Tag Archive for 'memories'

ten year old deja vu?

Published on May 14, 2012 in Computers. 0 Comments Tags: , .

I accomplished a lot of stuff today, but I feel like I might have been done the same exact tasks ten or eleven years ago. I took a few ailing Pentium 4 Dells, swapped hardware around until I had the best two machines. One of the Dells was giving a bluescreen on every boot, so I got to do that old trick where you boot it off the Windows XP CD and not install anything, just quit once it finds the hard drive, and somehow it magically fixes the boot record, or whatever was wrong.bad capsI saw some “bad caps,” I played the Windows Update waiting game, and I weighed the pros and cons of a KVM vs separate keyboards & mice with a monitor that handles multiple inputs. Then I cleaned out a printer and installed a set of alternative cartridges, so that we don’t have to pay full retail prices for ink. All was eerily familiar, all ridiculously easy, though occasionally irritating; all tasks I did a million times in my tech heyday.

Unlike the Mac problem I had this weekend, where what should have been a simple update to the latest OS X Lion version, suddenly made the hard drive unbootable, unverifiable, unrepairable, locked from the Lion installer, invisible to firewire target mode, and, once I bought a new hard drive and got Lion installed on it (which required hours upon hours of downloading the OS, since they don’t sell it on a disc, anymore), unwritable, as a secondary drive, until I reformatted it.

Both these trials took a lot of time, and both seemed to end in some measure of success that felt like accomplishment and improvement… but the old hardware was simpler to deal with… more predictable, more logical, more fun?

tragic

Published on April 5, 2012 in Computers, Music and Photo. Closed Tags: , , , .

Still doesn’t feel real

Not really in the mood to post any big long blog, tonight. A man I respected and admired, who wrote songs that actually made me dance once, is dead. I’m sad that any pictures of him that I once had were lost in the great hard drive failure of ’03 and I’m far away from Worcester, and cannot mourn with my fellow Wormtowners, but I am thankful that the state of the internet let me be part of the conversation and that this exists: http://75.130.235.51:8005/listen.m3u

Nothing is safe…

Published on March 27, 2012 in Work. Closed Tags: , , .

My job involves facilitating a group through a series of challenges until they’re comfortable taking risks around each other, because they know the group will support them. The challenges are all designed to specifically target certain skills that are helpful to a team and the process usually includes some physically risky challenges, with at least some perceived risk, if not real risk. Unfortunately, the benefit of some of these activities has been diluted by changes in the safety requirements. Instead of the group completing a challenge as a whole, they might have to do it three or four times, because two thirds or three quarters of the group is required to be “spotting” the remaining third or quarter, while they do the actual activity. We all try to pussy-foot around the issue and claim that the spotting is as important to the process as the activity itself, but I can’t honestly get behind that logic. I put on a good mask, when I’m at work, and pretend to believe in this stuff, but I know the activity is more effective, more fulfilling and more in line with the reasons I work in the industry, when it’s done the way it was designed to be done.

It makes me sad that we have to water down the risk in activities that are designed to be risky.

Sarah says I take too long to write a blog

Published on August 15, 2010 in Family & Friends, Photo, Random Thoughts and Work. Closed Tags: , , , , , .

Frank, Sarah’s little brother, is now 21. We went to Famous Dave’s, a chain BBQ place, last night, and he did not get carded. Sarah didn’t get carded either, but she wasn’t that surprised. It made me think back to when I was 16 and my sister was 26 and the two of us were wandering around Key West, Florida, during the week that my brother got married. We stopped into a bar, because there’s more of those than anything else in Key West. She got carded; I ordered a Sprite, the bartender asked if I was sure that’s “all I wanted.” My sister was upset… in a few more years, I’m sure that getting carded no longer upset her.

I also took a trip down memory lane, earlier in the week, when an old ex-girlfriend apologized to me on facebook, in case she was ever heartless or selfish. She wasn’t and I told her so. It got me thinking about past relationships… there are a few people I should probably apologize to; I guess I have a few regrets, but I think I only really hold one grudge, maybe two. Facebook is certainly good for bringing up these random memories and feelings.

