Monthly Archives: September 2004

Computer Running Smoothly Again

Computer Stuff

This spring, my computer started getting bogged down by all the extra junk I was loading on it. I told myself I’d reformat the hard drive and re-install windows over the summer when I had lots of time. Here it is… end of September, and it’s still a mess. So, after a few programs started unexpectedly crashing on me… I finally decided it was time.

And within an evening, I have almost everything back up and running. Sure I couldn’t find the right Windows XP CD … at least I have a few of them laying around. I just had to use a different key. Anyway. Things are running quite smoothly, though I could continue installing software and tweaking the system, but then I wouldn’t get any sleep… which I desperately need to drive the bus in the mornin’. So I’m quitting right now…. after this post…. and a couple other things….

Sickness is no fun…

Leisure

Neither is firefox when it crashes as I’m trying to make an update 🙁 . Let’s see if I can remember everything….

I headed to Darlington this weekend for the first time in ages. Amanda and I had a great time watching movies on an 80″ screen (aka: the wall), cruising around the tri-state area, and dining out at Reds, one of our favorite places near her because they give you big plates of fresh veggies, crackers, dip, and bread before they even take your order. Unfortunately, something (maybe the big chunks of garlic scattered all over her chicken and steamed veggies?) didn’t agree with Amanda, and she spent most of Sunday feeling pretty miserable.

I had fun taking care of her, pampering her and reassuring her that she’d survive. She thought I was crazy, but it was kinda nice to be able to make her comfortable and do what I could to help. By the time I left, she was feeling better and even, as I heard later, kept a bowl of soup down. Now it was my turn.

I finished all my homework this weekend, so I had nothing left to do besides fall into bed, exhausted after my long 3.5-hours-in-a-straight-line drive. Soon, though, I felt myself being uncomfortably hot, then uncomfortably freezing. Surprise, I had a 101-degree fever! Eventually, I finally got to sleep, fully expecting to wake up at 5:45am (75 minutes before my report time) and call in sick to work. I woke up at 6:40, thanks to my non-funcitonal Nokia alarm, 40 minutes too late to call in without being late. Thankfully, my fever was gone. Though I felt terrible, I managed to surive the shift. Classes were a different thing… didn’t happen. I plan to try and get a couple hours of sleep now before my afternoon shift, so I don’t miss that either.

CyRide is messing with my head

Bus Ramblings

On my time card at work today I see a “new run assignment at dispatch desk” note. Fearing the worst, I figured they finally cut my last two cardinals, effectively cutting about 6 hours ($60) a week from me. Surprisingly, however, I find that they added back the 20 minutes they stole a couple weeks ago, so I’m back up to 20.5 hours a week! On top of that, I got the rocket-sled 942.

Now, normally, when they change your run, it starts the next Monday, so I figured I’d do what I was doing for the last two weeks today still. But the flow sheet (the thing the dispaters use to see all the buses and what routes/times they’re running) said I was doing my old run with slightly different times. Then the run sheet (the sheet that tells a driver what trips to do) told me to do my old run with the original times. As they send me out to start a 7:29 orange trip, another dispatcher over the radio explains that, no… I’m doing what I was supposed to be doing last week. The new run really does start monday; the flow-sheet was wrong. One dispatcher called me back to base, but when I got there, the one at the desk sent me back out to the parking lot. Argh! Don’t we all love communication issues?

To make my day more fun… I was driving around in a padidle all day 🙂 . My bus was winking at everyone I passed. I thought it was funny anyway…

House cleaning can be fun!

Computer Stuff

I was going through my 3 main hard drives, trying to free up some space in anticipation of a much needed reformat/reinstall of Windows. As I’m searching through folders, I came across some Red Green tv episodes I had taped back when I first got my AllInWonder video card. So I started watching one. Oops. They’re kindof addicting, and soon, I had watched an hour. Well now that I just saw the end of one, I think I’ll head to bed. Early bus driving tomorrow morning followed by choir, algorithms (zzz), and another long drive up to Wisconsin. Though I’ll be more happy to see my girlfriend after that drive than I will be to see my dispatchers after the morning one (no offense Tom, Gary, and Wanda….).

I like my red car

Life Musings

So.. in addition to everything else that went wrong last month with my car, I developed a leak in the transmission fluid line. After being told that it would cost more than $150 to fix, I figured I could live with the quart-a-month fluid the leak drops out. Hey… I’m getting a free, albeit gradual, transmission fluid exchange!

So anyway… I bought a case of this stuff at SAM’s today and proceeded to add a quart in the parking lot. Clutzy me knocked over the half-full container, pouring fluid all down the front of my car. I got most of it wiped up… but the good news: my car is red! I meant to get to a gas station and wipe more of it off, but Ames stations started annoying me with their 5-10-cent price differences. I’ll just get gas on my way out of town tomorrow. I cleaned up the rest of the fluid at home. Hopefully it doesn’t do much damage :- .

Annoying Nokias

School

Ugh. I’m tired of my cell phone not being a reliable alarm. I had it set for 7:00am this morning, so I’d have time to get ready for my 8:00 exam. Woke up really groggy thinking, due to the light, it must still be before 6. After laying in bed for awhile, I decided to pick up my phone (the nearest clock I could see without my glasses) and saw that it was 7:40. I jumped out, got dressed, packed my pag, and ran out to the bus within 4 minutes. Pretty impressive… but I was still groggy and didn’t have any time to prepare for the test. Still… I think it went well. I knew most of what was on it. Guess we’ll see when the grades come out.

Now onto algorithms, networking, choir, and senior design. Nice long day for me.

We get email…

Computer Stuff

Hey, I got email working the way it’s supposed to on this server. This means two important things: webmail and comments.

First: Webmail. Rememer when I said I had a mail server working? Well now, check it out! You can have a digimuzik.com email address, check-able from any email program on your computer OR from a webmail interface! Anyone interested?! No? Oh… well that’s okay. Let me know if you change your mind.

I also receive an e-mail now whenever you comment on one of my posts. This is not too useful because NO ONE READS MY BLOG! But that’s okay… someday I’ll email my family about this and get 2 or 3 more viewers. But for anyone who does read… go ahead and click on the “Comments” link after any entry you want to comment on, even the really, really old ones.

Footnote… again for family members or anyone who doesn’t get it, the title of this entry is a paraphrasing from a classic internet annimation about a really old, poorly-translated video game. My Inglish izunt kwite that bad…