Tilting at windmills for a better tomorrow.
My Grado SR-60s* died. Had them since the early 90s. Re-soldered the connections in the right phone twice this morning, but nothing. And so into the dustbin (oooh, how British!). Will live with the AKGs for a while (though I must say, those RS1s sure look tempting ;). They make me look like an air traffic controller, but I’m okay with that.
* Heh – the same ones I’m wearing in my current LJ icon photo.
It’s not a standard, but it looks like one. Also, Definitions of Managed Objects for Drip-Type Heated Beverage Hardware Devices using SMIv2.
Oh boy… the rewards of a university career…
Since you’re all dying to know this, we’ve just received official word that if you work 25 years for U.C., you’ll get a paperweight in appreciation. 40 years and you get a pin with a diamond in it (clearly a holdover from the days when only women were “staff”). And if you retire after 20 years you get a bronze clock from Tiffany’s. Goals to work towards. Happy weekend.
We’ve used a professional tax preparer for the past five years. Decided to try and save some money this year and got a quote from HR Block. Sounded like they could save us 50%. The experience was miserable. The guy we got was a dud, hated his life. “How long have you been working here?” “24 long years…” he responded, in the closest unintentional approximation of a Droopy the Dog voice I’ve heard. Didn’t even try to help us find good deductions. The place felt like a sausage factory. There were AOL logos printed right on our tax forms, that’s how incestuous these giant multinational conglomerates are.
Anyway, when he was finished we got a bill for more than we usually pay our professional preparer. So we raised a stink. We had no proof of the amount we had been quoted before we went in, since it was over the phone, and they claimed they don’t give quotes. Well, someone gave me one, that’s for sure. And it’s the only reason we wandered into that god-forsaken rat-hole to begin with.
The whole system is computer driven and the agent was powerless to do anything. Had to call a central number, who authorized a $50 rebate. Clam boogers. Decided to fight. Had to go the district manager, argue with him over the phone about it, fax in a bunch of documents and write a letter. Finally got email back today – they’re refunding us $122. Good enough. Chalk one up for the little guy.
Set up QTSS on Sherlock today. Did some upgrades to the Admissions database. Ate burritos from Gordo tonight (great spinach tortillas) and watched the first two episodes of Oz, which is pretty damn good, but not as involving as we had hoped.
Just returned from a couple of days in Los Angeles at USC, attending a seminar co-hosted by Berkeley’s and USC’s j-schools. Around 125 educators and online journalism professionals from around the world, arranged in panels discussing the state of online journalism, how it could be done better, etc. Much discussion of whether and how much it’s appropriate to utilize the audience as information gatherers, which touches on the topics of community-driven sites, blogs, etc. In fact, there was quite a bit of discussion about the blog phenom, professional journalists who maintain blogs alongside their regular journalism, etc. Also much discussion about training – old-world journalists need to know how to use typewriters, but that’s not enough anymore. How to bring the old guard up to speed. Debates on whether we’re “doing it right” or not – what does that even mean? Is there a succesful online model yet? Is the internet different enough a medium that it deserves to be treated as categorically different re: journalistic techniques, or is it just another means of distribution with a few unique characteristics. Is the “immediacy” of the internet anything new? Radio and TV are immediate too, so no, not really. Anyway, some interesting discussions, but mostly debate, not a whole lot of concrete stuff to take home, and nothing technical. Worth the trip though. Shook some good hands, made some contacts, etc.
Anecdote: At one point, a panelist was talking about the “three-dot column” form of journalism, like Herb Caen of the SF Chronicle. “… three guys in a restaurant trading bites of top sirloin … Time for a new mayor … ” So this woman in the audience raises her hand and asks “What was that address again?” Confused looks, awkward silence. Took a while to realize that she had thought he was talking about something.dot.com. The term “three-dot column” is fading out because, well, because there aren’t many three-dot columns anymore. Well, it was funny at the time. Maybe you had to be there.
Wrote a PHP mail form so administration could take survey results from people all over the world on international health issues. Since the form had to appear in multiple languages, and because the prospect of random secretaries in random countries editing php/html directly sounded disastrous, built a system that lets me give them a language template in plain text. Plop their translation into place, then let the user choose a language as they enter the form. Fun project.
Power’s still out on much of the UCB campus this morning, which is pretty much unprecedented. Classes cancelled, buildings closed. A big yellow sign on my office door said I should turn around and go home. A substation flooded, causing a cascade failure. Question: How does such a critical substation get built and run without major water-detection and warning systems? Anyway, had a nice bike ride to work and back, now I’ve got the day off to work on the SKSM database and leave for dad’s place early.
Taught my first class to adults tonight. It went really well for the most part. We actually covered more ground in the first session than I thought we would. Aside from the fact that several students kept working on other students files accidentally, we got through forms, variables, and control structures. Some of them actually started to get excited, which is all I can hope for. And I enjoyed it. If the rest of the class goes this well, I wouldn’t mind doing this freelance (though I’d probably rather just have normal freelance php gigs).
Amy just called to say she had gotten back from the doctor and heard our baby’s heartbeat for the first time. She described it as the sound of “tiny little horse hoof-beats.” And that she could hear her own deeper, slower heartbeat in the background. So the baby is tuned in to the elemental rhythm, and making one of its own. The primal funk. What a moment, wish I had been there.
We didn’t want to see olympic hockey so switched to Fox, only to find ourselves watching this hugely overproduced food eating contest called “Glutton Bowl.” They bring chronic over-eaters in from all over the country and pit them against each other eating enormous portions of slop. They start by dumping 1,000 lbs of whatever the food for the contest is going to be onto the stage from on high. Then they introduce the “athletes” with “food facts” like “Once banned from an all-you-can-eat shrimp buffet.”
We saw a 23-yr-old Japanese kid eat 31 hot dogs in 5 minutes, winning easily. Then we saw a second group have to slop down mayonnaise in 32-oz. servings. Said one host to the other, “Some of these gustatory athletes have the ability to eat without tasting, which is a huge advantage.” Changed the channel and didn’t see the winner of that one.
It is a strange and beautiful world.