Friday, October 17, 2003  

If You Can See This, Rob Reuter Is My Hero

If this shows up at all, then Mr. Rob Reuter, through the magic of AIM, was able to offer some suggestions that successfully got Shitty-Ass Computer #2 up and running.
Posting stuff with Lynx just feels so Neal Stephenson, man...

I Feel Like I've Been Raped

By a guy in a Red Sox hat.

I can't adequately describe it. How did I get invested emotionally in these knuckleheads?

Luckily, I've got good friends like John Curtin:

Understanding that you're relatively new to this whole experience, if there
are any questions or unfamiliar emotions you need help with, I'm here for
you.
-JC

P.S. Grady Little must die

Compu-Mystery

My computer woes continue in a most bizarre way. If anyone out there has any ideas, PLEASE let me know...

So here's the deal: I tried to put that hard drive in my P3 Windows box. There was a little spark, and it died. It wouldn't boot. I took it to the kitchen to start a postmortem, and it booted. I plugged it back in in the office, and it booted once, and then wouldn't. And it stayed dead.

So I took it apart, keeping the good stuff.

Just so I'd have something to tide me over, I got my 200Mhz linux box out of the basement, and brought it up here to the office. I plugged it in, used it to check email and start SSHd, and then powered down. Now *it* won't start anymore. Won't boot. You can see the cooling fan on the processor try to start, and then nothing. Won't power on.

SO...it was plugged into the same power strip as the other one. Could something be wrong with the STRIP? But if there is, how or why would it fry my power supplies (working theory) when I power the computers down? Shouldn't it either work or not work? I mean...there's no way that it's coincidence. What's going on, and how do I fix it before I plug in my replacement stuff?

Tech-types and gearheads (Paul Day and Baratunde, I'm looking in your direction)...PLEASE HELP!!!

R.E.M.

I'm sorry, but the "new" R.E.M. song is just fucking great.

Thank You, Jesus!

Oh, lordy...why did I have to be at work when I saw this? FHM has asked the Food Network's Rachel Ray to pose for pictures. At least now I know I'm not the only guy in the universe who's crazy about this sexbomb (who makes pie!).

(Thanks to my kickass wife, who passed along the recommendation from her friend Trystbat, in whom she's apparently confided my lust for Ms. Ray)

Catatonia in Red Sox Nation

The air around Boston is indescribable today. The only time I've ever seen so many people suffering this combination of fear, exhaustion, and grim determination is in Vietnam documentaries. I'm surprised we're not calling the Yankees "Charlie."

Let me say it for the record: I officially care about baseball now. The Sox are a virus, and I'm infected. Last night, the wind blew down power lines in our neighborhood. When I found out, my first thought was not of my wife and child...it was being pissed off because I'd miss the end of the game.

Note to self: buy batteries today.

The show at the Comedy Studio has been cancelled tonight, natch. Thank Christ. I was going to make Mike Birbiglia do an hour while I watched in the bar downstairs. I had my "you're the big Comedy Central star" speech all planned. No disrespect to Mike, who's unbelievably talented, but I wasn't going to be relegated to MC *and* miss the goddamn game.

This way, everyone wins.

EXCEPT THE YANKESS!

Goddamn you, Sam Walters, for getting me hooked on this goddamned team. This is a codependent relationship, man. Between me and the Sox, not between me and Sam. That relationship is patient and kind. But the Sox...the fluctuating emotions. It's like your first high school relationship, where everything is either blissful or the end of the universe. It's not you, it's me! I need space! WIN THE MOTHERFUCKING SERIES, ALREADY, WILL YOU???

Shows This Week

In case all my computer babbling hasn't completely undermined my credibility as a comic (sorry, I'm not Doug Stanhope. I'd like to eat mushrooms like they were popcorn and live a delightfully Hunter S. Thompson kind of life; but alas, I'm a dork with a job and a family. That's not meant as a slam on Doug, by the way. I'm so jealous of his career, his talent, and his life...well, his career and his talent, anyway...), I am actually performing out and around New England this weekend.

