I’ve known for a while that Intel won’t be deploying Microsoft Vista internally. Now that the New York Times is reporting on it, you can know too.

Intel, the giant chip maker and longtime partner of Microsoft, has decided against upgrading the computers of its own 80,000 employees to Microsoft’s Vista operating system, a person with direct knowledge of the company’s plans said.

The person, who has been briefed on the situation but requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of Intel’s relationship with Microsoft, said the company made its decision after a lengthy analysis by its internal technology staff of the costs and potential benefits of moving to Windows Vista, which has drawn fire from many customers as a buggy, bloated program that requires costly hardware upgrades to run smoothly.

“This isn’t a matter of dissing Microsoft, but Intel information technology staff just found no compelling case for adopting Vista,” the person said.

An Intel spokesman said the company was testing and deploying Vista in certain departments, but not across the company.

John Fleck posts today about a New York Times story on how the Saudis are afraid that by squeezing demand for oil they are going to put themselfs out of buisness.

While they are reaping record profits, the Saudis are concerned that today’s record prices might eventually damp economic growth and lead to lower oil demand, as is already happening in the United States and other developed countries. The current prices are also making alternative fuels more viable, threatening the long-term prospects of the oil-based economy.

It’s not your imagination, gas prices are higher than they were in 1918 when adjusted for inflation. Unless Saudis significantly reduce the price of gas and keep it down, the path is set to lessen our need and maybe one day eliminate our need for oil as a means of transportation.

My truck gets 15 MPG (when I’m lucky) and the last time I filled it up it cost me $68. When gas was about $2.50 a gallon, I looked at getting a Honda scooter that gets about 80MPG. Considering my truck is already paid off, the break even costs didn’t work out for the scooter nor is it likely to still work out to purchase a more efficient vehicle (I need to redo the math for current gas prices and I will publish it later). I still want to reduce my expenditures on gas so I’m going to burn fat instead of oil.

Assuming the weather cooperates, i will start riding my bike to work next week. I’m also working on resurrecting Project Maverick (my long languishing project car) and it will be electric. Both of these things I wouldn’t have done if it wasn’t for the high price of gas. Apparently I’m not the only one reducing my use of oil, Exxon is selling off it’s retail gas business because it can’t make enough money off it.

Finally my point is that once people get into these habits they are not going to fall out. The movement against oil has already started and will counter the oil producers greed.

I said I would blog more. My wonderfull employer is sucking the life out of me. I really, REALLY want to write about that subject but I’m afraid it will get me in trouble.

Long ago, Motorola was the largest employer in Arizona. My grandfather worked there. My Father worked and retired from there. My Mom worked there. Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, a lot of my family worked there. I wanted to make computer chips so when I was 18, I applied to work at Motorola. I went to their employment offices and took their tests. They used to give math and other tests because they wanted highly technical people working there.

I grew up listening to my parents talk about their work at the dinner table and even though they were as far away from the CEO as anyone could be, yet they still knew that the company was poorly run. Engadget received a letter from the adviser to Geoffrey Frost, Motorola's Chief Marketing Officer to Greg Brown the CEO of Motorola describing how screwed up the company is.

It really angers me to see that you're really no different from the rest of the incompetent senior executives at Motorola -- but instead of merely being incompetent, you killing the company. Your lack of understanding of the consumer business doesn't give you a valid reason for selling the business; moreover, publicly disclosing your explorations of such a move, in an attempt to keep Carl Icahn off your back, shows how much you value the safety of your incompetence. You have no interest in fighting the good fight and attempting to mould Motorola into the market leader it can and should be; taking control of the handset division, as you have recently done, will accomplish very little -- it will simply give you an ability to say "we tried our best" when you finally cart the business off to the highest bidder.

Motorola was once a great company that made great products. I remember a Motorola radio in my grandfathers workshop. Everyone wanted a StarTac when they came out (I eventually had one when they got cheap, it's around here somewhere). 68k and PowerPC chips were very competitive with x86 chips from Intel.

Now they are splitting into yet more companies because they can't seem to figure out what it is they do. Thanks to this greedy, stupid management thousands of people in Arizona lost their jobs. Some of the former Motorola factories are still there as Freescale factories, but many of them were simply tore down.

I thankfully never went to work for Motorola. Instead I went to work for another company that makes computer chips. I look at the failure that is Motorola and compare it to what is happening at my employer. I hope my managers all the way up to the CEO learn from these failures too.

