Removing Viruses, Trojans, and Spyware!

A late night post from the Mac Man while I attempt to remove internet viruses, trojans, and spyware from a friend's computer. It's loaded. You boot up the machine and you instantly start getting flooded with pop-ups, fake security warnings, etc. Reminds my of one more reason I really enjoy my Macs.

The wife and I got a bunch of pictures and wall-hanging-things hung up Sunday night. Those are the kinds of things that I just don't think about, but they add a little character to the otherwise empty walls. 

My volleyball team won 2 of 3 games tonight, which was a nice change of pace from the previous few weeks. We started off undefeated for a couple of weeks, and then it went downhill fast, to the point that we didn't win a game for a few weeks. The ref has some sort of family emergency, so he left right before we were about to start. The people we played were good sports, however, and we were all pretty easy-going on calls.

The new iPhone was announced yesterday, as expected, and I'm super pumped. My contract with Verizon has been up since April and I've been waiting for the new iPhone to be announced to switch. The new version has faster internet (3G), GPS, and longer battery life, among other things. It costs a lot less up front than the old iPhone, but the data plan now costs more so over the span of a 2 year contract it really ends up costing the same. The math still works out in favor of it over my Treo, however, since Verizon's data plans are more expensive and a new Treo wouldn't be that much cheaper up front than the new iPhone. The release date of July 11th can't come soon enough, although I'm going camping that weekend and will not be near a store for the launch.

DotD: Musical pillow for $1.19. Just plug in your MP3 player and fall asleep to Kutlass.

What's new in your world?

February, huh? Yeah, it's been a little while. And even that was sort of cheating. December before that. Wowsers!

Life has been a little bit busy lately, and I haven't really been sitting around at the computer blogging, reading blogs, or hanging around facebook. Sorry if you all feel neglected, it was not my intent. 

The big news since the last post is that I am a freshly-minted husband. I have the jewelry to prove it. Married life has been great so far. I'm no longer the only person who feeds and walks the dog (Mac), the cooking has more variety, and most importantly of all, I now have half the closet and dresser space I used to have. It's my way of working on the simple life. ;-)

The other cool thing that I did recently was play 7 games of softball in 2 days. I played in a church league tournament this past Saturday, and we ended up playing 5 games that day: 9:00 am, 11:00 am, 1:00 pm, 2:00 pm, and 3:00 pm. Whew! Then I had my normal double-header on Sunday  night as well. It was a ton of fun, but I got some nice sunburn on my face, neck, and arms. Oh, and my legs were just a tad sore...

I hope to be a little more regular in posting again, but don't get your hopes up yet Dan on a daily schedule. Baby steps.

DotD: Free MacBook Pro battery. Okay, so it's not for everyone, but my laptop has been acting strangely when running off of the battery recently. It would be fully charged and then after about 20 minutes on the battery, it would just shut off with no warning. It's only about 1.5 years old, and I don't use it every day or anything, so the battery should be just fine. I took it into the Apple Store today, they confirmed that the battery was defective, and gave me a brand new battery right on the spot for free. They never even asked me for paperwork or anything, other than to sign the form saying they performed the work and I owed nothing. Sweet!

Leopard

Well, the first week of my new job went well. Actually, day 1 was pretty crazy. My head was swimming from all of the new information, procedures, tools, etc. My current project is working on software for a medical device. I'll be generic at this point until I get a better feel for what I am allowed to say and what I am not allowed to say. Given that we have to keep the machine under a tarp when we are not actively using it, it is safe to say that confidentiality is a pretty big deal for the company making it. I currently have a small version of the machine in my cube for development and testing purposes. I can flip switches, turn dials, and pretend to be a great doctor or nurse. 

Of course, while important, that had nothing to do with the subject of this post. Because while I like to keep you informed of what I'm up to, you just want to find ammunition to use against me. Don't say I never gave you anything.

Ms. Fiance and I were meeting after work at Rosedale Mall, planning to have supper after a failed attempt to meet somewhere else...

