Schadenfreude

Schadenfreude is a feeling I try not to experience.  If you aren't aware, it means;

"pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others"

Feeling pleasure from the misfortune of others isn't all that idealistic.  I'd like to believe that I'm above that and can feel saddened by the misfortune of others.

But I'm human.  And when there is misfortune of people that I believe are behaving badly, then there is a little bit of giddyup in my step.

Thanksgiving was one of those times.  No, before you think so, my family is fine.  No misfortune at our festivities beyond my brother B working (and his family spending time with the inlaws).

The misfortune that brought a smile to my face was instead brought on by all the douchebags going out on Thanksgiving for deal shopping.  Lemme back up a bit and explain how I smiled all the way home.

Obviously, what I remember as a child is fogged and changed and not at all clear, but one thing that does come through is the streets on Thanksgiving.  They were empty.  No (or at least very few) stores were open.  The people you saw driving around were simply going from home to some Thanksgiving feast.  There were several holidays like that as a child; Christmas, New Year's Day, Easter... I think there may have been more but I recall all of those as 'empty days'.

Ferguson: Some Random Thoughts

Watching the people get lairy

It's not very pretty I tell thee

Walking through town is quite scary

It's not very sensible either

A friend of a friend he got beaten

He looked the wrong way at a policeman

Would never of happened to Smeaton

An old leodensian

-I Predict A Riot by The Kaiser Chiefs


I haven't had much chance to watch the news these past few days, but what I have seen has been about the riots in Ferguson.  Before I dive too deeply into this post, let me say that I'm only casually informed.  I do not watch the news intently.  I do not go searching for all of the information, nor do I read all the information that's made available to me.  My opinions can only be based upon what I know... if something I know is wrong, then obviously my opinion would change accordingly.

What's happening in Ferguson touches on so many subjects.  I'm sure I'll miss some and gloss over some that deserve a harder look.  I may even focus in on some that aren't worthy of any thought.  But when you have racism, police brutality, over arming police, protesters, and riots, there are going to be a lot of ways you can frame an argument.  I think one of the biggest problems is that no one can look at the entire picture.  When you focus in on one and only one of these pieces it can be easy to make an over reaching argument.  One that may be valid, but doesn't exactly fit the current Ferguson model.

Baccalaureate degree?

When I was in high school I had a lot of dreams.  One was being the first in my family to graduate from college.  I 'knew' in my junior year that I was going to be an optometrist and that made it certain that I'd graduate with a bachelor's degree.  To get to optometry it was required that I get a bachelor's degree.

Not until I shifted gears and went into photography did I ever consider that getting an associates degree could be a goal unto itself.

I briefly considered transfer to a photography bachelor's program while in school, but I couldn't find any practical use for it.  At the time I was looking at six years in school and was more than eager to get to the big city (Chicago baby!) and start working.  Having a bachelor's degree wouldn't help that goal one bit... hell, having an associate's degree didn't help in and of itself.  Having a portfolio and the know how to produce good photographs was all that was needed to land a job as a Photo assistant (oh... and a work ethic!).

So I dropped the idea of graduating college.  But it still burned a bit in the back of my head... yes I went to college.  No.. I didn't graduate from college.

To Buy or not To Buy

Everybody knows that I love Photoshop.  Photoshop, more than anything else, IS my creative force.  Yes, I'm good at photography but using a camera to take images is only a means to get them into photoshop.

There are plenty of programs out there that can do similar things.  Gimp, and Paint.net immediatly come to mind.  But I learned how to do what I do on Photoshop.  It made sense as I learned it while getting a degree in Photography and Photoshop is what the professionals use.

I learned Photoshop way back on version 4.  It's hard to follow version numbers as they switched to 'CS' versions and are now on CC versions.  But if you follow each iteration, Photoshop CC is version 14.   But they've already had a 'major' update to Photoshop CC, so we might as well consider it version 15.

