My Computer Has Lupus

I have reached the point of no return with my computer. I turned it on yesterday morning...and continued trying to turn it on for the next half an hour, at which point I had to give up and go to work. I tried some more yesterday afternoon and finally got it to start, but with entirely unsatisfactory results. The same thing has been happening today.

Here is the problem. When I turn on my computer, it does all the pre-flight checks and asks me for my password. Then, as it boots up, I get the following error message:

There is a problem with your display settings. The adapter type is incorrect, or the current settings do not work with your hardware.

In other words, my hardware and my software seem to be mutually allergic to one another. Wonderful.

When faced with this message, there were two options given: "OK" or "Cancel". Kind of reminds me of the old "Abort, Retry, Ignore?" bit I got from Bill all those years ago. Anyway, I chose "OK". That didn't work. It brought up another error message that ran on for about half a page, none of which was any help at all. Then it tried to restart my computer, which just ended up hanging the system in the middle of the process. I had to do a hard reboot, which led to the blue ScanDisk screen, followed by - you guessed it - entering my password and getting "There is a problem with your display settings...." Lather, rinse, repeat.

So I chose "Cancel" one time. That path was only slightly less useless. It actually allowed me to log on to my machine, after lecturing me about display settings and hardware some more. But it allowed me to go into the right-click "Settings" menu. I changed the settings back to what they had been before all of this started. Then it told me I needed to restart my computer. That led to freezing, followed by hard reboot, ScanDisk, and "There is a problem with your display settings...."

<hulk> Must. Control. Rage. </hulk>

The good news is that I finally found a display setting that works. The bad news is that it's 640 by 480 pixels. And 16 colors. Just in time to use the DSL/broadband router and cabling I installed just two days ago, for which I paid around $65.

So that's it. I'm in the process of backing up and recording anything worth saving, and then I'm going to cut my losses, wipe the hard drive, and start all over again.

I hope to be back online again soon. Until then, kindly ignore any enraged, obscenity-laden yelling you may hear coming from the direction of Salt Lake City.

Trolls

For the last several weeks, the U of U student paper, The Daily Utah Chronicle has been running a lot of nasty things in their opinion page. Most of it stems from the writings of two authors (if that's the right word). One author, let's call him "G", is a man who left the LDS Church and can't find enough bad things to say about it on the way out. The other, "K", is a classic right-wing nutjob, somewhere on the political spectrum between Ted Nugent and Attila the Hun. From their collected rants, much shouting, name-calling, and strife have ensued..for the last several weeks, as I said above.

So I wrote in about the situation. My letter was published in Friday's edition of the Chrony. Here it is, for your consideration.

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Stop feeding the trolls
Published: Friday, October 28, 2005

Editor:

As a graduating senior, I feel it is both my place and my right to give a little advice to those of you who are still going to be here for a while. So I'm going to share with you some of the best advice I've ever received: "You don't have to attend every argument you're invited to."

Over the past few weeks, The Chronicle's Opinion Page has seen a large number of rants, insults and inflammatory comments, many of which were written by two particular authors, whom I shall leave unnamed. Their letters typically generate anger, arguments, counter-rants, rebuttals, re-rebuttals and so on, ad infinitum.

These days, we're at the point that almost all we see in the Opinion Page is written by or about these two authors. The situation is so bad that there are now calls for The Chronicle to stop publishing such articles. But The Chrony's journalistic integrity aside, there's an easier solution.

Stop giving the authors what they want. Why do these two gentlemen keep writing these letters? It's not hard to figure out: because of the response they generate. They love seeing how many people they can get to write in saying, "Author X is a genius" or "Author Y is a jerk" (or worse). They get a kick out of the controversy. It makes them feel important. When people write in to comment on what they write, it makes them feel as though they know something the rest of us don't.

Well, loyal readers, you have the ability to put a stop to it. And it's easy to do-just stop responding to their grandstanding. Stop writing in to say how misguided or how brilliant these two authors are. Stop the arguments by deciding to stop arguing. If people stop responding to these provocative opinions, the authors will eventually become bored and move on to something more important in their lives.

I have just one final comment. While I know that the phrase I'm about to use is typically reserved for the Internet, I think it has good real-world application here as well: Stop feeding the trolls.

Michael Scott Martin

Senior, Chemistry

Listen Up, You Primitive Screwheads!

Gimme some sugar baby.


Which B-Movie Bad@ss Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

I was really hoping for this one.

