The Bearupweb

To simplify things I’ve loaded an add-on named “fotobook.” This will synchronize the bearupweb gallery with the gallery on facebook. That way those few of you (mom) who don’t use facebook will be able to access the gallery. It also eliminates all messy cross-domain frame stuff since the new firefox doesn’t like it.

If you’re reading this then the bearupweb changeover is complete. In a masochistic twist I’ve decided to host the bearupweb on my very own web server. I figured this would give me a chance to toy with some technologies I’ve been ogling for year (e.g., Dynamic DNS) as well as experiment with porting Wordpress into IIS (which turned out to be trivial). This new setup will give me enhanced control over the bearupweb as well as oodles of additional drive space!

I’ve also retro-fitted the “Quotes” and “guestbook” sections into blank pages that use Wordpress’s comments feature for input. The old pages used some outdated code from my college era that was prone to misconfiguration and hijacking from anyone willing to tinker with it. This new setup is less elegant but should prevent further problems.

Oh, and I’m in the process of relocating the gallery to facebook. This will let folks comment/tag the pictures, plus they won’t have to browse to this site to see them heheh. If you don’t have a facebook account (pay attention mom) you can just choose the gallery from the menu at the top and it will take you there – no account required!

In other news I recently parted from my employer and am back on the job market (hence my motivation to tinker with technology in my spare time). So if anyone has a project they want some help on let me know! Also, if you have any idea how to create a Mac OS VM on an AMD system let me know – I outright purchased the Snow Leopard license/media but can’t for the life of me install it (I know I know, it’s not supported – shut up and be happy you got my money, Apple!)

Fall-time in the Pacific Northwest is amazing. Somehow the vast species of trees, coupled with the slow decline in temperature, yields a lush, rich fall season that’s both pleasant in its entirety and extensive in duration. The leaves on some of our trees began changing color almost two months ago, and even now, in mid november, I can gaze out the floor to ceiling windows of Microsoft’s Red West campus and see acres of rouge foliage leading up to the foothills of the mountains that separate us from Eastern Washington.

Thanksgiving is fast approaching, as is the six month mark for Nichols and I in Seattle. We departed New York on May 19th, and arrived on McChord AFB on Friday the 23rd. The following months were something of a scramble to get our lives in order – new apartment, new jobs, new furniture, new bars…new friends. And long hours at work have taken their toll as well. And not that these months haven’t been fun, but Nichols and I are definitely in the upswing now in terms of social lives out here. Nichols has started bringing his guitar to work to practice music during his downtime. I’ve started singing irish tunes (mostly the pogues) with Mingus O’Banon at open mic nights on mondays. And above all we’re finally starting to feel at home. The more time I spend out here, the less I think I’ll ever want to leave.

Oh, and as a personal sacrifice, I took two hours out of my Saturday night to update the Bearupweb gallery. You’ll now find all my awesome pictures (and witty banter) from Bob’s wedding, as well as random pics of everything that’s happened since. It was a strenuous endeavor, but it’s one I undertook for you, my adoring public.

Just thought I’d let you all know I’ve finally updated the Gallery. August and September are now filled in, and I uploaded a few stray pics and captions from July as well. I’m trying to be more dedicated about inserting those captions, but it’s just such a pain in the neck without booze. That’s why you should all donate to the bearupweb cause by buying booze for me as often as possible. I’m actually adding this to the list of things that will be federally mandated when I ascend to the rank of Sky Marshall. Just you wait and see…

