Stuff I am currently thinking about....

1. I miss the Fab One-Shot. The best laundry product ever. I discovered it in college. Obviously invented by a guy. No need to think. One packet in with the clothes and it contained detergent, fabric softener, everything. Then move the whole batch to the dryer. All done. SCORE!
2. The Aero bar. No longer available in the US -- most people here just didn't go for it -- but thankfully I can still get them in Canada and the UK. Mom brought me one and I intend to eat it tomorrow.
3. Smarties. Yum. Screw M&Ms. Smarties are way better. Not for sale in the USA due to a trademark issue with the US Smarties. Totally different candies.
4. Josh. I should know better, but I don't. ::mutter:: Oh, and Eric Hedlund, too. I wonder what he's doing right now?
5. Austri. I really do have to tell her about the Billy Crystal concert being cancelled. Tomorrow for sure. Which reminds me, my trade show in Vegas is rapidly approaching.
6. Banana Nesquik. I am running low and the other brands are just not as good.
7. Milo has returned to the USA and I've just bought some at my Publix. I first had it on the Caribbean island nation of Dominica when I was a kid.
8. Schweppes Lemonade -- a UK only drink, not for sale in the USA. I'd like some right now.
9. My review of Vladimir Tod from Friday. I'm thinking I'll re-read it again.
10. The fact I spent $180 on the plumber. He was here for 16 minutes. But the shower in my guest bathroom works again.
11. I am itchy.
12. Dinner did not fill me up. I am hungry. I am a pig. Blech.
13. Adrian because we ended up not skating and not seeing a movie. Nobody is to blame because it just didn't work out.
14. London. I'm half tempted to go for the weekend. I could use miles. Leave Friday night. Arrive Saturday morning. Spend the day there. Fly home Sunday morning. Travel is great. No way would I do it. But I like thinking about it. Nobody would be crazy enough to go with me, anyway. Foyle's, Forbidden Planet, the London Transport Museum, a tour of the new Bond exhibit at the Imperial War Museum, maybe a show, a dinner at Rules, and a trip on the Eye. I could it all in that one day. That does sound fun, doesn't it?
15. Both The Simpsons and Family Guy are repeats tonight. Hence my ruminations on number 9 above.
16. I was thinking about Rob Barry. He wrote me -- snail mail -- two years ago and said we ought to write something together. I wrote him back twice (email and snail mail) and never heard back. That's a project that has always interested me. Rob's smart. I like Rob.
17. I'm still vexed by converting Claris Resolve to a current format, especially now that I can't even run OS-9 reliably.
18. I was thinking about visiting Pystar's offices to discuss the Mac clone. Pystar is a short drive from my house. I'm sure they're scammers, but I want to see for myself. If I'm wrong, I'll buy one.
19. I need a literary agent still. I'll never get published without one. One day... One day...
20. Scooter's vet check-up went well, so another 90 days of hopeful good health. Everything was as normal as could be. The thyroid medications is working her kidneys are starting to fail but she's compensating well.
21. How to get more traffic to my Panthers (and other teams) Hockey Message boards.

In This Weekend's News

I am disgusted with the Panthers. I am disgusted with the Panthers Management, for they are most of the reason I am disgusted with the Panthers. I won't bore you gentle readers with such a diatribe here, but it's posted over at my Panthers Hockey Message Board if you want to read it, though posting does require membership. Related to that, I've been invited to a NO TIME LIMIT meeting with the owner Alan Cohen (along with other season seatholders). I must assume my invitation was an error, but I've RSVP'd and am going. They have no idea what they're in for. I will be polite, professional, and brutally scathing. They shall wither before my causticity. May God have mercy on their souls because I shan't.

I have begun the slow process of selling my random computer items on E-bay. I've started with some low-end, cross-platform software. All bids start at a buck (99 cents) and have no reserve. The list of what will slowly appear there is at my website and if you see something, contact me directly. We can work something out before it goes on e-bay. Friends and family get items free or at embarrassingly low prices. A friend has already claimed my G5 so that's not listed; I'm shipping it off Monday. I took considerably less than I'd have gotten off E-bay but it's going to a good home, and that's more important to me than the extra money.

Yesterday I hung out with Timmy for the first time in awhile. He's still the same. Take that as you will.

