blog
Various topics
12/08/2007
Well it's been snowing for about two weeks straight up here. I'd say this is probably the most snow we've received this early in the season since I've been up here. Mont Ripley opened yesterday, but I went out with some people from the department to a bar so I didn't end up going skiing. It was free yesterday, so it was probably really crowded anyway. I'm hoping they'll get all of the hill open next week so I can try out the new lift before the holiday break.
I know that I haven't posted in a while, but it will probably be like that for another few weeks unless I get sick of doing homework. I've got a bunch of stuff to do for the last week of school and obviously it's all due soon since the semester is almost over. In fact, I should be doing it right now but I decided I'd distract myself by posting something first.
I've been on a streak of watching terrible movies lately. Mr. Bean's Holiday was pretty terrible. Mr. Bean is hilarious, but two-thirds of this movie was horrible. Shrek the Third is a complete disgrace to the series. Very little actually happens in the movie and it's full of really bad humor, relative to the previous two in the series. Finally, last night I saw Good Luck Chuck with Scott and Angela and it was also pretty horrible. I'll admit I had a few good laughs throughout the movie but it was way too predictable and cheesy for me.
Charter decided they'd give me a reason to hate them more yesterday. I was trying to pay my bill online using their quick pay page, which I like because I don't have to create a login. Well they've decided that you can't do that anymore and you have to create a login now. That's fine with me, I kind of expected to have to make one anyway, but now in order to create a login you have to have your account number and a unique security code, which is supposed to be on your latest bill. Unfortunately, my bill does not have the security code/PIN on it. I saw a page on their site that mentions you can have it sent to you in the mail if you request it in their chat room. Here is the start of the chat room conversation I had with them:
---
Me: I'm trying to pay my bill online and I don't have the PIN number I need. It is not listed on my bill.
Charter rep: For identity and verification purposes, may I please have the phone number starting with the area code, the name on the account, the service address, the Charter Account number, and your account PIN code?
Me: I don't have an account PIN code, that's what I need to find. It is not listed on my bill.
---
Who do they hire to work at this company?!?! Eventually he told me if I "still didn't have the PIN" to visit my local Charter office to obtain it. I quoted the website and asked for it to be mailed to me and he said he'd process that, finally.
Things like this really make me want cable deregulation. Companies should be able to compete for your cable business instead of allowing a sub-par company (i.e. Charter) to be the sole provider. I don't know the main arguments behind the website I linked to above or those opposed to it, I just know I'm sick of over paying for cable service when they aren't providing people with reasonable content. Why cable companies don't carry NFL Network is a different debate, but why can't cable companies provide anywhere near the amount of HD stations that satellite does? Is it bandwidth restrictions? People shouldn't be paying the same price or more than satellite when they are receiving a lesser amount of content.
When I move back to Rochester, I'm going to do everything in my power to get satellite instead of cable as well as trying to get DSL instead of cable Internet.
I know that I haven't posted in a while, but it will probably be like that for another few weeks unless I get sick of doing homework. I've got a bunch of stuff to do for the last week of school and obviously it's all due soon since the semester is almost over. In fact, I should be doing it right now but I decided I'd distract myself by posting something first.
I've been on a streak of watching terrible movies lately. Mr. Bean's Holiday was pretty terrible. Mr. Bean is hilarious, but two-thirds of this movie was horrible. Shrek the Third is a complete disgrace to the series. Very little actually happens in the movie and it's full of really bad humor, relative to the previous two in the series. Finally, last night I saw Good Luck Chuck with Scott and Angela and it was also pretty horrible. I'll admit I had a few good laughs throughout the movie but it was way too predictable and cheesy for me.
Charter decided they'd give me a reason to hate them more yesterday. I was trying to pay my bill online using their quick pay page, which I like because I don't have to create a login. Well they've decided that you can't do that anymore and you have to create a login now. That's fine with me, I kind of expected to have to make one anyway, but now in order to create a login you have to have your account number and a unique security code, which is supposed to be on your latest bill. Unfortunately, my bill does not have the security code/PIN on it. I saw a page on their site that mentions you can have it sent to you in the mail if you request it in their chat room. Here is the start of the chat room conversation I had with them:
---
Me: I'm trying to pay my bill online and I don't have the PIN number I need. It is not listed on my bill.
Charter rep: For identity and verification purposes, may I please have the phone number starting with the area code, the name on the account, the service address, the Charter Account number, and your account PIN code?
