My Shit

The dash lights in my car have not worked in months: rather annoying to say the least. When driving at night I have to turn on the dome light to see how fast I’m driving. I usually set the cruise control when I’m on highways and that helps. I can’t see my gauges though and I’m a person who likes to keep track of what the car is doing, beyond the steering and throttle inputs. I finally decided the car must go in for service, which, I feared, would cost an arm-and-a-leg. Well, driving way over the speed limit on a twisty-turny road two nights ago the dash lights sprang back to life. I felt like I was in the cockpit of a space shuttle. I had no idea how many things were actually lit up at night: the gauge cluster, the door lock and window controls, PRNDL selector, radio, and the heating and cooling controls. I’m thrilled to see my lights back. They worked again tonight when I went to the store too!

Tired of hearing how slow Macs are? Check out The 500 Fastest supercomputers in the world. Hmmm .... PowerPC chips are in 4 of the fastest 10 supercomputers in the world including the #1 spot!

So the one friend I am drawing away from, I want to talk more about this:

I think the thing that bugs me the most is how I feel when he is talking to me about a subject where we have differing opinions. Don't get me wrong, I do get defensive on my own and I also have strong opinions. The way he expresses himself is very domineering and overbearing. We do share many common interests but when we disagree there is guaranteed trouble. But we are very close, which I believe makes the confrontation all the more damaging. He has even said, “I’m closer to you than I am my own brother.”

If I may, I think I want to analyze the interaction. The statement about being closer to me than his own brother is not something I see as being false or to take lightly. It did, however, come at the end of an argument where we were somewhat trying to reconcile differences. It was like he was stroking my hurt ego after making a big attack, like realizing he had done some serious damage to the bond between us then moved to take some corrective action to not totally ruin everything. I don’t believe this friend has ever really lost anything of great value to him that he ever knew. His father did die while he was an infant, so he didn’t know him, and I actually rank his step-father as a more important influence in my life than my own father (which, while that wouldn’t take much, is meant to show the value of this individual). Having never lost anything I don’t think he knows where the boundaries are. I don’t think he knows how hard he can push before someone walks out. Material items can be bought and sold but people cannot and no one close has ever chose to leave (i.e. he walks away from friends before the choose to walk away from him, he only selects friends that will listen to him yammer away, and he has never had a serious long-term relationship with a female).

Watching him go into one of his attacks against me can actually be seen. I mean, when he starts in on a subject where we disagree his posture and face change: his body puffs up a bit, his eyes squint, and his mouth gets really small with lips tight and nearly white. I’ve gotten to the point where when I see this I don’t really pay much attention to what he has to say because he is essentially preaching to me and not listening to a word I say.

The unfortunate thing is that this behavior, while rare, has been an ongoing event. I have experienced this since we were in high school. Things were much better when we saw each other rarely due to the long distance between our universities. But now that I am living in his house, paying rent by the way, things are more-or-less back to normal. This ongoing behavior will eventually push me out. I was not going to look for an apartment until this summer but I think for the safety of our friendship, and potentially felony crimes, I need to find a place of my own much sooner.

I do take some of the blame because I am such a dominant person myself. Must of my other friends are dominant also. My girlfriend and I are currently working together to figure out how we can have conversations about taboo subjects or subjects were we both have strong and extreme positions. This is a long process but I fell well worth the struggle since she is a great person to be around (when she isn’t wrong). My other friends and I, however, do not seem to have this clash. We either have good debate skills and can discuss delicate issues or have strong opinions where other’s do not. I can only recall one incidence where a person was less than thrilled with an opinion I was express to the point where the conversation became even slightly hostile.

Enough of this. Only time will tell how this plays out.

Why I like Mac

1) It Works
Yes, I know OSX is based on FREE BSD. Do I care? No. Why? Because it works. The apps that come with OSX work with OSX. I don't have to try to find drivers and I don't have to put in CABS CD # 8. My additions work out of the box. I bought an AirPort Express card, plugged it in and it worked. I didn't have to buy a second more expensive card becasue the first one didn't work, and it works with the 1 and only operating system on my machine. Yes, my card cost $80, not $40 for a Linksys, but it popped in -- no worries -- and life was good. It doesn't lock up or shut down like a Windows machine (3 restarts in 1 year).