I saw Adrian today and we had breakfast and went skating. The movie bit was cancelled because he had work to do. I had also seen him Thursday when he came and got the old TV in the guest room. My guest room now has HDTV -- see my previous post, item number six :)

We did stop, on the way back to his house, at the newly-reopened CompUSA (now a division of Tiger Direct). I gotta remember to let Tom know just for his amusement.

I cleaned Scooter's ears yesterday. I went to the grocery store, spent $50 and noticed I don't have anything to eat. Sucks to be me. The final four doesn't interest me this year, nor does the current NHL playoff picture though that may change. I am doing laundry, and I was going to go to the mall to kill time but I'm just not motivated. So I am blogging instead. Lame? Probably.

Eight Cores of Bliss

I have on my desk a 3.2ghz dual quad core Xeon MacPro running Leopard* 10.5.1 with 2gb of RAM and a total of 2TB of hard drive space (around 1/2 full already, thanks) plus dual SuperDrives and Airport and Bluetooth.

The switch has been painful as all hell. I didn't realize I could boot back into 10.4.11 which was my original plan. That created some issues with stuff that doesn't work with 10.5. I'm slowly working around them. My lack of access to Claris Resolve files will continue to be a pain because 10.5 cannot access OS9 and neither can Intel Machines. I am working on a solution.

The upgrade from Adobe CS2 to CS3 was a real chore since the transfer process didn't go smoothly. Three freaking hours, dammit. It gave me something to do whilst the contractors tore apart my shower (which will continue for the next week) to fix the shower pan.

Tomorrow I shall probably put one hard drive back in the original Mac so it works. That dual 2ghz G5 shall be on sale soon for interested parties. Still pretty damned fast.

Had dinner with Erin. Called Jose who was distracted and Tom after that. Discussed new mobile phone purchase that is pending. Just trying to get the iSync stuff up to date before I do that.







* Blech

Return of Wherefore art thou Eric J. Hedlund?

It's been a busy week. Let's see, I'm sick. I have a cold. My throat problem appears to be back, but I've been ignoring it for weeks -- it's pretty bad now so I'm off to the doctor tomorrow. Dad gets his one year oncologists report tomorrow.

Last night, I saw the Trans-Siberian Orchestra with Evan and Brenda, their kids, and Adrian. Actually enjoyed it. For their second year running, they opened the show in Sunrise, Florida. It's a bit early for a Christmas show. WHAT? CHRISTMAS? Yeah. But that's not why I go, though I truly don't mind it. I love the second half where they do rock-based classical music. That's how I discovered TSO.

Codey, a 17 year old kid, who I never, but knew on-line, died this past Sunday. I won't go into all the details but it's not fair. Life isn't fair. A great kid and we need more people like him. I'm remarkably sad considering I never spoke to him, only had a few IMs, and basically knew him via email and/or forum posts. Friendships aren't defined like they used to be.

In a previous post I wrote about Unca Eric which was actually a follow up to a 2004 post I made. A few months ago, I decided to track him down a few months ago. I found out he left his job in Taos (see that previous post). I knew some of his friends names -- met them once so many moons ago -- and through the power of Google and my persistence I contacted PL and EW -- who both had no idea how to get in touch with him. E-mails to all known addresses bounced. I had given up.

Then, suddenly, there were new posts in his blog. Yay. YAY! I wrote him through the LiveJournal internal mail system for its members, figuring there was no chance of contact whatsoever. He wrote me back! I felt some really nice, sincere, deep joy. I realize none of my blog readers will care, but I do. Eric meant a lot to me -- in a world of mental midgets he was a rare mental giant I could talk to. I respect him.

