Kaltaris Weblog

I work for the university doing tech support for staff and students. For the most part its a ridiculously easy job for anyone who is computer savvy, and it pays pretty decent.  The one and only difficult part of the job is dealing with certain faculty members. For a school that prides itself on its computer science program we have some of the most retarded faculty member I have ever had to have the displeasure of talking to.  Here’s just a few excerpts from recent conversations with our computer illiterate faculty members:

“Ok sir, it appears that you don’t have cookies enabled, I can help you fix that. Go ahead and open up Internet Explorer.”

“You mean the internet?”

“Well what program do you use to access the internet sir?”

“I just click on the internet button and it automatically pops up.”

“…”

“Ok go ahead and do that then.”

“Ok, now what?”

“Do you see a tools button in the top right hand corner?”

“On the website?”

“No, in your web browser.”

“I’m looking all over the page and I don’t see Tools”

“It wont be on the page itself, its in the program, at the very top right of your screen”

“There’s nothing there, its just the buttons for my email.”

“Above that sir, in the window frame itself.”

“There isn’t anything above that.”

“…..”

“Ok sir, I’m going to recommend you use our online help so we can screen share with you.”

And of course upon screen sharing with them we discovered that they just refused to look outside of the page itself to the actual options buttons in the Internet Explorer window.  Pretty bad I’d say…but it doesn’t quite top the guy who refused to plug in his keyboard because he was afraid he might mess something up and made us send a tech out to do it for him…*sighs* some people just shouldn’t be working for a university…Or at least maybe we should offer free Computers 101 courses for all new staff members…

Apartment living really is the pits.  I’ve lived in some really nice apartments, but lets face it, there’s always a downside to them. The nicer they are, the more expensive they are, and for a really respectable apartment, you’re going to end up paying a monthly rent that’s closely equivalent to a house mortgage.  What a waste.  I’m currently living in an “economy” model I would say, decent quality, but nothing special, with just enough room for me live fairly comfortably. I’ve been living in this place for about three months now, the very first night I moved in a group of skater punks started skating in my breezeway, RIGHT outside my door.  They made such a ruckus and woke me from a such a contented sleep that I ended up chasing them off with bit of a metal pipe.  Upon attempting to fall into a sleep again I’m kept awake by a constant tapping sound in my hallway, coming from behind the wall I can only assume its a water pipe.  Finally back to sleep at 2AM, CRASH! I’m jolted from my sleep once again by a loud thumping on the floor of the apartment above me. It’s 4:30AM, now I’m really pissed.  The thudding and thumping continues intermittently for a few minutes and I’ve finally had enough.  Like some old codger I grab a broom and proceed to violently assault my ceiling in the loudest fashion possible.  The thudding from upstairs ceases.  Back to sleep.  My alarm sounds at an all too early 9AM.  Walking into the hall I notice the tapping noise behind the wall has stopped, but in its stead there’s a giant water stain consuming a large section of my drywall…Fantastic, haven’t even been in the place a full day and there’s water leaking through my walls.

Two weeks and five maintenance calls later my apartment finally seems to be in good working order…for now. Apartment living, who needs it.

I’ve recently found myself single, again…hooray!  And in being such I’ve noticed just how much I absolutely abhor the single scene.  It seems like there’s always a sort of insistent social pressure to “get out and meet someone”, and in so doing a whole myriad of unpleasant situations arise.  Bars are probably the easiest and most amusing scenario, people go to bars for two reasons, to get drunk, and to meet people.  Seems simple enough, right? Oh but if only it were that easy.  Upon my recent venture to a bar in Addison I sat at a table with my friends, curiously eyeing the group of girls across from us. The most interesting things occur when there’s a group of attractive girls sitting by themselves…Hoards of guys approached, one after the other, with some of the corniest and most hilarious pickup lines I’ve ever heard.  After watching a dozen or so groups of guys be shot down by these girls it was time to head out, head swimming and thankful someone else was driving. *sighs* Just another reminder of how uncomfortable the entire single gig can be. Better luck next week.

The deeper I go into my degree the more hesitant I become to finish without changing majors.  Arts and Technology is a true passion of mine, and I like to believe I have some degree of skill in it, however I also have to consider just what I am going to do with this degree when I am done with school.  As of late I have noticed some rather disturbing facts about the career field for ATEC graduates and the options available to them when seeking a job related to their field of study.  I know a lot of ATEC graduates, and I would say almost all of them are either not working in the field, or they can’t find a decent job doing what they know.  The select few who actually do find a job in a related field are typically overworked, underpaid, and completely stressed out.  This all seems a bit disturbing to me, to say the least…might not be a bad idea to start considering that business degree after all…

Running out of things to blog about tonight…I’ll post more later….back to my blog sites and comics for topic ideas!

