Eliyon People Finder is a relatively new website that has some implications for privacy on the web. Look up a former employer, or even better, yourself...
posted by MikeM at 4:00 PM    

 
Infosec News and Analysis: "Today Microsoft released a patch to Internet Explorer that addresses critical vulnerabilities that may allow malicious sites to run arbitrary code on unpatched systems. These vulnerabilities have been known for some time. One of them was being actively exploited by the Scob/Ject attack"
posted by MikeM at 3:24 PM    

 
Moving day is over. *Whew!*

All of the furniture is moved to our respective apartments, cable hookups are tomorrow - I'll have a computer again!

Today we both dropped the pups off at the old house just to avoid the sudden shock of being left alone in a new place all day. We'll give them the weekend to get used to the idea in short bursts before we give them the acid test Monday.

We still have to move out the artwork and such, and a few other odds and ends, and then clean the house, but the major stuff is done.

My apartment is looking nice, now that I have somewhere to sit and somewhere to sleep. Once I get the computer going I'll have to unpack all my computer stuff and games, then I'll have all the time I need to get my bookcases assembled and populated.

Of course, NEXT sat is when the dining room table is moved from Sara's, so I need to have at least the middle of the dining room cleared. That means I have a week to get the majority of the non-book boxes unpacked and put away. Or moved to another room.

Patty and I also bought matching Digital CamCorders - Panasonic GS14 model - nice ones! We were in Best Buy getting the stuff she needed for her internet hookup coming Saturday and she decided to get one, so I did too. She also got a VCR/DVD combo unit so they could watch DVDs. And a 15" LCD TV for her bedroom. She spent money like I usually do. :)

So once I get this camcorder/camera figured out, I'll have pictures posted up here. The older Panasonic SuperDisk-120 camera still works, but I might retire it in favor of this new one that uses a Mini-DV tape for video and an SD card for pictures.

posted by MikeM at 9:00 AM    

 
A federal court recently ruled that website privacy policies aren't binding, because nobody reads them. The implications are far reaching for contract law and the Internet.

The ruling would also allow companies to post any sort of privacy policy on their websites to convince customers to disclose sensitive data, but would not require companies to uphold the privacy policy. The judge argues that since no contract exists, no trial can proceed under contract law, and since the data becomes the property of the airline, invasion of privacy is impossible.
posted by MikeM at 10:08 AM    

 
"file sharing has no impact upon sales of CD's", says this new study.
posted by MikeM at 3:43 PM    

 
Space Science Pioneer James Van Allen Questions Human Spaceflight.

I tend to agree with this most astute gentleman in that continued manned spaceflight is a waste of money and effort. Leave it to the robots and remotes.

posted by MikeM at 2:38 PM    

 
Yesterday was a whirlwind! Worked until 11:45, had to go to the apartment to let the fed ex guy in, delivered one of my bookcases. Three to go. At 1pm went to the house to show it to some more potential buyers, no show. At 2pm back to the apt to let in another fed ex guy, helped him get two more bookcases (huge ones) into the apt. Three down, one to go, likely today at some point.

Called movers and decided on one, worked out a moving schedule with Patty and Sara, hired the movers for Thursday.

Went to Circuit City and bought a Panasonic 34" Widescreen PureFlat™ HDTV Monitor (PAN CT34WX54) for $1399 with a $100 rebate. Added a nice TV stand and came out of there for about half what the 40" Sony would have cost! This TV is HDTV ready, native 16:9 format with a second 4:3 tuner, so it handles all signals well. It looked fantastic at CC, even when the salesman turned off HDTV and tuned it to standard cable to show the 4:3. Patty and Sara helped me drag it into my apt last night, so it's home already!

When I got to the house just after 5pm, there was a group of people waiting to see the house - the same group that had seen it twice before. Hmmm, must be interested! I showed it again, this time there was a couple of new faces, I think the parents are buying a house for their son and his wife. I explained everything I could about the house, the yard, the pool, what conveyed, etc.

About 7pm I got a call from our realtor - they had put an offer in! Very good! Hopefully everything will work out and we will close in 3 weeks (they are in a hurry, and we should be out of there easily by then).


posted by MikeM at 7:47 AM    

 
The open house went well - I learned that you can never clean too much, and you can never actually finish cleaning, as you will discover dust where you are certain you vaccuumed only a day ago. Friday and Saturday were spent packing, loading and unloading the truck at various apartments. Saturday night until around midnight was spent cleaning the house from top to bottom, making everything nice.

