Aww..the poor puppy is starving!

/agree

Sample iTunes review

I have had a hard week, and am basically angry at everything. So, in today's post, I will bash on iTunes Customer review and the mighty mouse.

First, the Might Mouse. I hate you. With a passion. I want your cord to be longer so I can generate more momentum while swinging you around to then bash you into a brick wall that is on fire. The scroll ball doesn't work after a few months, and is impossible to clean. In order to attempt to "clean" it, you push very hard on the ball back and forth hoping to magically dislodge the piece of dirt/dust that is stuck. Very technical. I'm glad the engineers thought through there design enough to ask the question "so...what if the scroll ball stops working?" BAH!

Now, on to iTunes. Let me preface this by saying I buy my music almost exclusively through iTunes. I love the service, and I think its great. I wish I could buy international music easier, but I'll get over it. The customer reviews however...maybe not. Here is my personal summary of every iTunes review ever. First, a good review.

**clears throat**

SO I DONT KNOW IF YOU HAVE HERD OF THIS BAND ALREADY BUT IF YOU HAVENT JUST LISTEN TO IT RIGHT NOW AND YOU WILL LIKE IT AND BE GLAD YOU HERD THIS SONG BECAUSE IT IS REALLY GOOD AND IT KINDA SOUNDS LIKE [insert band name] BUT IS REALLY BETTER AND DIFFERENT AND THEY REALLY EARNED ALL THE STUFF THAT THEY GET BECAUSE THEY WORKED SO HARD AND I HERD ABOUT THEM LIKE A LONG TIME AGO AND THEIR MUSIC IS REALLY UNIQUE AND STUFF EVEN THOUGH THEY KINDA SOUND LIKE A BUNCH OF OTHER BANDS BUT BETTER.

And now, for a complaint about the free single of the week.

Oh my gosh. Apple does it again. I can't believe they are so horrible and terrible to give out this music for free. They should pay us to listen to it. It is so bad that not only does it not deserve to take up the space on your 120gb ipod, but it will even eat other songs with its badness. I hate this style of music with a passion, but this song is so bad. You should listen to my opinion because I don't understand the nuances of this style of music and take every opportunity to bash it. Click yes if you agree with my mindless rant.

Can I just take a minute to request something from you iTunes customers? Please don't complain about free music just because it isn't your style of music. I don't prefer rap music, therefore, if I download a free song of the week that is rap, I don't complain about it. It isn't my area of expertise. If a song is released in a genre that I feel informed about, I will give my opinion. But to simply explode with uniformed gibberish makes us all dumber than before. Stop making the world dumber...please.

Also, if you are planning to compare a band to another one, and then call the original band unique, please stop typing. When one thing is easy to compare to another thing, it has lost its ability to be unique. Also, caps locks is not necessary, and punctuation is very important. Finally, you have not herd music, you have heard it. Herding is animals...not music. If you didn't know that, please stop posting.

This class...

...is the suckiest suck that ever sucked from Sucksville with suck on the side.

Here's a painting of Wild Bill Hickok by N.C. Wyeth.

Am I on Drugs?

This is the most bizarre thing I have ever seen. I...I just don't get it.

Changing tide?

Could this steal from Ron Paul's votes?

Technoviking > All

I post this for Ian. I can't dare take credit for something that was so clearly found by him.

It smells like burning

Irvine, California
October 21, 2007

Sandstorm

There were sandstorms up here yesterday, and I think thats cool. Here are some photos from a rainy day, and the sandstormy day.



Looking towards Big Bear.



The pass called "the narrows" to get from the I-15 to our place.



View of the Mojave River.

Overall, it was a really interesting experience. The winds were whipping clouds of dust up seemingly out of nowhere, the gusts would cause you to swerve a bit as you were driving, and it looked like dust was dancing across the streets. Petty cool stuff. Sadly, it is quite dangerous too.

God Hates Hugs

Network issues

I realized something about the network her at work today. We have 1 full time tech guy, and the network hasn't gone down once. At my previous job, we had 5 full time tech guys, and the network went down regularly. I can't help but think that PC networks (with PC workstations) require more people to be less stable with more downtime.

One of the common arguments I hear about PCs is that they are cheaper than Macs. Lets assume a PC is $200 cheaper than a Mac. Now, some will argue that a $999 PC isn't really equal to a 1199 iMac, but that's not something we'll deal with. Lets just say $200.

We'll assume each network has 25 computers, and 25 users making $15/hour and that the tech team makes $20/hour per full time employee. For the PC network we will assume 4 hours of downtime per month which, from my experience, is pretty accurate.

5 Full time tech support = - $208,000 per year
PCs at $200 less than Mac = + $5,000 one time cost
25 user downtime for 2 hours = - $18,000.00 per year

One year of operation, assuming no replacement parts on the computers would cost:
($208,000) + ($18,000) - 5000 = $221,000

Now, for the Mac.
1 Full time tech support = $41,600
Cost saving = $0.00
25 user downtime for 0 hours = $0.00

So, the cost of 1 year of operation is $41,600.

So it looks like a PC network costs you $ 179,400 when you add in the cost of employees and downtime impacting the rest of the staff. But hey...at least you saved $200 on all those nice new machines.

Outside Opinion

So I saw this logo on the way into work this morning, and was really caught off guard. While some logos are so abstract there is no way to associated them with the company they represent, others are designed to be an icon of the trade. So the meat company that yields this logo wanted a design that was in the shape of a cows skull I presume. Instead, it looks like they sell jock straps more than anything. I guess it shows the value inherent in asking other people's opinion of the work you create.

Location, Location, Location

This would not be good location...assuming of course this isn't the actual name of the dentist office.

Cool Weather

I woke up this morning, and the sky looked really cool. I had just enough time to grab my camera and shoot a few shots without being too late to work.

This is looking South-East from our guest room balcony.



This is looking due south. I love how the clouds separated enough to really highlight the vegetation surrounding the Mohave River. As you can tell, that is really the only green stretch out here. Makes for some very interesting contrasts though.

Ahh...the desert

Some coworkers and I were wandering the desert today after work to find the "right" Joshua Tree for a project I am working on, and we stumbled across something interesting.



That would be a live round, just chillin' off the road. We found another one in the same location. Crazy stuff out here. We saw some stink bugs too, but they weren't nearly as interesting. I did get some great rocks for an upcoming photo series I am working on.

I love bugs...

Therefore... I love the desert.

We found this little guy scurrying through our place tonight. Very cool looking!

Looks like here he wanted to model for me a bit. He was ready for his close up... to him. It got a little uncomfortable when we locked eyes for a moment, but he realized he was stuck in a cup... so there wasn't much he could do. That and the fact that I could smash him a toenail clipping. Once our "shoot" was finished, I let him roam the burning wasteland that is the High Desert on his own.

PoMoness

There really is no better place for this post than our blog. At least that is what my truth says.

How to get rich.

Today I parked my $2,000 1998 Saturn next to a one million dollar 2007 Ferrari -- AT CHURCH.
Seriously people -- how does anyone make enough money to buy a new Ferrari? I can barely afford groceries.

Money and power. Curious things.

PG

Looks like we are rated PG. Not sure if that is good or bad. I'm sure this might tempt some of you to ramp up the questionable behavior to see how much we can change the grade.

Gloiven