I was just like every other middle class graduating senior, I received my fair share of graduation cards and checks and presents, and with my graduation money I decided to purchase ze5170.  It was a great day for both of us.  I took him from the lonely shelf of a local Best Buy, away from the torturous salesmen who were too busy dreaming up new ways to rip off unsuspecting customers with one of those “premium protection plans”.  ze5170 and I went home and started our time together.

At first it was the typical computer to person relationship, I’d power him on when I needed him and leave him be when I wasn’t surfing the net.  But things soon changed as I started classes at OU that fall.  ze5170 was no longer just for my entertainment, him and I wrote countless papers and completed hours of engineering projects; so much typing that his keys are shiny smooth from wear to this day.  Before long I just started bringing him with me to class since I always seemed to need him.

Throughout our time at college, ze5170 went through the usual aging process, and he required repairs and got some upgrades on more than one occasion:

• early on, while he was still under warranty, his optical drive failed, so I fixed him up with a new one
• after my first year with him he got a RAM upgrade from 512MB to 1GB
• in his second year we replaced his battery with a newer high capacity one
• shortly after ze5170’s third birthday his original hard-drive failed, so he got another similar one (same 40GB capacity)
• after a solid two years with no problems, ze5170 and I were out of college and out in the workforce when his graphics card fan came loose and started flopping around inside of him - this prompted his first major surgery to get to the fan, but in the end just required snapping it back into place
• finally in his sixth year of life him and I had our first major battle - he lost his second hard-drive and took with it about a month’s worth of code, web designs, financial data, and who knows what else - luckily for him a ridiculous trick of putting the hard-drive in the freezer actually worked and allowed me to get all my data back
• after the hard-drive debacle we replaced his drive with a tiny 20GB drive from a Creative mp3 player about the same age has ze5170

So we’ve had quite a good six years together, and I was kind of content just to keep on going and see how long it would last, but suddenly a couple of days ago ze5170 just shut down right in the middle of some normal budget work.

With the cryptic last words “System Restarted - CRC Error,” ze5170 passed on.  After a bit of Googling, I attempted rudimentary CPR by running a memtest on him, and sure enough there were failures all over the place.  With ze5170 bleeding out, I order a 512MB stick of RAM to hold him over, but when it arrived I got the same results.  It seems his motherboard has stopped mother-boarding.

Time of death: 9:34 p.m. 11/7/2008

May ze5170 rest in peace.

Please leave your condolences in the comments.

Pebbles and Bam-Bam… Monsters from “Monsters, Inc.”

This year, Halloween included costume changes for the kiddos.  For their school parties (and parade) on Friday, I made them little Pebbles and Bam-Bam costumes to wear. Josh and I decided that their monster costumes would not only be too hot to wear all day, but if you’ve seen Ali try to walk in hers–with it’s big padded belly–you’d understand that it would have been a disasterous day at preschool.

That said, this year we got some awesome pictures of our kiddos, in their various costumes. They must’ve looked pretty cute, because each came home with their pumpkin buckets overflowing with candy. (Really, I have no idea what we’re going to do with all of it!!)  I know for a fact that I never got that much candy when I was trick-or-treating, but apparently it’s hard to say “No” to the two cutest little monsters ever.  (Prepare yourself for a tangent here…)Ali even milked her way into more candy. At one of the first houses we went to, the family had a little bitty dog (I mean, teeeeeeeeeeeeeeny), and it stood by its owners legs as she opened the door to dole out the goods to Xavier and Ali.  Ali took one look at the little ”cat” as Xavier called it and burst into tears and cried so hard that her little body violently shook. The lady who owned the dog felt so bad that she dropped like 10 pieces of candy into Ali’s bucket, and then a whole handful more just to make her smile.  Then she did the same thing for Xavier, because “They’re just so darn cute.”

Later, Ali fell (her belly threw her balance off) and practically landed on the feet of this sweet old lady. The poor old lady also felt bad and loaded Ali up with candy. Josh and I kind of joked that this would just be Ali’s system and she left with her bucket almot half full from that woman’s house.l

Not to be outdone, Xavier would walk up to people’s door, and act really shy. Then they’d lean over, drop a couple pieces of candy into his bowl.  Then he’d turn on the charm, and finally look at them, and go “Mooooore peeeeeeeeeeeeez.” …And of course, no one could resist. My little con-arist (who is not in the least bit shy in real life) would then practically yell thank you to whomever he had just suckered into giving him way more candy than they shouldv’e, turn as fast as he could, and with a big grin on his face say, “More houses-more candy Mommy!”

Haha. It was a fun, fun night.  Pictures in the gallery.

Love you,

~ Josh

September 2008 album

An excellent insight into the Comcast debacle.

