I went to the bookstore today and I was looking through the computer books. The thing I noticed when I was trying to find the right book was that there are a million books and half of them are about the same things, but just written by different people who are asking way too much for their books. These money hungry whores don’t seem like they are concerned about actually writing good material because by the time you sift through a 500 page book only about 50 pages contain information that is actually useful. That means you have to buy their whole series of books just to get the relevant information that you were looking for in just one book. Not to mention they mark the prices of the books up to about fifty bucks per book. I am no math genius, but when they say knowledge is power and they are charging 50 bucks per book, but only 10% of that book is relevant information that means you’re paying 90% of the total cost of the books for just bullshit.
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Drinking Etiquette
Occasionally when I’m out drinking with friends there is a stranger who will walk up and want to tell you his life story. I’m always more than 100% willing to listen to what they have to say, but it always comes at a cost. I consider it good etiquette that if you are going to tell me your life story and I’m going to have to listen to it, then you are going to be buying me drinks. I’m always willing to listen to what you have to say, but in return you’re going to refill my glass. The same goes for if I’m the one telling stories, then I’m the one buying drinks.
The logic behind this is that one is not as willing to talk as long if their pocket book is getting smaller. That way everybody is more apt to have a turn at telling their tales. This is just food for thought the next time you are out and a stranger comes up and wants to tell you their life story.
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High School Reunion
I recently received an e-mail from a girl I knew in high school. She was trying to get updated contact information and trying to find out if I’ll come to my high school reunion. It was neat to see some of the names listed on the contact list. She also sent out this e-mail saying, “Getting to know you.” I figured this was an ice breaker so everybody could start contacting each other. So I filled it out and sent it back to everybody on the contact list. Then the following day she sent another one. I hate these e-mails like this because thier whole intention is to clog an e-mail server. So I replied back saying that if you haven’t stayed in contact with people from high school, there was probably a good reason for it and these “Getting to know you” e-mails aren”t going to make up for lost time. Naturally she replied back saying that if I don’t want the e-mail then just delete it and that I shouldn’t reprimand when I reply back to everybody. I say, “the hell with that”. I don’t have to be politically correct anymore because I don’t have to be around you. Nice time is over! You should have gotten pleanty of nice time in high school. Now that high school is over, so is nice time. I don’t give a shit about who is doing what and who is making more money and stupid irrelevant stuff like that. I’m not out to please anybody, but myself. Call me selfish, but I don’t care. I’ll get you a nice warm glass of “Shut the hell up!” The thing is, the people I stayed in contact with from high school are the only people I really care to stay in contact with. These stupid e-mails aren’t going to make me like you any better now, especially if I didn’t like you in high school. That is just unwanted spam. So I added her to my black list and I don’t have to worry about her e-mailing me anymore.
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Dell Finally Gave In and Gave My Money Back
The Dell saga has ended. Finally today Dell gave my money back after initially placing the order on March 3rd, 2004. The product was shipped back last month and this month I was finally refunded my money. It seems they are much quicker at taking your money than they are at giving it back. It only took 8 phone calls and numerous e-mails. If you call that good customer service I would hate to live in your world. At least it has ended and I can go buy a Mac.
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Punishment For US soldiers in Iraq for Abuse
It is going to be interesting to see what kind of punishment the soldiers in Iraq will get. The interesting thing won’t be the example the military is going to make out of them, but instead because they are enlisted soldiers, will they get imprisonment? This is interesting because we know the only thing US Navy did to Commander of the USS Greenville, Scott Waddle was forced him into early retirement and he killed 9 Japanese fishermen. The soldiers in Iraq only abused Iraqi prisoners and their punishment will probably be much greater. You can’t tell me that the enlisted soldiers who are going to be punished for abusing prisoners were the highest ranking in this scandal, but they will probably be punished much greater than anybody else.