Me: I don't have an account PIN code, that's what I need to find. It is not listed on my bill.
---
Who do they hire to work at this company?!?! Eventually he told me if I "still didn't have the PIN" to visit my local Charter office to obtain it. I quoted the website and asked for it to be mailed to me and he said he'd process that, finally.
Things like this really make me want cable deregulation. Companies should be able to compete for your cable business instead of allowing a sub-par company (i.e. Charter) to be the sole provider. I don't know the main arguments behind the website I linked to above or those opposed to it, I just know I'm sick of over paying for cable service when they aren't providing people with reasonable content. Why cable companies don't carry NFL Network is a different debate, but why can't cable companies provide anywhere near the amount of HD stations that satellite does? Is it bandwidth restrictions? People shouldn't be paying the same price or more than satellite when they are receiving a lesser amount of content.
When I move back to Rochester, I'm going to do everything in my power to get satellite instead of cable as well as trying to get DSL instead of cable Internet.
Labels: cable deregulation, charter, movies, school, skiing, snow
Break time
11/18/2007
Thanksgiving break has started and it's nice to be away from school for a little while. I've always thought it's kind of annoying having to go back for only another few weeks and then being done for the semester though.
There isn't a whole lot new with me. I've been really busy lately with school work, which kind of surprised me. I think I'm past most of the really busy sections of the semester now though. I'm kind of disappointed that most of the TV shows I watch will now be showing reruns until that writers strike is over. I don't know what I'll fill my time with now!
Mont Ripley started making snow for the ski season. There isn't a lot yet from what I can tell, but it's good they are starting early. I'm excited to get to start skiing so I can try out their new ski lift. Actually, I'm just excited for it to start snowing in general because it's kind of fun in the U.P.
I'm pretty sure I had more stuff I was going to say but I can't remember now that I'm actually writing stuff. I'll post more later if I remember.
There isn't a whole lot new with me. I've been really busy lately with school work, which kind of surprised me. I think I'm past most of the really busy sections of the semester now though. I'm kind of disappointed that most of the TV shows I watch will now be showing reruns until that writers strike is over. I don't know what I'll fill my time with now!
Mont Ripley started making snow for the ski season. There isn't a lot yet from what I can tell, but it's good they are starting early. I'm excited to get to start skiing so I can try out their new ski lift. Actually, I'm just excited for it to start snowing in general because it's kind of fun in the U.P.
I'm pretty sure I had more stuff I was going to say but I can't remember now that I'm actually writing stuff. I'll post more later if I remember.
Snow
10/26/2007
It's finally been getting colder out. A few days ago we had some light periods of snow in Houghton, which was nice to see. I'd like it to snow early and often so that the skiing is good this year. Some of my friends who ski/snowboard are also going to get a season pass and go with me sometimes but they haven't decided if they are going to get one from MTU's Mont Ripley or Mount Bohemia which is apparently much better skiing but is 45 min - 1 hour away. Bohemia is also cheaper, as long as you buy the season pass on the $99 pass day.
Gmail has added IMAP support. Most people probably don't care but I'm really happy about it because it will allow me to upload all the e-mails I have stored on my computer so that everything is in one place. I'm almost done uploading them all. It's kind of funny reading e-mails that I had from as early as 2001. As of now Gmail says I have 12,579 e-mails on their server. That's a little ridiculous.
I don't remember if I mentioned that my "nicer" camera broke about a month ago. It all of a sudden would only take pictures with a bunch of horizontal white lines in them. After searching some website, I found out that Canon is saying it is a faulty piece of hardware causing the problem and has been replacing the part for free for customers. I sent it in and without about a week or two they sent me... a NEW camera. My old camera was probably about 4 years old so they must not have had the parts in stock anymore to fix it. I had a Powershot S1 1S and they sent me a refurbished Powershot S3 1S. It seems a lot nicer than my old one so I'm pretty happy about it. It's like getting a brand new camera for free. I went out geocaching the weekend after I got it and tested out some of the color modes and other various things. I'll eventually post the pictures on here, but until then you can find them here. And yes, some of those are in graveyards. Some of the geocaches I found that day were in abandon cemeteries from the 1800s (most were about 1850 or newer).
