.:: Yolospat ::.

You know what sucks about being on a no yeast diet? Just about everything. I can eat whole wheat bread, but I’ve been eating subway for the last week and frankly, I’m a little tired of it. My doctor told me that when I crave sugar, it’s the yeast talking and starving. That’s creepy, but it makes sense in a way.

I’ve also been craving Yogurt. For me, that is weird. Yogurt with granola on top. Hmmmmm. I just had some, but I wish I had more.

We had a fire drill today at work. It was like a flashback from elementary school, only the gathering area in Adult land included an ice cream cart. I cheated and had an ice cream sandwich. That’s why I had the yogurt. Because I felt guilty.

Thankfully I’m still allowed to drink coffee :: chug ::

This is what I have learned about putting in the extra effort at work the last few months.

1. Your a fool for doing it.
2. Comp time is something that doesn’t exist.
3. You just got used.
4. You need to find another job.

What has this job done for my boss? It’s turned him into a liar. My boss is also a friend of mine (was?). I guess I’ve lost a lot of respect for him.

Sad.

It has been a very long tiring day. I went to my long anticipated appointment today to see the specialist that people travel 2, 3, 6, 12 hours to see. I feel almost spoiled having this clinic 6 miles away from my home. When I first walked in it wasn’t like any other doctors office, where there is the typical waiting room and a big front desk. There was just a room off to the side where the receptionist came to greet me and asked my name. After I told her it was like a whirlwind. She took my 24 page questionnaire that I had filled out prior to the appointment (yes, I read the directions). The “waiting room” looked like someone’s living room. Very zen. Not even 5 minutes later a nurse comes out and introduces herself to me, to my Mother and my Husband and told us that she will be taking care of me today and asked me back to one of the rooms to take my vitals. After vitals I was shown to another room with a glass round table and cute little chairs that went around. The only thing that reminded me I was in a doctors office was the seat where you can either lay down or sit on the end (you know, that massage table looking thing that is in every doctors office). Dr. C came in and introduced himself. He is Indian, so I was really scared upon meeting him because I have the worst time understanding people from India because of their accent. I really have to listen hard to pick out the words, I don’t know what it is about the indian accent.

Anyway, he started talking to me right away about why I was there, and that he was positive he could help me. He did a pressure point test on different places around my whole body, and talked about my previous medical history. Doctors usually don’t look over your chart until they are in the room with you but he had already read my entire packet that I had brought with me just 15 minutes previously. He first started to explain to me why my body was acting like it was, and even explained to me why my body is acting like it is, and where the pain was coming from and he guessed that I had been sick for a lot longer then 9 months since some of my symptoms date back as far as 8 years ago when doctors couldn’t find an explanation for my migraines, or for my irritable bowel, or the reason why I always felt off balance. Everything seemed to come together like a puzzle, and everything started to make sense. I think it was at that moment I started feeling a bit hopeful again, even after he said I was one of the more severe cases he’s seen in a while.

I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia along with Chronic Fatigue. When I told him I had a full time job and that I went to school he couldn’t believe it. He said that his other patients had had to go on disability long before the point I was at. I told him that I didn’t have that option since my Husband hasn’t gotten a job.

Dr. C then went into the program he was going to set up for me. He prescribed pain meds, muscle relaxers, Ambian for sleep, and an anti-fungal since my yeast levels were high. He wants to start me on 9 different natural and organic supplements on Friday and get me to the point I can ween off all synthetic drugs (chemical drugs you get in a pharmacy) while maintaining pain management and getting my body back to working correctly.

After meeting with Dr. C I was taken in a little room to have my blood drawn. They took 1 liter of blood!! I’ve never given that much blood in one sitting before, I felt a little woozy halfway through when they had me drink apple juice which He also had me do an IV treatment. I was lead into this room with 12 recliners and about 6 people were in there with IV bags hanging over them. I felt like I was on the cancer ward getting ready to get chemo therapy. One of the IV bags was medicine for the pain and stiffness and the other bag was for my memory and concentration (what they call Fibro Fog). The IV treatment lasted 2 hours. After that I got an energy shot in my butt and the nurse went over my medication schedule with a booklet about each med, when to start each med, and how much of each med to take. She said she would call me in the middle of the week sometime to check on me and see how I’m doing. Wow. That’s all I have to say about that, is wow. They were so nice and it was clear they really were all about the patient, and the patients needs.

