unsolicited mail

short stories

2009-07-07T21:31:00.000-05:00

linking to my other place and back and forth again. two short stories and explanations

http://www.jakestephens.net/thoughts/index.html

in response to the idea of wishing someone luck

2009-02-09T09:53:00.001-06:00

I don't like wishing people luck when it comes to things that require skill. I thought about it and have this to say:

"There is luck when creating, I know that. I try to avoid framing it as such, however, as it takes the power out of us and places it on a pedestal which we can’t reach. Going back to that place where we inhale divine breath of inspiration requires often either ecstatic exercise, whereby we are forced to gulp it down as quickly as it comes, gasping and rattling form the exertion, or to breath slowly, regularly, and intentionally, allowing the power to infuse and suffuse within us.

The former can be a more powerful and profound experience, but it requires us to simply wait to be hit in the head with the anvil and observe the constellations that appear before our eyes and can often lead to the mistaken idea that it was the anvil – the outside force – that acted, Newtonian, upon us. This can lead to drug addiction and superstitious habits of magic pens, notebooks, places, and typewriters.

The latter requires much more cultivation and discipline and can appear to the uninitiated as a boring and uninspired way to create. It is true that the elixir that comes from this alchemy is oftentimes less potent than its ecstatic counterpart, due to its carefully crafted nature, but it takes form and shape through force of will and intensity of purpose that comes from within.

The truth is that both of these endeavors arise from our own mind, as does the world and we have to be both able to be disciplined and ecstatic so as to carefully craft both the pure form of the creative element and the untamed elements, then take these reagents and allow them, with proper heating and cooling in a sacred vessel, to react to each other in unexpectedly formulaic, arcanely mundane ways.

Inspiration is one part inhalation, one part exhalation, one part exaltation, and the rest is probably hard work, but mostly just happy accidents."

do it now! this i command!

2008-12-06T08:53:00.001-06:00

How many times do you use it? You know you do. Support them and all of us!

Please?

fecund times

2008-12-01T16:05:00.001-06:00

muchtoomuch to do. been to long. will get this damnable contraption to work by the fair. oh wait, that's beauty and the beast. anyhow. posting depth charge and about facing to the left hand terminal. arbitrary shifting noncompensating dampener thimble gristle torn and whistle. let's all dance dance dance.

2008-04-16T09:18:00.003-05:00

Idea for the day:

Save a chunk of the world political/topographic map to your desktop and learn geography while you work.

One thing I am grateful for this morning:

Flow. That state of grace that entails peak experience; for me, it is when I create, be it music, art, songs, or poems. I've even lapsed into the state while woodworking, so for me, it is very much about creation. My mind quiets and even though there is chatter it is constructive chatter, urging and guiding. I can see the item that I will create and I keep moving things around until it feels right. For digital art, I rather enjoy mixing up a lot of images and pixels then moving them around until my mind creates a shape or an idea, then flow turns on. Click, clickclicklcikdargclickclickdragundoclickclickundofaderedoclick and before you know it, there it is. The piece I did, mapping the stars, was like that, as was the Autumn King as was the random numbers piece. I'll get that printed one day... ten feet by ten feet. Wonderful.

Well, I am at work and in the IT zone, so more later.

alternative views

2007-10-17T14:13:00.001-05:00

http://www.projectcensored.org/censored_2008/index.htm

more thoughts on the will to power

2007-10-17T14:01:00.000-05:00

another email, this one about power and who has it. why we're all so apathetic and complacent... and overworked and unable or unwilling to try and see what's really going on. without further ado, here comes the sun:

-------------------------------

I really don’t know. Perhaps if we all become more educated, concerned, and, most importantly, involved? But we’ve got other responsibilities. Imagine if wealth were distributed more equitably across the spectrum; if we all went home with a greater percentage in our pockets while CEO’s and Board Members of various companies got less. Imagine if the working poor continued to work, but was not just able to subsist.. if our minimum wage was enough to, if both parents worked, pay the bills and for child care? Imagine that we didn’t have to work two jobs to be able to afford a house and “The American Dream”. Now, imagine… would any of us voluntarily give up that extra time to participate in government?

Judging from the number of people that I’ve heard complain about jury duty, how ineffective voting is, and never attend local town/city hall meetings, I’m guessing few or none. How do we motivate our citizens to get involved? We certainly can’t be compelled by law… we do have state-run educational institutions… and yet, they teach kids to be compliant, unimaginative, to take sides unfairly and arbitrarily based upon silly divisions such as geography or chronological age, and not to be creative, concerned, involved, or educated in the operation, protection, and upholding of our Constitution, both state and federal.

Who has the power? Who wants to keep the power? Who should have the power? Who wants the power? Who has the means to acquire the power? Who has the power to take the power?

Like in Fahrenheit 451, people want their choices to be simple. Fewer choices makes it easy, especially if they can be made without thinking – vote for the side you always vote for or for the one that has the best hair… eventually, people won’t want any choice at all, they just want to go back to having fun and not worrying.

Toward the end of the Roman Empire, citizens worked one-two days to pay their taxes… while armies of slaves took care of all the work. In my opinion, consider the CEO’s and corporate higher ups to be the only real citizens of the US, since they are the only ones who can really exercise a vote with their almighty dollar. Us? well, we’re just the slaves that have to keep the gears greased and turning. Thank goodness we have other slaves to make our food, mow our lawns, change our oil, take care of our children, and wipe our asses when we get too old to do it ourselves.

In the words of Rage Against the Machine, “We gotta take the power back.” and “What better place than here? What better time than now?”

Was Heidegger a bastard?

2007-10-17T12:57:00.000-05:00

This is an email that I sent Eric the other day. Probably get my house firebombed by Rush Limbaugh... Nah, it's pretty innocuous.

I'll just cut and paste and do no editing. Eric's email had been something to the effect of well if you had been around when the Nazi's were in power, you'd have gone along with them (it wasn't a slam, just an observation). We were talking about Heidegger after I mentioned trying to learn Spanish and Eric said he could read a little German and Latin... at any rate, I'm becoming long-winded:

--------------------------------------

I would’ve been a Nazi at the time. Much the same way as most of us stand idly by and keep our heads down while the “Patriot Act” is still on the books, and journalists are strong-armed into revealing their sources in the name of “Counter Terrorism”. SO, much the same as the German citizens who claimed, after the war, “we just did what we were told, we had no idea it was that bad”, we go on thinking that Arabs in general are not to be trusted and that the USA is AOK while our CEO (I won’t give him the title of President, he doesn’t deserve it and longer) goes on the books and down in history as officially condoning torture of prisoners. Meanwhile, we are left to consider the things that affect us more day to day, like our jobs and friends and local IT policies.

So, no, I’m not blaming Marty. If I were in his position and Unkle Adolf walks in and says, “Hey, you’re smart, we want you to be our official smart person spokesperson,” even if you think the guy is insane (especially if you think he’s insane actually), there’s no way you’ll turn him down. You’ll thank him for the honor and go about your business, just trying to keep on keeping on, all the while watching your back and hoping it doesn’t get any worse.

Then history makes you into a bastard.

On the other hand, Mr. Sartre can sit in his smoky underground resistance lair and pen all kinds of goodies about responsibility and taking it. Since he’s on the side that can get killed for saying boo… why not go the distance and really lay it on thick? So, Sartre (who was actually involved in the resistance, I’m not calling him a weak-kneed academic) goes down in history as a hero who stood up for his cause and Heidegger goes down in history as Nazi scum. Ironically enough, they’re both Existentialists whose works I greatly admire.

Much like Americans during the time of McCarthyism, and Germans during the Third Reich, think that we’ll look back one day and shake our heads in shame that we let it go that far. Much like Senator Joe finding commies, I think most Americans think Crazy W will just give up if he finds one more terrorist… if he shreds one more amendment to the Constitution.

So, actually, I said it also for humor, but I also chide myself for not being more like Sartre than Heidegger. However, we’re more in the boat of the Germans than the French (insert your own joke there), so we don’t have the “luxury” of being able to put our finger solidly upon something for which we stand, since there’s no oppressor’s boot in our face, rather a velvet glove around our throat.

