Just a few more hours...

One of the "sad" events this summer is that I've got to head out and go back to Kingman tomorrow. In all reality, I'm pretty excited about this, but it'll be the longest time I've been away from the helpdesk since I started here in August last year. So now, I'm working "just a few more hours" to help fatten the last paycheck a little bit more before I get back in mid-July.

Tonight's project is to gather all the stuff I want to take with me to leave at dad's house, and anything I think I'll need for my project at the high school, and for my trip to Michigan. So far I know I'm bringing the Lenovo R61i and the D300 stuff, along with the MyWD hard disc, which I use for imaging and multimedia. I'll probably also toss the color calibrator and the rechargeable batteries slash recharger(s) in the photo-backpack too.

Just for good measure, I think I'll bring the A21m, for some NT4 action, and maybe the PowerBook 520s, so I can swap in the good hinges on the 520c, and get some of my own software installed on it.

Anyway... Just a few more hours of work before I leave the helpdesk until July.

Sushi

Today, I accidentally wasn't on the schedule for most of the evening shift, so I was able to leave work at about 4:30 and hang out with Megan. We hung out in the room a little bit while she finalized the new color of her hair, and then we went to Hiro's to go get some Sushi.

Today we've also been watching Avatar: The Last Air-bender, but there's more on that tomorrow.

Swamped

The first five-week summer session started today. It's 7:45 and just now after so many hours of this shift have I had an opportunity to start closing out some of the calls I had to leave open, so I could go back in later and add details. Unfortunately right as I was nearly done closing out the last of those calls, another hour-long call marathon came in, this time all dealing with ResNet.

It's a very exhausting experience to be on marathon calls for so long, but as always there are the really nice callers who are polite and seem to be happy merely for the fact that there was someone on the other end trying to help them with their computer.

Tonight, I'm looking forward to heading home and falling asleep freakishly early. That, or maybe watching a movie.

Downtown

One of my favorite activities so far this summer, one which I'll probably miss the most while I'm in Kingman then on my vacation, has become visiting downtown Flagstaff.

Before going downtown though, it's worth noting that I spent some time video chatting with Megan.

Today, Glenn, Meaghan, Mel and I went to downtown on a wonderful little photo adventure. We walked around downtown, had a bit of a fashion shoot in the park, and then went to Pita Pit for some dinner. That's the other thing I'm going to miss in Kingman/Michigan, Pita Pit.

Afterward we came back to the room and had a bit of a dance party, along with some music and web browsing.

After that, I did some color calibration and got myself caught up on processing and posting my Photo365 images. I've got a lot of workflow stuff I need to do on that front though, especially keywording the oldest of my image folders, making sure my list of keywords is complete, and burning keyworded folders to DVD for archival.

Inventory

One of the most terrifying things about being such a packrat has been moving. Moving from Cedar wing to Aspen wing of Gabaldon was downright terrifying, and somehow in the past few weeks, I've managed to get not only another computer of the desktop variety, but another two are on their way.

One of the things I suppose I need to start doing is finding the time to work on some of my other projects, like re-combining the ThinkPad 760 machines so I can toss out my least favorite one. Same with the PowerBook 520s, and I think I need to send a computer or two back home, probably the PowerBook 180 and/or whichever 520 I deem the best. Plus the e-PCs probably, and who knows whether or not I'll keep using the U60.

I've also got optical discs I need to get rid of because they're useless, a whole box of extra sheets, blankets and clothes I've never worn, and a bunch of other little nicnacs.

For the summer, living minimalistically is both very easy, and extraordinarily difficult. It's difficult to get through the day without having to dig through the various layers of boxes underneath the bed. I find it difficult to move around the room without tripping on something that hasn't found it's own place that's out of the way.

In summation, I need to get rid of stuff, or at least figure out a better way to move it and have it around without it being in my way.

Speed Racer... oerr... Indiana Jones.

Last night, Meaghan, Tyson, Mel, David and I went to see Speed Racer, I mean Indiana Jones. It was a pretty great movie overall, and quite a fun adventure.

The movie itself was pretty epic, I'd never seen any Indiana Jones movies before, so there were a few little things lost on me, but it wasn't something I felt like I was unable to continue watching, which is good. I should check to see if there's any particular order in which I should watch the others, or if they're standalone too.

Because I can't seem to post without some technology update, it's worth noting that I chose and bought a video card for the flatdell -- I'm getting for it an nVidia GeForce 8600GT.

Errands

Today has been very busy. Lots of errands were run. I've been to the helpdesk, to Staples & Walmart, and I've just now gotten back from getting food (Taco Bell) for Glenn, who now has a job at the front desk of Gabaldon. In a few more moments, I'm heading out with Meaghan, Tyson, Mel and probably a few other people to go see the new Indiana Jones movie.

