He really is a miserable failure (google miserable failure).

Too bad Wil beat me to the blog rant. You can just read his to pretty much sum up my views.

If I had half a notion anti-same-sex marriage as a Constitutional amendment would even make it to a congressional vote, I’d be calling/writing my congressmen. But I can calm down, because there’s no way this could go that far.

You would think Bush’s swan song isn’t something that would help the country, but instead makes everyone realize what an idiot he is.

Others taunt me with having knelt at well-curbs
Always wrong to the light, so never seeing
Deeper down in the well than where the water
Gives me back in a shining surface picture
My myself in the summer heaven, godlike
Looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs.
Once, when trying with chin against a well-curb,
I discerned, as I thought, beyond the picture,
Through the picture, a something white, uncertain,
Something more of the depths–and then I lost it.
Water came to rebuke the too clear water.
One drop fell from a fern, and lo, a ripple
Shook whatever it was lay there at bottom,
Blurred it, blotted it out. What was that whiteness?
Truth? A pebble of quartz? For once, then, something.

Nothing.

Recent hubub at work about CITES migrating people over from students/staff cluster to their email and netfile replacement services prompted me to actually switch over. I still value my staff account, and will miss it when it gets deactivated. For now, I still have it, and the CITES replacement stuff.

CITES broke students into two pieces: Express Email, a blackboxed email solution they’re providing campus, and NetFiles, a DAV-based file front end to do the file sharing and web hosting. I hate to say it, but these services really are an improvement to the old cluster. The DAV stuff is neat because I can actually use that quota space from my Windows boxen, and share things, cleanly between systems. I used to FTP up homework and such from my home computer to print from a campus lab. I also had a bunch of little quotes and poems and stuff saved there for plans; thus the Robert Frost above.

But their email solution doesn’t have a spam component (or at least CITES didn’t purchase it,) so for the time being I’m going to stick with CS’s mail.

Courtesy of the Friday Five…

When was the last time you…

1. …went to the doctor?
2000. I went to McKinley to handle a bunch of little things. They didn’t ask if I was pregnant.

2. …went to the dentist?
Ugh… 2000? It’s been a long time, and I’m overdue. I need help finding a good dentist in Champaign, because I’ve finally resolved I’m never going to be home/Collinsville during the week for my family’s dentist.

3. …filled your gas tank?
My AutoTrip book would tell me. It was within the last week or so, and this tank has been all city in the cold, so it’s going to be sucky mileage.

4. …got enough sleep?
Last night. I think I got close to 11 hours sleep. That’s not usual, but man it feels good.

5. …backed up your computer?
My work computer? About 2:31am this morning. My home computer? Uhhhhh…. I should do that sometime.

Today’s Friday Five:

1. Are you superstitious?
Not really. Most things I do out of habit, if I onced believed in them, and those habits stuck.

2. What extremes have you heard of someone going to in the name of superstition?
I think the things people do in casinos at slot machines or before throwing dice are just plain weird.

3. Believer or not, what’s your favorite superstition?
The Stevie Wonder song.

4. Do you believe in luck? If yes, do you have a lucky number/article of clothing/ritual?
Sometimes it’s luck, sometimes it’s skill. I like low prime numbers and multiples of 3. I always put on the right sock/shoe/glove first since I was told once that right is the lucky side and left is bad. (See point #1 above.)

5. Do you believe in astrology? Why or why not?
I don’t believe, but I think it’s fun. It’s real easy for someone to read about the qualities of their sign, and agree with them … just like they could agree with any of the qualities of any other sign. But horoscopes are fun. Behavior is a function of environment and personal experience, and is not dictated by which planet we’re currently under.

….

And there’s my five.

Through itunes“>iTunes, I found Radio.Wazee, a streaming Internet alternative rock radio station. It’s music is close to The Planet, but with a little more indy influence and more variety (I think) and without stupid jocks or advertising for retarded blind date contests or C.O.’s drink specials.

So, check it out. I give it two thumbs up (blooooood).

Had a busy last few weeks, even though I haven’t blogged (much.) The massive gambling weekend was great …. Peoria on Friday night, Tedd’s on Saturday/Sunday and ended with a great SuperBowl party. I wound up winning $200 at Par-A-Dice casino, all at craps. They had a few shooters that were on fire, and walked away up (for a change.) Between Tony, Tedd, Rich and me, we took the table for about a grand. That’s when I decided not to gamble (big) for the rest of the weekend. I’d already burnt up my luck. Most of the gambling that weekend was teaching games (craps, cards, etc.) and so as soon as it got interesting, someone new sat down and the tutorial started over again.

Tedd/Rich/Curt have a pretty sweet place, and it was raw form for the Poker Night / SuperBowl weekend. There were TVs all over the place, Lingerie Bowl (with fewer bare tits than broadcast television!), tons of food, ice cold keg beer (it comes in pints? // I’m getting one!) and even big TV (which made me not miss mine.) Great job, guys! I just wish the numbers I would have gotten would have paid out. Stupid shanked field goals, stupid go-for-two’s. That’s okay, with football out of the way, it’s time to focus on basketball!

The carpenters finally finished the little touches around my office today, so if I get inspired, I can unpack everything and look like I actually live here. I need to find a new dual-output-supported, Linux-supported video card (recommendations? Nate says get NVIDIA stuff, but I want to make sure it does dual-headedness, and I didn’t find much on their site) for my desktop and get some better monitors too. The last part of the move has taken forever … F&S needs 4-5x the number of carpenters working in Siebel than they’ve produced. It’s annoying to be here, and be ready to move equipment or get a lab online, and be waiting on your tables to be assembled.

Apparently, we’re going to be more involved in the Siebel Center Grand Opening (in April) than I thought. Here I thought the hard part (moving) was over, and it turns out we’ve got 3 more months of fire-fighting insanity before the calm sets in. I’m beginning to wonder if the calm will ever get here.

But now I’m a Linux admin. It’s neat to hear your boss tell you your previous assignments (backups, networking, etc.) all get lower priority. So, today I installed (with Nate) four Fedora Core 1 boxes and integrated them into “how we do things” in the department. I’m supposed to take some of the day-to-day stuff off Nate’s shoulders so he can do more with the Linux infrastructure changes we need to be making soon. (Oh, did I mention the Grand Opening needs a brand new departmental website, online a few weeks before the opening?)

I really thought the Grand Opening was going to a PR/admin office thing. I didn’t realize it meant more effort from us…. We got you in the building, you really want more than us?

But as the calendar turns, college hoops keep getting better and better. The Paint-The-Hall-Orange game was last night at Assembly Hall, and the Illini schellacked Michigan State. I love that game every year, and this one was great. If I wasn’t at the game, I could have seen it in HD …. Man, sports look good in High Definition. Too bad the HD TiVo is DirecTV only, and a thousand bucks. The Big Ten tourney is supposed to all be on ESPNHD, and I’m seriously considering working from home those days.

And I think that’s it for now. I’ve got a few more ideas to blog, but I’m hungry.