Stuff from June, 2004
This is the archive of tumbledry happenings that occurred on June, 2004.
This is the archive of tumbledry happenings that occurred on June, 2004.
Sometime in the next month (give or take a month, for good measure), tumbledry will be moving to a new home. Service should be uninterrupted, but for those sharp-minded individuals who notice anything bizarre, unannounced, or supernatural occurring, please understand that this is a normal part of the moving process.
Did you know nice restaurants sometimes give you steamy cinnamon-scented towels with which to wipe your face when you have completed your dining experience? Neither did I. It was quite lovely, though; I felt full to bursting, yet refreshed.
The day after next (my stomach still asking to be relieved of the overtime it had done after Lake Elmo Inn), three of us took a run through the rain. It was a perfect rain: not too hard and not too cold - it both hydrated and cooled us - we felt like we could run forever. I was on the far right as we ran three abreast and noticed, as we approached a cross walk, a car coming toward the stop sign at our intersection. I did not think anything of it - we were fifteen feet from him - surely he saw us. We continued at our original speed - suddenly his hood was inches from me. Without even thinking twice, I leapt to the side and continued my pace, narrowly avoiding being struck by the vehicle. As we continued down the hill, the adrenaline from nearly being run down by a Jeep was put to good use. Apparently, the driver had been on a cell phone. Driver, if you are on the road, I just ask you avoid running into pedestrians who are in the freakin’ crosswalk. Thank you.
For those of you who are curious, the answer to the previous question (and I do thank you for your good advice, Nils) is not calling back. The situation ironed itself out in a rather startling way. One of the rules of good blogging (there is such a thing? I always think my ramblings here would bore anyone to tears - maybe they do) is to describe the situation or event to which one refers in complete detail. Unfortunately, I will have to take this particular event and violate a rule of good blogging by leaving everything frighteningly vague. When I figure out what is going on, I promise I will let you know.
In the next couple of months, I will be helping two people (Katy and John) shop for notebook computers. Ever notice how they are no longer called “laptops” by any company? This is because, in terms of cooling, notebooks perform less than ideally on a lap. Anyhow, I am educating myself about wireless standards. I learned from kottke about cordless phone interference in the 2GH’z’ish range. I read some interesting C|Net articles about the future of 802.11; one columnist likened the standard to the x86 standard and the Ethernet standard. His point was, when a “critical mass” adopts a standard, even if that standard is not technically the best at that time, it will grow to dominate and evolve to meet the needs of the market which it serves. Think Betamax and VHS wars.
Today was unexpectedly good. John and I took a run, and it ended up being around four miles. Thing is, we took an easy pace and kept up conversation the whole time, which made it really enjoyable. Sometimes I adopt the “speed is everything” running philosophy and tear around the paths as fast as my body will allow. Running like this has its time and place (in fact, it has become a bit of a tradition for me to take a good hard run when women are confusing me), but on this past rainy Thursday, it was simply time to talk and jog. Given the chance to do the same, I would highly recommend you take advantage of it.
Sometimes luck is on your side. In this case, we dumped the old red van and bought a brand new silver Celica GT-S, manual. It even has a sunroof, which everyone knows I have a weakness for, and it is a vast improvment over the 1997 Mercury Villager I was previously stuck in. John recently captured my new-car glee on his cell:
Telephones, telecommunications, telephone conversations, telemarketers, and even televangelists have become a part of our everyday lives. Like the refrigerator, television, and increasingly the computer, phones are a simple part of everyday life. Few recall (and even fewer care to imagine) what life was like before one’s neighbors were merely a handset away, or when that handset failed to successfully connect. “Only one in 50 …” of the people in the 2000 census did not have a telephone in their homes (Detroit News). So, how has a device with such a stunning impact on our business, consumer, and social lifestyles changed over the years? And, more importantly, how has it changed us?
If you can read this, then tumbledry has successfully and completely been moved to it’s new home on Justin’s server at the datacenter in Minneapolis. Alternatively, you may have somehow determined the testing IP address we used and then wandered here in search of the freshest tumbledry you could fine. Finally, if you do not speak English, you may be able to see this but not be able to read it. If this last category does apply to you, I am sorry, but I do hope you enjoy these foreign strings of characters snugly nestled in a standards-compliant design.
Currently, I am assembling an article about workflow efficiency and the importance of optimizing your desktop environment for increased productivity and multi-tasking. Seriously. However, that particular communiqué is on the proverbial back burner whilst I deal with life. By life I mean summer chemistry. And by summer chemistry, I mean hell. However confusing the elements are, human chemistry is infinitely more puzzling. I would like to restate what has tormented men throughout thousands of years, diverse social climates, and different evolutionary stages — women are ridiculously, unrealiculously, shockingly confusing.
Honestly, what is your problem? Why do you put up with computers that take forever to connect to the internet, to check you email, computers that force you to jump through hoops to do routine tasks, and take forever just to turn on. Why? Because you found one way to do things, and it has worked for you. Like millions of other computer users, you are stuck in the default settings of your computer, settings that certainly do not match your habits, interests, and style of using a computer. Maybe WinXP has your files living in “My Pictures” and “My Videos” and “My Everything Else.” Maybe getting your email is a lengthy log-in process. Maybe you are always juggling open browser windows. Maybe IM is always in your way. Regardless, streamlining and eliminating these minor annoyances you have come to live with will save you piles of time.
My parents are celebrating their 25th anniversary in Canada this week. Upon sharing this nugget of information with my friends, I was immediately asked by Matt, “Does this mean you get to blast the stereo?” The thought had not crossed my mind, but come to think of it, the system does need a good workout. At home, I switch from running the HPM’s on the Pioneer SX-838 to using the Pioneer SX-850. The real power, however, comes from the subwoofer of thunder. Thus, we will have to see what goes down - some new SPL records may be set in the Micek basement.
This will be the first album recommendation I have made based on … almost no exposure to an album. This little disc, Everyone Is Here, has a single called “Won’t Give In,” which is available on iTunes as a part of a three-song download. Unfortunately, I do not have iTunes and do not have the time to grab it, so I am sitting here hoping Cities 97 will play this song again for New Music Monday. It was just one of those songs that grabbed me. Traveling 70 miles an hour eastbound on I94 with the windows open, some subtle nuance of the tune grabbed my eardrums and told them “this is something special.” Then again, I am suggesting you buy a compact disc based on 30 seconds of hearing bits and pieces of one song from it. This means either the song is so amazing that 30 seconds of it filtered through traffic causes melodic brain convulsions, or I am utterly misguided and should be doing better things during the driving task.
In all the time that I have sorted clothing, washed it, and dried it, I have never regarded the process as particularly difficult. Our washer is high efficiency with a large load capacity (no pesky center agitator), the dryer has a dryness sensor; it isn’t rocket science. Folding shirts used to throw me for a loop until I learned the proper use of the chin whilst folding (oh you suspected, but you did not know - a third appendage during folding does help!). Oh yes. Anyhow, ironing is not a problem either because I only burned the screen print off one t-shirt and it ended up looking rather cool: like it had been speckled with paint. I do not think I will get that lucky the next time I melt something, so I have pretty much avoided it since. Either way, I have never turned any load of whites pink and really do not think about laundry any more than the average person.