Vista SP1 is coming

2007-09-06T08:51:00.000-05:00

I'm sure that anyone who uses Vista will appreciate that SP1 is coming in the second half of 2007. Better domain performance, better coping and extraction of files, better hibernate and resume funtionality... all the stuff that you'd expect from a first service pack. I may actually start deploying it on something other than the laptops at work.

And for those that are using VIsta now, and are irritated becuase you can't find a quick way to access the network settings quiclly in Vista, well I have the answer for you. You used to be able to just right click and go to properties for My Network Places and hey presto... now, you have to right-click, go to Network and SHaring Center and then go to Manage Network Connections, and then finally you get to the network properties. Well, mein freund, it's easy when you know the command. I poked around a bit in the SYSTEM32 directory, looking for CPL files (Control Panel) and EXE's of interest. The old standby's are all there - throwbacks to an older time, like MAIN.CPL which is the mouse properties and DESK.CPL which is the Display Properties... then I started taking note of new CPL applets... and one-by-one I tried them and finally had the answer and the quick way to start it: at any Command or Run Prompt, just put in NCPA.CPL and TADA!!! you have the network connections folder at your fingertips.

NOW THAT'S A HAPPY DEVELOPMENT! W00t!

arrrrgh!!!

2007-02-05T15:17:00.000-06:00

Eric and I had joked around previously about how I don't like pretty much anything Victorian, particulalry the novels, stating that they needed more excitement - you know, ninjas or pirates or something (I'm paraphrasing the conversation to make this all sound like my idea). So Eric mentioned that while watching the show on PBS this weekend, he "kept thinking 'this would be the perfect time for Ninjas to show up- or maybe pirates.'" So I obliged both of our fantasies with this image. I thought that it turned out well.

Apropos of their sneakiness, pictures of ninjas were harder to come by than scantily clad women in pirate outfits. ^_^

"server transmogrification: how I played the shell game and won," a play in five acts

2007-02-01T16:02:00.000-06:00

server transmogrification: how I played the shell game and won a play in five acts

cast of characters:
The Sysop (MSCE Extraordinaire)
The Sysop’s PC (Dell Optiplex 745, Vista Workstation)
The Sysop’s Home PC (Homegrown goodness)
The Sysop’s Wife (Beautiful, classy, and sassy)
The New Server (Dell PowerEdge 2900)
The RAC (Dell Remote Access Controller)
The Old Server (Dell PowerEdge SC1420)
The Switch (Cisco Catalyst 3560G Managed switch)
The Terminal Server (Old Windows2000 DC)
The Backup (external 80GB USB hard drive)
The Old Install CD (Small Business Server media)
The Floppy (Floppy disk with RAID drivers)
The Temporary O/S (Windows XP Volume License and key)
The New Install CD (SBS 2003 R2 Upgrade)
The Transition CD’s (SBS 2003 Transition Pack CD 1 &2)
The New CAL’s (3 SBS 2003 CAL Transition Packs)
The Terminal Server (Old Windows2000 DC)

Prologue:
In fair Viroqua where we lay our scene, a production environment, which utilizes four servers in three locations. The Old Server, an aging king, must be succeeded by his stalwart son – a dual processing, quad core warrior, who will lead the kingdom to ever-greater heights. The succession must happen during off-hours. The Sysop, who desires nothing more than to work his arcane magic from afar, so at to be able to kick back and enjoy the comforts of his abode rather than the fluorescent oppression of the office, must complete the succession in secret so that the citizens of the kingdom never know that the Old King was deposed and the New King has been seated on the throne, for all know that the people are a superstitious lot and if they know that succession is to occur, their panic may cause the kingdom to crumble. Thusly do we begin as the Sysop develops the spells necessary to make the change remotely, legally, and seamlessly…

ACT I – Thursday’s Preparations

Act I, Scene I, The RAC sings:
Thursday Morning, The Sysop’s Office
Enter Stage Right: The New Server, The Old Server, The Switch, The Backup, The Sysop PC

The New Server is setup and tested to be sure that all hardware was working, during which time the BIOS is set to boot first to CD, then to RAID, then to floppy. The RAC is setup to use a static IP. The RAID is configured as RAID5 with a hot spare because The Sysop is never too careful. Console access is obtained from The Sysop PC via browser. The Sysop giggles maniacally, then sets up a dedicated port on The Switch for The Older Server, The New Server, and The RAC.

Act I, Scene II, The Sysop PC creates Images:
Later Thursday, The Sysop’s Office
Enter stage right, The New Install CD and The Transition CD; enter stage left, The Sysop PC and The Backup

The Sysop PC makes ISO images of the The New Install CD and The Transition CD 1&2 and the Dell Drive CD using free ISO recorder software. These images are placed on The Backup, along with free ISO mounting software and text file with keys for upgrades. The ADPREP folder is copied from The Transition CD2 to The Old Server. From the console of The Old Server ADPREP /ForestPrep is run successfully, receiving the following information:

Opened Connection to The Old Server
SSPI Bind succeeded
Current Schema Version is 30
Upgrading schema to version 31
Connecting to "The Old Server"
Logging in as current user using SSPI
Importing directory from file "C:\WINDOWS\system32\sch31.ldf”
Loading entries.............................................
............................................................
139 entries modified successfully.
The command has completed successfully
Adprep successfully updated the forest-wide information…

A little giddy, The Sysop begins to giggle.

Act I, Scene III, The Temporary O/S and The Backup make ready for the assault
Even Later Thursday, The Sysop’s Office
Light come up on an already occupied stage, The New Server and The RAC wait patiently. The Temporary O/S and The Floppy enter whistling.

The New Server is loaded with The Temporary O/S with the help of The Floppy, during which The New Server takes on a temporary name. After the final reboot, the system’s firewall is turned off and The Old Install CD is placed in the drive.

Enter The Backup, Stage Left, The Floppy exits, stage right

The Backup is connected to The New Server. Both lie in wait.

ACT II – Friday’s Backup

Act II, Scene I, The Backup makes good, The Floppy gets updated
Friday, day’s end, The Sysop’s Office

Enter The OId Server, Stage Left

Via Remote Desktop, The Drive Mapping is created on The Older Server, mapping to The Backup on The New Server utilizing the NET USE command and the administrative share name for the backup. The Sysop logs on to the third-party spam service utilized by The Sysop’s company, mumbling about their lousy customer service and how much he hates them overall and how he’s looking forward to dropping their crap services when their contract is up, and sets the system to spool all incoming messages durint the down-time.

The Sysop then runs an ASR backup on The Old Server, using The Floppy as the destination for the ASR files and The Mapped Drive as the Destination. After the backup is begun, The Floppy, now pregnant with RAID and ASR files exits.

Exit The Sysop and The Floppy stage left.

The Sysop verifies the backup is running properly and giggle maniacally again.

Act II, Scene II, The Stage is set for revolution
Later, The Sysop’s Office

As the lights come up The Floppy enter stage right; The New Server, disguised as a workstation sits and waits.

The clickety clack of data backing up The Backup fills the air as The Sysop places The Floppy in The New Server and heads for home.

Exit, The Sysop, Stage right

ACT III – Saturday’s Uprising

Act III, Scene I: Hallowed be thy remote
Saturday Morning, The Sysop’s Home

As the lights come up, The Sysop can be seen logging on to the network viaThe Terminal Server in the Production Environment. He piggybacks over to The Sysop PC via Remote Desktop.

Beer in hand, The Sysop logs on and verifies that the ASR Backup has completed on The Old Server. The Switch is logged onto and the port for The Old Server and The New Server are disabled for the time being. He then uses The RAC on The New Server to reboot the system, being sure to “Press Any Key to Boot to CD,” “Press F6 to load a Third Party RAID Driver,” and “Press F2 to begin ASR process.” With The Floppy in the drive, The New Server gets a healthy dose of RAID Drivers and ASR configuration. When asked for the location of the backup files, The Backup, which has patiently bided its time, springs to the forefront, fat with data. The restore begins in earnest. The Sysop giggles maniacally.

Act III, Scene II: The driver dance
Later Saturday Morning, The Sysop’s Home

Softly humming “The Safety Dance” The Sysop enters stage right and sits at the Sysop’s Home PC.