Anywho, while in school I had state of the art Macintosh computers and the full version of Photoshop to work with.  I downloaded a hacked copy of it for my home pc, but it ran like absolute shit.  I think that was back on my Pentium 166 with 8Mb of ram (Megabytes.. not Gigabytes!).  After graduation Adobe kept putting out new versions and actually made them run on Windows fairly well.  For the longest time I ran with Photoshop 7 (the last 'numbered' version).  When I went to get a new hacked version I eventually got CS5.  But the hack was... well it was bad.  It actually handicapped several features in the program so I 'downgraded' to CS3.  The hack that I got was actually the entire Creative Suite and included Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat Pro, Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Contribute, Soundbooth, After Effects, Premiere Pro, and Encore.

UPDATE:  Installed

LB Update 01

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

A New Computer

When I got my job last July, I fully expected one of my first purchases to be a new computer.  I not only use my computer every single day, it's a hobby that I really do enjoy.   Building computers.

But I surprised myself when I sat down to think about it.  I came to the unlikely conclusion that I didn't need a new computer.  Even in my 'poor' days I always found ways to get updated computer parts.

Sure, mine was (at the time) a year and a half old and just jam packed full of compromises... and yes I COULD afford to get exactly what I wanted... but it just didn't make sense (or cents!).  Without looking at a single part, I knew my 'new' computer would cost me well over $1000 and frankly I had other things to spend money on.  Things that required an upgrade/new version or things that I had wanted for longer and had never been able to afford.  Fiona... a necessary upgrade from Lita.  The Galaxy S4... a much wanted upgrade over my LG Rumor Touch.  Traveling to Chicago and Dallas... something I couldn't afford to do before.  The Shotgun/Hunting Trip... something I didn't know that I really wanted.

So instead of spending money replacing something that was already eminently acceptable, I spent my extra cash in other ways.  I knew that it was only a matter of time before I would 'need' to upgrade.  A part would break down, or a new game would come out that my system couldn't handle.  At that time I would look at what money I had available and either do a major upgrade to my system, or do a new build.  Well... that time was yesterday.

(Updated:  It's built!)

Don't Call It A Comeback

Boredom leads me to writing.

I complained that I didn't have much to fill my free time in the last post.  Thus being my weekend off of course leads to even more free time.

Saturday wasn't a problem.  The day started around 10 am with college game day and ended around midnight in the middle of the Oregon at Utah game.  Sunday though...  well it would have been a good time for t.v.  

After doing my normal morning web tour I perused this blog looking for... something.  Anything that could spark me doing something.  I read about how I wanted to help my family more... but really there isn't anything TO help my family with.  I read about how I didn't game much any more, but there isn't a game out that I want to play (that will change on Tuesday as Assassin's Creed Unity comes out).  I read about traveling, but it's not as though I can hit up Chicago for a couple hours.

And then I came to the beginning of this blog.  No.. not when I closed it off and started writing from a more personal perspective.  When I had intended this to be the place to write about writing a story.  I marveled at how much effort I put into setting up a story without ever starting it.  Writing out what I at least think of as a good outline, character bios... I even went through the idea of writing it as journal entries vs a personal narrative.  And in the end I just didn't do it.

Free Time

For awhile there I was on quite the TV high.  Back in June I wrote a post about how I watch television, and almost as importantly; what I watch on television.  Since then, I've caught up on some older television shows and the new fall season has begun.

The fall television season has brought back The Walking Dead, Person of Interest, This Old House Hour, and a bit of Top Gear.  I've added another show to those that I record and watch regularly... This Week With John Oliver.  If you haven't caught this HBO news mocumentary, then you need to catch it.  John Oliver, who started on the Daily Show, is quick witted, funny, and presents the week's news with a really interesting spin.

The older shows that I've caught up with are:  Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and Luther.  All three of those shows were great successes.  I enjoyed watching them and feel better for having watched them.  I also re-watched HBO's The Newsroom in anticipation of the third season.  So far, all of that has been a success.  I've entertained myself thoroughly by watching those new and old shows alike.  But then no all is quality in TV watching world.  There are two unsuccessful TV watching experiences.