Thursday - The Comedy Studio. Duh. 8:00

Friday - Club 360. Dover, NH. 9:00. This is one of my favorite clubs. It can get rowdy, but in the right way.

Saturday - Oh, god. Apparently I'm playing someplace called "Woody's" at the "Hobo Lounge" in Claremont, New Hampshire. 9:00. Even if you don't come, please archive this page so you can give it to the cops when they're trying to reconstruct what led up to the crime.

Boring, Sid, Boring, Boring, Boring

Spent last night moping about the Red Sox, finishing up my homework, and trying to fix my computer. I took it out to the kitchen table to dissect it and salvage the pieces worth salvaging, and lo and behold, it booted up! I don't know what changed...but I got it up and running, and then met with complete defeat when trying to put in the new hard drive Randbot hooked me up with at the strip club the other night (in either a very Matrix-y or very nerdy kind of move, depending on your interpretation). I'm sure I'm doing something wrong master/slave wise (those are technical terms, assholes), but something is definitely wrong with my floppy controller, so I'm pretty much SOL.

Doesn't matter, because even though I surfed and typed like crazy last night, this morning, it was DOA all over again. So I've been breaking up work by shopping for the components of a new system on TigerDirect.com. If anyone has any other reccomendations of places to shop, by all means, let me know. Right now, I'm getting a new HD, an Athlon XP 2200, a new motherboard, 256 MB of memory, a new case, a shitload of cooling fans and a new floppy for around $400. I'll keep my monitor, keyboard, vid card, sound card, and NIC.

The point is this: the faster I get up and running again, the sooner I can get on with my life and the sooner there might be something halfway interesting posted here.

Libertarian for a Day

My head is throbbing. In the last 24 hours, I've consumed over a pound of red meat; drunk a generous portion of beer, whiskey, and sake; received several lap dances, smoked 2 packs of cigarettes, and expended over 400 rounds of 9mm ammunition.



Now that's a bachelor party.

Mr. Ross Garmil, my friend and co-creator of the Grand High Council is getting married in a couple of weeks, and last night we feted him. And today, I feel like I'm going to die. Going from 5-years-quit to 2-packs-in-a-night makes your lungs feel like they're filled with pudding. I confessed my week-long flirtation with the Tobacco Demon to Jeniphir yesterday and promised to re-quit today. I don't know why I've been fucking around with cigarettes. Oh, yeah, because I have no impulse control and because Philip Morris is evil. The week I ran the Studio, I snuck about a half dozen smokes, mostly out of exhaustion. Then I switched over to Kentucky Cheroots, which didn't get the monkey off my back but at least left my lungs in a mostly puddingless state. But in Colorado last week, I found myself sneaking my mother's menthol Virginia Slims (which makes me either secure in my masculinity or gay as Carson) whenever everyone else would leave the house. I came back and started bumming more manly smokes, and Saturday, I bought a pack, which is the sign of immiment defeat. So I gave Jeniphir my pre-party confession (to which she responded with a very touching and supportive, "What the fuck is wrong with you? You don't smoke anymore, you dumbass!") and blew through (with the help of Ross, Benari, and Glenn) 3 and a half packs of Camels of various varieties, which leads me to today's nicotene hangover (being treated with Chinese Curing Pills and Hail Marys) and an intense combination of regret and addictive craving. Brilliant fucking decision, McIntire! Brilliant!

As long as I'm confessing my retardocity, let me point out that I'm posting this from my wife's iMac because after Randbot was cool enough to drop a free 16GB hard drive on me last night at the party, I came home and tried to slave it in my machine without turning it off. Flash! Sizzle! Moron! I don't know if I shorted out the power supply or fried something more substantial, but either way, I now have a 700Mhz testimonial to being a fucking dumbass sitting on the floor of our office with its guts flung everywhere like it got attacked by a bear.