jakew

Community Server must die!

2009-01-02T23:04:25Z

Enough is enough. I'm trying to build traffic so I can build a business and CS is getting in my way more ways that I can count.

I've never been really happy with CS, just too lazy to go find something else. Well, this morning I could not post and then discovered that my whole friggin site was down. Hosting company was doing fine. It was this POS CS garbage I've been running on.

I'm going to switch to another .NET based platform to see if it will work for me. If it does not work out I'm going to have to switch to a place that can host WordPress. I seriously have no time to be screwing with this stuff.

Sorry guys, I hate to bash a product but this has been a crap experience.

Reading for 2009-01-02

2009-01-02T23:01:13Z

http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2009/01/01/sex_for_men.html
This is one of those balance things. There is also a big lie here: women like sex too! Last I checked we all are built on the same platform and at its root is a very basic drive to reproduce. We also know that for both parties there are homones and stuff that help make the relationship better.
Advice to both sides - give a little and get a little. Doesn't matter what is being traded, just trade.

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2009/jan/01/suspect-dead-aspen-bomb-threats-last-will-sent-tim/
This is really quite beyond me. There is a presuposition that what he was doing had a good intention for him. But I'm not clear on what he got out of any of those actions. It's sad in its own way. I'm glad nobody else was hurt.

http://www.dcexaminer.com/opinion/columns/ChrisStirewalt/Harry_Reids_Unhappy_New_Year_010109.html
Tasty. Poor little guy has quite a conundrum.
Here is what is so damn funny about all this mess - I've been hearing about how much better the Dems are when compared to the Reps. Really? So far I just see scum bag politicians on both sides. Maybe I'm missing something...probably.

http://www.capecodtoday.com/blogs/index.php/2009/01/01/two-new-year-hopes?blog=81
yes to the first, no to the second.

http://thecollegepolitico.com/another-reason-ill-never-buy-a-microsoft-zune/
Didnt notice sense I was home all day and didnt have a chance to use my zune. OVerall I'm really happy with the stupid little thing. However, what I like best is the Zune subscription service. It's nice being able to go load up my library with whatever I'm in the mood for.
Right now I'm building a trance/ambient playlist. The heavy metal, rap, and other stuff I listen to is occasionally distracting. Like when I'm reading. Trance and ambient are great at these times because they just provide background sound that I can float along with. Probably not good for riding the motorcycle though.....will stick to heavy metal for that.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=090101201547.5tfqatzn&show_article=1
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aMcZJPyLLIDM&refer=home
live by the sword.....

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/gaza-a-matter-of-proportion/
I had higher expectations for Sarkozy. Oh well, he's French, what did I expect? A cowboy?

http://spacefellowship.com/News/?p=7838
I think this will be excellent for New Mexico's economy over the next decade. I hope it generates a *** load of ventures, startups and other wild eyed star trek like stuff.

http://tapscottsbehindthewheel.blogspot.com/2009/01/what-concept-let-detroit-profitable.html
Just more reason to reform our corrupt, bueracratic government. It might be better than the rest, but that isn't good enough.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1103843/Boozy-Britains-bloody-New-Year-A-999-seven-seconds-alcohol-induced-mayhem.html
the pictures in the story are quite startling. And here I thought "A Clockwork Orange" was just a movie. I didnt realize it was one of those reality shows. However, these are Brits, the people who bring us Soccer hooligans so maybe this is normal.

http://tigerhawk.blogspot.com/2009/01/years-that-sucked-more-than-2008.html
yup.

Reading for 2009-01-01

2009-01-01T22:37:14Z

Can’t help it – I’m an addict.

At the moment I don't feel like playing talking head. I'm too busy playing with my new toy.

Happy New Year 2009

2009-01-01T16:52:10Z

2009 will be a good year.

My predictions:

1. The pundits, economists and talking heads will, as usual, be wrong

2. Things will change

We are not in the industrial revolution anymore. We don't need companies with market caps over a billion dollars. We don't need Ford or GM. Big business just means dumb business.