Sunday morning I packed 21 boxes of books and moved them to my apartment - wow. Books = heavy. Now I have a pretty much empty house except for my clothes hanging in the closet and two boxes of assorted stuff I need to live there. Plus the kitchen china, glassware, and other stuff I haven't packed yet. I'll start that tonight.

I need to buy a TV - I'm no longer stuck on the 40" Sony, now I'm looking at a 36" Panasonic for about half the money. And weight.

posted by MikeM at 8:36 AM    

 
Last night I loaded the Escape with all the boxes I had prepared the night before - 14 small boxes full of books, cassettes, magazines, etc. Plus two computers, two monitors, a double-sized milk crate full of files and some other assorted odd-sized stuff. I could have put 18 of those boxes in the car with a little room to spare. Nice! After unloading all this stuff at the apartment, I laid down in the floor for a moment to rest around 9pm. I must have fallen asleep, cause I didn't wake until nearly 10pm when my phone rang! First sleep in the apt - nice and quiet actually, not noisy at all!
posted by MikeM at 8:37 AM    

 
Yesterday was frantic! I had to drop off my new car at the dealers to have the aftermarket stuff installed (including lojack, woo!), and so needed a ride back, etc. I had them try to buff out the scratches on my back hatch from where I backed into my garage door.

eek. Yup. The previous night I was moving boxes into the garage and lowered the stairs to the attic so I could see where to put boxes that wouldn't interfere with the stairs. I forgot to put it back up.

The next morning, when I hit the button for the garage door, I heard it start and got in the car, then heard it stop, assumed it was all the way up, and since it stopped just above the window level, I couldn't see it. Backed up slowly, CRUNCH. The door safety stopped it when it touched the stairs. Just above the window on my back hatch I now have a nice assortment of scratches, as well as a broken garage door.

Application of force got the door back on the track, and well-placed kicks got the bottom panel back in the frame and not looking too bad. Except for the 2' crack down the whole panel. *sigh*

As for the car - it mostly buffed out, and only cost me $25 extra.

Then, while the car was at the shop, I got a call from our realtor saying she had a client very interested - so I said I would be there at 12 to clean up a bit, and he could show at 12:30. Then I realized I had no car. Brian was kind enough to loan me his car, even knowing that I back into doors and such. Brave soul, and kind too! I moved dozens of boxes into the garage, cleaned up the house as best I could, and got the dogs outside as the clients showed up. I spoke to them a bit about the pool and the house, they seemed interested.

Hopefully they will make an offer and we won't have to go through the ordeal of an open house!
posted by MikeM at 8:32 AM    

 
Note:
Small Box = 16-3/8" x 12-5/8" x 12-5/8"
Medium Mox = 18-1/8" x 18" x 16"

My new Escape can sure haul a lot of cargo! 6 med boxes, 6 small ones, two area rugs, a large pillow, 10-12 winter coats, a boombox and a suitcase. I measured the back with the seats folded - 58" deep, 34" high and 40" wide. This means I can take a lot of the smaller furniture items out without hiring a mover! All of the endtables and coffeetables, the chair and ottoman, even several of the shorter bookcases. We can get the place cleaned out fairly well by Sunday, I think.

I emptied the guest room of all of my computer stuff, all that is left are a few '45s and a toolbox. I'll get those tonight. I made two trips to the apartment last night, including one with the DVD bookshelf with storage doors. Heavy. My back is letting me know that I really should be more careful. Just a warning twinge this morning.

While I am getting the rest of the house emptied of Mike's stuff, I am slowly realizing just how much is left. There are truckloads of stuff that isn't mine, and that I don't want. Maybe half of this remaining stuff is Patty's. The rest is accumulated 'stuff' that we thought we needed. I sense a dumpster in the future for a lot of it.

We are leaving a lot of stuff with the house, including all of the yard gear in the garage. Maybe the new owners will find a treasure trove of 'stuff' in the attic!
posted by MikeM at 8:04 AM    

 
As usual - the weather predictions were wrong. We had rain overnight, a light rain until around 9am, rain from 11-2, then sunny skies and decent weather the rest of the day. So far anyway.