The restore process has ended and The New Server has rebooted, looking suspiciously like The Old Server. The Sysop mounts the driver CD and installs various and sundry drivers, ignoring the remark that the hardware has changed significantly on the system and that it need to be reactivated. He thinks out loud to no one in particular – “You won’t be running the same O/S long enough to worry about not having the right license, my friend.” Then he laughs manically and goes to get another beer

Exit The Sysop stage right.

Act III, Scene III: Hold all my calls
Later Saturday, The Sysop’s Home

Re-enter The Sysop stage right.

Still working via Terminal Services, The Sysop guzzles his beer and disables The Old Server’s port on The Switch, to make sure that no other systems notice that he is going to secretly replace the server they’ve normally been drinking with a new cup of coffee. But to make sure that all remains legal, he has to deal with the old OEM license. He cracks his fingers and heads out for another beer.

ACT IV – The Old Switcheroo

Act IV, Scene I: Time for your shot
Saturday Afternoon, The Sysop’s Home

Enter The Sysop stage right, yet another beer in hand, hummin, to his surprise, an old Queenrsryche tune. Worried that he is getting too drunk, he starts up some music on The Sysop’s Home PC and returns to the task at hand.

The New Install CD is now mounted on The New Server. Exchange 2003 has Service Pack 2 applied, and SharePoint doesn’t need it because it’s already been applied. SBS Server gets updated to R2 and is rebooted. Nervous that he may be sobering up The Sysop scurries for a beer.

Act IV, Scene II: Transitional Mogrification
Later Saturday Afternoon, The Sysop’s Home

Enter The Sysop, stage right, holding two beers. He staggers to his seat and mumbles.

“Where’s my checklist? Oh yeah yeah yeah, I got it. Transition Pack. HAH!”

The Sysop mounts The Transition Pack CD 1 and enters the key from the text file on The Backup. He starts the setup process, specifies the key and enters the admin password so that the system can reboot of its own accord. He sits and waits, clicking OK every here and there when warned that services or drivers did not load, mumbles, belches, and surfs “educational” sites on the Internet while waiting.

The Sysop falls asleep as the lights go down.

Act IV, Scene III: Transitional Dreams
Late Saturday Afternoon, The Sysop’s Home

The lights come up dimly and fog floods the stage, The Sysop sits at The Sysop’s Home PC, clicking mechanically, eyes closed. He mutters and grunts.

Above his head, visions of failed upgrades and arcane errors dance. Red glowing X’s. Angry flashing FAILED Signs. The Sysop slumbers on while the upgrade continues. At one point he raises his head and clicks OK when the server worries about bad things happening. The dream ends and The Sysop rises to go to the bathroom.

Exit The Sysop stage right.

Act IV, Scene IV: Transitional Realities
Early Saturday Evening, The Sysop’s Home

Enter The Sysop stage right, espresso in hand. Reseated and now very serious he begins the process that affects other servers in the enterprise.

The Sysop now enables the port for The New Server, now running Server 2003 Service Pack 1, on The Switch. He minimizes his RDP connection and runs REPLMON from The Terminal Server and forces Active Directory Replication between The Terminal Server and The New Server. Satisfied when it completes, he closes his Terminal Services session and vows to complete the task tomorrow.

ACT V – Dénouement

Act V, Scene I: Satisfaction
Saturday Evening, Out on the Town

The lights come up and The Sysop can be seen having dinner with his The Sysop’s Wife , flushed with success. Soft music plays and the scene fades.

Act V, Scene II: Activate the sleeper cell
Sunday Morning, The Sysop’s House

Enter The Sysop stage right, drinking espresso and casually rubbing his head, smiling. He logs on to The Terminal Server and picks up where he left off.

Windows is successfully activated, since the system is now running a valid FPP license. The Transition CD 2 is mounted and setup continues. After warnings that his head may explode or his dog may die if the upgrade goes awry, Server2003 R2 setup is run and completed successfully. The Sysop peers at the clock wondering if it is too early to have a beer.

Exit The Sysop stage right

Act V, Scene III: Testing the services
Later Sunday Morning, The Sysop’s House

Enter The Sysop stage right, drinking a water, since it’s still pretty early.

After The Upgrade Process is complete, the spam filtering agency is contacted and the system is taken of Spooling. Test emails are sent to verify connectivity. The Sysop connects to several PC’s in the domain and logs on as an end-user to verify that Group Policy is applying and things like Folder Redirection and drive mappings are occurring. Satisfied that all is operational and working fine, The Sysop pats himself on the back and rechecks the time, which is now 12:01PM. Grinning he rises and walks out.

Exit The Sysop stage right. Moments pass and he returns, with A Beer.

Smiling to himself, The Sysop drinks his beer and logs off all of his sessions. He raises his can and whispers. “The King is dead, long live the King.” He smiles knowing that The Old Server will have new adventures in the weeks to come, being deployed as a minor Duke in a Branch Office, but that, is another story…

Curtain call.
FIN

"server transmogrification: how I played the shell game and won," a play in five acts

2007-02-01T15:52:00.000-06:00

server transmogrification: how I played the shell game and won
a play in five acts

cast of characters:
The Sysop (MSCE Extraordinaire)
The Sysop’s PC (Dell Optiplex 745, Vista Workstation)
The Sysop’s Home PC (Homegrown goodness)
The Sysop’s Wife (Beautiful, classy, and sassy)
The New Server (Dell PowerEdge 2900)
The RAC (Dell Remote Access Controller)
The Old Server (Dell PowerEdge SC1420)
The Switch (Cisco Catalyst 3560G Managed switch)
The Terminal Server (Old Windows2000 DC)
The Backup (external 80GB USB hard drive)
The Old Install CD (Small Business Server media)
The Floppy (Floppy disk with RAID drivers)
The Temporary O/S (Windows XP Volume License and key)
The New Install CD (SBS 2003 R2 Upgrade)
The Transition CD’s (SBS 2003 Transition Pack CD 1 &2)
The New CAL’s (3 SBS 2003 CAL Transition Packs)
The Terminal Server (Old Windows2000 DC)

Prologue:
In fair Viroqua where we lay our scene, a production environment, which utilizes four servers in three locations. The Old Server, an aging king, must be succeeded by his stalwart son – a dual processing, quad core warrior, who will lead the kingdom to ever-greater heights. The succession must happen during off-hours. The Sysop, who desires nothing more than to work his arcane magic from afar, so at to be able to kick back and enjoy the comforts of his abode rather than the fluorescent oppression of the office, must complete the succession in secret so that the citizens of the kingdom never know that the Old King was deposed and the New King has been seated on the throne, for all know that the people are a superstitious lot and if they know that succession is to occur, their panic may cause the kingdom to crumble. Thusly do we begin as the Sysop develops the spells necessary to make the change remotely, legally, and seamlessly…

ACT I – Thursday’s Preparations

Act I, Scene I, The RAC sings:
Thursday Morning, The Sysop’s Office
Enter Stage Right: The New Server, The Old Server, The Switch, The Backup, The Sysop PC

The New Server was setup and tested to be sure that all hardware was working, during which time the BIOS is set to boot first to CD, then to RIAD, then to floppy. The RAC is setup to use a static IP. The RAID is configured as RAID5 with a hot spare because The Sysop is never too careful. Console access is obtained from The Sysop PC via browser. The Sysop giggles maniacally, then sets up a dedicated port on The Switch for The Older Server, The New Server, and The RAC.

Act I, Scene II, The Sysop PC creates Images:
Later Thursday, The Sysop’s Office
Enter stage right, The New Install CD and The Transition CD; enter stage left, The Sysop PC and The Backup

The Sysop PC makes ISO images of the The New Install CD and The Transition CD 1&2 and the Dell Drive CD using free ISO recorder software. These images are placed on The Backup, along with free ISO mounting software and text file with keys for upgrades. The ADPREP folder is copied from The Transition CD2 to The Old Server. From the console of The Old Server ADPREP /ForestPrep is run successfully, receiving the following information:

Opened Connection to The Old Server
SSPI Bind succeeded
Current Schema Version is 30
Upgrading schema to version 31
Connecting to "The Old Server"
Logging in as current user using SSPI
Importing directory from file "C:\WINDOWS\system32\sch31.ldf”
Loading entries.............................................
............................................................
139 entries modified successfully.
The command has completed successfully
Adprep successfully updated the forest-wide information…

A little giddy, The Sysop begins to giggle.