I have more to write, but right now I’m too tired.

My Mother goes home tomorrow. I’m really sad about that and I’m going to miss her.

“The future doesn’t lie ahead of you, waiting to happen…it lies deep inside of you, waiting to be discovered.”

I’ve been “boss” this week at work because my boss is on vacation. When I say “boss” I don’t mean being drill sergeant yelling at staff while holding some scary looking stick threatening to pound anyone’s face in who even hints at slacking off. I mean, make sure all work is done and bosses boss is pleased and doesn’t yell. At least too much.

The bulk of what I’m doing are the jobs and tasks I never really wanted to deal with before, because it would have taken some actual thought and I would have had to logically thought about something. I used to just “leave those” to my boss who always used to “take care of those jobs” .. well, guess who’s taking care of them now? Guess what. They aren’t so bad. In fact, they have become quite fun. Weird. Someone has to do them. They take patience sometimes. They are really fun sometimes. My appreciation for those jobs had totally changed. I’ll probably continue to do these takes after my boss gets back. I sort of feel bad for slacking on those before. Whatever. Moving on.

I’ve been saying “moving on” lately too. I would send out department emails, someone would be defensive about something, and I would reply “moving on” or “moving forward” because frankly I don’t care about excuses, I don’t care about setting the story straight about who did what and when. What I care about is did A, B, and C get done? If it did, I really don’t care how. Smile!

I think that everyone needs to be boss for a week because it’s opened my eyes up to everything my boss puts up with. I have a new appreciation for his position and I feel like I’ve held together what could have easily fallen apart. I even got kudos from the bosses boss, so stick a fork in me, I’m done!

Just making a test right now, posting this from Textmate. I’m also going to test inserting an image through Textmate using drag and drop.

Inserting image didn’t work, trying to find out why

Nothing like messing up some hidden apache2 file somewhere deep inside /etc/

Well, I did. I’ve been doing a lot of that lately. Maybe because my brain is dying. I was riding the rail the other night with ruby and after realizing that I had installed my gems incorrectly I reinstalled. Then I got an idea for a Java program I was working on so I jump over to Netbeans 6.1 and I realize that I had a gem I wanted to install there too, so completely distracted (doesn’t take much) I start installing some gems and plug-ins and … oh noes.

CRASH!

There goes Netbeans 6.1 … I try to open it again and I get this:

Just great. After many searches through the Googlespere I find out there is some apache file that calls Xalan.jar and makes it a very unhappy jar file breaking some class that Netbeans 6.1 calls. So I had another Bright Idea™ (I really should be careful about those big idea’s). I’d just delete Netbeans 6.1 and re-install. Nope, didn’t work. I thought I would re-install apache2 with macports. I got this error:

Great, so the all mighty macports won’t even install apache2 again. I went to xMod and let it check and fix my files and permissions. Ya, didn’t work. So, I had to do the long road. Reinstall completely with my last Time Machine backup. But, then I had another Bright Idea™ .. I re-named my /usr/local folder and try to re-install apache2. With success I got:

Yet, it didn’t fix my Netbeans 6.1 problem. Sigh. Let me go try out another Bright Idea™ …

I have been, BUSY. So busy that I’ll be writing to my advisor tomorrow to drop one of my classes. I think I’m going to drop Java, I think. I’ve been staying late at work mostly due to our lack of competent support staff. I’ve had to fix a lot of mistakes lately for people. It’s extremely frustrating. I’ve been handed this huge job of configuring and maintaining the Altiris Helpdesk, including custom automation, setting up notify rules, and building custom forms that integrate into the software and database itself. I’m not a DBA, but I feel like I’m soon becoming one.

The other night I was playing around with Ruby on Rails. It was a lot of fun. Even with all my web development experience, I never really learned about database stuff. I just knew how to set up MySQL to work with whatever web application I needed. After playing with Ruby on Rails I learned a great deal about SQL syntax and how to install, and create databases (through command line). Fun stuff. Dangerous for me however, because my idea bank really starts to expand when I learn new things. When I get to work Monday my head was exploding with all these idea’s for Altiris Helpdesk and how I was going to make it rockin’. I’ve already done some code customization work to it that was noticeable to everyone right away so that was good. Even a little encouragement and the idea’s in my head explode. That’s where I get into problems. I have to start one idea and take it all the way, then start another idea. I tend to switch what I’m doing about every 5 minutes, it even annoys me. Point is, there are some things I want to start working on now, like the custom forms but that’s not exactly the most important or demanding feature they want implemented.

