Forgiveness is always better than revenge...

My former boss may not like this post, since this is being written about him, but I fell that I have to write this. And there is wisdom to be learned. Like the subject of certain posts of late, who he is & the company in question will remain in pectore, though in due time, you may figure it out (especially if you follow me on Facebook). But for now, I'm not naming names...

After I was fired, my first priority was to put out a resume, apply everywhere I could find & basically find another job. I was still hot under the collar about the way I'd been treated, and I was going for revenge, as documented here. I was out for revenge. Almost at all costs. I avoided his store, and I made sure everybody knew why I left. I was right (after all, I had the documentation & I had prevailed in my unemployment claim. And L&I had sided with me as well). And the final piece in my plan was to simply take his ass to court. And to convince my (now former) co-workers to go in with me (even in small claims court you can get up to $5000 per head, which would've been easy for me, as I have documentation and proof of retaliation). But I couldn't. At first I just decided to walk away from it. I'd found another job, was making better money. I'd received a couple of text messages from my former employers, and I just silently deleted them.

But through the months, I realized that I was getting even more bitter over this. Whenever I saw mutual friends, all I could say was how he was a jerk/thief & that he should be shunned. In the end, I was looking more like a bitter, disgruntled former employee. So, I refriended my former employer on Facebook, and started talking to them again. One of the things I've learned in the movies is that hubris will be one's downfall, and I'm not looking to become another Darth Vader (you know, the whole getting your limbs cut off, and left to burn in lava just isn't my thing)... Eventually, I worked up the courage to go back to the store and talk to him in person. Long story short, that hatchet has been buried, and I'm back to working for him on occasion. I'm not going to cut ties with my current employer (after all, I'm making more money here than I was for him, and he just doesn't the payroll anymore). I may not agree with him, but I don't need to argue the point, nor do I need to prevail with him. I know I'm right, and that's the only person I need to convince.  You don't have to prevail in every argument. A friend is better than an enemy. Forgiveness is better than revenge.

Underway on Linux. Again.

I must be a glutton for punishment. Every once in a while, I'll try to install Linux. Usually what will happen is there will be an epic fail within the first two hours, and I'll end up wiping it completely. A couple of times, I've ended up taking the nuke form orbit approach and wiping my entire tower, and starting over with windows and linux. Sometimes it'll last more than two hours, but I'll end up nuking it because I can't the graphics driver to install. Or the tv tuner... But I always keep getting drawn back, called by the Siren's Song of running my computer and sticking it to The Anti-Christ.

Then again, I think I've stated before here that I want my primary OS on my tower to be Linux-based. Of all the distributions I've tried, I keep coming to OpenSuSE. It supports both KDE and Gnome, and I can get it to play nice with all my hardware. I've dabble in Fedora before, but I couldn't get it to mount my windows drive, so I couldn't really 'move in', and it only supported Gnome (if you're migrating from WIndows, KDE is the way to go).

This time, I've gotten past the all essential graphics driver reinstall stage. Two monitors is really important to me, and what has happened in the past is that I could only get it recognize and drive one monitor, or I'd only be able to have the same display on both monitors. Not good. The next things I have to do are install the printer drivers (a little tricky since I'm running the 64-bit, and the only drivers I could find are 32-bit, but I can brute-force it), and the TV tuner (not that big of a deal right now).

So, Hello World. I'm under way on Linux. Again...

So, United Health Care doesn't want me to see a doctor. Period.

With the passage of Obamacare, I lost my company provided health insurance. Not that I grieve for it. The one claim I filed for a routine diabetic checkup was denied due to a pre-existing condition, and I ended up paying over $400.00 out of pocket for a 15 minute office visit (GFY Aetna). So, I filled out my online application, and I qualified for the state's basic health plan (aka Apple Care),  in this case provided by United Health Care. I assigned a doctor (who was not the previous doctor I'd been seeing). They call themselves managed care. It should be more correctly called micro-managed care. I looked on their website and saw that my previous doctor was on the network,  but the website wouldn't completely load so I couldn't do anything about it. I asked online how to switch providers, and I was ignored. They just sent me a new ID card with the sand provider. I tried calling them, but all I got a as a voice recognition program that couldn't understand what I was saying (kind of like a menu where they deliberately how the choices).

Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago,  when I updated my income (getting more hours at work), and I'm no longer eligible for United Health Care. I'm still covered by it till the end of the month,  and i was finally able to switch to my old provider. So i call and set up an appointment with him. The next day, I get a call from the doctors office saying that I'm not listed in the system, and that I'd be paying for this out of my own pocket. I don't have over $400.00 so I canceled the appointment. After calling United Health Care, I was told that the changes won't take place until I receive my new ID card, which probably won't conveniently arrive until after I'm off of United Health Care.

I'm a type I diabetic. And United Health Care doesn't want me to see a doctor.

So, it is Mother's Day today....

So today is the day to celebrate motherhood. Whatever issues you may have with your parents, at least take the time to acknowledge her existence and the gave that she bore you for nine or so months, then endured the Hell you gave her for 18-21 years... I say my mom's yesterday, I'll probably be over there again tonight. Abd tomorrow we're going to get together at my sister's for the actual mother's day celebration.

I did do something today as well,  and I would encourage you to do it s well. I went through all my facebook contacts,  abd left a Mother's day wish on the walls of all my Facebook friends whom I know to be mothers. And it just about killed my phone's battery...

To the unknown person…

This is primarily addressed to a certain person. Saturday, I got a phone call form my mother that somebody called her and asked for me. It was replied that I don’t live there (which is true). I called the number on the caller ID, and it was a Magic Jack user with a Kent, WA telephone number. To satisfy my curiosity, I called it & I’ve never had an answer.

So, if you’re that person and you want to get a hold of me. I can tell that you have Magic Jack, which probably means that you have email. So why don’t you drop me a line at roger.a.bryant@gmail.com.

(I’ve no problem with publishing this email address on the internet). It was my reply to address when I was on usenet, and I’ve heared that Gmail has some very robust spam filtering onboard.

May the Fourth Be With You

So, it is apparently some sort of Star Wars day today. I suppose you could reach out to that Special Inept Imperial Officer and Force-Choke him (though I'm also partial to the Force - Bitchslap)....

May the Fourth be with you. Although having said that, LucasArts is jumping the shark in completely disregarding all the canon that built up all the years and in the video games. Episode 7 without Kyle Katarn? They might as well make Cousin Oliver and Ted McGinley Jedi Knights... 

Time for a breakthru

Hasn’t everyone felt like this before? Like you just wanted to make that connection to somebody.

Even if you haven’t, it’s still a good excuse for a Queen video. Although I’ve never had to have a reason to justify enjoying Queen…

So, what has happened this week?

Where do I start? Let’s just pick something and go with it:

• I’ve been looking at CenturyLink lately. Too many time ‘page cannot be displayed’ errors with Comcast. And I have serious issues with the proposed merger with Time/Warner. Less Competition = Higher Prices for less service. There is a story here in and of itself. When I put my current address in to CenturyLlink, I was told that I could get 3 mb speed. But I put the address that the apartment used to have, it came back with 40 meg speed (even faster than the cable). After talking with the local retail store manager, I decided to take a chance. And I’m now enjoying a speed that’s at least twice as fast as I was getting before. Hey Comcast, guess who’s dropping your not-so-high speed internet come Monday?
• If you use Mozilla Thunderbird, and have a hotmail address, hotmail now supports IMAP. Which is good, as when I check my mail on my phone/tablet, and I read a message, it will be marked as read on my computer as well. And CenturyLink has IMAP on their email (though it is not officially supported).
• For some reason, the live chat link on the Adobe Customer Care website is listed in the MVPS.org HOSTS file. I suspect it is there for a reason. They are definitely a special kind of stupid…
• I just had to retire my Saitek Cyborg 3D USB. For the past couple of years, one of the buttons hasn’t worked, but I held on to it because I’m left-handed, and this is one of the few joysticks that can be set up for left-handed use. It’s being replaced by a Thustmaster – T – 16000M (that’s what they called it) that I got from Worst Buy. It’s a little bit on the expensive side, but I got it because it has a hat switch, and most importantly, it can be configured for left-handed use…

Technorati Tags: The Moron-Bots at Adobe,Worst Buy,MVPS.org,Thunderbird,Comcrap,CenturyLink

On dealing with rabbits….