Act I, Scene III, The Temporary O/S and The Backup make ready for the assault
Even Later Thursday, The Sysop’s Office
Light come up on an already occupied stage, The New Server and The RAC wait patiently. The Temporary O/S and The Floppy enter whistling.

The New Server is loaded with The Temporary O/S with the help of The Floppy, during which The New Server takes on a temporary name. After the final reboot, the system’s firewall is turned off and The Old Install CD is placed in the drive.

Enter The Backup, Stage Left, The Floppy exits, stage right

The Backup is connected to The New Server. Both lie in wait.

ACT II – Friday’s Backup

Act II, Scene I, The Backup makes good, The Floppy gets updated
Friday, day’s end, The Sysop’s Office

Enter The OId Server, Stage Left

Via Remote Desktop, The Drive Mapping is created on The Older Server, mapping to The Backup on The New Server utilizing the NET USE command and the administrative share name for the backup. The Sysop logs on to the third-party spam service utilized by The Sysop’s company, mumbling about their lousy customer service and how much he hates them overall and how he’s looking forward to dropping their crap services when their contract is up, and sets the system to spool all incoming messages durint the down-time.

The Sysop then runs an ASR backup on The Old Server, using The Floppy as the destination for the ASR files and The Mapped Drive as the Destination. After the backup is begun, The Floppy, now pregnant with RAID and ASR files exits.

Exit The Sysop and The Floppy stage left.

The Sysop verifies the backup is running properly and giggle maniacally again.

Act II, Scene II, The Stage is set for revolution
Later, The Sysop’s Office

As the lights come up The Floppy enter stage right; The New Server, disguised as a workstation sits and waits.

The clickety clack of data backing up The Backup fills the air as The Sysop places The Floppy in The New Server and heads for home.

Exit, The Sysop, Stage right

ACT III – Saturday’s Uprising

Act III, Scene I: Hallowed be thy remote
Saturday Morning, The Sysop’s Home

As the lights come up, The Sysop can be seen logging on to the network viaThe Terminal Server in the Production Environment. He piggybacks over to The Sysop PC via Remote Desktop.

Beer in hand, The Sysop logs on and verifies that the ASR Backup has completed on The Old Server. The Switch is logged onto and the port for The Old Server and The New Server are disabled for the time being. He then uses The RAC on The New Server to reboot the system, being sure to “Press Any Key to Boot to CD,” “Press F6 to load a Third Party RAID Driver,” and “Press F2 to begin ASR process.” With The Floppy in the drive, The New Server gets a healthy dose of RAID Drivers and ASR configuration. When asked for the location of the backup files, The Backup, which has patiently bided its time, springs to the forefront, fat with data. The restore begins in earnest. The Sysop giggles maniacally.

Act III, Scene II: The driver dance
Later Saturday Morning, The Sysop’s Home

Softly humming “The Safety Dance” The Sysop enters stage right and sits at the Sysop’s Home PC.

The restore process has ended and The New Server has rebooted, looking suspiciously like The Old Server. The Sysop mounts the driver CD and installs various and sundry drivers, ignoring the remark that the hardware has changed significantly on the system and that it need to be reactivated. He thinks out loud to no one in particular – “You won’t be running the same O/S long enough to worry about not having the right license, my friend.” Then he laughs manically and goes to get another beer

Exit The Sysop stage right.

Act III, Scene III: Hold all my calls
Later Saturday, The Sysop’s Home

Re-enter The Sysop stage right.

Still working via Terminal Services, The Sysop guzzles his beer and disables The Old Server’s port on The Switch, to make sure that no other systems notice that he is going to secretly replace the server they’ve normally been drinking with a new cup of coffee. But to make sure that all remains legal, he has to deal with the old OEM license. He cracks his fingers and heads out for another beer.

ACT IV – The Old Switcheroo

Act IV, Scene I: Time for your shot
Saturday Afternoon, The Sysop’s Home

Enter The Sysop stage right, yet another beer in hand, hummin, to his surprise, an old Queenrsryche tune. Worried that he is getting too drunk, he starts up some music on The Sysop’s Home PC and returns to the task at hand, tapping his foot to The Dresden Dolls.

The New Install CD is now mounted on The New Server. Exchange 2003 has Service Pack 2 applied, and SharePoint doesn’t need it because it’s already been applied. SBS Server gets updated to R2 and is rebooted. Nervous that he may be sobering up The Sysop scurries for a beer.

Act IV, Scene II: Transitional Mogrification
Later Saturday Afternoon, The Sysop’s Home

Enter The Sysop, stage right, holding two beers. He staggers to his seat and mumbles.

“Where’s my checklist? Oh yeah yeah yeah, I got it. Transition Pack. HAH!”

The Sysop mounts The Transition Pack CD 1 and enters the key from the text file on The Backup. He starts the setup process, specifies the key and enters the admin password so that the system can reboot of its own accord. He sits and waits, clicking OK every here and there when warned that services or drivers did not load, mumbles, belches, and surfs “educational” sites on the Internet while waiting.

The Sysop falls asleep as the lights go down.

Act IV, Scene III: Transitional Dreams
Late Saturday Afternoon, The Sysop’s Home

The lights come up dimly and fog floods the stage, The Sysop sits at The Sysop’s Home PC, clicking mechanically, eyes closed. He mutters and grunts.

Above his head, visions of failed upgrades and arcane errors dance. Red glowing X’s. Angry flashing FAILED Signs. The Sysop slumbers on while the upgrade continues. At one point he raises his head and clicks OK when the server worries about bad things happening. The dream ends and The Sysop rises to go to the bathroom.

Exit The Sysop stage right.

Act IV, Scene IV: Transitional Realities
Early Saturday Evening, The Sysop’s Home

Enter The Sysop stage right, espresso in hand. Reseated and now very serious he begins the process that affects other servers in the enterprise.

The Sysop now enables the port for The New Server, now running Server 2003 Service Pack 1, on The Switch. He minimizes his RDP connection and runs REPLMON from The Terminal Server and forces Active Directory Replication between The Terminal Server and The New Server. Satisfied when it completes, he closes his Terminal Services session and vows to complete the task tomorrow.

ACT V – Dénouement

Act V, Scene I: Satisfaction
Saturday Evening, Out on the Town

The lights come up and The Sysop can be seen having dinner with his The Sysop’s Wife , flushed with success. Soft music plays and the scene fades.

Act V, Scene II: Activate the sleeper cell
Sunday Morning, The Sysop’s House

Enter The Sysop stage right, drinking espresso and casually rubbing his head, smiling. He logs on to The Terminal Server and picks up where he left off.

Windows is successfully activated, since the system is now running a valid FPP license. The Transition CD 2 is mounted and setup continues. After warnings that his head may explode or his dog may die if the upgrade goes awry, Server2003 R2 setup is run and completed successfully. The Sysop peers at the clock wondering if it is too early to have a beer.

Exit The Sysop stage right

Act V, Scene III: Testing the services
Later Sunday Morning, The Sysop’s House

Enter The Sysop stage right, drinking a water, since it’s still pretty early.

After The Upgrade Process is complete, the spam filtering agency is contacted and the system is taken of Spooling. Test emails are sent to verify connectivity. The Sysop connects to several PC’s in the domain and logs on as an end-user to verify that Group Policy is applying and things like Folder Redirection and drive mappings are occurring. Satisfied that all is operational and working fine, The Sysop pats himself on the back and rechecks the time, which is now 12:01PM. Grinning he rises and walks out.

Exit The Sysop stage right. Moments pass and he returns, with A Beer.

Smiling to himself, The Sysop drinks his beer and logs off all of his sessions. He raises his can and whispers. “The King is dead, long live the King.” He smiles knowing that The Old Server will have new adventures in the weeks to come, being deployed as a minor Duke in a Branch Office, but that, is another story…

Curtain call.

FIN

put it in escrow

2006-12-22T15:23:00.000-06:00

http://www.jakestephens.net is now alive... no content... but c'mon, I done bought it shore enough!

torpedo hash melanoma

2006-12-21T09:06:00.000-06:00

thanks to john mundt over at www.johnmundtesquire.com for mentioning my loquacion location to the wider world. john draws groovy picutures and is a funny guy. and yes i know loquacion is not a word. if you've read any of the other posts, you know that's not a problem for me.

i always worry that people just think i can't splel propoperly.

sure as chimbling rabidity, i'm back to the world at large - keep it real ya'll.

it came from the shower...

