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April 30, 2000

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April

April 30, 2000
Matt and I carpooled up to Portland this morning to help Joe and Carol move from PDX to their new place in Battleground. Is it just me, or is it a lot easier to help other people move? What a thoroughly enjoyable day! And what a wonderful new house as well, with vaulted Great Room, natural gas everything, and big back yard (which, once fenced, is going to be canine heaven). Congratulations to Joe and Carol on their new home!

The PowerBook continues its long trek toward my grubby paws. Latest tracking info has it leaving Tennessee:

I know it seems like FedEx would've shipped it straight to Portland or at least into Seattle, but their worldwide distribution center is in Memphis. Every parcel is routed through there even if you're sending it across the street. So it might seem like the PowerBook is moving farther away, but it's a very necessary step in the FedEx distribution chain. I'm hopeful that the PowerBook will arrive in Portland this evening, though that might wanting too much.

Just before leaving this morning, we had another SQUIPPO—Squirrel Induced Power Outage—which blew out a transformer and downed power lines. This is the second one in just over six months, and I'll be calling PGE about cutting back or removing the appropriate tree tomorrow. I love trees and hate to get rid of them as a general rule, but blowing out power to the surrounding neighborhood every six months is hardly acceptable.

April 29, 2000
FedEx tracking now has the PowerBook departing Anchorage, Alaska, the last two reports being:

That's enough to make me hopeful that I'll have it Monday or Tuesday which would probably throw me into hysterics and lead to general household confusion for most of the week. I'm not sure I can withstand the excitement. (I'm also not sure my company can withstand the VISA bill, but that's another story.)

April 28, 2000
According to FedEx tracking, the PowerBook has "Left FedEx Ramp C.K.S. INTL AIRPORT TW." I don't know if that means it's in route yet or not, but if you'd like up to the minute reporting without waiting for web site updates, you too can track the PowerBook's progress. It'll be fun, like NORAD tracking Santa on Christmas Eve.

Okay, well, whatever. [Note that the above link no longer works; it was fun at the time though!]

We replaced the three remaining metal thermostats in the house today. Interestingly, the one in the dining room area only needed BBQ sauce and a piece of meat to do its own brand of indoor/outdoor cooking: All the charcoal was already there. In other words, that thermostat had been burning material (probably insulation material) for a good long time. The other two looked okay, but considering they were all probably original equipment (circa 1953), you gotta figure it's about time for replacements. Another item off the home "to do" checklist.

I arranged Erin's France ticketing today via Alaska Airlines. Because she's flying free and those award seats are limited, we had to do her scheduling first. Good news, Bay Area denizens! Erin and I will have a layover of a couple days in your neck of the woods in late June before we depart to France. I've not yet been able to find out about pricing on the same flights for me, but if it ends up being a difference of a couple hundred bucks, we'll likely spend the money so we can fly together. If it's more than that, we'll aim to arrive same day, and I'll just take the cheapest flight available.

April 27, 2000
The PowerBook has shipped! I received notification from Apple this evening via email, and sure enough, their Order Status page confirms it. Looks like they're FedEx-ing it out of Taoyuan City, Taiwan, so I don't know how long it will take, but I'm hopeful that it will be here by early next week at the latest. You know I will keep you posted.

The clean-up crew got rescheduled to next Monday, so we've lived with the house in disarray longer than we ever imagined. (By "disarray" I mean "an environment of disorganization caused by someone other than ourselves.") It'll be good to get stuff back where it belongs, so that we can mess it up for ourselves.

As some of you know, Bret will be staying with us June 1 through September 1, the promise of free rent having convinced him that house sitting for us while we're in France ain't such a bad deal. He's been moving his stuff in gradually over the last few weeks, and I've promised him that both the family room and guest room will be his to clutter. He's making the most of this, but once the cleaning crew comes through on Monday, he should have even more space in those rooms to work with.

I also received notification from Amazon.com today that four—yes, four!—books were purchased via my web site last quarter entitling me to total royalties of $5.05. I don't know the who or the why, but I thank you!

