I am More American than Bush is Approved of

The results are in. I had always wondered just how American I am, and now Ann Coulter can't say shit!

You are 63% American!

You have 126 proof blood

You're a genuine American, citizen or not. Americanosity runs in your blood. You're an asset to the U.S.A as much as anyone can be expected and while you may not go out of your way to push the nation forward, you do what you can to make it all run smoothly. You root for America in the Olympics, try to stay on the right side of the law, and can name at least eight past US presidents. Keep America proud, tough guy. Other genuine Americans include: Betsy Ross, Johnny Appleseed, Irving Berlin, Eleanor Roosevelt, Humphrey Bogart, and Oprah Winfrey.

Maybe I'll contact the CIA and finally get accepted. This was the last bit of proof I needed after that Qu'ran peddling incident. I'll show those bastards.

Being American isn't all that hard. It's the getting along with Americans I have trouble with. I've stated those reasons in a recent post and will not continue to bore the bejesus out of you here.

Elite Status

I read something today while I was on the pot: "Only 4 percent of Americans can say that they didn't eat at McDonald's last year."

I will be able to say that in 2008.

Beth and I started at the beginning of 2006 that we wouldn't go to Wal-Mart anymore. We did it. We still haven't been. So I proposed toward the end of the year that we should just add another place to avoid every year. We decided that our most troublesome frequent visits were to McDonald's, and that was that. We haven't eaten anything from McD's this year. I went inside one to pee a couple of weeks ago, and the stench of the grease was revolting. I feel like I'm reformed or something. Now we've got to figure out which establishment is off limits next year.

This is Personal

Sometime last semester, I got really angry at a lot of people, and began feeling jaded toward society in general. Working full time and attending a traditional university was pretty demanding, on top of caring for my family. Depression seemed to set in, and I had been crapped on by too many people in simple situations, like the gas station attendant never making eye contact, some fat lady nearly causing a traffic jam trying to put her straw in her drink, and, yes, another fat lady not knowing what her job is at the auto parts store. These fucking people, I thought. What a place to live. One morning in class I decided I'd had enough and did what I always do during these times: I sit down and write. So I wrote:

I can't begin to explain my declining state of mind. Something is missing. I am becoming apathetic, yet hostile at the same time. I am angry at society and its current state. Most people are rude, and it's either because they were raised that way or they are megalomaniacs. People are hypocrites with earth-friendly stickers on their cars from which they throw trash on the road. They smoke cigarettes and eat pure cooked fat, then declare it a shame that Uncle Jimmy died of a coronary at 46, when he weighed 300 pounds. They wear gold and diamonds that shine in the headlights of other cars on the highway when their grossly neglected vehicle has finally given up. It's the same $600 car with $1500 wheels on it.

These are the same peole who snap at you for trying to hand them your credit card when you can just swipe it yourself, and only point you in a general direction when you're looking for something in a store. These are the people who don't speak when you hold the door for them, as if you owe it to that person. These are the people who share their telephone conversations with everyone in the restaurant and seem to have the hardest time driving while conducting business on said device.

I don't know where I'm going with this - I just want to sit down and learn how computers work, be left alone right now and not be bothered. But one cannot live without going out for needed items, forcing me out into the jungle of rudeness and hostility. Maybe it's because I'm white, or because I don't look like everyone else, but it's probably just because I'm on the same road or in their store, bothering them to no end. It's not as if she wouldn't have a job without paying customers, is it?

I was taking anthropology at the time, and it hit some nerves. The instructor is an atheist, and he really hit home on some topics I'd been toying with on a personal level for some time. The class was very invigorating, and struck the match that lit my fire.

I had been a struggling agnostic leaning toward atheism until I took anthropology. One night the professsor was talking about the significance we as humans imbue upon objects, events, and basically anything we can summon words for. This lecture told me exactly what I needed to hear: God exists because we invented a god. That statement is really for another article.

I have always been a believer in the purely physical and systematically proven concepts. I love it. I can touch it. I can explain it. I deducted from my observations that anything, with time, can be logically explained. I found this in mathematics, when I was trying to explain to Beth how I know that even though I can't actually define the exact value of the square root of 3, I still know that its square is the number 3. It's because it works for any square root. That also may be for another article.

All this to say that since I have decided that God does not exist in any form, my methods of thinking about most everything have changed. I have released the significance of many things, and this in turn has granted me liberty from our society. In my mind, I am truly free. There are many benefits to this, but there are also some drawbacks. One drawback is that my new level makes me socially awkward, and unlike 90 percent of America. That said, I don't have many friends here in South Georgia. That's okay, though, because I've always been socially awkward and without many friends. The pros outweigh the cons.

Don't get me wrong - I still pay my taxes, I respect people, and I even bow my head when someone wants to pray at the dinner table. I just don't give any significance to the animocity of some people, the $10.00 "Pray for Our Troops" magnets, or a scratch on my car's finish. It doesn't matter. It's just a car.

It's just a watch. A shirt. No matter what the commercial says, that diamond necklace only has the significance that you give it. To a monkey, it's just shiny. To a fish, it's probably something to eat. To a rock, it's a relative. What is it to you?

My dad once told me when I was having a fit about life that I must choose to be happy. I couldn't understand that because it wasn't that simple at the time. On a lower level, I was angry at the way things were and how I didn't have any money. I couldn't maintain my attitude about those things and simply choose to be happy. So when I changed my mind about the significance of money, of other peoples' opinions of me, and found out what is really important, I was able to make that choice to be happy. I have made my choice, and I am happy.

I realize I may have lost the respect of a few people in light of this, but I am prepared. I have in no way intended to imply that your belief is wrong - only that I may not share the same beliefs with you. If you have been offended, feel free to comment. I am finally ready to defend myself.

The Rainmaker

Looks like I'm gaining on this reading list after all. I haven't found much to do otherwise, so I bet I'll continue and at least get through a few more.

The Rainmaker is a wonderfully-told tale of a young law student, written in the first person and in present tense throughout. Quite an amazing feat, I might add. It's a 600-page paperback; I doubt I could write its equivalent.

This kid, Rudy Baylor, takes us through his last semester of law school, passing the bar, suing an insurance company and winning a $50,200,000 verdict for his client. At the end, he gets the girl he wanted and ends up killing her husband. Sound interesting? It's all there.