So when I learned that the IT Director wanted to get the email notifications and automation running first I thought, shit. I’m going to have to document all of this. My mind works with visuals so to make these automation tools the idea’s explode but if I don’t get them down in a flow chart of some kind I get lost and I can’t keep up with my brain. So I spend a lot of today writing those logic flows out, and I spent a lot of that time being completely distracted with down systems and down networks.

I’ve been so busy dealing with work fires (you know, shit just breaks sometimes) from our sites it’s emptying my tank fast. I was on a conference call for 2 hours tonight, and on the phone with network engineers for an hour and I wasn’t done working on putting these fires out until midnight. That’s a 14 hour day today people and keep in mind that I’m a full time student. Yesterday I wasn’t done until 10 PM. Do not want fires, I want to work on these projects and get my homework done and stuff.

I’m still not feeling well.

I was playing around in Photoshop last night and this is what I had at the end.

Also, the sun on Saturday morning was amazing in the backyard, coming through the pine trees.

I’m one of those poeple that has a TV on in my office even if I’m not watching it. It’s more for background noise, white noise, whatever you call it. Well, one station I usually keep it on is crime TV since it’s a lot of talking and sometimes they have interesting things on. So cops was playing tonight and they had a special Cops episode called “Party Girls”.

When I hear “Party Girls” I think of some sorority girl from a rich family in Cancun drinking like a fish while hanging all over every guy she walks up to pulling up her shirt and flashing every camera she sees. That’s not what this espisode of Cops is about. It’s about girls out on the street prostituting.

I feel sorry for some of those girls. There is one single reason why any of those girls are there, and that is a bad situation. Their home life was shitty, they get kicked out of the house at a young age, they get addicted to drugs to hide and numb their pain, or they have other emotional problems. Whichever the case, I bet if you asked any one of girls if they are where they want to be, they would say no. No one wants to grow up to be a prostitute. No one wants that life style. When I think of party girl, I think of a irresponsible college teenager having fun. I don’t think of a girl giving away the very being of herself to strangers, who’s so miserable on the inside she convinced herself it will be ok.

Sad. What’s equally as sad is the sorority girl will never have empathy because she has that silver spoon in her mouth to keep her from crying, otherwise known as Daddy’s wallet. I don’t know which is worse.

Am I sure glad it’s Friday. Altho I didn’t go to work 3 days this week I did work from home which granted me the privilege to get a hell of a lot done. It’s been a hard week when it comes to health. Ever since I moved away from where I was born and raised I’ve run into nothing but problems with the health care system, and I long to have my old doctor back. Going back to Colorado however, isn’t an option and I must seek and find what I’m looking for here. It’s just going to take time and energy, the two most non-abundant things in my life.

I haven’t gotten a chance to catch up with my RSS feeds yet. I can usually keep up daily with them but with the amount of school work I’ve been up against I haven’t even played WoW. I don’t usually during the quarter but when I have a little bit of time I at least log on. Not this quarter, however, and I fear it’s going to reflect the rest of my degree program. Onward and upward, someday I’ll be happy I did it. Right?

I truly do love education and I love learning. In fact I would probably go to school the rest of my life if I didn’t have any other responsibilities or family to provide for. Things being how they are, I’m looking forward to that time I can actually have to sit down for a while after coming home from work. It only makes me stronger I suppose, and I’m learning those time management skills I always wanted to know. I didn’t exactly want to be forced into learning those however, lol.

I don’t have to work this weekend so I have the next 48 hours to do with as I please, in a very responsible manner. I was fully expecting to be working this weekend so it was a nice surprise. I have two movies from Netflix to watch … which I might do as I’m looking up information for my System Administration class.

Might as well get started.

Right now I’m arguing with myself on what to do. It’s already 1 AM but I feel like I need to get more homework done. Do I jump into some java code, or do I jump into a 5-10 page paper about system administration? Or do I simply go to bed and feel defeated?

