Category: Ramblings

Can’t sleep

I don’t really have anything else to say right now. My wife and I decided to go see Pirates in an attempt to get my mind of some of the things I’ve been thinking about for the last few days. I’m glad we went. I enjoyed the movie much more than I thought I would, and it did help keep me distracted for a couple of hours.

Now I’m just back to those thousands of things running through my head all at once. I’m exhausted. I really just want to get some rest, but sleep won’t come. Instead I just lay there watching the blinking red light on our caller ID box in the other room, with my head full of all these thoughts.

I’ve decided it might help get them out of my head (at least for a while) if I get them into a word document. I’ve made a start, but there’s not much structure to it, and what I’ve written so far is riddled with incomplete sentances and only marginally cohearant thoughts. The topics jump around widly and the individual trains of thought are hard to follow. At least what’s on the screen resembles my current state of mind.

I think I’ll end up posting some of this stuff, but I want to try to get it cleaned up and organized first. I can already see two or three entries at the very least jumbled together on my screen. There may be more, but I’ll really only know for sure once I get more out of my head and into the document.

Would someone please tell my internal monolouge to shut the hell up for a few hours so I can get some rest? That pesky little voice in my head isn’t listening to me, and I’m starting to get tired of listening to it.

Semi-Regular "I’m still here" Post.

Yep, I’m still here. Haven’t gone anywhere.

Things of note:
I think that job I alluded to in a previus entry has fallen through – havent’ heard anything from the company, and my contact isn’t returning my calls

As far as my old employer goes, I am no longer “Furloughed” – we have all been officially “let go”. (Still haven’t seen a final paycheck yet, probably won’t until September. And that’s being optomistic.)

We’ve also been informed that all of our medical benefits (including COBRA) will most likely be discontinued at the end of August. Bleh.

I’ve kinda sorta taken up photography. I’ve got about 6 rolls of film that I need to get developed – I hope a few of the pictures come out.

I’m enjoying SWG a great deal. Too bad I’ll have to cancel my account at the end of the month. 🙁

The content of hooloovoo.net will probably be replaced soon with a semi-professional portfolio site as I step up my job search efforts once again.

(The change mentioned above will not affect simpson.hooloovoo.net – or any other subdomain for that matter.)

And now for something complety different.

An old boss/friend of mine contacted me yesterday about a possible job. It’s not web design, but it does sound intreaguing. It looks like it’ll be part time, but I’ll be able to telecommute. I’ll find out more about it next week.

There’s also an EB Games that just opened down the street from here. It probably wouldn’t pay enough by itself, but depending on what the position mentioned above is like, I may decide to apply for a job there too for the hell of it. (Just so I do actually get out of doors on a regular basis.)

I’m starting to feel like I need a change of pace, and being furloughed was a blessing in disguise. (Of course it would be nice if the company I used to work for would actually pay me what I’m owed. Now that I think about it, it’d also be nice if I got a check from EDD soon, too.)

Okay time to stop rambling. I’m off to make a shopping list.

Donating my free time

I’ve been helping simpsone and his parents get stuff moved up to Petaluma the last couple of days while frostedlexicharm has been down in LA deailing with nurses, surgeons, hospitals, and thier sick son. (For more info on that, check lexi’s blog – linked above.)

I tend to dislike dealing with simpsone’s father, but I’ve found that I can at least be civil towards him. (Even if he tends to be an ass towards me – well, towards just about everyone, really.) I’m actually taking a bit of a break from moving stuff right now, (and helping out my mom’s school to boot.) Anyway, we got (most of) the heavy stuff out of the way last night and this morning, but there’s still about 1/2 a garage and 3/4 of a storage area woth of stuff to get moved. (If I understood simpsone correctly.)

I’ve also spent the last couple of days working in the computer lab at my mother’s school, trying to undo some of the damage that’s been done to it throughout the year. I’ve been cleaning off the spyware, uninstalling apps that don’t need to be on the machine, “unifying” the desktop, and installing critical updates.

There’s more that I want to do to these machines, (like getting current virus definitions, tweaking thier network topology, and possibly even wiping all the machines and doing a fresh install of the OS and the basic software the lab needs,) but I don’t have the permission/funds to do that yet. (The scool needs to renew it’s site license to get current virus updates.) Getting the virus protection updated is the main thing I want to do but can’t yet – everything else would just be gravy.

I’ve actually enjoyed doing this stuff. It’s giving me a chance to get off my but and out of the house, and I actually feel useful. My job hunt is not going too well so far, but the last couple of days have kept me occupied – so I’m not spending all my time stressing about that.