Random Stuff

1. I had dinner last night with someone I hadn't seen in about 20 years. I'm still trying to figure out the exact date. Randy Barris. I had a really great time. He came over around 515pm right after I got home from work -- a good 30 minutes before I figured he'd get there -- and we talked until around 630, then we went to dinner. We had a decent meal at Macaroni Grill, and then talked until almost 11pm -- me, having trouble staying awake since my day began not long after 530am. I just thought I'd let interested parties know. No further public details available.
2. A few more people accepted my LinkedIn invitations plus I got a few invitations and my contacts are over 30 now. Yay. I recommend LinkedIn to everyone from a professional work standpoint. If you have a job and you're a professional, you should have an account. It's a great resource. I have the free account and it's more than sufficient for my needs.
3. Reminder: if you're on NHL Connect, Orkut, Facebook, MySpace, or LinkedIn -- let's connect. I use my darsysataoldotcom address on all of them.
4. If you haven't visited kiva.org, please check it out. If you haven't joined, let me know and I'll gladly send you an invitation. This is a great way for you to help those less fortunate. It's a micro-lending site. You put your money in $25 a pop and when you're paid back you can get your money or re-loan it to someone else. I have a few friends already participating. I've got 5 loans outstanding as of right now. Their default rate is low. It's not a charitable contribution, nor is it a tax deduction because you put in and get your money back without interest. But it's double-karma points and we all need good karma.
5. Looks like I am, after all, going to London this Christmas. I am ditching Christmas and leave Christmas morning with my sister. We're flying to Paris, spending a day in EuroDisney, and then taking the train to London. Continental has absurdly low fares to CDG from Newark right now. With the current exchange rate, the trip will still be a bit expensive. I'm working on that. Well Karen is, but she's so slow to respond it's frustrating me. Relatives will have to see me Christmas Eve instead. SMARTIES! YORKIES! YUMMMM! I'm going to try and meet with an estate agent to see what I have to do to buy a home and reture there, though the time of year may prohibit that.
6. I'm really hungry right now. I wish someone would bring me food.

Shout Out to Tom O'Drain

This is just so Tom knows I'm thinking of him. I've e-mailed him already.

Tom's mother is dying despite everything they've done. I'm not going to go into it here, but you can read his blog here: http://ducky72.livejournal.com/ Being involved with a parent with cancer is draining beyond all measure. As you know I'm there now. My friends Kris and Thomas just went through that and now Tom. Life isn't always happy.

My sympathies go out to Tom, his brother Trent, and his father and the rest of his family as well. And of course prayers to his mother in her last moments.

Wherefore art thou Eric J. Hedlund?

So, every now and again I like to check up on my "missing" friends -- you know the people you lost contact with but you wish you hadn't. I guess it's sort of nostalgic. There aren't that many that I've lost touch with that I wish I could reconnect with, but there are a few. One, Eric, was just an amazing person. I really liked him for all sorts of reasons. I met him when he was around 14 or so and I was in my early 20s (here's a picture).

He ended up, last I checked, as the editor of the newspaper in Taos, New Mexico. Every now and then I'd go check over there, read some of his articles, and feel a little more connected. I sent an email to him a few months ago and it bounced. Then I found a notice saying that he'd left the paper because he decided to leave Taos entirely. So now I've lost contact. I feel surprisingly saddened by this -- despite the fact I haven't spoken to him in many, many years. He hasn't updated his blog in over a year.

A few years ago one of his friends e-mailed me as a result of this blog, so I thought I'd post this here in the remote hope it happens again. Eric's not the only one I think about, but he's one of very few. I miss Dee, but sadly, she's dead. There were some other people too, but I've managed to reconnect with them via e-mail and/or IM and such (Randy, Carey, for instance). I don't count the people I've tried to reconnect with but have met with reluctance or resistance (Josh, Rob H).

Friend Test Analysis

In yesterday's post I posted the "friend test" which is both amusing and revealing at the same time. A number of my friends have taken it as well as some people I don't know quite as well. I assumed the better the friend, the better the score, but clearly this isn't the case.

Since I was able to control the questions and answers, nobody who knows the least bit about me should score below 50% because if you've ever read my website you can get 50%. If you've visited my website and visited my blog regularly, you should get around 70%. To get past that mark you'd actually have to know something about me.

Let me say, I'm pleased at Jose's score because not only did he get the highest score so far, he e-mailed me to correct one of his answers which would have put him at 90% -- out of a possible 95% since one question I don't expect anyone could answer right except by sheer luck (the people group question). I expected he'd do well and he did.

I've learned something from this: for the most part, the people I expected to know me really well, don't -- and the people I didn't necessarily expect to know me so well have done better than I expected. A score of 70% is where I expected my friends to start in, but that hasn't happened. I'm not sure if I should be upset, sad, distressed, disappointed, or what. I don't want to call out names because I don't want to embarrass anyone.

If you don't want to use your real e-mail to register, you can use Guerilla Mail's disposable e-mail addresses -- they're great for that.

Also, if anyone is a member of: Orkut, MySpace, FaceBook, LinkedIn, NHLConnect, or StumbleUpon, feel free to add me to your contacts. Expand your network.

Friend Test

I've created this test for my MySpace page, but it supposedly works in a blog, so I'll try it here and see if anyone tries to take this test or not.



I will pass no further commentary at this time.

