Plaidophile

M-E-R-G-I-N-G

So, of course, right after I sign up for both Flexcar AND Zipcar (spending money for both and getting both membership cards and so on), they announce they're merging. Which means now I have two Flexcar accounts? What?

Oh well.

My apartment building was gettin' jiggy with it.

So, Song Fight's server is down (or actually there is something wrong with its hosting account) so we're just waiting to figure out what the heck is going on. One of the traditions over at Song Fight's forum is what's called the "daily roll call" where people post something about their day and a question for everyone to answer. (Sort of like a community blog meets E2's "diary nodes," only with conversations and all sorts of other stuff.) So, missing my daily Daily Roll Call I figure I'll post one here.

It only took me close to 7 years, and a split vote in a fight practically nobody voted for (relative to the number of entries, anyway). Hopefully the next win will come a bit sooner.

I think I know which one to get. (Conveniently, that store is also basically on the way home from work. I guess I'll just pick one up on the way home, modulo a test ride anyway.)

I've been in San Francisco for two months and I still wonder when I can go home (where "home" is Seattle, oddly enough). Everything is so intense and fake here. I miss little things like people actually saying "hello" to each other on the street even if they're complete strangers, and I miss my friends. (I really need to visit Seattle sometime soon, I think.)

Whatever happened to just hanging out? All my friends in the bay area are so far-flung that there needs to be some special reason other than "it's saturday" to get together, and the only time I ever hear from anyone is when there's a concert or something, which frankly isn't my favorite way of hanging out with people. At least Pat wants to just do the hanging-out and movie-watching thing. Maybe this weekend. I need to either get a bike so I can more easily get to his place (which isn't really in walking distance) or finally get my fucking apartment cleaned up so I don't feel ashamed about having others come over.

Tears of joy.

Well, the reason for the AT&T issues is pretty obvious now... apparently, since my apartment complex (Avalon Yerba Buena) submitted the work order on my behalf, my telephone account is now in the name "Avalon Y Buena."

FAIL.

(Oh well, the CSR I spoke to was very nice and actually pleasant so okay at least they get that going for them.)

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So, right now I have two laptops (well, three, but I own two of them), and I don't really have much need for the 12" PowerBook G4 (wendigo). So it seems ripe for modding into something useful. (Not a router or file server or whatever, though, as I already have those covered by better solutions.) What sorts of interesting mod ideas are out there? I kind of considered the iTablet route, but that requires a lot of time and dedication and work for something I don't actually have a need for, and which wouldn't be very good at what it does anyway (since the 12" PowerBook has the same crappy screen of the old 12" iBook).

Right now I basically use it as my Internet tablet while watching TV or movies, mostly because I can just keep it on my coffee table and not have to pull my MacBook out of my backpack, but really it's not even very good for that anymore, between the trackpad problems, the assiness of the old-style power connector, and so on. It's not even a very good remote control for the Mac mini since the tiny screen means VNC has to scroll a lot.

The only simple "cool" thing I can think of for it is to invert the lid and turn it into a full-time Electric Sheep picture frame...

Apparently, developing TV shows is like software engineering. This reminds me way too much about the micromanagement at Amazon.

Wow, that is the easiest car sale ever. Also, signing up for Flexcar was a lot easier than Zipcar (Zipcar is making me request my driving record from the state of Washington, which isn't a huge pain but it's slightly annoying since I have no stamps but the post office is on the way home so WHATEVER).

In the future, if I ever find myself needing a car again, I'm definitely going to buy used. Registration is cheaper, insurance is lower, and ostensibly if I were in that sort of situation again it'd mean I wasn't living in a dense metro area and thus parking would be a lot cheaper.

Right now I almost never drive. I live right by both Caltrain and BART. San Francisco has both FlexCar and Zipcar, and both have several cars near my home. Insurance+registration+taxes+parking costs me about $450/month, and I still haven't gotten around to registering my car for California (which is a major pain in the ass and confusing and there's all sorts of other crap like taxes and so on). Even if I were to drive 40 hours every month (which is not bloody likely!) Zipcar is way cheaper for me.