I guess it’s about time for me to get back to working on the computers. Looks like I need to kill the spyware on the teacher machine as well. There’s been 5 different pop-up ads in the time it’s taken me to write this. (DEATH TO GATOR!)

Pointless Entry

Just a post mostly for posting sake. I don’t want to get out of the habit of blogging stuff here.

Let’s see: I think I’ve finally got my crap striaght with regards to my unemployment claim. (Someone was using my SSN to commit fraud against the system.) I might have to re-file my “did you look for a job” form from last week – I’ll know for sure in a couple of days.

I’m at that frustrating point in my portfolio web site where the design is done and I just need to plug in the content. I’m about 50% done with that. I guess I’m just used to most of the content being handed to me by someone else. I’d do a little bit of copy editing and image processing and then cut-n-paste the content into the shell I’d built for a particualr site. Writing the descriptions of the projects I’m including in the portfolio (goals, design hiighlights, etc.) is what’s got me jammed up. I suck. I was supposed to have this done last week.

Jeny and I went out for sushi with chutta last night. We’re having him over (well, down – he lives upstairs) for matzo-ball soup and lamb. It’s a really simple recipie I’ve been wanting to try out for a while. I hope it turns out.

Next weekend is the big camping/rafting trip. 15 people, 2 boats, class II and III rapids. It should be a blast. I’m hoping to do this again next year, but on a different part of the American river. One with class III and IV rapids.

Okay – ‘nough rambling for now, time to get back to writing copy for my portfolio.

Update:
I forgot one thing – I spent an hour or so yesterday walking around in the park over by lake merrit in oakland. I had my new-to-me camera and telephoto lens (purchased from my stepfather – payments delayed until I’m working again) and was taking pictures (mostly of the birds that were about) in color and black and white. I’m not expecting many good shots to come out. It was just a chance for me to get used to the camera.

It’s a Nikon N65 and I need to find some documentation on it, as there are a bunch of features on it I don’t know how to use – but I will learn.

Edited on Jun 10th 2003, 20:16 by Hooloovoo

Dust Is Not My Friend

My wife and I did a marathon cleaning session today, (with some help from her sister.) Over the last few months, the computer/craft room had become a major disaster area. Since I’m currently jobless, and Jenny had today off, we decided it would be a good day to do something about it. We also invited her sister down to help us out a bit. (We bribed Becky with food, a couple of driving lessons, and a ride to Plough tonight.)

We spent about 8 hours cleaning, with breaks here and there as my allergies kicked in, or we needed lunch, or were just feeling overwhelmed. Had I been thinking, I might have taken before and after pictures, because I can hardly beleive this is the same room. We’re not quite finished yet, there are still a couple of boxes we need to go through, not counting the 7 boxes of stuff I brought home from work, (most of which will probably end up back in a cubicle when I land a new position.) Still, this room is a thousand times better than it was yesterday.

Jenny is on her way up to Starry Plough with Becky. (Her third driving session this weekend.) Actually, Jenny’s probably on her way back by now. We’d thought about going to Plough tonight as, (I’ve never been – I should probably rectify that at some point.) but we’re both pretty wiped out.

On the job search front: The call I was expecting today hasn’t happened yet, but I’m not too worried about it. I’ll probably give the recruiter a call tomorrow afternoon if I haven’t heard anything from him. And as soon as I’m done writing this, I’m off to the online job search sites to see if there are any new listings I can post my resume to.

Just to see if he’s reading: Gossip, can you add a “Home” or “Life” category? (or both?)

Confessions of a Sentient Conflux

Hello, My name is Hooloovoo – and I was a sentient conflux.

(Hi Hooloovoo)

Back when the sentients first started to appear in Jumpgate you may have seen a C3 investigating a TRI Sensor Beacon out near Hyperial, or paying homage to “Emma – Destroyer of the Unwary”. That sentient was me. I was never a very good PvP pilot, but I did participate in a few of the early sentient-vs-player battles, (mostly as laser-cannon fodder.)

I was also Padan – whom you may or may not remember from the Pirates of GBS fiasco, which took place when Mother was the sole GM left by 3DO to run the game. (Again, I participated mostly in a laser-cannon fodder capacity.) I tried to help Mother out where I could, but Jumpgate was not my primary job responsibility.