On to The God Delusion...

Google Works Like Gravity

Since I posted my dealings with Streets & Trips 2007 and Windows Vista using an older device that came with the same program, a few people have found this site and have been helped. I didn't advertise, but I trusted Google (and, okay, maybe the other search engines too) and folks found my solution to this problem. I am grateful I was able to provide for my fellow man.

Still, Microsoft shouldn't have done this. Fools - they shouldn't have tried to force us into buying a new device with 2007. I realize that this could have been an oversight, you see, but it seems too common these days that Microsoft is screwing the little guy. I won't believe it's a mistake until some MS executive pays me to say it was.

I was going to wait until Apple gave wireless capability to the iPod to upgrade, but maybe now I'll wait it out until I can put my headphones on and get turn-by-turn directions from it. That would be the ultimate.

Motor Vehicle Purchase Impending

Beth needs another car since we sold hers a couple of weeks ago. She doesn't have a job and can therefore not pay for a new car. So spending my money on Beth's car will force me to make the decision on what to get. Sure, she'll have her input and I will listen, but at the core it's my money, right?

So after thinking a lot about the car I would buy for myself, I've decided to buy one of those for Beth. That's right, folks - she's getting a BMW. A BMW that will be kept in my family until its absolute disintegration, an event which we hope will occur at a point fifteen years after its purchase.

I didn't want to look at BMWs yesterday, but I ruminated this morning and figured that I better start doing my research because in five years' time, I'm going to have to buy Beth a car. And I figure it will take that long to convince her she doesn't need an SUV, and for me to figure out how to buy a BMW.

Tech Pillow Debut

I think my marketing skills are coming into swing now.

Beth and Anika have been gone for over a week now, and my creativity is thriving (at least during the times I am home. I have been in Atlanta for three days of it and am headed back for two more today.) I have created the logo for Rehberg Technology and have begun construction of rehbergtechnology.com, and have ordered my new business cards that include the logo. Today I had the greatest idea:

On the road, I can't sleep in a hotel due to the pillows. I finally bought my own pillow to take on trips, along with a pair of pillowcases. I was trying to think of something funny to put on the pillow (I'm a sucker for a conversation piece), but who would actually see my pillow? I do not entertain at home, and certainly not in a hotel room. So I decided it would be a company pillow.


Don't I work for such a nice organization? They even provide pillows for their employees based on special needs!

I couldn't ask for more.

Hannibal Rising

An absolutely great story. I read 56 pages last Thursday, and the rest of the story straight through Saturday morning. It is a very good insight into Hannibal Lecter and how he comes to his decisions to kill. He is certifiably, however, screwed up in the head.

On to The Rainmaker...

The Chamber

The Chamber was pretty good, I must admit. It was a long story, but it has to be because of how it ends. The story is about the kid's drama and everyone surrounding him. Grisham can be a good plot-twister at times, but this one was simply straightforward, but not expectedly. It wasn't a page-burner, either. It took me two months to get through it because it didn't hold me like the rest.

Streets & Trips 2007 vs. Windows Vista

I got a new computer a couple of weeks ago and decided it should go with me everywhere. Having made that decision, I needed Streets & Trips installed and working so I wouldn't have to install it on my company machine. No problem, right? Wrong. Here's my story so far with Microsoft Streets & Trips:

In 2005, I got S&T 2005 with the GPS locator device. Everything worked great. Flawless. Perfect. Loved it. Upgraded to 2006 when it came out, again without incident. Last November, 2007 was released with an upgraded locator device, but since I already had a perfectly good one, I ordered Streets & Trips 2007 without the device (clever me - I saved about $80) and it arrived from Amazon.com shortly after the release date.

Upon installing over the 2006 edition, I found that it simply uninstalls 2006 (or whatever earlier edition one may have) and cleanly installs S&T 2007. Fine. Whatever.

What it never told me is that it flushed all the drivers for the GPS locator device I had. Same program, just a newer version, and it paid no mind to my existing device. Not recognized. No support. Found nothing at microsoft.com about the Pharos GPS-360 device. I didn't get it. I still don't.

What I finally stumbled upon was at some 4-wheel-drive site that somehow had the drivers for this device. I installed these separately and the device worked perfectly. I don't know why the device isn't supported naturally by S&T 2007, but I'd found a fix and had helped a few friends with this issue. I thought it was over.

And then I got this new computer with Windows Vista. Different structure to the operating system. Some things still don't work. And all I had was this driver installer program written by some people who use Google to speak English. It said it successfully installed the drivers for this GPS-360, but when I plugged it in, Windows couldn't find anything to support it. This went on for several days as I downloaded the latest stuff from pharos, installed it, plugged in my GPS locator, and had no luck. Several times.

Then I got wise. I still had the discs for S&T 2005, and the drivers just had to be on there, didn't they? Tonight I put the setup disc in and browsed it for the drivers. They were there, and I was set. So I plugged in my locator and waited for Windows to tell me it couldn't find the drivers for my device...

And somehow it found them automatically. I don't know if it found them on the CD, or finally saw what I had installed seven times previously, but it works. And I'm happy. I'm writing this so that Google may index it for people looking to ease their troubles with Streets & Trips 2007 using the Pharos GPS-360 device. Here are the drivers from the S&T 2005 disc in case they happen to work for you.





Update: Some folks may have trouble with the zip file I've got. Here are the driver files as they are on the Streets & Trips 2005 CD:

GPSDrvrs/NT_XP:
ser2plms.cat
ser2plms.inf
ser2plms.sys

GPSDrvrs/98_ME:
SER9PLMS.sys
sersplms.INF
SERSPLMS.VXD
serwplms.INF

2007 Summer Reading List

My Summer 2007 Reading List is complete. I am excitedly looking forward to summer since I'm taking the season off from school, and want to get some reading done. For three months, this is not entirely impossible to complete:

"The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins
"The Ancestor's Tale" by Richard Dawkins
At least one Ann Coulter book
One book written by a former president
A book shared with Beth (probably from the banned books list)
"Hannibal Rising" by Thomas Harris,
And all my unread Grisham Novels, including:

• The Chamber
• The Summons
• The Last Juror
• The Rainmaker
• The Pelican Brief
• The Innocent Man

If I don't get tied up in anything else, I may finish this list. It's not a dull one at all.

