OK, folks, here’s what’s going on with The Main Computer here at Casa Jaquandor. I think I’ve written about this before.
Some time ago I replaced the CPU cooling fan, because the original one was rattling. Problem solved…except shortly thereafter, the computer started doing this thing where the case fan (our computer only has one case fan) would sometimes rev up to full speed, becoming very loud. It tended to do this in times of heavy load, such as during some of The Daughter’s games and when we’d use a screensaver that uses the 3D graphics that our graphics card generates.
However, the problem got worse until the computer started randomly rebooting suddenly, often in the middle of one of the kid’s games. This rendered many of her favorite games (Wizard 101 being the biggie here) unplayable. After researching, I concluded that the problem was the power supply, which I replaced last week. Unfortunately, the problems continued, which leads me to believe that the power supply wasn’t a problem at all. Oh well; now I own a 650-watt power supply.
Doing further research, my current hypothesis is that the CPU is getting too hot when under heavy load like that and shutting down to protect itself. Fair enough, except I’d installed that nifty new CPU cooler that was working just fine. But, it turned out that I never replaced the thermal conductive grease that you’re supposed to apply between the CPU and the cooler. So I got a tube of that stuff (it’s only ten bucks), applied it, and then got the computer running.
The news was a bit encouraging, in that The Kid was able to play Wizard 101 for about thirty minutes before it caused the computer to reboot. In the meantime, the case fan was revved up to its full — and loud — speed the entire time she played. This leads me to believe that my working hypothesis involving CPU overheating is correct, but I’m unsure about how to proceed. I did read somewhere that thermal greases take a little time to “burn in”, so they’re not as conductive at first as they are after a while in position, so maybe the problem will go away? Or do I need to figure out some other way to further cool the thing? I know that case fans aren’t expensive, but I’m unsure as to where I’d install one, as the back of the computer only seems to have an opening for one fan.
The other wrinkle is that a secondary problem has opened up: some important file has apparently become corrupted in such a way that the computer’s optical disk drive no longer works. This is, obviously, bad, and I’m not sure of any way to address this other than simply reinstalling Windows. That would be more of a nuisance than anything — I keep our content backed up religiously — but I’m wondering if there’s any chance that reinstalling Windows might help out the heating problem as well.
Does any of this make sense to any techies out there? Or am I chasing wild geese and would be better off just turning the machine over to the Geek Squad?
Oddities abound! But first, a bit of interesting (to me) and un-weird linkage.
:: Apparently the song “Same Old Lang Syne” by Dan Fogelberg has become a Christmas staple, even though the song doesn’t really have much at all to do with Christmas aside from the song’s setting at Christmas time, and the quote of “Auld Lang Syne” at the very end. The song tells the story of how the narrator (Fogelberg) ran into an old lover, purely by chance, in a convenience store one Christmas Eve, and then spent an hour or two with her, reminiscing on their time together, before parting again. I don’t recall hearing it much before this year’s Christmas season, when I heard it quite a bit. I think it’s a very fine song, wonderfully effective with poignant and poetic lyrics. Here’s the song:
What I found interesting about this song is that it’s true, and after Fogelberg’s death some years ago, the woman in the song came forward. It’s a fascinating story.
:: Yes, I do use some of these quotes in regular everyday conversation.
The other day, the Buffalo Bills held a hastily-called news conference to announce the hiring of their new General Manager: a guy named Buddy Nix, who was promoted from national scout to GM for the team. After everyone in Buffalo — and I mean everyone — agreed that what the team needs first and foremost is a good football person to take over the reins of the never-ending rebuilding project, the selection of Nix was billed as just that. But the reaction in Bills-land has been a pretty resounding “Meh”. Jerry Sullivan’s column from the other day is pretty representative of the negative reaction, while positive reaction has generally been of the “Well, they could have done worse” variety. I haven’t heard anyone who is really excited by Nix’s hiring.