I first came to Jumpgate when the company I worked for secured the publishing rights for the game. I was granted a beta account primarily because I was to help desin and implement the product’s marketing, and online billing/support sites. (Which would be loosely tied into JOSSH.) I stayed in the game post beta, because I had found something that I really enjoyed. Not just in the game, but also in the community. (I’m very glad that something of that sense of community lives on here, at g-blog.net, even if I don’t log into my Jumpgate account very often anymore.)

For the last 4 1/2 years, I’ve been involved in the design, creation, publishing, and continued maintenance of The 3DO Company’s online presence. I’ve worked as part of a talented web team, and more recently as “a web team of one.” All that came to an end about 3 hours ago. I am now officialy a “Web designer seeking a position in the San Fancisco Bay Area as part of a creative and energetic web site development team.”

Losing your job sucks, especially when this is the reason.

got hosed, tommy. He got hosed.

More Company-Bulk

Just thought I’d share some more of what I’ve found in my latest foray into Cumpany-Bulk
————————————————— —————————–
Reduce Your Junk Mail and Telemarketing Calls

The items below could help to reduce your junk mail and telemarketing calls.

Three Little Words

I suppose some degree of commerce would grind to a halt if telephone
solicitors weren’t able to call people at home during dinner hour, but that
doesn’t make it any more pleasant. Now Steve Rubenstein, a writer for the
San Francisco Chronicle, has proposed Three Little Words, based on his brief
experience in a telemarketing operation that would stop the nuisance for all
time. The three little words are: Hold On, Please… Saying this while putting down your phone and walking off instead of hanging up immediately would make each telemarketing call so time-consuming that boiler rooms would grind to a halt. When you eventually hear the phone company’s beep-beep-beep tone, you know it’s time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task. This might be one of those articles you’ll want to e-mail to your friends. Three little words that eliminate telephone soliciting.

Using the # Sign

Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?

This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and
records the time of day when a person answers the phone. This technique is
used to determine the best time of day for a real sales person to call back
and get someone at home. What you can do after answering, if you notice
there is no one there, immediately start hitting your # button on the phone,
6 or 7 times, as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine dialed call,
and it kicks your number out of their system.

Another Good Idea:

When you get ads in your phone or utility bill, include them with the payment; let the companies throw them away. When you get those pre-approved letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and junk like that, most of them come with postage paid return envelopes, right? Well, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little envelopes. Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send the pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn’t get anything else that day then just send them their application back! If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn’t on anything you send them. You can send it back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! Eventually, the banks and credit card companies will begin getting their junk back in the mail. Let’s let them know what it’s like to get junk mail, and the best of it is that they’re paying for it. Twice.

Let’s help keep our postal service busy since they say e-mail is cutting
into their business, and that’s why they need to increase postage again.

Send this to a friend or two or three…or fifty
———————————————————- ———————-
Update: Related to dealing with telemarketers: California residents can now pre-register for the national Do Not Call program

Edited on May 7th 2003, 22:34 by Hooloovoo

typing weirdness

I’m becomming more and more convinced that my typing skills (such that they are) are deteriorating rapidy.

I commonly make juxtaposition errors, like “teh”, taht”, “fro” and so forth, as well as mis-CApitalizing the second letter of a word many times (most commonly an “A” or an “E”)

Today I noticed a new one: Over the last few days when typing the phrase “to the” I’ve gone back to re-read a line (or run spell check) and noticed (or had the spell checker notice) that I actually typed “the the”.

Just now I was about to send an email to one of the VPs of my company when I saw that I had typed not “to the”, (or even “the the”,) but “to to”

maybe I should go sign up for a typing course or somethign.

(There’s another one of those juxtaposition errors…)

Edit: Some typos were intentional – others were not, and have been removed.

Edited on Apr 18th 2003, 23:40 by Hooloovoo

I said this weekend, but then I got bored.

Lexi, you may be interested in this link: http://simpson.hooloovoo.net

(If you want to see what it’s going to look like, check out http://gallery.belknap-family.net Same software, different content. And you’ll be able to upload new images yourself 🙂

Update: After banging my head against some poorly written error codes, I finally got the software installed on the site, and set up a test gallery. I just got off the phone with Eric, who is now in posession of login information for the two of you.

See what happens when a computer geek’s wife gets off work late? Instead of cooking dinner, he plays with server configurations. 🙂

Okay back to dinner cooking for me – seafood and veggies in peanut sauce over noodles. Kinda of a half italian – half thai – half leftovers kind of thing. Wait… that’s 1½ of a dinner – I need 2… Oh, I forgot about the salad. There, that’s better. 🙂

Edited on Apr 12th 2003, 03:13 by Hooloovoo