2006-12-20T10:22:00.000-06:00

where all of my interesting thoughts appear, the water, this sprang from me today:

metastatial reprise

as certain and unchanging as the black to grey moment before the dawn,
when realization colors the sky rosy fingered and eyes fill with sand,
this wheel eternally returns, bringing us back to the same realizations,
over and over and over,
overturning, underturning,
pinning us to the onionskin of life’s appearance like gravity

proof, he calls it, of god’s non-existence is just as certain,
but he knows and i know that it’s just as certainly uncertain:
the path of a raindrop,
a single piece of dust suspended by natural law in a watery cocoon –
yesterday a dewdrop
tomorrow a tear

i certainly awoke this morning, mindful
i lathered and cleaned and rinsed and considered,
awestruck that such divinity should touch me as these words:
metastatial reprise,
fluid, changing, static moments,
renewed and never returning, ever returning

not sure of who to thank,
i thanked god,
myself, water,
casting about for an inkling of existential proof,
soapy fingers grasping fleetingly the mercurial concept,
unable to forsake the implicit notion
that i am, that i will, that i was

and somehow,
that
is enough

-jakeStephens
12.20.2006

less than turkey

2006-12-05T00:31:00.000-06:00

stuffin and kibble, now at 13 cents off.
That,
sounded,
so much the better for it
when it lived in my ear

is ringing and swinging from a salvation army bell,
this jubilant feeling of generousity;

the best part about growing old, is growing wise.

studio giblet now has some funky video from the (possibly defunct?) production by fishook films, sltfkr, or, as it came to be called as everyone involved in the project, Ghouls, for as time went on, the grisly reality of what making a movie as disturbing as this was more controversy than any of us could bear - more rebuke in one spurning glance of the public's eye, your eye, than we could carry upon our backs, hunched and doubled from the gravity of it.

But I digress - the trailer was comprised of footage of the stars from a previous underground production created in a downtown loft apartment, as well as some fisheye black and white footage that was grabbedfrom a security cam.

The editing is not bad, if I do say so myself.

Not too shabby. *pat, pat*

bargain chicklets

2006-07-26T17:27:00.000-05:00

<><><><>studio giblet now sports gallery number 04 <><><><>

trial by sun

2006-07-26T11:15:00.000-05:00

I

a shifting river of thirst,
i but for this dream rehearsed –
go, think but not what of it,
restful, let the live-long but slumber,
i will awake in you eternally–

golden dancing,
a river of sweating flesh,
colder than marble, a granite reminder,
one trance ended, the eyes blinded,
open heart, drum sounding –
here it comes at last, the vision:

II

more than to the point,
i will appoint you
god-protector
a sunrise diadem behind,
a hewn-from-earth tomb before;
all crumbles, all fades,
a short-term mnemonic,
a lost number.

but in this epoch,
you will rule, bending or breaking in the winds;
parched dreams: east will return to west as we all sleep –
to slake that thirst, that immortal desire,
a fool’s game.

in that desert, we all come to realize our mortality,
the palm of that oasis whispers secrets,
the reeds of midas, a pandoran box:
some sights cannot be unseen,
some thoughts are unthinkable –
before this end, to us undone, thy will be thus,
thy will undone

III

love was sand between her fingers,
luminous ocean eyes and naive hope
that things would change,
that he would change.
some dunes can drift and drift
and never change;
absently, in a dream, my lips brush near her skin,
as if to taste a flower, or forever,
as if to drink her in –
what once i thought oasis,
a mirage of jealous hands, a possessive pharaoh;
an impotent priestess,
relinquishing gods and fertile dreams,
for a sandy piece of soul –
relinquishing her heart’s black soil
to the sleepless eye above.

IV

numina, rapid-distant pattering,
you found me there,
a sleeping fool in noonday sun,
a mourning dove,
a seed pod,
the swirling blades sputter and sleep –
your sunlit crown,
hair and tears cascading;
amongst the living,
i will sleepwalk a little longer.

a fitful awakening at the gates of notwithstanding

2006-07-17T22:59:00.000-05:00

surrounded by worthless trapping of so-called art,
unable to raise an intentioned hand to create it,
i, oppressed and maligned for the last time, swear it off:

there’s nothing there but substanceless bulwark and vicissitude,
unformed by higher principles,
unable to tell me what transcendence is.

frustrated and sweaty, heady with drink and aged far too much
to retain the subtleties and incongruencies that make up the sublime passage
of time’s feet on rice paper,
where infinity meets inconstancy,
where i rips from the passage,
an after thought, a scrap on the foot passing,

i, a stillborn photoanonimity, furtively trying to understand,
lest you deign to turn an eye,
as all above crumbles, a marginless morass, ungainly, unsupple.

the paper is ripped and i am unquiet, unable
to pass this sphinx

starshine

2006-06-28T14:47:00.000-05:00

irreplivacated
literaturgical
miasmeandering
flowfloating ontogenologically
inextroinspectedness
nothigsosacredness
(a life of visions
notnothingnonetheless
susurrus)
warmskinned nightsbody
youagainstme,
sleepingeyes, dreaming sky,
in afterglown slumber

lithe verses

2006-06-14T16:07:00.000-05:00

lithe verses

in and out of submission,
holding onto fragments,
the dream vision mirage fades
fumble crumbles.

dissolution of solution,
i lack the solvency to reiterate,
mind numbing, odious particles of
participles leading endlessly into
feedback loops,

tinnitus deaf humming
abigail is that you?
nightingale is that you?

(hummm)

homeric epoch
industrial clandestine
no measure for measure
together in time tumbles

in and out of submission,
this body intones
a song of midnight;
stars caress this naked flesh,
hands explore this twisting cosmos,
cool desire intones:

fragments of foreverafter,
a host of shards
of truth.

major, the be flat miner

2006-06-05T15:59:00.000-05:00

studio giblet has had a few new addtions; it is kind of meandering and confusing, but there's good stuff there; once day, it'll be decent showcase.

moreso the pity

2006-06-02T10:57:00.000-05:00

studio giblet is now open for business; it may be a chunk of tripe, but it's my chunk of tripe!

insolent solvents

2006-03-14T23:26:00.000-06:00

it's been a while, but it's not like anyone stops by. ah well. more's the pity for all of you pukes. the world keeps turning. i've managed to not go mad, and have started painting, and doing other good things. the book is underway. i am singing. my love life is decent. ah well, nothing more to say. i'm going to go watch a history of violence and see about doing some tutorials on maya.

ciao ya'll

a fit of regression

2005-10-26T13:07:00.000-05:00

It's hard to escape our irresolute minds. Old patterns die hard because we like them. Itwas a tough morning and I digressed into self-rebuke and loathing. Self mutilation never looked so good, so I did this instead. Breathinbreathout...breathinbreathout...

glass & steel

twisted shrapnel repeats inside me,
a fragmented, slivered, echoing mistake;
more relentless self-absorbing examination of intention -
a mirror that peers into the mirror that peers into the mirror -
i squint into its surface
anxious, it can shatter
sure, it will shatter
afraid, it will shatter
preemptively, i shatter

malignant despair, tangled rebuke,
fallacy of intricacy shaded by apathy,
after thought falls away, left with out
mangled, shivering dystopia
forced hand, fingers dripping cold with blood
impotent, important undeniable
trainwreck train wreck
trainwreck train wreck
trained/wrecked.
---------------------------------------------------------
Call it therapy I guess. Then this monsstrosisityty was born:

sph(e)re of influenc(e)

future discord, malign and sterilize:
keep the piece
the jaws of life can't
extricate

a symbolic truth, failure incarnate:
the flesh. the fleshly. the rotting;
a corpse of a dream of a shadow of sanity -
an eph e
me
ra l notion
of tan g(le)ibilit (libel/libert)y

uncertainly uncertainty waits in the doorway,
coa(t)l black, jackboot fascist depravity:
stompingon-stampingon-stompedon
hostility

eggshell ricepaper, membranous translucence,
brittle, untrusting, oxidized, and rusting

i'(m
e) falling a part,
mygripdestroying:

a butterfly's wings smashed on my fingers

---------------------------------------------------------

It was a tough morning, but Laura stopped by at work (where I'm writing now) and helped me to feel better. It's a good feeling, being loved. It's hard to feel deserving sometimes.

from a random email to a co-worker

2005-10-25T19:02:00.000-05:00

...not evolutionary psychology, per se. I have, however, investigated a bit of the neurological origins of individuality and the evolution of developmental psychology…

I’ve really only scratched the surface of psychology, a discipline that I long considered banal and pathetic, which I’ve now come to see as a natural evolution from the discipline of philosophy, of which I am extremely fond. Therefore, the working title of my book:

power (in)serenity: the death of philosophy

I presently and rather inductively working on a survey of all disciplines in an effort to more fully assimilate them all in a manner that I find unconfining. Educational bulimia is an unattractive by-product of the overeducation of the Western world. My present valance is to self-educate to the point of convenient retention, then come up with a casual, causal theory of everything.