To me, the least interesting of the objections to Nix are the ones related to his age (he’s 70) and his experience until now. I tend to think that if we can generally think of men in their 70s as being qualified to be President of the United States, Supreme Court Justices, or United States Senators, then surely a man in his 70s can run an NFL team. (So can women in their 70s, for that matter.) Not interested in the age argument. Nor am I much convinced by its parallel argument, that hey, since he’s 70, shouldn’t he have become a GM way before this? If Nix had been toiling as a scout for three or four decades and was only now getting his shot at being GM, that would be one thing, but he’s only been in the NFL scouting scene since 1993, when he left a long college coaching career for an NFL scouting career. Seventeen years of scouting in the NFL, rising up the ranks of two organizations in the process, doesn’t strike me as an unreasonable amount of experience for a first-time General Manager. Just looking at one other notable example, Scott Pioli is finishing his first season as an NFL GM in Kansas City; his prior scouting and front-office career with several organizations (most notably the Patriots) started in 1992. So I’m fine with Nix’s level of experience.
I’m also fine with Nix’s resume. He worked in Buffalo through the mid and late 1990s, when the team was still good and was still drafting good players. Then he went to San Diego at the beginning of this decade, as the Chargers began to build into one of the NFL’s better teams. (I have a feeling the Chargers will end up as this era’s best team to not make the Super Bowl.) Now he’s back in Buffalo — actually, he was back last year as a National Scout. The first draft since his return, the 2009 draft, was actually not a bad draft at all and may turn out pretty good in the end, especially if Aaron Maybin develops over the offseason into a good player. Nix has the pedigree you want in a GM: he’s been with two organizations for a long time each, during their good years.
The more compelling argument against Nix is the nature of the apparent search the Bills made for their GM. They didn’t wait to interview candidates from other organizations (which you’re only allowed to do when the season is over); from all appearances, they interviewed exactly two people: Nix and current Bills Director of Pro Personnel John Guy, who “happens to be black”, thus satisfying the NFL’s requirement that all teams interview minority candidates when hiring. The argument is that the Bills didn’t cast a wide net at all; instead they went with someone in house, someone safe and comfortable. Maybe. We’ll see.
I do think that Nix represents an upgrade over the previous football regime here. Obviously the results will tell the tale and the results won’t be in for a few years, but as long as Nix isn’t the type of guy to keep John McCargo around (or trade back up into the first round to pick him), maybe the team will be on the rise soon. Let’s see what happens when he hires a coach.
Well, I didn’t really plan to drop out of sight completely during the week between Christmas and New Year’s, but that’s pretty much what happened, isn’t it? Oh well. Nothing major, but The Wife was on vacation and we did other stuff that I’ll write about later. Regular blogging rhythm should resume quite soon, though. Yay!
Make sure to check out my “2009 Summation” posts, just below this one. I actually posted them on the first and second, respectively, but backdated them to 12-31-09, so they’d group in the archives with the December posts.
Here is my yearly compilation of what I consider to be worthy stuff posted here over the last twelve months. Enjoy. Or not.
First, a couple of notes on various posting series from the year. I stalled a bit on Fixing the Prequels, about halfway through Attack of the Clones, but that series will continue quite soon. I also started a new “label” for posts that rely heavily on photographs to convey their content, called Photo Posts. Most of those will be individually linked below, but the label’s there for those interested. Also, I went through and personally rated each of the fifty “Statehood Quarters”. I also had a series of posts of photos of myself, responding to dramatic moments from Season 7 of 24, called, creatively enough, “Watching 24“. While I watched the entire season, I didn’t get through the entire season of posting reaction shots, mainly because the season really petered out in the back third of episodes. I’ll still be watching the impending Season 8, though, mainly because of my massive new crush on Annie Wersching.
Speaking of photos, I posted a lot of stuff to Flickr this year; here’s a mosaic of my favorites from the year (but I easily could have chosen more):
Click through for the “annotated” version, with links to the actual photos themselves.
Finally, there was Ask Me Anything! 2009. The 2010 version is coming up next month, yay!
Well, here we are again, at the end of another year, in Blogistan and out of Blogistan. How to sum up? With my annual quiz, of course. I fill this quiz in every year, and here’s the 2009 edition.
Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Well, kinda-sorta. More “kinda” than “sorta”, though. Oh well. I fell of the wagon a bit as far as healthier eating and living over the last couple of months, but that’s easily rectified. I didn’t do nearly enough writing. I never rode my bike to work. So those are all failed resolutions. But I did keep up somewhat on those things, I read a good amount, I watched some really good movies, and I’m very happy with the progress I’ve made at The Store, learning the tricks of my trade. (How odd is it that my day job is one at which overalls would be ideal daily wear…but I can’t wear them because they’re not part of my official uniform! Aieee!)
