I fixed my garage door. I used the only repair technique I know: doing nothing. The garage door has started working correctly again, and all is copasetic.
Now to see if I can fix the fan in the bathroom in a much similar manner.
This is my first foray into “Web 2.0″:
I’m excited that we’ve re-coined piracy as the next Internet. You know, because it uses asynchronous javascript. That makes it OK.
Closing my garage door has become a game of skill.
As of yesterday, it has decided that upon closing it should freak out and go back up (as if it hit something on the way down). I did a periphreal glance at the controls I could see and didn’t find an easy “stop freaking out” button, though there was a button labeled “learn button” which I was tempted to press (would it learn something, or would I learn about the garage door opener ?)
So, I had to play around with it for a while to figure out what to do. I realized that if I let it lower, there’s about a half-second before it does it’s little go-back-up thing. If I push the button again at that second, it disables the lowering so that it doesn’t go back up.
If I hit it too soon, the garage will be left partly open. If I hit it too late, the garage door will start going back up, and the lights blink on and off quickly (this, I believe, is to alert you your child has just been crushed by the garage door).
It is a good thing I was raised playing video games or I would not have the mad skills to hit that button.
Things that are mythical:
I swear Boren Avenue only exists if you mistakenly turn down it when lost.
The most misused apostrophes per square foot would definitely be any state fair. Absolutely anything ending with an s gets one.
At least they had funnel cake!
Here’s a roll through a typical work day for me:
11:00: Show up. Grab a Talking Rain.
11:05: Worker near the kitchen asks me a random philisophical test question. I think he’s interviewing for other teams.
11:15: Get to my desk. Read some emails.
11:25: See if there are any bugs resolved to me I can move to other people
11:45: Tatiana comes in to talk to me. Perhaps we get tea.
12:00: Consider getting lunch
12:15: Get lunch
1:45: Look at the bugs resolved to me again, see if there are any bugs I can move to other people
2:00: Amy comes in to talk, lays down on my desk for some reason (tired ?)
2:45: Email.
3:00: Rob comes in to talk. He does not lay down on my desk.
3:30: I notice an SDK-related checkin so I look at the changes. I send an email to the person to get them to correct some problems I notice.
3:40: Read more email
3:50: Relative discontent
3:55: Open my test case query.
3:56: Close test case query
4:00: Resolve bugs
4:30: Amy comes back in to talk some more.
4:45: I wish it was before 4 so I could get some pastries from the cafeteria (they close at 4)
5:00: Email again
5:30: File a couple bugs I managed to find
5:32: Bugs are returned to me as “By Design” or “Won’t Fix”. I close them.
5:35: General malaise
5:50: No new emails yet?
6:00: Consider going home
6:15: Run a few tests to give some hope to the management our test pass is going well
6:30: Wonder why my job doesn’t involve anything I went to college for
6:33: Extreme malaise
6:35: Consider going home
6:45: Rob stops in. While there, Amy hears us talking and stops by, which draws Tatiana over. I think Harvin stops in to chat as well.
7:00: Consider going home, seriously this time
7:05: Bulk fail a bunch of tests blocked by the beta of Office 12 we’re using
7:15: Go home.
I should mention I am one of the most productive members on the team under typical circumstances.
BMG’s idea of “independent music I’ve never heard of” is Fiona Apple.
I am not sure I like Pepsi anymore.
For Lent, my initial idea was to give up sweetened sodas to try to switch to diet, but I then decided to just give up all soda and caffeine. Now, after Easter, I still don’t really drink Pepsi — I’ve had a few glasses but it’s just not the same.
Sell your stock folks, this could be devistating to their earnings.
I realized today that I’ve had this little typing thing on the internet for a few years, and my mind instantly fell upon one awesome idea: clip show.
So, for all you people out there that may not have been around from the beginning, here are - in my opinion - some of the more interesting posts from my past:
The poking story, probably one of my funnier entries.
Another whimsical anecdote involving an attempt at making lemonaid. It ended poorly. For those of you who don’t like the written word, this one has a few pictures.
Some true stories from my past internship involving a severed hand in my pocket! Wow!
I include this one only because it mentions mints, which have become part of a new fail-safe plan in the event I become destitute.
I’m not sure this one is interesting to read but it makes me remember one of the most amazing sights I’ve ever seen in my life.
This one is great just for the comments.
For sentimentality, my first days ever in Washington state. An introduction to Byron and George, who still remain, to this day, alive. This leads to one of my poorer decisions.
Finally, in case you were wondering to yourself, “What exactly makes Jim tick? I can not imagine his past and family life to create such an amazing and interesting person!” Well, here is an insight into my family life.
Maybe I’ll never have to be creative and write again - I can just keep posting links to crap I’ve already written.
Happy Easter all - hope you have a good day and find all the eggs that were hidden. If you do not find them, they may go bad.
I don’t talk too much about religion (I leave that up to Killer Bee), but on the most joyous day for a Christian, I have to say it makes me feel sorry for people who have no faith.
Also, I feel a bit sorry for myself as I have eaten too much candied jelly beans.
In honor of my mom finally becoming a citizen, I have done a google image search for citizen and am posting the most relevant image from the first page of image results.
Congratulations! Enjoy jury duty.
Take it for a spin today, and try it out.
On an unrelated note to F-you Friday, this is hilarious.
I’m #10 in google for the search term: “inevitable betrayal”. I don’t know why, but I like that.
I’m #4 for “I need tungsten” (you know, to live).
I’m like #20 for “dangling preposition” which is good, because those things shouldn’t dangle.
A while ago someone brought up the saying: “You have to love what you do, or who you do it for.” I was thinking about this as I went to lunch and, since the place was pretty desolate as it was near closing time, it came up in a conversation I had with the lady who runs the grill:
Lady: “So you look in a good mood”
Myself: “You have to love what you do, or who you do it for.”
Lady: “Absolutely, so which one is you?”
Myself: “Neither,” (small beat here), “but at least I have a philosophy.”
I was going to write a bit here about my job and why it sucks, but I’ve decided it’s probably best not to complain about it. So instead, another story, this one involving a laptop!
Dell sent me what surmounted to a giant turd when I bought my laptop from them about a year ago. I’ve had the touchpad replaced 3 times, and sent it in for repairs on other parts 3 times (I should mention that they never fixed anything aside from the touchpad, which would just break again). So, finally, they decided to just replace it with a new machine completely. They agreed to do this last week and told me I’d get a machine in 3-6 weeks.
This morning, after sleeping only like 3 hours, I woke from a dream in which a Dell laptop was chasing me around and throwing mints at me. The mints are related to an entirely different story, but the laptop was probably influenced by having to talk to some Dell dude for a few hours over the past week.
Let me break here to tell you something about this Dell guy. He sounds severely depressed. Any time I would talk to him, I felt like I should encourage him not to kill himself, and that things couldn’t be as bad as he thinks. Texans.
Anyway, I awake from this dream and decide I can shape the world with my mind. This is no longer a dream. I focus my mental powers… and at that moment my doorbell rings. This only reinforces my feeling that I am secretly controling the state of the universe.
I’m not sure what exactly brought me back to reality - I think that maybe nothing actually has, I’m merely distracted by my new laptop.
Let’s see if I can push the publish button with my mind:
Would you rather be good at nothing, or good at something you hate doing?