Personal

The stuff about me and my life. The “diary” side of blogging.

Out at the Vogue

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Just got back from the Vogue. I don’t often go on Friday nights, as I’m generally a bit tired at the end of the work week, and I know more of the music on Saturdays, but getting out of the house just seemed to be the thing to do tonight. Besides, the DJ told me to. :)

Had a good evening, though. Mostly just kicking back and peoplewatching, with a little bit of bouncing around every so often. Even met a pretty blonde named Kim when she sat down next to me and we started chatting — no smooth lines from me tonight, but at least I didn’t trip all over my sentences, which happens all too frequently when I’m meeting people. Turns out she’s been going to the Vogue off and on for years, and we ended up talking mostly about music and swapping band names back and forth (and I need to remember to check out Morphine and local band Faith and Decay [if I’m remembering that correctly, I can’t find anything on Google for them], on her recommendation).

Anyway, not really much other than that. Just a decent night out bouncing around for a bit. ‘Bout time for bed for me, I think….

Canon EOS Digital Rebel

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Canon EOS Digital Rebel

Now that my new computer is on the way (two weeks to go, at most…), I’ve started fixating on a new item for my techno-lust: the Canon EOS Digital Rebel.

I’ve had an interest in photography for many years now. I remember playing with my dad’s old SLR camera when I was younger — unfortunately, it didn’t work anymore, but I had fun fiddling around with it. I took one quarter of photography in high school. Not so much that I really remember much of anything, but enough to cement it as a definite interest. However, it’s been a fairly low-level interest for many years.

Just before I left Anchorage I picked up a nice little Kodak digital camera (the DX3500) which has served me well over the past few years. I’ve even managed to come up with a few shots that I really like from time to time (my favorite so far being one of Post Alley here in Seattle). The more I play with it, though, the more I wish I had a more full-featured camera, and the Canon EOS looks to be a really good value.

It’s essentially a full-featured SLR digital camera. 6.1 Megapixel resolution (roughly three times the resolution of my current camera), through-the-lens viewfinder, the ability to accept all of Canon’s EF series lenses and Speedlite flashes, and all sorts of other goodies. It even got rated ‘Highly Recommended’ by DPReview.

The downside, of course, is that I won’t be able to afford it anytime soon. While the \$999 price is extremely good for everything you get with the camera, it’s definitely out of my price range anytime in the near future (especially if I ever want to get myself out of debt). Ah, well — such is the way of life, right? At the very least, it’s a goal for the future.

Of course, if anyone out there is feeling generous at all, you’re welcome to help me out here! ;)

PayPal donations are accepted, if you go shopping at Amazon through this link I’ll get a miniscule percentage of whatever you spend, and, of course, Christmas is only a few short months away. Okay, sure, I’m shameless. But as I’m not expecting anyone to actually chip in, I can’t exactly be disappointed, now can I?

Moonshine Run

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The winter before I left Anchorage, my brother was playing bass for a bluegrass band called “Moonshine Run”. One evening they were performing at a coffeehouse in town, so I headed down to see them. I brought along a MiniDisc recorder, and they were kind enough to let me plug into the soundboard and record them. The next morning they were playing and being interviewed on a local radio station, and I added that to the end of the disc.

A couple months ago, Rick ran his MiniDisc player into the ground. Since I wasn’t using mine, I handed it to him along with a stack of MiniDiscs with one condition — that he get me a copy of that recording.

This weekend Rick stopped by for a bit, bringing with him a CD of .mp3s that he’d made from the MiniDisc. I just got them copied over to my Mac, and now I’m sitting here listening to Kevin and his friends play some good old down-home bluegrass. It’s great — every so often between songs I can hear Kevin laughing in the background.

A question for Windows experts

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Or at least, people who are more familiar with the intricacies of Windows 2000 than I am.

Here’s the short version: Why can’t I delete a partition from within the Windows 2000 setup utility?

Here’s the long version:

I’m in the midst of nuking and paving (wiping and reinstalling) my Windows box, running Windows 2000. The machine has two physical hard drives in it — a 2GB drive and a 6GB drive. Under my previous setup, I had the 2GB drive mapped to C:, and the 6GB drive partitioned into 4GB for D: (for documents and downloads), 1.5GB for E: (for applications), and 500MB for F: (for a scratch/temp disk). The thinking at the time (since I’m far more used to the Mac) was that I’d be able to reinstall Windows on the C: partition if it had issues, and I wouldn’t risk either losing my documents or having to reinstall my applications, as they were on seperate partitions. Of course, on Windows, it’s not that easy, as so many applications tie into the registry, so over time, I decided to ditch that scheme.

So now I’m working on the reinstall. While in the Windows 2000 setup utility, I’m given the option of deleting and recreating partitions on my drives. My plan was to essentially flip-flop things around — use the 6GB drive as my Windows 2000 system and application partition, and the 2GB drive for documents and downloads. So, I happily nuked all the partitions on the 6GB drive and created one single large partition across the entire drive. However, for some reason, the 2GB drive seems to be locked down — I can’t delete that partition at all.

Okay, so I figured maybe that was because I’d started the reinstall process by booting off that drive, and since the installer copied a few files onto the drive for the install before restarting and dumping me into the DOS-based setup utility, it couldn’t wipe that drive as it would end up wiping those files. So, once Windows was installed and I rebooted from the new installation, I tried reformatting the 2GB drive from within Windows, and it still won’t do it. The 2GB drive (still C:, but not booting from it) has the designation ‘System’ visible in the Drive Manager (or whatever that window is called — I’m going from memory on that right now), and the 6GB drive (D:, booting Windows 2000) is designated ‘Startup’. Obviously, the Startup drive shouldn’t be nukeable, but I’m not too sure why the 2GB drive has the ‘System’ label, or why it’s still locked down.

