2014-04-24:

Fri:

The two jobs went pretty well, but not great. The first one ran over, as I couldn't quite figure out his problem. As near as I could tell, his network connection would die when requesting a site protected by https. I scanned with every scanner I know, turned off Norton in case that was the trouble, removed his second router, messed about with IPV6 settings, (which I didn't even know RR used, technically.) Taking off the IPV6 stuff seemed to work the best, honestly. His wife's Mac used both just fine, it didn't need any fiddling around with settings. But it seemed reliable after all that, so that's how I left it.

I was then late to my second one, cleaning out three machines. That lady has a daughter that's in collage or about to graduate, she must be mid twenties by now. She then has another daughter that's maybe 5-6? And a son that's less then two. I admire her dedication. And for keeping her sanity for this long.

Anyway, the three machines fell easy to my skill checks, and I came back home.

What did I do… it's something I've done before- oh writing, that's it. 

Got up to 76,896 words. One chapter and I'll be happy with the length, I still have the final guardian fight to go through, then retaking the island, then rubbing DeVille's nose in it. It may end up, well, not as long as book 3, but longer then books 1-2. Super.

Game tomorrow, and no work. Game is late, too. 7:00. At least I don't think we'll have to worry about snow.

Sat:

Stayed around the house, noticed my driveway is peeling up in the back. Weirdest thing, the front is just fine, but the back is almost disintegrating. Worried.

Wrote more, duh. 79,677 words! So close!

Nicer. 

Went over to Sean's, later then usual. Got through most of the current adventure, which moved the plot forward a bit. Stopped just after the "Make sure they won't be a problem later," bad guy exit. We'll get you next time, bad guy!

Sun:

Got my new car radio put in. Wanted to have my father help, so I figured I would just get the space ready, take off the panels and such, then when I got stuck, finish it over there. So I started… and just kept going. An hour later it was hooked up and the front was put back together again. Huh. Wasn't as bad as I thought.

it was still a little annoying, tying the harness cables together. Tell me why there isn't a standard plug on the back of those things?

Anyway, it sounds much better. No more weird hissy electrical noise from having all those adapters and FM transmitters and such hanging off my cigarette lighter. It shows the song, has equalizers, thanks mom and dad!

Had a short visit as Heather was not feeling well. On the way home from trying to start her car (I forgot to find out if they did!) they stopped and picked up my metal scrap and saw my driveway problem.

Straightened up a bit. 

Used up the last of the resin stuff, which I came just short on, sadly, to make another gun. I'll have to get some more, I was hoping to squeeze one last cast out of what I had. Ah well. The one part was kind of nasty, I hope it works. I think it doesn't react well to mosture, which probably got into the container.

Did a bit of writing in the evening, not much, just to 81,753 words.

Mon:

Getting warmer, finally. Enjoyed my new car sounds while shopping. I didn't go to the bank, I should have checked, but I figured they wouldn't be open. Mail came however, so I bet they were. Oh well.

Spent most of the day trying to get 10.9 installed on this stupid Dell e6400 machine. Given that on ebay, they go for 1/3 the price of an equivalent Mac laptop, even though they are the same speed and specs. I did this because my mother expressed interest in replacing her aging iBook, something I didn't know she was interested in.

So I tried various things, following different guides but which gave the same results- utter failure. It wouldn't boot for more then a few seconds before rebooting itself.

In despair, having already given up, I put the HD back in to install windows so I could update the BIOS, the only thing different between the guide and what I was trying. I also hit the "defaults" button in the BIOS options screen, so everything would be put back.

Naturally, it booted beautifully. 

Loaded the kexts for it, got everything working on it, and if I must say, much better then Vista ran on the machine. Like, words apart. I thought maybe the SSD was particularly slow. Nope. (Chuck Testa) Runs great with OS X. Sound, video resolution, ethernet, trackpad, all work great. Not so much wireless, sigh. Ordered a tiny little USB wireless adapter, for $9.99, which has Mac drivers available. That should finish the thing off.

Now that's what I call reuse/recycle. 

Did my one job, writing a letter to the bank explaining how the old dude got scammed by the cold callers. Honestly, some old dude shows up to his bank with a $700 charge from India, the company website printed on the "company" papers doesn't exist, banks should know about scams… why are they giving this guy such a hassle? He was scammed by scumbags. Give him his money back! Good luck, dude.

Some calls today, My Buddy, and people I didn't reach yesterday, mostly. Sigh. Oh well, should have work for tomorrow, thank goodness.

Worked on the book, up to 82,947. Mostly thought about the next opponents for them when they reach the island. Hopefully they don't one shot these guys too! 

Also remembered about some bugs in battle runner and paragon database, so I went and fixed them.

One job for tomorrow, sigh.

Tues:

Did two though, in the afternoon I hooked up a wireless extender and tried to work around the horrible way Windows Live Mail does attachments. She finally decided on just using dropbox, as she could more easily send the high resolution pictures that way.

The other one was the hotel, hooking up a new printer. Their opera system is bizarre. There's a whole bunch of steps you have to go through to change the printer, is that java or just their weird implementation? I mean seriously, why are they using java for what they are doing anyway? Then he had to load adobe reader so it wasn't printing out garbage. 

Not many calls, only one job tomorrow.

Wed:

At least my writing continues. Got most of the battle one before my 2:00. That was just a cleanout, though finding the place was the problem. She said it was "200 such and such a street" without mentioning, oh, by the way, there's only one building and it's marked 100. So thanks for that.

Then came back and wrote some more.

Not many calls again, so again, I have nothing to do for tomorrow.

My new printer came, I'll have to mess around with that. It really curls up the heavier stock. And it doesn't do solid colors well at all, which you would think it would excel at. I printed a drawing, and that came out dark, but better. Maybe if I glue two of them together and then put tape over it like the stickers it'll be okay? 

Freaking cold today, and raining. In fact it's forty and windy right now, as I type this at 11:00. 

Dean and company defeated the foes, and I even made them last a whole chapter. (5 seconds) Sheesh. Up to 86,849 words. Possibly… two chapters left? One to retake the island, and one to wrap everything up, then the epilog which will be short. Excited!

Thurs:

Finished the book! 

90,717 words at present. Even did a quick read through, made a few corrections. 

Now there's just the final half of the "detective mystery" I started some time ago, and all my books will be written. Not to say I won't think of more to write, and I'll be doing more of Susan's adventures, of course. But getting the Demongate High books finally finished is very nice.

Didn't do much else today. Did get some calls, so I do have work for tomorrow. Setting some new machines up, and supposedly a printer that only prints certain things. I do love windows.

 I did get the wireless adapter, which works great. So this laptop is ready to rock out with OS X.

Now I have to rest my fingers, so no more writing tonight. 

Everyone warming up out there? No? Okay then.

See you next week.

And your gibberish for this week:

Heather help, so I bet the place was not feeling up in the way Windows so I figured I won't thing on it, got scammed by the back! Good luck, dude short. Excited!

Finish they go for keeping the last of those adapter, is that. I printer, for more of Susan's adventures that's in battle annoying, noticed my new car sounds much better that only one was not as bad as I thought.

it was inter that came back in to installed on the guides but between the from India, then Vista ran over that came back.