What does that say about the US military and their rank structure? Does that mean they think enlisted are expendable? Does that mean their careers are valued much less than that of an officer? Don’t get me wrong, what they did was humiliating to the entire US as well as the Iraqi prisoners, but should they be punished worse than that of Scott Waddle who actually killed 9 people as well as sinking a ship and damaging a US submarine, while trying to impress some guests on his ship? His crime was much worse than theirs, but they will probably be punished much worse. This is just one of those things that should open your eyes and make you scratch your head
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Wireless Insecurities
You would be surprised how many people out there have wireless networks running at home or at a place of business. You would be even more surprised how many people do not change the factory default settings. I recently set myself up on a wireless network before I even set my router up I was detecting other networks. The hostnames were the router version and the passwords were the factory default passwords and of course their wireless networks had no security. I was amazed to see this, so naturally I had to do something about it. Just what though, ‘I’ll keep it my little secret.’, ‘For all people considering putting themselves on a wireless network, be sure to change the factory defaults. Unless of course, you would like somebody else to take control of your network. It’s not hard to do and takes very little time. If somebody else can control your network, they can see what computers are on that network. Then to get files off those computers it’s even easier. Just a word of warning.
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Wireless Morons
You would be surprised how many people out there have wireless networks running at home or at a place of business. You would be even more surprised how many people do not change the factory default settings. I recently set myself up on a wireless network before I even set my router up I was detecting other networks. The hostnames were the router version and the passwords were the factory default passwords and of course their wireless networks had no security. I was amazed to see this, so naturally I had to do something about it. Just what though, I’ll keep it my little secret.’, ‘For all people considering putting themselves on a wireless network, be sure to change the factory defaults. Unless of course, you would like somebody else to take control of your network. It’s not hard to do and takes very little time. If somebody else can control your network, they can see what computers are on that network. Then to get files off those computers it’s even easier. Just a word of warning.
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Dell Saga Continues
I contacted Dell again because I placed an order on March 3rd, 2004 and I cancelled that order the same day. Everything in that order was cancelled except the monitor that had already been shipped. Once I received notification of the product being delivered I noted “Return to Sender” on the package. With my handy Fedex tracking number I tracked the package to make sure it had arrived back at Dell. They have had this package for over a month now and still I have not been refunded my money. Once I called the Dell phone number I obtained from their website I had to go through a series of automated phone features, then I finally got some Indian sounding woman on the phone. After telling her my situation she put me on hold for about 5 minutes. When she came back on the phone she said it should take 7 – 10 business days to be refunded my money. For crying out loud it has already been 2 months, how much longer does it take to put my money into my account? Anyway it is companies like this that turn me off from recommending others to do business with them. I’ll keep you posted on what happens next.
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My First Xbox Does Not Want to Play Nice
My coworkers have been talking about how great Xbox is and how much fun it is to play online and since I’m still playing Mario cart on Nintendo 64, I decided it was time for an upgrade. I went out and bought an Xbox today. It was fantastic I got 3 games that came with the system, a remote control, and the Xbox itself. I brought it home and was excited to play. After fighting through all the packaging for 30 minutes I finally had my Xbox set up and ready to play, but which game would I start with? I had chosen Grand Theft Auto – Vice City It was great I was learning the game, running people over in my car, stealing a new car after I crashed one, aaaaah the fun of this game. After about 20 minutes of playing I turned the game off because I had an appointment to go to.
After my appointment I was all excited about playing again. So I raced home, came in, and powered on the game. While the game was loading there was a number 7 on the upper left hand side of the screen. I thought, “That’s odd I didn’t see that before.” Then an error message popped up saying my Xbox needed to be serviced. So I called the customer service to see if this was a common problem. They advised me to pack the game back up and take it back to the store because this game could have been damaged in shipping. I felt let down, especially after all this hype from my coworkers. I took the Xbox back to the store and exchanged it. Then I came home and spent another 30 minutes fighting through the packaging to get the Xbox out. When I connected this Xbox up I was anxious to see if this one would work too. Once I hit that power button it started loading. This Xbox works, but I only got to play this one for about 30 minutes before I went to bed. Oh well, all in a game player’s day I guess.
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Failure at Everything
I was listening to a radio station today and they were talking about a guy who jumped over Niagra Falls without a barrel or without anything. The guy ended up living, so this was a botched suicide attempt. Now think about this, this guy failed at life so bad that he felt it was better to be dead. Then when he attempted to kill himself he couldn’t even do that right. How low is that?, I say, there are too many messed up individuals in this world that if they want to kill themselves they better at least get it right. The world will be a better place for everyone.
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Janet Jackson is Welcomed on My T.V.
