Install or die...

What do people and books have in common?
When they are opened they are red (read)……
(Clive Barker)

I am sitting here watching Repo the Genetic Opera, feeling like crap, suffering from the lingering effects of a devastating migraine headache;as well as being victimized and classified as collateral damage, by whatever gastronomic apocalypse is taking place deep in the bowels of my dog Bodhi. I don’t call him stinky dog for his attitude. Migraines and dog farts don’t mix, so to distract myself, I felt I just had to share my latest computer induced aneurysm with you.

I have spent the last few days working on my Eeepc 1000H. It’s been a saga of great annoyance and perdition that could have been avoided if I had just been smart enough to follow the advice Vizzini gave the Spaniard and started at the beginning. All good techs know that it’s generally a user error that causes problems. Rarely is the problem ever the hardware, except of course when it’s a hardware issue or the tech just has his head in an awkward and painful place.

Our saga begins with a BSoD crash after I had set the tiny infernal machine to dual boot Ubuntu and XP. The little silicon sybarite started to crash on a semi regular basis. My assumption was that something had glitched during the partitioning process as I had not wiped the machine and started fresh. I let the auto installer for Ubuntu do the work . I said to myself “Self, this is an easy fix” (I know it’s trite but I was entertaining myself and I derive no small pleasure from that chestnut). I got out the recovery disk that ships with the wee beastie, hooked up the external DVD drive, rebooted to the disk, started the recovery, and was on my way to functionality when the powers of evil that inhabit all motherboards and occasionally summer in the configuration gui’s of Symantec products, stretched out their hoary tentacles and carved out their flaming message in eleven point high times new roman on to my LCD . “Recovery Image Corrupt press F1 to restart”. I was perturbed to say the least.

After a bit of theorization and postulation as to the state of the quality control officers parents at the time of the QCO’s conception, I decided to implement the three R’s of computer repair: Re-format, Re-install, and Re-joice. I dug up a copy of XP and got as far as Re-inst…… It kept crashing during the reinstall. After several attempts with multiple copies of XP from various and suspect sources I decided I must be unaware of some strange bit of arcana regarding Asus products, maybe a Bios conflict of some sort or perhaps I needed to sacrifice a chicken or three or at least eat a chicken sandwich and drink a cold beer.

So I did what all good digital denizens do and turned to the modern high priest and oracle at Delphi, repository of all human knowledge, the great and mighty dread Google. After several hours of pouring over various and sundry boards, blogs, and online magazines, as well as many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, I came to the erroneous conclusion that it was a driver issue. Apparently Windows XP service Pack 2 has no SATA drivers. The EeePC 1000H uses a SATA drive not the older IDE type. So I downloaded a copy of N-lite, compiled an ISO with the appropriate drivers, burned a disk and being rather proud of myself at that moment, started the process of installation all over again.

I watched in horror as once more the Blue Screen of Death yet again reared its ugly lo-res face. At this point I said to hell with it and went to bed. As I lay in the dark ,simultaneously trying to shut down my brain and seriously considering changing my profession of choice to either that of an interstellar fry cook or French Foreign Legionnaire (I hear the hats are really cool but my French is limited to a bad Maurice Chevalier impression) the voice in the back of my head that often sounds suspiciously like Red Foreman from that 70s show, whispered “HEY DUMBASS!!! Did you check the RAM?”. I sat bolt upright and thought that it couldn’t be that easy could it? I grabbed a screwdriver and a pair of pants in that order, performed the surgery and swapped out the memory for some I knew was good and low and behold, It worked like a charm. I loaded it with Windows 7 Beta and I couldn’t be happier.

I Know I should have checked the RAM after the first couple of failed install attempts. I felt like an idiot for getting stuck on what I thought was the issue instead of what was the issue but now at least, I don’t have to march across the Algerian desert to make a living. I am just too old for all that marching about . Besides I am genetically predisposed to living in a peat bog. A red head and the desert just don’t mix. Why do you think I work with computers? Ever see an I.T. guy with a tan? Sunburn yes. Tan, no.

Still here

Short one just to let the few folks who read this know I'm still alive.

Whats been up

1. Back in school. Last quarter of cisco.
2. Installed ubuntu on my eeepc. It now dual boots windows and ubuntu.
3. W.o.W. III. Shoulder hurt. Not much fighting for me. Got a new (for me) klappvisor bascinet ( the helm not crib).
4. Brother and his wife are having a baby. (I still prefer dogs but sometimes wonder)
5.Started on a pair of Wisby gauntlets.
6. Soaze problems cause allot of my lower back pain. (Thanks Humpty for fixing it)
7. Dreaming of Alaska.
8. Gota realize I can't save all the stray dogs in the world.