With all the mess from the medical stuff I’m far behind and I want to catch up. I’m finding my time becomes less and less lately and it’s stressing me out in such a bad way that my health is failing. There really isn’t much I can do about it at this point in time, so I have to carry on and try my best.

Both projects that are due are pretty huge. I have to be semi-coherent for both which I am right now, I just don’t know which to choose. Sleep is something I haven’t been getting enough of obviously, but I don’t want to feel like I’ve not gotten anything done. I’ve been on call this week for work and tonight has been a busy work night for me too, which again pushed school off to the side. Sigh. I think I’ll start my paper …

The pains that have been torturing my body for the last few weeks, decided they were at a rock concert in a mosh pit. My feet started swelling up the day before yesterday. I couldn’t sleep, I haven’t had an appetite. Last night, while I was soaking my feet in the tub for some temporary relief I noticed that my toes, weren’t anything like I had ever seen them before. They were completely blue. I take a picture of them (I take pictures of everything, duh) and send the picture to my Mom. She in turn sends it to my Aunt Donna who shows my Uncle Don (the doctor).

Ohhhh boy. I knew something was bad when it was 11:30 at night and my iPhone started ringing off the hook. It’s a well known fact that my Mother is horrible at telling me bad news. My Aunt Donna has had “The-One-Who-Tells-Jen-Bad-News” title for about 15 years now, so I automatically assume if she calls me (especially late at night) that it’s not good. I couldn’t bring myself to answer the phone. My Aunt Donna knows this well too. It’s my way of sliding “into” the news. This is my Aunt Donna’s trick. She will leave me a message, and she will tell me right off the bat that she misses me and loves me. Then she doesn’t tell me anything about what the bad news is, except that I need to call her right away because she needs to talk to me and she, Uncle Don and my Mother weren’t going to sleep until I did, and it was very important. Then she ends it with she loves me again. She’s so good at this, and she’s also so brave at being “The-One-Who-Tells-Jen-Bad-News”. Believe me, no one wants that role. No one.

So, I get myself a glass of milk and waddle (I have to walk on the heels of my feet because of how swollen my feet and ankles were) out to the back porch and touch the Call Back button. I sit and listen. She’s very good at explaining things without actually telling me the bloody details while giving special care on the urgency of the matter. Then Uncle (Dr) Don gets on the phone. He sucks at telling me bad news, but he usually doesn’t get on the phone. My Aunt Donna quickly takes the phone back and I had agreed to go to the ER by the time I had hung up the phone, but ONLY until I took a shower first. Aunt Donna said it was fine, but to please try not to doddle (I learned the word doddle from her, I love that word).

Shortly after that, somewhere in between calling my Mother, taking a shower and doddling, my brain sort of unplugged itself. That’s the best way I can describe it since the next 1.5 hours are really fuzzy in my head. I could hear what Brendan and my Mother were saying to me, but I couldn’t match up the words. I was confused, and nothing made sense. It’s like everyone started talking in tongues. Brendan tells me that while I was in the shower I asked him what I was doing. My Mother called while we were in the car on the way to the hospital and she kept asking me how far from the hospital I was. I just couldn’t understand the how far part, like my brain was skipping like a scratched record. I had to keep asking Brendan for help. When I got to the hospital I couldn’t tell them my birthdate, except that I wasn’t 30 yet. I just couldn’t figure out anything past that. When the nurse asked me what year it was, I said that I knew it wasn’t 2006, but I couldn’t give her the year. I guess I did know that Bush was president tho, altho Clinton was at the tip of my tongue. I felt so, dumb. My brain, got stuck, and after the nurse asked me more questions I couldn’t answer I just started crying. I mean, I know I should have known that stuff, but … my brain was just stuck. I knew enough to know that wasn’t right or normal. That’s when I got scared. Something, in me, broke. Something just wasn’t right, something was really wrong.

For the next 6 hours on an EKG I had three IV’s stuck in me and I was just staring at the heart meter, watching my pulse and pulse oxygen level. Just watching. And then my brain turned back on. It went from pause to play again. Ironically during the foggy time, I don’t remember as much pain. I just felt like my toe was dead. When my brain turned back on, pain from all over my body throbbed. Blood test after blood test were taken. When one blood test came back as being fine, another one was ordered up. At around 6 or 7 AM the doctor came in the room (he had only been by for about 25 seconds previously just to ask what was going on) he said that they couldn’t find anything wrong and they were going to send me home with water pills to help drain the swelling, and to follow up with my primary care physician.