*Insert side story here*

We were originally going to meet at Arthur's Jewelers to look at wedding bands. We already have hers, but I don't have one yet. Anyway, at a recent wedding expo she won a coupon for $100 off a wedding band if you use the coupon by the end of October. As it turns out, the place closes at 6 pm on 3 out of 5 days during the normal work week (huh?), Friday being one of those days. Well, by the time we both would have gotten there it would have been about 6:30, so no dice.

*End of side story*

While waiting at Rosedale Mall for Ms. Fiance, I decided to walk all the way to the other side of the mall to the Apple Store, since Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard was being released that day starting at 6 pm. I had pre-ordered my copy online, but I figured I could kill some time and maybe even grab one of the free t-shirts they were handing out for the release night.

It was about 6:15 when I got to the store, and I saw the store was pretty full. There were employees standing next to the door offering people the free t-shirts as the left. I went to walk in past them when the first guy stopped me. I figured he was going to ask if I wanted a t-shirt. He said, "Did you just come from the line?" With me being surprised and confused, he continued, "We're only letting people in who waited in line." At this point, I turned around and noticed a line of people waiting to get into the Apple Store that extended all the way down the hall to about Macy's. Yeah, somehow missed that line of hundreds of people standing in a nice orderly line in the middle of the hallway. Whoops!

Countdown

Just a few more hours until I'm off to TEC 69. And I'm STILL not done with my wheat. Seriously, I need to concentrate and stop blogging and chatting, or someone's going to be very disappointed. Good thing Northwestern is open until 9 and is just down the street.

I finally joined Facebook last night, but then again, I think all of you know that already. Oh, yes, I know I'm years behind, but it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks. Even if that old dog is a computer geek.

Oh, and Cooper cheats at Scrabble. 20 points for sticking the letter 'p' between two 'o's? Seriously? That's an informal abbreviation, and you know it! I'm going to be dumping pop all over the conference room starting tomorrow and then we'll see what kind of words you use against me!

DotD: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard Family Pack - $189 - Oh sure, people complain about Mac's costing more. But how about this? The full, no-features-removed-or-disabled version of Apple's next generation operating system, usable on up to 5 computers for less than a single upgrade copy of Windows Vista Ultimate. Or, get a single license for $109. No product activation and no license keys, and everyone gets the full version.

MacDepot

Cooper and I were chatting the other day on the way back from a TEC meeting. We got to talking about websites and it reminded me of my old website from many years ago. It was a chance for me to spread my journalistic wings a bit and write about anything I wanted to. Which, of course, was all Macintosh related. A quick search in Google revealed that the long-forgotten website still existed out in cyberspace, but with many broken links, graphics, and features due to services and websites that don't exist 10 years later. In any case, it was fun to see the product of a young geek that I know very well.

Without further ado, I present to you the great archaeological find: MacDepot.

A couple things worth checking out include the News (including the Archives), Supporters, and Graphics pages. I wrote all of the news articles, gleaning information from tons of Mac-related websites and magazines. The Supporters list was a listing of people who had visited my site and filled out a form to have their name and location added to my list of Macintosh supporters who had visited my site and wanted it recorded, and the Graphics page is a page of various Mac graphics (gifs and animated gifs) from the pre-flash era of the web.

I hope you enjoy your trip into the past as much as I did.

DotD 1: TEC! TEC! TEC! It's coming this weekend! Hurray!

DotD 2: USB Vacuum Cleaner - $5.99 - I guess you can use it for vacuuming between the keys on your keyboard or in your cat's ears or something. But it was strange enough and cheap enough that I had to put it on here.

New Job(s)

This past Friday was my last day at Teradyne. I'm officially unemployed for about 3 weeks until October 22, when I start at my new job at Logic Product Development. Why three weeks? TEC, of course! I really wanted to work this particular TEC for a number of reasons, and since I was fortunate enough to sneak onto the team through the back door, I wasn't going to give it up. I wanted a little time off between jobs since I haven't really had much time off while saving up vacation for the wedding. So, I could either start at Logic, work a couple of days, and then have to burn my only vacation for the rest of the year for TEC, or start after TEC and enjoy a few weeks off. Granted, it's without pay, but I think it will be worth it. The downside is that my first day is now the first day after a TEC weekend, so I'm going to have to grab every last possible minute of sleep I can find during the weekend. Hopefully I can count on a particular Rector to help me out with some of his own bedtime stories, so I can fall asleep faster. ;-)