In other news, camp is almost over, though I got roped into an extra week. It’s going to be a low-enrollment/more chilled-out version of camp, but it’s still another week of getting up early and going to the city. My hope is that my seniority and 15+ years of camp experience will mean that I’m running the show as the fill-in director. My history in these matters is that I’m promised a director’s position and/or I fill in for one until a decision is made and then it isn’t given to me… no such promise was made this time, so maybe this will be the time it happens.

The commute to camp has been made much nicer, this summer, by the set of Ultimate Ears SuperFi 5vi that I picked up when they went on super-sale at Amazon. Unfortunately, the cord busted on the first set, so I had to get myself another set, but Logitech customer service got back to me about my complaint and replaced the first set for free… in the meantime, the cord started to separate, right at the jack, on the second set. I put some electrical tape on there to hold it together until the replacement set came. sadI’m hoping they replace them as well. The foam tips are the most comfortable, but it makes me sad that they fall apart after a week and half or so. I think my ear canals are too small or something because all of the various sized silicone tips irritate my ears a bit and seem to wiggle their way out. The cord is obviously cheap on this model, both have broken and it makes lots of contact-noise when I’m walking around, but if I ever upgrade to something better, I might look into those custom ear-molded ones.

I’m also still playing the music on my commutes from my iPod. I was hoping to be just be carrying the Droid. I am carrying an extra battery for the phone, so I don’t have that excuse anymore, and it’s not that it’s not capable, but the lack of gapless playback (for those few albums that really need it) or built-in volume normalization (for regular shuffle) or a shuffle-by-album option (for when I feel like reconnecting with my albums, which is most of the time) makes me continue to carry my iPod. There are alternative music apps that attempt to solve these issues (at least the gapless and shuffle by album), but none puts it all together. I’m sure that future versions of Android will get these features in, especially if the rumors are true and they start using android as an OS for a media-player type device. Will these features make it in before I upgrade to a new phone?

I’ve found the phone very difficult to use this summer. I’m not sure if it’s just too humid at my mostly-outside job, or if I sweat too much (likely) but the touchscreen gets all freaked out and thinks it’s being touched all over the place and renders the phone useless until I clean it off… and even then, I can only get good response from it for a few seconds until it starts freaking out again. If I go somewhere cool and dry (air conditioned) and give it some time to recover… and give myself some time to recover and not be so sweaty … it works just fine. This wasn’t an issue at all in the Winter and Spring; It will probably affect when I decide to upgrade to a new phone. I’ll be eligible for a bit of a discount in early July, and that humidity will just be starting to bother me again. So whatever awesome android phone is available on July 06, 2011, you can pretty much bet that I’ll be buying one. If it continues to happen on the next phone I own, I’ll have to seal my phone in a ziploc bag all summer, or something.

I’m pretty sure I have a legitimate use for the wireless tether feature of the Droid. We’ve booked ourselves a few days at a cabin in Gatlinburg, TN, in late September. The rental policy said something about having “local Knoxville area access numbers…” Dial-up? Awesome. I don’t think I know anyone in the area (unless EJ is still around there, somewhere), so this one is going to be pure vacation, for me, and no attempting to visit friends/family. That stuff will have to wait until sometime around the holidays. It’ll be one of the longer roadtrips we’ve done in the past couple years, and I’m excited about that.

Work AND play? or just more work…

Published on March 19, 2010 in Music and Work. Closed Tags: , , , , .