Just like that. Not only was I more swollen (my hand was starting to swell at that point), but I was mad, stressed, frustrated at being dismissed when nothing had really changed (besides my brain going from the off to the on switch). Everything my Aunt Donna told me she was scared of happening, happened in regards to how the doctor was going to dismiss it and to be persistant). I again asked him how this had happened before in 2002 and how I’ve felt so horrible the last few weeks, and how my tests always come back showing good stats, but obviously there was something really wrong. He said to see my primary care doc and elivate my feet in the meantime. Here is what just one of my feet looked like. I thought if I went to sleep, I’d wake up and my toes would dead.

I won’t go into a tangent about how I hate healthcare in this country. If no one has seen the movie “sicko” then see it, please. It’s such bullshit. Brains don’t just “turn off” and body limbs don’t swell up to the point of cutting circulation randomly or by a fluke like travel or such. It just doesn’t happen.

So, me and my balloon feet are going to see my primary care doc and go through the whole thing again, with a new set of bloodwork and repeating events of the last few weeks. And I’m scared. I’m scared that they still won’t find anything and I’ll still go on with all this for the rest of my life wishing for one day, I could get through the day, without pain. I just want to feel good.

All I have to say about Acrobat.com’s new web office launch is, whoa.

For the first time, it looks like Google will have some serious competition.

I just tired out Buzzword and ConnectNow and I’m completely blown away so far. Doesn’t webex make you pay an arm and a leg?

Beautiful interface, beautiful design. But then again, it’s Adobe, it’s sort of what they do.

Good job Adobe, very good job.

Lots of stuff has been happening recently, most of it being on the emotional spectrum. When it comes to loss and grief I’ve had more than my fair share in my 29 years of life. It’s the first emotion I can remember feeling when I was very young and I know my experience with losing someone, a loved one will only continue and the time between tears will steadily increase instead of decline. That’s just life, that’s apart of life. It’s the part of life that never gets easier .. but it’s not supposed to.

Over the past 10 years I’ve been hit left and right with grief. I’m the type of person that takes such emotions and stuffs them away much like a disobedient child shoving his clothes under the bed when he was supposed to have his room cleaned hours ago. When my Father passed very suddenly in 1999 the shock of it was quickly followed up with denial. I’m fairly certain I could resemble a walking zombie during that time, but I distinctly remember repeating to myself “this isn’t happening, this isn’t happening, I can’t be the kid that losses her Daddy, this can’t be happening to me”. A quick look on Wikipedia I found this about the denial process:

“Feelings of unreality, depersonalization, withdrawal, and an anesthetizing of affect. The person feels unable to come to terms with what just occurred.”

Around the year anniversary of his death the anger and rebellion set in. The denial wasn’t over by any means, it was just being ignored as I acted out against life for being so unfair. I remained stuck in that stage for 3 years living in the vortex of chaos and unhealthy relationships. Wikipedia has information about the “Volatile Reactions” would should also be called the spiraling downhill out of control stage.

“Whenever one’s identity and social order face the possibility of destruction, there is a natural tendency to feel angry, frustrated, helpless and/or hurt. The volatile reactions of terror, hatred, resentment, and jealousy are often experienced as emotional manifestations of these feelings.”

When I look back at it now I see loss and grief not only in the time of death, but when there is loss of a friendship, a dream, the sense of safety, and of possessions. Grief is a multi-faceted response to loss. The emotional effect is the same (though loss in the case of death, especially sudden and unexpected highens the intensity of the grieving process) and the same steps of the naturally occuring grieving process is triggered.

I will be the first to admit that I don’t handle loss and grief well at all. I’m still dealing with losses from 10 years ago, trying to bring that process full circle. It’s also made me a better person. I never got to tell my Father goodbye. We hadn’t spoken to each other in a week due to a silly fight. Since that time my Mother and I never end a phone conversation or an email without telling each other “I love you!”

