SMooSH Space

Over the long weekend Lily had some new developments. Blueberries would be one of them. Oh how she loves them, and for those without first hand experience, I can tell you that they are surprisingly similar upon exit.

Those big blue eyes are complimented well by the blue goo that covers her face, sometimes so extensively that she looks like she has some deep blue 5 o’clock shadow. Amusing to be sure.

Her other development is a new found attachment to me. While she’s always liked being held by me, and playing with me, suddenly she seems to be going out of her way to make it known that she wants to be with me. Last night for example when laura had her resting on her chest in bed, Lily took a look at me, crawled off Laura and cuddled into me and went to sleep. I’m not ashamed to admit that it made me a bit weepy that my little girl said so loud and clear that she loves me with her actions.

The down side to this… Over the weekend she seemd to get accustomed to waking up at 6am with me, at which time we would have our breakfast, play and cuddle while Mom slept in a bit. It was nice to have the time with Lily…I miss her when I’m at work. Work, the problem. Tuesday as I was getting up and getting ready for work she sensed the change. Dad had to iron his clothes, and shower and basically do his own routine without the little tag along. And when it came time to say goodbye, my little buddy, so confused and sad wailed with her arms raised in the air, wondering why I wasn’t picking her up so we could go play.

Awful…It hit me in the gut and made me want to call in to work saying “sorry, Lily needs me more than you” It made me think that it seems so counter intuitive to go away and leave my progeny behind to spend the day ensuring businesses can keep selling things we don’t need to buy, and that we can keep paying for them.

I’m left with conflicted priorities.  I want to stay with her 24×7, teaching her about the world and exploring it with her.  But I want to give her every opportunity she could want.  Travel, education, good food, a warm home, toys now and then.  For that I must leave her daily and spend 10 hours out of her reach.  +Sigh+
My instincts tell me to stay, my current status as a pawn in a commerce dominated society makes me go…

Despite the inner conflict, there is part of me that smiles as she reaches for me with tears in her eyes, because it unequivocally tells me she loves her daddy.  That’s an indescribable feeling.

I’ve not had too much to say lately, so a random update.

I’ve been playing with a number of things lately. Project Ubuntu is still ongoing and I am a proud and loud proponent of open source software now. Gone are the shackles of the Microsoft overlords, and I’m happy about it.

In other nerdy news I’ve really come to love the ever popular site Life Hacker since I found this article explaining how to turn my point and shoot cannon into a super camera with a non destructive firmware hack (CHDK) I can now use the camera to take my regular point and shoots, but in parallel save the RAW files which I can tweak (develop) when loaded into GIMP or Photoshop.

In life news, it’s time for a new furnace and air conditioner. Our yearly inspection brought to light some deficiencies which required an upgrade. One of the greatest deficiencies of note is that the furnace was approximately 65% efficient. Not so good some someone like myself who is becoming ever more concerned with his environmental footprint and fuel usage.

Our new unit is rated at 96%, which will do wonders for the heating bill, and my conscience. This will be installed tomorrow. We have also arranged a home energy audit which will identify areas for improvement, as well as make us eligible for sizable government of Ontario rebates for the furnace, and anything we fix that is flagged in the initial audit.

A long weekend approaches. I’ve taken an extra Friday off, for no other reason than I am not a fan of working. We will be taking Lily to the Zoo with her friend Sadie for a picnic. This past weekend we realized Lily is a bit of a jerk, when at Sadie’s first birthday party, Lily stole her happy birthday balloon and made Sadie cry. What are you going to do, someone’s got to raise the trouble makers of the world, may as well be us.

Work is work, and little has changed.  Laura is beginning to fear the realization that she will be required to return to work in a few short months.    I don’t blame her.  I leave Lily behind every morning and it still causes me pain daily.  It’s such an unnatural feeling to leave.  Life in the modern commerce driven society…

I suppose I should cut this short and get back to auditing some bills sent to us by contractors.  How this falls into my job title of network specialist, I don’t know, but that’s the story of my life.  I very rarely do what I am getting paid to do, but no one ever seems to mind.  I suppose I can’t complain…

I drive to work every weekday, 45 minutes.

Often times I spend this entire time in my own head, in my car. Just a singe person, in a tiny, uncomfortable bubble.

When I find myself in a mindset like this, it bothers me. It bothers me because I know there is more to the world than that. It’s at times like these that I stretch. Not physically, but mentally.

I start my stretch with a reach outward from the introverted mindset and realize that I’m not alone on the 401. I’m in fact joined by thousands of other minds sitting in their own physical and mental self imposed bubbles. It makes me happy to know that somewhere out there on the stretch of road there is likely someone else stretching out their world view to include me as an anonymous like mind.

