Blog updates for random

10.11.06

Definition of a Pastcaster

Pronunciation: 'past-kas-t&r
past·cast·er noun

1 : One who through an unintentional circumstance, verbally disseminates to those within a close environment, information that has been well established and accepted as truth by the group involved, though unbeknownst to the original disseminator, thus creating an awkward situation for that one.

6.7.06

Me and cockroaches don't get along

I got my first grill last year. Just a 22" Weber, nothing fancy. Seems that I find myself grilling about every weekend. Most of that time was practice in not burning the hotdogs. This past Monday was no different, except it wasn't a weekend. I threw some turkey dogs on the grill and was hoping to get my bratwurst done as well.

"Hoping" you ask? Yes, hoping because it was already dusk when I started...and stuff starts coming out at night.

Just as I started to turn over the first batch of dogs, I seen this biggole, two-inch roach chilling out on my deck's railing. Natually I blew it off and heard it hit the dirt below. A few seconds later, I see it fly up and around the roof.

About a minute later, I see another biggle one just crawling on the deck below. UGH! Fortunately the dogs were about done, so I kick him away and head inside for a sec. Before I go, I shake my shirt and pants to get rid of anything that may have gotten on me.

After about 5 min, I go back outside to grab the dogs off the grill. Biggole roach #3 (as far as I know) flys around my head. I swat it away, grab the dogs, shake off my clothes and take them inside.

While I'm telling the wife and sis-in-law what was happening, I start to feel something crawling around. I rubbed my neck and shook my shirt...Nothing. Felt it again, so I shook more vigerously and out flew that roach!

It landed on the wall and just looked at us. That was the last look, 'cause as the title says, "me and cockroaches don't get along."

5.31.06

Unintentional accent slip

I don't know if this is funny or sad. Today I found myself working with techs from our El Paso, TX office. This is sort of uncommon. No real reason why, just don't end up working with them too often. The weird thing, though, was every time I spoke to them, I started slipping into a "Spanish" accent.

It was fairly embarassing because I hoped that they didn't hear it. It wasn't like I was mocking them...at least intentionally. Wonder if I'd do that around an Australian?

5.15.06

Restaurants over charging your card?

Ran across an interesting article on a 20% padding some credit card machines add to a charged purchace. Keep an eye on this, what you sign for, may not be what you end up paying.

BTW, this is end-user "the merchant" changable.

Here's a tip: Credit card terminals may be padding the bill

4.24.06

My neck, my back...my neck and my back!

You know those "hand posture" warnings that come with new computers or keyboards...yeah, the ones that usually get tossed because they never apply to you? Remember them now? Do ya?!? PAY ATTENTION TO THEM! All those warnings about not slouching my mother warned me about are coming to light.

Last night I couldn't turn my head any direction without a burning pain. The only thing I could do was take an extra strength something or other and curl up on my love seat (all 6'2 of me) and pass out. Felt better this morning, only a slight bit of stiffness.

It wasn't until I came to work today that I found the source of my aches. I slouch badly in my seat. I mean, nearly to the point of totally reclining back. Arms stretched out and shoulders hunched into my neck. HORRIBLE posture. And to make it worse, I sit like that for hours.

To make it worse, last week I came home to play some Need for Speed: Most Wanted on a 360...nuff said.

My body has asked back from what I stole from it. What was that rule again...wrists raised, fingers on the home row, hands at 10 and 2?

3.13.06

So, why are Americans fat?

Because they like to eat things like this...

The new treat is a thick hamburger, topped with sharp cheddar and two slices of bacon. But instead of a bun, it will be served on the grilled halves of a Krispy Kreme glazed doughnut.

I think my artery just blocked up thinking about eating one.

8.21.05

WAP Yahoo! traffic

I was looking for a way to get traffic updates on my mobile phone. Yahoo! has a XML feed that lists conditions based upon your zip code and I found a sweet PHP based XML aggregator. Put the two together and presto! traffic jams on your cellphone.

I formated the text to be small enough and I set the sevarity level to (hopefully) accident-type conditions and above.

Traffic condition search:
http://www.djesigns.com/yahoo_traffic.php

To bookmark a page, use:
http://www.djesigns.com/zip/(your zip code here)
...without the parentheses.

I'll try to find a way to get that info to your phone easier in the future. If anyone has any improvement suggestions, feel free to share!

8.14.05

So this storm came through last night

And one of the three huge gusts of wind broke off a large limb from the tree in my backyard.



As you can see, it landed on my power line. I removed it easily enough. I had my wife out there prepared to hit me with a stick in case I got bit by electricity. For some reason, she was more than willing to help with that part.

Later that evening, I treated the family to some Pizza Hut. Of course, I had to get my Buffalo Chicken pizza. It seems that they had "the new girl" cut my pizza for me. I don't think she did so well in geometry.

8.11.05

These people write your software

Joel Spolsky's website, Joel on Software, is daily musing for me. While I'm hardly a programmer, I do find his take on programming, hiring programmers, and end-user program usability very interesting to read.

Anywho, I was reading a post he made yesterday that included tidbits of an audio interview he recently gave. In it, he praised a book, Internationalization With Visual Basic, by Michael Kaplan. Being the investigative type, I simply click the link and head over to Amazon to check it out.

