Radios and Red Sox

So it's the trade deadline.

A little while back, I picked up a little Sony AM/FM walkman. No tape, no CD, just the radio. I have an iPod for everything else. The only reason I got the radio was sports radio. I would almost prefer an AM only radio, but have you tried to find an AM only radio in a store these days? Now, I only went to Best Buy, but I had a hard enough time finding JUST a radio (without CD/Tape/etc).

So it's the trade deadline for the Red Sox, and I am at my desk sitting listening all day to WEEI through my headphones.

The only thing that's pissing me off is that there is a HUGE trade that is happening for the Celtics. It sounds like a good trade, etc. But that's not why I'm listening! I do not care about the Celts. Sure, it would make it more interesting, but I don't care. I want to hear about my Sox, dammit!

Does anybody actually watch basketball anymore, anyway?

And can't I get a Red Sox only day on the trade deadline?

And why is it so impossible to get a POS AM radio? Or perhaps I should try to build one?

Sister Mary

My routine of having no car is pretty well established at this point. Wait for bus, get off bus, hop on train, hop off train, walk to work. Then, at the end of day, walk to train, hop on train, hop off train, wait for bus, hop off bus, get home.

All of the time that I am not hopping, or walking, I am reading a book or filling in sudoku's. Okay, sometimes I'm looking at pretty girls, but I SHOULD be reading a book or filling in sudoku's.

So on the way home today, I walk to train, hop on then off train, and sit down to wait for bus...

SM: "Hi, I'm Sister Mary of the [get in your face] church. What's your name?"

BG: "[BostonGraf]"

SM: "We have a table set up over there that has a lot of [brainwashing techniques]"

BG: "Yeah, I'm an atheist, and am really all set"

SM: "Oh, well, do you believe in family?"

BG: "Yep."

SM: "Well, we have lots of information that [can brainwash them too]"

BG: "Yeah, but it requires belief in something that doesn't exist. I'm really all set."

SM: "Can you tell me what made you not believe in [invisible all seeing sky buddy]?"

BG: "Sure. Logic. I looked at all of the myths and religions around me when I was very young and realized that morals are good, and all the myths and stories all have the same morals but different characters. And I don't need to believe in the characters to agree with the morals. So it makes sense to treat them like fiction."

SM: "Well, I know that I have had my prayers answered by [invisible all seeing sky buddy]"

BG: "But don't you agree that it is better to be good for the sake of being good, than doing so because of some punishment/reward you might receive after you no longer exist?"

SM: "Oh, it's not based on a reward system! [invisible all seeing sky buddy] has many mansions for all those that are judged, and after this life he will sort some into some houses and others into others"

BG: "But if you don't do his bidding, you will go to hell, right?"

SM: "Well, [invisible all seeing sky buddy] will decide that based on your actions and desires."

BG: "But the Greeks taught us that we all die and have to cross the river Styx and will be judged below the earth, and there are many different levels and outcomes from that judgement, and those stories were around before your stories."

SM: "But I KNOW that with prayer to [invisible all seeing sky buddy], all will believe if they have faith in their prayers."

BG: "So you have to HAVE faith to propagate faith. There's really no REASON to have faith. And BLIND faith is the only way to REALLY have faith."

SM: [says something that I don't hear because bus is pulling up]

BG: "Yeah, that's my bus. I got to go." [start walking, she follows]

SM: "But you won't know it's too late until it's too late! When we are all judged by [invisible all seeing sky buddy]"

BG: "Oooohh...I see..." [gets on bus]

Now, I've engaged in MANY conversations about the existence of god, and felt as though I've won some, and felt as though I've lost some. This one, I felt I won. But that's not the point. The point is that I had three sudokus in my hand (easy, beginner, and professional) , and I know that I need that wait period at the bus stop to do the easy one to get my brain going to finish the other two by the end of my bus ride.

And this broad just took away my waiting period! So, I didn't get to finish my freakin sudokus by the time I got off the bus. The nerve of these people! Don't they know that they interfere with people's lives with their crap. They can cause some real damage if they don't watch out...She's only lucky there wasn't a pretty girl I was trying to watch! Then there woulda been trouble.

TypeR 00-0642 has retired.

So, I've been putting this entry off because it is very sad for me.


My poor car has been totalled. After they caught the theives, the insurance company took a look at the car and they said she was dead. We talked about getting second opinions, etc, but in the end, we would have to go through a lot of work for something that wasn't guaranteed. So it is totalled. They paid us a good fair amount to close out the policy, and I am now sans vehicle.

I will have to live with my memories of her. I did a LOT with that car.