April 26, 2000
Dave came over so that we could walk through Adobe GoLive, but at the end of the hour there really wasn't much to do or many questions to answer. He's a pretty sharp cookie, that Dave. Since he was on vacation he was able to spend the night, which was cool. Watched The Matrix, did computer stuff, walked around the neighborhood, even did some yard work today. Always a good time.

My back is improving daily. Still gonna wait awhile before I head back out to the basketball court, but for everyday activity, it's fine. Thanks to all who wrote in.

Got my new passport, but Erin's has been delayed because, apparently, we don't have sufficient evidence to prove that she really did change her last name when we got married. Looks like we'll be heading down to the passport office tomorrow, where a lesser degree of proof is needed than the mail-in passport arrangement we tried initially.

France tickets are proving to be a challenge. Due to a mileage plan, Erin's ticket will be free, but mine won't, and it looks like it will cost a bloody fortune. I'm being quoted anywhere from $1800 to $2400 for round-trip in the June 20-Aug 20 time frame. There's a pretty good chance that we may have to fly separately (which bites), just so we can afford to get over there and back.

According to the Apple Store rep I talked with today, the PowerBooks are on backorder but should be shipping by early next week.

Happy Birthday to Jennie, the Roshambo Queen!

April 23, 2000—Happy Easter!
My back was still a little sore, but not sore enough to stop me from going over and joining the Davison clan chow down on some of Mom's fine cookin'. Watched the Blazers win and the Sharks lose as well.

Certainly I agree with the majority of Americans that young Cuban refugee Elian, the Clinton Administration's latest political football, should have been returned to his father. But was there any way short of turning this into another Waco that the Administration could've screwed this up worse? Criminey, the dad asked for his kid's return the day after he was rescued at sea. And it took five months of hand wringing and teeth-gnashing before finally just throwing up our hands and sending in armed troops? What a pathetic inability to know right from wrong and what a pitiable need to test the winds of public opinion before making a decision. I know it's par for the course with these guys, but I've never stopped finding it galling.

Speaking of pity, poor Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore can pretty well kiss off Florida now, can't he? Odds were always very slim, but the nail's pretty much in the coffin at this point with Florida's 25 electoral votes. Florida's traditionally Republican anyway, so maybe it's the kind of issue which will boost Gore nationwide while only hurting him in the panhandle state. If so, it could end up being a net gain, though I think that's probably too optimistic a view. It's not like Gore was involved in the situation to begin with, of course, but try telling that to the Florida Cuban community. They still haven't forgiven the Democrats for the Bay of Pigs, and that was 40 years ago.

April 22, 2000
Well, the beautiful weather of the last few days led me to do something really stupid, namely play basketball. Went one-on-one with an older guy, Jack, who had a pretty good hook shot, but not so good that I couldn't beat him two out of three. Then I played 3 v 3 with a bunch of high school kids. I was pretty dominant, which felt nice.

Of course, I'll bet none of them woke up with back problems the next morning. I'm pretty sure it's not a disc thing and just sore muscles, but they're muscles which are so used to being tweaked that it's almost like they remember how to feel sore, if that makes sense. So yesterday and today have both been lame. I'm hopeful that I'll awake Easter Sunday feeling a hundred percent. What's one more miracle?

The electrician finally came around and swapped the flamed out thermostat with one that, presumably, won't attempt to burn the house down. Cleaners should come through again next week and move all our stuff out of the guest bedroom back into the living room. It'll be nice to get that back in order.

France trip hasn't been fully plotted, but we're getting there. Will be buying tickets soon. Apple's Order Status page still shows my PowerBook as "Being Assembled."

April 18, 2000
Erin and I have been trying to get our France travel ironed out. We emailed her friends in Paris over the weekend and just today heard back. We've yet to have time to discuss the responses in any detail, but we'll likely spend our first couple weeks in Paris. Other sites high on my "to see" list are Verdun, Normandy, and other World War I and World War II locations. Other than that, I'm hopeful that we can hangout in little French villages and soak up the atmosphere.

I confess that my biggest concern at this point is making sure that my SiteRev.com responsibilities are adequately discharged even though I'm a half a world away. We tried looking up some French ISPs this evening with disappointing results, so we'll have to keep trying. The PowerBook I ordered should enable me to pull all this off, but theory is one thing and practice is another.