The losses that I’ve had along the way that weren’t a result of death have been forefront in my mind. Maybe I’m making up for the rotten last words I ever spoke to my Father, but I’m determined not to leave a situation in hurt and anger. The only thing I can control is myself and that has been pushing me to patch up those losses while I can, even if it’s to properly say goodbye.

I wanted to make a video demonstrating this emotion because I always have a hard time putting these emotions into words. Rather, I can visualize the emotion in my mind. This video is symbolic to the trials of Loss and Grief. It’s called “Love and Loss” ..

This is a little embarrassing, but I just had to do it. I was running out of desktop space.

So I decided to mount my 20″ Dell wide screen monitor and my 13″ LCD HDTV to the wall. I feel like I’m in a cockpit now.

My new set up in my office

Forgiveness means forgiveness. Not bringing up the past and not letting the past be just what it is, the past. Forgiveness means going from the present time forward. That’s forgiveness.

For anyone out there, remember this when telling someone you’re sorry. Please, for yourself and for them, mean it. Don’t just say it.

“To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.” Lewis B. Smedes

“Sincere forgiveness isn’t colored with expectations that the other person apologize or change. Don’t worry whether or not they finally understand you. Love them and release them. Life feeds back truth to people in its own way and time.” Sara Paddison

I just made my 101 in 1001 list. I’m stuck on #46, so if you have any suggestions let me know.

I’ve been meaning to do this for a while and my friend Chriss inspired me with her list.

I can’t get over how incredibly easy Apple makes it to learn their framework and to dive right into Cocoa programming. I’m a member of Apple Developer Connection because my passion is creating, coding and developing. When I first dove into Cocoa and Objective-C programming and signed up for the ADC program Apple pretty much got out a silver tray and handed me every tool I would need to create neat, fast and stream-lined OS X and iPhone applications.

The Library’s Apple offers are huge and they are actually built into XCode (the apple developer tool). I’m a visual person so I’m much more prone to video than I am having to read gobs of technical jargon. Apple takes care of people like me and with my learning style. They offer both introductory video’s, advanced video’s and everything in between. Not only can you find these video’s on the Apple Developer web sites but you can also find the video’s on Apple’s iTunes and download them to your iPhone/iPod/Touch to take with you.

Like I said, I thrive on this stuff …

I recently downloaded two albums on iTunes the other night. Low and behold, my Macbook Pro crashed and my last backup was from two weeks ago. After I got it restored with Time Machine I noticed I had lost those two albums (like seriously, that’s $21.00 I didn’t exactly want to throw out the window).

So I wrote to iTunes and told them what happened.

They wrote me back and said, here is your music!

So I wrote them back again, because really, what company actually cares, right? This is what I said:

Can I hug you? :: hugs ::

Thanks so much awesome Apple People (And Ray who helped me)

Jen

It’s sent to a general iTunes box of course and not even one hour later I get this email:

Dear Jenny,

You’re very welcome. Thanks for the hug!

Nothing makes Apple happier than to hear that we have pleased our customers. I hope that you continue to enjoy the iTunes Store.

Thank you for being a valued iTunes Store customer. Have a great day, Jenny!

Sincerely,

Raymond
iTunes Store Customer Support

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you. You may receive an AppleCare survey email; any feedback you provide would be greatly appreciated.

In all honesty, I’m not that valued as an iTunes customer as I don’t pay for music that often (I’m pleading the 5th on this). Now I feel like only buying my music from iTunes. Apple made me feel special, once again. I thrive on this stuff.

Well, I had quite the day. This morning I was installing some software and in the middle of it it stalls, everything froze and I did the worst thing possible. I lost patience and held down the power button to reboot my mac instead of waiting. When my Macbook Pro started back up it was at the start up screen with the apple logo and the rotating gear. FOR A FREAKING HOUR. Sigh. It wouldn’t boot. I tried everything, I even tried restoring from Time Machine, but nothing was working.

Then I start freaking out … Because I have a shit load of homework to get done for the projects due tomorrow and I’m already wasting hours trying to get my computer back up.

I rush to the apple store right before they were going to close. They thought it might be the hard drive but I made an appointment to have it checked out for tomorrow today at 12:15 PM.