Low and behold I immediately see two negative reviews. The first one, blah, who cares. I simply skipped over it. The second one, although from 2003, really helps me appreciate why some software simply sucks.

My company is going to get some customers in Asia. We are (2 ASP, VB 10-year experience programmers) going to make our products to be able to support Asian language. What we read this book and we found totally nothing help us. Even I would like simply message box a Chinese word instead of ??? in VB application. We also searched many websites and newsgroups that talk about it. Michael and People sometimes introduce this book in the newsgroup. But why people still keep asking such kind of questions, like ???.

How in the world can someone attempt to manipulate, in a meaningful way, a programming language when their own grasp of English has failed miserably. At least spoken language can be "assumed" when portions are missing or misused.

8.9.05

My Samsung MM A880

Yup, went got a new cell phone. My previous woes were not fixed with updating the phone and I'm not comfortable with not having a reliable means of communication. So, after checking out what was available and reading reviews on a couple of models, I decided on the Samsung MM A880.

While it doesn't have built in bluetooth connectivity, it has absolutely everything else I want. Camera/camcorder, dual color screens, SMS (yeah, my last phone only did short mail...talk about pain), and it's a clamshell. Every other feature reads like the typical standard set of modern phones.

What stands out about this phone, though, is its shape. This thing is ultra slim. No, not RAZR slim, but slim enough to gently slide right in your pocket. Even though it is so small, it has a nice weight to it. It doesn't feel weak or cheaply made. A nice touch is the internal antenna. You can hold this phone in either hand without feeling obstructed.

Voice calls are super clear as well. The background noice cancelling feature on this phone may need to be adjusted depending on where you are. If it is relatively quiet around you, there will be no audio feeding back into your earpiece. Sometimes I have to make sure the call didn't drop due to the silence.

The only downsides I can find is the keypad. Not only is the layout so different from most of Sprint's other handset offerings, the actual number pad is "raised" in the middle. Yeah, it's like the "5" key is peaked in relation to the others around it. You almost have to feel it for yourself to understand its weirdness.

Also, the phone is a metallic lavender. That...didn't...strike my fancy at first. I quickly got over that, though. The color choice, along with the sleek build and awesome menu navigation make this phone a sweet choice. And, if Mace Windu can whoop people with a lavender lightsaber, who am I to look down on that color!

8.2.05

The mosquitoes, they attack!

This has been one of the worse years of mosquitoe biting I have ever experienced. Funny thing is, I haven't been bitten that much. Over all, it's only been maybe 5 times, but these bites are swelling up larger and lasting long that in years past.

At the beginning of spring, I had a bite on my leg that spread to an inch wide and took 3 weeks to leave. I wasn't scratching it (although I painfully wanted to), yet it stayed a deep red until is totally disappeared. I'm convinced that the spraying they are doing to control the mosquitoe population is actually making them more potent.

Man, I'm glad they're not as bad as those "Panama Canal" mosquitoes, but it seems like we're not that far off.

7.27.05

Time for a new cellphone

My Sprint provided Sanyo 8100 is blowing chunks right now. For about the past two weeks, it has been dropping call after call and disconnecting from the Interweb. At first, I simply thought a tower around here was being worked on, but even in known strong signal areas it's doing it. Now my phone, when I make a call, goes into a perpetual "Looking for signal" mode. When I try to power cycle it, it will continue to reboot when it tries to find a signal again...and will continue to do so until I remove/replace the battery.

Unless I can get this model repaired (like that's going to happen), I will have to get a new model. "Sure, what's better than a new phone?", one might ask. One thing...Sprint has THE WORST selection of phones! The quality of the phones are fine, but the feature set they all have are horrid.

I'm looking for 3 things:

• Clamshell (flip phone)


• "Vision" capable


• Bluetooth

Sprint has no phone that has these three features. At best, they have a "slider" style phone with Bluetooth and Vision. All the others are video-speakerphone-$500 plus deals that have a mix and match of my requirements.

Oh well, we'll see how this goes. It's amazing how the mobile phone industy is set up. I'm actually willing to change providers just because of the handsets they offer.

Update - It turns out a software update on my phone has fixed it. I guess I can stick to my boycott of buying a new phone until I get exactly what I'm looking for.

7.24.05

Moxi through a VCR connection

When I first wrote about my initial Moxi impression, I mentioned that you cannot connect your unit to a tv through a VCR's RCA inputs. I have to retract that because it is indeed quite possible.

I'm not sure if you can do this with modern VCR's that use Macrovision protection (preventing DVD players from displaying when connected through the RCA inputs), but I was able to do it using an older HiFi Stereo VCR.

I am in no way suggesting someone use this method to circumvent any copywrite protection schemes, but this may save a buck or two if you have a tv set that's a bit behind the times.

7.13.05

Moxi, oh my Moxi

First, digital cable changed my life with it's excellent picture quality and Video on Demand service. Now, I've gotten Charter's Moxi digital video recorder (DVR) and television will never be the same.

I know DVR's have been around for years. I've seen the reviews and praises of their convenience, but I never thought that "TV watching" was serious enough to justify getting one of these. The ability to pause and rewind live TV and record directly to the unit is only a small scope of what this unit can do.

Like all DVR's, you can record one channel while watching another and even set the unit to record an entire season of shows to watch at your leisure. Yet, what makes the Moxi experience more enjoyable than traditional digital cable service is being able to continue watching TV while scrolling through what's currently on 10 other stations (at a time), configuring the unit's settings, or watching a customized news ticker (CNN style).

