ThinkNIC

Coach Bob Knight, apparently, can't keep his hands to himself. Apparently, I too, am too smart to be a police officer in New London, Connecticut. The last professional IQ test I took, in the 4th grade, put my IQ at 129. Since I lack more recent data, other than a cheesy take-home IQ test, on which I scored a 156, I'm going to guess that my IQ is around the 130 range, as 156 is somewhere around super-genius, which would make my college GPA monumentally embarassing. I saw this story mentioned over at the Curmudgeon's web site. I'm wondering if they have the statistics to back this up...

I'm interviewing today with the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences here at UNI. The position is very similar to the one I have now, but easier, and with better pay. All of their computers run Windows NT 4.0, and they'll be moving to 2000 in the near future. That's a lot easier to support than the amalgamation of Windows 95, 98, NT 4.0, and 2000 that we have here, not to mention the myriad of Macs and specialized applications which seem to have been written in someone's basement or garage.

Looking for a second computer? I just came across the NIC. It's pretty cheap, $199 without a monitor, $329 with a 15 inch monitor. It runs Linux from a CD, and you don't have to use any pay-per-month service. I'm thinking about getting one of these as a second station at home. It's got both a 56K modem and 10/100 ethernet, so if you just want a web station, it's ideal! The machine has 4MB of flash RAM, where your bookmarks and settings are stored. More specs below:

QuickCam

I've got two laptops sitting here on my desk that I can't work on. The users have dropped them off to have software installed. That's a little difficult, since they didn't leave the CD Drives or the ethernet cards. I've left them voice mail messages, so now I just get to sit here and twiddle my thumbs until they find the drives. Why would you take it out of the computer and not put it in the bag? Why would you remove your PCMCIA ethernet card? I'm toying with my new QuickCam Pro. This is a really slick webcam, and the image quality and speed are outstanding. I've set up a dorky webcam below:

{javaScript}

Soap Box

I just placed my order for Norton Systemworks 2001. It doesn't come out until September 20, but I don't know how much longer I can live without Norton Utilities in Windows 2000. I swear by Norton AntiVirus, and 2001 will finally make the update process truly automatic. Windows ME will have the same functionality, I only wish Windows 2000 did as well. It should be customisable, but I think that all software should have the option of getting and installing all of the relevant updates automatically, especially if you're on a broadband connection. Why should I have to remember to check? This afternoon, the local Linux Users Group is having a meeting to plan an upcoming install-a-thon. This will be the second meeting I've attended, and I'm hoping it's better than the one I went this summer.

After the LUG Meeting, I'm going to a lecture given by the professor I had this summer, and who is teaching the class I'm taking this fall. He's giving us extra credit to attend, but I'd probably have gone anyhow. I'm not sure how much I buy into his whole "Social Capital" theory yet, but it's intriguing at the very least.

Well, my request was denied by the Human Resources department, and I found out that I was lied to again! Since I'm about to be made permanent, I asked if the six months I was required to work before becoming eligible for tuition reimbursement would start the day I became permanent, or would be covered by my previous year of employment. I was told by Michelle that the previous year would count if I got written approval by my department head (the dean in my case) that the job was essentially the same. Her boss, Regina, had a different story today on the phone, that no such provision exists, and that it doesn't matter what I did before, the six months starts the first day I'm made permanent. I suggested to her that she inform her staff of the proper regulations surrounding temporary employees, since this is the second time I've been given wrong information by her staff. Obviously, from now on, I'll be getting everything in writing from this department, as they've proven themselves to be extremely unreliable.

It may take a few tries, but Microsoft eventually gets it right. I've been playing around with Windows Media Player 7 for the last couple of weeks, and I'm impressed. I used it to copy all of my CD's to my hard drive, which used up 6GB of disk space, but now I have 100 CD's of music here with me at work, and my CD's are at home. I don't know how well the Mac version works, but the Windows version is quite slick. It downloaded the track names for all of my music as I was ripping the audio, then organized them by both artist, and album, so you can always find what you're looking for. The streaming video function works well, and the player doesn't try to take over my entire system, unlike the shoddy RealPlayer, which is more of a worm than an application.

I stuck a Gore - Lieberman image on my site this morning. I found it rather annoying that they didn't have any nice ones pre-made for me to use, so I just stole the one off of the campaign site. If I'd felt like it, I could have registered to have them make me a page, but all I really wanted was a button. So, it's pretty apparent who I'm going to vote for. McCain would have had a legitimate shot at getting my vote, but there's no way I'm voting for George W. Bush. In the last ten elections, the person ahead in the polls on Labor Day won the election, so things bode well for Gore at this point. I'll get down off my soap box now, and return you to your regular web programming.

Statistics

As long as I'm doing a lot of quoting today, I figured I'd post the quote from the front of Forever Peace that I forgot to post when I mentioned it last week:

"Man was born into barbarism, when killing his fellow man was a normal condition of existence. He became endowed with a conscience. And he has now reached the day when violence toward another human being must become as abhorrent as eating another's flesh." -Martin Luther King, Jr.

From the newest edition of The Onion:

God Damns Minnesota Vikings As Requested

LIBERTYVILLE, IL--Responding to a fourth-quarter cry from diehard Chicago Bears fan Lester Ruddick, God damned the Minnesota Vikings Sunday. "Players and employees of the Vikings organization," God announced from Heaven, "I have heard the pleas of Lester Ruddick in the final moments of a devastating 30-27 Bears loss to the Vikings, and My wrath shall burn forever against you. No supplication, no contrition can help you now. Every last one of you, from All-Pro wideout Randy Moss all the way down to third-string left guard Chris Liwienski, shall be damned to an eternity of pain and suffering."