In one final guess, I went back into the Windows 2000 setup utility, this time starting the process after booting from the new install on the 6GB (D:) drive. I wasn’t sure this would work, but I figured it was worth a shot, guessing that the lower-level system hooks of the setup utility would be better able to muck with the drives, and this time it wouldn’t be copying any setup files onto the drive I intended to nuke. Unfortunately, that didn’t make a difference — the setup utility still stubbornly refuses to let me reformat the 2GB drive. And, once I’d started the setup process, I couldn’t get out of it, so now I’m starting over from scratch (which is why I was going from memory in the previous paragraph).

So, now I’ve got a 2GB drive which is essentially useless to me, as I can’t remove the installation of Windows 2000 from the drive to either just put the new install of Windows 2000 on that drive (which I’d rather avoid, as these days 2GB is fairly limiting for both the system and applications) or to use it for my documents and downloads.

Anybody out there know how I can reclaim those 2GB of space?

Updates, updates, updates

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As it’s been having issues for a while, I started the process of nuking and rebuilding my PC last night. I just managed to get it online (after having to search out the drivers for the motherboard’s on-board ethernet port, since it wasn’t auto-detected), and Windows Update has just notified me that I have 33 “critical updates” to install to my copy of Windows 2000 SP 2.

Oh, joy. I’m so glad I have broadband — but even so, there are enough of them that have to be installed on their own so that they can trigger restarts that this is still likely to take all night.

Update:

After the first update was installed and the computer restarted, the next trip to Windows Update actually increased the count to 34. If this keeps up, I’ll have the computer up to date round about the time Longhorn is released to the public in…oh, 2007 or so.

Can't it wait?

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Why in God’s name do people find it acceptable to stand at the urinal and talk on their cell phone at the same time?

Just wait. For one thing or the other, wait. But if I’m ever on the other end of the line during one of those calls, I’m hanging up.

Who's on stage?

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Okay, this is it — the last one. Mostly because it’s the last version that I know of, but hey, that’s okay. This one comes from one of the best TV shows of all time, the Animaniacs (specifically, epsiode #59, midway through “Woodstock Slappy”). If there’s anyone out there who can get me an .mp3 of this scene, I’d love it!

Update: This clip has been posted on YouTube! Who knows how long it’ll be there before the copyright police yank it, but it’s there now…. (via MeFi)

Who’s on stage?

Skippy and Slappy are at Woodstock. Roger Daltrey is onstage singing….

SLAPPY: Skippy, what is the name of that group playing on stage?

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the group.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The group on stage.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The group playing on stage.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: You’re starting to sound like an owl, Skippy.

SKIPPY: Who is on stage!

SLAPPY: That is what I’m askin’ ya’, who is on stage?

SKIPPY: That’s what I said.

SLAPPY: You said who?

SKIPPY: I sure did.

SLAPPY: So tell me the name.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the group.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The group on stage.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the band on stage!

SKIPPY: Who!

SLAPPY: You’re doing that owl thing again, Skippy!

SKIPPY: I’m not, Aunt Slappy, I’m telling you Who is on stage.

SLAPPY: So tell me.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: So tell me.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the group.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The group on stage!

SKIPPY: Who!

SLAPPY: That’s what I’m asking you!

SKIPPY: And I’m telling you the answer.

SLAPPY: Wait, Skippy, let’s start over. Is there a band on stage?

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: Does the band have a name?

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: Do you know the name of the band?

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: Then tell me the name of the band on stage.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the band!

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The band, playing on stage!

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: That’s what I want to know!

SKIPPY: I’m telling you!

SLAPPY: Who is on stage.

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: Who is?

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: Oh. So the name of the band is Yes.

SKIPPY: No, Aunt Slappy, Yes is not even at this concert.

SLAPPY: Then who is on stage?

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: Who is?

SKIPPY: Yes.

SLAPPY: That’s just what I said, Yes is on stage.

SKIPPY: No, Yes is not here. Who is on stage.

SLAPPY: Whaddya askin’ me for?

SKIPPY: I’m not!

SLAPPY: Wait, let’s try this again. Do you see the band on stage?

SKIPPY: No I don’t see The Band, that’s a different group entirely.

SLAPPY: On stage, Skippy. Look, see the band?

SKIPPY: No I don’t.

SLAPPY: Get rid of those John Lennon glasses and look! There, there’s the band!

SKIPPY: No, that’s not The Band. The Band is performing later on. Who’s on stage.

SLAPPY: You tell me.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the group on stage.

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The name of the group!

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The group on stage!

SKIPPY: Who.

SLAPPY: The band!

SKIPPY: No, The Band is performing later. Right now, we’re listening to Who.

SLAPPY: That’s what I wanna know!!

[Cheering]

ROGER DALTRY: Hey, you squirrels are funny, man. Come on up here and take a bow.

SKIPPY: Yeah! Far out!

SLAPPY: Oh brother…

(Thanks to my friend Rick for tracking this down on videotape so I could finally see it after being told about it for years…still looking for that .mp3, though!)

Who's on first?

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I gave a copy of the “Who’s on first” takeoff that I posted earlier to the guys I work with, and one of them was completely confused. He’s originally from Britain, and had never heard of the original Abbott and Costello routine!

So, I went out and found this page, which had the .mp3 online, and was able to introduce someone to one of the classic comedy sketches of all time for the first time ever. How cool is that?

He’s still chuckling over it, too.