I call it the science of the art of a bunch of shit in the new university of the old school of jake (anyone can audit, but no one graduates).

hrm. too much wine at this hour, but this’ll be funny when you read it in the morning.

from home,
ajek

moreso's the pity

2005-10-24T22:09:00.000-05:00

oh where does the wind blow,
what can the winding road tell me,
too tall to teach the reach of reason,
too short to take me where i want to be:
cold feet and calloused hands.

new leaves

2005-10-11T23:39:00.000-05:00

As the trees lose their leaves, I continue to turn new ones over. I'm realizing my strengths and I can't always be so afraid to do what I want to do. Yes, other people may find it not suiting their tastes, but I have to explore the possibilities of who I am. I enjoy exploring and trying new things, regardless of how well its been done by someone else, because what I do, what I think and feel and know, is intrinsically different than any other person that's ever existed.

That is the beauty and genius of humanity: our vast differences; all of our myriad differences that combine in a random soup of genetic matter. And what do we get? Humanity. Patterned chaos. Each of our traits is distributed evenly and well throughout the species. Extremely desirable traits are reserved for a minority, while the majority shares with each other equally the fruits of our genes. The minorities at the other end then become the possibilities for change in contrast to those "perfect few" that enjoy the attention of desirable traits. The few on the opposite often make the desirable traits into undesirable traits, allowing them the strength of conviction to pursue change in the majority. If they can change the majority to accept their desirable traits and ignore their undesirable traits, then they can affect change in the overall scheme of the species.

As an example, consider the blind. The causes for blindness are quite numerous, but obviously it would either be something that you are born with or some loss of sight later in life; it could be considered to have been a biological or mechanical process; it could have been sudden or have happened over time. The challenge of the blind is then to convince their peer or social group that their blindness does not affect their other abilities. Truly, in the case of blindness, those that cope with the loss of the sense better than most - that is, those that stand out, head and shoulders above the rest - the ones that are exceptional regardless of handicapped, or rather, the "perfect few" that have coping schemes so good that they can operate at levels above those of most sighted people. These people are the ones that affect change, not because of their handicaps, but because of their inherent abilities and people's preconceptions of what it means to be "able."

Anyhow, yeah, I think I'm done rambling for the day.

fallfire

2005-10-04T17:51:00.000-05:00

Just made this for a contest over at http://www.johnmundtesquire.com. It's not bad. I made it with various screenies taken from a program called Visual Thesaurus.

a: reason to :strike

2005-09-29T21:48:00.000-05:00

hornblower, magnified and taciturn
indemnified, now ostracize,
when the world held high a head and sighed
what is required to we free to be
when is gone and done,
we rose again as one

(in)titled

2005-09-23T08:56:00.000-05:00

This is pretty weird, a collection of "bad thoughts from a bad day" that I found scribbled on a piece of paper at work. I seem to recall it was a tough day.

I

a simple gesture,
a forgotten motive –
listlessly rustling in the weeds, forgotten by the river
restlessly unhappy, sinking in a muddy quagmire
disembodied unreality: this is not happening to me, the familiar thought a lie
a fragrant breeze teases my nostrils as i sink
deeper into whatever this is;
i try to concentrate on that thing, one thing,
any thing
that will ease this constricting ooze before it overtakes,
inevitably intoning, no longer breathing, i sink

deeper
deeper
i sink

II

bloodied railways hyperextended
superficial inspection,
a matrix of spoiled milk and forgone
conclusions, rippled apathetically
into-over-under-indefinite motives –
mitered redolence, failure to
communicate.
meagerly anticipated, steel on steel
reprisal
in fatuous deference, alarmed at
my reason –
I’d rather be

fallacy of flippant truths,
I’ve chosen a better lie
it’s easier than smiling.

III

my head has become smooth from rubbing it –
i feel is a fallacy that i adhere to
i cannot express this
i am is more appropriate
i am disgusted with myself
i am disillusioned with my loved ones
i am disgusting
i am not able to remain awake
i dream of sleep is a useless euphemism
i am tired of being alive is another
but they nonetheless mean something
too many i’s make you blind

IV

i’m not breathing to spite you
why do you defend yourself
i’, just trying to – i don’t know
i don’t care
what is that to me
who are you to judge
why did this happen
it’s all your fault
get out of my head
get out of my mind
get out of my world
that’s the best you can do
buy me off with questions
not enough, i’ll get you yet.

-jakeStephens
transcribed 09.14.2005

rantinabulation: a study in a#m7

2005-09-22T11:50:00.000-05:00

frindulous, exaspertame, opiodine, ivertoid disclarifications:
whither goest thou gobly infractious knave?
was’t winderous wroth, chapsing intessimally?
undestrayed?
willidious crow, will crownst!
wilious, despotocranial, fluidition;
oft vilisibility taciturned, malefacted will:
rise unclarified, return unsent.

-jakeStephens, (A+MCP)*(MCSA-M) / MCSELMNOP = EIEI.0

the true believer knows!

2005-09-12T21:54:00.000-05:00

According to a recent poll, 65% of Americans blame God for the flooding in New Orleans. 15% blame the President, 12% blame Al-Quaida, and everyone else was asleep when the polling took place.

Who knew that hurricanes could cause so much damage? Sheesh. Not to be flippant, but it kind of goes with living on the coast, doesn't it?

Blame the guy/lady upstairs (i.e. your head, not God) for the damage.

Ah well, I'm going to Hell. I polled a number of non-believers and they all hedged their bets and said so. Good thing that there isn't one. Oh well, call it karma, but that's be like getting mustard in your peanut butter (which I do actually like): you just marvel at the pretty colors and try to keep on keepin' on.

Truckin' ya'll. Truckin'.

exploration in the key of me

2005-08-23T09:22:00.000-05:00

3:1

clotho tremulous, the fear in her voice is the only indication:
“something wicked this way comes”
has always sounded more impressive than our acrid, simple terror
of the unknown
of providence
of salvation – i know not what may and not what
means we should take
to arrive on these plutonian shores
unscathed, but for our fiercefully
beat heart –
“beat heart, beat and bleat and cower”
showing no sign or other outward indications
but casually distinct,
she trembles in our arms

lachesis tremulous, her voice a rage of indications:
something wicked this way comes has always sounded our simple terror,
revealing impressive depths of unknown providence;
by what means we arrive unscathed on those plutonian shores
our fiercefully beaten heart, not salvation,
beat and bleat and cowered,
showing no distinction,
she casually empties our trembling arms

atropos tremulous, her voice rages,
simply sounding my terror,
revealing depths without providence,
a plutonian shore where gasps a fiercefully beaten heart:
bleating, trembling, cowering:
an empty-armed indistinction,
an empty salvation

-jakeStephens

eyespy

2005-07-01T14:12:00.000-05:00

fecundity in motion,
pass that lotion,
and i’ll spread a pint or two around
more to the point, i’ll make short work of passing notions,
more’s the pity if you don’t mind;
and if you don’t mind, then i don’t mind and we don’t mind together;
a three-legged race to the finish,
i bet we come in first,
but please don’t spread it around,
i wouldn’t want anyone to know those shortcomings were mine;
yes, i’m certain i’m better than you at this and that and the other thing too
so much depends on it,
that i shudder to think of what might become of not thinking so,
and so do
and so smile
and so it is:
my Perception is Reality