When I get home, I just figure I’ll try to restore the hard drive by reinstalling a fresh copy of OSX. Previously in safe mode it wasn’t seeing the hard drive and after using first aid and trying to repair the OSX volume it failed. This time, when doing a fresh install it saw the hard drive and it took the install. Then when it was back up I restored everything but the applications folder from Time Machine (because it was faulty software that did it in the first place I think). Then I selected the applications that were critical to school and to my functioning from Time Machine and HURRAY! My Mac is BACK!

Granted it’s 2 AM and today was completely wasted and I’m going to be going through some serious crunch time in getting this Java homework done, but ..

But I haven’t felt a personal connection with a computer in a long time. Years actually. This is 100% due to the frustrations of Windows. Ever since I got my Macbook Pro my computer experience has been restored and I have this personal bond with my projects again. Weird I know, but I am a professional computer geek who wants to know the ins and outs of everything dealing with technology.

I’m just glad I’m back. I didn’t want to suffer through using my Vista computer while my Macbook Pro was sitting in the apple store getting fixed. That reminds me, I have to call and cancel my appointment for tomorrow today.

Today would have been my Father’s birthday. It’s feels surreal he’s been gone for 9 years now.

Happy Birthday Dad ..

It’s truly amazing to me how people can sit around and let their brain rot. It’s equally confusing when I hear people say they are bored. It makes me sad when the very core of creativity dries up in a person turning the very shell of their existence to a dependent dull boring, nothing. And the kicker is … these people seem to accept that it’s who they are completely forgetting they at one time in their lives they showed true potential by independently thinking, creating, experiencing.

Throughout my life I keep seeing this phenomena over and over and I’m equally shocked each and every time. Mindless activity is a nice relaxing vacation every once in a while but permanent mindlessness should be a fucking sin. A quote from the 40 year old virgin, “Is it true that if you don’t use it, you lose it?” reminds me of this. When one stops exercising that gray matter it just might not come back to its full potential.

Don’t get caught up in settling for anything less than creating, learning and experiencing every part of this short span of time they call life. Don’t become the dependent simpleton who’s light bulb is so dim the light doesn’t reach your feet. Keep that mind constantly full of knowledge, keep that bulb burning bright and strong so you can always clearly see your path. Don’t waste energy on over-analyzing every single fucking situation. Take what you need from it, leave the rest, and LEARN from it. Turn off that TV, turn off the computer, go outside, take pictures, read a book, talk to a total stranger and listen to the story of their life. Everything is as interesting and wonderful as you make it.

The sun is only as bright and beautiful as you allow it to be…

I recently moved my site to This* (one of my sites, this one will be going shortly) and I know I’ve written about them before but I have to write about them again, because they impressed me with personal touch.

I got an email from Jules, the Technical Director who was proactive and manually moved my site without waiting to hear back from me.

Hi Jenny,

As a new client of ours and having been with us for a couple of weeks now, I’m just e-mailing to check up on the service you’ve received so far. How has everything been? Do you have any comments, suggestions or other feedback for us that may help us improve the service for yourself and others in the future? Any and all comments are welcome so feel free to speak your mind!

–
Best Wishes,
Jules Robinson - this* Technical Director

I emailed Jules back quite the book.

Hello Jules!

Let me start out as saying I have never been treated by any company as I have been treated by ThisWebHost. My jaw is still dropped to the ground thinking back through the few weeks of my new membership with you.

I give you, and This* a standing ovation :: stands up and claps ::

The extremely quick set up was completed 45 seconds after I hit the “sign up” button. I was extremely busy at work that day and I didn’t get back to you about moving my site, yet you were proactive and completed it for me before I had a chance to check my email (and I know full well that it’s NOT part of the hosting plan to manually move sites, it’s only part of the plan to move sites that had certain cPanel services). My site has been blazing fast, and you guys are AWESOME.

I’m a software engineer and I’ve been in the “business” for 10 years now and I have never seen IT folk so personable, friendly, and helpful. You work for an extremely wonderful company and I hope to find a company with as much integrity when I graduate from college.

I’m going to tell a little story that happened to me the same day I signed up with This*. I went to get my hair cut at this new Fantastic Sams close to my work. The gentleman that cut my hair was extremely kind and talkative and we sat there talking 30 minutes after he was done with my hair. It wasn’t but 2 days later I get a card in the mail from him to say thank you for the conversation and he hoped I had a good time with my family who was coming into town. It wasn’t one of those thank you notes that was pre-printed. He took the time and energy to thank ME, when he was the one that cut MY hair. The point I’m trying to make is, This* did exactly that. You go the extra mile and you truly care about the care of the customer. Consider me your permanent customer, and I’m in the process now of transferring my other two sites over.