The last two days have been really pleasant, and I've made my way down to the park for a little early afternoon basketball shoot-around both days. The City's park workers have put up new nets and since I'm shooting fairly well right now, I'm enjoying hearing the rip of the twine. (Is there a sweeter sound? I'm not sure.) Overall, I'm not convinced it's great exercise, but it sure it fun.

April 15, 2000
Erin and I watched What's Eating Gilbert Grape? last night in something that at least for me approached amazement. People who've only seen Titantic will fall out of their chairs when I say this, but Leonardo DiCaprio was brilliant. I can't explain the how or why, but his performance as the mentally impaired brother to Johnny Depp's Gilbert Grape lead was Oscar-worthy. (I wonder where that talent went?)

As for the rest of the cast, they were very good too, except for Juliette Lewis who seemed comparatively lightweight. The theme of desire versus obligation is effectively and subtly handled, but then I'm a fan of any picture that challenges people to change their point of view and see the world in a new light. This film is quirky and offbeat from the word "go" but if that's a barrier for you normally, don't let it stop you here. The acting alone is worth the video rental. Recommended.

I've ordered an Apple PowerBook 500-MHz, 128 MB RAM, 12 GB HD machine through the Apple Store and expect its arrival within 12 business days. Now to think of a name for it....

April 14, 2000
Panicky week on Wall Street with all the major indices plunging and tech stock in particular taking a beating. My response is, I'm sure, atypical, because I think this is the best thing to happen in a long time if it helps drive day traders and their ilk out of the market.

If you think about the societal purpose behind the stock market, it's to help regulate the flow of capital so that companies can have adequate funding to succeed in the marketplace on their own merits and, hopefully, better society by providing their particular goods or services. Investors who provide this funding are, in my opinion, taking substantial risks that their investment will not work out; consequently, they also deserve a hefty return if it does. This is why I favor a large reduction or elimination in the long-term capital gains tax rates.

By contrast, the short-term investor—well, speculator, really—can't be concerned with the fundamentals of a company or its long-term success. He or she simply wants to make the correct short-term guess, grab his money, and run. This serves no corporate or societal purpose, which is why I favor huge increases in short-term capital gains taxes.

It's also why I really enjoyed this week. Day traders got hammered, and hopefully it drove a lot of people who really shouldn't have been there out of the market, at least for a little while. Our own portfolio dropped about $7,000 this week, but give me another few weeks like this, and I'll be plenty happy. Long-term it'll all be fine.

Another good side to this is that it may finally bring some rational thought to the tech stocks. No company's stock, no matter how wonderful and rosy a future the organization has, is worth a price-earnings ratio of over 40. Heck, I won't even touch most stocks above 15 (but I'm overly conservative by nature).

It's no secret that most of the dot-coms are living on borrowed time. They hemorrhage cash like mad and never make a profit. CDNow is one of the top five sites on the Internet. Latest word from them is that they expect to be out of business by end of the year. If that doesn't spell doom for most of the online companies out there, I don't know what does. For the vast majority of businesses, the Internet cannot be an end unto itself. It's just a medium with which to communicate with and sell to customers. Brick-and-mortar stores remain important.

So let's hope this week heralds the end of the tech stock speculation and a return to rational investing. It's overdue.

April 12, 2000
I don't know what it takes, but somehow, some way, I will get AT&T to leave us the hell alone. We've gotten more telemarketing calls from them than I can count. (A dozen or so in the last 90 days; three this week alone!) and I keep requesting placement on their "do not call" list. We're also now signed up with the State Attorney General's "black dot" program which theoretically disallows companies from calling us. Hasn't made a bit of difference. Those AT&T SOBs just keep calling. I am more than a little aggravated since these calls are blatantly illegal and I hate telemarketing calls in general to begin with.

Another recent problem for us has been our US Postal service. Simply stated, a lot of our mail is not getting through. Bank statements, bills, packages—you name it, and we're not receiving it. Most things are arriving, but some very important stuff is getting round-filed or something. I''ve called to complain, and supposedly they're researching it. Here's hoping.

Despite how the above might sound, today was a really great day. SiteRev.com is doing well to the extent that I'll probably buy the PowerBook tomorrow, I got to help my parents a little with some tax stuff this afternoon, and Erin and I received a free PERS (Public Employee Retirement System) informational dinner in the evening. Great all the way around.