Some of us may have an issue with a certain rabbit tomorrow. May I remind that this type of rabbit is best dealt with using Sacred Relics:

Just because I need a laugh.

After I laid my cards on the table last week, I think I just need a good laugh. Nothing like Tom and Jerry for that:

This is actually one of my favorites. I’ve always want the ability to hock one so powerfully as to be able to shatter a vase from across the room….

An email was sent tonight.

And my cards are now on the table. Let the consequences come what may…

Opening night

And the Seattle Mariners won 10-3. For the past 8 seasons, they have won the opening night. And then they’ve choked it during the season. Seriously, they need to change there names to the Seattle Inept Imperial Officers. I almost want to say that they’re the laughing stock of The New World Order (Mind-Control Division). But then again they did have a winning pre-season.

I should also point out, that while the Mariners historically suck, they still put more points on the board in tonight’s game than Peyton Manning did during the Super Bowl. Now that’s gotta hurt…

It’s here

And I’m talking about the spaghetti harvest:

And yes, spaghetti does really grow on trees…

So, what all happened last week….

Last Monday was St. Patrick’s day. In Ireland, it is more of a religious holiday. In fact, up until 1970, all the pubs were closed on St. Patrick’s Day, and you went to church that day. It’s only in America that it’s celebrated with Green (actually St. Patrick’s color is blue), and excessive beer (which is ironic as St. Patrick’s Day is being celebrated during Lent this year, if you’re Catholic…). I’m not Catholic, nor  am I Irish. So I didn’t wear green, and I didn’t drink at all. I think it should be mentioned here that I no longer drink (alcohol is really pointless).

I’m watching Cosmos with Neil DeGrasse Tyson. He’s still no Carl Sagan, but he’s still making science interesting. The fact that he almost has a pornstache doesn’t hurt either… Carl Sagan introduced me to Johannes Kepler. Tyson has introduced me to Edmund Halley…

I renewed my phone contract a couple of months ago (I’ve already blogged about my new phone). And this week, my brother wanted to upgrade, too. So, he got his latest iPhone this week. And I had to be there, since it’s my account, and Sprint is rather strict about account holders…

And if you’re play Flight Simulator X, give yourself at least 15,000 feet before you barrel roll a jetliner. And while you’re at it, don’t hell dive the final appraoch…

Reconciling with pluto…

A few years back, I wrote about Pluto gaining midget status… Last week on Late Night with Seth Meyers, Neil deGrasse Tyson was on. Neil was part of the committee that relegated Pluto to midget status. Well, they finally buried the hatchet:

This may be just a late-night sketch, but there is a moral here. Always make peace with those around you. You don’t always have to agree with them 100 percent, but just get along. You can have a different opinion than your fellow man, and not have to come to blows….

Technorati Tags: Neil DeGrasse Tyson,Pluto

Finally, something good from the FOX Networks…

I remember growing up in a military family. While we were stationed in Germany in the early ‘80s, the only English speaking TV station was run by the US Army. Basically imagine getting NBC, ABC, CBS, and PBS all rolled up into one channel. What it meant to me basically was really kick-ass anime after school and Saturday mornings (I personally salute the head of programming just for that).

I remember this book called Cosmos on the living room coffee table, and I remember every Sunday morning, sneaking into my parents’ and playing the Atari 2600 (with their permission, of course), and then seeing this show featuring the planets Jupiter and Saturn and Stars and such. That was my first encounter with Carl Sagan. So every Sunday morning, I just had to see this show. I was hooked and I was only in the 4th grade.

My father’s military career progress, and we were eventually sent stateside, and on occasion every summer, KCTS would rerun Cosmos. And I would watch it religously. The time came for me to move out on my own, and I saw to it that that copy of Cosmos came with me. I even got a copy of Pale Blue Dot, Carl Sagan’s follow-up to Cosmos. When Carl Sagan died in 1996, I mourned.