How bizarre, I would expect schools to be overcrowded not due to insufficient enrollment.

Jordan Elementary School, a Mesa Public School located in Chandler, will likely close next school year because of declining enrollment, with its 486 students assigned to Frost or Pomeroy elementaries.

I went to Jordan Elementary in the late seventies and early eighties.

Search & Rescue could not reach them today. There are 3 parties stranded: 5, 4 & 2 people according to sherif's dpt (when I called this PM). Search called off for tonight. 2 snow cats being loaded for deployment in AM. Snow condition are severe... possibly record-breaking.

Hopefully, when they tried to leave the Yurt, they realized they couldn't make it out and went back. They will be warm and comfortable in the yurt but they are running out of food. I hope they get to them tomorrow.

Update 02/05/08 6:43 am: I'm happy to report that my friends are safe. Apparently, search and rescue wasn't able to make it to their yurt, equipment issues of some sort. When the owner of the yurt was contacted he said he could make it up, on skis. Which he did and guided them out. Impressive, no? Keep in mind this guy probably skis up to the yurt in between rentals with supplies to restock it. He could probably do it blindfolded. I now get to look forward to the stories.

Chama, by the way, has been declared a disaster area and I don't think they have figured out how they are going to get back there to pick up their vehicles.

I enjoy cooking. I'm no master chef, but I'm think I'm pretty good at the small list of things I can make. One of my favorite things to make is Thanksgiving dinner.

Assuming people aren't just being nice, I've received good reviews on my turkeys. There's no secret to how I make it, I follow Alton Brown's recipe pretty much verbatim.

Thanksgiving isn't thanksgiving without mashed potatoes. Mashed potatoes are my favorite food. I've spent years trying to perfect the recipes and a few years ago I found something that allows me to cheat. The Steam'N Mash by Westinghouse. I does a good job at making mashed potatoes, but it's nearly as fun to watch and/or demonstrate the machine.

Finally, I have started making home made turkey gray in the last few years. My favorite so far is generically called Turkey Neck Gravy. There's many variations of it, this website seems to have the basic recipe that I use. I only use the neck, the heart and gizzard go in the trash. Animal organs shouldn't be eaten as far as I'm concerned. I also like to add mushroom, then again I like to add mushrooms to everything.

I won't be making the main thanksgiving dinner this year. I will be making 15lbs turkey on Saturday.

From wikipedia's entry on Lucid dreams:

A lucid dream is a dream in which the person is aware that he or she is dreaming while the dream is in progress. During lucid dreams, it is often possible to exert conscious control over the dream characters and environment, as well as to perform otherwise physically impossible feats. Lucid Dreams are known to be extremely real and vivid.

As far as I know, every dream I have is a lucid dream. I always have some level of knowledge that I am in a dream and the level of control I have varies from dream to dream. My dreams are always very dream-like. Best way i can describe them is to say the video quality is poor. Sometimes black and white or sepia, dark or bland colors. Until last Thursday night.

I was staying over at a friends house. Then I was in my house. How the heck did I get in my house and why did I feel like I was drunk? The lights in the bedrooms starting turing on. That would only happen if the motion detectors were set off. I picked up some hand tools, a pair of needle nosed pliers and adjustable wrench, to go check out the bedrooms in case someone was in the rooms. There was no one there

I come into the living room and sit down. At this point I realize that I might be in a dream. This dream is different than any other dream I've ever been in. The dream is so realistic that I cannot tell the difference between dream and reality. My house looks exactly the same in the dream as my real house. I'm talking "The Matrix" style reality here.

There's obviously something off just enough to clue me into the fact that I'm dreaming. What does one do to test if they are dreaming? I guess many people might pinch themselves. Not me. I begin to stab myself in my left knee with my needle nose pliers.

There is no pain. There is no blood. My knee is as if it was made of rubber. At this point I'm thinking it's a good thing I'm dreaming.

For the remainder of the dream I pretty much just hang out and marvel at the realism of the dream. And I do what I often do in my house, sit on the couch and watch TV. When the dream ends it fades out like a movie and I wake up.

I hope next time I have more control over my hyper realistic dreams, i certainly would pick a more interesting place to be.

After the layoffs my job changed some. I am no longer on compressed work week and moved to first shift (not my choice). I lost pay in the process. I also am busier and have more responsibilities than before..

I am thankful to have my job.

