Tralfaz

Author: geoffand

  • Sick Again – A December tradition

    Last Sunday, I cold feel the start of a cold or flu in its infancy. Felt out of sorts, and funky. Got some meds and Monday, I felt good enough to go to work, assuming that I had dodged the bullet.

    Ha.

    Tuesday, I had a trip to Boston for a tradeshow, and apart from the usual dehydration of airplane travel, it was normal., almost uneventful. But at dinner, I knew something was coming.

    Not to be disappointed, about 1:00AM I was awakened with that distinctive, back of the throat pain indicative of a cold. Would it go up into the head, or down into the chest? Curious minds need to know, man. Needless to say, the 6 hours I spent on the floor on Wednesday weren’t pleasant. Since I didn’t leave home with good cold medicine, I got raped for $16 for Tylenol severe cold tablets in the hotel shop. Ouch. (more…)

  • Damn NCIS

    Damn NCIS

    Last weekend I finished the 12 seasons of NCIS that are available on Netflix. Not quite a binge watching, but a pretty addicting stretch of TV.

    While this isn’t a surprise, I often watch old TV shows and series on Netflix, I usually get to a point where I give up. Either the story line becomes tired and stale, or I get bored, and move on. Rockford Files and Columbo are two examples where I fade away after 5 or 6 seasons.

    However, NCIS was different. There are several reasons why I stuck with it (and will likely pick up the 13th season when it hits Netflix.)

    The Writing

    (more…)

  • Visiting Family

    Since we moved back from Arizona last year, we are a lot closer to our families, and we need to take advantage of that. Of course Barbara has been much more proactive than myself, but that is no excuse.

    Last year we visited my sister, Tracey and her wife in their home in Mountain Ranch, California. A lovely place nestled in the hills of Calaveras county, and a modest 2.5 hour drive away (depending on traffic, naturally), and loved it. The boys did as well.

    Of course, living in the country, they have a veritable menagerie of animals. (more…)

  • Computer Repair Man

    Computer Repair Man

    Earlier this week, I got a Facebook message from my sister. Their iMac was behaving poorly, lots of spin-y beachballs (the “I’m thinking” on the Mac OS-X), so I asked the usual questions.

    • What model iMac is it? (from the about and system report)
    • How much memory is there?
    • How big is the disk, and how much is used (from DiskUtil)?

    All the standard things, but the DiskUtil reported that there was a problem with the disk, and to back it up and take it for service.

    Sigh, a failing drive. And their closest Apple store is about 90 minutes away. Rustic, rural living has a downside. (more…)

  • Evernote Dumpage

    Back in 2010, I was looking for a note taking solution. I had a taste of the Microsoft solution, OneNote, but being a “Mac” person, and the fact that OneNote wasn’t cross platform, and I went looking for a solution. The obvious choice at the time was Evernote. Cross platform, and while it wasn’t as flexible and convenient as OneNote, it was serviceable.

    Over the years, the Evernote did a lot of incremental improvements, and it worked well for most of my needs. They added a pretty feature rich ios application that made adding notes from the road trivial. Adding the capability ingest PDF files, and do OCR on them, making them searchable.

    But, some things were always clunky. Exporting via copy and paste was an unmitigated disaster. It was compelled to export in some really funky HTML format that always required a shitload of finicky reformatting to make presentable. (more…)

  • Music Streaming Services Revisited

    Music Streaming Services Revisited

    In the last installment, I had raved wildly about Apple’s then new ‘Music’ service. Same price as Spotify, filled some holes that Spotify had in their library, and since they have my entire collection in their cloud, they have the inside track on offering suggestions that I will enjoy.

    Add to that the fact that Spotify’s curated playlists had been somewhat stale and I was sold. Even before the first month of the three month Apple Music trial, I was ready to cut the Spotify cord.

    However, I didn’t, and today I am increasingly glad I didn’t.

    Apple Music is still a great service, and more than a credible competitor. The selection is large, and their “For You” recommendations rock. A constantly updated set of playlists that are eerily on target to my listening habits (and no recommendations for things that are completely out of my taste – like hip-hop or country). (more…)

  • Bicycling Magazine – More hilarity

    As a Performance Bike “member“, I get a free subscription to Bicycling Magazine. I find that every month, I almost (barely) enjoy thumbing through this rag because it is chock full of hilarity. I have written on it before, and this may be my last installment.

    Like most print magazines, their once vaunted position of the monthly dissemination of information, learning, and relevance has been eroded (decimated? eradicated?) by the advent of the Internet. One no longer must wait until the mailman drops the mag in the box, or the local drugstore has it on its periodicals shelf, all the information is now at your fingertips 24/7.

    Yet, magazines cling by their fingertips trying to remain relevant. Bicycling is no different.

    However, that is not my rant today. As I mentioned in the lead-in, I didn’t consciously subscribe to Bicycling, I get it for free with my annual Performance Bike Membership. However Bicycling seems to think I will renew and pay for their rag. (more…)

  • BDIU – Driving – Audi takes top spot

    BDIU – Driving – Audi takes top spot

    In this year’s balloting for the biggest douche in the Universe – Drivers, we have a new winner. A position that has been literally owned by BMW drivers so long, it seemed hereditary, has finally been overtaken by Audi drivers.

    BMW drivers have held the top position for so long it is almost prehistoric. From the fact that they seem to come without turn signals, and that speed limit signs are merely a suggestion, as well as audacious merges into traffic on the freeway, their hold seemed unshakable.

    However, this last 12 months it is clear that a bigger group of asshole drivers has emerged. Those who drive Audi’s. (more…)

  • Insane bicyclist

    This morning, I saw quite possibly the most ballsy, insane bicyclist I have seen in a LONG time. And that is saying something.

    As I exited off of 280 at Lawrence Expressway, this dude on his bike pulled off of Lawrence behind me. The light changed, and he kept taking the whole lane, turning left on to Stevens Creek. See the picture below:

    Looks innocuous enough, but after passing under Lawrence Expressway, you get to deal with quite possibly the worst intersection in the valley. You have traffic wanting to merge into the onramp for 280 North, you have traffic turning right from the Lawrence Expressway wanting to merge left onto Stevens Creek, and you have us brave souls who actually work at Keysight or Agilent, and have to turn right. This Google Earth view of the crunch area, with the “Green” bike lane shows the chaos.

    That little strip of bike lane has a never ending, criss-crossing of cars whose drivers are impatient, and grumpy.

    This cyclist followed me onto Stevens Creek, and turned right into the Agilent/Keysight parking lot.

    A ballsy, and extremely dangerous maneuver.

  • The Aftermath

    The Aftermath

    After the low speed, but still catastrophic fall cycling yesterday, I knew that the next day would be brutal. I am not disappointed.

    The swelling is down, the golfball-sized lump on my elbow is gone, and the scrapes are scabbing up. Yay.

    However, the other damage is now coming to the front. The inventory isn’t great, but I guess it could be worse.

    The Elbow isn’t broken, full motion, but there is soreness beyond the scrapes and new scabs.

    My left hamstring seems to have a deep tissue bruise. I am wondering what the hell I did to get that. No surface bruising, but yikes, the muscle is painful.

    My nose, and left cheek have some edema’s that were caused by hard contact with my sports glasses. Enough force to pop out the lens is enough to leave some permanent marks.

    General muscle soreness in my lower back, my pectorals, and other places that will not be mentioned.

    Yep, Vitamin I for the win today.