However, I do plan to do those things and more in 2010. I plan to focus a good portion of my reading and film-watching time on things related to Shakespeare, and I may even launch a new blog to keep track of such things. I plan to cook more, diversifying into some of the ethnic cuisine cookbooks I own; I also plan to rely a lot less on pre-packaged “convenience” items like bagged salad mixes and pre-shredded cheese.
I also resolve to stop listening to old wax cylinders of Gustav Mahler conducting Debussy. As I’m sure that no such wax cylinders exist, I figure this resolution should be easy to keep.
Did anyone close to you give birth?
My sister-in-law gestated and delivered a healthy baby boy in October. Huzzah!!
Did anyone close to you die?
Last year I noted that the Reaper only seems to strike us in odd-numbered years of late. Less than a month later, on January 26, my mother-in-law died. Ugh. And just a short time ago, a very dear friend of ours passed away after a brief fight with cancer. (When I say “brief”, I mean exactly that — diagnosis to death took all of six weeks. It was awful — every time we got an update it was worse than the one before.)
What countries did you visit?
I renewed my acquaintance with Fionavar, Tigana, Arbonne, and Al-Rassan (from the books of Guy Gavriel Kay). I hung out a while in Derry, Maine (via It), and on a whole slew of planets in Pandora’s Star. And many others.
As far as real countries, I went nowhere. We’re making it a sufficiently large pain in the arse to travel in this country that I’ll have to be a lot more affluent before I ever much bother.
What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008?
My mother-in-law; more money; a $1000 gift card to Home Depot.
What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I cited them above, I guess.
What was your biggest failure?
I listed those, too. (And let’s not talk about The Promised King, OK?)
What was the best thing you bought?
The Wii!
Whose behavior merited celebration?
I usually cite The Daughter here, and I see little reason to alter that pattern. I love the way she’s turning out.
Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
I was going to launch into a big rant here, but we’ll just say the entire Republican party and the entire Teabag “movement”.
Where did most of your money go?
The usual: my stomach, my gas tank, my creditors, and my bookshelves.
What did you get really excited about?
Buying the Wii! And the inauguration of Barack Obama. (Thus far I give him a B-minus.)
What song will always remind you of 2009?
“In My Life”, by the Beatles, and “Man in the Mirror” by Michael Jackson.
Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder?
Both, but more happier than sadder. (Wow, that was some bad grammar.)
Thinner or fatter?
Fatter, but not wildly so — just a few pounds heavier. They’ll come off. Oh yes, they will come off.
Richer or poorer?
Strictly speaking, about the same, I guess…but maybe richer because I’ve started saving money finally? Baby steps and all, on that score.
What do you wish you’d done more of?
Reading, writing, exercising, family stuff.
What do you wish you’d done less of?
Third year in a row: worrying about stuff I can’t control, and controlling the stuff I wasn’t worried about. I also think it’s time to scale back my reading of political blogs and political news. I tire of the whole thing.
I also wish I’d had to replace less ceiling tile at The Store. I just don’t like working with the stuff; ’tis a pain in the arse, and I swear I could do the job wearing a full astronaut’s space suit, and I would still get a particle of tile in my eye.
How did you spend Christmas?
Reading, a little writing, playing Wii, eating, visiting Little Quinn’s grave, and so on.
Did you fall in love in 2008?
My stock answer: I fall in love on a daily basis!
How many one-night stands?
If Sela Ward isn’t going to tell, then neither am I. Tina Fey isn’t returning my calls anymore, I’m sad to say.
What was your favorite TV program?
The Office, Grey’s Anatomy, The Amazing Race, Once and Again, Firefly. (Nobody said I had to limit myself to shows currently running.) We’ve also taken a shining to Castle and The Mentalist.
Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
As I note each year, I don’t like hate. But there are people who annoy the living heck out of me. To name one, Glenn Beck.
What was the best book you read?
Obviously re-reading Guy Gavriel Kay was a high mark this year. For new stuff, Dan Simmons’s The Terror and Stephen King’s It were high marks.
What was your greatest musical discovery?
I didn’t really do a whole lot of new musical exploration this year, but I dug more into things I either already liked or had already started shifting my opinions of. The big one was my continuing epiphany regarding the Beatles, and my realization that I really like the Bee Gees.
