February 2007

Almost had to go to work

rmiles7721February 22, 2007Site News

One of my cooks didn’t show up for work tonight. Fairly tense because for a little while there I thought I was going to have to go in and cook it myself. I ended up getting a waitress who can cook as well to do it. Actually it was two cooks, since the one that was scheduled is sick, so he traded with my other cook and then she didn’t show up. As far as I am concerned they both hung me, and they both know my policies on this, so someone else that just transferred to my store is going to end up with some unexpected hours this week and the two others can enjoy a nice small paycheck.

Asshats.

Right in the middle of Grey’s Anatomy too. Why did I allow myself to get sucked into this show anyway?

Vegas

rmiles7721February 22, 2007Travel

For awhile there it looked like there was going to be a blog meet in Las Vegas, but that sort of didn’t pan out. I would have loved to go, but really can’t afford it right now anyway. I have only been to Las Vegas once, 22 years ago. My friend Chris that passed away last years was in Construction Battalion in the Navy. He was based just north of Los Angeles for the last year that he was in, and at the end of one leave, he wanted to get his car back there from Atlanta, so I helped him drive out there, and then he flew me back. It took a few days and along the way we basically made three stops. We stopped to sleep in Texas once, we stopped at the Grand Canyon, and we also stopped in Las Vegas. It was the first time either of us had been there, so we spent a little extra time. We got a room at the Holiday Inn on the strip, and hung out at some of the casinos, checked out some of the sites, and looked at some of the Vegas homes.

It was about three months before my 18th birthday, but we didn’t have too many problems. I did manage to get carded at Caesars Palace, and they threw us out, but otherwise it was a pretty good trip.

I enjoyed the trip out there, and like most places I go to on vacation I wanted to move there for awhile. If I did, I think I would have to move into one of the high rise condos rather than a home. There are some pretty good deals on Las Vegas homes, but if I were to move somewhere like that, I think I would want it to be pretty low maintenance for me.

Tech Support

rmiles7721February 22, 2007Technology

I don’t know what it is, but once you have been in ANY kind of tech job, you are the free tech support person EVERYONE wants to be friends with. I actually did tech support for a few months in between running restaurants and working in our corporate office for a provider that contracted out to about 35 different ISPs. I also spent three and a half years in support for about 300 desktop users and about 850 remote locations. Four of us worked in the IT department. Every once in a while that could really become a headache.

Last week one of my waitresses that has worked with me for several years was asking me a question about her computer, one of the others was in there with her husband. They quickly asked “Do you work on computers?”. “Yes, but I charge $50 an hour”. They quickly shut up. Hell, $50 an hour is CHEAP. A couple of minutes later the husband asked if I could look at his TV. Now how the hell would I know anything about televisions. Mine quits working, I buy a new one. There’s the fix for that little problem.

Anyway, one of the other managers called me up a few minutes ago. He is an end user with no clue. That’s OK, sometimes they are easier to deal with than the guy that THINKS he has a clue and doesn’t want to listen to you. His Internet connection to Bellsouth is down, so I walked him through checking a couple of sites, then pinging a couple, as well as himself just to make sure TCP/IP was installed then ended up telling him to reset his modem, router, and computer and if it didn’t work to call Bellsouth since that’s what he is paying them for. I don’t mind helping out, but once that ten minute mark hits I start getting frustrated and they need to deal with someone else that they are paying, not me.

Day Off

rmiles7721February 22, 2007Site News

This splitting up my days off is weird. I went back to work today and didn’t feel like doing a damn thing. I managed to get everything done that needed doing prior to 2 PM, shot off to my meeting, and actually made it home by 5 PM. That’s great for a Thursday. So here I am. The wife and girls have gone to softball practice, so I figured that would give me the opportunity to catch up on some email and posting. I am also off tomorrow, that will be REALLY nice. I am keeping the four year old home with me tomorrow, so I won’t be spending the entire day blogging, but I am sure I will be able to squeeze some time in there somewhere.

I am in the middle of downloading and installing Windowblinds 5.5 from Object Desktop. It has been updated to be compatible with the 32bit version of Windows Vista. I mentioned the other day about Dreamscapes and Stardock Deskscapes. I made my own animated background the other day. I had the girls beating on the window shouting let me out, let me out, pulled that in from my camera, and converted the digital video to an mpeg that I am now using as my desktop background. Now it looks like the girls are beating on the inside of my monitor trying to get out. Pretty cool actually, and THEY loved it. I will try and get a capture of it tomorrow and upload it to youtube so you guys can see what Vista is capable of.

Anyway, it’s off to read email and click some links. I will post more later this evening I am sure. Not going back in for drawer change (for a change) so I will be around all evening if anyone wants to shoot the shit.

As Much As I Hate It…

rmiles7721February 22, 20077Site News

…I need to get off my butt and get ready for work. I am feeling really lazy today which sort of sucks as I will be cooking all day, and then have meetings all afternoon.

That was weird…

rmiles7721February 22, 2007Technology

…my computer just rebooted in the middle of doing the last post. Luckily Zoundry auto saves the posts, at least through the last complete sentence or something. When the system came back up I got one of those “Microsoft Windows has recovered from an unexpected shutdown” messages. The details were:

Problem signature:

Problem Event Name: BlueScreen

OS Version: 6.0.6000.2.0.0.256.1

Locale ID: 1033

Which I though was funny. No BSOD, just a message that tells me that I got one. I will have to run a scan of my hard drives while I am at work. That hasn’t happened before, so I am not really sure what is up.

