7/31/06

I had a long bitch season with my NITIC today. We have agreed that my D-Delta tests are now showing extremely good results for the Protocol, and they have agreed to drop the dietary restrictions until such time as that changes. As food is one of the major pleasures left open to me, this is very heartening news.

7/30/06

Very little has happened of late. eBay killed some more auctions and Shaun has found last competent doctor in Florida and has been given hope for a life with less or no pain down the road. A long slow recovery to be sure, but it's a blessing just find someone that knows what is going wrong. I can relate to that.

7/26/06

The landlord's middle child Amy came over this evening. If I followed what she said correctly, she wants to be home schooled, but her parents don't want her home alone all day. What this translates into for me, is cheap labor if she gets a place to be. Amy is both smart, computer literate and artistic. She can be taught DVD menuing and might turn out to be better at DVD cover design than I am. If true, this is the answer to my catch-22 of how to increase income so that I could get enough work going to employ an employee. She can work for cheap until enough is rolling to employ her properly. And if her age proves a problem and she's a flake I haven't invested much in her.

Plus I get to help save another kid from public school. It’s win-win-win.

7/25/06

I've always been into Christmas or not, on any given year. This is the only year I can think of where I am kind of into it. I think it is because I am fairly sure that the family will not be getting together again. In fact it's quite possible that the Bigelow family Christmas is a thing of the past.

7/22/06

I have been trying for some time to get a copy of Kurt Vonnegut's Cats Cradle, without spending full price for it. We have four used bookstores in the area and two monthly library book sales. No luck. I bid and won on a copy on eBay. Turned out they didn't actually have it. Finally I won again on another eBay auction and this time it arrived swiftly. Assuming I ever get my payment back on the first auction, total cost was $4.89. I read this book long again, and it was one of my favorite Vonnegut books. I look forward to reading it again.

I finally finished the book, a Life Interrupted, the book Spalding Gray was working on when he committed suicide. The second half of the book was eulogies and such speeches, made me really wish I had seen more of his monologues. Strangely they all described a man always eager and ready to converse with people in the world at large. The jibes completely with the man that ran from Cronig's Supermarket after I said hi to him.

John G. came by and fixed the passenger side window of the car today. He was very interested in showing me why things worked despite my very obvious lack of interest. Regardless I learned that they design the motors in cars windows to self-destruct rather than taking off an arm or head. By replacing the powdered plastic gear with metal ball bearings the window is now capable of removing an arm. Neat.

7/21/06

I'm finally feeling back to normal today.

I got an email from eBay today. Only three days to respond after randomly crippling a man's livelihood (I'm speaking in character). While I'm grateful that they exist, I will be first in line cheering when an alternative knocks them out of the game or down a peg (my money's on Google*).

Anyway, i get kick out of this email as step one says "Know what you did wrong". Now from character point of view, what did I do wrong, have the same phone two years ago as some eBay kicked off? I'll have fun with this when i respond. Second and final step is easy; "Prove I'm me." I'm pretty sure I can do this.

*Google recently came out with Checkout which is poised to become the only real rival to eBay's PayPal. eBay instantly announced it will not be integrated into eBay - only PayPal gets that special treatment. Google offhandedly announced that they might look into the auction market. The more I think about it, Google is about the only active player that could make a play for eBay's dominance of the market. Currently almost all of it's 2.5 billion in revenue this year comes from selling those little ads that are everywhere. They have the expertise to handle software of the scale needed, the pockets to fund the opening stage where you really need to give away the auctions listings for free to attract the sellers which attract the buyers - otherwise you get stuck in a Catch 22 - chicken/egg conundrum that most others that have attempted this fall into - without customers you can't get sellers and without sellers you can't get buyers. But other than deep pockets the other advantage, that I'm sure has occurred to them is that they have a natural synergy with their ubiquitous Google ads. If they allow the auction seller an inexpensive way to get his auction in the Google ad stream, it both makes Google money, makes the seller happy and promotes the Google auction site itself. It's win-win-win. And as the ads appear on sites based on site content, the ads have a real chance of being effective. They could rival eBay within a year with little or no main stream advertising.

I hope Google reads this, for as I've said, I'll be first in line cheering for eBay's fall from dominance.