As an update on 'Precious' the Dell Inspiron 530s, I have decided not to get a new monitor for it yet, I am going to run it with the 19" dell trinitron monitor, which I found out is capable of running at 1600x1200@75Hz, which is a very viewable resolution and refresh rate. I'm going to try color calibrating the thing in the next week or so.

I'm also still looking at graphics cards for it. I've found nearly a dozen individual suitable cards, but I'm not a hundred percent certain which one I'm going to get yet.

Speed Racer

The other night Meaghan, Mel, David and I went to see Speed Racer. Unfortunately this is being put up using the Scheduled Posting feature, because I've already got a queue of blog posts out to like Thursday or Friday.

The good news is that the movie has a pretty amazing soundtrack and the color is amazing. The sound design in it's awesome, and the editing and visuals are awesome. Glenn asked me if any of the extra effort put into the technical detail detracts from the movie at all, and I've got to say that it definitely doesn't. The whole thing is made more impressive by, for one example, the editing where as events are unfolding, you can see everyone's reactions.

The music makes this movie, I think. During the whole thing I can feel the suspense, the excitement, or whatever other emotion is being conveyed on the screen, more because of the music than anything. It has a great orchestrated sound, and I intend to have bought it on iTunes by the time you read this.

The bad news is that Meaghan and I managed to get hopped up on caffeine during the movie, each of us having consumed 44oz worth of our preferred caffeine drink. (Coke and Dr. Pepper, respectively.) Meaghan ended up staying in her room, hopefully she's managed to fall asleep by now because I feel terrible about having contributed to her crazy insomnia. I've stayed up for a bit to write this blog post, and do a few other things around the room.

I completely recommend that anyone who is looking for a movie to see, see this one.

Rent, & Other Summer Plans.

Well, as a way to celebrate the end of the semester, Megan and I are planning on going to see Rent on Sunday, May 11th, down in Phoenix. I'm not sure of the details yet, but Megan really wants to go, and I do quite like Rent too. We're going down to Tucson on Friday after my last normal Spring2008 shift at the helpdesk, hanging out there for a bit, and then Rent on Sunday, and I'm taking the Flagstaff Express back to campus, in time to get some sleep before the first ACHD shift of Summer, 2008!

Also, I am still REALLY ready for the summer to begin. I've started having heartburn, VERY frequently, and I think it may be a result of the stress of almost the end of the semester.

This summer I'm working 20 hours a week at the helpdesk, and I'm not taking any classes. As far as I know I'm not going to be working any other on-campus jobs.

After Rent, I intend to reformat the ThinkPad R61i with a fresh install of Windows Vista Business or Ultimate, mainly because since I did the overlay from the included Home Premium to the Ultimate disc I have.

The other thing this summer I'm doing is taking a train trip from Kingman to Michigan for a few weeks to visit grandma. My brother's coming with me on the train, both ways, so I'm really not sure how that'll work out, but at least there's only one 23-hour layover, the one going East.

With the new backpack, the D300 and the R61i working properly, this trip promises to be pretty great. I can't wait to get daytime Amtrak photos, and of course it'll be great to have my photo workflow to use on my family members.

Another cool piece of technology I intend to bring is the EDGE data card for the R61i. I'm going to use the EDGE card to put photos on Flickr and make posts to the blog during the trip -- I may pre-write and schedule some posts for each end of the trip though, just in case I don't get any time to do so on those days. If I do get some time to write those days and need to go ahead and post something, it's really easy to use Blogger's interface to move something out even further in the future.

Other than that, my plans include "not having a roommate," "hanging out with Meaghan," and "lots and lots of photography." I also intend to "not move at all, the whole summer."

So I'm pretty excited about that.

Ready for Summer.

This post was delayed in favor of my previous post, "State of the MLA."

This is just a quick note to let everyone know that I am, in fact, ready for summer to start. The overnight shifts are great, but I haven't worked both of my own overnights on any regular basis since before going to the Renaissance Festival back at the end of February. That, and either the homework really is worse this semester, or I've just been letting it all pile up in awkward ways, because it seems like every two weeks, just when Megan seems to want my time the most, I've got large piles of homework due.

After finishing the German project I keep forgetting to work on, and getting done with everything else, my intent for the summer is to get on a regular sleeping schedule again, and work on some of my projects, such as my rationalization of my blog categories, getting the Sun Ultra60, and working with Windows 2003 ActiveDirectory.