Told You I Was Watching!

Looks like April 26 is the day for Dr. Hawking's weightless flight. I wonder what his motivation is...

Yeah, Thanks.

You are Catherine the Great. You are very intelligent and a socialist. It is very important to you that all people be treated equally in a society. You are able to fully comprehend social problems and you are outspoken when it comes to dealing with them. Take this quiz at QuizGalaxy.com

Actually, I think I'm just a follower of Scott. Every time he finds a new quiz on the Web, I take it and post my own results, just like he did.

Still searching for the meaning of life.

Everything in Question

I've been pondering lately the meaning of life. Not just the meaning of life, mind you, but a slew of other questions as well, such as our reason for being here and the reason we do certain things. This line of questioning tends to branch off and become very complicated at about the sixth level, so I'll stop there. I want to share my thoughts with my readers and quote a bit, if not just to fill up some space on the World Wide Web.

The first passage I want to share with you is too long to reprint in full here (I'll only provide one paragraph.) It is from the Introduction to A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson, and I would encourage anyone to read it for understanding. It helps explain to me why we're here on Earth at this time:

To begin with, for you to be here now trillions of drifting atoms had somehow to assemble in an intricate and intriguingly obliging manner to create you. It's an arrangement so specialized and particular that it has never been tried before and will only exist this once. For the next many years (we hope) these tiny particles will uncomplainingly engage in all the billions of deft, cooperative efforts necessary to keep you intact and let you experience the supremely agreeable but generally underappreciated state known as existence.

Simply put, we just are. That's it. We exist. Maybe there will be more later as I continue my journey. Maybe not.

If You Think It's Hard To Find Teachers Now,

Wait until this shit hits the school system. Federal guidelines telling schools when to fire teachers? For reasons often beyond the educator's control (and beyond the school system, for that matter)? I don't get it.

Yeah. That's What I Said, Too. (Netherlands or Bust!)

I've been rather apathetic about my organization's role in society lately. Now I know I'm not alone. For those of you who know, you know. I will not disclose my employer here.

Support, Support, Support. I Need It.

You may now show your support for this site by sending money via PayPal to service@nfccomputers.com. Or you could shop at our cafepress.com store where "Ben Rehberg's Value T-Shirt" is selling like mad.

Wankers and Misspellings

The Probablist wrote a list of 10 most misspelled words in blogs, and I couldn't be happier with the level of attention his article has gotten. Digg.com blew it up and it got lots of traffic. Props to him.

I am chastised every time I try to correct someone's misspelling or grammatical errors, and the culprit shines a light of disdain on me that somehow paints me the color of "asshole" every time. It's English, folks, and the American kind. It's the type we were taught in elementary school (though you weren't listening while the teacher went on and on about comparative/superlative adjectives and run-on sentences). I learned in the Army that paying attention is key to survival, and it couldn't be more important when applied to writing in the public domain. I haven't told Scott yet that "noone" should have a space between the o's, and Justin should really study his usage of apostrophes. I can't really harp on them though, and this is why: I know several people who hold graduate degrees and still cannot form a proper cover letter. They cannot document their work with proper punctuation and spelling, and some cannot even communicate well verbally.

I must point now to an article I came across several years ago (can't believe I can still find it) titled "How to Write Like a Wanker." The article points out several shortcomings of speech on the Internet, albeit mostly by teenagers (my definition of "teenagers" here certainly includes wankers in their early twenties), but informative and entertaining nonetheless. It includes my favorite, "pluralize with apostrophes." We could all use a little brush-up on the grammar, spelling, and content of what we write, and also a lesson on how our writing can impact our own image and credibility. I simply refuse to patronize any establishment with misspellings, backwards letters, or simple oversights in their marquees, menus, or websites. It makes no sense to put value in someone's work when they can't bother to get something that simple correct.

And yes, I do admit that I am not perfect. I've tried my best to make this site look as clean as possible and keep the ads to a minimum. I do my best to spell everything correctly and form complete sentences, and for the most part I succeed. Let that be my gift to the Internet, and may you all go spread the correctly-spelled word to others who need it.

Thought We Were Out of Beta

While trying to publish an edit to the previous post, I got this error:

bX-y5mpya

Additional information

blogID: 6667391
uri: /post-edit.do
host: www2.blogger.com
postID: 4728350865740187879

Just thought you should know. Not sure why they gave me that information - they didn't point me directly to a form to report a problem. But I trust Google.

Someone's pager probably went off as that error number was being generated, and that thought makes me happy because it's 3:30 AM in Mountain View, and I'm not there.

DualDisc

John Mayer recently posted about the DualDisc and its failure. For those of you who don't know what that is, it's a disc with two capabilities. On one side it's a CD just like any other, but on the other side is DVD content. Just like a dual-layer DVD, but with one layer of CD content, readable from the other side of the disc. Marvelous idea in my opinion, but apparently not for a musician who is pressured to find crap to put on the DVD side. This video is an illustration of the small production John Mayer created to put on the DVD side of his DualDisc. He also says "the DualDisc was so aptly named as only two of them were sold, I thought you might like to see."

I admit that I own one of those DualDiscs.



This probably helped engineers get started on the dual-mode HD-DVD/Blu-Ray discs (not a bad idea if companies can't agree, though there really should be just one friggin' format) so we can ignore the hype of either company.

Remember That Time I Played Rugby?

I don't think I told my readers that I recently took up the sport of rugby. I started a column weeks ago about how rugby has changed my outlook on many things - I felt more confident, walked (though very sore) with a sense of pride that almost made me a bully (no one ever knew), and thought I had found a group of real gentlemen.

I never finished that column.

We had our first game today, and I can say nothing much more than that it was a disgrace. A disgrace not only to our ability to score, but a disgrace to the highly-regarded game of rugby and the people we are. When I was brought into the sport, I was told it was a gentleman's game; that there was respect for the sport and the opposing team right on the pitch, even when the referee wasn't looking. No matter what happened, we'd all get together to drink and sing songs post-match as was the tradition of rugby. It's a rewarding sport, with every step the history and presence of the traditions and rules would wrap us all in glory just for having played.

Ready for my take?