One interesting twist to this is that in the process of looking for a new job, I got to interview with Bob. No, not just Bob's company, but Bob herself. At my previously mentioned introduction to High Society, at the hands of Bob herself, she mentioned that her group was looking to hire. This was part of our computer geek conversion mentioned in that post. That was probably the weirdest, yet most fun interview I've ever done. I was both relaxed, since it was Bob, and yet not too relaxed, since she had a cohort with her for the interview. However, in the end, Bob's influence and bribes were not enough to overcome the lack of some specific skills and experience that they really wanted for that position. I am no longer speaking to Bob. Well, except for this past Sunday, next Sunday, the Sunday after that.... ;-)

I would like to point out that this was the first time I've ever applied for a position and not been offered the job. And it was all Bob's fault! Never again will I listen to her lies and deceit! Or something like that. ;-)  Actually, the recruiter from her company said the feedback from the interview process was really positive and they thought I would be a great fit for the company, but just not for that position. Which is just dandy. But in the end, I decided that without the special draws of that position in particular, the commute to Eden Prairie from Andover was going to be a bit much (probably about an hour each way, a little longer in the evening), and the Logic position was still a possibility. So, in the end, I chose not to work in the same building as Bob, as crazy as that sounds. I'm not sure that company was ready for the two of us in the same city at the same time anyway.

So, why the potential plural in the post title? I just found out yesterday that big brother is also getting a new job. Neither of us knew that the other was in the process of looking, so we surprised each other with new jobs at almost the exact same time. His last day was yesterday. Little sis got a new job a couple of months ago as well. I guess I should expect some news from my parents in the next few days...

DotD: Superman keyboard and mouse - Free! - Newegg again has the Superman keyboards and mice in various colors for free after rebate. I picked up the red and blue keyboard and mouse awhile back when they were also free and really like them. They're not the highest quality, of course, but I think they just look pretty cool and they've worked fine for me. The keyboard is available in blue, black, or silver, and the mouse is available in red/blue, blue/black, and silver/black.

High Society

It's time for me to hang up my blogging cleats.

Oh sure, I've had a good run these past couple of months. Okay, actually I've bored you to tears in the process, but that's not why I'm moving on. Blogging just doesn't fit into my new lifestyle. You know, the rich and famous.

In a short period of time, my place in society has risen from the dung heap to my rightful place among the stars. I am speaking, of course, about being invited over to Bob's house for a cookout. That's right, not begging to be invited, not sleeping on the doorstep hoping to be invited in, but actual "won't you please come over" invited.

My hubris has attained new heights!

Ms. Fiance, Little sis, and I joined the famous Bob for some delicious grilled meat, fresh fruit, and skinny cows. Bob was good and didn't eat the skinny cows, but I have no such control. It was a ton of fun, reliving our memories from TEC 68 and just chatting into the night. I also found out important information such as the number of M&M's consumed by Bob during the last TEC. I'd tell you, but then I'd have to kill you. Or at least tickle you.

Bob and I even managed to talk computer geekiness for about ten minutes before Ms. Fiance and Little sis started to poke themselves in the eyeballs and bang their heads on the table in boredom and disgust.

All in all, a great relaxing and fun evening.

A word to the wise: If you ever find yourself in high society as I did, don't use the front door. It's forbidden. Those who wish to not perish by Chinese water torture should use the side door instead. I was the only person to make this grievous mistake last night.

Oh, and I was kidding about the end of the blog thing. I'll keep blogging. But I'm not the one that's going to suffer!

DotD: An empty gas tank for the grill - $19.99 - Someone went to the gas station to get a new tank of gas, since hers was empty. The station attendant was busy with customers, so he told her to take whichever one she wanted. She picked one out and brought it home to use at a particularly high-society cookout. Mac Man saved the day by both pointing out that the new tank was awfully light, and by driving back to the gas station to retrive a full tank. Understanding that this could be quite embarrasing if anyone ever found out, he has chosen not to divulge the name of the individual who made this hilarious mistake. ;-)