Fast forward to yesterday. There’s a new version of (more of a sequel) Cosmos, host by Neil DeGrasse Tyson. I liked what I saw in that first episode, but Tyson has some shoes to fill. It is produced by Seth MacFarlene, so there’s hope of hearing Roger the Alien or Stewie Griffith describe the stars….

And yes, I only used Wikipedia links in this post. Sorry, I’m just lazy tonight…

Technorati Tags: Space,Cosmos,Carl Sagan,Neil DeGrasse Tyson,Roger the Alien

Almost Underway

The Seattle Sounders FC’s 40th season is almost about to get underway. I guess I know what I’m going to be doing for the next 90 minutes or so….

Yes, I know that they’ve only been in MLS for 5 years, but there was also this whole North American Soccer League….

Edit: as per the Standard Operating Procedures when facing Sporting KC, it went into the 4th minute of stoppage time before the game was decided. This why we dint give up, people....

I needed a candy bar today

Or a peice of Key Lime Pie. I was rather disappointed that Google decided to name the current version of Android Kit Kat rather than Key Lime Pie. I’m saying this because the Android upgrade for the Sprint HTC One has be released. And I decided to bite tonight, I was running the 420 Jelly Bean ROM singe I got my phone, and I was pretty happy with it. Enough that I stayed with Jelly Bean for a couple of weeks even when there were new ROMs coming out (applying a lesson learned not to leap straight into upgrades, especially when what I have already works). Then the 420 Kit Kat ROM came out, and I decided to try it out today. 8 hours later, I’ve given up on it, but I found a new rom: ViperOne. So far, I’m happy with it. There are a lot of tweaks (kinda like the LeeDroid tweaks in Gingerbread and Ice Cream Sandwich I had when I was running my EVO 3D). Also a plus is it’s easier to manage blinkfeed (I went with 420 because it was a Sense 5.0 Jelly Bean ROM that had blink feed disabled by default).

Kit Kat is good. Although I should add that I’ve said that about Jelly Bean, Ice Cream Sandwich, Gingerbread and Froyo…

The perfect storm....

By At work, there is a policy with regards to cell phones. Namely, don't use them. So I keep mine tuned off and in my locker. Abd so it was last night. I got off work abd I turned my phone back on. Abd it just kept boot-looping ad naseum. Normally this would be cause for concern, but I figured it was an issue the kernel I flashed, and I would just reflash the ROM as soon as I got home. I get home, turn the computer on,  and guess what. No boot. It did turn on, abd wishes loaded. It just wouldn't load the desktop. So i ended up having to wipe the tower, reinstall Windows just so I can flash the ROM on my phone (owing to space constraints, I haven't been keeping a copy of my ROM on my phone. I may visit that policy soon...)

But so far,  everything appears back to normal. I got all the settings restored back to my phone. Now I just have to reinstall everything back on my tower. Again. Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster for my 1 tB usb back up drive...

Edit: I hope I've nailed the problem with the tower not wanting to load. It appears to have been an issue with my Bluetooth adapter. After installing the software/driver for it & pairing my devices with my tower, my wireless keyboard stopped working. Upon rebooting, again the desktop didn't load. Until I pulled the Bluetooth adapter out...

Offense vs Defense....

Ok, the Denver Broncos brought the #1 offense in the NFL to the Super Bowl. And the Seahawks brought the #1 defense in the league to the game. Abd there is a reason why defense is what wins games. From the opening play safety too the interception taken to the house, Peyton Manning got his head handed to him on a silver platter. But enough about the Seahawks trouncing the Denver Broncos...

I had to work today. I thought about calling out (unlike previous employers, this one offers paid vacation and sick leave, abd I had accumulated enough of both that I could've called out. But I have these damn ethics, and so I showed up for work. Fortunately, my assigned post was near the tv, so I was able to catch most of the game...

One ring to rule them all, abd the Seahawks have it. For once, Seattle has a professional sports franchise that can not only make it the post season, but they can also not completely choke it...