Get small and think big!

Happy 2009.

Happy new year!

2009-01-01T07:00:06Z

Expectations have been set low enough that I'm very confident that 2009 will by a lot better than anybody expects.

A well paved road indeed

2008-12-30T14:00:42Z

Looking around at the world and I have some serious reservations about where we are heading. I’m optimistic about technology, my future and the future of nonconformists. It is the rest that I wonder about. I’m not really worried about it. I make my own choices and pay my own way. Other people can make their own choices too. They can try to push the payment on to other people’s shoulders but that only goes so far. The world needs people like myself and at a certain point we walk away and do something else.

I just finished reading “Atlas Shrugged” by Ayn Rand. I wish I had read it sooner because so much of what bothers me about our society was well described in the story. I blame Glen Reynolds and his “Gone Galt” posts during the election cycle. But on the whole it is pretty accurate.

So what am I talking about?

Stuff like this:

· The Arab Sole

· How Clever: Chicago TV Station Stages 'Throw a Shoe at Blago'

There is plenty more. But seriously – is this where we are? To be a hero all I need to do is throw a shoe at somebody? So what about the American soldiers who fought and saved Europe from the Nazi’s? What are they exactly? What about the Fireman who rescues a child from an inferno? What term shall we use for those people? It is also telling to me that there are people who would describe American soldiers as criminals – not just a well paved road, but a twelve lane super highway.

It’s fine. I don’t tend to associate with people like that. I’m too offensive to be around them. Something about hyper masculinity. I’m probably compensating for something. I’m just not clear on what exactly. Maybe it’s my overly liberal parents that have caused my allergy to this crap. Which of course brings up this stuff:

· Tis the Season to be Inoffensive

· The Quivering Upper Lip

The Brits are Brits and we have to keep our expectations within reason. Growing up overseas and going to school with kids from all over the world leads to being pretty comfortable with the reality of situation. Having seen all of this gives notice to Americans having an inferiority complex when it comes to our former colonial masters. Want to take over a room – speak with a British accent. Doesn’t matter which, any will do. Americans will go all docile and obedient at the sound. If you can carry off a convincing Sean Connery (Scottish, but most yanks can’t tell the difference anyway) then you are pretty much a god over here.

The reality though is far different. They’re bigger idiots than we are and are only too happy to trust their government. Didn’t the X-Files teach anybody anything? Trust no one. But where the Brits go we follow. So Amazon has a holiday sale, not a Christmas sale. A lot of retailers tried that. We don’t want to piss off the Wicans. They’re scary – they might cast a spell or something. The Taliban might cut our heads’ off if we show a Menorah. The snivelers might get upset about the overt display of religiosity. You should take no notice though that their liberal ethoses don’t go far enough to giving gay people the right to get married. Why gay people want to do that is beyond me but still – pick a side sniveler.

But that swings back to my point. Perhaps this explains it:

Lose the Pointy Shoes, Guys

But I’m all hyper masculine with the Sketcher work boots, race bikes and computer hacking. What do I know? We don’t need any devils, angels, spirits, or mighty gods to screw things up – we can do the job quite well on our own. Just need somebody to paint the stripes on the road and we should be ready to go.

Changing the game a tad

2008-12-29T14:00:49Z

I’ve had fun with my experiment and have learned a few things along the way. I’m going to take what I’ve learned and change what I’m publishing a little bit.

First – I’m going to post in four areas that interest me. Motorcycles and technology are obvious. Business and economics should also be pretty obvious. I’m going to start commenting more on current events. And related to current events is what I call my “Going to Hell File”.

The other piece is that I’m going to try to post more substantive pieces than I have been. I want to post one article a day. So I’ll rotate through my various topics of interest. It will take a bit more planning to do this, but I think the results will be worth it.

One of the challenges to me is that I’ll be posting up more of myself. In the past talking about technology is just…well talking about bits and bobs. You either get the facts right or wrong. Geeks can argue over exactly how you use those facts, but it’s all pretty boring stuff. Commenting on the economy, current events and the GHF stuff will be different. I dislike arguments. Not because I’m a Pollyanna who thinks we should all get along and agree with one another, but because I suck at it. Guess I’ll learn.

