Year: 2006

While trying to repair yet another botched Ubuntu upgrade, I got this fabulous warning message:

Do you want to continue? [Y/n/?]
The following ESSENTIAL packages will be REMOVED!
sysvinit

WARNING: Performing this action will probably cause your system to break!
Do NOT continue unless you know EXACTLY what you are doing!
To continue, type the phrase "I am aware that this is a very bad idea":


I was rushing through, so a simply Y/n prompt probably would have left me screwed (still my own fault) – but this one pretty much slams you in the face with how bad a move you might be about to make. And you just know that there are people on message boards complaining that this broke their system.

It reminds of this school I did work for at my old job. When they insisted on buying and maintaining their own firewall, rather than going through us, we made them sign a document explaining how that was entirely 100% their machine to deal with and we were not responsible for supporting it at all. Sure enough, as soon as they had problems they said something to the effect of, “We know we signed that document absolving you of responsibility, but we still think this is your responsibility.” Sometimes spelling it out just ain’t enough…

Oh I definitely could have used one of these back in college. I mean, just imagine the possibilities…

EDIT: I just realized that I totally botched this link. No wonder no one cared!

I think we were one clogged toilet from having to use our backyard as a very public bathroom. We’re talking 2 bathrooms containing: 1 busted shower, 1 clogged tub, 1 clogged sink, and 1 broken faucet. Each time something broke I was all, “That’s okay, at least the other bathroom still works!” That only lasts for so long before you’re knee deep in crap – and that ain’t just an analogy.

The upstairs shower is the least of our concerns as we’ve gotten used to just using the one downstairs anyway. No, I haven’t conceded that battle – I’m just letting the infidels enjoy the broken fixtures until a time that I feel confident busting through that wall. But once the tub downstairs started filling halfway up our calves when we showered… well, let’s just say that it was no longer the cleansing process we desired. Sick of dumping random chemicals that could be killing cute frogs and stuff down a drainpipe that went from slow to stopped up almost overnight, I started with ye olde baking soda trick. And after a few boxes of baking soda and several gallons of boiling water and vinegar were poured down I learned something – environmentally safe clog removal methods ain’t worth crap…

But before I switched back to the mighty gods of Drano and Liquid Plumber, I decided to give snaking a try. Thankfully that removed a wig’s worth of hair to clear the upstairs bathroom sink, because all it managed to do in the tub was frustrate me to the point of tears. Half a bottle of Drano later (down the drain, not my throat) and I didn’t care if the pipes below were being completely eaten through – let the damn shower just drain out into the basement for all I care! At least I won’t feel like I’m showering in the local crick! Miraculously, just as I had given up on the process, water just started rushing through as if the pipes suddenly discovered just what the hell their purpose was in life. Hours of bleaching later, and showering downstairs had quickly turned into a pleasant experience once again.

As for the faucet downstairs, I already hated that fixture, so my only beef with the hot water handle ripping out right in my hand was that it happened at the same time as EVERYTHING ELSE IN OUR HOUSE SUDDENLY BREAKING!! Seriously, double-you tee eff?!?! Did the warranty on our happiness just expire? Can we not just continue our peaceful existence? So I find myself buying the one of the cheapest faucets I can find at Home Despot (they were out of the $20 one, so that forced me to upgrade to one of the nicer looking units) and then having to learn some basic plumbing. The faucet replacement was actually a breeze – that told me something else would have to be totally FUBAR before I could wrap this project up. Sure enough, I found out that the drain underneath was wrapped in duct tape because the metal pipes had eroded down to aluminum foil. At this point I’ve still just got a bucket under the new sink drain as I haven’t had a chance to pick up the elbow PVC that I need.

At least the new boiler is in. Considering how much that cost (even going the lowest bidder route), I’m praying for cold weather to rush right in and justify the expense. Either that, or I’m keeping our house at 80 degrees until spring. I’m getting my money’s worth one way or another dammit!