The long breaks between seasons make me nervous; When the new season begins, my confidence in my ability to do my job is completely deflated. Right now, we’re a few weeks into the season, and I not only KNOW that I am damn good at my job, but I’ve been doing it long enough that I should be teaching other people how to do it or running my own program or both. It reminds me of the time right after my Dad died, when I was nervous every day I had to go to work that I would just break down and not be able to focus enough to get through the day. I managed to get through every day, back then, and the only thing that I couldn’t keep up with was playing in bands. I’m not sure, now, if I just needed the time I was devoting to music to relax and decompress or if playing was actually more mentally demanding than working. Maybe it was both. I miss playing music, I want to play again… but when I feel so insecure at the beginning of each season of work, I wonder if I really have the focus to pull both off again. It’s just like all those classes, when I was in school. I feel like I can do one very well, but if I try to do all of it, I’ll end up doing them all half-assed… is this just pre-season jitters? Will I suddenly remember how good I am at being in a band a couple weeks in? Will my work or my music suffer from trying to do both at the same time? Sometimes I feel like taking some shitty office job that I don’t care about and wouldn’t have to try hard at, just so I can focus on the rest of my life. The money would certainly be more stable… but would I go crazy if I didn’t enjoy and believe in my job? I certainly felt crazy when I worked at TelecomNOW; I had to give up caffeine just to stay grounded. And I took on the Wormtown.org project while I was working there. Not only did it help me keep my sanity, by being something I believed was worth doing, but it kept me connected to the music scene, so that when The Overtones stopped playing, it wasn’t hard for me to find another band to play with. I don’t feel confident enough to try for any drastic changes… find or start an organization I believe in that I could work for full-time, all year or make a living with music by building up my chops and getting back to the point where I could sight-read and do studio work… I’d be happy, but they seem unrealistic or unattainable. I definitely feel pressure to do more, though. That is my point, I either need to do more of the work that I’m doing, that I love, or I need to do more of something else… music or something. I don’t think I’d ever feel this insecurity or lack of confidence if I didn’t have these huge breaks.

I loved Freeway

Published on October 27, 2009 in Random Thoughts. Closed Tags: , .

Freeway by Activision

My mom found this. It was somewhere in her house, probably in the basement with a bunch of other old mail. I definitely played Freeway, a lot. Like any good addictive game, it would still be there, long after I stopped playing, when I closed my eyes. Seeing the picture and screenshot in the “Summer 1982 Activision Video Game Cartridge Catalog” made the memories come flooding back. Now I have to figure out what I should put the patch on.

The text of the letter:

Dear Fan of FREEWAY™ by ACTIVISION:

Congratulations! You guided your chicken through traffic at least 20 times, which qualifies you as an official member of the Activision “Save the Chicken Foundation.”  We are pleased to reward your traffic dodging achievemets with the enclosed patch.

Your name has been added to our mailing list and we will keep you posted on new Activision game cartridges as they become available.

Thank you for sharing your accomplishment with us.  We hope you’ll try other video games by Activision and write us about your experiences with them.

Yours truly,

Jan Marsella
Customer Relations

JM
Enclosure

PS. Please read the enclosed Heat Seal Instructions carefully. Children should not attempt to heat seal the patch to clothing.  Improper use of an iron (or related appliance) may result in damage to clothing, or bodily harm.  This patch may also be sewn to any fabric.

Also be sure to check out the scans of the Activision catalog at flickr.

morbid coincidence

Published on September 26, 2009 in Random Thoughts. Closed Tags: , .

I found out, today, that Andy Jones died. I don’t know any details. I don’t know how to feel, yet. I have good memories of Andy Jones from high school. He was a talented dude. He had the ability to do whatever it was he chose to do, very well. He knew how to be excellent. He’ll be missed. I dunno if I have a favorite Andy memory. The first thoughts about him that came to my head were about the band he was in called Split… and then about high school… show choir trips, nights in the barn … and then I remembered running into him once at UMASS … and then the last time I saw him, at a company christmas party a couple years ago, for a company that a couple of other friends worked for, including Drew. What kept popping into my head was how he had an almost word-association type reaction to certain bands. If I mentioned the Pixies, he’d say, “Man, whenever you mention the Pixies, I immediately think, ‘Cariboooooooooooooou…’ and whenever the Dead Milkmen came up, he’d say, “I have nothing against the Dead Milkmen, but there was this kid back in Indiana, and he loved that song Takin Retards to the Zoo, played it on repeat a lot, kinda turned me off to them…” There were so many in-jokes, ridiculous phrases and stuff that have absolutely no meaning, now, rattling around in my head…

