Day After Yesterday

So time has passed since I was laid off, and with that I have had more time to reflect on the entire situation, and the more I reflect, the more frustrated I get. As you will recall, my coworker and I were both laid off at 4pm on tuesday, with that very tuesday being our last day. The speech was of course that times were tight and the company had to tighten the belt financially, and due to this, my position was no longer. And, of course, the company was in no financial position to offer me anything above and beyond what I was legally entitled.

Evidently the company is in financial trouble.
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I love nokia phones. I really like the symbian OS too. I think I just like the concept of an OS where I can install apps and whatnot and do whatever. Oh, and it isn’t an MS OS, which I won’t do. So I have a nokia. My wife has a nokia. My kid has my on of our old nokias as a toy. My mom has one. My sister has one. I tell everyone that they need nokias. When people who bought RAZR’s finally get fed up with that piece of crap phone, I tell them to go nokia.

So when the iPhone was announced I was conflicted. I also love apple. But the whole lack of installable software pissed me off to a degree that I knew I wasn’t going actually get one. I took the money and bought car parts and bike parts instead.

As the iPhone hit the market and I got more into it, there was a tinge of desire there I will admit, but then I remembered, while I sat on the can playing solitaire on my nokia, that I could do that on an iPhone, but I would have to be hitting a web page. Meh.

Then I got this link today, and I found it really funny. And really the points are all valid. Sure, it is a bit over the top, it is all valid. And really pretty in line with my feelings and thoughts. Sure, he does better animated GIFs than I do, but I am ok with that.

I hate Jerry Falwell. Not that I am going out on a crazy limb to say that, but yeah. Needless to say, while I don’t usually cheer when people die, we are better off without him. Hatred is hatred, regardless of what ‘religion’ you are hiding behind. While I am an atheist, I respect the right people have to free speech and religious beliefs. My stance is I won’t tell you my beliefs and you don’t tell me yours.

But overall, I think he was incredibly negative. Glad to see him gone. I hope his flock of fools wanders away and realizes that they have been led around by a bigot.

Here is a list of great quotes from Jerry.

I have a smart playlist in iTunes of the above name, and it is staggering how many songs are in there. Insane. Sure, some of them are older CDs that I own that I surely played the hell out of in high school, so the iTunes play count is a poor representation of my history with those songs, but there are a lot of newer things on there.

The problem is of course caused by the very thing that makes me love digital music as I do-instant gratification. To sit here at my laptop and think, DAMN, I want to listen to that one Guided By Voices song, it will be playing within 15 seconds. Combine that with the fact that I don’t spend NEARLY the amount of time in my car I that I used to, and I don’t listen to music in the same way anymore.

Back in the pre-MP3 days, I would load the car up with CDs. In high school, I used to drive around with a minimum of 100 cds in the car, in wooden crates in the back seat, in the door pockets, center console, glove box. CDs were everywhere. It was a major auto theft waiting to happen. Not that the average thief would have much to do with local chicago punk CDs and random imported ska CDs, but nonetheless, it would have sucked for me.

But once I moved everything to MP3s and got the ubiquitous iPod (first on the block, waiting in line at the Apple Store that saturday morning for my (now) huge 5GB iPod. Still works quite well thank you.) everything changed. I hardwired a firewire plug behind the dash board, I wired the iPod into the CD Changer inputs of the Audi headunit. and built a fancy little holder for it.

And thus the instant gratification began. And the death of the album per se. I like the concept of an album, I think the order of tracks is important. But I don’t care anymore. I don’t listen to anything in order anymore. I usually have whatever I am listening to on shuffle. I am not ready to bring the album back, but I am working on listening to music as I get it, giving things a fair few times before it falls into the vast library. There have been a number of songs that I REALLY like now, but would have never found on the first pass.

So my current plan is to get everything to a play count of at the least 1. And I am seriously listening to them. I am filling the iPods off those playlists and syncing them back. I am down to ~1400 songs left. I am also trying to not add as much music at the rate I usually do. I am deleting things I don’t care about in an attempt to both clear up space and also get rid of the crap. I don’t know why I had so much Jennifer Lopez, but that is all gone now, needless to say. I am have an ‘on deck’ folder with MP3s that I will add once I listen to the album I last added.

I am getting lazy with music due to the potential floodgate that I could open at any time. I need to give more attention to what I have and digest it all versus slamming it all down. I need to rediscover my music.

it is hard. My God says I can own slaves, but my government says I can’t.

What is a good christian to do?

It is tough. And since I am told that being gay is wrong, and I thus feel that is true, then one can only come the conclusion that slavery is good. I mean, the bible can’t be 100% wrong in one verse and 100% right in another, ESPECIALLY when they both are verses in the same book! I mean, how would THAT be possible?!?

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Easter has come and gone… and easter, the jesus rising to a zombie thing, etc. I wasn’t even into it enough to care enough to make bad jokes. I do find it odd that all these people see the following: Guy that is both loved and hated is put to death in a public spectacle, then he is buried. The next morning, the rock to the tomb is moved and the body is gone.

They see that and while logic would argue that the MOST likely situation was that his body was stolen. Not surprising when you consider the number of people that both hated him and loved him. But instead of following the most likely scenario, it is believed that he rose from the dead.

Now if you had bought the pope’s VW golf (now on eBay) and you got it and put it in the garage. Then the next morning, you came out and your garage door was open and the VW was gone, you would most likely assume that the car was stolen. You would be hard pressed to convince the world that god came and TOOK the VW. I realize that this is not the same level as Jesus, but I think it ignores the most likely scenario. But alas… what do I care.

Believe what you want, but I would like to see more people think about it critically vs. just going to church and believing everything you are told.

so my boss got a new laptop and surprise to me, it had vista business on it. Sure, we are not prepared to deal with vista machines, but whatever. Anyway. So I am setting it up for him, and I am not impressed by any means. It is a Core 2 Duo with 2gb RAM and it is still slow. SLOW. Using a SLOWER cpu on my macbook, I was expecting more. And it appears to be a lame update in that it seems to be all fluff. All pretty and less speed. XP feels faster.

And evidently it is a huge moneymaker to install every app in the world on the machine, because it seems there are 40+ installed demos and trials and whatnot. Awesome. And needless to say, no install CD/DVD where I could REINSTALL it without all that crap. Great.

Perhaps I am spoiled in my OSX world. Such it is.

Feature wise, it is close to my macbook. intel core duo, 2gb RAM, 160gb HDs, both have cameras, etc. I will say when you are used to a slot load, the flimsy trays are not impressive.

Oh well. Whatchagonnado.

Thanks to josh for this link…

Scary Voting Facts in the US

I saw the clip last week, but this commentary is awesome and provides more awesome links. God I hate religion (intentional).

Read Rodney’s Post.

It covers religious bigots who claim to be religious (Surely jesus would side with them, he was big on denying things to those that didn’t agree with him. He also loved rich people, and I am sure he would love the media today). It touches on the media’s inability to report on things that matter, which could imply that the average american is an idiot. Awesome.

I saw the clip last week, but this commentary is awesome and provides more awesome links. God I hate religion (intentional).

Read Rodney’s Post.

It covers religious bigots who claim to be religious (Surely jesus would side with them, he was big on denying things to those that didn’t agree with him. He also loved rich people, and I am sure he would love the media today). It touches on the media’s inability to report on things that matter, which could imply that the average american is an idiot. Awesome.