Today, I was going to take my wife out for dinner to celebrate her birthday (which was actually on Dec 21).  We had reservations at a nice Inn with live music for 5:00 PM.  At around 1:30, we had yet to eat lunch, so we were hungry.  The kind of hungry that cannot wait until 5:00.

Scrounging around in our cupboard, we found a can of tuna.  Hmmm... tuna sandwitches are easy and quick and won't get us too full.  Perfect.

Thanks to Charlie the Tuna and his gang, we didn't get to do dinner.  Instead, we found ourselves in the emergency room with a case of food poisoning.  NEVER again will I allow tuna to enter my personal space. 

Right now, I am enjoying the effects of an anti-nausea medication.  Should the medication lose effectiveness before the food-bourne illness leaves my body, I have a backup supply of... anti-nausea suppositories that I can count on to rescue me.

What a way to end the year.

+ruined

If patience is a virtue, then I am not very virtuous.

My life is on the verge of changing drastically for the better.  A new job awaits, a new house, a new state, a new life.  It's the opportunity I've been waiting my entire life for and had given up hope that it would ever happen.  But, out of the blue, the opportunity has arrived.

This opportunity is with a new company that is still in the phase of being formed.  Investors are being gathered, contracts are being drawn, deals are being hammered out with brand-name sponsors (Ford vehicles, for example).  Everything is in place, except for the very final step of getting the investors to sign the dotted line.  That's all we are waiting for.  But, this process is taking seeming centuries to complete.

I cannot wait to give my current job my two-week notice and get on with my life.  To the point, even, that I am having dreams on a nightly basis.  When I wake from these dreams, I'm depressed that those were indeed just dreams.  If life had a fast forward button, I would be happy.

In the mean time, though, I am stuck in a dead end job with a dead end company waiting to finally grab my little slice of Heaven on Earth... waiting with very little patience.

+ruined

They are everywhere.  iPods.  And where there is an iPod, usually iTunes follows. 

iTunes is a very good piece of software.  Of course it is... it's from somebody other than Micro$oft.  There is a major problem with it, though.  That problem is called DRM (Digital Rights Management).

Every song downloaded from iTunes is encoded with FairPlay, which is a type of DRM that allows the following:

• The purchased song can be played on any number of iPod devices.
• The purchased song can be copied to only three (3) "authorised" computers.
• The purchased song can be copied to CD and from there can be ripped to another unprotected format.  As compression imperfections will be copied to the CD, ripping to another lossful file type (MP3, etc.) will result in further degradation of the sound.
• The purchased song can only be copied to CD 7 times before the playlist needs to be changed.

The problem here is, if I shell out some money to buy a song, I should be able to do anything I want to do with that song, as long as it does not violate any copyright laws (such as selling, performing, or any other type of reproduction for profit). 

Enter QTFairUse6.

QTFairUse6 is a free piece of software that converts the protected M4P file downloaded from iTunes to an unprotected M4A file.  Here's how it works.

• Download QTFairUse6. You will need to have Python (a computer programming language) installed in order to use QTFairUse6.
• Install and run QTFairUse6.  When asked if you want to convert your iTunes library, simply type 'y'.
• You now have unprotected files that you can do whatever you wish with. 

Get your money's worth when you purchase music and tell Apple exactly what they can do with their DRM.  Once you buy it, it's yours.

Enjoy your music!

 Shoutz to Ramzi of The Broken for the tip.  You got leet skillz, you hax0r beotch.

+ruined

Tomorrow is my wife's birthday.  Along with the joys of getting older comes another one of life's great joys... renewing license plate tabs.  That's right... the state's way of making you pay through the nose to keep the right to drive your car for another year.

Being the good hubby that I am, I took the responsibility of renewing her plate tabs for her as she attempted to keep the savages she babysits under the reigns of the law.  I entered the Secretary of State's office and took a number.  I was number 25... now serving #17.  C'mon... my lunch is only one hour!

The line moved rather quickly and #24 was up to bat.  She was an elderly lady, perhaps around 117 years old, and barely able to walk without assistance.  She was there to renew her driver's license.  To do so, she had to pass a vision test.

"Place your forehead on the rest and read the line of letters," commanded the lady behind the counter.

The elderly lady placed her forehead on the viewer and responded, "What letters?"

"The letters on the screen," the lady behind the counter patiently explained.

"Oh... those!  Uh, let's see.  'E'... uh, I mean... I guess that's a 'B', isn't it?  Ummm... 'G'... I THINK that's an 'O'... or is it a 'Q'?  I'll go with 'O'.  Uh..."

The vision test went on for a few minutes, each letter a challenge for the customer.  However long it took her to get through the letters, she was passed and granted a 4 year renewal of her license.

Now, I have a problem with this.  If it took her that long to tell an O from a Q, or an E from a B, the pedestrian she is rapidly approaching would be road kill.  I feel that less safe on the roads, now.  Because, somewhere out there is an elderly lady who might not be sure if that's a STOP sign ahead... or is it a "Ice On Bridge" warning?

+ruined

Ah yes... reality shows.  Televised situations that are usually manufactured, but the reactions are supposedly very real.

Even Discovery is taking advantage of reality TV in a different way.  In this show (I will not mention the name of the show to avoid any potential problems), a man braves the elements and goes to the very extreme of human endurance to survive.  Amazing, the things this guy will do to live another day.  Amazing, until I thought of a very basic problem with the show.  What about the camera crew?

