Because I'm an INTJ

I hate run-on sentences.

I hate Comic Sans serif

I hate nattering debate on minutae when I CAME UP WITH A SOLUTION
FIFTEEN MINUTES AGO and it's a good one.

I hate that when the nattering goes on another hour or so, that I can't
actually kill you with my mind.

/"You should have listened to me" will be on my tombstone

27-07-07_0739.jpg

27-07-07_0739.jpg
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

Yeah, something is amiss here. (these sculptures belong to an optus ad campaign )

27-07-07_0738.jpg

27-07-07_0738.jpg
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

Hmm that wasnt there yesterday ...

Bacon Krispy Kreme burger

Bacon Krispy Kreme burger
Originally uploaded by satanslaundromat.

I'd be tempted to try this... just to see if I survive

(Like most burgers, without the bun it's low carb!)

12-07-07_0001.jpg

12-07-07_0001.jpg
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

Macspotting

Things I hate about office life #1

 

…Salescritters playing barista at 9:00am, coffee machine peak time.

 

You don’t need your cappuccino perfectly frothed, okay?  I know you and your five cubemates in the queue behind you don’t need to do any actual work, but some of us do.

 

 

15-06-07_0650.jpg

15-06-07_0650.jpg
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

3 degrees!

11-06-07_2349.jpg

11-06-07_2349.jpg
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

Plz can it be wwdc time now?

TEST

The new command center

The new command center
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

I finally settled on a new desk. It's really very different from what I *thought* I wanted, which was more of an Imposing Desk of The Nerd (+2 Int, +2 Spirit). I stumbled upon this one online literally the day before we went to the cheerfully evil, wallet draining flatpack store.

I have a weakness for clever, multipurpose objects. I was musing over solving the space problem in the 'computer room' by wedging a desk into the wardrobe. I also wanted to buy a chest of drawers. I'd decided that all those homes on Apartment Therapy *really* achieved their zen unclutteredness by less furniture, not more, and an abundance of storage space for their stray widgets and technocrap.

This desk is a modern version of the classic secretary desk, and the second monitor sits on top pretending to be a tv. I can control my laptop via my bluetooth kb and mouse.

Emo without a cause

I'm sort of depressed. Which is weird - there's no reason for it. Nevertheless, the depression trolls that lurk under the metaphoric bridge of my concious mind (be nice, it's 6am) are alert, and jumping on any thought ambling across, that seems like it might lead somewhere miserable.
It's not a matter of just trying to focus somewhere else - really, I'm working very hard to distract myself.
"Well... lets see what's on TV. Hmm ET! Trashy. Has potential.
Brittney Spears! Geez, she looks depressed. And bald. With two mini K-Feds. Sucks to be her."
And then I'm thoughtfully reminded that Brittney is stupidly, stupidly rich and could jet off anywhere at a moment's notice. Its not as if I cared ten seconds ago, but right now this situation seems terribly unfair.

I have a lot of things going right at present. Why the hell do I keep trying to sabotage myself?

Let the record play

Today's Earworm- "Keep your hands off my girl" - Good Charlotte

I didn't load up enough music on my iPod, it's a slightly emo selection and I don't feel emo at all now. Just strange. Disjointed. It's funereal. I'd made some predictions about the future that turned out to be dead wrong. In a good way, but still strange, and the new data means my worldview gets recompiled. (I had another post where I elaborated, but that sort of thing is just begging for the KarmaHammer).

On a personal level things have been pretty good of late... I *know* saying that is asking for trouble, but here we are.

As for the webcomic... working on that, but the next time I natter about that will be when I've posted something.

“You don’t want your phone to be an open platform,”

Bullshit.

Yes, yes you do.

“You need it to work when you need it to work. Cingular doesn’t want to see their West Coast network go down because some application messed up.”

Because phone networks are a series of tubes . And if some joker running Bittorrent on his iPhone clogs up those tubes....

Ahh this isn't even worth mocking. If I can't run 3rd party apps, I don't need an iPhone. It's not worth the asking price... it would need t be a lot cheaper, if nothing else.

Good thing Apple dropped the 'Computer' from their name. Wouldn't want to have mistaken the iPhone for a computer.

Geez, *thanks* Apple

So *now* where are my iPod dollars going? My 3G iPod is in pieces, my Palm ... well, it's a Palm.... and my Nokia going to need a new battery soon.

Don't you want my money?

*Whimpers*

The night before Stevenote

I'm a pretty recent switcher. I'm Mac-whipped, my 3G iPod is dead and my mobile phone battery is developing CBF syndrome. I've been tracking the iPhone rumors. But the pre-Stevenote buzz is much crazier than it seemed to be last year. We've moved from the barest whiff of an iPhone rumour to a 'mobile computing device that's the first of its kind' (Noooooooo, John Markoff never exaggerates) . Ending in this sort of scenario.