There are plenty of other pluses that new users and those coming from traditional digital set top boxes will appreciate...but there are also some "gotchas" to watch out for.

1) These Moxi units do NOT have coax outputs. If your television does not have RCA inputs then you will need to use a RF Modulator to connect the unit to your TV. You can NOT use a VCR with RCA inputs to connect your Moxi to the TV. In theory this should work, but it will not. The unit will boot up, go through all the processes and say "Launching Moxi", but the screen will go blank and not turn back on.

2) These units get hot. Make sure this is kept in a well ventilated location. Electronics tend to do funny things when they can't get rid heat: ie, lock up or crash.

3) This unit gets rid of heat by use of an active fan. The fan, while muffled, it audible in a quite room. If you are a light sleeper or like absolute silence, then putting this unit in another room would be advisable because you cannot turn the Moxi off unless you unplug it.

7.6.05

Message center job advertisements

Anyone with a digital cable set top box is likely familiar with the red LED that periodically lights. It's the good ole "message waiting" indicator letting me know my provider, Charter, has something to tell me.

Well, guess what, it was lit the other day with a message from none other than Charter. And what did Charter have to tell me this time? That they were having a job fair at their corporate office in a few days. There have been previous messages like that in the past.

So, I've been wondering, is Charter's sending of these advertisement messages a helpful way to share career opportunities or a tacky way to misuse their system? I guess that depends on which side of the employment line you are on. But, I wonder how well that will go over if my job sent out mass voicemail messages to our customers to let them know about job openings?

7.2.05

Fear the plumbing skills

I've had a nasty little leak under my kitchen sink for a second. Turns out the generic Moen faucet had a leaky seal in the handle. It caused a bit of a mess down below, so I have some sanding to do, but up top the faucet looks great.

6.24.05

Taco Bell's missing burrito

One of my co-workers part-times at Taco Bell. Seeing that they get free food, he's at liberty to come up with his own concoctions to eat. One such item is this grilled chicken burrito deal he brought in for me today.

Sort of like the current Grilled Stuft Burrito currently on the menu, this thing is big and grilled, but he sort of changed the ingredients:

12" tortilla (grilled)
marinated chicken
seasoned rice
sour creme
cheddar, pepper jack and mozzarella cheeses
hot sauce

He told me I can order each of those ingredients as "sides" and have them put it together and grilled for around $2.40...only by coming inside of course. I may have too. This is the best tasting item I've ever had (however bootlegged it may be) from TB!

6.1.05

The hiatus is over

I imposed a little break from this site last month. No, it's not like it was a burden or anything, but it kind of stemmed from a lack of time to do anything. So....I just pushed the keyboard away and got caught up on a couple of things.

You may ask, "what things?" Well, of course, I seen Revenge of the Sith at the midnight showing...with the rest of the Jedi-dressed, saber swinging Esquire visitors. I was tired, but it was definately worth it.

I also got my phone service changed over to Charter. There were several "glitches" to getting it installed. Word of advise...never accept refurbished equipment for a new install! But, after everything was corrected, the quality is outstanding! Incredibly clear and it works without me wondering "is it going to work this time?"

5.2.05

I won Jack's stuff

Those 2-1 odds of winning something from Jack in the Box are nice. From my last two trips to JITB, I've picked up: two free tacos, chicken sandwich, an ultimate salad, and a Pannido.

While the chicken sandwich and tacos are common enough, I have to give a quick critique on the salad and the foot long sammich.

Jack's Ultimate Salad - Southwestern Edition:
This is a big salad. Other than that, it's a salad. All salads taste the same until you put dressing on it.

The Pannido - Hot Turkey and Ham good:
These sandwiches are long. I mean a good 12 to 14 inches. It even comes in a handy carrying case, as any $4 plus snack should. The only real complaint I have is with the bread. If you take too long and let the bread cool off, it gets hard as a rock.

OK, this wasn't much of a critique, but the food was free and worth every penny spent...buying JITB's other exspensive "value" meals.

4.11.05

Ear candling rocks!

I had my ears candled last night. This is a process in which a special candle is used to melt and suction built up wax in the ear. The process takes about 30 to 50 minutes depending on how many candles per ear you use, suggested 2 (I used one per ear).

My goodness, I always thought of myself as a diligent ear cleaner. But that deep wax build up around the inner ear was impossible to get. After having mine done, my ears feel so "open." Kind of like having your ears pop after riding in a plane. Just super clear.

People with sinus problems may find this helpful as well. Of course, care should be taken and those with punctured ear drums are advised not to try this procedure.

4.6.05

Google fixed their stuff

While doing my daily check on misguided Buddhist, I noticed that the count of those referred to my site (the Live Journal images page specifically) suddenly stopped increasing. Well a search of the image on Google shows why. They finally associated the image with it's correct site...BTW, it's the potentially offensive one.

Well, as it stands, the "official" count of people looking for that image here, since 2.18.05, is 5302. It was fun while it lasted. Guess I'll have to dig up other interesting refers to this site.

3.30.05

Retraction to Pizza Hut complaint

It seems I spoke too hastily about Pizza Hut not offering their Buffalo Chicken pizza anymore.