Please feel free to forward this to your boss, their boss, and their boss. I want to thank everyone!

Jen

YES! They are really that amazing.

Well, it was sort of made of win. Pepper went to the vets to get his cast off today. After taking xrays his vet decided that his little bone isn’t quite healed good enough and they put another cast back on him for the next 2 or 4 weeks. Poor little guy, I’m sure he’s forgotten he even has 4 legs.

Other than that, it was a great day at work. I’m getting a lot done, and I have some huge projects on my plate for the week which feels great. I also got a raise, and I happen to be one of the two in my department that aren’t … :: cough :: … leaving the company not by their choice soon (if you know what I mean).

So what does that mean? That means I get more money, and they think I’m a smart valuable cookie. That makes me feel good
Got Brendan a new phone today too since he put his through the wash. It’s an LG Shine (black). It’s amazing how phones really haven’t come super far, of course when they aren’t iPhones.
Finals going on today and tomorrow. I haven’t been playing WoW because of this, and because I have to pull off at least a B in these classes. I miss WoW

This time it was a guy and a girl. The guy actually knew what he was talking about, using those big tech words in the correct way. This time I actually listened.

I’ve had Comcast for as long as they had broadband internet in my area back when I lived in Fort Collins, Colorado. At that time I was high on speed, internet speed that is. It was like a totally new experience. Before I dove into the word of broadband I had a 50 ft phone cable plugged into the back of my laptop which went wherever I did in my condo. But this new broadband thing, I never had to sign off, I never had to hold up the telephone line, it was like any young geek girls dream. Ever since the beginning .. I had problems with them but I was living in cyberspace and it was the only alternative I had. When I moved to Florida, it was the only alternative I had. When we moved to Georgia, it was the only service available with such speeds, but the problems never quit. When I think of Comcast I have this bad taste in my mouth reflecting on bad experiences, shotty service, and extremely poor customer service.

AT&T fiber is going to give me HDTV (when reading all the forums it’s supposed to be way better than Comcast), move my current phone number over, and feed 10mbps through fiber optic paradise right into my house.

One of the big sellers for me was if we had any problems AT&T would send out a tech within 24 hours. That’s unheard of with Comcast.

I’m excited. I’m not canceling Comcast yet, but I can’t wait to drop them if this service is better.

Oh ya, and I fed the guy and girl that were here. Because they were cool.

When I woke up this morning I saw a card laying on my desk with my name on it. It was from my husband. The inside says ..

You’re a better Mommy than you realize! And someday I hope to make that true. Love, Brendan

I called my Mother today to wish her a happy Mother’s day. She’s really the best Mom ever. I’m sure most people say that about their Mom’s. I didn’t always appreciate her tho. Growing up my Mother and I never really bonded like Mother and Daughter should. This caused my teenage years to be less then enjoyable, more for her than myself. I put her through the ringer and back again (it makes me scared of having my own children). Shortly after my Father died I went spinning into Galaxy and I wasn’t there for her as much as I should have been while she mourned. I was dealing with the pain in a way that hurt us both. Eventually I pulled my head out of my butt enough when I decided to move clear across the country. Something happened I never knew was possible. My Mother and I, although we were thousands of miles away, bonded.

At this present day my Mother and I are not only family, but we’re also the best of friends. I’ve had to be there for her through breaking up with her first and only boyfriend (at least since my Father passed) and she’s had to be there for me through the easy and hard times of my marriage. She’s recently retired which brings to light how much both her and I have gotten older.

My Mother now has time to come to Georgia for more frequent visits. She often leaves her items here so she doesn’t have to haul so much. There is one closet in the spare bedroom that spells exactly like her. I don’t let my husband open it too much so the times I really miss her I can go to that closet and breath her comfort. Weird? Maybe. But it makes me smile just thinking about it.

So happy Mother’s Day Mom, I love you so much!

I like playing with software and I’m always trying to understand complicated software like Final Cut Studio …

Anyway, to my 4 year old beagle, Jonah.