is, I heard a lot of music back then that I wouldn't have heard if I were listening to only one programmer.

I think I have finally found a way to correct this problem. I am now subscribing to Pandora in addition to keeping up my listener support contributions to Radio Paradise. I am going to alternate days with one day going to Radio Paradise and the next going to Pandora. Today is a Pandora day and I have to say that Pandora plays pretty good music. You tell 'em what music and which artists you like and then the play those and others who make similar music. The thing about Pandora is that you can create a bunch of different radio stations with different themes and artists. You can have a soft rock, hard rock, couintry rock, folk, classical and stations that mix genres. Then you can listen to one station for a while before switching to another station that is also programmed for you.

I highly recommend both Radio Paradise and Pandora to any and all out there. And for the jerks at the RIAA, let me say that, for the most part, I listen to the streaming music. However, I do buy about 10 tracks a month to add to the MP-3 player. If at all possible, I buy directly from the artist's web site in the faint hope that most of my purchase price will go to the artist and not to the parasitic suits. Also, to the jerks at the RIAA and the jerks at ClearChannel (or whoever it is who has bought up a huge chunk of the broadcast stations out there) I want to say that one of the major reasons music sales are down is because the vibrant diversity of what was presented to us back in the heyday of vinyl just isn't here anymore. However, places like Radio Paradise and Pandora begin to fill the void...at least when I have an Internet connection.

I just have a little more work to do around the house to get my music into where it needs to go, and I will have a soundtrack at least when I'm home...and that's a good start.

spend, spend, spend....doing my part to boost the economy

I did it. I dithered and dithered for weeks, and then I made the plunge. I bought an ASUS CM5570 (refurbished) which has a pretty fast CPU and 6gigs of RAM. Now, I am, for the moment, stuck with Windows Vista (Home Premium), but I am thinking about going to Windows 7 ASAP. That move will be determined by what the upgrade costs me. If Microsoft is gonna gouge (and I can't finagle something CHEAP), I'll suffer through with Vista for a while. In other words, any upgrade to Windows 7 will be strictly determined by price.

After our conversation of about a month ago about how my old Dell was starting to do weird things and how I needed a new desktop machine...and she said that she was OK with this if I could do it for under $500, I haven't raised the issue again. When this little box showed up for like $421, with all that RAM, a big hard drive and an NVidia video card, I just couldn't resist. However, I haven't specifically mentioned that this is actually a done deal. I'm waiting to see how long it takes for either her to notice that I seem to have a new toy, or to finally ask if I am happy with my new machine (you know, letting me know that she knows...).

Of course, there is a small caveat at work here. While the 'puter did cost less than $500. I had to replace the monitor as well. I had two monitors die within two weeks of each other. I took the 22" Gateway in to someone who works on flat screen TVs and asked what it would cost to fix it. His answer was somewhere between $120 and $150. Well, I had originally purchased that monitor for $129 about 8 months ago. And I knew that I could get a new flat screen monitor for about the same cost...so I did. I found an nice 22" Dell that was going for $139 to replace the Gateway. The guy at the shop told me that it was just not cost effective to repair these bits of technology. So, the next time my town has an electronics recycling day, I will contribute two flat screen monitors, one 17" and  one 22". I would have been much happier fixing these because I'm sure that what failed in each is a relatively small and inexpensive part.

Ah well, such is life in Babylon...

Hack, Hack...wheeze....

I've had this damn cold for a month now. It is starting to bore me. It sorta migrates around my body...stuffed up nose this week; cough next week; impacted ears the following week; and then it starts over again. I just can't seem to kick it. I mean, I don't feel all that bad other than the fact I'm blowing my nose ever three minutes, my eyes are watering and I have this ongoing cough. Other than that, I don't feel bad at all. *sigh*

Of course, this means I can't go near my Mom who is at her new rehab facility. There are signs all over the place saying something to the effect that if you have a cold, stay the hell out. So, when I called to see how she was doing this morning, when she heard me coughing she told me to stay home today. I was happy to oblige. Of course, work is another thing entirely. We are staffed so thin that any call-out puts a heavy strain on store management. So, I go in today to pass my germs on to a cross section of the area's population. Just call me patient zero.

Isn't this fun? I said I'd post more, and this is the first of many. I've decided to post what would be journal entries (if I kept a journal) in the absence of more profound subject matter. And now I have to go pull myself together for work...

Greed and avarice, Part 1

Catchy title, that. I can see it easily reaching Part 1,000,000 very quickly if I allowed myself to catalogue every instance that I run across. However, today I will limit myself to commenting upon the Amazon/McMillan Publishers pricing controversy. Basically, Amazon prices new and bestseller ebooks at $9.99 apiece. McMillan wants Amazon to sell its ebooks for $12.99 to $14.99. Now, I assume that Amazon's cut of the price is not changing (ie. they are not getting a bigger payout per book), so this means that McMillan is hoping to get $3 to $5 more per book rolling into its coffers. If McMillan sells 10,000 ebook copies of a book, that means it makes an extra $50,000 for one that sells for $14.99.

Personally, I find that offensive. McMillan is, basically, picking my pocket to line theirs. I mean, it is not like it suddenly costs $5 more per copy to produce and ebook. No, the cost of an ebook all lies in writing and editing. After that, the cost per copy is negligible. In fact, I would suggest that the people at McMillan run out and get themselves a copy of Chris Anderson's "Free". As it is, I can see the pirate flags unfurling across the Internet. I would guess (hope) that McMillan's revenue from all sources begins to slide. And, if furtherance of that hope, I am calling for a retail boycott of all McMillan products. I also call for McMillan's authors to demand that their publisher cease and desist this larceny of their readers.

'Nuff said...

New Year's Resolutions

Ok, here it is, February, and I am just getting around to New Year's Resolutions. Although, in my defense, there have been extenuating circumstances...which I won't bore the world with. However, I am now ready to deal with my resolves for 2010. In addition to those which primarily affect only me, I am going to make a concerted effort to post more here. (Yeah, yeah...I know that this is not world shaking news considering how few people know this blog exists.While the major reason I will be writing more is that it is something I need to do if only to keep my mind exercised, it does have the potential to impinge upon the lives of other people.

So, let's see if I can bring my average up to...oh, let's go crazy here and aim for...three posts a week. Three posts of at least one paragraph (each containing at lest four sentences, on average) per week is not an overreaching goal. Obviously, this post, as a precursor, doesn't count. So, that means I need to write something else today. Let us (me) begin.