How do you manage expectations before an event like this, with a massive, distributed rumor mill running on the barest whiff of objective evidence? Do you try to scale back your expectations? Probably not, because it feels inherently disapointing, and human nature is to get worked up over silly things. Remove the pomp and ceremony and gossip from life, and things are pretty damn dull.

No, the only way to deal with likely disapointment is to blow your expectations out to LUDICROUS levels. Push it so far it's actually funny. It's like imagining that skeevy asshole ex or old boss (the one who used to 'jingle the change in his pocket' far more than was comfortable) is not only doing better than you, they're the silent third partner at Google, they have a lovely submissive daytime soap star wife, North Shore real estate, and a model they are also banging (either gender) while on 'business' in Dubai.
So using this mental judo on yourself, it's not just an iPhone, it's a Seti node that allows you to speak to advanced civilsations, Enter The Matrix (thanks to Google), it shoots video at HD at 600 frames per second, a wireless Skype phone that somehow isn't a COMPLETELY RETARDED idea, and it does all *that* with a completely intuitive interface that scrolls like butter.

When you're done sniggering at that, you remind yourself that yes, it's just a trade show keynote, and actually, the Nanophone you actually get is kind of nice (though not really for you).

Happy New Bear!

Happy New Bear!
Originally uploaded by MidBlueMac.

A spontaneous Druid bear dance on the bridge at Auberdine. No, I don't have a good explanation for this.

Traditional Xmas Pine Smoke

Bushfire Season in Melborg. The sun hangs red in the sky, the air is smoky and muggy, there's an orange light cast over everything, and my hair reeks of wood smoke.

The heat seems to be affecting my ability to sleep through the day too. Hoping that isn't really the case.
I might need to up the 'B' vitamins because I've spent serious sleep time lately worrying about things that proved to be of no consequence. I spent some time at the doc's last week, but fortunately only my credit card was unhealthy. Having bumped the one thing off the list that could potentially have been worth worrying about, I moved on to 'did I get people presents they wanted'? 'Did I send the boxes to the right addresses'? (Possible as I didn't *triple check* the shipping labels. I'll take photos next time.)
Now that I've confirmed *that* stuff is okay (the parcels arrived via rocket camel) I've moved on to really inconsequential stuff, the day to day paranoias. I forget that I live and work with fairly reasonable people, and I start taking all kinds of things the wrong way, and start extrapolating wild alternate realities where Everything Goes Wrong and I Can Do Nothing Right. For example, the english language and I usually have a pretty good relationship, but there will be this horrible lurking fear that what I though was concise and well-written, is crappy and incomprehensible, and that I'm just lucky nobody's realized it yet. (With the corrollary that in fact, nobody at work really reads what I write. Hmph).

It's the weekend tomorrow, though. All I have to do is finish this week and it's off to Virtual Xmas (working on the 25th), Wii sports and WarCrack.

So, I'm not tone deaf

Go figure. I always assumed I had tin ears. I can't hear the mosquito ring tone, I assumed my pitch perception was just as crappy.
FWIW, it doesn't seem to be an Internet Inflated Test (See : any IQ test on the internet). Plenty of people scored lower than I did.
It's not a *useful* skill, but it was a surprise.

DeadPod

My MacBook Pro is back, with a fresh new logic board. If Temperature monitor isn't lying to me, the main CPU temperature diode sits at about 57 degrees C in normal use. The whine is pretty much gone, I hear it extremely faintly on AC sometimes.

So that meant it was time for my iPod to sign off. I can't blame the battery upgrade for this. There was some hard drive clicking and abrupt disconnecting from my computer that I'd actually put down to the battery. So when I replaced the battery, I'd expected my iPod to just behave and not unmount itself.
It started unmounting itself after a few seconds today, and I heard the iPod hdd frantically clicking. I pulled the iPod open again and checked the IDE connector and battery connectors, but to no avail. I guess using the iPod for only a couple of hours a day (all the battery would hold) had held back its demise, but since I'd started USING it again it couldn't keep up. The hard drive controller is toast. It's an ex-Pod.

As an interim measure I've bought an iPod shuffle. If I'd realised I was getting *one* playlist I might have sprung for a Nano. It's charging though, and I look forward to using it.
One reason I didn't get a Nano was that the Nano gets the best accessories, and my stop-gap solution plus add-ons would really quickly start heading for the full price of a 5.5 Video iPod anyway. I'm not fussed on the Video iPods, the video functionality feels a bit hacky. I was waiting for the 6G, that hasn't changed.

Crazzy Go Nuts on Graveyard Shift

I've been without my laptop since Wednesday. Doesn't feel like the two full days it has been - these shifts are a blessing in disguise I guess.
*Twitch* *twitch*