More on Friendships and such

This must be my favourite topic, because I've written about it often enough. Well here's another rant of sorts:

I despair for the future -- not my future, but that of the world -- because I find younger people can't have intelligent conversations for the most part. They think they're intelligent to be sure, but they can't talk about a whole lot except in a cursory fashion. Even when I was younger I found people able to have deeper conversations. Maybe it was just me and my friends, but I don't think so. I think people are getting less intelligent as time goes on.

I've tried repeatedly to engage some of my friends in intelligent conversation but it fails, repeatedly. And some of these people are supposedly smart. They seem smart, they act smart, but if you try to talk to them about anything that requires a thought process, reasoning, and an ultimate conclusion, you're in trouble. I can usually terminate any conversation with a "... but why do you feel that way?" because they just can't answer. I understand that sometimes you really can't answer that question, however mostly you should be able to answer it. If you're having a reaction to a situation, you should know why you're reacting that way, what it is you're feeling, and you should be able to talk about it (or say "none of your damned business" or "I do not choose to share").

Because I don't want to make these aforementioned friends feel bad, I'll leave their names out of this blog post on the off chance they one day read this post. Among my older friends, there are some who can have these discussions (whether or not they choose to do so and with whom is a different discussion) and there are some who can't. But the younger the friend, the less likely they're capable. I know it's not age related because 20 years ago I had friends in their teens who could have these sorts of discussion without any problem. I'm not sure I can name anyone under 25 who can and that's bad news for everyone. I know the thoughts are taking place -- it's a human condition -- but the skills to relate them are gone. Vanished without a trace. I have no explanation for it but it saddens me and makes me feel, well, lonely.

Let me use one person as an example 'cause I know he won't come here and read. There's a guy named Josh and we were really good friends for years. We used to have lengthy, involved, interesting talks that were amazingly complex, detailed, and enjoyable on many levels (the subject of which are confidential as are all my conversations with friends). He's in his mid-to-late 20s now. We're not even friends any more but that was his choice. He may be one of the most brilliant people I have ever met, and I get frustrated because he's wasting his life. He should be running the world and instead he's just another employee at a national retail chain. He might be the only person I'd admit is more intelligent than me. (That sounds so egotistical I've almost offended myself, but it's true. I'm amazingly smart and I think he's smarter. I think I need a bigger box for my ego.)

To be fair, most of my friends are smart: I think I said that in a previous post, or maybe I didn't. I don't suffer fools gladly and I cannot stand morons. Smart and Intelligent aren't the same thing though. And although the people I hang out with are generally smart, they're not all necessarily intelligent, though most certainly are. Of course they all think they are but thinking something is true doesn't make it true. It's just really weird and I'm having a hard time expressing it here, but then again I am aimlessly ranting.

I was going to make a point here, but if you're intelligent you've got it figured out. If you're smart, you probably haven't. If you don't know, well that's a different story altogether.

Reasons some friends suck

This is, in theory, a follow up to an old post: Lost Friends*

Someone asked me what exactly I meant. So let me explain it here. This is probably far too personal to post on-line, but what the fuck. I'm in a mood right now. Maybe I'll delete this after a few days. We'll see.

One day, for whatever reason, you become friends with someone. I don't mean acquaintance, nor do I mean a typical casual friend. I'm talking a full a deep friendship with someone you care about and assumedly cares about you back. Most you probably know what I'm talking about. If you don't, the rest of this post will be pointless to you.

As with all good friends you share all your most intimate details -- both ways, of course: that's what share means in this context. You do things together, you talk, you go places, all the things friends do with each other alone and in groups. And then, suddenly, you never hear from that person again without warning. There are no calls, no e-mails, no IMs, nothing. You call, mail cards via snail-mail, letters (e-mail and snail mail), send IMs, anything in an effort get a reply but nothing. Maybe you get a "I'll call soon when I have time" or some platitude if you're lucky, and because you're a sucker you believe it.

But it's a lie and it stabs you in the heart like a knife. It kills you inside slowly. Years later you still look at the person's website just to get a little taste of his/her life that you are no longer a part of -- and you don't even know why or what happened or anything at all. There, now you can all laugh at some aspect of my life that is truly pathetic. Have fun.

(*In deference to this person I will leave his/her name off this post. Their name is not included in the original post either because even I am not that brave. Maybe I should be.)

Online Friends versus Offline Friends (Real Friends?)