Dumbsmack of the Day

I train a new group of recruits each week at work. Each class has between three and ten newbies, of which 90% or more are hired each time. The reason we have training so often is that we have a lot of turnover. On average, we lose half of each training class within six weeks of their hire date—primarily due to violations of our attendance policy, but occasionally for other reasons like school conflicts or other jobs.

But today's employee departure was truly unique. It was a girl I hired last week who hadn't actually worked yet. She was scheduled to come in tonight for our 6:00 pm shift, but she never showed up. When we called her, she said she needed to quit.

Her explanation: She couldn't keep the job because she'd lose her welfare.

Whatever. If that's the way things work in your mind, then I'm sorry. You're too stupid to work here.

Bite Me

You scored as Angel. Yep you are the cute dark and oh so mysterious one. It takes people awhile before they know you. You have a scary past that you try to make amends for. Good luck with that! Louis 58% Blade 58% Angel 58% Dracula 58% Lestat 50% Deacon Frost 50% Armand 42% Spike 42% Marius 42% Akasha 25% Who's your Vampire personality? created with QuizFarm.com

Heh. It seems I'm only moderately scary.

Format C:

My computer is really ticking me off. Even after removing the recent virus from my Frankenstein's Monster of a machine, the thing still isn't running up to spec. It's slow, it hesitates or freezes sometimes, and it almost never shuts down properly. I've run every diagnostic of which I can think, and it's still twitchy.

So I've pretty much decided that I'm going to have to wipe the hard drive and start all over.

That's not going to happen anytime soon, mind you. There's way too much stuff going on between now and December 16th (the day of my last final exam). So I'll start saving important and/or hard-to-recreate documents either to Zip disks, CDs, or my GMail account. I can do that a little at a time, and things should be fine.

There's one real question going through my mind about all of this. Once I've reformatted, do I go ahead and reinstall Windoze 98 SE, or should I make the leap to Linux? Am I ready for that big a step? I've already ditched MS Office, Word Pad, Outlook Express, and Internet Exploder. But am I really ready to go completely Micro$oft-free?

I guess it's not a decision I need to make right now.
::opens chemistry textbook::

Two-Two Twain

Part I: Friday's Feast
Friday's Feast, 21 October 2005.

Appetizer Do you button shirts top-to-bottom or bottom-to-top?
Both, actually. I button the bottom button first to make sure it lines up. Then I start from the second-to-top button and work my way down. I only button the top button when I'm ready to put on my tie.

Soup What is your favorite sandwich?
Uh, me between a mattress and a quilt?

Salad What was a family project you helped work on as a child?
The garden. We had a huge garden every year, and I was involved in everything from dunging to planting to weeding to harvesting to canning. Good tomatoes, though.

Main Course When have you acted phony?
You mean other than in high school drama productions? (Okay, so everything in high school was a drama production.)
Probably when I have to pretend to be interested in the inane drivel that so many people around me feel the need to share. Politeness and that sort of thing, you know.

Dessert Do you write letters or postcards? If so, to whom?
Almost all of my correspondence these days is electronic, but I'll still drop the occasional letter or postcard to a friend or family member.

--

Part II: Top Five on Friday
Top Five on Friday from The Music Memoirs:

Top 5 bands/artists that you can't get enough of and a song and/or album by each that you'd recommend to your fellow meme-ers.
I'm not really fixated that much on any group or artist, so let me just introduce a few lesser-known bands worth knowing:

» Crenshaw, Upside Down
Recorded in fabulous Alterna-Soul!

» Cross Canadian Ragweed, Soul Gravy
Rock sounds + country sensibilities = kick-butt music.

» Girls From Mars, Planet Swing
A swinging trio reminiscent of the Andrews Sisters.

» Rocket Scientists, Oblivion Days
One of my favorite neo-progressive (whatever that means) groups, featuring Beatle-esque vocals and Wakemanian keyboards.

» Singularity, Between Sunlight and Shadow
Another neo-prog favorite, and a product of Colorado to boot.

Regular readers will probably recognize all of these groups by name, if not the actual music. But if you don't recognize the music, what's wrong with you? Go out and get some!

Somehow Familiar

In my scripture reading this morning, I came across several verses quoted from Isaiah. As I understand it, they are not only a reflection of the state of things in his time, but a prophecy of a time and place far in Isaiah’s future. They sounded eerily familiar:

Therefore, O Lord, thou hast forsaken thy people, the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the east, and hearken unto soothsayers like the Philistines, and they please themselves in the children of strangers.
Their land also is full of silver and gold, neither is there any end of their treasures; their land is also full of horses, neither is there any end of their chariots.
Their land is also full of idols; they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made.
And the mean man boweth not down, and the great man humbleth himself not, therefore, forgive him not. (2 Nephi 12:6-9)

Wait, wait, I know this one....