What did you want and get?
I got: a Democratic President, a hammer drill, several different new flashlights, a Wii, tools to do my own oil changes, two new pairs of diagonal pliers (because I wear them out a lot snipping stuff), a belt pouch for tools, a pocket-hole jig, lots of books, a couple of nice travel mugs, a wireless router, a multimeter, bottles of wine and rum and beer that are now long empty, new ornaments for the tree (we’re going to need a bigger tree, kind of like Quint’s bigger boat), some movies, and some other stuff. I also got to sit behind The Wife on an airplane and watch a Canadian guy hit on her; I got up hyper-early for work (at what we like to call “Oh-dark-thirty”) a bunch of times; I got a lot better at the day job; and I even got pied! Not a bad year, actually.
What did you want and not get?
Published. And I didn’t want any, since I have a ton already, but it’s now two years and counting since the last time I bought a new pair of overalls.
What were your favorite films of this year?
Never a good question for me, as I don’t get to the movies much anymore, preferring to wait for DVDs in most cases. The only 2009 releases I saw in 2009 were Star Trek, Up, and The Men Who Stare At Goats. I liked all of these.
What did you do on your birthday?
The Wife and I traveled to the Apple Festival in Ithaca, NY and had a good time. Then we came home and ate Chinese takeout and vanilla bean cake while watching Castle.
How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2007?
No change to report here: I’m still the overalls-clad hippie. (Except during the warmer months, when I’m in shorts.)
What kept you sane?
My friends and my family; wine, beer and rum; books and movies; liberal bloggers.
Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Robin Tunney (on The Mentalist); Stana Katic (on Castle); and the usual suspects (Gillian Anderson and Sela Ward and so on). My man-crushes on George Lucas and Nathan Fillion continue.
What political issue stirred you the most?
The health care bill, I suppose.
Who did you miss?
Those who died.
Who was the best new person you met?
Lots of folks online — there’s a funky little community of overalls-clad folks gathering, and my policy of “friending” everyone on Facebook who asks (unless I screw up and delete the request in one of my mass-deletion binges, which happens more often than I’m comfortable admitting) has led me to meet some really terrific folks, such as a local actress/singer. Pretty cool. Also, my church got a new pastor after the previous one hung up his robes for good after many years of pastoring. The new guy is frankly terrific, so we’ll see how this goes.
I should also mention all of the fine folks from high school and college with whom I’d lost track over the years whom I rediscovered in 2009, mostly via Facebook. It’s truly wonderful to see how some of these lives have turned out — marriages and children and careers and the like. People I loved back in the day and now I see them again — that is just awesome.
Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008:
Cut to the waste side. Very important, and one of those basic things that’s best learned the hard way — as in, making your cuts and then discovering that each piece is an eighth-inch too short. Ouch!
And keeping the ones from years past: The Internet is made of people. Punting is for losers. Democracy works, eventually. Not all tears are an evil. Whipped cream is a miracle substance. So is ice cream. Use your library; limiting your reading to only those books you can afford to buy is madness. OpenOffice rules. Buy good tools, take care of them, don’t lend them out, and they’ll last forever. Savory or sweet, eaten or worn, from pizza to apple to coconut cream, pie is wonderful. Screw fashion; if it’s comfy, wear it. We’re not meant to be alone. No object fits in your hand so perfectly as your wife’s hand, and no object fits so perfectly on your shoulder as your child’s head. Let it be, and all you need is love.
And keep smiling, because you never know what life will throw in your face next!
Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
My favorite Beatles song, for years, has been “In My Life”. I’ve tended to favor various artists covering it over the Beatles themselves playing it, but I’ve come to appreciate the original a great deal. It’s a great song, and even though it doesn’t relate specifically to anything from 2009 for me, I’m naming it my personal Song of 2009.
There are places I’ll remember All my life, though some have changed Some forever, not for better Some have gone and some remain All these places had their moments With lovers and friends, I still can recall Some are dead and some are living In my life, I’ve loved them all
But of all these friends and lovers There is no one compares with you And these memories lose their meaning When I think of love as something new Though I know I’ll never lose affection For people and things that went before I know I’ll often stop and think about them In my life, I’ll love you more
Though I know I’ll never lose affection For people and things that went before I know I’ll often stop and think about them In my life, I’ll love you more