2) It has always worked.
I just switched to Mac at OSX v10.3. Maybe earlier editions of Mac or OS 9 sucked hairy balls. I don't know. But I've used Windows 3.1, 3.11, 95, 98, 98SE, NT4, NT5, ME, 2000, and XP. I've heard good things about XP but I had XP on a machine at work and it totally sucked. I hated it.

3) The cost for quality is fine with me.
I looked at two brands of laptop when I bought my iBook: IBM and Mac. I went for these two because they are supposed to be the strongest and best performing (in terms of wear and tear) of any laptop. When priced on as many factors as I could think of, RAM, hard drive, weight, battery life, screen size, and even processor speed the Mac was only slightly more expensive. For the quality of product I am fine with the price I paid for my laptop. I don't consider it throwing money away and the lack of problems I have had has been well worth any premium I paid.

4) I enjoy the interface.
Any bouncing or effects that are active on this machine I have turned on by my very own will, the machine came plane-Jane, and I like how it looks and works. Aqua is not free, contrary to popular belief, and Apple sends the dogs ... lawyers ... after people trying to copy Aqua.

5) Most of my 3rd party software works.
Word, Excel, and Powerpoint all work better on my Mac than they ever did on any version of the Windows OS I ever used. The fact that Word has never locked up on my Mac says so much to the quality of those that brought OSX together and those who re-wrote Word for the Mac. The only software I ever have trouble with is AOL and the Gimp, both of which die regularly on Windows machines (including XP). For 3^rd party software sitting in my dock alone we have AOL, Netscape, Fire, Real Audio Player, Word, Excel, and Powerpoint, Adobe Acrobat Reader, Maple, Matlab, SETI, Gimp, and finally Intellisys. And, as state earlier, I've only had trouble with AOL and Gimp. This is notably unlike Windows where most software was known for falling flat on its face at any moment.

I think I'm done for now. I like my Mac and I have my reasons.

I'm thinking of four people, two best friends, a girl friend, and my mother.

One I really am beginning to dislike, one I'm hiding things from, another that I miss greatly, and one I'm tired of being without.

Can you figure out which is which?

I use am iBook. If you don't like it, piss off, I don't care. If you think I'm an idiot and waste money make sure you take a complete inventory of yourself first.

Everyone on the internet has something to say about bad drivers. News flash we all piss off other people when we drive. If you are a left lane sitter or a no blinker user there is a special place in hell for you. If hate people that weave in and out of traffic it is because you secretly wish you had the capacity or the car or the lack of intelligence to do such things. If you think you've never been cussed at by someone else you are oblivious to the entire world around you and I recommend you pull your head out of your ass and join the select few people, though I'm probably not included, who do not keep their head there.

But one of these days, when I've had enough I'm going to follow someone home. I'm going to get out of my work van and start coming at the person with a screw driver and a roll of duct tape. I hope it is someone in a minivan or a Benz. I will tape them to a tree in their front yard and stab them in the thigh with the srew driver (don't want to seriously injure anyone here!). Then I'll leave a note on them for the police to find that says, "hello, I'm a bad driver, and I deserved this."

. . . don't know why I'm doing this
. . . just need to write
. . . don't want a blog
. . . don't want to be one of the millions expressing an opinon no one cares about
. . . don't want to feel responsible for the electrons that make this happen
. . . need an escape
. . . need an out
. . . need a place to say things I wouldn't normally do
. . . don't care
. . . tired of answering to other's needs and wants
. . . where's my gin?
. . . need to feel a part of something
. . . and this isn't it
. . . but this will do
. . . I am sorry to my girlfriend for deleting the first one
. . . for the rest of you, I'm not, it was a burden
. . . this, when I write, will likely be my angry spot
. . . if you don't want to read angry thoughts, don't read this
. . . I'm done for now