As part of the recent gadget clamp-down I’ve been conducting on our house, I decided it was time to amalgamate (that’s right, I know big words!) My Mediabox and my Desktop PC. This would serve many purposes, as parts of it could go to various members of my family in need of upgrades. So in-effect, my MediaBox machine was a registered “component” donor.
I’ve been wanting to do this for while, and especially now after my Mac has become my primary PC. The main part of the Mediabox PC has gone to Scott along with one of my many Hard Drives. Mel has now got a Pioneer 106 DVD-Burner and a Gigabit lan card (2 things she’s wanted for a while) and Mum will score a DVD-Rom drive, which she is in desperate need of.
In my attempt to combine everything in my little ATX case I successfully managed to blow up my Main Pc. The reason it wont start is still unsure at the moment. The symptoms are: Lights coming on, fans turning but no display. It sounds like the Mainboard but could still just be the (very under spec’ed) 300Watt PSU (as this same issue has happened to Mels PC in the past). I will have to put it through further testing to be sure. In any case I have bought a replacement Mainboard – socket478 hardware is rapidly becoming rare, due to the new Socket 775 standard. Plus I am getting a 500Watt PSU to make sure this wont happen again.
Now lets all pray my Data is ok 
My original plans of “taking it easy” last weekend fell through. In fact, not only did they fall through, I was busier than ever.
Friday night, My Mac was having trouble printing to our little networked inket printer and was being painful to get going. I’m happy to say that it is now working, but unfortunatley needs a windows machine to do so. Oh well – we’ll be upgrading our printer as soon as we can.
Saturday Mel and I did a spot of cleaning and I started my “Ebay Garage sale”, putting up all the gadgets that I no longer had use for. We then headed out to battle the weekend crowds down at the shops. I bought the John Mayer TAB books I’d been wanting for a long time and spent a lot of the afternoon learning “Daughters” – a favourite song of mine.
Saturday night was a “last minute” gig. It was local and early so I agreed to fill in at the agencies request. It was a different sort of performance for me, as it was a dinner crowd. I had to put away all my bogon music and pull out as much jazz and easy listening that I could summon on short notice. It was a good night because the location meant that Mum, David, Mel and Marion could come and check out what I do – and have themselves a good meal in the Bistro.
Sunday I helped out at church again, playing bass for their service – something I have begun to take a liking to. It is fun to play a different instrument every so often, and I enjoy the challenge of sightreading. That afternoon I spent putting a PC together for my brother Scott. His PII 333 was getting a little dated … well carbon-dated. So we headed down to Dromana to set it all up for him and catch up with my Family down there.
One of the topics of conversation was how I hadn’t had a Migraine in a while. Well I don’t know if it was the missing of the odd meal, not drinking enough, the stress of my home PC dying (long story) or the fact that my “Restful” weekend was nothing of the sort – but a dump- truck sized Migraine decided to park itself inside my head this afternoon at work. There’s very little work I can do when I have a regular strength migraine, but this one was out for gold. I had every symptom under the sun, which made the long trip home at lunchtime all the more interesting.
Since entering “Mac World” I have had my poor little laptop loaded up with everything I could possibly need. There have been a couple of programs that required me to … that’s right … spend money! They were both able to be downloaded after a simple purchase over the internet.
The first program I bought was to sync my PPC (Phone) with iCal and Address Book. There are only 2 out there, but I decided on “The Missing Sync“. It was recommended by the Apple site and was reviewed as being more stable than it’s older rival “PocketMac”. Just a couple of hiccups in the setting up stage (as I get with all sync apps) but all seems ok now. I did make use of there online support for a couple of “I’m a Mac dumbass ” issues I had.
The second program wasn’t vital, but was just something I saw on James’ Powerbook and thought “That’s Cool!”. It’s a program called Synergy (one of the many programs called that). Well they are developing something new, so now it’s called “Synergy-Classic“. It’s a little extension that enhances iTunes. I just thought it was cool. Only $8 … OK?!?
Now that I have my Laptop talking to our Novell Network at work, it is becoming a very useful (and reliable) tool. I must thank James AGAIN for putting up with my constant questions. I’ll get the hang of it all soon!
Now I just need a game … 
mel and I decided it was time. We gathered all the loose piles of tangled cables that I had collected over the last decade, threw them into a big pile on the loungeroom floor and began.
It felt like we were in therapy or maybe some kind of torture camp but we kept on until every last one of the cables was untangled from the other. I tell you, some of the knots these things manage to work themselves into would be the envy of today’s navy.