I swung by Best Buy yesterday for my weekly what-newly-released-CDs-are-under-ten-bucks trip to find a growing campsite out front. I was briefly perplexed by the number of homeless people who would choose that area for bedding down when I remembered just how stupid people (read: boys in their twenties) can be. OMFG!! The PS3 is coming out!!1!!1 LOLOLOL!!! And some geeks just can’t get it fast enough. I guess I should give these guys some credit – perhaps they are planning to turn around and sell it on ebay with an exorbitant markup. For that I would salute them. Otherwise they just deserve ridicule and possibly even BB pellets.

At this point it’s not the price or the unwieldy waiting list that will keep me away from the PS3. Rather it’s the sheer evilness of Sony. I truly hope they go out of business. And since I’m trying to stick with convictions these days (I’m still not paying for TV!), I’m avoiding as many Sony products as I can (okay, I do get their blank DVDs when on sale). And don’t try that “but they lose money on every PS3 they sell” crap on me – hey morons, they lose even more money when that PS3 just sits on a shelf in GameStop collecting dust.

Maybe someday when our finances are more in order I’ll take a look at upgrading to an XBOX 360 or Nintendo WHEEEEEEE! But for now I’ll just say no, and keep playing my YARGH! pirated PS2 games.

These are the things homeownership is now forcing us to deal with:

• Forget a possible simple fix for the heater-thingy in the basement. We’re talking replacement now. Just a little rewiring was likely to coast a grand, and there was no guarantee we could even start the boiler after that was done. So it looks like we have to pony up the cash and get us a system that wasn’t initially designed to burst into flames.
• Now the oven is in on it. That’s right, our oven stopped working. I don’t even know how that happens. It’s the most basic model you can get with built-in ignition. You just open up a pipe o’ gas and add a spark – how does that break? I could possibly understand it if the burners weren’t working… but just the oven? Dammit, I just want to cook the Trader Joe’s pizza already…
• And of course the basement is still causing problems. I was so excited when cleaning the gutters seemed to stop the flooding. And then we really cleaned up down there, got rid of a lot of crap, installed a deep freezer, and generally made it less creepy. But that just seemed to encourage the water. Now it’s coming in from the other side and generally disguising its advances. The plumber said they could also install a sump pump for around $1100, but I say screw that – I’ve got a sledgehammer, plenty o’ liquor, and even more frustration. A concrete floor is no match.

Amazingly, this wouldn’t be so bad if work weren’t becoming truly stressful for the first time in my 3 and a half year tenure. The year end audit isn’t quite as bad this year, but when combined with being brought in as a major part of some litigation (nothing confidential here – you can read about it on our website) it really starts to drag. I’ve suddenly been getting headaches on a regular basis from all the tension in my body. It’s gotten so bad some days that I just have to shut down for an hour or so to cope.

Thankfully Mark provided me with a “copy” of Justice League Whatever that has given me the ability to prance around as a sexy, yet annoying magician who can turn robots into bunnies for a large Martian to smash with cars. Now that’s what I call stress relief…

On a day when the nation rushes to the polls to determine the course of US politics for the next few years – a day where we could truly shift the direction we as a people are headed in – CNN makes sure to deliver the most important news first:
!@(images/screwcnn.jpg:L480px popimg: “What’s a KFed to do?”)

EDIT: I’m not sure why the thumbnail isn’t displaying properly on this. It seems to be a problem with the LazyImageLayout plugin and the k2 theme. Just click on it anyway.

And a merry healthy eating season to all!

The day I’ve been counting down to for months has finally arrived. That’s right, the 55,000 square foot Whole Foods has opened across the street. You just can’t imagine how excited Lisa and I have been as we’ve watched this megastore be constructed, the workers hired, and the shelves stocked. Unless, of course, you too are dorky suburbanites with no lives. 😛

This weekend we were checking out the Whole Foods website to find out any details we could. We almost passed out from the thrill of finding out that it would open on November 1st – that’s today! There was even a preview party Monday night (which I sadly skipped, as Lisa was working late). But this morning I slipped in on my way to work; and let me tell you, I fell in love. I swear, I’m ready to sell our house and claim a corner as our new living quarters.

