Ramblings by Chase

Argh! (as I would expect to hear coming from Scum). Stupid people and their stupid pet projects with stupid drop dead-deadlines. You cannot expect a whole new ecommerce project to “just be done” in 12 days! Especially when I won’t even have time to start that project until well after that deadline. Unfortunantly, the department asking, well not so much asking, is too big a favorite with, ehem, some people in our administration to completely ignore or push off the hot plate.

And here we have it, the real reason McDonald’s started taking credit/debit cards. I don’t think the one here in Longview takes plastic yet, but I know I would eat there a bit more often if they took something other than cash as I almost never carry cash.

One of the worms running around the Internet right now (MyDoom) has attacked our beloved search engine, Google. I checked in on the Google Blog this morning, like I do most mornings, and noticed they have an entry on the whole affair. I found the second paragraph really funny as they took a swipe at the news agencies writing about “Google’s downtime”.

After messing with my van of Saturday, I messed with a bunch of computer stuff for dad. I’ll post a bit more about that if I have time, but for now go check out the photos from the event in my gallery.

Well, things are looking up. Friday evening my father came up to Longview to help (or do mostly all by himself) work on my van. He got in town just in time for us to run off and grab some quick dinner. Lucky was at the apartment when dad showed up (he was going to watch Stargate with me later) as he was stranded there after letting Jon borrow his car. So, Lucky joined us for dinner as well.

After heading back to the apartment to meet David and Sara (who forgot to call to see if we were back from dinner), we all gathered around my smallish TV. You see, my parents bought me this cool little TV for Christmas, and it’s perfect for just me. But when you’ve got about five people gathered around to watch a show, it’s a bit small. Next time we bring Jimbo’s TV over. David and Sara were interested in watching Stargate with us, and I sure as heck wasn’t going to turn anyone away.

Lucky, David, and Sara all took off about 10PM when the show was over (both Stargate SG-1 and Stargate: Atlantis). Dad and I sat around messing with stuff and talking until sometime around 1AM , when we finally decided to get some sleep. It was only about seven hours later when dad stuck his head in my room to wake me.

I was anticipating a long day ahead of us, after all, we had a lot to do. We decided to run over to one of the many parts stores here in town (there are a ton of them!) to get brake pads for the front and a new link kit for my stabalizer bar. While there I also picked up some stuff to add to the power steering fluid to help stop the leak that has formed.

We got back to the van (after returning to the store for a large C clamp) and got started on the brakes (bad one first). After looking at the rotor in person, the gouge that looked so bad in the picture was actually nothing more than a surface scratch. It shaved off just enough to cause a color difference. Therefore, no rotor work was needed and we were able to proceed on to the brakes. The brake replacement went really well, and while the wheel was off we fixed the stabalizer bar on that side. After putting the wheel back on, it was time for the other side. The driver side went just as fast, if not a bit faster.

Thanks dad, it drives real nice when it has brakes.

Went to see “I, Robot” with a couple of others tonight. Now, understand, I *have* read “I, Robot” by Issac Asimov so I can’t watch this movie without making some comparision. That comparison being, it was nothing like the book.

Moving on, I really liked this movie from an entertainment point of view. It kept me entertained and immersed in the story almost the entire time. Now, I went into this knowing that it was going to be mostly just an action type movie, and I wasn’t dissapointed in that aspect. The story line was mostly flushed out and the computer graphics were excellent. Worth watching if you can spare the cash and time.

Killer Waves

Well, I finally finished watching season 3 of Alias. I had all but the last three episodes already, but had not seen any of those last three to include the season finale. So, I hopped on Bittorrent and grabbed the last three episodes yesterday while I was at work. What can I say, it was … interesting. It feel like a lifetime since I watched Alias regularly, so it was a bit difficult to just hop right back into the story. That’s why I decided to rewatch the last episode that I know I had watched, just to give me a little time to reaquaint myself. Interesting indeed.

After a restful weekend, I total blew it. I stayed up all night Sunday night working on a project of mine. So I got to work a little early, which was great because I’ve been running a bit late recently (like today), and tried to concentrate on work. Staying focused was a bit difficult, but I did get some good work done on the Student Web Payments (stupid little bug when dealing with payment plans on future session where the user has paid more so far than they needed to).

As I headed home last night, my brakes sounded horrible. They’ve been getting worse, and I’ve been trying to take it easy on them, slowly over the last week. I’m trying to hold out until this weekend when my father will be up here to help me replace them and a few other little things. I sent dad a text message (I knew he was travelling) telling him I thought they were to the point that I was a little concerned. Ha! What an understatement. He suggested that I pull the wheel off and inspect the brake and rotor in question, take a few pictures and email them to him. I was so tired by that time that getting the van jacked up and the wheel off just about wiped me out.

Once I got the van up and the wheel off I got some pictures, trying not to get grease all over my camera in the process. I felt around the rotor and didn’t notice anything really wrong. That just goes to show how tired I was because once I got everything back on, the van down, got cleaned up, and the pictures downloaded I knew better. I resized one of the photos down to an acceptable size for email and shot it off to dad. He responded after I had already crashed for the night (sometime around 8:30) and posed a few more questions. After reviewing those this morning and taking a second look at the full size photos, I realized just how bad things really are under there.

See that groove? Well I didn’t last night when I was looking at the real thing. So, it’s time to set the van aside for the next few days until dad show up.

Good show so far. I think I’ll enjoy watching both SG1 and Atlantis on Friday nights.

Official Satrgate Atlantis site