davedot dot com

I forgot all about this flickr thing, and all about this picture. Luckily someone directed me to some photos, and I thought "hey, I have one of those!" and here we are. I took this while out exploring with cameras with my friend K. The original macro shot of dandelions came out with unusually blue foliage, probably because I forgot the flash. The flower was still very vibrant though. I decided to bring it out, so I blued-up the lowlights and yellowed the highlights. It reminds me of those pictures of bacteria, especially with the stem of the flower that is cut off in the upper right.

I'm sitting in Warner 018 at SUNY Cobleskill, the Mac lab. I can honestly say that this is the last place I expected to find myself when I started my college career here. I was all "mac minus minus" and stuff. As it turns out, learning the mac has proven no more difficult than learning linux.

I do have a certain number of greviances, as I'm sure does anyone who grew up on PC and finds themself working on mac.

1. I have to open a window to get a full list of my applications.
2. The meta key configuration is confusing to me. Why when I just press [apple] does the apple menu not drop down?
3. I am completely unfamiliar with the shortcut keystrokes, though I acknowledge this to be my own shortcoming, and not that of the OS.
4. Where the fuck is my right click?!

Other than these, I really have no problems with the mac. I will withhold judgement on the administration and hardware facets of the system, never having dealt with them. The interface is functionally and aesthetically beautiful. I'm actually on the lookout for a dock-like widget for Linux. I'm running FC4 and Gnome 2. If you happen to know of any, let me know. Better yet, if you know of a way to mod the existing system, that would be better.

I would buy a mac. It wouldn't be the next system I'd buy, but if I owned one I would use it.

Things don't always work out the way you planned. This summer I found out that I had to take Biology I. Also, I work 8 hours a week. My schedule actually ends up looking more like the attached.

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I'm on lesbian Lizz's mac again. There's a pride parade tomorrow, but I'm not taking the late bus to be able to go. Monday I'll be home for the summer.

I was observing the other day (something which I often do) that people are more reserved than they need to be, and about odd things. When I'm having a discussion, there is very little that I won't tolerate well. I don't have a problem with differences of opinion. An interesting conversation has at least a couple, and that's if I'm just having it with myself!

I'm aware that there is not always a tactful way to say something, or that the words sometimes get away from people. I'm also aware that some words are incredibly loaded with connotation. I do not think that should be a barrier to discussion. If something can't be said tactfully it should be said bluntly, rather than not being said at all. If people aren't making points because they're afraid of offending someone, they shouldn't bother. On the other hand, if people are offended in a discussion by frank terms, they need to thicken their skin a bit.

Mom is pretty pimpin in the pimp hat. Actually, this was apparently Papi's hat, and is missing a feather. It's amazing the things you'll run across when you're trying to clean up a little bit.

The blue thing in her ear is the earpiece for my phone. She's harassing Steve about painting. We're going to be doing some painting in a couple of days. I just changed the lightbulb in here to a sunlight florescent, so between that and the new color, it should really brighten things up in here, even though the color is a tad darker, and blue. It feels clean though.

Doesn't momz0r have a pretty smile? I think she does.

Mostly, I've just made my first upload to flickr. I've had a flickr account sitting around for quite a while, but a recent discussion with Uncle Bill prompted me to re-investigate. Now I find that they have this niffly little thing that'll post to your blog through an API. Yeah, geeky. Anyhow, I have to figure out how to make it work the way I like, but I have a couple of good ideas.

Most importantly though, I have to make sure that flickr always posts to a specific category. If I'm blogging from flickr, I'm blogging about a photo, and thusly it belongs not in "General" but some "Flickr" or "Photos" category that I have yet to devise. Luckily, the support on WordPress is phenomenal, and the documentation is getting better.

EDIT: After looking at this post for the third time, I realized that I hadn't said a thing about the photo. It's the original from which the header image on this site was made. It's also my wallpaper image. I'm a great fan of it. It's probably one of the best shots I've ever taken. One does have to get lucky now and then.

Today was my first day home alone. Over the weekend I at least had people to see and things to do. Today really drove home the fact that I have to do something.

Here's a brief rundown of my day:

• Woke up at noon
• Went outside, got the cat, took her back to my room
• Woke up at 3p
• Played Halo 2
• Archived things from my D: drive to DVD so I can format
• Made invitations for my little brother's birthday party
• Took my sister tanning

At this point, even dialup would be an improvement. I'd post a picture of my cat, but I don't have the patience to do it over dialup.