Month: March 2005
Totally lost
Right now I am down. I’m down about several things but lets go with first things first, secodn thing ssecond and all that jazz…
I’m taking a break from the Stonegauge for I don’t know how long or even if The Stonegauge will be back up in the future. I’m just goign to stop with the site because…. Well, lets be frank and honest – you could care. By you I mean by everyone who is out there.
I know that really sounds pessamistic but that’s how it feels right now. I’m not writing much on here lately for oen reason or another and what I do write is too self-absorbed to really have any worth. I know I write something that not only gians people’s attention but also interests readers over at Boltsmag. I can’t say the same here at Stonegauge.
Who cares about my opinions? I express them on forums and in the Newspaper and they haven’t brought out change. I’ve shared my writing and my day to day dealings and it’s not as if many are reading this right now.
I’ll probably end up posting shit elsewhere just because it’ll be more private or because it’s not a target for spam (or hasn’t turned to shit because WordPress 1.5 sucks).
Bah 🙁 I’m down.
The good and the bad of the day
The bad today was, of course, finding my sites hacked — baseballboards.net and forum.boltsmag.com. I wasted a ton of the day fixing those things as best I could.
The GOOD? While I was fixing those pages, a road crew showed up at my place and tore out most of the broken slab of the gutter which I didn’t expect until next maybe weeks from now. The sad part about this is that, even with the concrete taken up, there is no clear reason why the gutter had been buckling as it was. That and the fact we won’t have things completed until days from now – if that soon at all.
Oh, more bad news — I’m sick 🙁 Oh well….
Michael Crichton's "Prey"
When I was working in Target a few years ago, Michael Crichton’s first book in a while came out — titled Prey — and I found myself wanting to read it but also fearing disappointment because Timeline hadn’t been that great and Michael had seemingly gone off the deep end with comments he was making in the media.
That was 2002.
Last week I got bored and while my girlfriend scanned my mom’s bookshelf for paperbacks to borrow, she came across a copy of Prey and I immediately snatched it up, saying I’d like to take a look at what Michael has offered us here.
Now, when I started reading the novel I knew two things – that the action in the novel would be interesting and that I would likely learn something or be inundated with technical information that can or may entirely bore me. What i hadn’t banked on was the book being predictable and that it was.
The novel starts out with a synopsis of what was going on 7 days after the book starts. “Things rarely turn out how you plan them” seems to be a fitting line that leads you into chapter one because this synopsis does not hold true at the end. Yet the little piece that Crichton threw in before section #1 (Home) that my interest was immediately piqued.
Crichton also departs from his normal formula by writing this novel in the first person which I found helpful to his cause because he can go off for entire chapters in technical details and lose vision on the story… Having Jack Forman, the main character, tell the story allowed Michael to mix in the action of the story with the technical information that was going to be told to the reader through the story. Everything is paced rather well in that fashion and the book is a page turner…
But…
I felt like I was reading something I had read before — not just that but things were predictable with allusions that Mike left. Maybe they were intended but when you tell me a virus helps you make something and that something is now running amok all on it’s own, it seems rather obvious that the virus has something to do with it as well as everything you suspect that you don’t find out until later.
I have already spoiled the book enough with that last paragraph… I don’t want to go into predictable stuff any more nor do I want to continue to spoil it for those who haven’t read the book yet (and there is probably a handful of you if not a bunch of those who have missed the book’s release).
It’s a page turner and it’s captivating… it may be Mike Crichton’s best pacing of a book but at the same time – it’s not his best book.
But it's all right now! Just not for long
My GOD it is a gorgeous day here in Fllorida – Spring is very much in the air. The sun is shining brightly, there isn’t much of a cloud in the sky! It’s sunny! It’s bright! It’s warm! 75+ degrees! It’s perfect out there! I
But…
300 miles out in the Gulf of Mexico, it’s raining. Pouring actually. By tonight it will be overcast and for the rest of the week it shoudl be raining.
When did I move to Seattle? It’s been raining pretty well every couple fo days (for a few days) for most of March and February before it. In fact, last time I saw storm progression like this was the late fall/winter of 1997-98.
You know, the last severe El Nino year 🙁
If you want something done
I feel real weird sometimes when I accomplsih things for myself and by myself. Especially when it isn’t somethign that I have an official say over. Calling over cable problems a few weeks ago while my father ignored the problem and tried tos et up a phone line was one example of it. Today was another example of it.
For months – maybe longer – there’s been a lingering problem in the front of my yard – the water gutter has been cracking. Not just cracking but raising to such a degree it stops water from flowing down the gutter and to the drain. I’ve talked to my parents aobut it a few times and they have shrugged mostly at the problem. “Yeah, we need to get that fixed…. But what am I supposed to do about it?”
That attitude is something I’ve taken with me in life and being disabled to one degree or another, that attitude does not help me accomplish things I need to accomplish or SHOULD accomplish.
So Wednesday, before another bout of rain that we have had a good deal of here in Florida so far this year, I emailed the county about the problem. I expected to be ignored or hav emy problem lost in beauracracy and red tape.
Maybe it still will be but this morning it looked like somethign was actually going to be done.
