Appliance Repair Wisdom for the Ages

Wednesday, November 13, 2002

Clawing my way out of Computer Hell

It's been a tough haul out of the mess that the Yahoo Intellisync program made on my computer (Intellisync lets you synchronize your Palm calendar with with a database on the internet so Grasshoppers could look at it and Mrs. Samurai could add things like watching the kids to it.) I had to completely reformat my hard drive...several times, and do a clean reinstall of Windows. The system still wasn't stable so I had to take it back to Dr. Tim, the designer and builder of my awesome computer, for major surgery. He chanted Hare Krisha over it and sprinkled it with magic Woofle dust and got it running right again. But I've emerged from that disaster with a more robust system. We now have four computers networked together and connected to a broadbad internet connection through a router. Another benefit of the router is that it's a hardware firewall, so all the computers are protected from malicious probes.

Haven't been doing much 'pooting lately. Been busy getting my shop set up for the gasket fabrication service I'll be launching soon. It's been a lot of back-breaking work clearing out the basement, throwing out four full-size pickup truck loads full of accumulated junk, making room for the 4' by 8' gasket fabrication table that I have yet to build. The pallet of gasket stock, magnets, and the gasket welder were all delivered by freight truck yesterday. They're being stored outside under several tarps, hopefully impervious to the steady rain we've had for the last two days. I'll move them into the workshop tomorrow and they'll stay there until the fabrication table is built, hopefully later this week. Stay tuned for some exciting pictures.

In keeping with my migration away from Yahoo, I've given myself over to the Dark Side and jumped into the MSN camp with both feet:

• I'm using a Hotmail account for my main email client and will eventually close the Yahoo account as important email gets switched over to Hotmail. My Hotmail address is samurai_appliance_repair_man@hotmail.com. Use it in good faith.
• I deleted the Appliantology group at Yahoo Groups and reincarnated it in MSN Groups. After I've finished the housekeeping (e.g., uploading photos and files, adding links, customizing the appearance, etc.) I'll open it up for the Grasshoppers to peruse and join
• I even downloaded and installed the new MSN 8 software. It's pretty cool but all the features don't work in the downloaded version so I'm waiting for the CD to arrive. If it does all it's hyped up to do, it'll be well worth the $10/month. And, by the way, it includes its own version of Intellisync so I can give it another shot.
• I pinned up a 4' x 7' blowup of Bill Gates' face on the wall directly behind my monitor so I can always feel the imperious gaze of the Master. We are Borg, resistance is futile.

Another change I've made is to change the forum from an open forum where anyone could post to a Membership-By-Admission (MBA) forum. To be approved for membership, you have to contribute to the United Samurai Beer Fund. Details on this coming in another post.

With a computer workstation installed downstairs now, I can listen to Live365.com while I'm working down here. My favorite stations are Radio Prank . Com and ((( HaLLuCiNoGeNiC ))). Radio Prank has some really funny schtick on it and it's well worth the $5/month subscription to Live365.com to get it.

More coming soon, stay tuned.

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