Guess there isn't a second.

We’ll see how it works. If I do it right this will be a lot of fun. I suspect if I do it wrong it will be a lot of fun too.

Just one more time

2008-12-27T14:39:27Z

I've been getting in to supermoto lately. Watching these maniacs drift their bikes through turns is wild:

I also really like the track the person picked. It's Grits "Ooh Aah" from their album The Art Of Transformation. One benefit of the Zune subscription is that I generally have no trouble finding everything I like in there.

Motorcycle stuff 2008-12-27

2008-12-27T14:30:44Z

Bayliss Wants 2 Million For Rossi Ride Off

I think a race between Rossi and Bayliss would be cool to see. I like both riders so it would be hard to cheer for one over the other. But it would be cool to see.

2009 Yamaha R1 vs early-1990s Yamaha 500cc GP racers

The power of the machines we have available today is amazing. It’s also amazing the mere mortals like myself can keep these machines reasonably under control.

One thing I wonder about – we are close to seeing 200hp bikes coming from the factory. 200hp measured at the wheel. Considering that the weight of the bikes isn’t going up this is an amazing amount of power to have on top. I won’t question the need for it – that is obvious (you’ll never need more than 640kb of ram or a 1Tb hard drive either). But I really question whether or not I’ll want it.

I don’t want a liter bike, but 600cc bikes today produce an S load of power. The Kawi ZX6 is making over 110hp at the rear wheel. That is an insane amount of power and it doesn’t offer any electronic aids to keep riders from spinning up the rear.

Power Lines

I have a friend who owns a pair of Buells. We make constant fun of him. He deserves it. Silly squid HD doesn’t make sport bikes!

Looking at the dyno graph though I can see that Mr. Buell has been working his butt off to get a great engine in his bike. I just wish his bikes looked a little less fugly. But it does make me reconsider getting the ZX-6. Maybe an 848 would be better…..more choices is better than fewer. I’ll try to buy both!

Crashes Galore

The only reason people watch NASCAR is to see the crashes. I hate seeing them happen. Motorcycle crash videos on YouTube are pretty damn popular. Want lots of hits – post up a remix of crash outtakes and they’ll come.

One of the big reasons I can’t stand Randy DePundiet is because I don’t think there are 5 races in the past two years where he didn’t eat pavement. What makes me despise him though is that when he becomes gravity’s *** he usually takes out other riders. I’m watching motorcycle racing, not NASCAR.

Power up your next ZX6-R

Too bad more power isn’t what I’ll want when I buy one of these. 115bhp (at the wheel supposedly) is freaking amazing! 600cc engine producing that much power is insane.

More power is at the bottom of my shopping list. Better braking (Brimbo MC and SS lines), 2^nd set of wheels for track days and suspension tuning are at the top of the list.

Save 1500 (quid) on a new Kawasaki ZX6R

MCN is British so that is about $3000 in real money. Wonder if Mr. White would offer that price to me and ship a bike to Dallas. Yeah – probably not. Still, luck bastards over there best take advantage of the deal. I suspect the ZX6 in 2009 is going to be the killer toy to have on the play ground.

Testing

2008-12-27T14:26:24Z

I'm getting an error when I publish an article so I'm trying to figure out what is going on.

[update] - must be the post. wonder what it is.

[update] - Ima idiot - the post's title was 'motorcycle stuff'. Already have a post with that name so CS didnt like it. Fixed.

BTW - if you try to comment and are having trouble could you please shoot me an email? either use the email link on the left, or shoot me an email at. RunsInCirclesScreaming at msn dot com. Don't worry - that is my spam catcher account so I get lots of cool can't resist offers over there anyway.

Either the stuff I'm posting is not worth comment or there are problems with CS. I'd go in either direction. I'm starting to seriously consider killing CS and moving to wordpress. I'll have to decide pretty soon.