The first was American Horror Story.  My brother highly recommended this FX series, and it has a unique twist that I found interesting.  Each season is a full story.  Beginning, middle, end.  The first season was titled 'Murder House', where a family moves into a haunted house.  The second season was about an old insane aasylum the third about a coven of witches, and the current season is about a circus freak show.  All of them have the same core actors with a few single season stars.  I think one problem was that my brother got hooked on the second season, while I tried watching the first season first.  The first season is... well it's not good.

Voting 2014: For or Against

Voting.  I did it.  I've done it in almost every election since I was legally able to.  The few elections that I've missed have been all purely 'local' ones that snuck up on me.  I didn't prepare, I didn't know what or who I would be voting for, and I honestly don't believe uninformed people should be voting.  That being said, I think EVERYBODY should be voting.

I know that most people think of elections in terms of Democrat Vs Republican.  They are either registered DorR, or lean so heavily toward one party that it doesn't matter that they aren't registered.  I'd love to wax poetically how I'm different.  How I am purely independent and value all candidates on their merits.  There was a time where I could defend such statements... the elections in 1992, 1994, and 1996.  But around that time I think that the parties really started to polarize.  There were less and less conservative democrats and less and less moderate republicans.  I can't really think of any liberal republicans in my voting life.  At least not any in elections that involved my personal vote.

Anywho... around that time I started to see a trend.  The dull candidate.  The candidate that had no personal message.  The candidate who simply touted their party and demonized the party of their opponent.  It's these candidates that I just lump into their party.

Dreaming Big, Dreaming Small

My Dad always dreamed of winning the lottery.  I'm not sure how deep his dream went beyond "YAY I'M RICH!"

The bug of winning the lottery never hit me until I was driving a truck in 2006.  From 2006 until this year I would 'regularly' play the lottery.  I have to use the air quotes there as I couldn't regularly afford to play the lottery.

I was reminded of those dreams this morning as I cleaned up my desk a bit and found an old lottery ticket.  It was a winner, but only for $4.  It was my last lottery ticket.

It got me thinking about dreams.  No, not nocturnal images of me being a superhero saving a tied up damsel in distress or of being the damsel in distress being saved.  No, I mean dreams of the future.  Dreams of changing my present.

Back in 2006, I wanted nothing more than to get out of the present.  The present, at that time, was my father dying of Cancer.    Was me leaving a job that I loved and being unable to use that experience to get into a similar job.  Was me becoming financially dependent on my parents again.  Was me losing a close group of people that I hung out and worked with.  It was a bad present and I wanted.... lusted after... a grand future.  And more importantly I could see no way to get that future without some massive event changing it.  Like the lottery.

Random things on my mind

Just a few things on my mind.  None of these are worth their own post.

I'm getting a little to focused on my next phone.  It's after all JUST a phone.  Or maybe it's more appropriate for me to call it an internet device.  I rarely make or receive calls, but I have it constantly (outside of work of course) at my side and am constantly looking things up on the internet.

When I got my current phone in July or August last year I was very excited.  I had wanted an Android phone since they first came out.  I had seen friends and even family with them and was so deeply green jealous that I just couldn't stand it.  It wasn't completely selfish though... I wanted to bring my Mom into the smart phone age too.  I was still new in the job and reveling in having enough money to pay any bills, so I decided to pay back Mom.  She had been paying for my cell phone bill for years.  And while she didn't really know what she would even do with a smart phone, I told her flat out that I was going to get her one and take over paying the bill for it.

Shopping for them was fun.  There were really two 'big' hero phones out at that time.  The Samsung Galaxy S4, and the HTC One.  They had similar specs, similar sizes, and similar features.  I was actually leaning toward the One as it had an aluminum back and, to me at least, therefore felt higher quality.  But then the sale came.  Sprint (my carrier of choice for the past 13 years or so) had a 'Buy One, Get One Free' sale on the Galaxy S4.  That made it both more economical over all and easier to convince mom to get a good phone.