April 11, 2000
With our neighbor Fred's help I cut down one of two rotting oak trees in our backyard. The beasty took a fair amount of work since I don't have a chain saw, but I got a nice v-cut into the thing, and with Fred pulling on the safety line, my back cut felled the tree in short order. Unfortunately, I've got a taller one yet to take out, and it's unlikely to be as easy as this was.

Truth be told, I also need to remove a couple younger trees, a Japanese maple and a dogwood, which are growing in bad locations. To let them go would be to ultimately destroy the view of the park from the living room, and I'll be darned if that's gonna happen. Sorry, trees.

April 10, 2000
The painters finally arrived today to tackle the smoke damage from the fire of a few weeks ago. We opted to go with a "designer white" for the living room, kitchen ceiling, dining room and hallway. The results clash a little with the more cream-colored trim, but the house is noticeably brighter and less gloomy. We really like it. (We'll also be using this color to paint the dingy yellow guest room.)

In the off-hours, I've been trying to get into Myth: The Fallen Lords, a computer game that won 1997's Game of the Year honors. So far, I'd rate it a mixed bag. The single-player storyline is excellent, and narration is superb. The cartoon-style cutscenes are kind of goofy, but at least they're well done. The game play, unfortunately, isn't all that great. The graphics are pretty, and it simulates combat reasonably well, but it just isn't that much fun. I don't pretend to know what component it lacks, but when you're looking forward to the between-levels narration more than the game play itself, you know there's a problem. Perhaps Myth II: Soulblighter will offer more this regard.

I've been doing a lot of research on Apple's new "Pismo" PowerBooks, and at this point, I'm about a week away from ordering. Despite the higher price, I've decided to go with the G3 500-MHz model. I think I run enough processor-intensive applications that I can justify the higher speed, and if nothing else it should give the machine a slightly longer lifetime before obsolescence.

The benchmarks out of the G3/500 PowerBook are very impressive, in many cases outrunning the G4/450 desktop machines. Obviously that's not true for Alti-Vec (aka "Velocity Engine") based routines, but that technology isn't yet very firmly integrated into the MacOS. The PowerBook also lags a little in video-based performance, since the 8 MB Rage Mobility chip can't quite match the full Rage Pro 128 card on which its based. Nonetheless, that's comparing a portable to a desktop unit, something nearly heretofore unimaginable in terms of speed. And all reports are that Pismo's video performance is the best ever for a portable.

In fact, reviewers indicate that Pismo is the best at everything in terms of an Apple portable. It's lighter, faster, cooler (in terms of heat and in terms of fashion), Airport-capable, and less expensive. It's even able to drive an external monitor and its own display simultaneously in a dual-monitor configuration. Almost universally, the accounts I read say that Apple has never made a better portable machine, and that's saying something given that previous G3 laptops (Wall Street and Lombard) were also best of breed.

April 9, 2000
Bret came in for a haircut from Erin and while he was here we took measurements of the house so that he could draw it up in AutoCAD. (As many of you know, Bret's a CAD tech so this is right up his alley.) I'm hopeful that eventually we can use these plans to remodel the house and landscape the grounds. Many thanks to Bret for his efforts here!

April 8, 2000
Dave took off for Eugene this morning, a little earlier than planned, but this worked out since Bret invited me up to Portland for the Blazer game. He'd scored some comp tickets via work, and, ever the nice guy, invited his bro to join in the fun. I'd never been to the Rose Garden before, so this was a fascinating experience. It'd also been years since I'd attended a Blazer game so that was fascinating too.

The game itself was pretty good. The Blazers won, and our seats were nice, so no complaining there. I will say that I was amazed by the hype and commercialization of the proceedings, almost to the point nausea. What a shallow, glitzy, uninteresting, capitalist culture we have. Perhaps I'm just not a populist. Really enjoyed the game itself, though.

April 7, 2000
Dave was able to shake a second day free from his busy schedule and come up to visit us in Salem. Fortune smiled upon us, and he was even able to spend the night, which of course meant we stayed up until about 3 AM. Of course, we accomplished lots, too, so I'll pretend that's adequate justification for messing up our sleep schedules.