Just yesterday, there was a glaring coupon in the mail advertising the offering of that pizza again. Oh, joy of joys! Looks like I'm eat'n good tonight!

3.28.05

Petition to Pizza Hut

Bring back the Buffalo Chicken Pizza!

It's never a good idea to go shopping on an empty stomach. It's equally bad to talk about food while hungry. Especially food that makes your drool glands work over time...ugh...

Why does Pizza Hut do this? They come out with a great item, tease the public with it for two weeks, then pull it without a warning. I really wish they would make the Buffalo Chicken pizza a regular item. My goodness, that was the best pizza they've offered.

Hot sauce smothered under a layer of chicken and cheese. Then, dipping it all in ranch dressing...oh my...I can't talk about this anymore...

3.18.05

Chinese food type casted

I've made numerous trips to 88 China in the course of me working at my current job. So many, in fact, that I've built up a relation of sorts with the people there. This relationship consists of 3 elements: me, them, and the sweet & sour chicken lunch special. Oh, this is a good meal. It's cheap and fills me up.

Over the course of things, I've went from having to state my order every time to the folks there "verifying" my order without me saying a word. This has gone well, that is, until I wanted to try something different.

The last time I went, I wanted to try their General Tso chicken, but, I was abruptly greated with a, "I know, I know...sweet sour chicken, crab rangoon and water." It was funny. I laughed it off and got what she ordered for me.

Today, though, I was fiercely determined to get some Gen Tso. I had a plan of attack and refused to be backed into a corner when she proclaimed what my lunch would be. As soon as I opened my mouth, she blurted out, "$4.78!"

...I handed her my five. I got punked by a little Chinese lady.

3.7.05

Cadillac Catera for sale

Yes, yes the infamous Cadillac Catera is up for sale. $700 OBO.

Why $700? I just want to get rid of it. Haven't driven it in over a year. May need a head gasket replacement. Body has hail damage and a missing driver's door trim. Also needs two front tires.

All this could be a couple hundred dollar fix or couple thousand. If you have desire to fix it, email me.

The Catera is now gone. Rust in Peace!

3.3.05

The Captive Portal worked

As a follow up to yesterday's post about Lish's connection to my wireless network, my plan seems to have worked. Checking the logs, I can see he did try to connect, but MRTG didn't see any traffic on my WAN interface during that time.

Too bad I didn't get a call. I was hoping to have a friendly chat with him.

3.1.05

Delayed hot water

I have the most annoying problem with hot water at my house. I have to wait on it for about 1 minute before I actually get some.

Cold water, of course, comes up right away. But, anytime any of the hot water sources hasn't run for a while, it takes forever for the hot water to come out. I can't for the life of me, figure out why this is happening.

I've read suggestions of wrapping the hot water pipes to resolve this, but in every other house I've been in, I have never seen this problem....Even more, seen this problem avoided by simply wrapping pipes.

Man, I'd hate to have a plumber come out, but it looks like I may need to.

2.22.05

Spread that lovely germ

It's cold and flu season and guess what, everyone is sick! Well, not everyone. I'm not - so far- and my family isn't either. But everyone around me at work is. Did you catch that? Everyone around me at work is. Sick people, why are you here?

My company gives a generous amount of sick/personal days at the start of the year. I'm not saying that they should use them all at the beginning of the year. But, taking one day off to fend off a coming cold is MUCH better than fully catching it, spreading it and having a small handful of people taking 3 days off.

Maybe if every company had a sick day policy like Yahoo!, people would be more apt to stay home so they can cough and sneeze in their own space.

2.18.05

Google, Buddha, and Live Journal

So, one day, I get bored and decide to host a page of Live Journal images. Simply put, this page runs a script that grabs the last 10 images uploaded for use on LJ pages and displays them here...along with their HTML location. Consider it "dynamic hot-linking".

At some point Google's search bot stops by that page and finds an image of Buddha as one of the recent images...and it gets cached. Now mind you, I don't host these images, but that concept is as transparent as mud to some people.

Everyday, I get at least a couple hundred hits of Buddhist looking for images of their deity...even sending me emails to express their misplaced outrage. So, in order to have a little fun with it, I decided to keep a rolling tally of refers to my site based upon that image. It's at the top and it changes daily.

12.27.04

jmn.exe pop-up ad program

I didn't find any returns on any search engine for is excutable, so hopefully this post may help someone in the future.

I came in to work one day and as soon as I logged into my workstation, I started getting lots of pop-up ads. I ran Ad-aware SE several times, but nothing malicious was found. When I checked the Task Manager, I seen "jmn.exe" running. As soon as I ended it the pop-ups stopped.

Doing a system search didn't find where it was running at, but I found it listed in the registry as being in the C:\Winnt\System32 folder as a hidden system file. Deleting the registery key and changing the folder properties to "Show hidden system files" allowed me to delete the program.

12.9.04

Soothing the savage workplace

My cube sits right outside a director's office...who loves to use speaker phone on full volume. He uses his speaker phone to talk to his team's manager that sits catty-corner to my cube...who also loves to use speaker phone. When you take into account all the other typical office noise, this can be a pretty hard place to keep your concentration.

Fortunatly, I have my music to block all of that mess out. I have headphones on all day. ALL DAY. I've become so use to listening to music, that when I have to answer the phone I'm almost in shock at what I miss going on around me.