The game went well once we started it - the preliminary bull session and such was fun, however. Ants are an excellent adversary to level up low level characters quickly. A group of four workers, follower by another group of four workers and two soldiers made all of the players lvl 2, then they went against a group of four soldiers in a bottleneck that allowed the characters to win at the cost of being injured with no healing left and very few hit points remaining. They withdrew and rested for a few days to heal back up and learn new spells, etc.

We broke the game around 5pm, after the rest period. This was pretty much a sample game, so we could cover some of the stickier points of 3.5 ed AD&D, such as cover, attacks of opportunity, and flanking. We also got a level in, so we practiced taking a character up a level. Good overall, and we got to eat some hamburgers and hot dogs, play with Maggie and Toby, enjoy the day, and overall have quite a good time.

Now back to packing what I can.

We signed with an agent, open house next Sunday from noon to 5pm, and we have to have the house in GOOD shape, with most of the cluttery furniture out, and most of the decorations as well. Just the primary furniture can remain.

After the open house, we will likely begin moving the larger items until eventually we will be left with an empty house, completely moved out of and us settled in our respective apartments. Hopefully it will sell quickly. I would like to have all of this behind me by September.
posted by MikeM at 5:47 PM    

 
Today we are supposed to have an AD&D game with a pool party and cookout - but it's raining. Supposed to be rain broken up by thunderstorms all day. *sigh* Ah well. I suppose we can cook the burgers & hot dogs and then eat inside. The game should be fun anyway. I don't have any miniatures, so we'll be using my old Battletech minis to represent the various warriors, mages, and clerics.

In other news - the new car is doing great! I loaded several boxes into it last night, then bought more moving packs from budget, delivered the full boxes to my new apt, and got the packs back home where we started packing kitchen stuff. The moving packs are quite well-designed. 10 medium & 10 small boxes, along with tape and a marker for $40. The kitchen pack has 4 small and 3 medium, along with a dish pack and glasses pack, with bubble wrap and 10 lbs of paper for wrapping things. And the marker and tape, of course.

We will be having an Open House next Sunday - we signed the papers with the realtor yesterday. This gives us a week to get the house partially empty, as it should sell better with some furniture. We might empty it out after the Open House, depending on reaction from the attendees.

posted by MikeM at 7:05 AM    

 







posted by MikeM at 7:26 PM    

 
Bought it! I own a new SUV! This thing is great, ride is fantastic, lots of power and space, and I got the 10 yr ext warranty so I won't be hit up with big-ticket repairs in a few years. :)

posted by MikeM at 1:18 PM    

 
I just test-drove what I hope will be my new car!

A 2005 Ford Escape Limited Edition 4WD! Silver with black leather interior. Upgraded MACH stereo w/6 CD system and subwoofer, safety canopy side airbag system and power moonroof.

Should be around $500/mo after trade in and rebates. I'm going for the cash back instead of the APR, because I'll be paying it off entirely once the house sells! $26k isn't bad!

Check out the ford site - build one up and take a look at the features - this thing is truly loaded with nice stuff.
posted by MikeM at 2:43 PM    

 
Amber Diceless RPG CLOSING DOWN! Yes, Phage Press is ceasing publication of the Amber Diceless RPG and as of July 31 this year they will cease selling it altogether. Note that this also includes the Amberzine magazines that they have left. They have only a few #3 left, but more of #7 through #11. #12 is not out yet, but will be the only Amber item sold at Phage Press. After July 31, the only place to get these will be Ebay, at quite a mark-up!
posted by MikeM at 2:14 PM    

 
Microsoft has released several new Critical Security Patches as noted on this security website. All windows systems need to have these patches installed ASAP to protect them from the inevitable worm and virus exploits to follow.

I've been tinkering with a new project here at work - a Single Board Computer from Winsystems. This is a very nice board, and the development kit is nice as well. I'm having problems addressing the Disk On Chip portion of the system, as well as intermittent hard drive problems. I hope it is something I am doing and not a hardware fault!
posted by MikeM at 8:29 AM    

 
Monty Python conversions of two recent movies:

Monty Python: Fellowship of the Ring

Monty Python: The Two Towers

posted by MikeM at 2:16 PM    

 
It appears that someone has written "Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail" into a broadway play. The article mentions some of the actors that are expected to participate, including Tim Curry and David Hyde Pierce. Star names join Python on Broadway.
posted by MikeM at 8:27 AM    

 
I got the keys Friday, looked around and made the move-in inspection. Overall, everything looks great, and the apartment is larger than I had thought on previous visits.

