My job rocks! :) So far it looks like I'm really going to like this job. :) Let me recount my day. I woke up at 7:15am (uggh) got dressed, ate my oatmeal (quiet Brit :), and headed off to work at 8, arrived at 8:30. Started meeting some people while I waited for my boss (Ed) to get there. He arrived, I filled out paperwork, hung out for a bit. They didn't have a phone or computer for me when I first got there, so there wasn't much that I could do. Tony was my "trainer" who showed me around the office, introduced me to so many people, way too many to begin to remember names. There's about 40-50 people that work there, and 10-11 tech support guys (that's me :) Basically what we do is call back people using the collision estimating software, either helping them with problems, or helping them upgrade to the newer versions. The best part of the job definitely has to be the lack of dress code, and other restrictions normally found in a workplace. It's really relaxed, we have access to tons of free soda and snacks, the horrible flourescent lights stay off most of the day. I think my only complaint so far is that we have to use Windows 98. *cringe* hehe but I think I'll survive. :) Oh, and I forgot to mention, we have a break room with a pool table, a bar, and a foosball table. :) This place rocks! :) And I'm getting paid $11/hr and after 90 days I'll get $13/hr. hehe it's nice to finally have a decent job and to get paid at least part of what I'm worth. :)
Well, tomorrow is the first day on the new job. Wish me luck. :) I'm kind of sad to have left Denison, I really enjoyed working there. If only they had a full-time position for me. This will be the first night in a looong time that I've gone to bed at a reasonably normal time. Britni has headed home to Wadsworth, so I'm all by myself for the next week. :( OSU won the OSU-Michigan game, riots ensued in Columbus, luckily not near me. Word has it that almost 50 people were arrested, and over 100 fires were set. Crazy drunkards. :P Anyways, I'm headed to bed, I get to wake up at 7am in order to get ready and be at Comp-Est for my first day at 8:30am. Uggh.. so early. hehe
if your laptop is getting too hot, by god, get the thing off your damn lap. LONDON, England (Reuters) -- Laptops have always been a hot item but a 50-year-old scientist did not realise to what extent until he burned his penis.
So I just got back from one kick-ass Thrill Kill Kult show. I went by myself yet again, but it was worth it. The two opening bands were pretty good, but the place was virtually empty. Maybe 100 people in a club I've seen 1000 people in. But that was nice cause once TKK started I was able to stand 1 person away from the barrier. Front and center baby. :) Apparently I was in the sex/lesbian section though cause there were two girls in front of me dancing all over each other, and losing clothing until security threatened to throw them out, and next to them was a couple making out and dancing up on each other the whole time. But the show was great, I never can remember what songs bands play but these I remember: Swine and Roses, Do You Fear For Your Child, Temptation Serenade, Girl Without a Planet, Daisy Chain 4 Satan, ummm, Martini Built for Two, Sex on Wheelz was the encore, oh, and the classic After the Flesh, the first TKK song I heard that got me hooked. Anyways, I got a new cd of some of their live stuff, I'm thinking it's from their last tour, the one I saw last Halloween, but I have yet to listen to it as I try to get a CDripper installed on linux with Freshmeat down thanks to a server move. :( I also picked up a cool poster, and a bunch of free tickets to some band next week (Eightdaze, Kettle, and Speed the Plow). I got 5 tickets, anyone want to go? It's the 26th. hehe Anyways, all you cribbers missed out. :)
I don't know if I mentioned it before, but I've switched over to Linux as a desktop OS. Been using it for a few weeks maybe? Fuzzy and Juicy say it's not going to last, but it's looking more and more promising as a viable desktop replacement for Windows. I'm running RedHat 8.0. Got my WinModem working, signed up for Earthlink dial-up, and took off running. So far for software I'm using Mozilla for web browsing, XChat for irc (perl scripting.. :), GAIM for Instant Messenger (more perl scripting support), Ximian Evolution for my email, XMMS for MP3s of course, Xine for just about all media files (including DVD), k3b for CD burning (the few that I've burned), and I'm using Gnome and have it configured like a cross between Mac and Windows with some extra fun things. I've got everything setup and configured except my webcam so far. It appears that I will need to recompile my kernel for the webcam support. So I'll do that eventually. I've got my two NTFS partitions mapped and easily accessible (although only ReadOnly), I've got the Windows Shares on my local apt network mapped, hell, even the Thumb Drive works with Linux. I also got ahold of WineX, and it runs things quite well. I was able to load up GTA3 and _almost_ play. The video is a little too slow to erally enjoy. I was able to get other "favorite" windows programs running, including mIRC and the Windows VNC viewer. So anyways, now that I've bored all the non-geeks out there, I shall leave you. 3 Days till My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult!!!!!