7/20/06

Way back when I first got Windows, I quickly discovered the amazing time-sucker that is Solitaire, and later Spider Solitaire. Eventually I removed them from the computer. The productivity went way up. Well today I discovered Google Maps. This may well surpass Solitaire in the time wasting department, but it might not have the legs. I had heard of this, but thought it was a MapQuest alternative and wondered (but not much) what the fuss was about. Well, for those that haven't played with this, it is not. What it is, is the entire world in aerial map, and aerial photography, right down to being able to make out your house! Which is what I did. I looked up my house, then Shaun's house, then all over Martha's Vineyard, then where I lived in Chicago, then convention places I missed, and on and on until it was 2 in the morning. I don't now if I should recommend it, or warn people away, but it's intriguing and brought out a nostalgic home sickness I didn't know was brewing in me.

I used screen captures, and a painfully slow Photoshop to build the map you can see here.

7/19/06

Day Three:

Mike arrives by noon. he plugs the old drive into the old carcass. I don't know why he thinks this will work, that motherboard seemed very damaged. It doesn't work. Long story short, there are now two temporary replacement computers, neither as strong as the machines they replaced. Photoshop runs so slowly it isn't really an option to use. But everything seems to be running. My data is intact and life is okay again. I can breath a sigh of relief. When I can spare the money I'll have to get two new computers.

The problem with the phone line turned out to be that both home phones shorted out. I had used the Leggo phone for testing, but I had unplugged each phone swapping it for the Leggo phone for testing and then plugging the original back in. It wasn't until I disconnected both phones that suddenly everything worked.

Karen came over shortly before Mike left. The last few days was finally catching up with me and I figured that taking a Phenytoin might spare tomorrow from being a total loss. I don't remember a thing from a few minutes after I took it. I figured i must have been really poorer company than usual, but Karen said I was cuddlier than usual. I feel that must mean something, but I'm not sure what.

7/18/06

Day Two:

I awake less unfocused than I was expecting. Days like the one before usually have physical or mental repercussions.

I forgot the mention that Shaun got hold of Mike yesterday. I spend much of the day awaiting his arrival. I have no idea when he is coming and there is no food in the house, but I am scared to leave. Even if I leave the door unlocked, Mike won't come in on his own.

I'm mostly working from the laptop which is annoying as I can't figure out how to disable the mouse pad and so as I type the pad of my hands will brush the pad and the cursor will jump and I'll notice it a few words or sentences later. But, at least I can get most stuff done. I can't write to this site, and I can't get some of my email accounts, but most of the functions are covered.

Mike shows up at three o'clock. I breath a sigh of relief. All should be fine one way or the other. But it fights him, just like it did me. My biggest fear, that my data drive might be defective, becomes a possibility. The other computer eventually gives way to replacement and finally connects to the net. But I'm on pins and needles about the hard drive. Mike comes and goes several times. Around 10pm he declares victory and leaves. Happy I go to check everything. My personal computer had two hard drives, one from an earlier crash that i would refer back to occasionally for information. The computer boots to an unfamiliar screen; Mike has spent all day working on the wrong drive. Again, I go to bed worried about my data.

7/17/06

Day One:

This day started badly. As usual after waking I fired up the computers. Usually I look at my personal email while getting the other two computers ready to do business. Today I had two emails that capture my attention. In the first my brand new and strictly legit eBay account was suspended. Weird stuff like this happens a lot to me in my life when I make any attempts to delve into more socially acceptable methods of making a living. At this point no reason is given to me.

The second email is from Karen, we are arguing through email, and since I am unable to grasp what exactly I have said to start this process all attempts to correct it are escalating the situation. And now she has managed to find a button of mine and pushed it.

At Gram's I remark that the day is off to shitty start; I have no clue what is in store for me.

This is enough to distract me from my Massage Therapy session and I forget all about it (I don't even realize it until Thursday.)

When I get home, I get the eBay orders out of the way and take them to the Post Office. The sky turns from blindingly bright to pitch black and ominous in the few blocks it takes to get home. It is just beginning to rain as I enter the house, already I can hear the thunder in the distance. The daily thunderstorm is about 4 hours early.