As with many sports, rugby depends heavily on teamwork. We simply didn't play as a team. One wing (one of the men on the outside) touched the ball one time. That's about as much passing as we did. I saw men on both teams get hit for no reason. The match really turned into "who's balls are bigger" and the game and traditions of rugby turned to shit. All we had to do was pass the ball to a few folks and we could have kept possession and probably scored a couple of more times.

But what do I know? Last time I was on a winning team that worked this hard, I was 9 and the sport was soccer. The principles were the same then, too.

Now I'm just going to bathe and find something better to do.

...But I Don't.

I wrote earlier about programming on this cute little Mac, but there was something I didn't realize at the time. I found that Java development was already available on this machine and I could compile and run my programs with ease. Fantastic.

But actually writing the code on the Mac has become a bit more than trivial. The only text editors I have are in AppleWorks 6, TextEdit, and vi (a command-line text editor). I can't figure out how to save a file in TextEdit to a raw text file (it only saves in RTF), it's virtually impossible to do in AppleWorks, and I'm not taking the time to write programs in vi. Looks like I can't put the Windows box in the closet yet.

I tried Eclipse, but it never tells me it won't run - it just doesn't run. Turns out it only works on 10.4. Damn it. I thought I had it all worked out.

It'll Never Happen

My good friend John wrote back in September about zombies when he was visiting Portland. Not sure what brought it up (he is a very creative fellow), but his post was funny nonetheless.

As I sit here tonight and battle another round of insomnia with milk and cookies at the kitchen table rather than my office, I'm trying to find a way to get in touch with someone loved and adored by millions. According to MySpace, John is one of my 13 friends, and I'm one of his 211,375. He is a hard person to contact due to his frequent traveling and wild popularity.

The reason I want to contact him is that I saw a book during my Christmas shopping that I thought he might be interested in. That's all. And I'm writing about it here and now because I can't sleep. I visited John's website tonight after reading that he'd stopped in San Francisco yesterday to do a special show at Macworld for the announcement of the iPhone. I thought he might write to say something about San Francisco or maybe the first performance in two weeks, but nothing except the "Tao of MySpace."

Yeah, Tao. Of MySpace.

I posted a comment on his MySpace page and thought I'd stand out somewhat with what I said. When I went back to actually see my comment (about two minutes later) I found it buried under 9 others already. It was then that I finally realized.

If You Don't Read Anything Else

I know I'm on furlough, but I got the best e-mail from someone named "Your Federal Credit Union" at info@mail.dc2cars.com and had to take a look. It got through Gmail's spam filters somehow, so it has to be legitimate, right? In a word, no. It was sent to the address I have posted in the sidebar to elicit comments (see the section labeled about me), and I have never registered anywhere using that address, nor have I given it to anyone. I've simply displayed it there at the right. The e-mail was as follows:

Dear Federal Credit Union account holder,

This is a part of our security service measures, we regularly screen activity in Federal Credit Unions (FCU) network.
We recently noticed the following issue on your account: A recent review of your account determined that we require some additional information from you in order to provide you with our secure services.

Case ID Number: FCU-065-617-349

In accordance with NCUA User Agreement, your account access will remain limited until the issue has been resolved. Unfortunately, if the access to your account remains limited for an extended period of time, it may result in further limitations or eventual account closure. We encourage you to take 3-5 minutes out of your online experience and update your personal account records as soon as possible to help avoid this. We thank you for your prompt attention to this matter. Please understand that this is a security measure intended to help protect you and your account.

Visit the link below and fill out the form on the following page to complete the verification process.

National Credit Union Administration

We apologize for any inconvenience.

Sincerely, NCUA Account Review Department

If one were to click on the link to what might appear to be the National Credit Union Administration, they would be taken to a site that looked a whole lot like this¹. Compare it to the actual NCUA Website and you might notice subtle similarities². This is a good trick to make one think he's actually at a valid website, and it actually does exactly that. The reason phishers are so successful is that apparently no one reads the news or warnings about phishing attacks and believes everything they read in e-mail, even if it's from info@mail.dc2cars.com, is quite vague, and has something to do with their personal account at a credit union. Not to mention it was supposed to be from the National Credit Union Administration, (a United States bureaucratic organization) but the link in the e-mail led to //kokoroplanet.jp/NCUA/ (a domain reserved for an individual or company within Japan) and the clicker actually ended up at //83.147.69.14/NCUA/ (a server traced to somewhere in Italy).

I think someone said one time, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." That shouldn't even be a valid statement, given the warnings we see every day and the stories we hear about stolen identities and empty bank accounts. The new saying should be "Few will be first, but no one should follow." I have posted on phishing at least two other times at this site. Microsoft and Mozilla work hard to try to warn users about these sites as soon as they're reported. ISPs and governments work together to try to shut down the server hosting the fraudulent site. All of these efforts are greatly appreciated and benefit the public, but none of it would be necessary if we'd just pay a little more attention.

I've noticed that many people who ask my advice never attentively listen to my answer or explanation, and then just shrug it off with a "hum" when I come to a point. They never realize just how important it is that they know what I am telling them, or how dangerous things can be if they're ignorant. If you think your credit's shaky with the $300K home and the new Escalade, wait until you type your Social Security number into the wrong form on the web and send it to a twenty-something in Zheleznodorozhnyy, Kaliningradskaya³.

Heed the warnings, people. I just wish I could get some good spam lists and send this letter to everyone on them.


1. If they make me take that page down, I've also printed it for you.
2. Actually, they're not similarites - all of the sidebar content and images are actually provided by the NCUA website. The phishermen just took the NCUA page as a template, inserted the form for the victim, and posted the page at their site.
3. Zheleznodorozhnyy is a real city. You won't really see it, but this points to the metropolis, pop. 2963.

Space Travel at 67 is Crazy, but This I Gotta See

Okay, check this out:

Anyone know who Stephen Hawking is? You know, the theoretical physicist who wrote "A Brief History of Time?" Yeah, him.

Are you familiar with his physical condition? At about age 22, it was discovered he has ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease. They told him he might not make it to 25. He now rolls around in an electric wheelchair and speaks with the help of a computer. He holds a prestigious position at Cambridge University as the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, a chair once filled by Isaac Newton. He was born on this day in 1942.