I've got plenty of things going on, but not in the mood to write about it. Hopefully things change in a while.

I was prepared both mentally and financially to be laid off. My years of employment at Intel would have provided me with several months of pay. The state is helping everyone find jobs (you know, our Governor is running for President). There was also the chance of going to school. I know, I should be grateful that I have a job particularly since Intel pays so well. Especially for New Mexico. But there were some benefits to being laid off and I am ready for a new career. Or that's what I have convinced myself leading up to last week. Not to mention that the whole process left a bad taste in my mouth.

There is no good way to do a layoff. There seems to be bad ways to do layoffs. The common way, it seems to me from talking with others who have gone through layoffs at other companies, is that people are suddenly missing one day without warning. You show up to work and a bunch of people are no longer there. Intel's way was different, it was a process. I could go on and on and on about this, but I will leave it at this for now. Since I still have a job, I want to keep it and stay out of trouble.

The whole reason for these layoffs, which has been widely reported, is that Intel is moving from 200mm to 300mm wafer sizes. There are two factories here, a 200 and 300 one. Merging them together with all the wonders of automation in the 300mm factory means you need less people to run it. New Mexico didn't have the only 200mm factory, all other factories like this should pay attention to what happened here.

It's good that I have a job, at least I can focus on other things that don't involve looking for a job. I paid off my debt in preparation, that was also a good thing. This next year should bring along some changes, time to hold on for the ride.

Related: June 30, 2006: Intel -- will it, or won't it?

Haven't been in the blogging mode the last several weeks. My company sent me to Arizona for an assignment, which pretty much sucked

Normally I would have jumped at a chance to go to Arizona for free. But its hot and miserable in Arizona this time of year. Then I caught a cold and was sick for the first two weeks. How does someone catch a cold in 100+ heat? Someone broke into my rental car. Thankfully it wasn't my own car and I didn't leave anything in the car. It was still a hassle and lost most of a day dealing with it

Anyway it's good to be back home.

The Los Alamos Labs are probably going to be having their own lay offs of a similar size to Intels. Yes they have a much smaller town and it will be difficult for them to absorb all the out of work people. This article in the Los Alamos Monitor highlights several issue with the new management that makes is sound even more bleak.

"LANS management isn't vested in local community/most live elsewhere"; "they aren't seen in local stores or restaurants"; "too many Bechtel employees brought in - leaving LANL employees without enough work"; "an ever-looming threat of layoffs is killing local business"; "LANS officials have bloated salaries;" "management arrogance"; "LANS is sucking the community dry"; and "it's all about profits now."

This is via the Los Alamos Blog (with a freaking long name) which also has this disclaimer

To put this story into a bit of perspective, the Los Alamos Monitor is the local company town rag. The editor of the paper, Ralph Damiani has traditionally been a complete toady when it came to publishing stories that even hinted at a point of view less than totally complementary towards LANL. He would spike any story that did not deliver glowing positive things to say about LANL and its management. That fact that this story ran is an indication of how complete the unhappiness with LANS is at Los Alamos.

Ive been watching the iphone rumors since I started this blog. There's no one that's a bigger fan of an Apple cell phone than I. But my excitement has waivered and I wont be buying one.

1. Nothing to do with technical issues, but I simply cannot afford a large purchase at this time.
2. How much are they going to over charge for a voice and data plan. Why won't they say before June 29th? Because it's going to cost a freaking arm and a leg.
3. It has to replace my Sony Ericsson K750i on T-Mobil. It appears that it can replace all the applications on the SE and will sync with my address book. But will it be able to work with Salling Clicker? Will it take the beating that my SE does (I drop it all the time and it works as good as if it was new). Seems unlikely.
4. T-Mobil sucks at my house. I barely get a signal. Will AT&T be any better? I doubt it. I can't roam onto AT&T or Cingular because I can't get their signal at home either.
5. It has to replace my Palm TX. Since real applications cannot be written for the iPhone, i would still have to carry around my Palm, web based apps wont cut it.
6. I sync my Palm with Outlook using PocketMirror and sync between my Palm and Mac using Missing Sync. It works pretty flawlessly. Not sure that will work with the iPhone.
7. It has to replace my 60GB iPod Photo. I could cut out some of my playlists, but i'm not sure 8GB is enough room for music and photos.