Suddenly it is a real storm and its fury is lashing at the windows, ceiling and walls. This is sound that always brings be comfort, its as if the weather is in sympathy with my mood. I call Mom. A crash of thunder in the distance, lightning and thunder about 6 seconds apart. The cell phone goes dead. Mom calls me back on the land line. The lightning adds pops and clicks to our conversation. She asks if talking on the phone is the smartest idea during lightning, and as I'm explaining it's a cordless phone - WHAM - the loudest sound I have heard since lightning struck the flat metal roof of our dorm back at Nasson. Loud, lighting and thunder at the exact same time. It didn't strike the house, but it must have been damned close. The phone goes dead.

Almost all the electronics in the house are protected by Uninterruptible Power Supply devices, but still I go around to check every thing. Everything in the garage seems fine. In the computer room I notice all the computer screens have messed up colors. Luckily most computer screens these days have degaussing technology built in and I am able to correct the three monitors. It is then that it registers on me that none of the screen savers have moved while I have been doing this. My personal computer is locked up. if fact it is so locked up that holding down the power button does not shut it down. I am forced to pull the power cord. When I plug it back in the system does not reset. It doesn't even try. My guess is the motherboard is blown, I play that the hard drive is okay. Having no memory my email and my daily planner act as my memory. Without it, I'm lost. And these are of course some of the harder systems to backup.

I go to call Mike, the phone is still dead, but the cell phone works. Turns out Mike hasn't answered his phone in so long the answering system is full. Panic begins in build in the back of my mind.

On to the business machines. Jenny works but won't connect to the Internet. It's probably a blown Lan card. At this point I remember that this has happened once before and I feel really stupid. I knew that the Cable Line was unprotected, had taken this exact same hit and had forgotten all about it. Stupid stupid stupid.

The Cable modem is a goner. Luckily I have rewired the machines just the other day getting the other Cable modem ready for return to Bright House. I swap them out and the other one works fine. Jenny is still offline.

The Lisa computer is working fine, no noticeable damage at all. It's 3:30pm, I need to post auctions on Jenny before bed. I also need to be able to read my email to read the next round in Karen's fight. Tension builds.

The laptop was not online when the lightning hit. I hook it up. Normally this would be already to go as a backup machine, but it was repaired last month and the hard drive replaced in the process. As I didn't really trust the fix, I hadn't put any effort into setting it up since. Its almost a blank slate.

Amazingly, I am able to find, and or guess settings and passwords enough to get my Google email address running. This allows me to read that my eBay account was suspended because they had connected my account to a suspended account; Jason's account. I assume they did this through the phone number as all the other info is different. I fire off an indignant email.

After some digging and experimenting I have my gbigelow email working, and can read Karen's missives. There have been two. It seems that with the help of my absence from the argument the situation has resolved itself. I feel the tide turning.

The only thing that really needs doing is getting the Jenny on the Internet so I can post the auctions. Ideally I'd like this at 10pm, midnight is less ideal only because I don't want to be up that late. Unfortunately its 6pm, the computer stores around here will be closed. Okay, half the machines in this house aren't on the net, and they all have Lan connectors. I open the editing computer, Lan is built into the motherboard. No help there. I open the printing computer. I can not figure out how for the life of me to get to the motherboard. I've never seen a computer insides like this one. I open the personal computer, built on the mother board.

Somewhere in this hunt, the absurdity of it all SNAPS. And just like that it's no longer an increasingly frustrating situation, it's a universal challenge I'm enjoying. Like crying 'do your worst' into a storm. I'm bound and determined to pull this off. I pull the garage and the parts closet apart. I can't believe I don't have a spare Lan card. Then it occurs to me, Mike has left two computer carcasses here over the year. First one, built onto the motherboard, but the second has a card! Ah ha, take that universe. I plug the card in, and still no Internet connection. Counter-check. At this point, I realize I've been being stupid. I know I have a functioning card in the Lisa computer. I swap it into Jenny. Nothing. The problem is worse than the card. I've reached a dead end, and one I could have figured out before my three hour Lan card hunt. I put Lisa back together and take a break.