Tonight we’ll take a walk over for a deeper investigation. Hopefully I’ll even be able to provide some tasty photos of the mounds of fresh fish, perfectly stacked fruit, and deadly chocolate counters to make you all drool with envy – deliciously sinful envy!

Yes! PBF (that’s Perry Bible Fellowship for those of you not paying attention) finally made the t-shirt from one of my favorite comics a reality. That one might even rival the sheer fabulousness of the TV on the Radio shirt I picked up at the show last week (yeah, a photo will be coming soon).

(thanks to Boing Boing)

With such intelligent, well-thought out, and even-keeled writing as found in “The Day the Music Died”, is it any wonder that Wired fell out of relevance years ago? Are the people who work for that magazine so completely out of touch with the world of today? And yes, I find both sections of this “article” to be ridiculous.

But Jeph puts it best: “Of course, this guy isn’t a REAL journalist. I mean, he publishes articles on the INTERNET.”

(thanks to QCJeph)

OK, so we bought this house. Alright, that’s not really news. I told you that months ago – around when we bought it. Did I mention that it has a boiler? Ha, I bet you didn’t know that. Alright, you probably figured out that it had a furnace or boiler or some other device for making the house warmer than 40 degrees. But did you know that said boiler is about as old as the house and as big as a fridge?

So, everybody that’s figured out where this is going, raise your hands. You must all be homeowners, too. No, I don’t think we’re looking at a getting a new furnace right now (even though ours uses as much gas just to turn on as modern ones use for an entire month of keeping a house toasty), but that doesn’t make us any warmer than we currently are. It really seems to be a much simpler problem – but then problems always seem much simpler, don’t they?

This past spring we had a new (to us) oven installed by PSE&G. Basically I’m willing to fiddle around with the electrical wiring around the house that could send me flying across a room or pissing sparks for a week, but things involving flammable subjects speak to the not-so-handyman in me and say “call an expert.” So the guy hooked up the newish oven and offered to look at ol’ Bessy down in the basement (that’s my nickname for it – at least in this sentence). I should have known this was some sort of extortion racket going on once he immediately noticed that the low water shutoff valve wasn’t connected (alright, the fact that there were absolutely no wires coming out of it was probably a big hint). Regardless, he shut ‘er down and told us to have someone fix it before the cold weather creeps in months later…

Months later, the cold weather crept in (I really wanted to say creeped, but Firefox informs me that isn’t a word – unless I just add it to the dictionary. That feature certainly makes spell checking seem pointless.) and I found myself needing to get that little wiring problem fixed. Yes, I have comfortably sunk into my stereotypical husband lifestyle, complete with wife unit nagging me to fix all of the things that I assure her I will fix. So sue me.

A friend of Lisa’s came to look at the beast and assess the situation fir us. I will now add for insurance purposes that this “friend” is licensed to perform such tasks (assuming we were to move our house 50 miles north during the work). Of course, there now seems to be another problem with a broken valve or pipe or transmission or something – how the hell should I know? So I call up our home warranty hotline (I just love that concept – if your house breaks just send it in and will fix for you in 3-4 weeks), and they manage to get someone out relatively quickly (the delay was really my fault, so we’ll ignore that it happened). Of course this guy is saying that the shutoff valve problem is a pre-existing condition, just because it was like that before we bought it… Anywho, they might not cover the problem, and the day turned into a game of phone tag that I was not invited to participate in.

Now we’ve got a furnace/boiler/nuclear reactor in the basement that is turned off because it wasn’t designed to not burst into flames on it’s own, and can’t be turned on for one of two reasons – and the reason they’re going with is the one that they won’t pay for. Somehow I see this being resolved in late March. In the meantime I am building small fire pits in the middle of each room. I can only hope that our smoke detectors don’t work either.