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Author: NiteMayr

Before:

Kevin was born on the mossy hills of Scotland and lived for a while in West Lothian before the mores of pre-Thatcher and REALLY pre-Oasis Great Britain sent his family across the ocean to North America. They moved here and there and Kevin did the same when he was old enough. Now he lives in London with his family and a Dog.

Kevin Wardrop is an amateur writer, amateur photographer and professional pain in the ass. He has worked in the PC support business for most of his adult life and has been accustomed to simply answering technical questions as a matter of fiat, it was his career choice after all. Now he herds cats and puppies for a living as well as babysitting the web enterprises at the heart of western industry.

Three Days of Mucus and Sleep

Published by NiteMayr on November 4, 2006

NiteGirl and I have been dealing with a fairly entrenched head cold (that has marched into my chest and set up shop too).

I’ve been trying to shake it, with little success,  I don’t think I’ve had enough Vitamin C.

Oh well.

I played a marathon session of Civ IV last night and had to go down and ask the neighbors to turn down their damn stereo, only to have it come back up (not super loud but loud enough to annoy) at 2:30AM.  They are a nice couple of kids, but their brains just go out of their heads when their friends come over.  I told them that this was the last time I’d let it slide and told them that I’d be reporting them to the managers, reminding them that serial offenders of the noise rules are evicted.

So Busy Today

Published by NiteMayr on October 30, 2006

I was so overwhelmed by my work today.  I handled 50% of the total measurable work volume today and I really felt it (considering there are three of us).  Not to mention the face-to-face work and the ongoing work, I’m really stressing the lack of another head on the team.

The actual work is easy, but as time stretches on I can see things getting out of hand.

That’s life in the tech industry I guess.

NiteGirl took her first driving lessons this weekend, (30 mins total) with some practice around the neighborhood and a local high school parking lot.  She did really well, and only made me scared for my life once.  That must be better than I did my first day out.

I did TheSpawn’s makeup yesterday (cheetah) it turned out okay, but I’ll revise it tomorrow.  I also supplied her with a bloody kitten as a prop, which went over gangbusters at the Halloween party.  TheSpawn won 6 contests including Best [loudest] Scream, Scariest Costume and Best Costume.  She was so proud!

I was pretty proud too, she got those lungs from me and my family!  She’ll have a great “Mom Voice” when she grows up.

That reminds me of a quick story I wrote on my private blog a couple years ago.

There were these ROTC kids messing around by a dumpster a fair distance from my friends and I as we waited for the bus.  They were getting louder and rowdier and eventually I got tired of their noise and obvious misbehavior (ROTC KIDS!!)  so I puffed up and gave them a big Authoritative “HEY!” and they scattered like confetti in the proverbial hurricane.

My Friends couldn’t believe the volume and depth of the voice that came from me; they had checked themselves when they heard it.  Funny Stuff.

A similar thing happened at a Basketball game; I was yelling “Brick” and “Psyche” during layups and free throws.  It was a blast.

Sore Tooth Blues

Published by NiteMayr on October 28, 2006

I had a bad toothache way back in June/July.  The pain was relieved when a large chunk of popcorn came out from between my teeth a week later, it had been deep under my gum line all that week and driving me crazy.  The dentists I reached out to told me I would have to wait “about two to three weeks” before they could see me if it wasn’t an emergency.

Oh well, the pain was gone and except for pain when I ate candy or chocolate, my teeth felt much better.

A couple weeks back the pain came back and no amount of cleansing or picking at my gums had any effect, last Sunday I was tasting “rot” in my mouth when I ate.  This was it, a serious tooth problem.

I broke down on Monday and called a Dentist, and got in right away to see them, eighteen X-Rays were needed to establish a baseline for my mouth.  One tooth (Number 14) was in need of a Root Canal [yikes]

An appointment was made with a specialist and I was seen yesterday at 7:30 AM.  By 9:00AM i was on my way home.  The  whole thing was pretty painless, until the anesthetic wore off about half-way through, then it was not so nice.  After it was done my jaw hurt a bit, but I felt fine.  Talking sucked when I was at work and I avoided the phone as much as possible.

I felt okay at night, but my tooth hurt “a little”.

This morning my jaw was killing me and my tooth hurt ALOT.

It hurt enough to make me not want to speak.

I texted that I wasn’t coming in and went to sleep, pain killer less.

I feel better now.

Today's Top 5

Published by NiteMayr on October 26, 2006

Books, movies, music; what’s in your top 5 right now?