I've been considering getting one of the XBox 360 HD-DVD players. Some places have deals where you get a free copy of Heroes season 1 ($70), King Kong (comes with the HD-DVD player), and 5 other free movies. That offer should be enough to make anyone want to buy it, but I'm still a little bit nervous about buying into a format that might be dead in two years. Blu-ray seems to be winning the high definition format war, at least right now. I guess if I do buy it then I'd still be able to rip the movies and burn them as Blu-ray once all the technology is out. I'm not sure if it's worth the hassle to get it right now, but it would sure look awesome.
Gmail has added IMAP support. Most people probably don't care but I'm really happy about it because it will allow me to upload all the e-mails I have stored on my computer so that everything is in one place. I'm almost done uploading them all. It's kind of funny reading e-mails that I had from as early as 2001. As of now Gmail says I have 12,579 e-mails on their server. That's a little ridiculous.
I don't remember if I mentioned that my "nicer" camera broke about a month ago. It all of a sudden would only take pictures with a bunch of horizontal white lines in them. After searching some website, I found out that Canon is saying it is a faulty piece of hardware causing the problem and has been replacing the part for free for customers. I sent it in and without about a week or two they sent me... a NEW camera. My old camera was probably about 4 years old so they must not have had the parts in stock anymore to fix it. I had a Powershot S1 1S and they sent me a refurbished Powershot S3 1S. It seems a lot nicer than my old one so I'm pretty happy about it. It's like getting a brand new camera for free. I went out geocaching the weekend after I got it and tested out some of the color modes and other various things. I'll eventually post the pictures on here, but until then you can find them here. And yes, some of those are in graveyards. Some of the geocaches I found that day were in abandon cemeteries from the 1800s (most were about 1850 or newer).
I've been considering getting one of the XBox 360 HD-DVD players. Some places have deals where you get a free copy of Heroes season 1 ($70), King Kong (comes with the HD-DVD player), and 5 other free movies. That offer should be enough to make anyone want to buy it, but I'm still a little bit nervous about buying into a format that might be dead in two years. Blu-ray seems to be winning the high definition format war, at least right now. I guess if I do buy it then I'd still be able to rip the movies and burn them as Blu-ray once all the technology is out. I'm not sure if it's worth the hassle to get it right now, but it would sure look awesome.
An update!!
2/23/2007
A lot has stuff has happened since my last update. I'll do my best to tell you the interesting stuff...
Probably the weirdest thing that happened recently involves my car. On the way home from school one day it stalled once. No big deal, right? I just started back up and went on my way. I figured maybe the really cold temperatures got to it. So a few days later I'm on my way home from school and it stalls 4 times in the 3 miles on the way back to my house. I make an appointment with the dealer and he finds something very unusual. Nothing mechanical was the problem, but the problem was most likely SOFTWARE. Yes, SOFTWARE. Unbelievable. He showed me the description of the update for my car. It fixed some stalling problems and fixed the instantaneous gas mileage reading to be more accurate. Since then, haven't had any problem with it. Crazy stuff.
I'm really excited for baseball to start. I've already purchased my subscription to MLB.TV so I can watch and listen to all the spring training and regular season games. I think this could be their year, as long as the offense stays productive and the pitching stays healthy. Prior is actually participating in spring training this year which he hasn't done the past few years because of injuries and Kerry Wood is throwing in preparation for his new role as a relief pitcher. It's starting to sound good.
I tried out Windows Vista a few times this past month. The CS department at school gives us a free copy of business, which I installed on my laptop but it was too slow for my tastes. My laptop just doesn't have enough memory for it. I then installed Vista Home Premium on my desktop and it runs great. I'm really impressed by it. Some say that the prompts for allowing or canceling something are irritating, but they rarely come up so I don't find it annoying.
Winter carnival was kind of a let down this year. The lack of snow and dangerously cold temperatures in the final statue nights made the statues a lot less detailed than they normally are. It was still fun though. My parents came up as well as Ashley and some of her friends. I took pictures and I'll get them up eventually.
I've become obsessed with skiing lately. I'm taking intermediate and advanced skiing classes this semester and this year they try and get you to take the lessons instead of just showing up and getting your name checked off. I'm really glad they are doing this, I've learned a TON. This past week I think I finally realized how to do the technique for short turns and I'm really happy about it. I'm probably going to take the ski racing class next year since I need more P.E. credits. In the advanced class he had us go down the race course just so we knew what it was like, and it's really fun.