But it gets better: Professor Hawking intends to go into space in 2009.

Beat that.

Goodbye, and Thank You

Ando Momofuku died Friday. He will most certainly be remembered for his subtle gift to college students, Army personnel, and the poor alike. Ando created a culture with his meal, and probably never thought it would become this widespread.

I'm eating Top Ramen's Spicy Chile Chicken Flavor noodles this morning in his honor. Total cost: 26¢ and four minutes.

And don't be fooled: I'm still on furlough.

Furlough

I'm off for awhile. E-mail if you want.

Why Do I Bother?

Google Answer to Filling Jobs Is an Algorithm (New York Times)

Google is trying something new with hiring folks these days, and I began to read this article with enthusiasm, thinking a dream just might come true and I could find myself on the payroll next year with my favorite corporation. Alas, I still need to finish school even to be the janitor.

Mathematics is absolutely required for engineering at Google, and it's a subject I have long put away after going nine rounds with Calculus earlier in the decade. I feel comfortable with math but it takes a good bit of time and an inordinate amount of self-discipline to operate at that higher level.

Google has created a survey that its candidates will begin taking this month, and it predicts it might double its workforce this year (which is 10,000) and that means about 200 hires per week. They had to find some quantitative method, didn't they? I probably would, too. With my current level of education and experience I still don't qualify even for systems administration. So...

If given the chance I would propose to Google that they buy me. That's right, me. They can put me through the rest of school and I will work for them to pay it off. If Google gives every employee so much to come and stay, why can't that be education? They're building an army and they seem to have the money to accommodate me (not to mention a little pull with the folks at Stanford), the only question is how do I ask this? Who do I e-mail, or where do I show up to yell "I want to finish school so I can work for Google!"

If I could ask the right person and they can answer me objectively as to why it's not a good idea, I'll quit. But until then, while the United States Army is still offering to pay off student loans to any flunkie who went to college, it's a good idea for Google to front me some education. Hell, I'd even settle for Berkeley. Everyone says they're starving for people, but I just don't see it yet. The Department of Family and Children Services will pay for a Graduate degree while the social worker goes to school while employed, and some school districts will pay for education so long as the future educator signs a contract to teach in that district for a period of time. I believe I have a case.

Java and the Mac

In light of the quickly approaching first day of Spring semester, I thought I should check this Mac and see if I'll have any problems programming in Java with the little cutie. I had already downloaded Eclipse and installed it though I never have learned how to build a project. Today, for some reason, it wouldn't even start. I just wanted to write simple program source files and compile them for class, so I went straight to java.sun.com and looked for the SDK that they surely made for the Mac - and didn't find it. Next step: Google.

The first thing the idiot savant told me was that I didn't need an SDK or to download the runtime environment. I found a developer's site at Apple that said, "Mac OS X is the only mass-market operating system that comes complete with a fully configured and ready-to-use Java Development Kit." I think that's great. I even tried it. I took a source file I wrote last semester and issued the same commands to compile and build the program, then ran it. Flawless. If I could find a text editor I liked, this thing would be really groovy.

It's Official.

It turns out that I had good reason to think that MySpace is crap.

It is.

If you look at the pages built by anyone for free, such as the sites built at angelfire (now a part of Lycos) or geocities (now part of Yahoo!), you can see what happens when bad design and a plethora of built-in advertising come together. And yes, I was even part of angelfire at one time, before I started this online enterprise of mine. I just needed somewhere to post my pages I built in my web publishing class, but it was appropriate at angelfire because I had nothing meaningful to say.

So I am proud to announce that the #1 Worst website, according to PC World, is MySpace.

From the article:

Yes, we know. With more than 90 million users, MySpace is now more popular than Elvis, "American Idol," and ice cream. But the Web's most visited destination is also its most poorly designed and counterproductive.

Actually, there are over 144 million registered accounts now, but it's my guess that most of them are managed by robots or people who have different motives other than social networking or music appreciation. You see, MySpace originally came about to promote independent musicians, and spread to every teenager's room in addition. It is a powerful tool for bands (I have a friend in Albuquerque who has gotten some attention with his group) but pretty much stinks for all other purposes. Now it is full of illiterate junkies who apply the worst of templates to their site and type in an awful new language to each other. Then there's the spread of spyware, the horribly obtrusive advertising, slow page loads, and the dangers of online child predators if nothing else has stopped you from going there. I plead with you: stop the madness.

So continue your web surfing, and do it safely around MySpace. It's really not worth it, and my opinion is now supported by a major media outlet.

No One's Reading Anyway

It's the new year and I don't have anything to declare. We didn't party last night and we actually missed midnight - we were in the middle of a movie about mathematicians.

I didn't know that James Brown died on Christmas morning until two days ago. Funny how the death of a former president overshadows the passing of a musical icon. I am willing to bet a large wager that more people in the United States are more familiar with the name James Brown and who he was than they are with Gerald Ford and what he did. I have no real complaint, though. More people should be familiar with US history and how our country got where it is; maybe then we'd all vote and have a better government. I'm sure that I just dipped into something I don't want to discuss, especially since I started this post out of pure boredom, so I'll let your comments lead the way.

This is Not the Last Post

Today is the last workday of the year for a lot of people, and this morning I am pondering the question of exactly how much work will actually be done today in comparison to any given day in the fall. Productivity usually slows to a crawl at times like these as folks are waiting for the long weekend or a road trip. Not me; I've got plans to start the new year off right: I'm doing nothing different from any other day in 2006. No road trip or family visiting, no fireworks or banging pots & pans at midnight. No plans.

That's not to say I'll be working more than anyone else today, however. My work depends much on the needs of the people in my office. If they have no questions for me, I have to find my own projects to keep busy. Half the office is still on leave for the holidays, and I finished a large project last week, so I'll be reading today.

So if this is the last time you'll be in your office (or whatever you call it), enjoy it, because it's the last time you'll set foot in there until next year.

I really need to get better material.

Borrrrrrring

Okay, so maybe I'm back for a couple more times before January 1st. I've just finished re-creating a document that I lost on a flash drive (physical loss, not corruption or stupidity) that is 32 pages long, has 21 screen captures, and 4459 words. It was slightly aggravating, but it is done and has been improved upon greatly. I'm just sorry I can't publish it in the public domain due to some copyright restrictions for the images I captured.