Ridin' the Storm Out

At least there was someone in New Orleans that wasn't caught with their pants down when Hurricane Katrina hit:

Most of the zoo's residents and a dozen or so key staff members stayed put for Katrina. The caretakers hunkered down in the reptile house, a building designed to withstand a hurricane and serve as a shelter. Food for animals and humans alike had been stockpiled.

"We have been planning for this for years," zoo spokeswoman Sarah Burnette said, adding that Audubon had picked up survival tips from the Miami zoo after Hurricane Andrew.

(Elephants Help Clean Up New Orleans Zoo, Yahoo News, 15 October 2005)

Maybe more of Louisiana's loud-mouthed elected officials ought to spend more time at the zoo....

Two For The Show

Part I: Friday's Feast
Friday's Feast, 13 October 2005.

Appetizer Who is someone you would consider to be a calm person?
My brother Sam is very calm and level-headed.

Soup What was your last "gut feeling" about? Were you right?
The last 'gut feeling' I really remember was to ask Nancy for her phone number. So far, so good.

Salad List 3 words that you really don't like how they sound.
1. The 'F' word
2. ditto
3. ditto
I hear people use it so often that I figure it's good for all three.

Main Course What kind of shampoo and conditioner do you use?
Let me check. Hold please... ::elevator music:: ...Suave 2-in-1 Cleansing Care Shampoo + Conditioner.

Dessert If you found out that you definitely do have a guardian angel, what would you name it?
A guardian angel? You think one is enough to keep me out of trouble? More like two or three, methinks. And I'm sure they already have their own names.

--

Part II: Top Five on Friday
Top Five on Friday from The Music Memoirs:

Top 5 "Crying" Songs (Interpret as you wish...)

» Don't Cry by Asia
» Angel Don't Cry by Toto
» Cry by Faith Hill
» Everytime You Cry by The Outfield
» Dead End Kidz Don't Cry by Diesel 120

Family First

Reading the most recent post on Derek's Blog, The Simple Life, drove home the importance of a quote in the month's LDS First Presidency message:

"Whatever the era, whatever the times, one thing will never change: Fathers and mothers, if you have children, they must come first. You must read to your children and you must hug your children and you must love your children. Your success as a family, our success as a society, depends not on what happens in the White House but on what happens inside your house." -Barbara Bush

My praise goes out to all those who make sacrifices of time, comforts, and prestige in order to spend time with their children. I hope to be that kind of parent one day.

Nothin' Better To Do on a Friday Night

Part I: Friday's Feast
Friday's Feast, 7 October 2005.

Appetizer Name 3 qualities that are important to you in friendship.
Honesty. Loyalty. Understanding.

Soup If you could dream about anything tonight, what would the subject matter be?
Flying through space and seeing all the wonders of the universe... attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, C-beams glittering in the dark near the Tannhauser gate, that sort of thing.

Salad Do you usually make an effort to personally thank people who do favors for you?
I try to. It takes me a while to render thanks properly, sometimes.

Main Course If you had to go out of town for an extended period of time, who would you trust to take care of your home and belongings?
My roommate James is a trustworthy fellow. I'd feel comfortable leaving things in his care.

Dessert How do you react to practical jokes when they're played on you?
It depends on how good they are. A truly skillful prank will leave me filled with admiration, and maybe even envy. Mundane practical jokes usually annoy me. And stupid, inane, "flaming bag of dog poo on the porch" style tricks just make me want to show the perpetrator what a real practical joke looks like. Bwahahahaha!


Part II: Top Five on Friday
Top Five on Friday from The Music Memoirs:

Top 5 Silly Song Titles

Everything Right Is Wrong Again by They Might Be Giants (You knew they had to be in here, didn't you?)
The Weather Is Here, I Wish You Were Beautiful by Jimmy Buffett
The Mystical Potato Head Groove Thing by Joe Satriani
Locomotive Breath by Jethro Tull
Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana

And if you're feeling frisky, a bonus: Top 5 Silly Album Titles
"Poodle Hat" by 'Weird Al' Yankovic (Once again, you knew he had to be in here.)
"Never Mind the Bollocks Here's the Sex Pistols" by The Sex Pistols
"Lounge Against the Machine" by Richard Cheese
"Tormato" by Yes
And my very favorite of all time:
"You Can Tune A Piano But You Can't Tuna Fish" by REO Speedwagon

Swimming In This Ocean Of Words

I've joined the enemy. Either that, or I've joined everyone else in the 21st century. It depends on how you look at it, I guess.