Now, as a woman who has been pregnant twice, I see a couple of problems with Lindsay’s concern.  First, and most obviously, is that Bristol Palin is five months pregnant.  Any day now, she’s going to start looking the part, and if Governor Palin had denied the story what would she say?  “No, I’m sorry. She’s just gotten fat.”  Maybe a better answer would be, “Yes, she is pregnant, and I lied to all of you.”  That’s not what anyone needs.  Not only was it wise of Palin to be up-front with the people who will be voting on whether or not to elect her and Senator McCain, it was admirable.  There are enough people in the world who are willing to lie to get ahead, save face, or make a name for themselves.

The next problem goes right along with the first.  In four months there will be a baby to be accounted for.  If, by some miracle, the Palin family was able to hide Bristol’s pregnancy the entire nine months, there would still be a baby one day.  Then what? Would Lindsay, purveyor of all knowledge, prefer we’d all just turned our eyes from Bristol’s burgeoning belly until then?

Far be it for Lindsay Lohan to turn on her brain before she turned on her computer and blessed us with her “thoughts.” (As if she really has any.) In the same blog, she writes that all she keeps hearing about is Sarah Palin’s pregnant teen daughter, and that “Its (her grammar error, not mine) distracting from the real issues, the real everyday problems that this country experiences.” 

First, let’s point out the obvious. Sarah Palin is not the one drawing attention to her daughter’s pregnancy.  Whether they work for E!, the New York Times, or some Podunk, small town weekly, it is instinctive for every journalist to find a story, spin it, and sell it.  Just like everyone else, journalists need to get paid, and honey, digging up dirt on Sarah Palin’s doe-faced, 17-year-old daughter is certainly a good way to do it.  (I have some authority on this; just look at my degree.)  Palin was wise to publicly acknowledge Bristol’s pregnancy now.  Denying it or avoiding it weren’t solutions—no one likes a liar, and let’s face it, the truth would get out eventually.  I’m surprised that Lohan is so quick to blame Palin, when she’s been in the news so often, whining and complaining about the paparazzi that stalk her and the magazines that misquote her.

Now let’s delve into the bigger issue with Lindsay’s journey into the blogosphere.  Again, to quote the genius that is Lindsay Lohan, “Its distracting from the real issues, the real everyday problems that this country experiences.”  Really, Lindsay? What might those problems be?  Could you please, please tell me what problems you’ve experienced today?  I’m certain that the problems that those of us who live in the real world experience aren’t the same as the ones that trouble you.  You see, as a country, we’re experiencing economic distress, because too many people want to give too much to people who don’t do anything.  They say, let’s make those people who work hard for their money (and no, going to a club to promote your next crappy album doesn’t count as work) shell out just a little more, so that those people who don’t work can also have insurance and houses and cable, and so that those with over-bloated bank accounts (that one does include you) can just continue to sit there, and make more money. 

Those of us who live in the real world face problems like trying to pay the mortgage and daycare in the same week.  We normal, average people here in the real world struggle to keep marriages together, and to raise happy, healthy, well-adjusted kids.  We as a country, struggle to uphold and maintain the Godly values this country was founded on, in principle and in purpose.  You, and everything you stand for, mock all of that.  You “work,” but really, you party and play with your girlfriend.  You have “problems”, but really, your problem is that you don’t appreciate anything you have and you aren’t wise enough to realize that the real problem our country faces is people like you.

From now on, stick to what you’re good at, and go find yourself a nice club to party in. Leave the singing to someone who can carry a tune, and the acting to any girl that can smile and actually looks good blonde. 

After putting in a total of 52 hours, 47 minutes, and 4 seconds over the past four months, I can finally move on to another game.  I highly recommend this game to anyone holding out.

Peace at last.

I love you too.

Anyway, not really too many changes you guys will notice in 2.6.  The biggest thing is post revisions, but not sure how useful that will really be to you.  As always, let me know if you run into any problems.

I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, but the blog log-ins are not letting you in right now.  I just upgraded them all to 2.6 and that introduced this problem.  It isn’t that you are locked out or anything, it is just redirecting incorrectly.  I am working the issue so hopefully I’ll get it resolved soon.  If not I’ll be rolling the blogs back to 2.5.1.

Stay tuned.

Now to code the bbPress forum theme…

So I made the call to Microsoft, and as expected they asked me for the serial number of my Xbox.  As I was reading it off over the phone I noticed the manufacture date of mine was actually November 2005!  Probably not very exciting to most of you, but if you own a 360 you probably know that they extended the warranty of most units from one year to three years to try to alleviate the outcry about so many broken 360s.  Whew, I just barely made it.  I guess I should consider myself lucky that it broke now, and not six months from now. 

A few minutes later I was told I’d receive a UPS label and then I could drop it off at any UPS Store and expect it back in two to three weeks.  Overall it has been a relatively painless process so far for me, but I’ve heard some pretty bad horror stories (sorry Autstin), so I’ll keep my fingers crossed until I receive my new Xbox 360. 

Curse you Microsoft.