-jakeStephens
07.01.2005

data malaise, a boot record

2005-06-21T14:07:00.000-05:00

structured parity check will begin at next login,
cycling redundancy, each error processed with algorithmic accuracy;
last known good configuration has been invoked,
but integrity is uncertain and profile corruption may be imminent;
cascading failover, a catastrophic failure -
malformed data, a collection of unnamed and orphaned records.
directory structure awry and unreadable,
the partition's pattern, a jumble of chaotic bits;
lost files will not be recovered,
the boot record, unbroken, spins lazily on fluttering platters,
no log or trace of this indistinct sequence of events.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Laura's birthday today. 31. Life is a beautiful thing and I am full to the brim with the sublime notion of living it. Perhaps I've been listening to too much Literary Criticism. It's a good lecture, by Louis Markos. I've actually picked up a version of Critical Theory Since Plato that I've not quite gotten around to reading. Must study for the MCSE upgrade test (wheee!). Must also create curriculum for Teya's classes over the summer - with any luck, she'll be inspired to want to learn again. The public school system in America is in a sad state... at least where I work and live it is. Welcome to the place where the intelligent are lumped in with the duds and are forced to drown in a sea of mediocrity. More decrying bureaucracy another time, since I'm on the compan dime right now. Back to work!

kafka-esque

2005-06-10T17:24:00.000-05:00

it's the first book club today and we're all discussing "metamorphosis," from good ol' franz kafka. it's only the first part, so it's straightforward. book club consists of mainly pople from work... okay, only people from work, so it's an amalgamation of critters ranging from one-celled organisms to multi-cellular creatures that have what appear to be rational and/or cognizant thoughts.

which is a bonus for conversation.

no big a-bomb type insight into the book at this point, just the obvious and standard observations of Gregor Samsa turning into a big bug. Yeah, there's all kinds of subtext that can be found, as per the introductions, but I don't read introductions any more. Not since I read the intro to "Brave New World," by Aldous Huxley; just in passing rambles he says something to the effect of, "that's why he had to die in the end."

Fucker.

That's the equivalent of having "And he never knoiws he dead until the end!" in a trailer for The Sixth Sense.

At any rate, the book I got for Metamorphosis is pretty cool. I picked it up from www.abebooks.com for $30; it is a 1946 first edition in decent shape. I feel so special! I also saw on abebooks that the copy of Robotech Art I that I have sells for a couple of hundred dollars; I feel so Kewl! Just call me "L33t ßoOk D@Wg."

I lIk3 h@cKt3xT, It M@K3$ m3 f33L $O cOoL.

ßü+ $0/\/\3 þ@ÿ$ ¦+ #ür+$ /\/\ÿ #3@þ +0 \/\/r¦+3 +#¦$ \/\/@ÿ, +#@|\|» Ç0Þ ¦ #@\/3 @ 9RçR@/\/\ +0 þ0 ¦+!

H3H3. 3NoUgH fOr NoW. Th3 d@y @w@iT$.

meta-reality

2005-04-19T23:14:00.000-05:00

i was being facetious. gor that words fucked too.

who the fuck

2005-04-19T23:11:00.000-05:00

so evidently someone already has orphanos; that's okay, i thought of a sweet new word, meta-reality; never ind i was dead at the time. is this thing on? my fingers are itchy, my ass is scratchy, like wool.

you got'ny fingers in that bag, randolph?

able, and a cane, walking tall, like an old man on viagra.

more pissants in my tea, now i'm running out of frosting and ideas, so
i can't stay conscious for long; canticle article, descending,
yellow journalism and an artifical hip

opiode, the menagerie.

i'm not sure why our minds drift like treeswings in the breeze

2005-03-28T23:18:00.000-06:00

i'm not sure why our minds drift like treeswings in the breeze

spinning a slow and steady arc, lonely and creaking,
bereft of a body to fill that empty hole
through which blue skies always seem to appear,
even in the bruised, stormcloud gray of today

i'm not strong enough to always be strong,
but i can be lonely enough to feel like i'll always be lonely

the smell of autumn rain coalesces,
peppering the last remaining leaves in the branches,
toy soldiers beating loose wooden drums,
no rhythm or cadence to the swiftly growing din

the treeswing is a familiar memory, often frequented,
it's comfy, and warm, and predictable

despite the rain, a child approaches the pendulous weight,
chain tethers jingle gaily in the breeze ironically
there's no fanfare as the void is filled and the rain continues
there's no signal that it will end, but it does in a bolt of lightning

a boy runs,
the tire is empty again

good words

2005-03-23T07:51:00.000-06:00

a current, undeniably me

in a minor
key, turning circles
in dissonant
harmony
constituent melody, twitching
furtively the quavering vowel
of overtone in independent
integrity

a lyrical movement, its modes unspoken,
measure by measure, tongues unevenly ringing,
voices beyond us, breathing with meaning

now reverberates undeniably,
now oscillates uncontrollably,
now brassily swaggers,
now nasal, now sanguine,

the River

the River is music,
thrumming and humming, silent, the Giant;
passing the banks by, asleep in the morning,
the Body is golden in mist o’erflowing,
a symphony of song,
a cadence of dream,

at rest, transposition,
the timbre, the Key,
heart by beating heart, We sing

and our verse is instiflable,
our chorus, crescendo,
the People We singing,
our words are a window:

a nation, a notion of clamber our
words ineffably dream the sky overspun
with intricate rhythms and cleverest feet,
clogging in unison, oh melodious pipe,
oh singer of songs, oh bringer of dreams,
we beseech thee and lament the loss of our callow youth,
our wisened sages, and all the inkhorn flowers between,
we regret, so somberly, that we forget we live,
that we forget we love.

how we fiddle our tongues and think it music,
we silly race, we silly animal
we silly We

thank you.

new poem smell

2005-03-16T22:59:00.000-06:00

yep, it's that time. explorations of rythm and subtlety of meaning. there's even a little oversimplified introspection and a dash of symbolism.

a strong west wind

cloven-hooved, agape, in consequential rhythm-rape,
odorous odifery in my periphery
stuttered for the sake of me
shuttered minds, dots connecting

fettered boat, an empty shore
weathered oarlocks overworn
shifting beachsand underfoot
lilting hoarsely cry the gulls
arranging rocks in circles
amazing and strange, cold sand
each agate borne smooth, but these,
these are not your remedy

muttered incandescently
sweltered in the light of things
open-jawed, westerly, plague of locusts came to be,
drifting like the snow, semantic shift in spite of me.

so there you have it. it kind of sits there like a toad at first, but then it grows on you... or at least it does me...

moreover

2005-03-16T15:52:00.000-06:00

so today is better.

i'm presently listening to the history of the english language, focusing now, in lectures 18&19, on shakespeare. aye, there's the point. interesting bit, the quarto vs. folio versions of his plays, like hamlet's to be on not to be speech - more "grammatically" correct in the quarto version, and seemingly less flowery - an actor's version? a less perfect version? why was it changed? interesting.

anyhow, i think i'll start my new art project tonight. or maybe right now. hrm, there's an idea, the present. but not a lot of time, since i'm at work right now. maybe i'll map out some other ideas. i'm not sure that i like the yin-yang idea, but i do like the circle motif, because it's going to be hanging in the neonatal icu, where laura works. the circle is a symbol of life and eternity, so i like that, but they do have to watch out for death, since it is, after all the icu, so i do like the idea of the yin-yang, with the light in the dark, etc. hrm. a bit worth pondering.

i mapped it out in 4x6 (a little smaller actually) rectangles, because i'll have to print them out in pieces and then stitch it afterward, kind of like the piece i did for laura. i mapped it and thought about maybe trying to find photos that will fit the shapes for each grid, but the shapes aren't really that complex and i'm not sure how to represent properly areas that would be all white or all black, since there's no detail at all... maybe i could make it into two different colors - purple and yellow, perhaps. i don't want to do a cross or an ankh - the cross is a tired motif for me and the ankh, well, people just won't get it.

the only thing i could think to do otherwise would be to create pieces for each one, but that's about 16 separate items.

i could also take smaller close-up pictures of things and stitch those together. maybe some flowers, but i don't have any that i'd like to shoot, since the roses are all dead. hrm. that's not a bad idea though. or maybe a face stitched together from other people's faces, but who to use? laura would not appreciate being in it - maybe a bunch of babies? that might be a little too ann geddes or whatever her name is - i hate that baby shit. unless i use full-sized paper and then it's four pieces, rather than 16, since it's 17.5x22.5, so it's twice the length and width of a standard page... it bears some consideration.