After two (or so) hours of tedious threading, we got there. there was many times on the way that I wanted to go and get the scissors and make the job 10 times easier, but Mel convinced me otherwise. Needless to say – all the cables are now categorisd into drawers as follows:
1: Computer (CAT5, USB, IDE, SATA, MIDI)
2: Audio (Optical, Coax, RCA, Mic & Jack Leads)
3: “Tele” – TV, Telephone (Antenna & Video leads)
4: Power (Kettle Plugs, T18 – Figure 8, Extension Cords, Power Adaptors)
5: Gadgets (Webcams, Remotes, Controllers, Microphones)
I give it 6 months before we’ll have to start all over.
Last Friday Lunch I was once again playing for the Staff Rock Band for a “Reading Rocks” event in the Library. We did well, and Kids really enjoyed themselves. They must have fit the entire campuses compliment into that tiny Library area. Rock n Roll!!
Friday Night Dad came over to lend me some of his Mac Mags and to give me some of his pointers on Apple operations. He hates Windows saying that “Microsoft has users, Macintosh has disciples”. I have to say, since getting my Powerbook, my IT faith is taking a sharp turn to the Apple Gods. Mel wants a Mac mini now.
Saturday I did more Mac-ing around with James. He was kind enough to let me come over, so he could load my new laptop up with all the necessary utilities and applications. It was good to be networking Macs for a change, although the way we did it was a bit wild. Seems like the files went through about 6 stops every time we copied something – still … it worked great! It was also a good opportunity to check out his Foxtel IQ – very cool. We finished up late into the afternoon and I had to rush home to be in time for when Marion came over. Yep! My day’s computer work wasn’t done yet!
Sunday I spent mostly behind a Bass guitar at my Dad’s church. I played for both their morning (alternative) service and their afternoon “youth” service. Although that might sound like a boring thing to do, some of the Rock worship music that has been written by artists such as Geoff Bullock and the like, are really good to play. Its also good chance to bone up on my chord sightreading skills.
Now that I am back at work again – I can relax 
As you can probably guess by the title, I am now the proud owner of an Apple Computer. I am posting this using my new Apple 12″ Powerbook. I found a widget that enables me to post directly onto my blog with ease.
I think this new laptop of mine will become very very useful. Once I get the hang of OSX Tiger. Thanks James for putting up with me bugging you with dumb questions!
Last night at around 7pm, whilst attempting to do my budget, our power flickered off and then back on again. I turned to Mel with a grin and said “Thank God for my UPS!”. It was then that the power went off again, and the UPS I was previously boasting about, showed it’s age by cutting out after less than 1 minute.
Our place went pitch black and oddly quiet. We managed find some candles and lit them with one of my stashed lighters. “Shouldn’t be too long” we assured each other. 20 minutes later we figured it might be a while. Its only at times like these that you realise just how dependant we are on electricity. The impulse to turn on the light in every room was overwhelming. Not to mention … no internet!! (Gasp!!)
As resourceful as we were, we got out the trusty old laptop and spent the next hour and a half watching some TV episodes and movies on it’s 15″ screen. We took a short break to go and get some take away. Hungry Jacks & Movies – I tell you, we were really roughing it!
During our trip down the road we noticed trucks and cranes working on the line. We are not sure what happened, but were certain they were the ones fixing it. The power was restored at around 9:30pm and I am happy to say that all of our clocks are now back to the correct time.
I dub thee “Willy”. A perfect companion for my Maton “Eugene”.
I finally was able to purchase my new Fender Stratocaster today – thanks Dean for letting me use my lunch break! It is a new USA “Highway 1″ model, none of that Mexican crap. I’ve been wanting one for a long time, and my recent electric gigs have prompted me to upgrade.
Fender Strats have been used for years by players such as Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler and recently by John Mayer – all favourite artists of mine. Getting a similar (cheaper) model of what they use, will help me get a tone that I like.
OK – I’m off to practice my whaling 80s licks!
( Richard – before you ask: The chord is E/G# “E bass G#” )
Yesterday was my younger brother Scott’s 14th Birthday. He had a party at the new Dark Zone in Frankston, so we decided to crash and join in on the lazer games. I had some experience ages ago at the Box Hill one, and hoped I would stand a chance at this one.
It is basically a dark room the size of a Basketball court, with heaps of little dividers to hide behind. The smoke enabled me to actually see the lazer beam shooting my younger brother multiple times (as I was chasing him around). It was lots of fun, and Mel got in the last game. She spent a lot of her time in the corner getting shot, but enjoyed it none the less.
I ended up ranking 4/10 and 6/10. Some of those little punks were really good.
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