People at work know what a Apple fan boy I am. I constantly get asked if I have pre ordered my iPhone. Uh no, bitches, YOU CAN'T PRE ORDER A IPHONE. Then I try to explain to them why I'm not buying one, but I usually just get blank stares.

Maybe 2.0 will be better

When I first set up this aquarium I immediately had a problem with a brown algae like substance growing on everything. In fact, I had the same problem with the 30 gallon I set up just prior to this one. This outbreak is not brown algae but diatoms.

My Gold Gourami seems to enjoy eating the diatoms off every surface of the aquarium. In fact he did a pretty good job of keeping up with the growth when he was in the 30 gallon tank. So much so that I didn't feed him at all for weeks and weeks. For the 80 gallon I purchased two Otocinclus Catfish which will also eat the diatoms. None of them have been able to keep up with the diatom growth in the 80 gallon. I've been using a magnetic glass scraper to clean the glass, hopefully the fish will take care of the rest over time. Since replacing the Actinic bulbs with more natural sunlight producing bulbs, the diatom growth as seemed to stopped or slow down significantly.

I really really hate it when I have to buy some sort of new hardware but it looks like the best solution to this problem is a UV sterilizer. UV light will kill single celled creatures like algae by damaging the DNA if they are exposed to the UV light long enough. I decided to go with the 18 Watt Turbo-Twist 6X UV Sterilizer which cost about $150. UV light will destroy all single celled critters, including viruses and good bacteria. Therefore it's only recommended to run when you have a problem.

I'm still waiting for the UV sterilizer to arrive. In the mean time I've done a 60% water change, which has helped quite a bit. The live plants are still pretty new, it might take a while for them to get established and start using up the nutrients in the water

This doesn't sound good if I want to get my MacBook Pro repaired, which has similar issues. I might as well hold off and buy a new one

Last week a MacBook Pro 15”, 13 months old, came in for repair because the battery would not charge, and the machine had stopped responding to the power button. This machine had been “heavily” used, and did not have AppleCare. In this case, the machine required at the very least a replacement logic board, a part that costs over $1000. Generally, out of warranty machines can be sent in to Apple for flat-fee repairs. This program requires a machine to show no signs of accidental damage—no significant dents, scratches, bowing, or liquid spills—but this machine had lots of dents, plenty of bowing, a separating top case, and damage to the screen.

Apple will still repair damaged computers as mail-in repairs. They have a tier system for the extent of damage, and this one was a Tier 4, the most costly. The MacBook Pro was sent in, and had most every component—inside and out—replaced as part of the Tier 4 dispatch.

All of the Apple laptops I've purchased have had one problem or another. My Pismo Powerbook G3 shuts off if it's jostled too much. My iBook G3 caught on fire when the power cable running through the hinge shorted out. My Powerbook G4 has this weird graphical glitch. It's hard to blame Apple though, all three of these computers served me well, took my tourture and are all still in use with 10.4 (the iBook was in use up till a few months ago). Except my MacBook Pro which is broken again.

I just had to have the first Mac with a Intel chip in it. Three months after buying it had to be sent back into Apple where they replaced the motherboard, fan assembly and battery. A year later it's out of warrantee and I'm having battery problems again.

It started when the battery would be down to about 50% charged, and the computer would shut down. Slowly that number would get higher. Today it will shutdown when the battery is charged 99%. I took it to a Apple store and they thought it was a internal wiring problem. I wasn't convinced after all reported battery problems Apple has had. I bought a new battery but the computer reacts the same way. So it's not the battery.

It's probably a motherboard. It's out of warrantee so Apple won't repair it for free, in fact they tell me it will be quite expensive. Not to mention that I've already had to replace a hard drive that died. The cheapest non Apple repair I can find is $695. I think I'd rather hold onto the money so I can buy a iphone.

I installed a ceiling fan in the living room today. It's the simplest, most basic ceiling fan I could find, an 60" industrial ceiling fan from Home Depot.

To eliminate the hum from the fan controller I could implement a work around by Ed Cheung. It's a passthrough device that properly switches the speed without humming or damaging the fan. The cost of this device is about $50. A Switchlinc is about $45. Together I'm getting close to the price of the CCWHISPLC, but at least it would still not be X10. I'm still pondering this option.

The last problem with this fan is it hangs a bit low. My ceilings are 8 foot high and this one hangs about a foot down. I think I can cut down the 6" rod about 4 inches which should help.