Just got back from seeing Bowling for Columbine with the boys. A great movie, if you have the opportunity to see it, go see it. It's a great ?social documentary? by Michael Moore. Not only is it funny at points, but it makes incredibly strong points at others, and calls attention to things that seem to get ignored by society as a whole. the thing that struck home the most to me was a segment that talked about how the media and the people in charge do a great job of making people scared. Marilyn Manson also made this point and mentioned how media makes people scared and that in order to feel safe they need to be good consumers. I don't want to go off on a rant or start preaching or anything here, it's best for people to just go see the movie and make their own decisions. Oh, and yes, I paid to go see a movie.
Ok, so we were sitting at the helpdesk talking about 70's clothing, and why Lynnette should wear her 70's gear to the George Clinton show tonight, when Lynnette pointed out a picture of Michael Jackson when he was normal. The prompted a google search, and Britni found this jem. It shows the transition of Michael Jackson's face. Kind of scary. No scratch that, not kind of.
I gots me a jobby job finally. Comp-Est called today, and I start on Monday the 25th. The peeps at Denison weren't too happy about me leaving, but they knew it would happen eventually. But you know the best thing about this job? casual dress. :) no shirt and tie bullshit. hehe So I'm looking forward to it. Full-time work, but getting full-time pay finally. No more $6-7 an hour jobs. hehe Anyways, backing up a bit, I went to Lords of Acid in Cinci all by myself, had a good time still. Got to meet the band, including Praga Khan. :) Got my ticket autographed. Looking forward to George Clinton tomorrow. DJ Shadow on the 17th is going to be a no go cause mom is coming up to visit this weekend hopefully, still haven't heard for sure yet though. Let's see, what else is new. I'm running Linux almost exclusively, with the exception of booting into windows to get stuff I can't access like emails stored in Outlook. I've gotten quite a few windows programs running in linux using WineX, including the windows vnc viewer which works beautifully. :) Not a whole lot going on other than that. Holiday's are coming up and things are going to get hectic so I'm preparing for that. :)
So I'm sitting at home when I should be in Cleveland enjoying a spectacular Lords Of Acid show. But thanks to the weather, driving up there was not an option. Tornados, 1-inch hail, lots of rain, and 70 mph winds forced me to stay home tonight. So no LOA for me. But tomorrow they're playing Cinci, so I'm gonna hit that. :) There are way too many good concerts coming up. Tomorrow is Lords of Acid in Cleveland, the 15th is George Clinton at Denison, the 17th is DJ Shadow in Cinci, the 20th is Thrill Kill Kult in Columbus, and Dec 1st is Snoop Dogg in Columbus. We'll see how many of them I can make it to and afford to buy tickets. hehe And then come December it's time to drive back and forth between Ohio and North Carolina several times. Thanksgiving in NC, Dad and JM's wedding around the 13th, Christmas, and then time at the Cabin right after Christmas. Whew. In total, that's 50+ hours of driving in under a month. We'll see if I'm alive after that. hehe but things otherwise are good. Small but much needed paychecks are coming in from working at Denison parttime, and there's potential for further employment in the near future. Alright, well off to find out what other good software there is out there for Linux, as I've switched over yet again, botting into windows only to work with files on the NTFS drives and CD burning cause nothing on linux compares to Nero just yet.
I won't go into any sort of diatribe about copy protection, but I just wanted to post this quote from an article on new audio cd formats, SACD and DVD-Audio.
"Copyright owners are entitled to use whatever formats they want to use," von Lohmann said. "If they really want to protect their content they can go back to vinyl."
All sorts of stuff, but I'm tired and going to bed. In short, new layout. Consensus is it's better. I kinda like it. It's not serious and elitist, and it's kinda goofy. If you don't like it, go jump off a bridge, preferably from a moving car. :) I'll probably end up changing it again when I get some time. Anyways, in short, spent the evening talking with the guys on the RedHat Road Tour. got me a hat, a keychain, a poster, and of course a copy of RedHat 8.0 on cd. It was cool, very relaxed. They basically got up, talked for about 20 minutes on the new version of RedHat, and then answered any and all questions for awhile, and then broke down into small clusters of people. Anyone who wanted to hang out and chat with the RedHat guys and other people that were there. I talked to a few people there including James McDermott, one of the RH guys. Talked about all sorts of stuff, for way too long. I was one of the last people to leave. But it was cool. Nice to see Linux gathering a following, some publicity, and of course always nice to have an excuse to build more of a community. hehe Anyways, I'm off to bed.. gnite..