Also, I'm quite ready to be done letting people without IDs into the lab. Apparently this pair gets into the lab often at this time without IDs, so either they know one of the other SCAs, or they just come on different nights, and then make it halfway into the lab before mentioning that they know about our ID policy. How infuriating.

Diety of iPods

Note: This post was pre-written last night using a feature in the latest Blogger In Draft version of the Blogger Dashboard.

Well, I've just now fixed what will officially be the second iPod I've repaired. I reattached a little cable in formerly-Megan's 4th generation iPod (20gig.) I can now load songs into it and play them! I think there's still some pretty massive hard disk damage, but the songs it does play, it plays loud and clear through the headphone ports.

The other iPod I've repaired was Megan's 5.5th generation iPod with video (80gig) which I transformed into a 32-gig SSD based iPod. For now, we'll call it 5.7th Generation iPod with Video. I eventually need to decide whether or not to go ahead and replace the hard disc in this 20gigger, and then I need to decide whether I want to go the compact flash route, or with another rotating drive. (I've even been considering replacing the hdd in my 5.5th Generation 30GB iPod with a 32 gig CF card, mainly for the increase in battery life, but for now it's fine as I use it so little, and when I do use it, I'm pretty careful with it.)

Another recent repair is the Mighty Mouse that was included with my iMac. I've got to start using the Logitech mouse with the R61i for awhile, as a result of it's recent aversion to properly working with the TrackPoint. Unfortunately, I think it may be time to give the R61i a clean install, especially now that I'm set in the software I'm using on Vista, and won't really need to run around installing and uninstalling every other piece of software I see, which I think is one of the things that killed it.

As another note, this post is being written on my iMac with Blogger's "in draft" post manager. It's basically exactly like the normal Blogger dashboard, except it supports scheduling of posts. What I wonder myself is when this particular feature will trickle down into standard Blogger. Almost more importantly, I wonder when Windows Live Writer will be able to take advantage of it. I'd really like to start being able to pre-determine the exact release time of some of my bigger project articles, many of which have been late as a result of me not being able to be online or at my computer when I wanted them to be released.

Worth noting: I can imagine the blog being very, very epic this coming summer. My intent is to really step up my game as far as finding things to write about, and with some of my project posts. I've got the Digital Imaging Series, which I will probably re-write, and the Advice for College Students, which I will probably rewrite, if I've got any of them written by then. I also intend to do a series on Computer Networking Technologies, and of course, my venerable series, which will inevitably receive a re-titling and re-working, Helpdesk. (Actually, I don't yet have a series called Helpdesk, but one of the things I'd like to do on my blog is start separating the types of posts a bit better, and one of my projects on the blog seems to include writing about my job at the ACHD.)

Also, Happy Birthday, Megan!

Mountains of Homework.

It's my own fault really, but today I'm buried under a mountain of homework that's due either late tonight, or tomorrow.

Also, Megan is unhappy because she didn't get Friday off. It's been kind of a bad week. I'm looking forward to seeing Dad and Patrick on Saturday though.

Scanning Negatives

I had some other crazily awesome blog entry planned for today, I think. Although I've completely forgotten what it was, and although the draft for it is probably in my other computer, that's not where I am right now, and I'm feeling like I'm in a pretty good writing mood, so here I am, working on a post in Blogger's web mode.

Today I'm just hanging out here in the School of Communication open lab, preparing for my PHO382 midterm, and we're finally scanning files for Megan. I'm not sure exactly how much quality we need, so I've gone ahead and tried to give us as much extra quality as I possibly can. This way, even if we end up outputting 640px jpegs for the web, we'd have as much latitude and data to work with as posible, which is awesome. Only real problem is that it seems like the process of scanning these 300 megabyte TIFF files is very.. umm... well, intense. The computer hates me ow, basically. The protip of the day is that 300 megabyte TIFF files make computers very angry.

The open lab here at the school of communication consists of all Macintosh computers of various ages. I suspect some of the machines in this room, set up and able to be logged into on titan are nearly a decade old, such as the old PowerMac G4 systems with their 15" ADC displays. The very ones I remember Apple unveiling in 1999 or 2000. What workhorses. On the other hand, we've got a lot of pretty modern systems in here too, a bunch of the latest 20" iMacs, and G5s of various types (iMacs and PowerMacs.)

This iMac performed very well at first, and I bet that as a standalone machine, or a machine in an environment with a much faster network, this thing would rock so hard, it wouldn't be funny. Similar to those 2.0GHz/2GB Dell OptiPlex 755 systems in the College of Business Administration, except the iMacs here have bigger displays and webcams. Oh, and there's the whole thing about how the School of Comm only has one file server, but that's actually a post for another day.