I'm sleeping on the couch tonight because I have a bunch of crap on the bed. I get settled in and start to doze off when I get a loud nock at the door. That freaks me out. I don't have unannounced visitors at the house at this time of night. I look through the crack in the blinds and I see a Rio Rancho Police patch.

Yikes! I search around for my pants. I open the door and there are two Rio Rancho cops with flashlights out. They ask my name then ask me if I know a few other people. Never heard the names. Then they ask how long I lived here, if anyone else lives here, etc. Eventually, they realize I'm not the droids they're looking for.

Another lady comes out of the darkness with paperwork and they start discussing it. Not sure what was going on but I suspect they were trying to serve warrants. They ask me a few more questions then they decide to leave. I'm sure they also ran my plates since they asked if that was my truck.

I'll give them this, they sure are stealthy. I heard several cars drive off but I didn't hear a single thing when they came to the house, except for nock on the door.

Now I have to try to get back to sleep.

When I bought this house, the first thing I worked on was the kitchen. I had hoped that I could keep the cabinets and refinish them up but they were in too bad of shape. I didn't have a lot of money. I installed the majority of the cabinets that I could afford, plus I needed to do some construction before I could put all of them up. I used the Mills Pride brand from Home depot.

Here we are a year and a half later and I've have some money to put up more cabinets. Home Depot is apparently not carrying Mills Pride anymore, in fact Mills Pride's website says it's under construction. I'm not about to trash the cabinets I already put in and start over, so I decided to use some open shelving.

There's an area between the microwave and the wall I plan to nock down. I'm dying to nock down this wall, but I'm not quite ready yet. I really need some shelving here to hold food related stuff when I'm cooking. My "pantry" was next to my sink, which was an original cabinet and a pain to access. By placing open shelving in both of these locations I can easily access things that I use frequently and hide the rest in normally closed cabinet. I like steel wire shelving. Normally shelving like this is expensive so I used less expensive shelving normally used for closets and made them adjustable.

So far it's working out much better than I imagined. Having the extra cabinet space and having easy access to spices while still having them off the counter has been terrific. Cost of materials for 3 shelves 27 inches long, 3 shelves 31 inches long, 12 brackets and 4 wall mounts was about $80.

Several years ago I started wearing glasses because, apparently, my eye sight was getting bad. Wow, what a difference it's made. i didn't realize how bad my sight was until I started wearing glasses.

I've given up glasses and have been wearing contacts since last year. The contacts are nice but there are still times I need glasses, yet I've broken mine beyond taping anymore. So what, I'm going to have to pay like $300 for a new pair because insurance only covers them every 2 years?

glassyeyes.blogspot.com is documenting the scam that is retail eyeglasses and shows that you can get some really cheap glasses online for considerably less. I can get a pair from for under a $100, with all the options.

Having moved to Rio Rancho, Comcast is not available. I signed up with CableOne, the provider in RR. So far I've liked what I've seen better than Comcast. My cable bill for Comcast was ner $60 a month, that was just for internet. Even thought I didn't want TV comcast forces you to buy it for $10 a month. Cable one has no such extra charge. Right now I'm paying $29 for 6 months.

I also get a nice strong wireless signal from Roadrunner Wireless. They charge $14.95 a month for Internet service. It's not clear to me how they handle multiple computer so I didn't sign up with them.

I should note that within 4 hours of checking my cableone.net email I already had spam.

My grandmother died last week, I am in Arizona for her funeral. She lived a long good life. Her Obituary was written by my Uncle Ted in a Springfield Ohio news paper.