Retail at twice the price

2008-12-27T12:17:19Z

Reading InstaPundit this morning I followed two links from him about Sales (Black Friday II):

· After-Christmas Sales Hope to Lure Shoppers

· Phony post-xmas sales

This isn’t really surprising in my opinion. Disappointing sure, but not surprising. So if the sale doesn’t work for you should you be upset? Do we need to keep buying stuff? How much stuff is enough? maybe not buying stuff you don’t really need is a good idea. Do you really need a plasma display in every room of the house? How much crap do we really need to buy? Not to go all spiritual but is happiness really found at the checkout stand?

How about just playing a game with your kids and finding happiness there? I hear Scrabble is pretty damn cheap. Probably find it at a yard sale for a nickel. How is that for a mark down?

resharper - live the suck

2008-12-26T22:11:08Z

I use resharper as part of my development environment. In many ways it is a good tool and there are features in it I would hate to live without. However there are a lot of occasions were it pushes the line with me. Right now is one of those occasions. Something is wrong and their engine is crashing constantly.

That isn't good, but I can understand problems. I've written plenty of bugs. But here is where the suck comes in: every time the engine crashes it pops up a Dr. Watson type dialog to send in information about the crash. This would be alright except that it takes it about a minute to sort itself out. In some cases it takes longer. Worse, clicking on the don't show this dialog again doesnt seem to help.

After a few cycles of this I killed VS, took a break, and then wrote this.

The reason I buy tools is to increase my productivity. Happy to pay money for tools that make me better. If I were an athlete I would do every safe steroid I could find that gave me a competitive advantage. But the instant it either showed itself not to be safe or provide competitive advantage it would be out. resharper is getting dangerously close to falling in that category.

The economy

2008-12-26T15:49:29Z

A bigger pie – Mr. Pournelle’s main thesis that they way out of this mess is to make the pie bigger. Hopefully the rest of this stuff can fall in to place. Those of us willing to work hard are probably growing weary of those who aren’t willing to work at all.

Of course there is a shiny brass lining to our current state of affairs: Top 10 Used Exotic Cars: Get that Aston Martin for the Price of a Honda. If I were in the market for a car a nice DB7, even if 10 years old, would go very nicely in my garage. But I want another sportbike so I’ll wait a few weeks before I shop around again. If the economy really is in the toilet like is being advertised, and I still have a gig lined up, then I shouldn’t have much trouble scoring either a new Ducati or Kawasaki at a steep discount in early March. Not sure if I should celebrate or cry.

Mixed Signals

Economic data expected to show more weakness The actual numbers they mention are not pretty. But are they the drop off in to the abyss we’ve been being promised? I hesitate to put a lot of credence in what economists say because they get it wrong so friggin often. They’re like weather men. Or perhaps ancient priests divining the future by digging around in the guts of a dead sheep. Either way I take their forecasts with a lick of salt and a shot of tequila. Some lime too if I have any. But I like bourbon better.

I get that there is science behind what economists do, but I don’t think it is a well understood science where one and one is always two. Sometimes it is zero and other days it is eight. I understand that big companies have screwed up. But we have not killed off a significant portion of the population. No natural disaster has befallen us. Instead media has been calling for a recession for nearly two years and we finally have one. I’m not big on conspiracy but I feel like media set this up to get their man in to the white house. And now that he is there, it turns out he isn’t who they thought he was: “Obama’s Job-Creation Program Flunks Basic Math: Caroline Baum”.

It’s funny all the way around this situation. First, our deal beloved leaders get us in to this mess by directing their pet to help people buy houses. Many of these people could not afford to buy a house in the first place. Or if they could afford a house they ended up buying more house than they could afford. At the same time the geniuses on Wall Street start creating really cool new products that have no relationship to reality. Oh, let us not forget that while this is going on our beloved leaders rewrote the rules on bankruptcy.