It's pretty funny because the majority of people here have headphones on for the exact same reason. Since all of our backs are turned, due to the way our cubes are designed, a system has been adopted when someone's attention is needed. It's just a simple nudge on the back rest of the seat, but it's gentle enough not to startle.

OTOH, those that don't use headphones like to come and BANG on the book case to jar your attention. Yeah, that does more to discourage me turning around.

Oh well, that was my random bit for right now.

12.3.04

SPAM idiots

No one likes spam email. Not only does it make managing legitimate email difficult, it also puts unnecessary stress on system administrators and equipment that have to deal with it. But, on the other side of the fence, there are the people that send out this mess who actually feel that this is a "business". Well if it is a business, you would think that they would actually try to realistically get your attention.

I've found these eye catching subject lines in my bulk folder and tried to picture what idiot they think these would attact...

ppppain killllers weiight loss no doccctor

Hmmm, III ggguuessss ttthhey mmmmayyy bbbbee tryyyyinng tooo target faaattttt studdderrss wwiithh aachhesss.

No Catch --- Literal Skill! Augment your member.

This is obviously not a joke. I literally can get my member augmented --- with Skill!

Danne, Enl4rge y0ur pen1s n0w!

4 b19 pen1s 4 d4 l33t, n0w11!!1...I wonder if those come augmented, with Skill!

Oredr here and svae

Dysletic peolpe lookign to svae a bcuk?

And my personal favorite:

Are you pimped with a Rolex watch?

Thanks SPAM for pimpin' my wrist!

I guess if spammers stay in business, then these obviously work. When will people learn to use the Internet?

11.24.04

McDonald's McCall Center

A couple months back, I wrote about my discontent with fast food restraunts that outsource the basics. Like playing pre-recorded welcome messages right when you pull up to the speaker.

Well, a Cape Girardeau, MO McDonald's seems to have taken this a few steps further. They completely outsource the entire drive-thru order process. Using cameras and high-speed connections, a patron would never know they're really talking to someone in Colorado Springs, CO.

Though I posted my previous entry under "Stupidity", this set up is pretty cool.

Ah, the first snow

So now with the mad holiday/shopping rush, I'm going to have to deal with the mad Home Depot/Lowes rush. Lovely.

UPDATE - It sucks out there! There is already a nice THICK glazing of ice on the road that is being further covered with snow. My estimate, 2 hour home commute vs. a usual 45 minute one.

11.18.04

The Chinese (food) Connection

I feel like I'm about to burst. I decided to treat myself to the residential Chinese restraunt, but I over did it. I shouldn't have had the extra crab rangoons.

I have to give props to Dave for letting me know about 88 China at 1326 Sunburst Drive, in O'Fallon, MO 636-272-8855 or 8856. I'm always skeptical of new Chinese joints, but this one I can definately say I approve of!

10.28.04

It's Daniel, not Dave

This has been an ongoing battle for years. Growing up with the name "Danny" has never been easy. Aside from constant serenade of Ole Danny Boy from people that have (gasp!) a sense of humor and originality, nearly everyone seems to confuse my name with "Dave."

Trying to avoid this in my professional life, I started introducing myself as Daniel. One would figure that since these two names sound nothing a like, I should be good to go, right? Uh, no.

Maybe I should start calling myself "Marty?"

10.20.04

Early basement migration

In an effort to keep my upstairs from looking like a bachelors' pad, I moved my main computer down into the basement. It's a nice little boxen:

Athlon XP 2500+
1gig of DDR RAM
60gigs of storage
... assortment of other goodies

And, now, I have to leave it until next spring. That basement, yeah...it's unfinished...and it's cold outside. Outside cold makes the basement outside cold as well. I tried braving it last winter, bundling up in sweats and double socks. Not this year.

Nice, warm laptop usage while cozy in the bed for me!

10.19.04

Coldplay

I may be about a year late in "reviewing" this, but Coldplay's "A Rush of Blood to the Head" album is incredible. I've had it for a while and usually queue it up in Winamp while working around the house.

The entire album has such subtle, mellow energy. It makes a great easy listening choice no matter what you are doing. Not over the top to command your attention, yet has an ambient feel so that it seems proper at any occasion. Or maybe this feeling is just because Nora Jones was playing right before them ;-)

Either way, I highly suggest picking it up.

9.25.04

Searching for Gmail Invites?

Yeah, I've had some, and I've given many away. What's strange, though, is the amount of refers I get from search engines of people looking for these invites.

By now, I would think that most people that were interested in getting an account would have them. So, what wood work are these new folks crawling out of?

Note to self

127.0.0.1 ar.atwola.com
127.0.0.1 ads.web.aol.com
127.0.0.1 VTOT.proxy.aol.com
127.0.0.1 ads.aol.com

Ahhh, better now!

9.9.04

The impossible language barriar

For lunch, I stopped in at the local Taco Bell. There happen to be an East Indian guy in front of me and an older white lady working behind the counter.

I guess I'm use to hearing the "Indian accent", due to the large Indian employee population in this area, so when he placed his order, it was quite understandable to me...Not so for the register worker. After a few eye squints and ear turning, she decided she needed a visual translater to bridge the communications gap.

After picking the counter Quesadilla display and pointing all over it, she finally managed to understand that all he wanted was a couple of tacos with cheese, but no lettuce.