I got a cell phone yesterday.

I'm not a big fan of cell phones. I think too many people use them too much and in dangerous situations. It bugs the heck out of me when someone's phone rings in the middle of class—a situation that I'm sure will only escalate when I start teaching. We've had to ban cell phones at work because too many of our interviewers weren't paying attention to their job. And people who drive with cell phones? Don't even get me started.

I also have some personal baggage where cell phones are concerned. I used to sell (or cell?) them, back when I worked for Monolithic Electronics Chain, Inc. And I used to own one. It was an analog Motorola flip phone with 45 anytime minutes for $30 monthly. And I frequently went over the allotted minutes, mostly because someone I wasn't really dating at the time kept wanting to call me while I was driving to and from work. My fault for answering, I know. But there it is. Still....

The idea for getting me a cell phone came about a few weeks ago, when Mom was in town for Aunt Chris' 90th birthday party. She had brought an old cell phone with her that she offered to me. The way I saw it, I didn't really need a cell phone. But I could see—reluctantly, mind you—the advantages of having one on some occasions. So we called her provider to set up basic service. Based on my projected usage, we figured prepaid was probably the way to go. However, they wouldn't set up a new plan of any kind because the phone was too old. Specifically, it didn't have that new chip that allows the phone to be tracked by GPS in an emergency. Stupid antiquated two-year-old phone.

So I still had the phone, if not a service plan. I did some checking online and found what I thought would be the best prepaid package. (Perhaps not coincidentally, it was with the same carrier than Nancy has.) So I went into the closest store yesterday to get things set up. As before, they told me they couldn't set up service on that phone, but for a different reason. It didn't have the memory card that all phones on their network need to have. So I faced the fact that a new phone was in order.

The gent at the counter showed me the various plans available, including the prepaid ones. And the more I looked at the numbers—minutes, rate plans, and the cost of the new phone—the less sense a prepaid plan made. So I ended up going with the basic monthly plan: 450 daytime minutes, 5000 night and weekend minutes, no roaming charges, free long distance, and free calls to anyone on the same network. Not a bad deal, I have to say.

I got to use my phone in earnest on the way home from Ogden last night. I called Nancy after leaving the weekly meeting of the OGC. She was in the middle of something but told me she'd call back. And she did. My phone rang as the 70 bus passed Willey Ford in Bountiful. We talked until I got off TRAX at the Central Pointe station. The reception and sound quality were excellent, much better than my previous experience with cell phones would have led me to predict.

I've kept a land line for the past few years because I get free dial-up access with my tuition. But that's coming to an end soon. My roommate has DSL (or Broadband, I don't really know which) set up for his use, and anyone else's who wants to share the cost. I chatted with him about that last night, and with three of us using it, the cost is about half of what it would cost to maintain the land line. So as soon as we can work out the details, I'm going to cut the cord and go completely wireless.

May heaven have mercy on my soul.

--
Yes, the title of this post is a reference—a song reference, specifically. If it doesn't ring a bell, listen to "Lightning Strikes" on the 1999 Yes album The Ladder. Better yet, listen to the whole album. Good stuff.

Money—It's a Gas

I did something today that I think probably increased the value of my vehicle substantially. I filled the gas tank. Laugh if you will. But if you consider the age and condition of my car, along with the amount of gas necessary to fill the tank, I think you'll agree with me.

I decided to start keeping track of when I fill the car, how much it takes, and how far I've gone in between. Since the Dreadnought was last filled, I've gone 453 miles and put in 30.9 gallons of gas. That works out to 14.7 miles per gallon. Ouch.

To look at it another way, I last filled it on September 16th. That was 19 days ago, which works out to 1.63 gallons per day. Again, ouch. Of course, that tank also included two trips to Provo and back. I expect that my usual daily usage is quite a bit less. We'll see the next time I fill up.

You know what really amazes me? I take public transportation to work and school five days a week—six, if I happen to be working Saturdays. I've taken to riding the bus to Ogden rather than driving. I've even cut down on driving side trips. And I still can't seem to keep gas in that beast. Good thing I'm not delivering pizzas!