That's all for now.
Probably the weirdest thing that happened recently involves my car. On the way home from school one day it stalled once. No big deal, right? I just started back up and went on my way. I figured maybe the really cold temperatures got to it. So a few days later I'm on my way home from school and it stalls 4 times in the 3 miles on the way back to my house. I make an appointment with the dealer and he finds something very unusual. Nothing mechanical was the problem, but the problem was most likely SOFTWARE. Yes, SOFTWARE. Unbelievable. He showed me the description of the update for my car. It fixed some stalling problems and fixed the instantaneous gas mileage reading to be more accurate. Since then, haven't had any problem with it. Crazy stuff.
I'm really excited for baseball to start. I've already purchased my subscription to MLB.TV so I can watch and listen to all the spring training and regular season games. I think this could be their year, as long as the offense stays productive and the pitching stays healthy. Prior is actually participating in spring training this year which he hasn't done the past few years because of injuries and Kerry Wood is throwing in preparation for his new role as a relief pitcher. It's starting to sound good.
I tried out Windows Vista a few times this past month. The CS department at school gives us a free copy of business, which I installed on my laptop but it was too slow for my tastes. My laptop just doesn't have enough memory for it. I then installed Vista Home Premium on my desktop and it runs great. I'm really impressed by it. Some say that the prompts for allowing or canceling something are irritating, but they rarely come up so I don't find it annoying.
Winter carnival was kind of a let down this year. The lack of snow and dangerously cold temperatures in the final statue nights made the statues a lot less detailed than they normally are. It was still fun though. My parents came up as well as Ashley and some of her friends. I took pictures and I'll get them up eventually.
I've become obsessed with skiing lately. I'm taking intermediate and advanced skiing classes this semester and this year they try and get you to take the lessons instead of just showing up and getting your name checked off. I'm really glad they are doing this, I've learned a TON. This past week I think I finally realized how to do the technique for short turns and I'm really happy about it. I'm probably going to take the ski racing class next year since I need more P.E. credits. In the advanced class he had us go down the race course just so we knew what it was like, and it's really fun.
That's all for now.
Baseball
1/21/2007
Now that the Packers are done for the season I'm getting really excited for baseball season. The Cubs are vastly improved this season after adding Soriano and a bunch of other players. Rumor has it that they are up for sale and they are trying to maximize the value that they'd get for the club, but I hope it's just because they want to finally not suck.
My parents got me a brick from Wrigley Field for Christmas, I thought it was pretty cool. I'm assuming it used to be in the outfield area and was taken down after they added more bleacher seats last year. My dad made a stand for it too, it's pretty cool.
I'm disappointed that no one is making a realistic full-featured baseball game for the Wii. The Wii Sports baseball is really fun but imagine playing full games like that with real teams and players. The new baseball games seem to only be on the other consoles. Maybe I'll be forced to get it for XBox 360 instead.
The first week of school was interesting. It's different being off campus now. It's probably actually more productive for me since I have a lot of time between classes. I usually end up reading stuff for other classes in the computer lab. I think Computer Networks and possibly Programming Languages will be my favorite classes. The Computer Networks book is pretty interesting.
Skiing twice a week is pretty fun too though. The whole ski hill isn't open yet, but it's still been fun. Unfortunately, one of the times I have to go skiing is during The Office and Grey's Anatomy. I'll probably end up recording it every week and watching it when I get back.
My parents got me a brick from Wrigley Field for Christmas, I thought it was pretty cool. I'm assuming it used to be in the outfield area and was taken down after they added more bleacher seats last year. My dad made a stand for it too, it's pretty cool.
I'm disappointed that no one is making a realistic full-featured baseball game for the Wii. The Wii Sports baseball is really fun but imagine playing full games like that with real teams and players. The new baseball games seem to only be on the other consoles. Maybe I'll be forced to get it for XBox 360 instead.
The first week of school was interesting. It's different being off campus now. It's probably actually more productive for me since I have a lot of time between classes. I usually end up reading stuff for other classes in the computer lab. I think Computer Networks and possibly Programming Languages will be my favorite classes. The Computer Networks book is pretty interesting.
Skiing twice a week is pretty fun too though. The whole ski hill isn't open yet, but it's still been fun. Unfortunately, one of the times I have to go skiing is during The Office and Grey's Anatomy. I'll probably end up recording it every week and watching it when I get back.