Sight 2 and other things
Aug. 3rd, 2001 09:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ocelotLast week I mentioned that I thought something might be off with my contact lens prescription. Turns out I was right - it's too strong. So now I have another pair to try out. Since I've pretty much adjusted to these ones, I'm hoping that everything won't look disappointingly blurry.
I really must learn to trust myself more about that kind of thing, since my feelings tend to be accurate even when I think it's probably just my imagination.
For work talk, discussion about trashy novels, and mundane life stuff, read on...
I got more done at work after 5 today than I have the whole rest of the week (well, that's a slight exaggeration, but I have been astonishingly unproductive this week). I think it's the iced mocha I had after the optometrist appointment. Perhaps I should start drinking coffee in the mornings again. There's a little coffee shop on the way to work - it kind of sucks, but if caffeine can get me moving, it might be worth it.
Today I went shopping at the grocery store I shopped at before I moved. The store near my house is the same chain, but it sucks compared to the one I used to go to. Since I was in the neighborhood, I decided I might as well stop in and get some coffee, and ended up doing a small shopping trip. It felt kind of weird, since it was the middle of the workday, but I couldn't do anything till the bus came anyways, and they have a bunch of stuff I love that the other branch doesn't carry.
So, I got some popsicles to share with people at work, some hummus (my branch doesn't carry hummus. Can you believe that?), a thing of salmon chowder (yummy yummy yummy), and this lavender scented bath stuff for my mom's birthday. Oh, and the aforementioned iced mocha.
Got back to work, and sat around for two hours until 5, when I suddenly decided to be productive. Fixed some issues on our file server, discovered that our new web server seems to be having the same problems with transferring large files as the old one did (most unfortunate...I was really hoping the server move would just magically fix that), and discovered that the power in the server room is apparently having issues every other Friday between 5:15 and 5:20 PM.
This last is quite odd, if only in that I seem to be the first person to notice it - none of the Desktop guys had noticed it, anyways. According to the UPS logs, it seems that this has been happening since at least June 22. And I really don't think I'm the only one effected by it - two weeks ago, I was working in the server room at the time, and we noticed that one of the other boxes seemed to be having power issues at the same time as mine. And today I got cut off from the billing system (which is housed in the same room) around that time (presumably the exact same time, but I don't know for certain).
Weird...very weird... If it was every week, it would make more sense - a power fluctuation due to shutting off the air conditioning for the weekend or something. But every 2 weeks? That's just odd. I'll have to inquire further on Monday.
It's almost 8, and I'm still working on stuff (though I'm at home now, at least). Why can't my energy concentrate itself appropriately into work hours?
I started a new book today - Calculating God by Robert J. Sawyer. I'm only a chapter or so into it, but it seems readable. Funny, in a kind of understated way. It struck me while I was reading it on the bus how long it's been since I've read a truly funny book. I should do that more often.
Lately I've been reading too many stupid mystery/horror novels. I realized, after staying up way too late last night finishing one (Nightshade by John Saul, for the curious. Not the best book ever, IMO), that in general I really don't enjoy them. Jonathan Kellerman is the only mystery writer I really enjoy, and Orson Scott Card the only horror writer (yes, I know, he's more science fiction. Some of his work crosses over, though). Dean Koontz is another I'll read, though his protagonists are all the same person (well, so are Jonathan Kellerman's, since most of his books are in a series about a particular person. But since they truly are all the same person, and not the same personality in different bodies, that's excusable :)
Nightshade was an interesting story, actually. The end just didn't do it for me, though. The explanation for what was going on seemed somewhat awkward and undeveloped, as did everyone but a few of the more prominent characters. It felt like he went halfway in terms of development, realized his deadline was 2 days away, and rushed through the rest. He developed characters just enough so you feel disturbed when they die, and then kills them off for no real reason.
I don't like Stephen King for similar reasons, except more extreme. He sets up likeable people to die. After a few books, you stop letting yourself relate or get close to any of his characters, because you know they're just going to get killed off at some point.
Card doesn't spare his characters (or the reader's feelings) either. In fact, he's worse in some respects. But I feel that he does it in a less callous manner. You aren't left feeling betrayed at the end. Or at least I'm not - I know others have felt differently.
