complaint

Mah 'lectricities are back to working order. :)

goobermaster — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 22:07:04 -0500

Excel linemen replacing my service line.

Nearly two months ago (right after the fourth of July weekend), my electricity in the manfort started acting wonky. Overnight, half the house quit working. No reason — just quit. So everything in the basement and the kitchen had no electricity, but the outlets on the other side of the place still worked. A quick trip to the electrical box confirmed that none of the breakers were flipped. Hmm?

So I call Jon up and he gets an electrician over. Of course while the electrician was here, everything miraculously started working again. Great. And then the next day it quit working again. Seriously, some timing right?

And now the weird part. If I ran the dryer, the electricity would start to work so long as the dryer motor was running. As soon as the cycle quit — off went half the electrical again. How convenient. So the electrician said that he couldn’t find anything wrong and suspected the service from the transformer on the pole out back. In other words, Excel Energy’s problem. So we put in the call on July 14th. read more »

Facebook Fail

goobermaster — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 12:43:17 -0500

Alright — I still think facebook is superior to myspace in every way, but it seems I get this damn message at least once a day. Anyone else have as many issues as me? So friggin’ annoying!

Neighbor's Barking Dog from Hell

goobermaster — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 00:44:36 -0500

See the little fucker to the right? That’s my neighbor’s dog. The little shit is a Jack Russell Terrier that has no volume control or off switch. Whenever the damn thing is in the yard, it’s, “bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark bark…” until it goes back in. No exaggeration at all, it’s fucking constant.

So tonight…

That little beast has been yipping and yapping since 10:00. NON-STOP! It’s now 12:30 in the morning. Yay. And it’s still going strong. It’s probably a really good thing I don’t have my .22 handy.

Looking out the front window, I see the neighbor’s car isn’t there. (His absent status confirmed with no lights on in the house either). Well that’s just fucking wonderful. How thoughtful of you, neighbor, to leave the terrier terror out in the yard while you’re gone all night. read more »

Sunburn and Molting

goobermaster — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 17:08:09 -0500

See this little guy with his skin coming off in sheets? It’s pretty much how my head looks right now. Just replace green with red. Tell you what — sunburn isn’t much fun when you’re bald.

I got a little too much sun this last week. Not intentionally, it’s just how it worked out. Today I’m sitting in my office at work and scratch my noggin. I get a handful of dead skin. That’s nice, I think. I make my way to the men’s room to survey the damage. It looks like someone lathered my head in Elmer’s glue and it’s starting to peel away now. Pretty picture I’ve formed for you I’m sure.

So home I go to use a mixture of razoring, loofah, and sand-soap to rub my head raw. That oughta be fun… Damn German/Scottish heritage, turns into a lobster in the sun skin.

Goddamn Mother Nature

goobermaster — Tue, 27 May 2008 09:12:56 -0500

Who else woke this morning looked at the thermometer and promptly said, “What the Hell?!?”

Two days ago it was above 80°. This morning it’s 40°. When I get out of work, I refuse to acknowledge the elements if I see white shit falling from the sky.

When it rains it pours...

goobermaster — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 01:03:50 -0500

Jebus H Christ! What a fucking nightmare!

Here I sit for over a half hour listening to the goddamn Comcast muzak waiting for the human to answer. Did I mention how much I hate Comcast? And not only because they’ve a complete monopoly on DSL service in the Twin Cities.

This all started because I’ve been busy upgrading everyone’s sites from Drupal 4.6 or 4.7 to Drupal 5.X. And we all get a fancy and shiny new look to go with it. As I’m doing one site full of events, I notice that even though MySQL is storing the correct timestamp, Drupal isn’t displaying it correctly. A week ago, this kept me up all night trying to figure it out.

Then I learn the issue is really a bug in the way php 4.0.1 (which is what was on my server) dealt with the date() function. Soon I realize that I can’t use any of the fancy new php 5 functions either because my server software is woefully out of date. Even online forums were nearly useless, because they’re all discussing php 5 as well. read more »

The Minneapolis Towing Minions Attack Again

goobermaster — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 14:14:05 -0600

The asshole brigade was out in force last night. I could hear the plow going down the street and then Sid started barking at the perceived threat.

I poked my head out the front door to snap this pic and watch while they proceeded to tow 12 vehicles away — just in my block! No tickets. No warnings. These dick-heads were simply waiting like wolves for 9:00 PM sharp to roll around and then swooped in for the kill. By 9:11, all 12 cars were missing and they were on to the next block.

Sucks to be the unlucky neighbors who now have to find rides downtown and shell out over $238 to get their car back. Not only does the asshole brigade use the “heavy duty” haulers so they can charge more, they force you to pay a minimum of one night’s storage fee — regardless of whether or not you pick you vehicle up that night or the next morning. And of course these people are even less friendly than your typical DMV worker. Clearly deriving a sort of sick pleasure out of maximizing all the victims’ misfortunes and confusion. It’s a complete racket.

If Myspace were a person...

goobermaster — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 08:16:26 -0600

IF MYSPACE WERE A PERSON

From pcweenies.

Alright, I’m guilty of indulging too, but you have to admit many many profiles are horrendously hideous. Transparency and poorly chosen colors render text unreadable. And for the love of Jebus — turn off the damn auto-play on your mp3 of the day selection. If anyone wants to listen, they’ll hit play. It’s the equivalent of blasting Bass 305 on your 15 inch subs while cruising in your Geo Metro.

Goddamn Internet Explorer's idiot CSS reasoning

goobermaster — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 15:42:01 -0500

I will cheer loudly the day Microsoft finally goes away bringing the god-awful Internet Explorer down with it. It’s been a sinking ship for the last few years anyway. Please people — for the love of sanity — abandon explorer and start using Firefox today. You won’t even notice the difference (other than you’ll have less ad/pop-up/virus/etc issues and things on the net will look better and you’ll surf faster and more efficiently.) read more »

Nye's Polonaise

goobermaster — Fri, 04 May 2007 08:36:06 -0500

Alright — this damn place has been my haunt for years. My ex-wife and I first went there back in 2002 for dinner one night and I’ve been returning ever since. I started by sitting at the piano bar for a year, joining in while others sang. I sang “Love Me Tender” once with Walt before he passed away and then became one of the Nye’s fixtures as Jon De Vaal made it his home.

Along with Jon, I got to know everyone and everyone knew me. I really enjoyed the fact that I could walk in and people knew who I was and invited me to sit down and join them. It definitely was my home away from home. Between 2003 and 2005, I was there at a minimum of two nights a week and usually more. Always spending at least $25 or more. My quickbooks tally of how much I’ve spent at Nye’s is scary to look at. read more »