Another course of attack occurs to me. I can get Jenny up and running on the laptop. All I need is the email - it's Google and I have access to the original computer so that takes minutes to setup - and Turbo Lister. The program is easy if time consuming to download onto the laptop. I'm into the final lap. All I have left to do is transfer the Turbo Lister data from Jenny to the laptop. And I hit a wall: the computer doesn't have a CD writer, the whole problem is it isn't connected to the net, and my last known RAM key is over at Shaun's. I'm defeated. Check and Mate to the universe.

I give up and go to watch TV, the laptop screen mocking me in the darkness of the living room. Suddenly it hits me, Turbo Lister has an import from eBay listing functions. twenty minutes later at 11:30pm, the auctions are posted. A small but vital success. A day that could have ruined my mood leaves me feeling good.

7/15/06

As often happens when I have a largely focused day, especially if it has some unknown elements to it, the next day is a fuzzy day. Today was one of those. Fred came at 9, and I managed a mediocre workout. I blew off the eBay mailing (Saturday is optional but I almost always get the work out of the way.) but later in the day got the order sheets printed. The StarGate season has begun so I had some nice television to watch while I dazed.

Out of the blue, long lost  

The last few days I've made plans at night and failed to execute them in the light of morning. Today I got up and went to the Book Sale, bought $50 worth of books, came home set up an eBay account in my name (it's been about 10 years since I have had one in my own name) and did the research and design work needed to get one book up. Tomorrow, I'll add the finishing touches and get ten to twenty more up. I don't think there is much money in it, but it will add nice feedback and reputation. And I wanted it on a fresh account just in case it turns out there is a profit to be made, the clean account will make that much easier to determine. The eBay account is gartblanc. It doesn't look like much yet, but give it a couple of weeks.

Feels good to get some thing done.

7/13/06

I realized today, that I can't really afford to both go home in August and check out Waverly in September. I think it is probably smarter to have Tracy come here in September and help get me organized and back on financial track, and go to Waverly in April (it's about the weather, Waverly is lots of walking in Kentucky without heating or air conditioning.) I'll have to check that this works with Tracy, but I think that's the new plan.

7/12/06

I love movies that are unpredictable. Most movies follow the formula of their genre or decade, and if you've seen as many films as I have, you can pretty much not just guess what is going to happen at the end, but scene by scene. This makes certain films that break these formulas remarkable. For instance, in The Hitcher the main female sex interest (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is snapped in half, halfway through the film. The seen had around five minutes of build up, and everyone that had ever watched more than 3 mystery/horror movies new she would be saved. And snap, pulled apart by two tractor trailers. That scene will stick with me long after much of my brain is mush.

Well last night I recorded Forbidden Zone (1980). First thing I was shocked to learn is that Danny Elfman, who it seems has written almost every TV show theme this decade, is the same Danny  Elfman that was in Oingo Boingo. Well, if you are like me in that you enjoy the offbeat and bizarre, check out Forbidden Zone. It's hard to be bizarre, it's near impossible to be bizarre without it seeming that that's what your purpose is. This film manages that with apparent ease. About 10 minutes in I decided it was one of the 10 strangest movies I'd seen, by the end its in competition for the top three.

But don't take my word for it.

7/11/06

(As I fill in the last few days it is July 14th, I've scrawled a few notes since the 11th, but didn't post anything)

I haven't posted in a week. I've been feeling mildly depressed, and as many of you know, when I'm not feeling well, I don't tend to feel like communicating. Unfortunately too many of you know that, so as the days of non-posting dragged on I'm getting more and more emails, and worse calls, coming to express concern. Well I'm pulling out of it so I figured I'd better post now that I able. I tend not to trust my emotions any more, in the respect that I don't look for a cause. It is just as likely that my mood is a errant short in mind brain as it is that occurs from any real cause emotional or chemical.

On the very plus side Karen came over for the first time, and we seem very compatible. It is nice sleeping with someone in my arms again.

7/04/06

I'm posting today in advance. I had planned a political rant in honor of  Independence Day, but you know the scene in the movie Broadcast News where Holly Hunter's boss lights into her about how it must be great to always be right all the time and always know so much more than everyone else and Holly says, very seriously, "Oh no. It's horrible."?

That's kind of the way I'm feeling today (from the audience looking in anyway), like I've been slapped with a bit of humility. I think I'm just going to sit back and listen today.