It is an instructional document for my team to aid them in setting up each of their Linksys Wireless Broadband Routers. Everyone seemed to like the first and second editions, even the boss. He started passing it out to the Education and Training unit, and you know what they had to say?

"The page numbers are wrong."

I got "This is very professional" from several folks, and "This helped a lot!" from others, but from a unit that had no other clue about how to set up the device, I get "The page numbers are wrong."

So it's no accident that the page numbering is perfect this time, the font has changed, and all illustrations now have a reference number. It was created in Microsoft Word 2003 and will now stay that way in case I lose this new flash drive (I had previously published it in PDF and had no way else to freely convert that file back to Word to recover it.)

I realize you don't care about any of that, but I'm glad it's all out in the open. In other news:

I've been reading the archives from a year ago and I've got to say that I'm amazed at my promises I never kept, like reading all those books. I "vowed" to read them all, and I probably could have if I'd taken the time away from the computer and desk. I'm even busier now but take more time to read since my desktop PC stays dormant much of the time. I've taken to do more of my learning at work, since that is what I'm paid to do - to know. So time at home is more well-spent, I'm more relaxed, patience is more abundant, and I can get out of bed easier (could be these new meds) to write and read for hours before work.

I think a good ultimate goal would be to have a new MacBook Pro by the end of the year, but there is absolutely no way I'll promise something like that. I'd gladly give up my chance at a MacBook Pro to move to Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, or Arizona this year. I'd even take California for the right company.

But like I said (and I encourage everyone to do the same), I'm going to rock steady this year and continue my solid progression toward success, without the huge promises and false hope. I'm not going to lose any weight, buy a new car, or do any of that crazy talk. I'm just going to keep my flash drive close to me at all times, be prompt for work and school, and see where I am this time next year.

Resolve 2007?

I've been thinking lately about what I said last year I'd do this year, and I've come to the conclusion that new years' resolutions are overrated. With that, I've decided that all I want to do in 2007 is the same thing I did in 2006, and that is to simply rock steady.

I know I'll not get out of Georgia very soon as Beth and I must finish large milestones in our educational and financial goals, so we'll simply keep doing what we're doing, and aim for cool stuff rather than resolve to do something. Beth came up with a novel idea: we are probably going to budget enough time and money for me to take one certification exam every quarter. With that, I'll probably schedule the test and have to "shit or get off the pot." For something that I've wanted to do and half-assed for several years now, I certainly don't want to have wasted my time and energy.

But that's about it. We'll keep schooling and doing projects on the house, and when the time is right we'll move on to better things. But there is no absolute resolution, and there never was. Think about it: with all that going on (house-buying, daughter-raising, parents moving, sibling relocation, software projects failing and driving 15,000 miles on the job) how could anyone try to read the unread books in my library and blog every day? That's just ridiculous.

So among my peers and their resolutions to lose weight, get better jobs, get more, spend more, and save the world, I'm going to opt out and pick up a book.

Have a fantastic new year.

Stuffed with Cotton, they Must Be

I sat down to check mail this morning and felt like staying a while. It's comfortable in this office; no one to divert my attention this week. Just me and this little Mac right now, with a cup of coffee. And my ears are ringing.

It took me a minute to figure it out, but I finally realized why this office is so much more comfortable and quiet since yesterday. It's because last night before I went to bed I shut down my PC. It is still off. I hear the clock on the wall and beyond the sound of my typing, it is the loudest thing in the room.

Inside my PC there are four fans. One inside the power supply, two on the back of the case, and one mounted to the processor heat sink. Once one of them collects enough dust, it gets a little off-balance and so begins the first vibrations. Downhill from there.

I can't imagine how much power the entire system uses, either. Connected to the system are myriad devices, including a flatbed scanner, 320GB external hard drive, my iPod, amplified 3-piece speaker set, two printers, and two 19-inch LCD monitors. Everything is on top of my desk and blares right in my face. All of it is off at the moment. Just the sound of a clock powered by 1 AA battery.

How long will it be before I have to turn it back on?



Update: Probably not long, because that 320GB HDD is inaccessible to the Mac due to the drive's format (NTFS), which, I am guessing, is not supported by Mac OS X 10.2.8. Here I go again...

Speed Bump Number One

Okay. First gripe about my new Mac: iTunes.

The very program that warmed me up to the company told me that I cannot continue using the iTunes store unless I upgrade the iTunes program to a later version. Very well; one always wants the latest version. After downloading version 7.0.2 and beginning the installation, I am notified that I cannot install this version of iTunes on my current version of Mac OS X.

And I wonder why. It works on Windows, doesn't it? And XP is definitely older than OS X 10.2.8. After some investigation, I come to one conclusion:

It's going to cost me $129 to listen to the music I already paid for. iTunes will open and operate (I currently have the pre-installed version 4.9) but I can't authorize this computer so that I can play the music I purchased at the iTunes store (previously, with another computer.) So as I see it, the only solution is to upgrade to Mac OS X 10.4, which, as I said before, is $129.

On second look, it's $138.99. I don't have a DVD drive, so I'll have to get the CD-ROM version for an extra $9.99.

I really don't mean to put this thing down. Maybe I'll get past that part and see what every Mac user likes so much about it. My use is still very limited and I have been using Windows for 15 years. It all takes time.

Getting My Mac On

Beth's out of town this week and I've got the house to myself. I've been cleaning, mostly, but I got this new (well, relatively new) iBook G3 and am having a time with it.

The fact that I've not used a Mac since about 1987 has a bit to do with my apprehension, and the absence of the context menu. I've told hundreds of people, "When in doubt, right click." I have repeatedly found myself in doubt with no way out, but I have resolved each issue fairly quickly.

Take for instance that aged Apple logo. Once I found it, I couldn't figure out how to save the picture to my computer. In any graphical web browser I've used, I simply have right-clicked the image (Windows and Linux) and selected "Save Image As..." or something very similar to perform this task. Not on this Mac. There is no right-click. I tried holding the button down, looking for a "copy image" function in the menus, and then it occurred to me: just drag the damn picture to the desktop, Ben. And it worked. Silly me.