Fortunatly I was browsing the web on my phone, so I could sort of play off the laughter I couldn't hold in.

8.25.04

Improved customer support

I've been thinking about the lack of customer support quite a lot lately. Working in the ISP/telecom industry again has reminded me on how to deal with customers on a personal level.

All too often, as a tech, you can become extremely proficient in correcting the technical issue, but "leave the customer broke." What I mean is, what impression is the customer going to be left with after the trouble is resolved?

I've wrote about my feelings on customer service while visiting fast food drive-thrus, and the same can be applied in this instance as well. The lasting customer impression is all that matters. Too often, companies minimize the impact poor service has on the user of said service. They hastily pass off customer satisfaction as a cost instead of an investment.

Now, I'm not saying the place I work for is grossly neglecting this, but as is typical of large companies, the focus on Monthly Reoccuring Reveue (MRR) doesn't seem to include the large scale practice to insure that customer satisfaction evolves into customer loyalty.

So, how can this be achieved? I don't know. This would largely depend on the person directly dealing with the customer. One that struck me as impressive was putting the "fix" in the customers' hand. Confronting someone about their lack of troubleshooting skills will make someone feel defensive. A quote taken from The Morning News article Tricks of the Trade mentions:

"When helping someone fix their computer over the phone, and you want them to see if all the cables are plugged in correctly, don’t ask, “Have you checked to see if the cable is plugged in?” because the customer will always say, “Of course I did, do you think I’m a moron?” Instead say, “Remove the cable, blow the dust out of the connector, and plug it back in.” The customer will most likely reply, “Hey, it’s working now—I guess that dust really builds up in there!”

Sure they're other examples to consider, but the point is leaving the end user with the impression that they mean more to a company than a dollar sign.

8.24.04

Fake police car?

I was driving home from work yesterday and noticed what looked like an unmarked police car. Strange thing was, it had regular Missouri tags on it. The driver was tailing people and then getting in front of them just to flash his red, white and blue lights at them. No one stopped, but it really botherd me.

I didn't call the police because he got off on another highway, but I did get remember his plate number.

White Crown Victoria with Missouri tag:
428 TYW

Maybe someone could shed some light on this.

8.17.04

Google isn't just for Gmail

People are simply amazing. How could someone post a question on in a web forum asking for information on the history of networking technologies, then expect someone to get back to them "asap?" Yes, that was a literal example. But, that isn't an isolated case.

When Rick James died last week, someone from the same web community asked, "who was Rick James?" I responded with the this post's title, linked to Google's query URL. His reply, "Its not important enough for me to Google it."

Acronyms like STF (Search The Forum) and STW (Search The Web) are typical spin-offs from predecessors like RTFM (Read The Friendly...nicely put...Manual). The latest are that much more pointed, though, considering that the Internet holds VAST AMOUNTS of information. What's worse, it takes minimal effort to get it. So for someone to ask a question, then not even expend the small bit of extra energy to do a simple search is....ugh! Words fail me as how to describe them!

Oh, wait...maybe if I do a search for lazy and ignorant...

8.6.04

Singer Rick James was found dead in his home.

Cocaine's a hell of a drug!

7.29.04

The tongue

Proverbs 18:21 says that "death and life are in the power of the tongue." The principle is that, words can either build up or tear down.

Words of comfort, while beneficial, are fleeting. Words of pain are lasting. To illustrate:

Imagine a wooden fence. Words of comfort can be likened to applying paint to that fence. Over time the paint will weather and fade away, thus needing to be reapplied.

Words causing pain are nails driven into the fence. While there they affect the plank. Apologizing for saying those words are the same as pulling the nail back out. Unfortunatly, the hole is still there and there is no real way to repair the damage and no amount of painting will erase what was done.

Hence, the importance of choosing your words carefully.

7.26.04

Hey, want a Yoda?

Yeah, I'm a Star Wars nut. While I don't have a Storm Trooper's suit (yet), I do have a Yoda for you...err, your Sprint PCS phone.



Visit Sprint Users to upload it your phone. It's dimensions are 120x144, fitting a Sanyo 8100's screen.

7.16.04

I could just leave right now

That's right. It's my last day and I could just walk out and leave this place as a distant memory. I mean, I'm already closed out in the pay system. All of my tools and clothes are turned in. I even ate the company provided lunch already. So why am I still here? Probably because I'm stuck on the phone with a customer.

Yeah, I could just hang up on him. Wouldn't be nice, but it's not like I could get fired! I've said all of my "Good-bye's", cleaned out my desk, and caught up my documentation. What's stopping me from just jetting?

Employee integrity.

6.14.04

I got Gmail

And Gmail is nice!

Thanks for the invite!

6.9.04

Need-to-update-computer-itis

For years, my wife has been telling me I have it. I've always denied it or laughed it off, "what does she know? I just like computers." Well, I gracefully admit it now. Not in a funny sort of way, but very seriously.

I'm not the type of person that has to go out and get the latest and greatest of everything. I would consider that compulsive or "show-offy." Me, I'm the type of person that would rather get a new piece of equipment I want rather than a new pair of shoes I need. That isn't good. Not good at all.

