December 26, 2002

I can't wait until I'm 40

This is a short post since my carpal tunnel is acting up and my left eye has been twitching/blinking (hopefully from strain and not some horrible eye rotting disease) all day. I'm really dreading to see what its going to be like another 20 or so years down the road after using computers so long everyday. A new method of data entry would be great, but in 20 years it still won't have changed much.

I do have a problem that I've been contemplating lately though. I've always wanted to be my own boss and run my own business. I would be the one person responsible for my (hopeful) success and reap the rewards. I hate going out for network consulting where the customer gets charged $75 an hour and I get less than 10% of that. More and more lately too I've seen how nice it would be to be able to work from home at my convenience. Sadly wanting to be a networking geek that probably won't work out too well. Ohhh well I do enjoy working with other geeky people at least. :)

Thats it for now I think, my right arm is starting to go numb/tingly so I'm going to go watch Thunderball or maybe some of the Call for Help marathon show on TechTV and see how 18 hours of live tv is going.

Posted by johnm at 11:24 PM | Comments (0)

December 24, 2002

Merry Christmas

Its a nice Christmas eve so far. We've had quite a bit of snow and while I had to drive back to Centralia from Carbondale at about 35 mph, its still nice to have some snow this early in the year.

Other than that all I can say is nothing makes you feel more like an ass than getting a gift from someone without getting anything for them. I can say that I do have some really good friends though. I have no idea what I did to deserve them but I'm really thankful to have them as friends.

Posted by johnm at 11:45 PM | Comments (0)

I'm a mirror for you, as well.

There are spoilers ahead, so if you haven't seen Star Trek Nemesis yet, quit reading and go to the theather before its gone.

I'm torn on my thoughts for the 10th Star Trek movie, which I saw last Sunday. I really didn't care for any Star Trek series all that much except for The Next Generation which I really liked. The cast really made the show, especially Patrick Stewart. I'd been looking forward to Nemesis for a long time, even though it is to be the last movie featuring this cast. All good things.....

Overall I really enjoyed the movie. It had plenty of nice action scenes from the Picard, Data, and Worf driving the buggy around on the planet, to in-ship fire fights, and some excellent ship battles. I must admit I still don't understand why in every recent Star Trek movie the Enterprise must hit a planet, other ship, etc. Starfleet's flagship must spend alot of time in dock for repair at this rate.

On the down side the movie had a pretty weak story. Thats certainly not to say that Star Trek is the king of plot, but I can usually count on something a little more developed. This movie is pretty much bad guy has a big gun and wants to blow up Earth and the good guys stop him. Good action a twist or two would have been nice at least. The big sore point for me though is Data blowing up. Was it really necessary for the story, especially if this is the last TNG movie? Modeled a little much like Spock's death perhaps? Now we're just stuck with Data's retarded younger brother, yay. Wil Wheaton got screwed too and should have had his scene in the movie. I always wanted to see John DeLancie's character, Q, appear in one of the movies too.

In short, if you like Star Trek, especially The Next Generation you should go see this movie. Even if you just like general sci-fi/space shooters you might want to go see it. If you're a big fan you'll probably be a little disappointed to see what many think is the best Trek series to end with this movie. Pop in First Contact and watch it at least to make up for it since its still the best in the TNG movie series. Nemesis was an entertaining movie and worth seeing but really could have been better and deserved better for wrapping up the series. See it anyway.

Posted by johnm at 11:03 PM | Comments (0)

December 18, 2002

Telemarketers suck!

I've always been friendly to telemarketers, especially after doing tech support. I understand just how bad it can be to talk to people, and those were people that called me. I can't imagine what you have to put up with when you're making unsolicited sales calls. I exchange pleasantries with them and them ask that they remove me from their calling list and hang up. I'm polite to them but don't listen to their pitch.

About 10 minutes ago my land line rang so I knew it pretty much was a telemarketer or Krissa calling to say hi, pretty much everyone else calls my cell phone. Its 8:30 which is a little late for most telemarketer calls, but thats who it was. Some guy with a big drawl tells me he's from some lodge in Branson and I cut him, tell him I'm not interested and ask him to please remove my name from their calling list. The guy fires back in a pissy tone of voice, "why?" Alright that made me mad and I barked back "because I told you to." Sadly he hung up on me there before I could tear into him. That really irritates me though. Maybe if from now on when I answer the phone and realize its a telemarketer I should just begin the same obscenity over and over again, or just set the phone down and walk away. Its bad enough that you intrude on me in in a more invasive fashion than spam, junk mail, or even pop up ads, but then you're rude to me when I kind out of compassion for you because of your job......

I'm going to turn on the radio and listen to Love Line now. Its always a pleasant mix of Drew and Adam mocking people, and getting to laugh at the questions people ask.

Posted by johnm at 08:57 PM | Comments (8)

December 08, 2002

Another week down!

Last week was pretty cool, we got the first snow of the year and probably about 7 inches of it. I always hate having to drive after it snows because everyone drives so poorly. I also have a strong dislike for my car door freezing shut, then refusing to shut properly once pried open. Repeated banging or waiting with the heater on are the usual solutions. Frustrating when its early. I also didn't have a real ice scrapper with me so that made it more fun too. I still can't complain too much though, it was snow and I like snow.

Its about time to start Christmas shopping too. Always fun trying to pick gifts, especially gifts on my budget. I'll be glad when I have that done, but its usually Christmas Eve before I'm done.

I also have a final for my database class on Tuesday. I honestly have no idea how I'm doing in it so that should be exciting. Once thats over I'll have about a month off school and then I plan on starting back with school and cutting out a few hours of work each week. It should be better for me in the long run to get done with school sooner even if I prefer work. I do need to start filling out papers and stuff soon though for loans for next semester. The school should start to try to bleed me dry for some money before long.

Posted by johnm at 09:46 PM | Comments (0)