But there are others yet. I still can't find my Home and End keys. I am a keyboard shortcut warrior; it's part of being lazy. I think it's why I like the UNIX/Linux terminal so much - very little physical effort. Having to move that mouse and click those buttons just to advance the cursor to the end of the line is ridiculous.

But truth be told, I like this thing. It's old (2003 iBook G3, OS X 10.2.8), but it's quiet, cool to the touch, and doesn't have any vents on the bottom. I'm blogging from bed this morning, without the worry of blocking an air vent and burning my thighs. I think I'm going to try to upgrade the OS to 10.4 soon because 10.2 doesn't support the current version of iTunes or WPA WiFi security. I'm learning new stuff every day, and I think I might keep it.

It's About Time (for Nothing)

Well folks, it's here. Windows Vista will be released to corporate customers and OEM distributors today. As of this morning, Dell is still offering a free upgrade to Vista if claimed by March 31, 2007. I would begin looking for the pre-loaded Vista systems next week.

As one would expect, Microsoft finally decided on early 2007 to release Vista, but couldn't resist the temptation to get it on the street in some form for Christmas. Just like the PS3 craze, the Xbox 360 last year (plenty to go around this time), and the new Elmo that says your name. Of course, in this case Microsoft will have no shortage of Vista licenses for the OEM folks, and Dell can push out thousands of computers in a day, so don't get in a hurry.

I said more than a year ago that I'd start saving my money and order the first Vista system from Dell, but I have since changed my mind. I previewed the Release Candidate (RC1) on my home system and did not see an immediate benefit. Drivers for only one printer was included, and support for the cheap one (a DeskJet 825C) would never be seen. I'd just have to buy another one.

I couldn't move the Deskbar (Windows' answer to Google Desktop) to the other monitor. So there it was, stuck on the right side of the left monitor, smack in the middle of the entire display.

The current pricing scheme is going to cost too much for home builders. The answer to this, my friends, is Ubuntu.

And the proposed (final?) licensing scheme totally sucks. I haven't read it, but according to reports, I can buy a license off the shelf and install Vista on one machine. If I build another computer to replace the first one, I can install Vista on that second machine, so long as I remove it from the first. After that, I'm screwed. No more re-installations. That means if the motherboard takes a crap in the second machine, I have to buy Vista again.

I think I've decided to get a MacBook Pro, and keep my home-built XP/Ubuntu dual-booting desktop. If my customers want to know how to use something in Vista, I'm sure there's a good book about all that's new, and that doesn't cost nearly as much as a new computer. I'm not sure as to how many questions I might get anyway. With any luck the question of the year will be "How do I go about switching to Linux?"

Update: I was wrong about the OEM suppliers. Only the corporate edition is out today; all home users still have to wait until January 30. The Zune issue is probably still on the table.

America's Responsibility

My Political Science final consisted of a short essay to answer this question:

What is America's responsibility to our fellow man, and should we use American foreign policy and intervene in world events?

I hope I answered the question, but this is mostly my feelings. Here we go:

America’s first and foremost responsibility is right here, inside our borders. It lies with the homeless on our streets, the struggling entrepreneur, and the single mother. America should be very concerned with all of its citizens and their well-being. This includes the care, supervision, and education of our children, the number of people in prison and just how they got there (beyond the guilty verdict and into the why), the affordability of our food, the quality of our health care, and the future of our energy.

Our responsibility does extend, though, past the green acres of the territories of the United States and beyond those with the proper paperwork. Just as every individual has a social responsibility to the other people around him, the United States has the implied task, as the richest nation in the world, to care for the unprotected. The women and children in Darfur who are mercilessly beaten, raped, murdered, and mutilated on a regular basis are in dire need of help from any nation with the means to do so. Before the genocide, these people did nothing but live happily surviving with each other.

We do belong out in the world as good Samaritans, but only as such. Only to protect and help the vulnerable should we be there. Not to reform their government and oppress the people; only to keep them alive and productive, and give them hope. To let them live as they wish, in safety, comfort, and freedom as a people. The developed nations should step in, stop the killing, provide for their own mens of education and well-being, and leave the people to their own accord.

Our assistance to the people in these troubled countries is a measure of the United States' own success and heightened solidarity in our national security. To quote Barack Obama in The Audacity of Hope, “Globalization makes our economy, our health, and our security all captive to events on the other side of the world. And no other nation on earth has a greater capacity to shape that global system, or to build consensus around a new set of international rules that expand the zones of freedom, personal safety, and economic well-being. Like or not, if we want to make America more secure, we are going to have to help make the world more secure.” Obama, p. 304

Politicians tend to believe that if we don't help these countries in need, our world inside these borders, where our homes and friends are, could crumble. If we leave alone the civil wars, brewing terrorism, crumbling economies, and radical genocide, evil will spread throughout Earth and destroy what freedoms we have made for ourselves at home. Senator Obama also quoted President Kennedy in his inaugural address, supporting this claim: “To those peoples in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves, for whatever period is required – not because the Communists may be doing it, not because we seek their votes, but because it is right. If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.” Obama, p.314

So if we want to help the world, one country at a time, we should. Nobody likes to be oppressed or tortured, or to lose loved ones based on the radical beliefs of another. There is a standard of simple, uninterrupted life that we can help sustain, and it is our duty as humans to take that part. The flow of global society depends on good ideas, especially those that help the masses, and the United States and its allies should never miss a chance to make one real.


Reference: The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama

The Inland North?

I always copy things that Scott does.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Northeast
Philadelphia
The Midland
The South
Boston
The West
North Central
What American accent do you have? Take More Quizzes

I can't imagine how we sound the same, especially since he's from Iowa and I'm from South Georgia. As long as he doesn't say "eh" all the time (he now hails from Minnesota), we'll get along fine.

Dynamic Image Generator

Type in your phrase and it will put it below the old classic Quaker Oats "Ha Ha" man. Great for pranks or just funny pictures in general.

I'm surprised I have never used digg.com until yesterday. Man, I'm behind the times.



read more | digg story

Evil Twin

This is a new one. I never thought of placing a wireless access point near another commercially-available one and giving it the same name. This one's pretty tricky.

When the unsuspecting user (a clueless wealthy person in many cases) logs on to the fake AP, the attacker goes to work, undetected. The victim drinks his coffee and checks his stock portfolio, assuming that everything is safe.