If I do sell it, though, can I keep using my Washington license until it expires in 2010? That's a bit more confusing.

I guess there's no harm in listing my car for sale on cars.com and craigslist...

my brain is falling apart

I just finally got around to watching Big Trouble. As far as book→movie adaptations go, it was quite good! Of course they had to cut a lot of stuff out (otherwise it would have been like 4 hours long) but what stayed in was very true to the book and also went pretty much exactly how I imagined it in the book (which is most definitely worth reading).

I just got my download link for IN RAINBOWS!!!!!!

I just wrote a dumb CGI-based media streaming thing which scans my video directory for content, generates a QuickTime streaming link (which sets the video to fullscreen and autoplay), and updates a dumb little local database with play time. While video is a little bit choppy when streamed over my network to my Mini, it's certainly watchable (and if I pause it for a few seconds to let the buffer get ahead, it stays very smooth), and in the meantime I can also now watch shows from other places, like during typing breaks at work.

So now I'm not in such a hurry to get my Apple TV working again.

Schadenfood

So, my Apple TV won't finish booting anymore. I went through all the usual diagnostic procedures (as few as there are) and nothing worked. So I went to Apple's support site.

The site is pretty badly-organized when it comes to the Apple TV section. Trying to get information about actually contacting Apple for repair or replacement just led me around in circles. The "request repair or replacement" link sent me to a section of the site which had nothing Apple TV-related.

The "gee whiz" factor of the ultra-sharp video kind of wore off at about the same time that I normally get lost in a movie and stop noticing things like MPEG artifacting on DVDs, but it's nice to know that if there is ever a higher-resolution format, my eyes won't be able to tell the difference. Also, while it's pointless, I do appreciate the little touches like how smooth menus are now and so on. Also, the audio did seem a little more clear and punchy than DVDs normally do, but of course that's so subjective and prone to bias.

Meanwhile, in the world of Casino Royale, everyone uses nothing but Sony products, all day every day. Not that I mind a world where everyone uses Sony Ericsson phones (which are still the least sucky!) and I'm pretty darn happy with my current Sony receiver and my Playstation 3. Though it's pretty funny how apparently people use Blu-Ray players in security rooms, and there are ads for Bravia on every single website on the planet, including MI-6 internal ones. I'm kind of surprised the portable defibrillator didn't have a Sony logo on it.

Then of course there was the major product placement for the Aston Martin. I'm pretty sure I won't be buying one of those any time soon.

I hate when I get caught up in something and decide I need to do One More Thing before I go home and then that thing doesn't work and so okay let's try Something Else and then the next thing you realize it's 8 PM.

In the style of the LiveJournal Random Image Generator, I bring you the Flickr Random Image Generatr.

No spoilers this time, because I'm actually happy with tonight's episode. I think last week was a necessary piece of crap to make this week so wonderful.

Those two look just like Toby and Shooby when Shooby hadn't yet gotten gigantic.

(I miss them)

• AppleTV: $300
• EyeTV: $150
• Turbo.264: $90
• Hours of countless frustration, lost recordings, system downtime due to reboots, etc: Unquantifiable
• Total: $540 + aggravation

• TiVo HD: $300
• 3-year prepaid service (because, seriously, $17/month for a listing service is a total ripoff): $300
• Total: $600

So I saved $60 for an inferior combination of products! Yay me.

I'm having a heck of a time trying to find a decent massage therapist in downtown San Francisco. Most of what I can find are erotic masseuses who advertise their picture more than their credentials, and what's left is mostly practitioners of bullcrap like reiki and reflexology.

I really need someone (preferably a CMT, though the reiki/reflexology practitioners all claim to be CMTs as well so I'm guessing CMT doesn't really mean much anymore) who will do deep-tendon massage for tendinosis. Surely there's got to be someone good and reputable around here?

(I can find a number of decent-looking therapists down in Mountain View, San Jose, etc. and I suppose it's not that big a deal to go down on a Saturday or whatever, but it'd be much more convenient if I could go during the work week without taking a day off from work.)