Beyond the road I find that aside from being one of thousands of people on a well beaten path, I am part of something bigger. The grass, trees, insects, rodents and other living and breathing organisms join me as part of my day. I include them as my mind stretches across the blanket of life that stretches out in all directions surrounding me. Somewhere among them, one briefly glimpses that it is part of something bigger, something that includes me, and I smile to think of it.

A bigger jump now. I’m standing on a ball called Earth, staring up at the sky with my arms raised like a kid on a roller coaster screaming with wonder as I am hurled through the solar system at 107,000 km/h. I’m in the front seat of the coaster watching the sky race by at a blinding pace that I am usually oblivious too. My mind wanders to someone else on earth, arms raised, screaming with joy as they sit next to me on this cosmic coaster. I do not know this someone, but we are kindred, and I smile to think of it.

Stretch. Our solar system is on of innumerable similar systems in the galaxy. We hurtle through the galaxy at speeds that escape my wildest imagination. Our galaxy in turn rockets through the universe in a like manner. How many sentient beings scattered across the known and unknown vastness at this very moment hold a picture of the universe in their minds and are reaching out to embrace with thought, like minded individuals. Billions. Trillions. Numbers that perhaps escape description. All of us, on our own coasters, arms raised in the air hurtling through time and space toward unknown destinies. So far apart, yet together in a very real and epic sense. Once again, I smile to think of it.

Dare I continue and test the limits of my mind’s reach and venture into higher dimensions where even more sentients are stretching the limits of their consciousness across the near infinite possibilities of what I can only call existence…

Wow…a few moments prior I was a single man, in a car in traffic. Now, I am a voice among innumerable others, calling out to and embracing all of existence.

I look across to the person in the car next to me, and wonder “Are you in a tiny bubble with no room to stretch or breathe, or are you at the front of the coaster, screaming with me?”

Think about it.

Its been a while since I’ve gone solo to a movie, but today it will be ironman.
I rather enjoy the sunday matinee experience. There is a certain filter of people that appeals to me.
The punk teens are still just dragging themselves out of bed. Some volume is decreased by the absence of sunday churchgoers. What’s left is a rather peaceful moviegoing experience where one has their choice of seat, the popcorn is fresh and the movie can be enjoyed with minimal murmur and distraction.

I do enjoy a night out at the movies with friends, but the solo sunday noon show is a more personal moviegoing experience that’s all about me. And really, isn’t that what it’s all about?

Ah sweet Hardy Heron.  (Ubuntu 8.04)

You solved my probles with the Creative Zen 4G.  After upgrading my 7.10 install to 8.04, and reinstalling Amarok I not have some pretty decent support for the Zen.

Colour me impressed.

I’m liking Ubuntu so much, I’ve been inspired to go out and pick up a 24″ widescreen monitor for it.  To be delivered Monday.  Joy!

Once again, I must reiterate that I am extremely happy with my switch to Ubuntu.

In the last week, since I’ve made the full switch to Ubuntu, I’ve started asking myself this question, do I need Windows.

So often when I had that other boot option my though was Yes, I need Windows. “I need this program or that, I need to do that thing that only Windows can do.”

As the week has progressed without the handy fallback, I am beginning to realize that I have never in fact needed Windows. What I had needed was the comfort of the only operating system I have ever really known. I started with PC’s back in the days of DOS 2.0, and have since been staring the Microsoft brand in the face nearly every day of my life.

Over the past week I have found that 75% of what I do on the PC includes a web browser, a media player, and a graphics editor. All of which are quite handily accomplished with the likes of Firefox, Amarok and GIMP. (Among other alternatives) So with that in mind I can easily say that that at least 75% of the time, I don’t NEED Windows.

Of the other other 25 percent of my PC activities, at least 15% is dedicated to general fiddling, scripting, programming, poking around and messing things up. Activities for which Linux grants more than ample opportunity. Far more than Windows…So much in fact that that 15% may rise dramatically for the foreseeable future.

What’s left? 10%. This 10% has been perhaps one of the prime reasons I have stayed with Windows for so long. I have for a number of years been an avid casual gamer, floating from one virtual world to the next, slaying dragons and delivering packages for any number different elves, dwarves, mages, thieves, etc… Gaming has kept me in the Windows world for a very long time.