Education is a big thing. Equally important is the energy level needed for the user to care about whether the connection is secure. Many people just don't know how to be safe, and when told don't take the time to follow directions. This must be taught or we'll see many more stories like this for years and years. Until they learn.

read more | digg story

49times.com

I own a new site: 49times.com.

Don't expect an answer to "What is the significance of 49 times?"

I just thought of it and decided to find out if anyone had registered the name. No one had, so I did.

And it's now a wiki. It is driven by the same engine that drives Wikipedia, so I feel comfortable in its existence at least. There is absolutely no purpose as of yet and I doubt it will ever grow. So go there and write something - we can all at least try. I expect to create a forum for my own interests, and maybe folks can join me. It doesn't have to be as serious as wikipedia, so maybe we can live a little.

I expect comedy, idea sharing, how-to's, and other things related to exploring and learning. Go now.

And if you're in the mood for some really good humor, get a glimpse of what Microsoft would do if they bought Firefox: www.msfirefox.com

I Know my Public IP Address. Can You Find Yours?

I finished a cool little script yesterday and I am quite proud of myself, even though there's one part I just completely took for granted, hacked at it and made it work. But it does.

At home I have what's called a dynamic IP address, as most residential customers do. This means that one's public IP address can change depending on the ISP's needs and the customer's usage. If you leave your modem off for a week, you are almost guaranteed to be issued a different IP address than the one you had before.

I often like to get back to my systems at home for whatever reason (eventually I'll be able to turn the lights on and off remotely - a few work now). To do this I need the IP address that my ISP has given me. Knowing that it could change, I needed some way to know what it had changed to. Therein begins the logic: I know that one can go to www.whatismyip.com and see their public IP address. I also know that I can write a program in Perl to surf the web and look for stuff. I put the two together and employed my 10-year-old Compaq to run the program every day.

It actually sends it to my Gmail address, which is then filtered, tagged, and archived automatically. I don't have to delete the message every day - I can find the latest message in an instant, and access is mine.

The finished file looks like:

#!/usr/bin/perl

#Title: IP Sender
#Author: Ben Rehberg
#Version History:
#02/14/2006 Creation
#
#11/20/2006 Finally got that regular expression right
#  to extract the IP from the web page.  Done.
#
#########PROGRAM DESCRIPTION###########################
#
#I want this script to check whatismyip.com every
#morning and e-mail me with the address.



#variables and settings################################
($sec,$min,$hour,$mday,$mon,
$year,$wday,$yday,$isdst)=localtime(time);
$mon+=1;
$year+=1900;
my $date="$mon"."/"."$mday"."/"."$year";
my $url = 'http://www.whatismyip.com';
my @recipients = ('spaminator@benrehberg.com',
'daily_crap@techpickle.org');

#begin program code#####################################

use LWP::Simple;
my $content = get $url;
die "Couldn't get $url" unless defined $content;

$ip = "I can't find it.";

if ($content =~ m/(([0-2]?\d{1,2}\.){3}[0-2]?\d{1,2})/){
$ip = $1;
}
#print $ip;
#print $content;
#print $date;

require Mail::Send;
$msg = new Mail::Send Subject=>"Your IP Address for ".$date;
$msg->to(@recipients);
$fh = $msg->open;
print $fh "Your IP Address this morning is ".$ip;
$fh->close;

So there it is. Feel free to copy this and use it for yourself. I provide no warranty and assume you know what you're doing if you choose to take it. Be advised that you will have to install the Mail::Send and LWP::Simple modules in order for this to work. The LWP library was already installed on my system, but I had to get Mail::Send from CPAN. Just follow the link and the instructions.

Questions? Feel free to comment with them or e-mail me.

Update: I forgot to tell you that you must drop this file in /etc/cron.daily so the system will run it on a schedule. Also make sure you make the file executable (chmod 755).

Filibuster

Ever since the mention of a filibuster back when John Roberts was appointed, I've wondered just exactly what a filibuster is. I heard the term once in high school and it seemed fun to say. And with my overwhelming interest in today's politics, I never got around to looking it up anywhere. I did, however, come across a good explanation in Senator Obama's book today on page 80:

The constitution makes no mention of the filibuster; it is a Senate rule, one that dates back to the very first Congress. The basic idea is simple: Because all Senate business is conducted by unanimous consent, any senator can bring proceedings to a halt by exercising his right to unlimited debate and refusing to move on to the next order of business. In other words, he can talk. For as long as he wants. He can talk about the substance of a pending bill, or about the motion to call the pending bill. He can choose to read the entire seven-hundred-page defense authorization bill, line by line, into the record, or relate aspects of the bill to the rise and fall of the Roman Empire, the flight of the hummingbird, or the Atlanta phone book. So long as he or like-minded colleagues are willing to stay on the floor and talk, everything else has to wait - which gives each senator an enormous amount of leverage, and a determined minority effective veto power over any piece of legislation.

Now we know what a filibuster is. You're welcome.


                

Automated Horticulture

Beth and I kill plants. It's what we do, what we've always done. In Colorado they fell to the cat. When we got to Georgia and left some potted plants outside, even with the rain and good sunshine they still wilted and proved our investment in them unwise.

When my grandmother died there were enough houseplants delivered to start a small nursery. I ended up with two of them, and we only water them when we notice that the leaves are pointing down. There's no other way we'll remember.

I got Vol. 8 of Make magazine (really cool, by the way) a few days ago and finally found something in it that 1. I could use, 2. I can afford to build, and 3. I have time to do. I shopped for and built the prototype today. I guess I could tell you what it does:

It automatically waters the houseplants every day. It's a simple system (mechanically, anyway) that displaces air in a bottle and forces water out, through tubes and on to the plants. The air is forced in to the bottle by an aquarium air pump and the pump itself is turned on and off with X10 controllers.

So the pump can be operated by a PC interface or by handheld remote. I haven't gotten to the PC interface yet; my CM17A X10 PC interface device crapped out and I'm waiting on another one to be delivered. I will then probably be using HeyU on Fedora Core 6 installed on my wonderful 8-year-old Compaq Presario 5155. It's my utility machine on one leg, but it does a fine job of running scheduled tasks. If there are any more advancements on this project, I'll be sure to post them.