Firstly I’d like to beg the forgiveness of my adoring interweb fans for my terrible lack of updates this past month. Once I returned from Bob’s wedding in Rhode Island, my job exploded in a violent maelstrom that strongly resembled the state of my intestines after my last trip to Minar Indian restaurant in New York. (Curry and I have a love hate relationship). At this point the storm hasn’t even passed. I’m just taking a break because it’s Friday night and I need to be irresponsible.
So annyways, I decided to take a noble stance this past week. In spite of the nation’s economic decline and the impending doom that awaits us I’m spending money like a crooked senator at a titty bar. I broke down and got that Nokia N810 for 3 bills (I’m actually writing on it right now heheh) as well as buying a bed. The bed was necessary because, if I meet the girl of my dreams out here, I’m not gonna be the one who crashes on the couch.
Oh, and this week, in addition to working my ass off, i awoke at 6am on thursday to the news that my identity had been stolen. Haha that was pretty unique. Apparently someone in Maryland was masquerading as me using my credit card to make atm withdrawals. This amazes me because I have thrown out a piece of paper with my name, address, or account number on it sice 2001, yet somehow this arsehole has the whole shebang. All i can figure is that I flew through Dulles airport in Sep, and gave my card to a waiter who could have nabbed the info. Anyway, the damage was minimal and I’ll probably be reimbursed…we’ll see.
So in terms of Seattle life I found two new favorite haunts. The Balmar in Ballard has a stellar bartending and waiting staff that’s kept me out of trouble (and occasionally gotten me into it) the last few weeks. The Matador (conveniently situated across the street) has a happy hour with NO drink specials but some bitchin’ Mexican food. What i find is these places are great during the week when the hardcore drinkers and partiers are out, but on Fridays and Saturdays the yuppies come out en masse, which generally makes the whole ordeal a pain in the ass.
Oh, and I went out on Friday to Molly’s and ran into one of my favorite local musicians – Mingus O’Banon. You can tell by the name that he plays my favorite kind of music, but it’s worth noting that the foul-mouth bastard also knows all my Pogue songs! After singing and clapping along enough times he invited me to sing with him this Monday at open mic night. It may not sound like much, but singing Irish songs (especially the pogues) in an Irish pub is one of my life’s ambitions. So I’m looking forward to this…I probably won’t mess it up haha!
So overall life is good out here. Not alot of pictures to post this month, but I did get one of a local band named Pelvis - they do (by their definition) hard, thrusting renditions of Elvis classics. Admittedly the show was great, and ladies loved it, but it was the band’s last show…what a drag!

Before leaving New York I ranted and raved about hunting down Sasquatch in the forests of Washington – knowing full well that these are Sasquatch’s stomping grounds. Apparently my boasting preceded me, because a tribe of these noble creatures fled their homeland and settled in Georgia. Once there, the beasts were driven mad by the annoying accents and lack of good pizza in their new environments and, in a moment of desperation, one of them took it’s own life.

Don’t believe me?

I have only myself to blame for this tragedy, as my boasting was purely in jest. Humor is a trait known to abound amongst my sasquatch brethren, but since the release of this inexcusable monstrosity, they’ve apparently grown anxious of their hairless brothers, and mistakenly took my words in a malicious light that was not intended.
In light of this I take full responsibility for the death of this creature. To bipedal humanoids everywhere – regardless of the hair on their backs or the size of their feet – I offer my sincerest apologies.

While wandering through one of the Microsoft buildings, I saw someone with one of these from three stories up. I took a detour to find out what it was. Apparently it’s a Samsung Q1 Ultra, which is categorized as an ultra mobile PC. There’s alot of these things out there, but this was the first I’d seen in action. It’s basically a handheld device that can run a full-blown Operating System (WinXP, Vista, Linux), has a QWERTY Keyboard, jostick/mouse, USB, VGA, CAT5 Ethernet, and wireless. And did I mention it has a GPS add-on?

I usually try not to be to dazzled by high-tech gizmos whose real-world utility is largely overshadowed by the fact that they’re cool and shiny. But since the company didn’t see fit to give me a laptop for work this time around, this may be a nice alternative

I spent some time today linking some interweb things together. First I used the Google Calendar Sync tool to link my Outlook Calendar to Google. This is mostly a convenience factor for me, but it also means the Bearupweb Calendar has been migrated to Google Calendar, and will be updated much more regularly.

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I added more images to the July gallery. There’s one mediocre shot of the McChord Air Show from this past weekend, and a number of silly touristy shots of Seattle. These were taken mostly for my pals back home. So check ‘em out if ye like.

As mentioned in a previous post, I’ve been crafting some scripts to convert VMWare Server, a freely available server-side application, into a less resource-intensive client-side application (AKA VMWare Workstation without the $200 price tag). My “start_run_stop” batch file (presented in the previous post) is a batch file that starts the requisite VMWare Services each time you run the console, then closes them when you exit. And as I mentioned in that post, I could make a second script that installs that first script for you, taking care of the additional manual work of changing service settings and creating desktop icons. So I took five hours of a Saturday afternoon and did it. Without further introduction, here’s the VMWare Server 1.0.5 “Start_Run_Stop” Batch File Installer. Just rename the downloaded file to “.vbs” and you’re good to go. More Info after the jump.

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