So, when it finally hits the fan what do we do? We essentially give a blank check to the same idiots who got us here! Brilliant! The same Wall Street dorks who came up with the products. The same Washington ferrets that directed that the money should be lent out. It’s the same cast of characters who got us are going to get us out? Not.

As I’m putting this together I found this: “Obama’s Race Against the Economy”. Mr. Blumer links off to two other related articles: “Could It Be ….. Recovery? If So, Hurry Up Already” by Mr. Blumer and “5 Reasons Why the Economy Might Recover Faster Than You Think in 2009” by Mr. Pethokoukis.

These three people are saying what I have been thinking. But the problem I have is determining whether or not we’re suffering from wishful thinking or not. I don’t want to see people losing their jobs, their houses and the other things they’ve been working for.

I make fun of people who bought more house than they could really afford, but they didn’t do it out of malice. They did it because they were optimistic about the future. If you can reasonably afford a $150,000.00 house you don’t buy a $200,000 house instead because you expect to lose your job in the next five years. You buy it because you think things are going well and in five years you’ll be kicking ass so hard you could buy a $300,000 house. Perhaps not the most realistic view of the world, but I prefer it to the alternative. What if all the Bobs and Kathys had not shown up for the party and had continued renting or had bought $120,000 houses instead? What if they were really pessimistic and just kept their money in CDs. They didn’t invest it because – hello! They’re pessimistic! They expect it all to go to hell tomorrow. You buy a small farm far outside of town. You stock it with Twinkies and small arms. You don’t get a credit card, you don’t borrow money. You do everything you can to avoid any obligations to anybody. You end up economically looking Amish. Perhaps not a bad choice, but still. I prefer the optimists who go to Vegas lose it all and then get back up to rebuild all over again because next time – they will take the house to the cleaners. Those people are more fun to be around. Plus, eventually if they keep trying they eventually win.

[Update] I sorta screwed up my attributions for "Race Against", "Could it Be", and "5 Reasons" - so I did a quick edit to make things clearer about who did what.

At a rest stop on the road

2008-12-26T14:34:38Z

We’ve fallen so far and feel so threatened by the world that a kid a with cap gun needs to be arrested?

From a link on InstaPundit - Don't Take Your Guns to Town pointing to the actual story: 10 Yr. Old with Toy Gun Arrested, Fingerprinted.

Well, I for one feel much safer knowing that my government can protect me from crazy cap gun wielding 10-year olds. We’re all much safer now.

Man in Santa suit robs W. Knoxville drug store – Sort of funny. But it is still another road sign pointing us the way to hell. Criminals shouldn’t defame St. Nick when committing their crimes. Richard Nixon masks are fine, but not the jolly old fat man. It goes along with the general assault on Christmas which seems to be spreading. But apparently we didn’t start this fire, it was already burning when we got here.

Dodd deflects question on mortgages why comment on this as part of the road to hell? Because this is the type of person we elect to office. We don’t elect men of honor and integrity anymore. Those guys wouldn’t come anywhere near somebody like Mr. Dodd. What is sort of funny is the other weasels out there don’t even deal with him directly. They send flunkies and servants to – I mean lobbyists to do the dirty work.

so totally on the road.

Finally, desert on the road. This actually makes me feel good about the trip we’re taking:

“Beware L'Homme Fatale!” and “Stupid Women Taken In by “Hommes Fatales”. I know it is mean to make fun of people getting hurt so badly. But we are on the road to hell. Plus, it isn’t like the women were ambushed. These were choices actively made by those women. It’s just too rich and unseemly, but I can’t help but to laugh.

Acts of civil disobedience

Desert should be served last, but I’m going to point out that we’re still on the road and more stuff just keeps coming in. For instance: Santas disable revenue-light cameras. It isn’t that Santa’s in the video that have us on the road, it is our leaders. In this case Santa is trying to stop our progress. Bad Santa, we’re having so much fun and the road is so well paved. How can we not set cruise control on 120, sit back and start texting on our cell phone?

Merry Christmas

2008-12-25T14:00:42Z

Have a great and merry Christmas.