Don’t forget, submit some questions today and I will do the webcast tomorrow. I have split my off days up, have to work this morning and evening, but I will be home again tomorrow.

All that is Wrong About Islam

rmiles7721February 21, 20072Site News

This is just awful. From Michelle Malkin:

A father killed his wife and four daughters in their sleep because he could not bear them adopting a more westernised lifestyle, an inquest heard yesterday.

Mohammed Riaz, 49, found it abhorrent that his eldest daughter wanted to be a fashion designer, and that she and her sisters were likely to reject the Muslim tradition of arranged marriages.

On Hallowe’en last year he sprayed petrol throughout their terraced home in Accrington, Lancs, and set it alight.

Caneze Riaz, 39, woke and tried to protect her three-year-old child, Hannah, who was sleeping with her, but was overcome by fumes. Her other daughters, Sayrah, 16, Sophia, 13, and Alisha, 10, died elsewhere in the house.

Riaz, who had spent the evening drinking, set himself on fire and died two days later.

Clockwise from top left: Caneze Riaz with daughters Sayrah, Alisha and Sophia, Father killed family for being too western
Clockwise from top left: Caneze Riaz with daughters Sayrah, Alisha and Sophia

Relatives broke the news to the couple’s son, Adam, 17, as he lay terminally ill with cancer at the Christie Hospital, Manchester. He died six weeks later.

I don’t care what religion you are or what you believe, but kiiling people just because they don’t believe in it as strongly as you do is just awful, or as Michelle puts it, monstrous. Oh, but this must not be one of the run of the mill muslims, he must be one of those rare birds known as an extremist, of which most muslims don’t belong. Yeah, right. Islam is all about converting the rest of the world, and those that aren’t converted end up as slaves, or dead. There are moderate muslims out there, and they need to take a long hard look at what their religion is promoting.

Countdown to Extinction


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Grey’s Anatomony

rmiles7721February 21, 2007Entertainment

I’ve been sucked in to another damn TV show. The wife has been watching it since last year, and I have caught bits and pieces of it over the last two weeks. The third part of three is on tonight tomorrow and I will probably get sucked into watching it as well.

Dinner is just about done. I’m just making a simple chicken and rice thing, the oldest girl has softball practice tonight, so we don’t want to wait too terribly long to eat. They have to leave in about 40 minutes.

I hate that my BeyondTV box is not connected to the TV now. It means that I have to record to my computer, but if it is over channel 100 I don’t get it and have to watch it in real time or miss it. The Sopranos should be starting again soon and I am a fan.

Flash for File Sharing

rmiles7721February 21, 20075Entertainment

I am trying to decide if I want to use this on my sidebar or not. It’s kind of cool, but it is limited in that I actually have to upload the files or music to a server and access it from there. It’s a flash widget from Box.net. It is actually kind of cool. It is a little big but I may be able to mess with the code to see if I can resize it. I did add some good thrashing tunes to listen to either way. If you want, you can get your own Box.net Widget at their web site.


Get your own Box.net widget and share anywhere!

Let me know what you think about it. I may stick it on the sidebar somewhere. Like I said, I can’t configure it for a bunch of music or anything. That would be pretty cool it it would serve up the stuff in my files directory. This was originally posted a couple of days ago, but I was able to take it as a paid opp today, so here it is again <g>.

Why Am I Still Awake?…

rmiles7721February 21, 2007Parenting/Family, Technology

…at 2:30 AM. 22 Hours after I got out of bed last.

Good question and one which doesn’t have a real clear answer other than the fact that sometimes I am a dumb ass of the third degree. Actually I have a black belt in dumbassery.

I got up at the usual time yesterday, about 4:30 AM or so. Surfed the web, posted a little bullshit, a couple of paid ads, drank coffee. Normally I will hit the shower between 5:30 and 6:00. Since I work so much closer to home now it has more often than not been closer to 6 AM. Then I go to work, getting there by 6:30. I was pretty worn out by the time the first shift was over so I locked everything up, picked up the four year old and came home. I attempted to nap for awhile, but was only partially successful.

I had to go back to work at 8:30 to oversee the next shift change and finish the paperwork that I had locked in the office earlier in the day. Count all of the food in the restaurant, count the money, make up my bank deposit so I could drop it at the bank on the way home. Deal with 100 stupid things that needed to be dealt with. It was around midnight when I finally got home. Very rarely can I just come home from work and go to bed. I have to have a bit of wind down time. Normally that’s spent on the computer. I posted some more, and surfed for a few minutes.

Unfortunately the four year old is developing a pretty nasty cough. I took her to the doctor late last week and they said she was coming down with a cold, so we have been fighting that. I am letting her sleep on the couch tonight, she is pretty congested and will sleep better reclining than being flat on her back. That I guess is the main reason I am still up listening to her cough. She’s had some medicine now though, hopefully she will start sleeping a little better, because I am getting pretty droopy here. Nodding off and making all sorts of typing errors. Thank god for spell check. Now if it could just check my grammar and post for me too, all would be well in my world.

I was going to keep her home Friday and spend tomorrow sleeping in, but I may reverse that and keep her here tomorrow. I have someone’s laptop to fix, and taxes to do for one of my waitresses, as well as a couple of netflix DVDs that I still need to copy and send back, so that I can watch them later. I don’t guess I will be getting much in the way of rest tomorrow. One can only hope that they let me sleep in for at least a little while. Since the girl is sick, if she stays home she may sleep in as well. I damn sure am keeping my fingers crossed.