So, today I was thinking. I do that sometimes, you know? Most people call everyone they know online "friends" but are they really friends? I don't think so.

I have people I've met off-line, I know them off-line, and I socialize with them off-line. These are my "friends" and they are to some degree or another my friends. Some are good friends, some are casual friends, some just this side of acquaintances, and a precious few are Real Friends. I may interact with them on-line by exchanging e-mails or some-such but they are primarily off-line friends. Some have moved away or never lived that close but we do visit sometimes and occasionally talk via telephone.

I have some people I've met on-line that have become the type of friend I mentioned in the above paragraph. I say this because a reasonable amount of interaction with them is off-line. They belong in that same group. In fact, these friends may be better friends than those I've met off-line (TO, PJ, JM). Nowadays, I really try not to allow on-line friends to become offline friends because, frankly, there are too many mental cases out there. That's not to say it hasn't happened (WJM being the most recent). Oddly, when these types of friendships collapse (and like all friendships, sometimes they collapse instead of drift away) they seem to hurt more.

Then we have the on-line friends. Some of them I've even met once or twice, but we don't have that social interaction. I have lots of these folks -- more than half on Usenet or on various message boards. They don't know too much about me (and even that is possibly more than I'm comfortable with) and I don't know too much about them. What we really are is acquaintances. What we have is not really friendship. But the word "friend" is bandied about quite readily, even though it's simply inaccurate. I'd list some examples but there isn't space and invariably someone's feelings would be hurt so there's no point.

There are some on-line friends I'd like to say I'm not acquaintances is with (RB, RF, for instance) because I really feel like I am a part of their lives. We exchange holiday cards through the mail (as opposed to the grotesquely impersonal digital variety.) If they wanted to come to my home, I'd certainly invite them. If they asked me a favour, I'd certainly consider helping them much as I'd help any casual friend. I call these people "friends" and I mean it. It's hard for me to believe it on some level because I've convinced myself that these folks aren't real friends, but sometimes they are.

I've been toying with posting a edited version of a longish essay about friendship I once wrote here. Would anyone actually want to read it?

This is where I'd normally make a point, but I'm not going to type it. Make your own conclusions -- post a comment if you'd like. Link here and share this with your 'friends' -- maybe at some point I will edit this post and make the final statement I had.

Lost Friends

Well, maybe a little serious post here. I've been thinking about friends that I've made and lost over the years. People naturally come in and out of your life. That's just how things work. Sometimes we work harder on some friendships than others, sometimes we deliberately break some friendships, and sometimes death happens. Still, when you work at a friendship and it fades away, sometimes you experience regret and/or pain.

So, I decided to list some people here and talk about them. Maybe they'll even read this, but I doubt it.

Eric Hedlund. Of all the people I can think of, this is probably the most frustrating. But when only one person does the work, it can't last forever. I can honestly say I'm really, really, really glad he was part of my life, albeit for too short of a time. So many things could have happened, Some things, I suppose, were never meant to be. But it still hurts. So there.

Dorothy "Dee" Swansburg. In this case, sadly, death happened. She died too young (34) and too soon. :(

David Parisse. I even went to the trouble of finding him not that long ago, he wrote back even. I wrote him back and that was that. Not meant to be. Another decent guy. I hope he's happy :)

Steve Bernacki. I just lost touch with him. It was sad. Ever think in the back of your mind, you'd have been really good friends with someone if it just was given a chance?

Rob Henning. Psycosis on AOL back in the day. I don't know why I liked him, but I did. He was just one of those really cool guys. Someone told me he was dead but I can't imagine 'cause he was so young. He vanished without a trace.

There are lots more, too, but I just picked a random sampling. There are people I'm friends with whom I wish I were better friends with -- that list could go on forever. There are also people who aren't in my life anymore and I'm really glad. When things are looking up, it's easy to be friends. I'm leaving all the names off this part lest the involved people get embarrassed and/or pissed.

When things are down you know who your real friends are. I am very fortunate to have people like that in my life. These people are honestly good friends. I wish I had more, and I wish I were even better friends with the ones I have because you can't get too much of a good thing.

So there. A serious post. Happy?
(Some minor updating edits to this post made 1-11-06)

Shout Out to Friends

(1) Maury because she made me do this and it's all her fault
(2) Wil Wheaton because his blog (wilwheaton.net) is really cool
(3) Rob Barry because if he's doing it, I should do it
(4) Erin because I finally beat her to something
(5) Scooter Just Because

-- E