I’m still been hearing complaints of Janet Jackson revealing her breast on TV. during the super bowl halftime show. I’m sick of hearing complaining about this. There are too many shows on the air right now that show gays kissing, holding hands, and adopting children and nobody seems to complain about that, but as soon as Janet exposes a breast on TV. all hell breaks loose.’, ‘Only in America is showing breasts considered a bad thing. In Europe and Asia it’s on TV everywhere and nobody thinks anything of it, but in America that is considered unacceptable. Also, in America the producers are going overboard with politically correctness. For example the channel BET (Black Entertainment Television) is ok, but if there was a channel called WET (White Entertainment Television) that would be considered racist. Some shows currently showing gays that is 100% accepted are the famous “Queer eye for the straight guy?”, MTV’s Road Rules and Real World, Survivor with Richard Hatch, Rosie O’Donnell, and of course Ellen Degeneres, just to name a few.
I’m not saying I’m for anything or against it in anyway, but if you’re going to have channels and shows like these at least set some kind of standard and do it across the board. Also since when do people think it’s required to be identified by sexual origin? For example what did Rosie or Ellen gain by coming out of the closet? The point being, if you don’t want to be treated different then don’t identify yourself by sexual origin. I never hear anybody say, “Hi, I’m Suzie. I’m a heterosexual, but I’ve had homosexual experiences.” This is just a little food for thought, you can either take it or leave it. I just felt this excessive politically correctness on American Television needed to be identified and Janet can show her breasts on my TV anyday.
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Jerry Springer Rocks!
Jerry Springer should be rewarded for taking the time out of his busy day to go out to every single trailer park and find every bit of trash that he can in order for them to come onto his show and fight. Jerry must have been sitting around in his office one day thinking about who he could get on his show. Then it must have hit him, in all these trailer parks there are many people just sitting around making babies. So instead of them polluting the human gene pool he must have realized he would give them something else to do and that is coming on his show, with all baggage in tow, and duke it out. Our thumbs go up to you Jerry!
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Achieving Your Dreams
Reaching the stars may not be as hard as you think. I managed to reach my stars and it wasn’t even by the path I planned it to be. The main thing you always have to be in order to reach your goals is to remain focused. Without focus your goal will not be as clear and you may stray from your path to achieving your goal.’, ‘When I was 13 years old my dad and I used to go boogie boarding in Lake Michigan. Naturally the main time of the year the waves would get big in Lake Michigan was in the fall when the water was 50 degrees or below. I used to read boogie-boarding magazines to see how people body boarded in California and Hawaii. One main person whom I mainly read about was Mike Stewart and how he boogie boarded in Hawaii. This became my dream to go out to Hawaii and boogie board the same waves as Mike Stewart.
After I graduated high school I joined the United States Air Force. During basic training the Air Force gives everybody a choice of bases in which they want to go to. Then the Air Force will try to put you in one of the bases you choose or as close as they can to it. I put down every base I could find as close to Michigan as I could get and I put 1 overseas base in Hawaii. (Hawaii is considered an overseas base because it is not part of the continental US) Well I did not get Hawaii, but I did get a tropical island in the Pacific being Okinawa, Japan.
At first I wasn’t excited about being sent to Okinawa, but after I started to think about it more I thought that since Hawaii was in the Pacific and they get good waves, that Okinawa must get good waves too. Wrong! When I got to Okinawa and saw the ocean for the first time there were no waves. The only waves Okinawa really gets are big ones during typhoons. Anyway, I enjoyed Okinawa so much I ended up spending 6 years there, when the Air Force told me I had to move to another base and since I was enjoying Japan so much I decided I wanted to try to go to Tokyo. I waited for an assignment in Tokyo for a year and a half and I never got it. So I decided to try to put Hawaii down again. Low and behold the very next assignment cycle I got it. I was on my way to Hawaii.
I did it! I finally achieved my dream of going to Hawaii and body boarding the same waves as Mike Stewart. I body boarded at Bellows, North Shore, out west towards Wainae, and all over. I spent 3 years in Hawaii in the Air Force when I decided that I was going to separate from the Air Force. A company based out of Knoxville, Tennessee contacted me saying they had a position open in Hawaii. I applied for this position as a computer systems administrator and got the job. Now I managed to transition out of the Air Force and purchased a place to live where I am now living my dream of living in Hawaii and boogie boarding, working a an all right job, with owning my own place to live. Even though this was not the way I had imagined it I managed to achieve my dream and am enjoying every day of it, making sure I don’t take anything for granted.