• I took her drag racing up at NE Dragway in New Hampshire.
• I did autocross with her with the BMW Car Club.
• I reached 150mph at 2am on I-95 south.
• I enjoyed many a great street race against all sorts of cars.
• I tried to kill my buddy RoadTrip and myself by flying over hills in Campton NH. When crested a hill, the car got a little air. Then the road turned...while we weren't touching it. But the car saved us. When we landed, I cranked the wheel and the car held. It was amazing and beautiful and memorable and incredibly stupid.
• My fiancee and I enjoyed multiple drives up to Montreal through the beautiful mountains of Vermont and NH. The last time, coming back, we didn't even turn on the radio for the entire ride back. Just listened to the car.
• My buddy Fellswoop and I had a great drive down to NYC. This was right when SUVs were reaching their full gratuitousness and we both saw our first Excursion. The highway was empty, and the Excursion was in the middle lane, I was in the passing lane, of course. So I pass him, change lanes in front of him, then to the slow lane, drop behind him, back into his lane, passing lane, pass him again, and do the same thing again...He wasn't too happy . So he tried to chase me. An 9,000lbs SUV trying to keep up with a 2700lbs sports car. I toyed with him. Then we came across another truck in the middle lane, I matched speeds with the middle lane truck, trapping the Excursion in the passing lane behind me and next to the truck. He didn't like that, so he dropped back behind the truck and passed him on the right hand side...At which point I dropped into third gear, and redlined through up to about 130mph and never saw him again.
• And so many more...(Fiancee and I driving through NYC traffic, Fellswoop and I driving up to Montreal, Roadtrip in his GS-R on I-95 North, and on, and on , and on...)

But in our later years together, we calmed down. We still enjoyed an occassional street race, but not with the same veracity as before, just kind of out of nostalgia. I still enjoyed listening to her throaty screams at 8,400rpm.

I even recorded her. As far as execution on random ideas, this has to be one of my all time greatest:Boo's Throaty Screams
I attached a microphone to the inside of my engine bay, and hooked it to a mini-disk recorder sitting on the passenger seat. I love it.

For those that don't know what my car was, she was an Acura Integra. But not just any teg. She was 2000 Acura Integra Type R #00-0642. There were only about 1200 of them, they were serial numbered, and they were production race cars. The engine got an extra 30 horsepower over the GS-R. She sat .75 inches lower than the GS-R. There were extra welds in the frame for a stiffer body. She had extra body stiffening additions like a crossbar over the engine bay, and at the trunk. She has a 3" air intake instead of the 2.5". She had a high spoiler, and a sexy front lip. She was made with no sound proofing to reduce weight, and that made the sound INCREDIBLE. And all of this was stock. I replaced the air intake with a cold air intake for even more performance. She had great shocks, great brakes, great acceleration, great sound, and great looks. Everything I will ever want in a car.

And that is why I can't get another car. Yet. I need to make sure that I'm not getting a rebound car. I need to make sure that I find a car and that I'm not trying to REPLACE my Type R. I can't replace my Type R. And she will always be the first car that I really loved.

I'll miss you, Boo.

More SimpsonizeMe Fun

Yes, I have a picture of my cubicle. I actually printed it out, framed it, and it is now the only picture IN my cubicle.

But here is the picture of my cubicle with me in it:

Simpsonizer

Well, now this is just cool. Thank you Lois.

Get a Simpsonized verion of yourself: http://www.simpsonizeme.com/

And this is what I look like in Springfield...

Space, and lots of it

I got a new iPod. Finally. It is a wonderful piece of gear that I have been enjoying immensely, but I will not bore you with the usual review type crap. Everybody knows what a fucking iPod is. Everybody knows how to use it. Everybody knows. Everybody knows. (good song by Concrete Blonde, BTW)

The story I would like to tell today is about a mistake. You see, I got the 80GB version. Lots of space. LOTS.

Now, I also have about a thousand USB devices plugged into my home PC. I might go so far as to say too many. I know, I know…impossible, right? Well, this is actually too many, because my system has developed the bad habit of dropping its connection with one device when another device gets plugged in. One of the devices it tends to drop is my external hard drive. This is the external hard drive that I do my automated nightly backups to. (Yes, I am enough of a geek that I wrote some scripts to automatically backup specific directories nightly)

Now let’s jump forward to just a few minutes ago. I plugged in my fun new iPod and noticed that I only have 3.3GB of free space left on it.

What?

I bought an 80GB iPod and it is FULL? I had checked my music library, and I know that with the music, videos, and pictures that I put on the iPod, I should only be using about 30GB. But I spent a couple minutes and figured out what happened. When I plugged my iPod in the other day, I kicked my external hard drive off. And the iPod assumed the same drive letter that the external drive had been using. So my iPod became my backup drive. It stayed plugged in overnight. System did a full backup cycle. And I hadn’t noticed what happened until just now.

This means that the iPod is not only large enough for me to put ALL of my music (between 400 and 500 CDs or 6000 songs) on it. But it can then perform a full data backup to it, which includes ANOTHER COPY OF MY MUSIC FILES, and all of my pictures, and etc, etc, etc … And STILL have a couple gigs left over.

That, my friends, is a beautiful thing.