My realization of this happened over the past two days. I had a little bit of money available. As a "gift" to myself, I decided to pick up a new processor for my PC, $100 bucks. No biggie. Well, after flashing the BIOS, I found that the new processor (XP 2500+) still didn't get recognized. What do I do? Instead of taking the processor back, I say to myself, "self, just get a new motherboard." In all, I ended up spending $200 bucks for a want. That sad thing is, I would have easily justified NOT buying new shoes because it would have been a waste.

For me to say that I will never buy PC (performance) related items anymore is a lie. But from now on, I will truly evaluate every dollar I spend towards them.

6.8.04

We need a blog at my job

I've read several articles about using a blog in the work place to facilitate the movement of information within and between departments. While some deployments are used as "windows" into a company, visible by all, others are merely meant for internal purposes. That is what I purposed at my place.

Now, I work in the tech support department. Product support information freely flows between techs via voice and email currently. While the process has been working currently, that is one terrible shortcoming. Whenever there is a new hire, the whole experience process is immediately forced back to square one. The new person will never hear any of the past conversations or read any of the past emails. The whole support department is again forced to get the new person up to speed...which unfortunately often requires doing so at 1am, on the weekend, right after putting your newborn back to sleep, ect...That is why I have proposed using a blog for internal purposes.

Having a place where anyone can jot down notes about how service tickets were resolved (in tech jargon) where people can interact with the information would be a great help. Not only would this help during middle of the night calls, but give new employees a place to truly see the history of the department. Sure, you could look up ticket history, but that doesn't give the broad enough spectrum to find fixes to problems that may only creap up every few years or so.

So, hopefully this will become a reality. I'm pushing it and I can only see it as a benefit.

5.12.04

Thickburgers are a mixed blessing

Ugh, I love those things. For a fast food joint, Hardees has topped my list of choices...when I have money to afford those sky high prices. That's why I usually reserve my Thickburger indulgence for when I'm traveling overnight on a service call when company per diem pays for it.

Guess what? Tonight was a Thickburger night! Full of 1/2 lb Grilled Sourdough goodness! Guess what else tonight is? Huddle in agony until the Thickburger finishes having its way with my digestive system night.

5.10.04

Great ideas + HGTV = no progress

I've been living in my home for almost five years. I've drilled, painted, re-painted, cut, stacked, and re-painted again various areas around my house and still am not satisfied with the look around here. Sure, see other peoples' homes on tv gives great ideas, but something always seemed to be a stumbling block to me finishing a job.

Seeing other peoples' homes turned out to be more of the cause. I find too many aspects I like on tv.

Common sense says to be reasonable and just make a plan to work one thing at a time. Reality shows that the one time we tried to stick with a plan, it still got half done. Why? I'm not too sure, at least I didn't think I knew. Truthfully, I didn't know until today. My design ideas clash!

Right now, we have a very nice brown tone (Solomon Sand) covering the main walls of our home, a yellow tone (Wild Honey) on the back wall and into the kitchen, and an off white (Toasted Marshmellow) ceiling. The colors look fantastic together, but I planned on adding crown molding as the "finish" to the room. For some reason I never got around to it. Looking back, I'm glad I didn't. I would have looked awful together. The style of our home is too modern for something like that. So, the best bet is to touch up the walls where I planned to install the molding (to cover it of course) and further enhance the design of the house.

So, the point learned here is: work with what you have, not with what you want! Good. Glad I was able to work that out. Now it's time to move on to the motivational factor.

5.9.04

The pointless post

I haven't posted here in a while. Not sure if the interest is gone, or just that I have nothing worth writing about. More than likely, it's the latter. Guess April was just a dull month for me.

9.9.03

Just some time to write

Lately, it seems that everything I want to write about is negative. Typically, these are simple annoyances that crop up at the most undesirable of times. I really don't like coming here and uploading just my bitter experiences, but it seems as if those are the things that impact me the most.

For instance, the other day I decided to grab some Taco Bell at the store down the street during lunch. I typically go in and carry out, but this day I went through the drive-thru. WHY IN THE WORLD was the mic to talk into almost 4 feet in front of the menu? I've seen them on the menu and even after the menu...never 4 whole feet before it. So, while I'm reading the menu, I hear this faint voice from behind me saying softly, "If you would like to order, you will have to back up". Yeah, like I was suppose to know that. That also sure does explain why that drive-thru is always backed up...and why I always go inside and carry out.

Then there are the other times that I rather not post on here (due to visits by offending parties) that deserve a good ranting. Sometimes, these events are so colorful, and in hindsight humorous, that I feel like I'm doing a disservice to myself by not including them here.

Oh well. What to do, what to do...Maybe I should just learn to actively look on the bright side in life. Maybe I should just watch "Life of Brian" and get a good chuckle.

9.2.03

Things I like

Here is a short list of things I realized I like this past weekend.

- Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
I can't get enough of them. Maybe it's because I'm lazy and they are quick to make.

- Movies I actually own.
I bought 3 movies this weekend (Shanghi Knights, The Recruit, and Biker Boyz). Though I I've seen two of those movies, I usually borrow flicks from my friend...who is basically a substitute Block Buster.

- Rainy days
It was raining all weekend. It was grey and gloomy and even a tad chilly. But, there was a comfortable coziness from it. Kind of a mix if wanting to relax and being glad I had shelter from it.

Just sitting back enjoying the simple things in life

8.25.03

Been a long time!