Once again here I am. A long period of time has passed since I last posted. Between school and the SCA my life has been rather busy. Last quarter was horrible for me. School sucked so much energy from me that I had no desire left to write about anything. Basically I spent all last quarter with my nose buried in an algebra book. I still failed. Well actually I received a “D” for my Herculean effort but in regard to my degree, I receive no credit; so for all intent and purpose, I failed. This quarter is much better.

I had originally planned to not talk about the SCA here, but like every other person that engages in that particular form geekdom; I too will waste bandwidth and blather about my favorite hobby, although at this point I almost have to call it a lifestyle or perhaps at least a subculture.

At this year’s rather surreal Pennsic War, I received the accolade of Knighthood within the Society. Knighthood is the highest level fighting award one can achieve within the SCA. My knight, His Grace Logan delivered my buffet. HRM Sinclair dubbed me, and now I am a knight. (Right click / save target as http://ebonwoulfe.com/images/video/brian%20knighting.wmv ) What the hell that means I am not really sure. I am of very mixed feelings about the whole thing. It is a very big deal and yet at the same time it means absolutely nothing. To quote an old saw, “A peerage and a buck fifty won’t get you a cup of coffee.” To be a knight in the SCA means a lot of different things to a lot of different people and if you ask 50 knights what a knight is, you will get 50 different answers. I suppose my first step is to figure out what it means to me. I know this much though, I count myself privileged to be considered a peer by the Order of Chivalry of the Kingdom of Atlantia. One of the best pieces of advice I received on my vigil was “Just keep doing what you have been doing. You are being Knighted because of who you are now not what you might become. And above all have fun”

I find it very strange that I have been willing to sacrifice my body and invest so much time and effort, and will continue to do so, for a game that, at its most basic, is just a bunch of grownups dressing up in really out of date clothing and beating each other senseless with rattan. But somehow out of this strange hodgepodge of Victorian Arthurianism, historical reenactment, and Jugger ( Big geek points if you know what I am talking about, uber-geek points If you saw it in the theater http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094764/ ) We manage to create a place where the romance and Ideals of a bygone age can flourish. Where people can be inspired to be something more than themselves, Valhalla made manifest, and to paraphrase the Bard, where no man is ne’er so vile that he cannot be gentled and called my brother. In the SCA we tend to make our fantasies a little more concrete than most.

RUFUSSS!!!

School is out for now. I’ll be back in two weeks. Over the last semester I have had the time to do nothing but study. It seems as if it has been forever since I posted anything here. I would like to say something witty, or at least indulge in some good old fashioned ranting but I just don’t have the heart right now. Yesterday one of my heroes died. George Carlin was only 71. In the grand scheme of things, that’s really not that old. When I think of my earliest memory of a comedian I think of him sitting on that stool on with that puckish smirk.

George, more than any other person, taught me to think. He taught me to question everything. He taught me that my stuff was my stuff, other peoples shit was their shit, and through extension my stuff was just shit too. The man was deep. To say he was a comedian is true, but I think he was a philosopher first. Like the big D, a philosopher who used humor to teach us, and ease the horror of the human condition. He was a living expression of the Buddha’s teachings made manifest through a lower Manhattan accent. If I ever saw a real Zen master in action it was him. Understand that I did not agree with most of his politics. He stood way too far to the left for me. Understand that none of that matters. His was a voice that should have endured. There are very few like him left, if any.

Many people will post his seven dirty words bit. I refuse to do so. I want him to be remembered as the Iconoclast that he was, not for some poke at the FCC.

I wonder what his last words were. Good night Rufus. Remember the rules of the road. You will be missed more than you will ever know

I cut this from

http://www.georgecarlin.com/home/home.html

I think it sums it up rather well

I figured out years ago that the human species is totally fucked and has been for a long time. I also know that the sick, media-consumer culture in America continues to make this so-called problem worse. But the trick, folks, is not to give a fuck. Like me. I really don't care. I stopped worrying about all this temporal bullshit a long time ago. It's meaningless.

Stupid Monkey.......