7/03/06

I had an odd day today. A week or so ago, as part of the whole "become part of the world again" thing, I started looking at Craigslist again, and on the same day I came across two very different posts: one looking for a cuddle partner, and one looking for someone to talk about Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Cool, two activities I enjoy and within my limitations. So I cast my electronic hat into the ring and started emailing, and for the week have been having two enjoyable threads of communication.

Karen, the cuddler, seems very out-going, funny and seems to get my way of thinking and my humor, and best yet brings out my humor. Cool.

Nancy, was a bit more skittish, but I was enjoying the repartee. This morning I essentially get a "screw off" email from Nancy. In looking over the emails, I think I see what happened, I got some of my communications confused in that Nancy wasn't as up to speed on information about me and so completely misunderstood my last email to her. Unfortunately I responded before I fully grasped the situation and promised not to email unless she responded. Oh well, so if any one reading misses Buffy like I do, and would like to email about it.....

7/02/06

I woke up at up at 5:30 this morning, exactly when I wanted to. I've finally got my schedule shifted around so that I can walk in the morning. Of course now I'm going to bed around 9:30pm.

But I got up and turned on my personal computer (as opposed to my business computers, work computers or the laptop) and nothing happened. The power light started flashing yellow and the machine made no sound at all. I shutdown the UPS, let it sit while I showered and trued again. Nothing.

An odd feeling came over me, "I'm free!" I thought. It's Sunday, so I can ignore eBay until tonight, and now I can't email, work on this site, email or research (well I could email on the laptop but that's a pain so it wouldn't happen.) So, until the machine is fixed, I'm free. Not sure free to do what exactly, but it was nice feeling.

Next I won a brief inner battle about walking to Gram's. I hadn't had the energy this week and had been driving. Today I knew I should walk, could walk, but the inertia of being out of the habit was pushing toward the car. At 6:30am the morning sun has to fight through so much atmosphere to get to me that when it finally makes it it doesn't have the strength left to hassle me. The humidity was a bit much, but the cool air compensated. I felt good, I felt strong, and I took the long way around as I dislike being the first through Marshall park in the morning, for that is the person that must clear out all the silk worm strings and spider webs. Spiders are not my favorite creatures.

Must be something visible in my demeanor when I feel like this as the three strangers I ran across on my walk all stopped to talk. Of course, disturbingly that means there is something about me the bulk of the time that screams "Stay Way".

I like Gram's at this early hour, few customers, very quiet. I reread Spalding Gray's, Grays Anatomy. I was shocked at how clear my focus was, and how easy it was to keep my place. I read about 60 pages and laughed a lot. While rereading is easier for me that reading, this still showed that both my mind and blood sugar are doing very well today.

After breakfast, I stopped by Rotary park, determined to see how badly my slacker week had set me back. 14 seconds! And yes, you're going to hear about every advance here until I actually do a chin up.

Walked home, and talked to Charlie (the one neighbor other than my landlord that I know) for a good bit before I went inside.

Pushed the flashing yellow light on the computer and suddenly it was working just fine. I know I could still be free if I chose, but my mind and eyes are unusually clear and I really should take advantage of that. I want to convert these thought pages to run on real blog software, if I can find one with the features I want. That, laundry and the beginning of cleaning are the tasks for the day.

7/01/06

I was flipping through the few pictures in my camera phone (as I meditate more, TV is becoming less palatable, and some of the mindlessness just doesn't keep my attention any more) and realized that last week marked two years since I stopped working conventions (the more natural phrase for me on this is: "doing shows" but for clarity sake (I know "why start now?") I change it each time I use it.). I have a lot of dreams in which I have for some reason decided to work one more show. I have these tiring dreams often enough, that it doesn't seem that long ago since I dropped off the circuit. I don't miss the driving (much), and only a few of the promoters, and surely not the fans, but I miss a lot of my fellow merchants.

When Megacon comes around next year, I'd really like to be in mental shape to visit my friends. That wasn't a possibility this year.

I spent much of the evening building the Site Map for this website. A tedious task that requires surprising focus and concentration, and yet I stuck with it and got it done before I went to bed. A good sign.