And then there's V.C. Andrews. I hate her ("her" in the loosest sense of the word, since she's been dead for years. IIRC, everything past Flowers In the Attic is just "inspired by" her) books. But if I stupidly read one in a series (usually out of boredom while travelling), I'll end up reading the rest. I really don't know why I bother. Here's a summary of every single series I've read by her (exact order may vary):
Girl lives in poor family. Girl goes to rich family. Girl falls in love with her brother (knowingly or unknowingly, biological or non-biological), and becomes sexually involved with him. Girl discovers that the family she thought was her family is not her real family, and her real family is the rich family. Girl inherits the fortune of her newly discovered family. Girl encounters evil relatives who want to deny her existence, treat her as a servant, and try to kill her. They usually lock Girl in an attic or a basement or other enclosed area. Girl discovers she has a talent for something theater-related. Girl unintentionally becomes pregnant. Girl gets sexually assaulted by a relative (this may or may not overlap with the sexual involvement mentioned earlier), and occasionally a non-relative or two as well.
There. You've just read every single V.C. Andrews book that has ever been, and ever will be, written. I've saved you a lot of pain and torture. Be grateful :)
Geez, from this you all must think that I read nothing but trashy novels. It's not true. I do read too many of the things, but I read many other things, too. I just feel like discussion trashy novels today.
There are a number of car dealerships between my house and work. For the past few days, one of the cars has caught my eye, a green 1993 Honda Accord. On the way home, I checked out the price. Unfortunately, just the action of stepping off the sidewalk to check the price drew a salesman. He was a stereotypical used car salesman, with a Hawaiian shirt and everything. Just being near him made me feel creepy.
In any case, it cost more than I really wanted to pay.. After my last driving experience, I don't want anything nice. Just something that I can hopefully buy for not much more than the insurance money from the last one, that will be reliable enough to drive till I'm more sure of myself.
This Saturday I'm heading down to Berkeley, and meeting with a friend from a mailing list (possibly multiple friends, we're emailing tonight to see if anyone else wants to come along) to see Moulin Rouge. After that, I'm meeting up with various other friends (including![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tashiekitten :)
Then on Sunday, another person is coming to check out the other room. She's looking at several places, so I'm not getting my hopes up. Anyone know anyone who's looking for a place to stay in Davis, CA? :)
This means I must find time to clean between now and then - not that it will do a whole lot of good at any point before Sunday, since the cats will manage to make a mess of something or other if I'm out of the house the whole day.
Wow, I've been writing this thing for three hours. It's excessively long. I'm going to go ahead and post it before I babble any more.
I really must learn to trust myself more about that kind of thing, since my feelings tend to be accurate even when I think it's probably just my imagination.
For work talk, discussion about trashy novels, and mundane life stuff, read on...
I got more done at work after 5 today than I have the whole rest of the week (well, that's a slight exaggeration, but I have been astonishingly unproductive this week). I think it's the iced mocha I had after the optometrist appointment. Perhaps I should start drinking coffee in the mornings again. There's a little coffee shop on the way to work - it kind of sucks, but if caffeine can get me moving, it might be worth it.
Today I went shopping at the grocery store I shopped at before I moved. The store near my house is the same chain, but it sucks compared to the one I used to go to. Since I was in the neighborhood, I decided I might as well stop in and get some coffee, and ended up doing a small shopping trip. It felt kind of weird, since it was the middle of the workday, but I couldn't do anything till the bus came anyways, and they have a bunch of stuff I love that the other branch doesn't carry.
So, I got some popsicles to share with people at work, some hummus (my branch doesn't carry hummus. Can you believe that?), a thing of salmon chowder (yummy yummy yummy), and this lavender scented bath stuff for my mom's birthday. Oh, and the aforementioned iced mocha.
Got back to work, and sat around for two hours until 5, when I suddenly decided to be productive. Fixed some issues on our file server, discovered that our new web server seems to be having the same problems with transferring large files as the old one did (most unfortunate...I was really hoping the server move would just magically fix that), and discovered that the power in the server room is apparently having issues every other Friday between 5:15 and 5:20 PM.
This last is quite odd, if only in that I seem to be the first person to notice it - none of the Desktop guys had noticed it, anyways. According to the UPS logs, it seems that this has been happening since at least June 22. And I really don't think I'm the only one effected by it - two weeks ago, I was working in the server room at the time, and we noticed that one of the other boxes seemed to be having power issues at the same time as mine. And today I got cut off from the billing system (which is housed in the same room) around that time (presumably the exact same time, but I don't know for certain).