Since the birth of my daughter, whose images pepper my site frequently, gaming has become a distant priority. That time being replaced with time playing with her. Gaming at it’s best in my opinion. There may come a time that I want to get back into it, and here I must admit that I don’t know where Linux currently stands with this type of activity as I have not explored it in the least. (Unless TuxRacer counts…)

All that aside, I would hesitate to say that I need to game at all at the moment. I just want to from time to time. But even if I were to say that Linux does not handle gaming at all…I am still left with having no real need of Windows 90% of the time. (Or 100% of the time as I’m not currently in gaming mode)

I am really beginning to see that much of the pain people have in switching to Linux is not really based on what Linux can or cannot do, but rather, what is different from that which they have become so very accustomed to. Be it a specific program, a specific way of accomplishing a task, or maybe just that ubiquitous Windows startup sound that so many of us hear multiple times daily in our cubicle farms and homes.

If people were exposed to Linux in it’s current state (as a desktop operating system) from the start, it would be Windows we would look at with dismay and suspicion, and wonder quite loudly “Why in god’s name would I want to PAY for THAT? And PAY for virtually any program I want to run on it? I can do all that and more for free…”

So I’m still off windows, and for the most part feeling fine.

There are some things I have liked and some things that have been a challenge…but on a whole, I’m still quite happy as a windows free user…

Things I like:

• Firefox…A hint of familiarity for all my web browsing needs… Widows or Linux
• VLC media player…My person favourite for video… Windows or Linux
• Sound Juicer. A nice, no nonsense CD ripper.
• Exaile…A nice little media player, which is rumoured to support the Creative ZEN 4G, with a bit of work. Something I will need to investigate in order to get Laura’s working….
• TorrentFlux…A nice awesome way to download and manage torrents. Requires a web server running PHP, but lets you search, download and manage your torrents from a web interface. Nice to be able to log in from anywhere, or even my blackberry and start downloading completely free legal media. …
• Xampp web server in a box…. Includes Apache Web Server, MySQL, PHP, and FTP in a single easy to install package. Great for running on your home pc for a web sandbox for your projects before dumping them live on the net.
• Wine Who says you can’t have your cake and eat it too? Run windows apps in Linux…for those times that you just can’t get it done in linux…
• K3b Liking this CD/DVD burner as well.  Seems to get the job done, nice enough interface.

Challenges:

• as previously noted, the Creative ZEN 4G has not been easy to get going. I’ve heard it’s possible, but haven’t had time to sit and dig into it.
• A replacement for windows movie maker. WMM is actually a pretty capable little video editor for the novice who just wants to throw together a quick video of his kid without a lot of experience needed. Looking for a good alternative to that. Hasn’t been terribly easy at this point. Cinerella Cinelerra is a bit intense looking. May have to try Kdenlive next to see how that works.
• Dual monitor + Fancy Effects + ATI card. I can run dual monitor mode, or single mode without any fancy effects, which the nerd in me likes….you know…ooooh…shiney…. more investigation needed.

Those are my only hang ups so far. Loving the rediscovering of my PC, it’s like when I was learning DOS when I was 10 years old. New, fresh and fun. Heck…even Laura hasn’t minded the switch so far.

Say no to windows…

P.S. I certainly appreciate any suggestions for alternatives to the apps I have listed, I’m just exploring and have no particular allegiance to anything.  It’s still fairly new to me.  And if anyone has ideas for anything else, for purposes not listed above…please feel free…

So on a sleepless Sunday morning, I did it.

I decided to run my windows updates, which I have not done in some time.

This certainly seemed like a fairly standard and normal thing to do, something I’ve done countless times before. But Sunday, it was different.

Everything ran through fine, downloading, installing, and then….the reboot…Oh you bastard of a reboot.

NTLDR is missing

Hmm…I can fix that….Windows CD, recovery console…bippitybam…No go….

Flash forward to 4 hours of troubleshooting later….

The following has happened:

• An entire 200g Drive has been corrupted. Partition table unrepairable, master boot record smashed.
• My boot drive: Partition table is there, and I can see the data…whew…Pictures are still intact. But bootable…not a chance. No known fix to the NTLDR issue is working.

So…Needless to say, I have cursed Microsoft, Bill, Windows to the ends of the earth and back…wishing ill will upon them all until blue in the face.

Solution:

My desktop is now 100% Ubuntu Linux. I’m sick of all the crap I have to deal with on Windows. I’m sick of the fact that despite the fact that I have a legitimate license for widows, it would be hell to try to reinstall windows because since the move I haven’t been able to locate my license number, so would have to probably purchase another copy of windows, or pirate it.

I have used ubuntu a lot over the past year, but find myself from time to time lured back to windows when in need of an application. But this time…no dual boot. If I need something, I’m going to find an open source way of doing it.

Summary:

Screw you windows…I know Linux isn’t perfect by any stretch, but given the choice of paying for imperfection, or getting it for free…I’m going to go the free route.