I’ve been following several blogs this year, mostly out of boredom, something to kill time with, and I actually learn a thing or two in the process.  I’ve been in correspondence with several of the blog authors, and some of them actually make a living off of these mediocre information hubs! Most of these authors get their money from advertisements on their pages, the higher the volume of traffic they get, they more they get paid…seems like a pretty sweet gig to me.  A couple of these blogs actually get money from doing reviews and features about products, services, and companies…these are often a great place to find ratings on video games, movies, websites, books, and a whole lot of other categories.  My current blog interests follow those with info on video games, beer, electronics, astronomy, cars, and upcoming technology.  I probably spend at least an hour a day on these sites, and I only follow a couple, I have no doubt I could spend all day at it if I expanded my blog list.

One thing I find myself doing a lot of lately is checking on web comics.  No one really reads the funnies any more, as so much media is now access on the internet the rise of the web comic has given way to a new form of graphic entertainment.  No matter what your interests are you can generally find several web comics that feature  content in your specific area of interest.  Everything from video games and tv, to the everyday mundane, so many web comics have popped up over the past few years that there’s always a huge selection to chose from.

Currently some of my favorites are Penny Arcade, a comic by gamers for gamer, with a nice mix of everyday humor thrown in, and Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, a comic about, well, life and everything therein, their comics are short and to the point with frequent updates every day.  All in all I follow probably about a dozen different web comics in my idle hours at work and home, and I would definitely recommend them to anyone who is interested in free easygoing entertainment.

I’ve lived in Texas for most of my life, though originally from Orange County California I’ve lived here for the past twenty years and its been and experience if nothing else. Something about me has always preferred colder weather, so as you can imagine I typically HATE the weather here.  From the dry heat of Dallas, to the humid swamp-like weather in Houston, it’s all a bit much for me.  Then there’s the drivers, oh man…I’ve driving in at least a dozen different states, and Texas has by far the worst driver I have ever experienced.  Ever been run off the road by some douchebag redneck in his giant gas guzzling dually? I know I have, MULTIPLE times.  The cops here are horrible as well, though it does very by city a bit.

All negativity aside though, Texas has been pretty good to me.  The cost of living here is outrageously cheap compared to most other states I have been in.  Oh and the gas! Since most of the oil comes through the coast of Texas our oil prices are typically far cheaper than those of other states, allowing me to actually fill up my entire tank for under $25!  Texas has a great economy and is virtually recession proof, so I think I’ll be sticking around for a while, at least until things change.

Yet another blog about a service that I just can’t live without.  Pandora.com is simply revolutionary.  For a music lover like me it really doesn’t get any better than this, I can listen to CD quality music at any time, and discover tons of new songs and artists at the same time.  Go to the website, you just type in the name of a band or song that you like, and BAM! It sets up a streaming playlist for you adding other songs that are rated highly by other users with the same musical preferences.  You can also rate each song that it plays, and based on your preferences it will fine tune your future playlists.

You can create multiple stations for different artists or songs and switch between them at any time.  On one particular station I heard a song by a group called Dead Can Dance and I loved it, so I created a new station for them and have constantly been discovering amazing new music ever since.  I really have no idea how I ever lived without this before now.

I’ll take this blog space today to rant about something that I’ve recently discovered and often ponder how I ever lived without it before now: Woot.com!  This website is amazing, and borderline addicting.  Woot.com is a great place to score really sweet deals on electronics and accessories as well as many other random items.  Basically the site posts one item a day, an item that have in overstock, and they list it for a ridiculously low price. Now, only one item a day definitely limits what you can purchase, as you don’t really have the ability to browse for other items, but the prices more than make up for this.

I’ve found myself checking the site daily, ever looking for them to list an item that I am in desperate need of.  So far I’ve made probably a half dozen purchases through woot.com and I’ve been amazing satisfied with every one. Another great feature they have is their “wootoff”.  Every couple of weeks they will list their whole stock of items that they have left from previous days and sell them for even cheaper.  The wootoffs usually consist of a hundreds of items at dirt cheap prices, selling one item at a time until they are all sold out and then they move on to the next.  Check it out, you can find some amazing stuff for the holidays!  Now if you’ll excuse me…I’ve got to get back to this wootoff!