I've sure neglected updating this site. Life is busy. My daughter started her first day of kindergarden today and I couldn't be there to see her off. That sucks, but I was glad to hear she had a nice time. I've also been working on my job's web site. I'm pretty much finished with it. That's actually kept me busy all last week. Lots of products and backend work. Of course the Catera is continuing to give me problems. This time, I had to replace the radiator. Seems it sprung a 3 inch leak in it. That's a brief update on the going's on in my life. I'll get something witty here before long ;-)

Until then, get a piece of Bubb Rubb

WooWoooooo

7.29.03

The person you know the least...

...can sometimes be missed the most. I wonder who will replace her now?

5.27.03

Ah, the Dell!

A little over a year ago, I stumbled into a local pawn shop and seen this Dell Optiplex G150 set up with a 15" flat-screen monitor. Like most people that hear that, I'm sure your thinking, "what kind of pawn shop sells that kind of stuff?" Well, it wasn't until I got it home that I realized why it was probably there. It didn't come with a modem. What good is a computer that can't get online? Since I have a network in my house, it was a no-brainer to hook it up....in the bedroom ;-)

It's a quiet little sucker, so it being on is never an annoyance. Even better, I can fire it up and browse online in relative comfort. But, what I've really come to enjoy about having this thing in here is firing up the ole Winamp mp3 player, loading up a nice selection of slow jams and kicking back for a nice evening with the Mrs....

...until I find out that her younger sister is coming over around 8 this evening. Yeah, I just found that out while writing this. Guess it's time to save that playlist as slow_jam1.m3u.

5.22.03

P Diddy's Making The Band

I just happened to flip on MTV and seen that they are showing Making The Band again. I have to admit, I loved this series. Not that I'm all into the music industry, but his cocky tail attitude and realities he was putting before the contestants and finalists were real.

And in the end, I can say I walked away from the last season's episodes learning one thing...

Everyboy in Hip Hop got a flat screen!

4.29.03

The Joys of Running Your Own Mail Server

I have had the displeasure of receiving many emails from a certain domain lately. Fortunatly, my good ole, trusty mail server can easily be configured to either block domains or delete messages upon reading the header...among other options.

If anyone I know has an email address from this domain, well glad you know how to get a hold of me in other ways ;-)

4.17.03

Google from the Inside

There's a pretty cool story over at Wired.com. It takes a 24 hour look at Google searches from a world-wide perspective.

Guess it really caught my attention on seeing that someone in St. Louis is really trying to get an A+.

4.14.03

Monitoring Stats

So far, my line seems to be fairly stable. No noticable drops within the past several days. I'm currently bidding on a Siecor splitter for my line. Only a couple of hours left on it. I will feel better once I have one because I know that the present wiring job, while working, isn't the right way to go.



For kicks, here are the line monitoring stats from DSL Reports, or Broadband Reports if your new.



Removed graphs due to stopping monitoring

4.11.03

Hammer is 2 Broke 2 Quit

WHY, WHY, WHY

As if the VH1 story of his life didn't embarass him enough.

3.24.03

Best Buy Blunder?

Seems like someone is having a little fun with Best Buy.com If you check out their music section, you will see that every cd's track #8 reads, '"Bliss" Alice Peacock with John Mayer'.

I Googled the track and returned this. Obviously, someone is a fan.

3.13.03

Not much to post today...

...so I thought I I'll post about how Halley Berry looks pregnant while standing on stage for the NAACP Image Awards.

3.10.03

And what did we learn today?

Well, the little RAM upgrade I mentioned the other day didn't go as well as hoped. My laptop started locking up too. No biggie. I was able to get my old DIMM back, so I'm down to 384 megs again. Lesson learned: No such thing as a free lunch (or upgrade in this case).

And for lesson #2...
Don't try to play Jedi Outcast in the backseat of a Blazer while driving down Missouri back roads. It will make you want to throw up.

3.7.03

Dude, I got some RAM!

The Dell got a free upgrade today. A co-worker that has an 8200 as well was having problems with his notebook's memory. He had an extra 256 DDR module to try to correct his problem, but it seems it didn't. He was wanted to trade my 128 meg module to see if it made an improvement. It did for him, and now I'm up to 512 megs. Now I hope my laptop doesn't start throwing any errors.

3.5.03

Need'n some Chinese Food!

My job is in a pretty restraunt filled area of St. Louis. Even better, there are quite a few Chinese food shops around. The only bad thing, non are up to my standard. I mean, yeah, I can eat it, but it doesn't have that "I need to get me some more right now" appeal.

Actually I divide my Chinese food preference up into two catagories. First one:

Mass Appeal Style

This type of food is really good. It doesn't have that cookie cutter taste to it, but there are a chain of them. First one that comes to mind is Mongolian Bar-b-que Buffet. I think they are great, but there are more than one location, so the "unique" factor is out.

The other kind is:

Hole in the Wall

This, of couse, is the treasure of good ole' Chinese food. This is the stuff you grow up with. The stuff find next to quickie marts and laundry mats. There are only two places in StL that I have found to have this type of food, and both are no where close to this job...but are always on the way home from it!

So, what's left to do for lunch today? Crave until I go home? Or, suck it up and get some West Port "dry fried rice"? Guess I'll lower my standards and at least find a place out here where I can at least hear an accent.

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