i also have to work on my song and get it recorded so that keith and jason and john can come up with their parts. i want to keep a feel in the song. only thing i noted when we practiced it was that jason needed to slow down the drums in the chorus, maybe half-time, compared to what he's doing now - try to get it to open up a little, because the song needs to breath in that part... but the bridge really needs some work. i had a rhythm that i thought would've worked, using triplets instead of standard 4/4 type rhythm. oh well, i'm off for now.

minor dactyl surgery

2005-03-15T22:37:00.000-06:00

today was a lousy day. six hours on-site trying to get wireless networking going...and a printer...and that's it! Nothing complicated or hairy, but i managed to get side-tracked every time i turned around. how did it start? oh yeah, getting this old windows 2000 dell on the network. no problem, the system has a usb nic and a pci wireless card installed (wireless b, not g, like everything else in the house). so i try to get the nic going and it's refusing. while waiting for a reboot, i decide to pull the pci nic out and move it to another system, a windows 98, that we didn't have an adapter for, then i head back to the original system and proceed to dig myself into insanity trying to get this thing in there. every time i think i have it, error 31 pops up in the device manager. what the fuck is error 31? i look it up in the knowledgebase and find out that it means a parent device isn't working... okay, it's on a add-on usb card, that might be it, so i move it to the on-board (1.0) usb connectors, to no avail. so then, i decide to swap the usb nic i have with a different one i the office and get the latest drivers at the same time... try the nic after the switch. nope, try again. so then i open the dell back up and put the original nic back in and download drivers for the pci nic on another system...

but wait, do i have a cd with open space that isn't scratched to shit or otherwise unable to be opened due to poly-session-unreadable-osis? as luck would have it yes. and the drivers are all happy and the networking is done... big sigh of relief...

enter the customer, stage right:
"how's it going"

"oh fine, thanks. i got things going by swapping nics around"

"that should work"

oh wait, let's back up, i forgot that during this time i was working on his print server as well. yeah, it has a usb and parallel connection and the parallel connection didn't want to see the ibm 7039 laser attached to it. Probably afraid of losing a finger to the behemoth dinosaur. i astutely point out, "oh silly mr. customer, you need an ieee-1394 cable for this thing to work." and slap him firmly on his beefy posterior. he is unamused, but during the following minutes and subsequent reboots (see above for proper linear order...this comes around during the cd search), i decided to call the shop, since i was only five or six miles away, and ask for someone to run me out an ieee-1394 cable, which they do. and i connect it and the printer is still not recognized by the print server although (as I found out later) it did actually light up the parallel LED on the print server. can you hear the excitement in my words?

so back to the customer and our conversation...

"you get the print working on all of them then?"

"uh, no. the cable didn't seem to do the trick, but i've got some ideas."

"okay..."

so he went away to make money, since he's a stay-at-home-self-made-type, and i proceed to reconfigure the printer's settings in an attempt to get things to print. i changed the language to pcl and thought i was clever. i changed the parallel port mode to standard and thought i was even cleverer... hell, i remembered that you could set a standard tcp/ip port up and select lpr, instead of raw, and configure it to print to whatever port by lpr number... and i actually printer to the printer, but just got garbage characters...hrm, bad driver perhaps?

enter customer:

"how's it going?"

"well, the printer is kind of sucking."

"oh, well, just make sure that the hp 5550 is working. if you can't ge the other one going, i understand."

but i'm an mcse.

"no, i can get them going. i've got a few ideas."

after trying the driver on the windows 2000 system and the windows xp system over the wireless, i decided to try the printer locally on the xp system and proceeded to get shit characters. i reset the factory defaults and tried again... now i'm out of paper and have to send it through a second time. no dice. so i try it on the windows 2000 system, which the customer had taken it off of,to put it on the print server. it should print just fine, right?

wrong. still printing crap.

this is with the built-in drivers and the downloaded drivers for 2000/xp, from lexmark, not ibm, since ibm washed their hands of this damnable fossil.

i put the printer on the 98 system and try to print... no luck, doesn't even try. *sigh* oh wait, there's an epson print driver installed on here and it's got an epson printer port. aha! so i change the driver & it becomes lpt3 and i know that it won't print, but do i try? you bet i do. you bet i fail. so i'm in the process of uninstalling the software from the system... did i mention it's a pentium 200 with 64mb ram? no, i didn't... so the reboots are five minute ordeals. and i sit and wait and think about how many hours i've been here at this point (something like 4)

enter customer:

"how's it going?"

listen wiseass..."going not-so-good; printer won't print from anything. maybe it sucks." i forgot to mention that the sheets i had sent through it before twice i had now started sending through for the third time, and, oh yeah, now it's jamming every other sheet *sigh, how stupid can i get?* "but i'm just trying it on this 98 system to confirm... well, fuck me runnin' it printed fine."

"no shit?"

"yeah, no shit."

"well as long as it can print to something..."

"i should be able to set it up to print between them through sharing." now, i know this is wrong now, and i know that i should've realized that 9x would not be able to provide the xp systems with a driver and it would all suck anyhow, but i was frazzled, cut me some slack. so i start setting up file sharing on the 9x system and of course it doesn't work. the sytem can see out but nothing sees in. and i can't share. and yes, file and print sharing is enabled. so, i dig out the networking keys from the registry and remove dial-up networking and try to reboot and the systme locks up and i reboot and the registry didn't take so i have to do it all again and reboot and okay now i can see things (take a breath, take a breath).

"how's it going"

"you're sneaky, i didn't see your entrance written anywhere. the 98 system is able to share, but (working as we speak) network printing (realization hits) won't make a bit of difference for the xp and 2000 system, since the driver sucks, but hey, let's try it (to no avail) again."

"can it print to the 5550 as well?"

"oh yeah, sure thing." realizing that i hadn't set it up yet. "just as soon as i do it, it will."

"well, everything is pretty good then."

"yes. except for your wireless encryption settings."

now, i'm not sure what rock that thought crawled out from under, but i curse that thought to hell and fire and damnation.

of course, you can predict the rest - a couple of hours showing him how easy wpa was to set up on the xp system and how the 98 system couldn't use wpa and neither could either of the other two, so let's move to wep and fucking passkey fiveortencharactersneverworksihateihateihateihateihateiahatethat shit!!!

so i put it back the way it was. and retested printing and it's slow on one system and then its not.

customer says, "well it least it wasn't anything easy. i would've felt bad if it had been too easy on you."

"here's my card. i'm usually a lot better at my job."

yeah, that's the day. it sucked. it also continued, but i'm too tired to even consider writing about it...

ouch

2005-03-09T20:28:00.000-06:00

so i just dumped my guts out personally and rambled about the history of the english language and the historical jesus, only to get spanked by internet explorer's security settings and lose my whole post. a bit of scribbled margianlia, lost in the dustbin of history.

damn, now i really understand the implications of the burning of the library in alexandria.

*sigh* i am fortune's fool. but i lament...

i'm going to go contemplate the validity of my mcse...

unsolicited mail

2005-03-09T20:15:00.000-06:00

unsolicited mail

is this thing on?

mapping the stars

2005-03-09T16:02:00.000-06:00

I made this a while back, but it's cool and I need to decorate. ;^)

the die has been cast

2005-03-09T15:57:00.000-06:00

die-cast member of motives unseeming;
winsome, worthless wagging words -
alliterative, the hammer slams,
the ear's door shut,
is doesn't seem like much,
this gesture,
but it means everything to me.

from ether to substance

2005-03-09T15:40:00.000-06:00

Blog. Blogger. Clogger. Clobber. Climber. Limber. Limb. Lamb. Slam. Slum. Some. Same. Aim. Lame. Game. Name. Shame. Shade. Share. Shire. Wire. Fire. Four. Nor. Soar. Soul. Bowl. Bile. Bowl. Foal. Foul. Fool. Cool. Drool. Drawl. Shawl. Shoal. Shale. Shag. Shrug. Bug. Bog. Blog.

So there you have it. The first post.

I'm not sure what. I'm not sure why. I'm just trying to sound smart, I think. Hrm. Fairly monosyllabically, no less...