Archive for the 'Life' Category

Mega Update 2: Son of Mega Update

Published at August 26, 2008 in Life. 0 Comments
“Laziness is counter-revolutionary“

It’s been 2 months. I am a son of a bitch, no offense Mom. What have I done recently? Well, I competed in the Summer Olympics in Beijing and won 8 gold medals, set 8 world records and pissed off swimmers from 5 different countries. No, wait, that was half man, half dolphin Micheal Phelps.

I went to 2 weddings, congrats to Kelley and Steve and Alfredo and Christine! Saw Richard Cheese in NYC, went to New Hampshire a few times, Rhode Island, had The Feast Party, saw some movies ( Dark Knights, Step Brothers, Pineapple Express, Ne le Dis a Personne, Europa Europa, Elizabeth ) went to CT for the 4th of July and Cranston, went to the Casino a few times, went camping twice, once in a monsoon.

My good friend Jared is off in Europe right now, backpacking for 2 weeks through at least 9 different cities. He needs a vacation! He’s blogging it all on jaredmatfess.com

Ive got to fix my gallery up there. I use the ANIga gallery plugin, and during an update, something got disconnected. My database is still full, the pics are still there, but it doesnt work. I might have to dig deep for this one. I just ordered a new book, Head First AJAX. I guess this web2.0 thing is no fad, and I should start learning something if I am to keep my fu strong.

Ill try to post more as things develop, Ive got a few things cooking, Ill see what comes of them.

And now, for your viewing pleasure, my friend Shakir dancing with one of the Meow Mix DJs from Fredo’s wedding. A sight to be seen, truly.

Mega Update

Published at June 3, 2008 in Life. 0 Comments
“I try to be good hard-worker-man, but refrigemater so messy, so so messy. “

3 months. I know, I have gotten lazy in my old age. Updates, in no order:

  • Passed RHCT Test, not RHCE, disappointed, whatever, it’s only RedHat
  • Turned 26 years old
  • My sister is getting married
  • Paul G’s sister is getting married
  • Not to each other, though it is now legal in California
  • Fredo is getting married
  • Karen is getting married
  • Kelley is getting married
  • Enjoy work
  • Enjoy weather
  • Hate weather
  • Enjoy weather
  • Memorial Day parade and cookout
  • Got CVS ExtraCare Card
  • Saw Ironman, Indiana Jones 4, Indiana Jones 2, Smart People, The Mist, The Omen ( remake ), Dawn of the Dead ( remake ), The Counterfeiters
  • 2 hour Lost season finale, awesome, Weekend at Bernie’s-esque
  • Celtics vs Lakers, welcome to the 80s, BEAT LA!
  • Built new PC, 64bit chip, OS
  • Ubuntu 8.04 kinda flaky, works though
  • Took salsa class, eh
  • Want to buy new bike for Mass.

That’s the major stuff I suppose. I upgraded my Gallery plugin and ended up bricking the damn thing, so no pics until I can fix that.

Spring Training, Red Sox and Red Hat

Published at March 18, 2008 in Geeky, Life and Work. 0 Comments
“Remember, fans, Tuesday is Die Hard Night. Free admission for anyone who was actually alive the last time the Indians won the pennant.“

Mid March, can you feel it? Baseball season is soon upon us. And I have already seen a Sox game. I went with Paul, Cait and Erin to Spring Training in Fort Myers, Florida. I saw one game, the Sox vs Tampa Bay. By the way, The Tampa Bay Devil Rays are no longer the Devil Rays, just the Rays. I took a few pics.

Florida was fun, I got to see my Cousin and her family, ate some crab, had dinner with Christie, a dear friend who lives in Fort Lauderdale. Florida itself was interesting. For cost savings we flew into West Palm Beach, which is almost directly across the state from Naples, where we stayed. It took about 3 hours to drive across the state, it doesnt look that long on the map. It was mostly farm land and straight as an arrow, most of the roads there seem to be that way. Naples was full of our Greatest Generation. Some where loud, smelly, scary, most were just normal old people acting old. I felt their stares, jealous of my youth, lack of a fishing cap and stomach of steel as I downed a hot dog for lunch!

I also finally went to a Sonic. For the better part of a decade I have been taunted by Sonic commercials. In college ( Hartford ), Home ( Cranston ) and here in Home 2 ( Boston ), Sonic commercials are on all the time. At this moment the closest Sonic is 300 miles away in New Jersey. And I have little to no reason to go to New Jersey. But there are a bunch in Florida, so we went to one. An interesting place. It’s a Drive-In, like the 1950s places. Or the intro to the Flintstones. They pull up in the car and the lady brings them out a side of woolly mammoth or something? That’s what Sonic is. Only the waitress is a depressed teenybopper on rollerblades with no personality. I got an Oreo Blast, it was OK, nothing to write home about. In the end it was cool to go to, but trust me, you’re not missing much.