Fuck Harley's

This is an instant messenger session between myself and a friend of mine. It's been a little while since I voiced my disdain for the Harley brand, and I think I did a reasonably fine job of it here.
(I have corrected some spelling mistakes, but have kept the words and flow in their original form)
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[14:34] bostongraf: Hell, it's feasible that I could have a motorcycle by saturday, and this is all moot!
[14:35] qabacon: ooooh?
[14:35] bostongraf: (how much would that rock!)
[14:35] qabacon: what kind?
[14:35] bostongraf: Up in the air
[14:35] qabacon: I have a friend selling a barely used sportster cheap just to dump it
[14:35] bostongraf: I would love a Katana or a CBR or a Ninja
[14:35] qabacon: ah wrong market
[14:35] bostongraf: or a SV650
[14:35] bostongraf: I am a sport bike kinda guy
[14:36] qabacon: I could see that
[14:36] bostongraf: Fuck american bikes. They sound like shit and run even worse
[14:36] qabacon: I'm not ;-)
[14:36] qabacon: ouch!
[14:36] qabacon: though when it comes right down to it I'd buy a Honda Shadow
[14:36] bostongraf: The only american product worse than american cars is american bikes
[14:36] qabacon: it's pretty much a harley with a different exhaust
[14:36] qabacon: and much cheaper, and more efficient
[14:37] bostongraf: Right. And they actually take advantage of technology developed after the 1960's
[14:37] qabacon: right
[14:37] qabacon: actually honda and harley co-developed the engine
[14:37] qabacon: harley design fine tuned by honda
[14:37] qabacon: and they both use it
[14:38] bostongraf: Yeah, harley throws the engine into a frame with a couple paper clips and staples. Honda actually uses it
[14:38] qabacon: ha!
[14:38] bostongraf: Then Harley sued Honda to make sure it didn't SOUND like a Harley.
[14:38] bostongraf: great priorities, guys
[14:39] qabacon: wasn't that in the prenuptual agreement?
[14:40] bostongraf: Actually, I think you're right
[14:40] bostongraf: Honda could use the sound for a couple of years
[14:40] qabacon: harley had exclusive use of the engine for 5 or 10 years then honda could use it
[14:40] bostongraf: Oh, is it the other way around?
[14:40] qabacon: but only if it didn't make the potatot potato sound
[14:40] qabacon: yes harley got the better end of the deal
[14:41] qabacon: well, aside from finance. i don't know how that all worked out
[14:41] bostongraf: The funny thing is that Honda actually KEPT DEVELOPING engines and doesn't need anything from that design anymore
[14:41] qabacon: true
[14:41] qabacon: and you pay about half price for the honda and is more economical for the same/better bike
[14:41] bostongraf: While it was the first advance in HD technology since LITERALLY the early seventies
[14:41] qabacon: you just pay for the name with harley
[14:41] qabacon: hahahaha
[14:42] qabacon: my friend selling that 3k miles sportster with lost of extras on it wants like 4k and is open to better offers
[14:42] qabacon: I'm seriosuly considering it but I have nowhere to put it
[14:42] qabacon: so I can't
[14:42] qabacon: :-(
[14:42] bostongraf: Since then they have developed the Buell bikes, but I don't think there has been any carryover into the classic line
[14:42] qabacon: haven't paid close enough attention
[14:43] bostongraf: If you haven't noticed, the whole harley concept kinda pisses me off.
[14:44] qabacon: I see
[14:44] bostongraf: I see it as a seriously grotesque aspect of american counter culture that is not about freedom and livelihood, but is simply about status, degrading women, and crime
[14:45] bostongraf: Which would ALMOST be okay, except it's associated with a poor quality product that should have been removed from the market two decades ago
[14:46] qabacon: yikes
[14:46] qabacon: I can see where you're coming from
[14:46] qabacon: but still; yikes
[14:46] bostongraf: One of the things that opened my eyes was riding around on a ninja for a couple of summers. I learned REAL fast that HD guys do not wave at sport bike guys
[14:46] qabacon: true
[14:46] bostongraf: Sport bike guys wave at everybody
[14:47] qabacon: well, it is the "Harley Wave"
[14:47] qabacon: it's been adopted by other riders
[14:48] bostongraf: So these slime that ride around with their rent-a-whores think they can look down on a superior product that costs significantly less money because they have a fucking HD badge on theirs
[14:48] qabacon: right
[14:48] qabacon: well, some of them
[14:48] qabacon: don't know how many
[14:48] bostongraf: It's no more appealing to me than some bitch with a prada bag
[14:48] qabacon: hahaha
[14:48] bostongraf: Only the harley is an more inferior product than the prada
[14:49] qabacon: graf?
[14:49] bostongraf: yes?
[14:49] qabacon: how do you really feel?
[14:49] qabacon: don't hold back ;-)
[14:49] bostongraf: I think I want to print this session out and make a blog out of it
[14:49] qabacon: hahaha