There is so much to do with any move - I am just doing a little at a time, as the deadline is around mid-aug when the house should be sold. We will likely put it up for sale soon now.

Patty has begun packing in earnest, and she has several dozen boxes packed and in the garage for the movers (eventually). I'll start packing fairly soon - I might want to get some more bookcases first, then I can move the books to the new bookcases and have some extra room for the books I have in storage in Roanoke!

I'm still looking at cars, haven't made up my mind yet - Saturn VUE got some good reviews, but also some pretty bad ones regarding the fit and finish, quality of workmanship, etc. The Ford Escape seems to be better than the Vue on all counts, even mileage. Larger engine as well. The Subaru and Volvo small SUV entries aren't bad either, but the price jumps up significantly with them.

Got the Best of Alice in Chains - great CD - listening to it now. Might try and keep it going when I play City of Heroes! Lvl 12 now, with over 38 hrs in the game total. When you speak to pedestrians and such, occasionally they mention how long you have been playing - nice feature.

posted by MikeM at 7:46 AM    

 
Home again! I have been in Roanoke since Saturday morning, and just got home this afternoon. I had a thoroughly enjoyable vacation, met most of my old friends and got to spend some quality time with them, and got to even do a little gaming!

Traffic was light both on the way there and on the way back, regardless of the holiday weekend - I saw no backups at all.

I get the keys to my new apartment tomorrow! I'll be there most of the evening measuring and such - I have a lot of furniture to move/have delivered there and need to know what will go where.

As it is Thursday, Kingdom Hospital will be on tonight at 9pm on ABC, right? They wouldn't jerk it again, would they? Of course they would. The guide said 9pm, even the on-screen info said 9pm. At 9pm, however, some documentary about cancer came on and they scrolled a line at the top of the screen saying "Kingdom Hospital will not be shown tonight. However, it will be shown at 3am for those that wish to see it."

Gee, thanks. Bastards. Yes, I'll be up at 3am to see it. I'm off tomorrow as well, otherwise this would be VERY inconvenient! I hope they play it as scheduled next week.

Haven't played City of Heroes since Friday night... D.T.'s setting in. Maybe I can play while I'm waiting for Kingdom Hospital!

I have been going through a list of things I need to do when I move - and new checks cropped up. I need a new phone number for the new place (Patty is keeping her old number), and I need that number for most of the change of address notices on the bills, etc - and most importantly for the new checks! Tomorrow I'll have a lot of calls to make, as I want to get everything pretty much situated and ready for the change of address. The more I do manually, the less I have to depend on the USPS Change of Address forms to make sure my mail comes to the right place.

posted by MikeM at 11:16 PM    

 
Well, papers signed, so here is a floorplan for my new place! I'm first floor, with a patio door that leads right out into a small yard, so very convenient for dog-walking at all hours!

The place is great, in a nice neighborhood, and within 1 block of the library! I'll finally have room to add bookcases so that I can bring all of my book collection home from Roanoke in a month or so.

Still have lots to do before I take possession on the 10th - power & gas need to be turned on, I will need a new TV by August, and cable turned on by then as well. The fun bit is that I have a month to move stuff bit by bit before Moving Day for the furniture and such.
posted by MikeM at 8:27 AM    

 
Update to the marital bliss topic - Patty signed a lease on an apt, and she and her roomie will be moving from their current apt into the new one on Aug 1. I will be signing a lease tonight and hope to schedule the move for Aug 1 as well. I hope to get it all done at once while the moving company is there. We're going to keep it friendly, but she has pretty much decided not to seek any further help regarding this and I have come to grips with that. I think being alone for a while will be good for me. Besides, I get to buy my new TV now!

I should have my new address tonight or Friday - a nice 2br 2 bath apt classified as a luxury apt. At $1500+/mo it better be. Still cheaper than the house, and all of the maintenance is handled for me. That will be nice.

I'm going to put the house on the market as soon as possible. We have some major cleaning and such to do, but I want to see the house on the market by the 16th of July. We will put a clause in that closing may not take place before Aug 15th, to give us time to get everything out without having to rush.

I'm experimenting with Maggie, seeing if she can go 9-10 hrs without going outside. SO far so good. I hope she will be fine with this, otherwise I will have to modify my working hours to allow for 30 min a day to babysit the dogs. It will only be a 2.3 mile commute, but still a bit of a hassle.

posted by MikeM at 3:02 PM