So Florida trip, success.

I am also going on a little Spring Training myself in April. At work we use Red Hat based Linux distros for almost everything. Some of the servers have Red Hat Enterprise, Red Hat Linux, Fedora Core, or CentOS. I have my gripes with Red Hat, but it’s what we use and I dont forsee anyone changing that anytime soon. I still prefer Ubuntu these days, but that’s neither here nor there. Work will pay for training and grad school, so I am going to start that with some Red Hat Training. I signed up for Red Hat Training Course #253 Red Hat Linux Networking and Security Administration, which is 4 days of training with the 5th day being Red Hat Test 302 The Red Hat Certified Engineer Exam. The Exam has 2 parts and based on your score you either become a Red Hat Certified Technician or the higher grade Engineer. I am going to try to rip Red Hat apart on my laptop in preparation for the test, maybe I can become an Engineer.

I am also thinking about grad school. If work is going to pay for it, why not? Ive got some idea of what and where, details as I get accepted someplace. This might not be until next year though.

A Quickie

Published at February 24, 2008 in Friends and Life. 0 Comments

Far be it from me to judge our current political system but… I dont think the 2 party system is the best. I mean there are other political parties, but none of them have emerged as a powerful enough alternative to the the Big Guys. Enter Ralph Nader. Visionary that he may be, he pops up during these elections and tries to run. He’s not going to win. I know that, he knows that, the Viet Cong know that. So why does he run? Maybe to draw attention to the fact that we lack a powerful third party political party, maybe just to spoil elections. Enter the following text message exchange between myself and Paul F, Group Political Activist:


Me: Nader is running.
Paul F: If a Nader runs in the forest and nobody votes for him, does he make a sound?
Me: Ask Al Gore.
Paul F: Fuck.

I laughed my ass off. And I think there was some of this same kind of conversation going on around the country. “Ha ha, Nader’s running.” — it sinks in — “Oh crap, Nader’s running.”

Like I said, I am all for more ideas, more parties, not too many more, we don’t want to turn into some kind of European country with 30 parties, powers changing every 2 years, nothing gets done. That might work for the smaller countries, but we’re a Super Power!! Arent we?

A Worthy Update

Published at February 15, 2008 in Friends and Life. 0 Comments
“Politics. As exciting as war. Definitely as dangerous.“

First and foremost, congratulations are in order for my sister, Alicia and her ( now ) fiancée, John. He proposed to her just 2 days ago, and The Stickneys couldnt be happier. It’s funny, everyone asks me, “Is he a good guy?” Which I think is almost kind of odd. I mean, would I really let me sister marry an asshole? Probably not. So John, if there was any doubt in your mind, I do NOT think you are an asshole. Congrats! We’re all crossing our fingers and hoping for a Casino Wedding. I say Vegas, showgirls, booze, gambling, family, it would be grand!!

Now, onto other matters. I know, it’s been a month. Life has been going good. Good job, good food, horrible weather. I just havent felt inspired to write of anything of great importance. Until… today.

A few years back, I met a pretty interesting guy. Scott Ritcher. He was living with Webster at the time, and worked with him at Citadel Communications in North Kingstown. Scott was from Kentucky and had inexplicably moved to Providence pretty much for the hell of it. He was a graphic designer with a lot of talent, had lots of interesting photos, even edited and published his own magazine ( K Composite ). He even once ran for mayor of his home town of Louisville, started his own record label, wrote a book about it, was an influential member of Louisville’s punk scene, had a radio show about said punk scene, has gotten hate mail about his art work, and wrote a book about that.

Now he’s all grown up and still wants to make Louisville a better place. Scott feels the best way to do this is by running for state senator. Ive read through his website and I like what I see. He basically wants to make Louisville a better place by cutting through all the bullshit that comes with politics. I have to respect that. Also something I noticed that I found refreshing, I didnt see the words “democrat” or “republican” on his page. I think it’s foolish to label yourself. We did fight a war of Independence, we might as well all be Independents. I dont think I get many readers from District 35 in Louisville, KY, but if there are any 35thers reading, do yourself a favor and check out Scott’s campaign page: http://www.ballotrevolution.org/ Give em hell Scotty!