In addition to filling up, I had to buy a gas cap today. On my way home from Nancy's house one evening, I realized that the needle was dancing perilously close to Empty. So I pulled into the first station I found. I opened the gas door, took off the cap, and put in the nozzle. Then I put my debit card into the reader, only to find that the pumps were turned off. So I put my card away and put the nozzle back. The next morning when I went to get something out of the car, I saw that the gas door was still open, and the gas cap was gone. Oops.

Hydrogen-powered cars seem to be getting a lot of press these days. I wish that were as good an option as it sounds like. There are two big problems, though. First, current methods of storing hydrogen can be very risky. Hydrogen burns as well as it does for a reason! Second, hydrogen provides essentially no improvement, at least environmentally, over gasoline. Let me explain, if I may.

Hydrogen is manufactured by two main industrial processes. The first way of making hydrogen is by the steam reforming process, which involves using fossil fuels. Propane, for example:

C₃H₈ + 3 H₂O (900º, catalyst) -> 3 CO + 7 H₂

Obviously, getting hydrogen from fossil fuels really doesn't do anything to solve the problem. The second method is by the Water-gas and Water-gas Shift Reactions:

WG: C + H₂O -> CO + H₂
WGS: CO + H₂O -> H₂ + CO₂

The problem here is with the products. In addition to hydrogen, these reactions produce carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. (So does steam reforming, come to think of it.) In other words, we end up with greenhouse gas emissions, just like with gasoline.

::sigh:: Maybe I'll buy a horse.

On the Horizon

Today was chemistry day. I had discussion sections for all three of my classes. It started at 7:30 with Quantum Mechanics. The TA told us what he thought we ought to know for next Wednesday's exam. The professor did the same in class yesterday, and they seem to be on the same page. Good. I'll spend the next few days (re-)reading the material and trying to get a better grasp on it. But I think I'll be okay.

Next was Inorganic. We talked a little about bonding and structures for the Group III elements. We've got a quiz next week in discussion section about Groups IV to VI. We're also probably having an exam the week after that over everything from the Alkali Metals to the Noble Gases—in other words, pretty much everything except Hydrogen.

Then came Thermodynamics. We're having an exam next Wednesday in this class too—right after the QM exam. My skull hurts already. Seriously, though, it shouldn't be too bad. We went over some stuff for the exam today, then had a short quiz. Gregg Easterbrook once said, "Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything." That was the theme of today's quiz. The calculations weren't too difficult, but there was a lot of unit conversion to do. That's not unusual in chemistry; I had a professor once who had us convert velocities from meters per second to furlongs per fortnight. If you're interested, the conversion factor is ×6048.

But the best part came between QM and Inorganic, when I spent some time with my advisor. We reviewed my DARS report to make sure I was on the right track for graduation in December. All I have to do is pass my classes for this semester and pass the Senior Comprehensive Exams next month. I was a little concerned about the comps, because I wasn't really sure what was involved.

Now I'm feeling more secure. The comps are a series of four two-hour exams, each of which consists of about 50-75 multiple choice questions. The tests are standardized, and the results are compared against national averages. Then the results of the four tests are averaged for a final score. This is good news. I've always been pretty good at standardized tests. Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen.

I can see the end. It's hard to believe, after so many years, but I can see the end. There is no formal ceremony for December graduation, but I will be done. My advisor told me I could come back and do the walk in May if I wanted to. Will I? Unless my situation at the time prevents it, I'll turn to Gretchen Wilson for my answer: Hell yeah!

And there will be a celebration of some sort in December, believe you me.

You Don't Have To Shout

In August of this year, LDS Church President Gordon B. Hinckley issued the following challenge:

"I offer a challenge to members of the Church throughout the world and to our friends everywhere to read or reread the Book of Mormon. If you will read a bit more than one and one-half chapters a day, you will be able to finish the book before the end of this year....Without reservation I promise you that if each of you will observe this simple program, regardless of how many times you previously may have read the Book of Mormon, there will come into your lives and into your homes an added measure of the Spirit of the Lord, a strengthened resolution to walk in obedience to His commandments, and a stronger testimony of the living reality of the Son of God."

I'll admit that I didn't give it much thought at the time. I've got fifteen credit hours' worth of chemistry to learn by the end of the year. When am I going to find time to do that kind of additional reading?

Well, we were reminded of this challenge in General Conference this weekend. Not just once, and not just twice. Not even three times. The speakers mentioned the challenge seven different times.

And one of them even said that if you hadn't started yet, there was still time. It wasn't too late.

Okay, I get it.