Books

  1. Monster Island
  2. Monster Planet
  3. Autumn
  4. Autumn: The City
  5. Starship Troopers

Movies

  1. 28 Days Later
  2. Formula 51
  3. Garden State
  4. Return of the Jedi
  5. Rules of Attraction

Music

  1. Something I can Never Have – Nine Inch Nails [ Pretty Hate Machine ]
  2. Faith – “The Boy Least Likely to”
  3. Metal – Nine Inch Nails
  4. Bay Bronx Bridge (Bhongra Mix) – Masters of Illusion
  5. Apparitions – Matthew good Band

This Week's Top 25

Published by NiteMayr on October 16, 2006

What are your top 25 most played songs?
Submitted by Cooxie.

  1. Faith “The Boy Least Likely to”
  2. Crazy “Gnarls Barkley”
  3. BattleFlag “Lo-Fidelity Allstars”
  4. It’s No Good “Depeche Mode”
  5. Infinity “Guru Josh”
  6. I’m Not Okay “My Chemical Romance”
  7. Last Train to Trancentral “The KLF”
  8. Supermassive Black Home “Muse”
  9. I Ran “Flock of Seagulls”
  10. Don’t You Want Me? “Felix”
  11. Lotion “Greenskeepers”
  12. Something I can Never Have “Nine Inch Nails”
  13. Dead Souls “Nine Inch Nails”
  14. Otherside “Red Hot Chili Peppers”
  15. If you want Blood, You got it! “AC/DC”
  16. Killer “Adamski”
  17. Midnight Rider “The Allman Brothers”
  18. Don’t Panic “ColdPlay”
  19. Strict Machine “Goldfrapp”
  20. Enter Sandman “Metallica”
  21. Building a Mystery “Sarah McLachlin”
  22. Are You Gonna Be My Girl “Jet”
  23. Cold Hard Bitch “Jet”
  24. She’s Lost Control “Joy Division”
  25. Numb “Linkin Park”

Clarify

Published by NiteMayr on October 13, 2006

160+ Work emails gone and an evening spent with System Restore.. ah, geekery.
Last night I rebooted my PC for some reason (I think it was after a windows update)  and the login screen failed to load.

Damn.

After using last known good, I was able to log in and back up any changed data since my last outage, but a reboot brought me low again.
Double Damn.

A system restore to before I installed Alcohol 52% and iTunes let the system work so I tested a few reboots, made some more backups and reinstalled all the apps I lost.  No big whip.

Then I rebooted and lost my login again.

It was Alcohol.

Triple Dog Damn.

I restored to a pre-alcohol state and rebooted a few times, creating a restore point once I was convinced all was well.

I reinstalled the apps I thought I needed and then rebooted.

All was well.

I’ve rebooted a few times since with no issues.

Good.

All is well with my PC.

This morning it was a different story, my work inbox was full of mail and it took about 2 hours to clean it.

Such is the life of a tech on a short vacation (two day)

To my Co-Workers “Sorry Guys!”

I had all sorts of hoops on my cash transfers to ArmyAntzGirl but she got it in the end.  So now I’m off for groceries and my belated Birthday dinner.

The Bush has spoken!

Timeless Albums

Published by NiteMayr on October 11, 2006

What are some of your favorite, forgotten albums that have stood the test of time?
Submitted by PeterGibbons.

“Sergeant Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band – Beatles”
“Pretty Hate Machine – Nine Inch Nails”
“It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold us Back – Public Enemy”
“Pauls Boutique – Beastie Boys”
“Nevermind – Nirvana”
“(What’s the Story) Morning Glory? – Oasis”
“Chris Sheppard – Pirate Radio Sessions” [The one with Dove Song, Kicks Like a Mule, Ace, & Pragha Khan] [Edit: it could be Trip 2 the moon]
“VooDoo-U Lords of Acid”
“One Fierce Beer Coaster – Bloodhound Gang”
“Spawn – The Official Sound Track”
“Bloodsport – The Sneaker Pimps”
“Broken/Fixed – Nine Inch Nails”
“Bizarre Ride to Tha Pharcyde – Pharcyde”
“Which Doobie U B? – Phunkdoobiest”
“Cypress Hill – Cypress Hill”
“Amerikkas Most Wanted – Ice Cube”
“Bodycount – Bodycount”

Oh man, I could go on and on…

Another long Day at the Office

Published by NiteMayr on October 9, 2006

Well, not SOOO long, but long enough.

I rolled in there around 6:30AM and Left around 5:00PM.

It was long enough for me; oh well.
As usual, I can’t discuss the reason; it was work nonetheless.  I will have to pick it up in the morning too; which really sucks as I like to have my mornings for old work.

I think I’ll be taking thursday and friday off (after my aborted ones last week) the Spawn has Friday off so it will work out nice (as Friday is also payday)

We’ll probably hit the grocery store in the early morning and then just gap out after lunch.

Ahh, those easy going days off!

Maybe we should head out to coburg and snap a few shots of that graveyard?