I’m not sure if it’s sad or not, but this news totally distracted me from the fact that it’s been four years since my dad died. I think I would have gone the whole day without realizing it, if Sarah had not mentioned it. I’m not sure I realized it last year, but I think Sarah’s mom might’ve mentioned it. The Dad memory that came to mind tonight, as we were driving home from our friend Jessica’s housewarming party was about Dad giving me directions. It was one of those first trips that I took from Woonsocket to my parents’ house. I was going to head back the way I came and I mentioned that there’s probably some other road I could take that winds through Connecticut. Dad suggested a route. It was a couple windy roads that did exactly that. The best part was that he said “and you’ll be on this road, and just about the time you say, ‘where the hell am I?’ you’ll hit Route 44.” And that is exactly what happened. I think I even said it out loud… not realizing that I was fulfilling his prophecy until the moment it happened.

I dunno what is more saddening… but the coincidence is morbid.

adult things

Published on September 16, 2009 in Random Thoughts. Closed Tags: , , , , .

Today, I fixed a leaky bathtub faucet. I don’t think I’ve done much in the way of plumbing ever in my life… maybe taken off a faucet handle and then decided the job was too much for me or finding a leak, but then calling someone about it… or pouring drano down something. This was certainly the first time I ever actually fixed a leaky faucet. It was painless enough, even made me feel sort of accomplished.

Every time I see my prescription, specifically, the bottle with my last name on it, I think about my Dad… not some random thought, but something like “is that my Dad’s bottle?” or “Why is one of Dad’s prescriptions out here?” … defying any logical thoughts about Dad being gone for several years now, or the fact that I haven’t lived in the same house as my Dad for eight or nine years. My brain just can’t see a bottle with my name on it and think that it’s mine. Will I ever get used to having a prescription?

The ongoing health issues have prompted lots of discussion about health insurance and Sarah or I needing jobs that have real benefits. Drama being what it is around here, the discussions have often turned into fights or bouts of silent treatment. The whole thing has got me looking back into tech jobs. I cruise craigslist on a daily basis and send an occasional response to interesting looking positions; Haven’t heard anything back from anyone, yet. It’s not something I want to do. I swore to myself that I wouldn’t take another desk job unless I was being paid substantially more than I was in Marlboro… but I was probably overpaid, given my technical qualifications, at the time. Either way, I was not healthy and not happy and I don’t know what the consequences would be if I were to take such a job again. I don’t want to sacrifice my mental well-being for the chance at better physical well-being. It makes me actually take some interest in this health care reform political stuff. I guess there isn’t a chance that we’d have a universal, free-to-everyone system like the rest of the civilized world has, but it would certainly ease my mind of this issue, if we did.

I like vans.

Published on April 5, 2009 in Family & Friends. Closed Tags: , , , , , .

I helped Doug pick up a new van, yesterday. It was a lot of work, since it had a wheelchair lift in it, that we didn’t need and therefore, had to remove. I haven’t driven it yet, but I’m sure it’ll make the memories come flooding back. The most recent van memories are of the big passenger vans that I drove for the Y. Some of them were just big 15 passenger vans with a school bus sign slapped on top, and others were a little more bus-like, with rubber floors and an aisle. Whether it was bring kids to after-school day care from school or to a field trip for camp, they were always fun to drive.

bigvan My fondest van memories are attached to the van that I owned: the big red van that we moved The Overtones around in. I paid the same price for that van that Doug paid for his, yesterday: $2,000. It had a huge rack welded to the top of it; the owner swore that it would hold anything I could get up there. On the back of the rack, there were some super bright flood-lights that were fun for freaking out tailgaters. It was the perfect size for the band. There were two big bench seats in the back and room for a third, but no hook-ups… this translated into plenty of room for amps, guitars and drums. We usually took one seat out, so we wouldn’t have to stack the equipment too high.