First off, I get an email from someone with the North County Operatiosn center here in Pinellas. Standard wordplay with my complain being forwarded to appropriate parties and la-de-da. I thought this was proof of red-tape in the making.
…Up until someone showed up at the door a few hours later, asking for me.
A woman with the highway department had shown up and had talked to me briefly about the problem, I showed her the drain and how the water was being blocked by the rising concrete, which was being demonstrated while rain fell around us. SHe told me that they woudl be able to make the repair within a month and they woudl be in touch.
That’s mroe action on the problem in 24 hours than anyone in this family has had, besides talk, in several years.
The "Death" Beauty
Death Valley has come alive thanks to a wet winter…
A once in a lifetime event, folks… That or further proof the climate is changing?
Another post for Postierity
You know, there are certain people in this world who don’t get it the first, second or third time around. Petty apologies don’t make up for misdeeds they have done, and admitting their wrongs – while it may work sometimes – doesn’t mean they are going to start treading the way they should.
Someone needs to answer for Santino with another aspect of her life… And I would suggest repenting for her misdeeds instead of continuing on like nothing is wrong.
Well, how does it look?
How does the new header look? I hate the new version of WordPress…. It seems to make it tougher to do designs…. Oh well 🙁
WordPress upgrade and subsequent headaches
Note to self – WordPress 1.2 was absolutely fine and wordpress 1.5 is absolutely messed up.
Banked…applied
So my new bank is Bank of America…
And there was much rejoicing….
Also taking another shot at this thing called job applications. Applied for two positions at Channel 10…. Cynical me doesn’t think I have a shot.
I just HAVE to blog this
Boltsmag comes up #1 on MSN for the search term “ladies that clean your home in Montreal”
And here I thought that my sites only catered to a small, niche user base…. 😆
Tampa Road Jam
I’ve lived on Tampa Road in Pinellas County for 16 years….
And until today, I have never seen it backed up as bad as it is right now…..
Banking on a new bank
It took me less than 28 days – less than the month of February – to learn that my financial institution being bought out by a Ohio-based banking company is a bad deal for me.
It took me less than a month to learn that 5/3rd National Bank sucks… Instead of dipping into my savings account on an overdraw from checking, it fines me 30 bucks and 6 dollars a day after. While ATM’s tend to already ream you every time you withdraw from an ATM not associated with yoru bank, 5/3rd charges you $1.50 per use of an ATM outside their network.
Suffice it to say they are NOT the type of bank someone like me – without money to burn – shoudl be using and I am getting my ass out of Dodge, so to speak. The question is where to go from here?
Bank of America? Wachovia? I have to go to one of the big banks because they have the most branches, I think. I don’t want ot get screwed with fees from a place like 5/3rd but I don’t know where to go – closeby – for my new bank account?
Southtrust? Suntrust? The search goes on but I am not sure at all….
When I open it, I close it
SO me and m’lady are in Ybor last night… First time (if you can believe it) I have ever been to Ybor City. No I didn’t get drunk into a stupor and I didn’t go clubbing either. I was walkign around and exploring with m’lady and….
Well, we needed cash so I went to an ATM and withdrew a few bucks… WIth a 3.75 service charge?! Suntrust ATM’s weren’t working for me and I was already upset I woudl get screwed with a service charge. When I take otu money from a bank besides my own, my bank chargees me 1.50 as was.
So I paid five bucks to take out money. Motherfuckers….
So I am determined to get work now… Just because I can’t survive financially this month and I have to pay back cash anyway to my credit card company (I hate debt), and this is the basis for the title fo this thread. I found a position I could do in an instant today and I applied for it, which was the case with Nielsen Media Research as was. Lo and behold, before they even review my resume – I am basically rejected:
Dear Web Designer Applicant,
We are extremely thankful for your inquiry about our web designer position.
Our ad in the St. Petersburg Times/CareerBuilders has produced over 70
applicants via email (with more coming in daily). Due to this continued
great response, we want to wait until the week of March 7th before we
contact applicants to set up interviews. We are also exhibiting in a
tradeshow in Vegas next week that consequently limits the time needed to
work on these matters. Rest assured, all applications will be viewed and
considered. I will reply again soon. I appreciate your patience with this
process and look forward to communicating with you further.
Best Regards,
Mark Hastings
In the land of opportunity, it hurts to look into an opportunity and then see the door shut on your face before you even peek into that opportunity.
Wal Mart too cheap to handle it's own PR
Blogwood and the blogsphere is how I found out Wal-Mart is buying naming right sto a local ER that will be built….
ANother one
Damnit, it just won’t fucking end, will it?
Another student was hit by a car while trying to get to the bus stop… Another person hit by a car for god sake! This happened at a location I have been at a lot lately – Curlew Road and County Road 1 where there has been a plethora of construction going on. Yet this is another example of all that’s going wrong in the area. Not just bad bus stop designation but also the chief underlying issue — we’re too indebted to the car and too thoughtless about the pedestrian.
When will it end? I mean, they are goign to have a field day with regards to bus stop location again and bus stop designation but the bigger issue is pedestrian saftey in my mind.