SMITH, L. Ruth (Dibert) 90, died September 26, 2005, at 8:47 a.m. in Villa Jean Care Center, Chandler, Arizona. She was born October 5, 1914, in Clark County, Ohio, a daughter of Samuel and Alta May (Bishop) Dibert. She was a 1931 graduate of Terre Haute High School and a 1932 graduate of Westville High School, both in Champaign County, Ohio. She married Edward Donald Smith May 2, 1936 in Urbana, Champaign County, Ohio. She is survived by sons, Charles Edward [Sandy] Smith, Nelson Theodore [Lynda] Smith, James Richard [Sandy] Smith; daughter Betty Jean Richards; son-in-law, Robert Ray Jackson; 20 grandchildren; 26 great-grandchildren; brother, Charles Stephen [Mary] Dibert; sister, Mary Ellen Rowe; numerous nieces, nephews, cousins and friends. She was preceded in death by her parents; husband, Edward Donald Smith June 22, 1981; daughter Ruth Mae [Smith] Jackson August 21, 1996; son-in-law James Jerome Richards February 12, 1992; grandson Ryan Anson Jenkins and granddaughter Cassandra Marie Genco; two brothers and three sisters. Ruth had moved to Tempe, Arizona in 1957 and resided at 1806 Hardy Drive prior to moving to Villa Jean Care Center. She was a steadfast member of Tempe Nazarene Church for over 40 years and will be greatly missed by her many relatives, friends and acquaintances. Until the last couple of years she never missed sending birthday cards to relatives, family and church friends throughout the United States. A gathering of family and friends will be held Wednesday, October 5, 2005, at 1 p.m., on what would have been her 91st birthday. GREEN ACRES MORTUARY, 401 North Hayden Road, Scottsdale, Arizona will be the location of a funeral service at 3 p.m. with burial immediately afterward in the cemetery nearby. Pallbearers will be grandsons, Xan Smith, Gregory Smith, Anthony Jackson, Bobby Jackson, and grandsons-in-law, Paul Cruz and Chuck Genco. Memorial contributions may be made to VITAS Hospice, 3737 North 7th Street, Suite 203, Phoenix. Arizona 85014, or to Tempe Church of the Nazarene, 3929 South Rural Road, Tempe, Arizona 85282. Published in the Springfield News-Sun on 10/1/2005.

I think I've got the worst of my front end issues resolved. When I had the springs replaced last year, there were still issues. I wasn't quite sure what was left but I figured it was something to do with the brakes. My neglect of the system paid off this week.

The sound of metal on metal scraping is almost as bad as finger nails on a chalk board. I wore down my right front brake pad to nothing, leaving the metal backing to scrape against the rotor. I'd been meaning to get it checked as it was getting worse and worse, i could feel it. The steering wheel would vibrate back and forth when I would brake, for example.

It turns out, I would have needed to replace the rotor anyways. In fact both the left and right rotors needed replaced. I did go 100,000+ miles on these, not too bad. I've got friends with brand new cars and have had them replaced under warranty more than once.

It cost me just under $600 to have the job done. Might seem like a lot but I was quite happy it was that cheap. It was fixed and running in under 3 hours. I could have done the job for probably $200 or less, but I'd risk the chance that it would still be up in the air a week later trying to figure out why I can't get it back together. This is a 4x4, which it makes it a magnitude of scale more difficult (aka a pain in the ass).

I did however replace the spark plugs myself this weekend. This is an easy enough job but still cost me about $75 in plugs and wires. It took me almost a day to complete because of all the crap I had to take off the engine to get to the plugs. Since I had never replaced them before, the wire boots were nice and baked onto the plugs. Let's see how good my mileage is now.

All that's left is a front end alignment and oil change. It's nice to have my wheels drive down the road, in a straight line, without a lot of annoying vibration. Ski season is right around the corner, so it needs to be in tip top condition.

This last quarter's classes turned out to be more difficult than expected. I signed up for a MS Access class and a Business Stats class. I won't say much more about the Access class. I already had experience with it so it was a easy A.

I was looking forward to the stats class, since I use it all the time in my work. Unfortunately we were plagued by a new teacher and a new book. The first two chapters of homework were taking students 8 hours (!) to complete, this after being in class for 4 hours. That's just too much for people who also have real jobs. She cut it down quite a bit after that, but just illustrates how out of sync the teacher was with our needs.

I managed a B in the class, but not without a lot of help from my classmates. If I hadn't been able to complete the homework I wouldn't have ever passed. Yet, I still didn't come out of the class with a good understanding of the subjects.

The term the dental industry uses to describe rubber bands: "Elastics". I now know why there are little barbs on my braces, to hook up the rubber bands to. The idea here is to correct my overbite by forcing my jaw into place. I can tell that it's placing force on my front teeth and the goal is to get them to move around so my bottom jaw rests in it's proper place.

Essentially my jaw is stuck closed, I only take them off while I eat. In the future all this may not be necessary as it looks like they have found a drug that can cause teeth to move more easily.

I'm still without the super fancy high speed internet via cable. I will finally get them out tomorrow between 12 and 4 to fix it, hopefully. In the meantime check out Thomas Jefferson's Blog.

Update 07/06/05 8:04PM: Comcast came out today and checked things out. The day my cable went out they came by the apartment complex and "audited" the connections. Disabling the cable for non paying customer... and apparently paying customers. Anyways it's back on and working good now and they will be giving me a refund.

