Maybe it's just me...

I'm shopping for RAM (for to make the PC go the faster).

There are reviews for RAM, of all things - this one caught my eye:

"It does what it's advertised to do. The memory looks great and works great. It's probably the coolest looking thing in my computer."

Now maybe it's just me, but I don't care if the RAM looks like an unborn fetus, as long as it works. Who gives a shit what it looks like?

I find this hilarious

Happy Birthday to Me!

It's my birthday - I'm 33.

I got some very thoughtful emails from my Mom, and Cindy called from Florida to wish me a Happy Birthday. Leslie, one of the other store managers, sang the happy birthday song to me. I also got very nice cards from Grandma and Mom, and a handsome gift check from Mom (who promised she wouldn't send me a birthday gift after sharing my airfare with me).

I slept in this morning - maybe I slept too long, because now I can't really seem to get going. I gave myself the gift of "day off" from exercise this morning. Maybe a workout would have helped me wake up, I dunno.

I'm at work now. I installed FrontPage (a web layout program) on my PC at work. Since today is going to be a "sitting around in case someone calls" kind of day, I thought I might get some work done on my web site.

It took a bunch of rigmarole to get the FrontPage program installed - the cd tray on my work PC is broken, and so I had to put the disc into another computer, copy and paste the contents onto the network, copy from the network to my PC, and then install. For some reason it installed to Drive E instead of Drive C and I spent 20 minutes looking for the program, uninstalled and reinstalled it onto C. (See, I know just enough to mess it all up.)

So now it's installed. I open the very first page to work on, and it's all messed up. Text and art boxes are misaligned, everything looks like crap.

It seems that the 'Mike School of Web Design' means that it only looks good on one computer - mine at home. I could fix everything to look good on this computer, and then it would look like crap at home. Not to mention what it will look like to everyone else in the world. Like who knows what.

Ugh. Bleh. Blahgen.
(Blahgen is a new word I invented a few months ago. It means 'frustrated, fatigued, annoyed, disgruntled, or indifferent' Pronounced "blaagin". I just put an H in the spelling to annoy Eddie Izzard.

Eddie Izzard is a comedian, very sharp and smart, he's amazing. Check him out.

I just don't know enough actual web design (or ANY web design at this rate - let's be honest) to do it right. I'd get Fiction Interactive launched, blow my paycheck on advertising, and then wonder why no one uses the site. Why?? Why? Because it looks like crap!! This is not a good motivator.

But not to worry, I'm not gonna give up. I've put too much time in at this point to just walk away. There is a slight temptation to shelve the whole thing till I've gone to school, but no.

I've already streamlined the site drastically over the last few months. The site is now about 25 pages, rather than the dozens it was before. Since I dropped the idea of interactive crime scenes and suspect photos and all the complex stuff, there's no reason why I can't make those 25 pages look adequate.

It's just annoying. Everyone's PC has different settings for fonts and images - how do you allow for that? Bite the bullet and actually learn some real programming, I guess. Instead of just fudging everything with FrontPage until it looks ok.

No worries - I have nothing but time... As of current data, life expectancy is 77. And I have a young wife who can care for me in my decrepitude. Hah! Whack the bootie with my cane. Hee hee!

77 years old. That's 44 more years. My poor children - they will have to put up with me for a long time, and listen to me ramble about how my web site is almost ready.

Bwah haa haa haaaaa (evil laugh) Bwaaaaa haaa haa haa haa

Step by Step With the New Solution...

The home computer is fixed! I gave in and did the scary thing - I told the truth. I told one of the programmers that I'd taken the game home and installed it.

He was very nice and told me how to fix the problem. I was worried about his reaction, but he took it in stride. Now I wish I'd asked sooner, instead of waiting for like 3 days. Now we have our desktop icons, taskbar, and start button back. You miss those icons when they're gone, let me tell you!

Things are hopping at work, lots of new bugs have been entered - most of them French and Spanish text - and we're supposed to be Gold on Friday. I'd be amazed if we were actually ready. We need at least another week. There's a lot of bugs left in this game, I can feel it.

Cindy's Regional Manager was very pleased with the store on her visit, which is good. Cindy has really been sweating this visit and putting in lots of extra hours. I'm glad they paid off!

She works too hard. And of course, she's salary, so no extra cash for all that work. If I can help it, I won't take a salaried job again. It's the only thing that keeps an employer from working you to death. There's always more work to be done.

I'm a Big Dope

All right, so I messed up the computer at home. I was trying to show Cindy the game I'm working on, so I brought home a disc and tried to install it. The installation failed.

However, somehow it locked out my desktop.I have no taskbar/start button, no desktop icons, nothing. Right clicking on the desktop will not bring up the display properties dropdown.

Nothing. I can ctrl alt del and use explorer to navigate. Everything works fine - except the desktop. I deleted the desktop.ini that the game installed... Still no luck. I checked Microsoft's web site and they just suggest uninstalling the troublemaking app. Problem is, there is no uninstall. I already deleted the folders, but whatever locked out the desktop is a part of stored settings now.

I'm sure it's an easy fix, if you know what you're doing. I emailed Ed and asked for help, since he is the wise IT Master. Ugh I hate it when I do stuff that reminds me that I'm a big dope.

Working the weekend (again) oh how I love my job

Bored, and tired of looking at this game. The last build was missing most of the sound, that was refreshing. It's Friday and I dunno how late we're working. I think we're waiting about an hour for a new build.

I messed up the PC at home, Cindy can't really get in to Windows (it sounds like a problem with the desktop.ini) - My Bad. So she's screwed until I can get home, and I don't know when that'll be. Sorry Babe!

Rubber Sex Fetish Garments, and etc

I got to leave work early last night (after only 8 hours!) because my work computer crapped out and the programmers were huddled in a concerned fashion around it.

I don't think anything conclusive was found, the only thing they found was nothing. I keep getting corrupted assets during my installs. I think that's what you get when you install over a network, instead of with a disc, and don't ghost between installs.

Cindy and I went out to eat at the weird A&W Burger/Long John Silvers fusion in Manhattan Beach. Gotta love those frosty mugs, they make your root beer all slushy, as God intended.

We ended up at Target and spent much money. I got some new clothes, mostly, and the Kill Bill 2 DVD. I got this freaky shirt. It seems nice and normal, just a white shirt. Until you put it on, then it turns into a weird rubber sex fetish garment - which was not the intent.

Oh! I also got some of those rubberized anti-slip mats from the household items section. We're using them under the dance pad for DDR. It helps the slippage factor.