First, Erin, Dave, and I went for a long walk through the neighborhood. Lots of 1950s-era homes. Conditions varied from house to house. Some are very well maintained, others less so. No outright dumps, though the apartments all the way down at the end of the street (built circa 1970) aren't exactly beautiful. If I were a millionaire, I'd buy them, demolish them, and build townhouses or single-family homes. I'm not a millionaire, so there you go.

After we returned from the jaunt through the neighborhood, Dave and I attacked a dead tree in the backyard. Our neighbor, Fred, had come over earlier in the day to show me where a large branch had broken and fallen over. Since it was hanging up there, Dave and I decided to try to shake it down (taking all appropriate safety precautions of course). It took some sweat, but the limb came crashing down. Now I only have to remove the rest of the tree.

In the evening, Dave and I searched in vain for a cooperative multiplayer computer game so that we could play together instead of going 1 v 1. We experimented with Myth for a long time, but no dice. In the end, WarCraft II was the only thing we could find. We're hopeful that the upcoming Baldur's Gate, a game just coming out of beta this month, will fulfill our desires in this regard. (And if so, it may be the focus of a LAN party in the not-too-distant future.)

April 6, 2000
Dave came up from Eugene and we drove up to Portland for the Macintosh Business Expo at the Oregon Convention Center. Details in the Macintosh section, of course, but suffice to say that we had a good time.

I'm afraid that despite repeatedly playing with various 400- and 500-MHz Pismo PowerBook models, I still haven't been able to decide if that extra 100-MHz is worth $470 (what it will cost me at the Apple Store on a build-to-order configuration). I'm a couple of weeks off yet, but I had hoped to have things all ironed out after today. Oh well.

April 5, 2000
At the behest of several friends who can't believe I'm running a cable modem without one, I've been using a firewall for the last several days to see who, if anyone, has been hacking at my IP address. What I've found is that AtHome, my cable modem and service provider, runs a News Group IP security scan several times a day. Not sure why exactly, but they do. Other than that, I've encountered a couple of hack attempts out of Canada, but nothing all that exciting. With File Sharing turned off, I'm just not convinced that Macs are that vulnerable compared to Window-based computers, but who knows?

April 4, 2000
Thanks to Dad for coming over and mowing our lawn. Only a five minute job, but the grass looks so much better afterward, that it really is amazing. (Our dull-bladed push mower typically leaves the lawn looking like a bad haircut.)

April 3, 2000
70 degrees and sunny can mean only one thing: Basketball in the park. I spent about an hour in the midday sun shooting around then bumped into a high school freshman who wanted to do a little one on one. I jumped out to a big early lead, but my energy waned late in the game. In the end, 52-50, I win. Great exercise, and little bit of a tan as a bonus.

One downside of the sunny day is that our sugar ants have returned to the kitchen. We caulked some cracks and gushed them by the hundreds, but yet another war with nature stands before us. Of course, better this than battling the carpenter ants (whom we've not encountered for a few days now).

April 2, 2000
The Davisons got together yesterday to toast Erin and her recent birthday. Bret drove down from Portland, and we all assembled at Mom and Dad's place before heading over to Gonzalez, our favorite Mexican restaurant. There, we all once again ate too much and had a merry old time. We followed this with cake and ice cream at Mom and Dad's. (I'll be running on the treadmill for weeks to get rid of all these calories.)

Hurray for Erin!

April 1, 2000
Nothing says you're a fool like holding a QuakeWorld LAN Party on a day where the sun is shining and the sky is blue, so that's what I did. With Dave, Dennis, Matt, and Joe as attendees, we launched another marathon all-day session. We took occasional breaks to go outside and see the beautiful day and of course we stopped for lunch, but other than that, it was pretty much just QuakeWorld mayhem. Overall, I'd have to say that the 3 v 2 QW 2Fort5 games were my favorites, but we did a 3 v 1 "fox v. hounds" style game that was enjoyable as well. Later in the evening, Dave, Matt and I played WarCraft versus the computer, a challenging endeavor given that the computer tends to cheat.

Thanks to all who attended for making the April Fools' QW LAN Party a success!

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