I had cable internet hooked up last friday, it worked for about a week, then the "cable" indicator light turned off and I've been without it. It sucks because I haven't been able to stay home long enough to get the cable guy out.

I'm at my back up, a local coffee shop, but was getting frustrated because my wireless saw the wireless connection but I had a self assigned IP address. Knowing that they have a linksys router (I can see it hanging on the wall) I started messing with the DHCP settings. I accidentally stumbled onto these setting, which are now giving me access.

Unfortunately I won't be home next week to get the cable guy out again, which I hate since I'm paying them for it. But I ought to be able to get wireless from where ever I'm at.

I ended up with a very busy weekend, with school, a friday trip and a party on Saturday there was no time to post. Not to mention the wireless I'm, er... borrowing, went down and I my trial of MarsEdit expired.

The fact that 2 people have died going down the same part of the river did not stop us from making a rafting trip down the Rio Grande river on Friday. That's me in the picture, the blue hat in the back. I was a little worried at first, but it wasn't really that bad.

The trip was suppose to take 3+ hours but took less than 1 1/2 because of the speed of the water. We also saw where the the unfortunate incident took place that lead to the death of Carolyn Whalen. Really, it's a matter of a good guide keeping the boat from going in the wrong place and the river not forcing you there.

It was fun, were looking at doing "the box" which is a rougher part that's farther north up the river.

First, I washed dishes in this dishwasher and for the first time it has seemed to clean them rather than put food particles all over everything. Don't tell me I should pre clean my dishes, it's a fucking dishwasher, that IT'S job. Besides I did that before and it didn't help.

On to the grades. I would have never purposely taken math and english together in the same quarter, But one of the classes I had originally signed up for was cancelled so I took the only available class, math, in it's place.

Math was easy starting off, I aced my first test. Somehow toward the end I managed to screw it all up. I was getting my X and Ys confused when we got to the linear equations. I missed the night we did polynomial factoring, which I haven't done since high school, so I was totally lost after that. I thankfully got that down before the test but still was getting my Xs and Ys mixed up. End result, a B.

English was tough because of the effort required in the homework. Two papers that are two to four pages in length, one research paper and one final exam essay. People, I don't know how I did it but I managed As on both of the first two papers. Apparently my writing is improving.

The research paper is a whole other story. It was to be a 10 page paper in APA style. Not knowing what else to choose, I choose to research String Theory. That was a mistake, there was much too much to research in a quarters time and my paper reflected it. It fell apart half way though, I expected at least a 50% for the grade. The teacher (who many felt to be a "stickler" and maybe even a "hard ass") went pretty easy on me, saying I met all other requirements of the paper even if the content didn't quite come through at the end. I ended up with a B on that paper, A B! Apparently I managed a A on the final exam, which was hand written in class, becasuse I managed a A in the class. This coming from someone who failed 8th grade english.

It was a tough, stressful quarter and other things in my life didn't help. I don't think I will make it on the deans list but I'm pretty happy how things turned out.

After a little under 2 years of wearing glasses, I've had enough. It's harder than heck to wear them under my ski goggles, they fall off my face and they are dirty most of the time.

So I'm trying out contacts. I'm wearing my "test" pair for the second day. It's quite a interesting concept having little pieces of plastic sticking to ones eyes. Getting them in and out has been an adventure too. Hopefully within a week I will have it all down. Hey, in the future my contacts will be made in space

I cannot think of a more nerdier subject. But I must confess my love for the Pentel Hybrid(R) Gel Grip RTX Retractable Pens. I happened to be checking out the supplies of the Admins in the other departments when I came across these little gems. Initially I picked up one but went back for a blue and a red. Now they are nearly depleted and the Admins didn't order more.

These things are "Permanent, waterproof, fadeproof and acid-free", have a "Convenient retractable tip", and come in "Medium (0.7mm) and bold (1.0mm) points". They write like heaven, although take a little time to dry. The retractable tip automatically retracts if you hang it on your shirt, plus it has a very noticeable clicky sound. Perfect for annoying people in meetings. Seriously, anytime someone borrows my pin they always note how nice the pen writes. Then look at me evil-y, and I have to snatch it back from those stealing bastards.

But good luck at finding them at your local Staples (I like Staples because there commercials are cooler). I guess I will go to Office Max and check.