The only thing I can really purport to not love about this iMac is the keyboard, at first Apple's newest keyboard is a little bit off-putting. It's so low on the desk, and it's somewhat difficult to get used to the idea of a laptop keyboard like this on the desk. It was also difficult for me to find an appropriate position for the keyboard, where I felt like I could start typing on it at full speed and not have it fly out from under my hands, or have my fingers start feeling weird as a result of the odd positioning and shape of the keyboard. After a few hours of typing this blog entry and chatting in Meebo and Mibbit however, I'm feeling much more confident with this keyboard. While I'm not going to run home and buy one tonight, I would feel confident in ordering and using one if both of my previous-generation Apple Keyboards died, or it came to be that I ordered a newer Mac and didn't have a different keyboard to use with it.

Agency

We've been learning a bit about the emerging study of history of various marginalized groups in HIS102, and one of the big key words is agency. Basically the idea is that "women's history" (and history of other marginalized groups) gives those groups agency. The idea of agency is that you can be an active part of history, causing changes upon other things, and playing a real part.

This thought occurred to me just recently when I was thinking of the best way to execute a web comic. One idea I have had was to get photos of my friends doing various things and put captions on them. Unfortunately, what I noticed is that there are a lot of situations I would want to put on this web comic that I'm also a part of. Other than using a tripod, or having someone else take the pictures, I couldn't think of a good way to do it with my camera.

That made me think about how in this school year, I've become a much more active player in my own life. In high school especially, I would've been able to assemble a great photo-web-comic based purely on images I'd taken of other people. Here at the university, I'm a pretty big part of most of the shenanigans my friends and I perform.

It's interesting to see that transition, and definitely an interesting realization ot make. Especially since it's even more difficult to document my life with photos, since I'm now a big part of it.

Also, I'm sorry this blog entry was late -- last night I had to do homework and spend time with Megan, and by the time she left and I was almost done, it was 11:30 and because of my weekend novel-reading spree, which didn't end until 3 a.m. on Monday, I was unable to actually stay awake by 11 last night.

tehMegan

Well... I'm going out with somebody now. Megan, of course, is her name. Anybody who knows me will probably be fairly familiar with her, and astute readers of this blog will probably have read about her before, whether or not I actually mentioned her by name before. I met her before my freshman year at NAU, along with Glenn and Ally, also hailing from Tucson, at new student orientation.

I really do care about Megan, and I'm looking forward to a good relationship with her as "more than a friend." Last night, we spent a good chunk of time together, had dinner, went to the Flagstaff downtown art walk, watched a movie, and then just reclined for a few hours.

So it's with this blog post that I officially add the "Megan" category to the blogspot blog here. You'll probably be hearing more of Megan. ;)

Extreme Week

Well, I apologize. I've had a lot to write about lately, things I've done, reflections on working the phones for the ACHD, some NAULive/UTV62 things, and the SBS reception I attended representing NAU Live.

Although, what I've found is that between classes, work, and hanging out with Megan almost any time I'm not at work or in class, I really don't have the energy to write any detailed blog entries.

Although I think it's great to be back on campus, I do have some concerns. I'm not sure how long my little 750 dollars in dining money will last, and I am also not sure about my current financial aide and payment status. I work many many hours this coming weekend, and then my schedule should even out a little bit, which should improve everything.

As a sidenote, I am thinking of getting a Wacom tablet before long, I've been borrowing Megan's (Thank you, Megan!) and they're amazing. Although, I've got to fix my storage/backup situation first, so the first paycheck is likely to go toward an external 2-disk (mirrored, for data protection) box for my photos, some random temporary crap, and probably my video work.

Well, it's movie night, so I've got to wrap this up. Hopefully I will write again within the next week.

Returning to Flag

Well, shortly here I’ll be heading back to Flagstaff. The only thing that makes this noteworthy is that I’m going a week early, in an effort to potentially get a job. I am scheduled for an interview at the Academic Computing Helpdesk at 10 a.m. on Wednesday. Hopefully I can get the job, because it would certainly be nice to have a bit of extra money during the school year, I can say with some confidence that the next major thing I need will be either Leopard, or some additional storage for the computer, but I’ll save all of that figuring for later.

Anyway, I’ve got to get to bed fairly early (a few minutes before midnight, at least) because tomorrow, Dad and I are going a few places to get some last minute wardrobe additions for the coming year.

Another sidenote: I have intended for a few weeks to write a little retrospective on what I’ve used this blog for, and what I think the future for it holds, but with all the technical notes, and now status updates I need to do... who knows whether or not I’ll be able to do any of that.