The video computer is done. I won’t put it through the paces until tomorrow. We installed that fancy European OS [Operating System] on it, and it blows away WinXP. Mind you, XP is 3.5GB and this version is 14.7GB. That made for a lot of cloning and swapping of hard drives. Some may find it odd that my rental computers have very small drives, as in 8GB to 20GB, but that is intentional. I don’t want anybody downloading massive files or any files. So far this policy has resulted in no complaints and far fewer software problems. This made for a hectic day at the shop. One student brought me in a Sirius satellite radio system. It is a couple of years old, but still brand new in the box. I suppose these things are worth it to some people whereas I really don’t listen to much radio at home. (It is a home model, not for a car.) It is time I learned how those things work, anyway. Like most contemporary products, I smell some trick pricing or some glitch nobody warns you about. I heard you pay a fixed amount, but I’ve also heard anything from $20 a month to $20 a year. Standby on that one.
Nobody can say if it’s the advertising or the students back in school, but there are many new faces at the rental units. It amazes me the heavy chances these kids can take, like getting a four-year course in graphic design. The system seems to be pumping these graduates out by the zillions without any regard to their chances of getting a good job. How often in your life have you hired a graphics design artist?
The cooler enjoyable weather is arriving, along with the usual two weeks of rain drizzle while the season’s change. I also did a callout to Jack, this is the guy who tests the winning race horses for steroids. He had a burnout out power supply. And I have somehow managed to lose three important boot disks, all of which are a hassle to replace. Alzheimers? Absent-minded? Or just ordinary too pooped to whoop.
I confess I have had no time to practice or learn new music. That will change when I get the computer set up but it also means I likely will not go jam with Arnel tomorrow. I also finally bought a replacement digital camera ($25) so I don’t have to take a half hour using JP’s old computer every time I have to download. This camera will have a hard time living up to the Argus, but they don’t make the Argus any more.
My karaoke research has led to numerous web pages that have many complaints about the file formats and the way running a show becomes needlessly busy up on stage because of bad formats. These MP3+G files are the way to go, but I can’t find any examples. That is not strictly true, I’ve found some zipped files, but forget that. These would have to be unzipped which takes precious time. Of course, the Internet doesn’t help because searches won’t recognize the “+” symbol, or any punctuation. You get back millions of replies but no results.
So I went up to the Barn on Stirling. PopSci does it again. Those repetitious articles, this time about a flying car. They call it a driving plane, how brilliant. Why do these designers persist? Until strict regulation makes it impossible for certain types to get a license, the last thing we need is soccer moms fighting for landing spaces at the Wal*Mart. Oh, and there is yet another jet pack in this month’s issue. This one uses an ordinary gasoline engine and flies for several minutes, making it a vast improvement over the James Bond rig. They cost $100,000 each. I’ll stick with my bicycle for now. That’s another thing we don’t need overhead, drunks in jet packs.
Nope, I don’t mention it much, but I am following the stock market bailout thing. Personally, I think they should let it collapse. The party is over. The market was like real estate, it was fueled by speculation instead of underlying value. Like houses, the middle-class deluded themselves that prices were rising while they were all buying from each other. Now let’s see what happens when they try selling to each other. Like, who else are they gonna sell to?