That reminded me of the interview with Bob Costas in the newest issue of Playboy:

Costas: What was the other thing that drives me nuts? Oh. Athletes proclaiming that the outcome of the game was a result of their faith in Jesus. Now, someone professing his faith in whatever forum, I respect that completely. But I just find it to be a subkindergarten view of religion to declare that Jesus, Allah or the man in the moon determined the outcome of a contest. This is an insult to everyone's intelligence. I mean, who believes in a God that is so occupied with irrelevancies and minutiae that he micromanages a football or basketball game but allows people to be shot dead in churches?

I came home early from work, around 2:00, and spent the rest of the afternoon in a NyQuil-induced coma. I never get sick in the summer, I must be getting old...

I'm always amused by how people perceive risks. A great book I once checked out from the ISU Library had a lot of these laid out before you, to let you know exactly how risky the acts you engage in are. Unfortunately, the book is apparently no longer in print, but this one might be as good.

So why am I writing about this? Because all of the news about the Firestone tire recall is getting old. Yes, fine, these tires may not be the safest ones available, and the manufacturer has issued a recall. But it's not exactly a great risk to everyone, or even those people who drive a Ford Explorer. According to CNN, 89 people have died in the U.S. as a result of the faulty tires. Now I'm not saying that those 89 people don't matter, I just want to put that in perspective.

Let's look at another product that people buy which has a chance of killing them. Tobacco. Tobacco kills 1200 people a day, that's one every 72 seconds! (Source) Now you don't exactly have to be the Curmudgeon to figure out that it's a heck of a lot safer to drive around in Ford Explorers than it is to smoke. Yet not only are cigarettes not recalled, people continue to smoke them after being informed of the risks!

I'm willing to wager that out of the tens of thousands of people who will get their tires replaced, there are a few smokers. I'll even stipulate that some of them will stand outside the dealership and light up while the mechanic puts their new tires on.

If you're so friggin' safety-conscious that you need the safer tires right away, why don't you take the cancer stick out of your mouth and extend your life another five years?

Below is a quote from my book Ranting Again by Dennis Miller, which somewhat sums up how I feel about this behavior:

Hey, don't blame the cigarette makers. Tobacco companies are being sued way too much. I admit they're evil poison-mongers who give other evil poison-mongers a bad name. Yes, they lie about the addictive nature of their products and get rich doing it. But come on, tell the truth, we knew they were lying all along. If you're saying you didn't know cigarettes were bad for you, you're lying through that hole in your trachea. Of course it causes lung cancer. Of course it causes emphysema. It's fucking smoke. Would you build a campfire and every hour stand real close and take deep breaths? How could you not know smoking is bad for you? Is having teeth the color of caramel corn normal? Is coughing up your lungs one smoldering loogie at a time normal?

Opening Weekend

I listened to an interesting band at Septemburfest. One of my friends from high school has a band called The Toboggan Brothers, and apparently they now play every Friday night in Iowa City at Diamond Dave's. You can get four of their MP3 files here, yes, they're legal, so don't sue me. ";->" I'm getting a lot of errands taken care of this morning. I paid some bills, took out the trash, tidied up my apartment, and just finished writing a letter to the Human Resources Department. Last spring, I went to the office to find out if I was eligble for tution reimbursement as a "temporary" employee, as the employee handbook didn't make any distinction. I was told that I was eligble, since I had worked for the University for at least six months. They gave me the forms to fill out, and told me to bring them back when I received my grades. Flash forward a few months, and now I'm told that I was given incorrect information, that I am not eligible to be reimbursed, and that someone in the office made a mistake. This mistake will cost me a couple hundred dollars, so I'm not taking it lightly. I am, however, civil about this, and wrote the following e-mail this morning, in an attempt to persuade the University to make an exception in my case:

Greetings,

A few weeks ago, I spoke with Michelle in your office as part of a benefits overview. I've been a "temporary" employee of the College of Humanities & Fine Arts since last July, and will most likely become "permanent" later this week. Last spring, I stopped by the HR department to ask about being reimbursed for tuition, since I was a temporary employee. I was told that it didn't matter, since I'd worked for the University for six months. I was told I'd be eligible to apply for reimbursement, even though I was considered "temporary".

I was given the necessary forms, and told to fill them after I got my grade for the class I took this summer. I signed up and paid for the class, took it, and received an A-. When I talked to Michelle this fall, she told me that I'd been given incorrect information, and that I was not eligible for reimbursement. However, since the error was on the part of your office, she suggested that I take it up with you (you were on vacation at the time, I believe) and see if an exception might be made in my case, since I was apparently mislead by a mistaken member of your staff. Is there a time I could meet with you to discuss this situation?

Thanks!

-Seth

Yup, I'm officially sick. Time to swallow some Dayquil, curl up on the couch, and stare blankly at the ceiling. What a great day off, why couldn't I get sick tomorrow so I could stay home from work?

For you non-sports fans out there, this was the big opening weekend for both Collegiate and Professional football. My beloved Cyclones won their first game against Ohio, and the Vikings managed to beat the Bears, though it looked grim in the third quarter...