January 13, 2005 Tech Toys and Initiatives You know, you get more sales help in a computer store if you're taking notes in your Handspring. I suppose they'd be drooling over me if I were using a Treo or a Blackberry, but I still have my trusty Handspring, which I use only occasionally. Today, I was searching for a new monitor for Mom, who is going to turn the den into a home office (her current "home office" is the dining room table, which is inconvenient when we have guests). She wants a flatscreen monitor in order to maximize the space in the small room, so I went hunting for one. Nobody paid attention to me in Staples until I started typing in the price and model numbers of different products. Then a salesperson was all over me, asking how he could help me, and what was I looking for, etc. The same thing happened to me at MicroCenter, where I only got approached by salesclerks if I was busily tapping the screen while looking interested in the merchandise. Little did either establishment realize that I was looking for the cheapest model available (that was decent). Mom doesn't have a lot of funds to spend on computer stuff, and while her birthday is coming up next week, she has insisted that she'll kill any of her children who dares to buy her computer peripherals for her birthday. (She thinks we spent too much on her for Christmas.) I think I found the right monitor. The picture was very clear, and it was a very good price, after rebates. I then spent the rest of my time in MicroCenter looking around, wishing I had every geek tool known to man. I settled for a teeny tiny wireless mouse that can be recharged via the USB port. It's exceptionally cute, and even comes with its own little felt carrying case. I don't expect to use it anywhere but home, but it's nice to know I can have it with me at all times. I hate the touchpad on my ThinkPad, and I don't like having all these wires around me when I'm working from home. Speaking of working from home, I'm getting massive amounts of shit from my coworkers (especially Laurie) about the amount of stuff I've been doing at home since I got the wireless router. I tend to wake up early these days, and the only people I know that are around and awake on an instant messenger program are my coworkers, so I'll usually dial in to the network and chat with Terry. She doesn't seem to mind, though she does ask me why I constantly check my work e-mail. Lara, however, gets downright hostile when I'm on the system on my days off. I don't know if she thinks I'm trying to one-up her or what the story is, but whenever I instant message her, she IMs me back, yelling, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?" Mostly, I like to see what's going on in the department, and somewhat revel in the fact that I'm not dealing with it. Sometimes, I get ideas for things to do and will send e-mails asking if what I'm thinking of doing is a good idea or not. So far, I've started the image library and am about to start an animation initiative, in order to get the design departments around the globe all on one page when it comes to the way we approach animation. The one "initiative" I took today was sort of a joke. I called it the "Music Initiative," and bought a rack of blank CDs and a case and e-mailed the department, telling them to burn copies of their favorite albums onto those CDs so they can be left in the department. Right now, I'm the only one who keeps his CDs by the stereo, so they become the default playlist for the night shift. Usually on weekends, Laurie will start up her iPod and play tunes from her computer, but that does me no good, since she's too far away for me to hear the music, and besides, it's all her music, played by her whim. Not that we have any big differences in music taste (well, she hates all things New Age, and I don't care for Richard Thompson, but that's about it), but still, I'd rather have a large selection of music to choose from, and not just a pile of Patrick's Crap. And it truly is crap, for the most part. I usually like to listen to mindless pop while I'm at work, or a more soothing band like Grey Eye Glances or October Project. But when other people remember to bring in their CDs, I usually end up liking what I hear. If the only thing they risk by leaving a CD in the department is the 75 cents or so I spent on a blank disc, I think we'll have more to choose from. Mild digression: To say I like to listen to crap is really just my way of being funny about not keeping up with the trends in alternative music choices. When I hear modern classical or some country or folk or some rap, I tend to like it. My music collection might be mostly mainstream, but there are a few oddities scattered among the top-10 and powerful women singers that I tend to go for. One thing I truly dislike is when someone says that their music collection is "so eclectic!" I worked in a music store for a short while, and I can tell you that just about everyone in the world has "eclectic" taste in music. Or rather, nobody has "eclectic" taste in music, because music is, in itself, a place where you get to pick and choose at will, and run into things you may like from categories you hadn't thought of before. Whenever someone walked up to the counter with a one-hit wonder just on the charts, some Vivaldi, and a gangsta rap CD, they'd inevitably say, "I'll bet you've never seen this combination before!" Well, actually, yes I have. All the time. And I only worked in that music store for a couple of months. Sure, there are die-hard fans of deathmetal or jazz, but I'll bet you they could sing all the lyrics to any Carpenters' tune (if they're beyond a certain age). Show me someone without an aberration in their music choice, and I'll show you how easy it is to convert them into liking something they didn't even know existed before. "Eclectic." Feh. While I was at work, I of course checked up on Stephanie, and she seemed to be having a good time with Laurie. One thing that worries everyone but Steph is the fact that she's going to have to take the T home from work every Thursday night after 11pm. I told her I'd come pick her up on Thursdays (hey, it'll keep me from watching reruns of I Love the 90's on VH1 at that time), but she won't hear of it. "I've taken the T home, Uncle Pat," she said to me when I brought it up. I told her I didn't care, that if something happened to her while she was commuting home from work, I'd hate myself and be killed totally dead by my sister-in-law for getting her a night job in the city anyway. She said no. I said yes. She told me I was being ridiculous. I told her that I'd simply stand by her desk from 15 minutes before her shift ended until she needed to go home, and then escort her to my car, if that's what it takes. She can go to her dorm or back to her house (which is next door to mine), but either way, I'm going to make sure she's safe. Yeah, she's 19, but she's also still the 3-year-old that I met when Chris started dating her mother. Again, a meta-note: On Saturday, spies will be gone, for all intents and purposes. The domain name has changed to "leftfield.org," and if you have bookmarks or links to this site, please change them to http://www.leftfield.org/~xingcat/journal and you'll get this site. I'm going to have to dig through my archives, since I coded a lot of stuff with absolute links (dumb idea), and I should really fix the fact that from 1998 to 2001, I didn't use folders at all, so you may not be able to access or navigate through some of my archives while this switch is taking place. And I'm going to have my own domain up and running soon (with many thanks to Ceej), so your links will have to change once again. But after that, I promise I'll stay put.