Weird...very weird... If it was every week, it would make more sense - a power fluctuation due to shutting off the air conditioning for the weekend or something. But every 2 weeks? That's just odd. I'll have to inquire further on Monday.
It's almost 8, and I'm still working on stuff (though I'm at home now, at least). Why can't my energy concentrate itself appropriately into work hours?
I started a new book today - Calculating God by Robert J. Sawyer. I'm only a chapter or so into it, but it seems readable. Funny, in a kind of understated way. It struck me while I was reading it on the bus how long it's been since I've read a truly funny book. I should do that more often.
Lately I've been reading too many stupid mystery/horror novels. I realized, after staying up way too late last night finishing one (Nightshade by John Saul, for the curious. Not the best book ever, IMO), that in general I really don't enjoy them. Jonathan Kellerman is the only mystery writer I really enjoy, and Orson Scott Card the only horror writer (yes, I know, he's more science fiction. Some of his work crosses over, though). Dean Koontz is another I'll read, though his protagonists are all the same person (well, so are Jonathan Kellerman's, since most of his books are in a series about a particular person. But since they truly are all the same person, and not the same personality in different bodies, that's excusable :)
Nightshade was an interesting story, actually. The end just didn't do it for me, though. The explanation for what was going on seemed somewhat awkward and undeveloped, as did everyone but a few of the more prominent characters. It felt like he went halfway in terms of development, realized his deadline was 2 days away, and rushed through the rest. He developed characters just enough so you feel disturbed when they die, and then kills them off for no real reason.
I don't like Stephen King for similar reasons, except more extreme. He sets up likeable people to die. After a few books, you stop letting yourself relate or get close to any of his characters, because you know they're just going to get killed off at some point.
Card doesn't spare his characters (or the reader's feelings) either. In fact, he's worse in some respects. But I feel that he does it in a less callous manner. You aren't left feeling betrayed at the end. Or at least I'm not - I know others have felt differently.
And then there's V.C. Andrews. I hate her ("her" in the loosest sense of the word, since she's been dead for years. IIRC, everything past Flowers In the Attic is just "inspired by" her) books. But if I stupidly read one in a series (usually out of boredom while travelling), I'll end up reading the rest. I really don't know why I bother. Here's a summary of every single series I've read by her (exact order may vary):
Girl lives in poor family. Girl goes to rich family. Girl falls in love with her brother (knowingly or unknowingly, biological or non-biological), and becomes sexually involved with him. Girl discovers that the family she thought was her family is not her real family, and her real family is the rich family. Girl inherits the fortune of her newly discovered family. Girl encounters evil relatives who want to deny her existence, treat her as a servant, and try to kill her. They usually lock Girl in an attic or a basement or other enclosed area. Girl discovers she has a talent for something theater-related. Girl unintentionally becomes pregnant. Girl gets sexually assaulted by a relative (this may or may not overlap with the sexual involvement mentioned earlier), and occasionally a non-relative or two as well.
There. You've just read every single V.C. Andrews book that has ever been, and ever will be, written. I've saved you a lot of pain and torture. Be grateful :)
Geez, from this you all must think that I read nothing but trashy novels. It's not true. I do read too many of the things, but I read many other things, too. I just feel like discussion trashy novels today.
There are a number of car dealerships between my house and work. For the past few days, one of the cars has caught my eye, a green 1993 Honda Accord. On the way home, I checked out the price. Unfortunately, just the action of stepping off the sidewalk to check the price drew a salesman. He was a stereotypical used car salesman, with a Hawaiian shirt and everything. Just being near him made me feel creepy.
In any case, it cost more than I really wanted to pay.. After my last driving experience, I don't want anything nice. Just something that I can hopefully buy for not much more than the insurance money from the last one, that will be reliable enough to drive till I'm more sure of myself.
This Saturday I'm heading down to Berkeley, and meeting with a friend from a mailing list (possibly multiple friends, we're emailing tonight to see if anyone else wants to come along) to see Moulin Rouge. After that, I'm meeting up with various other friends (including
tashiekitten :)Then on Sunday, another person is coming to check out the other room. She's looking at several places, so I'm not getting my hopes up. Anyone know anyone who's looking for a place to stay in Davis, CA? :)
This means I must find time to clean between now and then - not that it will do a whole lot of good at any point before Sunday, since the cats will manage to make a mess of something or other if I'm out of the house the whole day.
Wow, I've been writing this thing for three hours. It's excessively long. I'm going to go ahead and post it before I babble any more.