I kept on driving it after that band fizzled. I remember loaning out my services as van and driver to a friends band a couple times. The craziest van memories include the time I was carpooling home from the tech job in Marlborough, when a crazed cop pulled us over and decided to search the entire van for drugs. I think he found some rolling papers in Sands’ bag. We just hung out by the police cruiser with the other officer, whom we lovingly referred to as “back-up,” and stared in wonder as he tore through every inch of the beast. I think he broke the handle on my sliding door, too. oops A few months after I downgraded to a station wagon, I borrowed the van from my Dad, to help move my friend Becky back to Charlton, from NYC. I knew Dad was a little hard on vehicles, but the van had stayed pretty strong when I owned it, so I trusted it to handle this move. We made it all the way down to the city, got it loaded and then got all the way back up to Massachusetts, off the highway, to within 5 miles of Becky’s house, and the right front universal joint let go. The wheel slammed into the back of the wheel well and we stopped dead. It happened while taking a corner at 4 or 5 miles per hour or less… had it happened on the 150 miles of highway between NYC and Charlton, we’d have likely flipped and/or rolled and died. We had several hours to contemplate our luck as we sat around and watched tow truck drivers scratch their heads. The first tow truck driver showed up with a regular truck, took one look at the situation and realized that it wasn’t going to be simple at all. The next guy showed up with a flatbed, and we still had to use a couple hydraulic jacks in place of the useless wheel. I think we moved all of Becky’s stuff to a couple other vehicles, in between tow truck drivers.

Dad had taught me how to listen and feel for unusual noises and vibrations that might be signs of trouble… and yet, in the few months that he had driven the van around, since inheriting it from me, he had managed to ingore any signs that there was trouble. And he had plenty of experience with vans… we owned no less than 4 or 5 while he was operating his Pressed4Time franchise pressed4time (corporate dry cleaning pickup and delivery service). I don’t remember getting the first van, but when he grew his route too large to handle himself, he hired a couple of guys and we went van shopping. I remember buying this enormous conversion van. It had a wooden bench in the back with the kind of cushion you’d find on patio furniture and some sort of bed-contraption in the middle, I think. I thought it was so cool. I was fairly sad when it got the standard white paint job and the clothes racks and support beams were installed in place of the bed-thing. If I had a day off (or faked sick to take a day off), I’d ride around in the back of one of the vans, rolling around with the clothes, all day, popping into some of the offices with Dad and helping carry clean clothes in and bags of dirty clothes out. I definitely preferred hanging out in the back of the vans than going into the super-hot dry cleaners at the end of the run.

Yesterday was a long day, but so much of it stirred up fond memories. I guess it’s the nature of vans, being so versatile, that you always have some custom attachments that you may or may not need… and you do a bit of converting and customizing, yourself.

cameraphone memories

Published on November 30, 2008 in moBlog. Closed Tags: , , , , , .

It started at the beginning of the month, when I parked my car in a way that was eerily familiar. Then a couple weeks later, the christmas trees arrived, and another familiar scene unfolded. I got my phone out again and tried to snap a similar picture. Then a scene/memory [/event?] from Thanksgiving of 2005 reappeared. That may have been the last time I saw gas below $2. I’m kind of amazed that it’s down below $2 again. I was tempted to find a similar sign and try to recapture that picture on my phone… but the tree one wasn’t as good as last year’s tree pics, so I decided against it. I think I just need to have my camera with me all the time, in November. Now I know, for next year. Unless, of course, whatever phone I replace mine with has a really good camera… doesn’t seem likely.

I think this would be a good time to mention that I’ll be at Mom’s house the weekend after Christmas. Sarah and I will only there for a few days, but we might have a little bit of free time if anybody wants to get together.

woot