I was watching Robot Chicken the other night when my lady love brought up how disgusting\disturbing she thought the show was with all of the violence and whatnot. [Shakes head …I think I was just channeling Dr. Christopher Turk for a second there]

Today I asked her how that show was different from the cartoons we grew up watching. Wily E. Coyote suffered far worse at the hands of his own ineptitude, and the high manufacturing and quality control standards of the (obviously based in China) ACME corporation. Tom Cat was cut up and lacerated in far more ways than the most diabolical sushi chef could have ever imagined; not too mention suffering through levels of blunt force trauma that would make the boys that play with the supercollider envious. Do we even have to bring up the indignities that Elmer J. Fudd suffered at the hands, errr…I mean to say paws, of our favorite cross dressing member of the Leporidae family. Her response to my query was “I don’t know…. It’s just different” I of course respect her opinion but have a hard time seeing why she feels that way. Granted, the gore is a bit more pronounced on R.C. but I think red play dough looks just like red play dough, even when it is squirting out of a Rocky Balboa action figure’s eye socket. I, in many ways, find this much more cartoonish than a shotgun blast to a ducks face or Tom getting his tail stuck in the chop-o-matic. In the cartoon the gore is self and medium consistent, and therefore more realistic. Whereas the stop action animated play dough gore just looks silly ”bleeding” out of a plastic toy. To me it’s more reminiscent of when Stretch Armstrong sprung a leak, than of various viscera.

As I sit here typing, the thought occurs to me that in the case of R.C., it may just be that I am male and she is female, and as children we played with our toys in drastically different ways. I realize that the things that the characters on R.C. do to each other,albeit with significantly more sarcasm and cynicism, are the same things that little boys have been imagining when they are playing with their action figures since before G.I. Joe was in basic training. I have watched a friend’s granddaughter play with her dolls (yes, boys have action figures, girls have dolls) and I don’t recall ever hearing Dora scream out in pain because Thomas the tank engine ran over her at the behest of the Dark Lord of the Sith. In point of fact I think the train said “excuses me please” on that particular afternoon, and as I recollect, Darth Vader was no where to be seen. I do on the other hand, remember my friends and me conceiving, and acting out things with our star wars figures that would have made Torquemada wince, then give full points for style and originality. Nothing can surpass little boys sheer capacity for creative fiendishness; to quote a certain excessively rotund, dead, movie icon “The horror, the horror…”
(Big lit nerd points if you can remember who originally made that pronouncement and in what book. Don't cheat and Google it ya' filthy heathen) Maybe this is the appeal of R.C. it’s like playing with our toys allover again, except this time the production values are slightly higher.

So what’s your take on the issue?

...and I believe I'll have another beer

Why do you believe what you believe? We all believe things, but very few of us really take the time to question the why of our beliefs. Why might you believe or for that matter, not believe in God? Why do you believe in right of the government to impose laws? Why do you believe that one fast food establishment is better than another? Why do you believe in anything at all?

De-constructing our personal belief structure can be one of the most brutal things we do to our selves .It can be ego shattering. We often find that what we “believe” is nothing more than brainwashing. Granted, the scrub job was often done by well meaning people, (our parents, teachers whomever) but the end result is the same; a brain filled with codes and general purpose sub-routines that we follow without ever wondering just why.

I think each person has the duty to themselves to pull apart the very fabric of their beliefs and see what lies beneath. Find out why. Question everything. Then and only then can you truly understand who you are and really begin to think for your self. It can be a scary thing, and if you find out that in the end you are really just nothing, its o.k. You can start over. Like that movie guy said “you can’t fill a full cup”.

Time is an illusion, lunch time ...doubly so

Current thoughts,

The perception of time is simply an expression of relativity. When we were young, the seconds would stretch on for what would seem to be an eternity. At some point, that changes, and the years go by in the blink of an eye. Einstein knew this, when he figured out the relationship between time and light. The Buddhists knew this when they realized each moment was the same as the next; and Michael Valentine Smith said it best, “Waiting is”. In our minds, some things are as fresh as they were scores of years ago. A first kiss, a first car, yet we can’t remember what we had for lunch today. I have six or so weeks left to go in this semester. It is both and eternity and a breath. Before I know it, I will be sitting in a chair taking the proctored exam for the CCNA. Before we know it, it will be us lying on our death beds wondering if it was all worth it, whatever “it” was. I just hope that when I get there, I will be able to say yes. Each scar is a merit badge. Each pain is a short hand note for a longer story.

What this really boils down to for me is that I need to get off my ass and get working on that book that I have been thinking about.