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Friends is Now Over
The t.v. show Friends had its season finale tonight and it was a sad day for many of the shows followers. Friends initially started in 1994 and ran til 2004, it was a good decade for all the friends fans. Have no fear though because now we have Friends reruns to look forward to for the next 20 years. Yeah!
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Roadside Incident in Afghanistan
When one of those things you never want to happen actually happens you just hope it isn’t one of your brothers in arms. This incident happened near Bagram airfield in Afghanistan.
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Company Functions Are Not Too Exciting
Last Thursday April 29th, 2004 our office had an outing because different people from the company came to Hawaii for business. Although this was not mandatory it was highly encouraged to attend. I figured that meant you don’t have to go, but we”ll all be pissed off at you later. Since I don’t have a life I decided I would go and try to work on my nonexsistant social skills.
To give you some insite on how I resolve issues, suggest ideas, or criticize something I don’t like with others I work with, I usually do it after we’ve been drinking for a while. That is my way of dealing with sometimes uncomfortable situations. I figure if we’re all drinking and talking about it we are more relaxed and more open to suggestions. Plus everybody is more willing to bullshit, share stories, and talk smack after they have been drinking.
Now that you understand how I like to deal with these kind of situations I’ll move onto how this night went. The night started out with everybody arriving at an over crowded Chuck’s Steakhouse in Waikiki. This place didn’t have much seating, was dark, and over priced. Since for the past couple of days I didn’t have much time to do anything, but sleep on my time and nobody was talking with me. I decided to make a phone call. I kid you not, as soon as I started talking with somebody on the phone then people I worked with started trying to talk with me. Which I nicely shugged them off and identified I was on the phone to them. After I had gotten off the phone I decided to talk with the other guys I work with. During our conversations the staff of Chuck’s Steakhouse kept interrupting us so they could squeeze by.
The time had arrived for us to get to our 50 foot long table. Everybody went to sit down. I ended up sitting in the smack dab middle of the table. I must have figured I wouldn’t be noticed sitting there. The little waiters and waitresses came around asking everybody what they wanted to drink. Since I had already drank about 4 Budweisers, why change? I ordered another. Then the waiters came around telling everybody the specials, I ended up interrupting the guy because I needed another beer. The guy then left and didn’t want to come back. So I decided to call him back over to finish saying the specials. Once he completed his little speal he asked me what I wanted to order. Since I don’t like eating at these types of events I decided to maintain my liquid diet. I ordered another beer. Everybody had noticed that I didn’t want to eat and asked me, “You’re not eating”? I told them I had to watch my figure. The night went on with everybody eating while I drank my beer.
I sat next to a cool guy that I enjoy talking with because he knows the company and he tends to give me some insight and points me in the right direction. We sat there talking trying to keep our conversation private, but I notice others eyes kept peering over to see what we were talking about. Then the waitresses showed up with the bill. Since this is Hawaii and the education level is low here. The waitresses like to put everybody”s bill on just one big check. I didn’t have any cash on me so I ran downstairs to pull money out of the ATM. When I came back like everybody else had left except for a few people. It seemed as though they were all waiting for the first person to leave so they could follow. Since they didn’t know I was only going to the ATM they thought I was leaving and decided to follow.
By this time I was feeling pretty good and was willing to open up and talk with others. Since the only other person staying around with me was the Director of Operations. I decided to open up and talk with him. Prior to this event the only thing I know about this guy is that we retired from the Marine Corps as an officer and he was a private type of guy. So I decided to try to get him to open up. I started out by letting him know my position of wanting to learn from his experiences. I also identified that others find him to be a rather private person and I informed him that since he has been with the company for a while and has retired from the Marines. I feel he has a lot of experiences I could learn from. We all know I can”t really learn from my current supervisor (If you want to know more about why, read the previous article entitled, “Do unprofessional bosses make good managers/leaders?“. I also told him it would be cool to hear about some of his stories, then the Director of Operations basically told me, “What you’re saying is good, but don’t expect to learn everything about me tonight”. I understood this as me making progress. I took this as him saying he may open up with time, but for now he’ll maintain the current level. I respect that and am willing to learn from his experiences when he is ready to open up, for now I’m happy with what I have achieved.
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A Difference Between Working Overseas and Working in America
After living overseas for some years it is a shock to see how different people act in America. For example: Americans working overseas, at the end of the day overseas people would usually hang out with the people they worked with. It made an easy atmosphere for resolving work issues. Here in America once the end of the day rolls around. You should see everybody shoot their own direction, like buckshot. This means if you have work issues you better either get over them or make an appointment because people just don’t want to deal with it on their time.
