Author: weed

<!–start rant–>
Does anyone else here dislike the new Amoco Ultimate commercials? The ones that go something like this:
You’re merging onto a busy highway. You know you need to go fast to merge, but will your gasoline help you or hurt you. If you have Amoco Ultimate, you’re golden. (boring product info) If you don’t have Amoco Ultimate, hopefully the people stuck behind you as you stop on the exit ramp waiting for the opening won’t get too mad.

I HATEHATEHATEHATEHATEHATEHATHEATEHATEHATEHATEHATEHATEHATEHATE THAT COMMERCIAL.

Now let me tell you how I really feel…
Now if you’re using shine from the hills to run your car, MAYBE then Amoco Ultimate might help your car, but no more than Shell’s 87-octane gas would. Maybe I’ll go buy an old Pinto, put some Amoco Ultimate in it, and then go drag race some 911s?
<!– end rant–> Weed

Allow me to add myself to the list of people who have themselves listed as the creator of a theorem/rule/postulate. Knowing all along that the theorem/rule/postulate is nothing but a bit o’common sense.

Anyways, here goes:

Weed’s Postuleom
It takes less talent & effort to critique than to create

So that’s it. That’s my epiphany!

Please remember to use my name accordingly when stating my postuleom. I’d hate to have my lawyers need to contact you…

My $.02
Weed

So I wrote a little script for the accounting department here at work. It takes data from a variety of sources (Access DB, Excel file, flat text file), does some calculations on them, then emails out the results to the project leads. It gives them a breakdown of the financial status of their projects.

Our company is a little paranoid about their accounting data, so it resides on a separate network, which has no internet or outside connections. Therefore, the accounting people have to move the data from the acct network to the main network so the emails can go out.

Well, in order for my script to run, the Excel file has to be formatted a certain way. Meaning, the filename has to be the same from week to week, the sheet name has to be the same from week to week, and the column headers have to be the same from week to week. Not very hard, at least in my humble opinion.

Well, there’s a lady in Accounting who just doesn’t get it. Every Tuesday, when she runs this script, I get a phone call.

“It’s not working!”

I used to check the logs, but now I just look at the Excel file and tell her to make sure everything is named correctly.

“But I did!”

So I tell her what’s NOT named correctly, get the usual “Oh….”, and the script runs fine.

Now I know there’s 10000000000 ways to fix this to idiot-proof it, I just haven’t had time to do it yet. I just think it’s funny a human being can’t wrap her mind around the three little things that need to done in order for this script to run. A filename, a sheet name, and column names.

Am I asking to much here? Am I being that IT guy? I’m talking many MONTHS here of the same thing, over and over. My own personal Groundhog day.

My $.02 Weed

The Supreme Court is hearing a case about file-sharing.

Whaddya think?

My $.02
Weed

WHY WHY WHY!!!

It’s been at least 10 years since I listened to Def Leppard’s Hysteria album, but I still remember EVERY G** D*** WORD!

WHY!!!

I need those brain cells elsewhere! Please God help me invent a Brain Cleanup Wizard and Defragmenter. I can be like that dude on TV who’s skinny little pale head doesn’t match his muscular body.

“Here’s Weed, showing you how you can remember your wife’s anniversary, the grocery list, and your kids’ ages at THE SAME TIME!”

And if you’re wondering, yes, I’m really getting it, I’m armageddon it. Please shoot me now.

My rant’s now over.
Weed
“Running from the law, the press, and the parents
Is your name Michael Diamond? Naw, my name’s clarence.”

So my wife & I have been entertaining ideas of packing up and moving to Arizona.

Mind you, I’ve lived in the same 15-mile radius mile my whole life, minus the 5 years I spent at college. My entire family (and my wife’s as well) live within half and hour of us. So it’s not like Graber moving again. Not to mention the 2 year old and the 5 month old.

But…life feels like it needs a change. My job is unfulfilling because they seem to lack the proper respect for IT. Especially a growing company with remote offices that wishes to collaborate together. 8+ years at the same job and maybe I’m getting the itch. Plus my wife and I hate cold weather.

Plus with me being in the IT field and my wife being a nurse, finding a job shouldn’t be TOO hard 🙂

Any ideas or insights about Arizona? Or about the moving in general. I know there are some on this board who have packed up and moved out west away from family before, and I’d like to know what they thing. I don’t know if it would be permanent, maybe for 10 ot 20 years.

My $.02 (is it worth $.02 in Arizona as well?) Weed

So I partitioned my drive Downloaded Fedora Core 3… Burned the DVD And I am now installing Linux on my home machine.

After I get it installed, I play to play a lot. Set up an LDAP server. Install SAMBA and see if I can be a Domain Controller. Install Mambo and make a cool portal site. Learn Apache & PHP. MySql as well. Make my opensource funk match my Windows funk.

Any tips or hints? I am a certified computer geek, so you don’t need to worry too much 🙂

More importantly, any cool programs or apps out there I should know about?

My $.02 (minus the licensing and CALs) Weed

EDIT by matthew: Adjusted teaser length.

Building upong Matt’s thought of “Who was the first one who thought of strapping boards on their feet and hurtling down a mountain?”, what are some things you wonder who came up with first?

For example, what poor Indian soul was soooo hungry he decided to boil a crab and pick it apart?

And where did the phrase “State Of The Art?” come from?

My $.02 Weed

So this Friday night, the Grabers threw an engagement party for their son Sam and his fiancee Shani down in good ‘ole Gaithersburg.

A fun time was had by all, but I have to admit to a moment of petty theft. For on the refrigerator I noticed a picture that I knew absolutely HAD to be posted to barnson.org. A quick scan later, and voila!

In all their 80s high-school glory, we have Wayward Sun version 1.0:
Matt Barnson, Sam Graber, Ben Schuman, and Kevin Graham.

You can click on the picture to see a higher res version.

With apologies to Marilyn and her refrigerator
Weed

If you arrived here by searching for “Tony Dungee”, you probably are more interested in Tony Dungy‘s bio on Wikipedia than this several-year-old article. Due to the overwhelming number of foul comments posted here due to Dungy’s team winning the superbowl in 2007, this entry is closed for comments. —Matthew, proprietor.

Recap: Before Monday Night Football, ABC usually has a 90-second vignette starring football players and ABC stars, to entertain you and promote ABC’s shows. This week, Terrell Owens, wide receiver and notorious attention-monger, did a little clip with Nicholette Sheridan, star of the epic drama “Desperate Housewives”. Nicholette, wearing only a towel, throws herself at Terrell, who rebukes her because he has a game to play.

Until she drops the towel, then he tell shis teammates he’s sorry, but he’s gonna have to miss the game tonight.

Pan to two more stars of “Desperate Housewives” watching and lamenting about how bad soap operas have become.

That’s it. No nudity, I think h*ll was said once. Nothing you can’t see on any other TV show. And the nation IS IN AN UPROAR!!! How absolutely stupid!

Tony Dungee, black coach of the Indianapolis Colts, even went so far as you bring out a charge of racism, saying that Terrell, a black man, was bing manipulated and stereotyped for being an over-sexed athlete.

What????!!!

How in the world is having a beautiful blonde woman get naked and jump into your arms a slap in the face of being black? Tony Dungee has done more harm to the black cause by making such a stupid statement. Now you got Bubba and Joe Bob saying “See, they bring the race card into EVERYTHING!”

I heard a great point on the radio last night. Here Congress is easing ethics rules on their own (see DeLay, Tom) whilst raining down on ABC for something totally harmless.

Please please please please please let common sense and intelligence return to DC someday…

My $.02
Weed