SOMEBODY has to operate the video cameras.  SOMEBODY has to record the audio.  This means that he is being followed by a crew of at least 2 or 3 people.  So, that known, we can assume one of three things:

1. The crew following the host are all experts in survival, just like the host.
2. The crew is very lucky to be in the presence of such a survivalist.  Otherwise, they would become a permanent part of the surrounding landscape.
3. The whole show is made up and - even though the host appears to be constantly living on the brink of death, they will soon be in their hotel room wearing fuzzy slippers, tipping back a steaming cup of hot chocolate laced with peppermint schnaps.

Myself, I think theory 3 sounds most plausible.  But that's just me.

+ruined

To carry on with my music theme, I'd like to offer a history of my musical offerings spanning from 1999 to present. 

For a list of songs I have available for download, GO HERE.

To give you an idea of the history of the songs, I will list the names and the year recorded, below:

"Binary" - 2006
"Critical" - 2002
"Man Made" - 2006
"Mind Wipe" - 1999
"Money Machine" - 2002
"Own Worst" - 2000
"Pale Reflection" - 2006
"point_zero" - 2000
"Stripped Away" - 1999
"Struggle" - 1999
"Total Disregard" - 2002
"Virtual Suicide" - 2002

Happy listening.

+ruined

I consider myself a Christian.  Granted, I am not a shining example of what Christ would have been, but I do follow His beliefs and teachings.  As a Christian, I do enjoy certain Christian bands.  Among my favorites are Chevelle, Starflyer 59, and the list goes on.

During my perpetual quest of knowledge that can only be gleened from the pages of the Internet, I ran into a fascinating website titled "Christian Rock Is Evil!".  My assignment to you is read it and come up with your own opinion.

My opinion is that the writer is a few cards short of a deck.  It appears that he takes certain verses of the Bible and perverts their meaning to prove a point that is his, not God's.  However, I cannot speak for God to say that this guy isn't correct.  That said, please read the article and let me know what you think.  I'm especially interested in your opinion, Pastor Dave.

Please keep in mind... the purpose isn't to argue the existance of God, the importance of religion, or any other topic of the such.  The topic here is the article linked, above.

Thanks and looking forward to your thoughts!!!

+ruined

Way back in May, I mentioned a potential change in careers from what I do now (Computer Programmer) to what I actually went to college to do (Multimedia Production).  The company that wanted to bring me on board is one signature away from being realised. 

The specifics of my employement have been offered.  The salary will be twice what I make, now.  Benefits include a retirement package, full insurance (health, vision, dental, life), reasonable flexibility in work schedule, and... a house.  They are buying us a house!!!  Since we're packing up our lives and relocating to a whole new area (just outside of NYC), they say that it's the least they can do to smooth out the transition.

One slight problem.  We need to furnish the home.  What we have in mind is contemporary furnitur that is yet elegant.  I've been killing Google's search page looking for furniture manufacturers to get a specific style in mind, but I'm having a terrible time trying to find manufacturers.  All I find are sites that link to other sites that link to advertising sites.  Annoying cycle of advertisers.

Does anybody have a favorite furniture manufacturer that they may be able to recommend to me?  I'm looking for all rooms... Living Room, Family Room, Great Room, Bed Rooms (girls and master), and Dining, so the more types of furniture they offer, the better.

Thanks for your suggestions!

+ruined

I should rename my blog "Customer Disservice".  What ever happened to something as simple as customer service?

The financial institution that holds my savings and checking account is a credit union.  I gave up on banks because of customer service issues of their own.  Until recently, my credit union has been a pleasure to work with.

Yesterday, I stopped by Wendy's to order lunch.  My debit card was rejected, much to my surprise.  So, I paid by credit card and proceeded to head north a couple of blocks to my credit union.  As it turns out, I had $1,986 removed from my account that was reimbursed to me because of a fraudulant charge to my account in July from Jamaica.  Apparently, I didn't fill out the appropriate affidavits.  I argued that I DID fill out the affidavit and returned it to THIS VERY BRANCH!  The teller said she recognized me and remembered the situation.  So, she researched the problem and found out that I only signed 1 of 3 affidavits required.  I never received the other 2... just the one that I signed.  So, with the other affidavits signed, they said that my money will be available first thing this morning.

As of 9:25 AM, still no money.  I called to get an ETA and talked to the very lady who reversed my account.  She was nothing short of rude saying that she has to go through her mailbag, which is much more important than restoring the money that is rightfully mine to my account.

As rude as she was, and as sick of customer disservice as I am, I am quite tempted to contact corporate headquarters and raising unholy haides.  I'm sick of the consumer getting the short end of the deal.  It's time Corporate America bends over and takes it up the pipe.

+ruined

Some time ago, back when I used to post on a somewhat frequent basis, I wrote several posts about trying to find some sort of "high speed" Internet.  When all options were exhausted, I finally settled for HughesNet satellite Internet.

I've been a HughesNet customer for nearly a year, now.  I must say... HughesNet is one company that knows how to disappoint.  In the 11 months I've been a subscriber, the service has worked correctly for all of 2 months.  July and August were great.  Since then, I've been experiencing some strange problems.

In the morning, my service works great.  Out of the possible 1000Kbps download speeds possible, I usually get around 995Kbps.  Pretty good.  The later it gets, the slower my Internet gets.  At times, around 8:00 PM, my speed is around 60Kbps... barely over dial-up speeds.  For $70.00 a month, this is completely unacceptable.

It's been like this for 3 months, now.  Several calls to tech support, several installers on site to figure out the problem, and a stolen re-installation disc from one of those installers, the problem still exists.  They say it's a hardware issue, but if that's the case, wouldn't the problem exist all of the time... not just in the evening?  If you ask me, it sounds like they have me pointed to an overused satellite. 

$70.00 a month... and for what?  Half-working Internet service.  Where is technology when you need it?

+ruined