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SF to Fresno

 

The idea to do twin road trips on the east coast (North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia) and the west coast (ummm, California) started with the very practical issue of where to put my car while I flew back east for three weeks. I had the brilliant idea of visiting a couple of friends in San Diego, leaving my car with one of them, and then flying east from there. I figured I could have an extra road trip which would basically pay for itself in saved parking fees. Brilliant, yes?

I completed finishing touches on a few projects this morning (notably this one) and finally left the house about 3:00. Rush hour traffic was not bad, until I got to the grade between Castro Valley and San Ramon. The next fifteen miles of my trip took about an hour. I was (even more of) a ball of stress by the time I stopped for food and gas in Tracy.

When I finally arrived in Fresno and checked into the Motel 6, my first order of business was another phone call to my friend Stan in San Diego. As had happened for the past three days, I was unable to leave him a message because his voice mailbox was full. Which seemed a little odd. Stan and I have been friends for almost 20 years, and he knew I was coming this weekend. I’d been promising a visit for about five years.

Anyhow, I called Eugene next, to warn him I might be taking him up on his offer of lodging for me and the car. Then I went to Vons to get a snack, came back to the room, watched a movie, and went to sleep.

Gone Visitin’

In less than 24 hours I will disappear for three weeks. I make no promises that there will be updates until I get back. I make no promises that I’ll be answering any email until I get back. On the other hand, I also make no promises that I WON’T be doing either of these things…

What I will definitely be doing is visiting Mom and Dad. And eating well. And visiting numerous supermarkets and thrift stores, and the occasional roadside diner. And hopefully seeing Duncan and Rick, PJ, Becky, and assorted other people without websites. Not to mention Stan and Eugene in San Diego, one of whom will have temporary custody of my car.

Apologies to anyone whose email remains unanswered as I depart. You can’t possibly imagine how much the past three weeks have sucked…

Note to cyber-stalkers: look for me in Greensboro, Charlotte, Raleigh, Chapel Hill, Atlanta, and maybe DC. I’ll be travelling US 29 rather than I-85, just because that’s what I do…

Note to potential thieves: the apartment is being watched. Please don’t throw any wild parties while I’m gone. Lock the doors. And turn off some of those lights, dammit…

Stupid Netscape

Things I’m thinking tonight while designing for Netscape 4.x:

  • This sucks.
  • Miserable piece of shit third-rate browser.
  • Why is 15-20% of the world still using this pile of crap?
  • Fucking useless.
  • WHAT CSS support?

Frustrated and Excited

I give up. To hell with designing websites and writing porn. I’m gonna be a Towerette…

Frustrated:

  • I’m working on three major projects right now which HAVE to be finished by the end of the this week when I leave town, and two of the clients affected did not get back to me with approvals on Friday, making me lose two very-needed days of work on them this weekend.
  • My new monitor is causing interference on the TV in my office, but only on the lower channels.
  • I rented some of my first porn videos in a couple of years this week and they just plain sucked. And not in a sexy sort of way.

Senile or just overloaded:

  • I seem to be forgetting very basic things this week, like where the trunk and hood releases are on my car, how many spoonfuls of coffee to use, and what channel Bravo is on.

Excited:

  • I’m leaving town for three weeks next Saturday, no matter what.
  • I found a really cool That Girl video at the Super K-mart last night, which contains not only all three versions of the opening and closing credits, but also the famed Ethel Merman episode.
  • I found a copy of Repo Man for $3.99 in the very same pile.

Randomly Monday

Yeah, I know I’ve done that stupid search engine queries thing to death, but really, just who types something like “92folsomstfair” into a search box and actually thinks they’re going to find something useful?

Unrelated:

  • Hey, it’s where I USED to live…
  • I’m in Block 11, so (after today’s outage) I’m safe. For a while…
  • Tomorrow, as it hits 75 degrees in San Francisco, my heat will be working again…

Work and Vertigo

Jeez, what a weekend. I’m working on three major client projects this weekend and they’re all starting to look alike. And somehow I don’t think the book distributor or the soccer promoter really want a site with elements from the site about semi-public cocksucking…

But my mood improved dramatically with a long drive this afternoon, and it’s gotten still better tonight with Vertigo. Twice…

Apologies to everyone whose email I’ve ignored over the past three or four days. It will get better soon. Maybe…

Tech Assholes

So suppose you’re working on a site redesign for a client who’s moving to a new proprietary database-driven server application. Suppose you’re given minimal instruction on how to design for this mystical new server application no one’s ever really used before. And suppose you have a question related to the rather uninformative FAQ you were sent.

Suppose their response to your query is “this question is already covered in the FAQ. Please look it up.”

While you’re supposing, please suppose that you’re neither an idiot nor a 12-year-old. Suppose that, had the information been clear, you wouldn’t have asked the fucking question in the first place. And suppose you know that it would have taken this account rep about five seconds either to have cut and pasted the text in question into her message, or at least to have referenced just where in the FAQ this information was.

Suppose you emailed her back with the diplomatic and businesslike translation of this:

“Look, you condescending bitch. I don’t respond well to rudeness and flippancy. We’re working together to help a mutual client here. But this client has a much longer-standing relationship with me than with you, and I’m not above making your life a living hell.”

Suppose that would be a bad thing?

Music

Music. It used to be one of the primary ways by which I defined myself, although it was usually more about what I hated than what I liked.

I guess it still is, in a way. But I’m not really an active consumer now. I don’t buy music. I don’t keep up with who’s who and what’s what. I’m not constantly looking for something new. I listen to songs. I like some of them and I hate even more of them. And then I’m done with it.

Music has become a somewhat passive, background sort of thing for me, with certain excpetions. And the idea of owning music was never quite the same after I stopped being the music director at my college radio station. In other words, after everything stopped being free. It’s gone downhill for me ever since.

Which is why I like the idea of Napster, but also see a very real problem with it. Yes, many people sample music there, which they may very well purchase at some later point. But I have a sneaking suspicion that more people are looking for something specific that they really want to hear but really don’t want to buy. Ever.

Anyhow, that’s what I’d use it for, given a fast enough connection to make it worth the effort.