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A Little Piece of Loneliness
When you go to another place or country to visit or even live for a while, the people and culture immediately begin to grow on you. Your heart begins to open regardless of the language or cultural barrier. You begin to go out and absorb as much as you can. Even though you may not always understand what people are saying, you tend to feel a comfort in the whole experience. This may go on for the duration of your time in foreign land, but then you’ll eventually have to return home.
When you’re home people get caught up in their day to day activities, but it is when that special song plays or you hear the language or that little hint that helps you remember the time you spent there. You may even begin to miss it and want to go back.
The funny thing is that no matter how passionate or how emotional you are, when you try to tell somebody about how you feel when you miss the experience you had in the strange world. They just don’t understand. Most of the time, you’ll just get a blank stare. Then when you try to explain the things you miss, the person you’re trying to make your point to usually find error or something to poke fun at. It is then you begin to feel alone for nobody else seems to understand your experience and there is nobody else you can talk to who will understand. This is the little piece of loneliness that aches inside me driving me to want to go back.
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Issues With Dell
On March 5th, 2004 I decided I had been waiting around long enough to get a new computer. The predicament I kept running into though was that every time I tried customizing a computer on Dell’s website the price would jump up drastically. So I decided to call their phone support to help me with purchasing a computer.
I spoke with a polite sales representative Morgan Owens who informed me that if I ever needed to contact her again about the order I need to call 1-800-WWW-DELL, then press 1, then her number 70510. She informed that I could also contact her via e-mail at the following address: morgan_owens@dell.com I explained to her what I was trying to do and she informed me that Dell has some great deals going on and she can be the one to really help me out. So we went through the ordering process and I had a great computer picked out for only $2,400. After I hung up the phone with her I started to get ready for work as I was thinking about what I had just purchased. Then I started getting second thoughts about the computer. For some reason I just didn’t feel confident that the computer I had just purchased was the type of computer I was looking for.
So I decided to call back to cancel my order. I tried reaching Morgan, but her phone was busy so I had to wait to get another representative. Once I reached the new sales rep. I told her the situation and how I would like to cancel the order. So she walked me through the process of canceling this order, but she informed me the monitor had already been shipped. I told her that it was only 5 minutes since I had placed the order and she told me that they work real fast. This made me begin to laugh. This nice representative informed me that if I don’t want the monitor to just don’t accept it once it arrive to “return to sender” and once Dell received it back my money will be deposited into my account.
Less than a couple weeks later I had received a notification that I had a package. So I went to FedEx to tell them to return the product to the sender. FedEx assured me it would be sent back to Dell.
This is now April 24th, 2004 and I still do not have the money for this monitor back in my account. From this impression, Dell is telling me they are happy to take your money, but they don’t want to give it back. Yesterday I decided to call Dell back and try to figure out what’s going on. This new representative informed me she would have to submit some paperwork for me to get my money back and they still haven’t received the monitor. I’m getting the feeling that this monitor is sitting in Dell’s warehouse somewhere and they haven’t re-inventoried it or something, either way this is truly becoming unacceptable customer service.
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American T.V. Channels Suck
I was flipping through channels the other day and realized MTV really sucks. I thought the point of MTV was to play music. Hence the Music Television name. Anyway, MTV would be better off changing their name to “stupid programming and utterly retarded game shows?”.
I base this opinion from numerous things. For example what the hell does “Pimp my ride” have anything to do with music? Although it sometimes is funny, what does Viva la Bam have to do with music? The list can go on and on, but the point being if you’re going to say you are for music you should at least play some.
Don’t worry though, MTV is not the only channel on TV that sucks. VH1 joins the channel ban list. They used to be an acceptable alternative to MTV, but they recently have become boring to. Although some of the programming for VH1 actually has to deal with music or artists for example “I love the 80’s.” Even though it’s not the 80’s anymore this still has some credibility for at least going over artists and songs from the 80’s.
A few channels that actually support their name are the National Geographic channel, History channel, and the Discovery channel. These channels have great programming that uphold their ideals and their name.
The point I’m trying to get at is if you’re going to call yourself something you should at least stick to it and not be a rating whore. It’s because of too many rating whores out there that make TV crappy for you and me.