Chris Crockett – Gaming and Computer Geek

?????? ?????I now know exactly what it feels like both to need, and to get, a root-canal.  Let me tell you, it’s awesome.  A week of fuzzy headed lightness followed by three days of utter, jaw-shattering, agony followed by a man you’ve never met before diving into your face with a full assortment of dental tools along with what appear to be a fistfull of misshapen thumb-tacks.  Actually, I thank my endontist for being a perfectionist, and for eight shots of novocaine (the last four delivered directly to the nerves in question via the convenient new hole drilled in my tooth) and for making the process as quick and painless as possible.  He also did his best to hide the terrifying details from me, which is not hard to do when he has me laid on my back, feet above head, staring into the ceiling and the small, nova-burst like, light aimed into my face.  Nevertheless, I did manage to catch the occasional reflection in his glasses of the yawning void that had been created in my tooth.  A hole that seemed unlikely to fit within the physical constraints of my mouth, much less a single tooth.

This is why such details are hidden from the patient.  The natural tendency to amplify any such information to unbelievable heights of gibbering fear is bad enough without forcing the patient to experience the complete, horrifying, details.  I didn’t really need to know what length the fillings were being cut to, I just knew that if that drill didn’t stop going in soon, it was going to come out the other side… and then where would we be.

>коли под наемy, my world is now bereft of my little weasel buddies.  About two months ago Puck sufferred a brief insulinoma siezure, followed a month later by one much worse.  Bad enough to require the ultimate decision.  Sadly, his big brother Oberon has recently (yesterday) succumbed to the same issues.  It was a sad day but I can celebrate the fact that they had a long and happy life for ferrets, eight years or so, and that they brought a lot of fun into my life.

But now, my apartment is empty of the pitter-patter of ferret feet.

In the coming time of elections we may think that there is too little difference between the candidates.  Worse, our favorite candidate might not even be a viable choice.  I’m not writing this to express my feelings on which candidate is right, or which one I support.  I’ll say that I am a conservative but not a religious zealot conservative.  To say that my choices seem to be a rock and a hard place would not be far from correct.  Even worse, it seems like none of the available candidates supports anything like what I see as the best future course for this nation.  Nevertheless, I believe that all of this makes it ever more important to vote.  It’s not about who is right or wrong, it’s about demonstrating to our leaders that we will hold them responsible for those choices.  The thing is, it’s not even very hard to vote these days.  Sure, getting out to your polling place on election day can be rough, especially if you, like I, have to work on that day.  I for one am solving this problem by using an absentee ballot.  My state of residence allows every registered voter to do so without even bothering with any explanations.  It only took a few moments to fill out an online form requesting it.

The fact is that low voter turnout enables our leaders to do whatever they choose because they know that no one will be holding them responsible.  Low voter turnout demonstrates that no one really cares.  Even if your candidate loses, put the fear of responsiblity into the victor’s thoughts by giving them a slim margin on a 90% voter turnout.  Nothing will make politicans more responsive than knowing that we’re all watching them.

I am now officially dual-booting my EEE PC 900.  I’ve got Windows XP running on the internal SSD and Ubuntu rockin’ the SD slot.  Admittedly, most of this work was done by the fantastic folks at Ubuntu (which demonstrates that Linux is getting pretty close to general purpose usability) but there was a little bit of “off-the-map” configuration needed.  I started by following the instructions on the eeeUbuntu page to install Ubuntu to an SD card (a 4GB SDHC card for now but I’ll probably upgrade to a 32GB when the price drops a bit) but I did have one problem (okay, two, but one was a badly burned Ubuntu CD so that doesn’t count).  It seems that the “optional” step nine of upgrading the kernel is… less than entirely optional, at least on the model 900.  Maybe I just didn’t wait long enough for the generic kernel to scan the system but my first boot attempt on my EEE PC hung.
Fortunately, I was able to boot my desktop PC from the SD card and upgrade the kernel from there.  Now, I’ve got an entire second operating system for my EEE PC stored in the SD card slot.  Can I just say, that’s fantastic.

I’m not one for pomp and circumstance, drawing out simple statements into big productions so I’ll say this the only way I know how.  I’m getting married.  There are no details yet as we’ve not made any decisions but both of us have some life goals to get in order that basically puts the timeline at a year to a year and a half in the future.  I’m looking at a promotion with transfer to an as yet unspecified location and she’s got a Ph.D. to finish.  More information will be forthcoming as it develops.