3.06.2008

Musings and such...

Just a few things to update what is going on in my life right now. Work is progressing at a steady, albeit slow, pace. My immediate boss is a young woman probably 15-18 years my junior and although she is sweet and nice she is also somewhat condescending to others. I respect what she has accomplished and where she is but what I feel she does not understand is that what we do there is not that difficult of a job. I will have everything down and be proficient within a month. But there will be no rocking of any boats by me. I really like this company and what I do there does not matter to me, working for the company is what matters. For now having a non-challenging job is really nice after all the stress I have endured the past year. I think things can only get better as time goes on here. I have finally figured out what I should have become in my life. I love to learn. I love photography. I love history. I wish I would have figured out 20 years ago that what I should have become was a professor at a small college. What I would like to have become is a teacher of the impact that photography had on human civilization. Not teaching photography but rather what photography did for mankind. How it changed us. I still believe I will pursue this but now for personal gain. I have long since passed the option of being able to go to school and become what I was meant to be. We all have paths laid out for us but it is our ability to have free will that causes these paths to change course from the original destination. Maybe as an amateur I will still be able to write a short paper about the impact of photography on mankind. I know it has been before but maybe I can find a new angle or point of view to express it in a different way. Maybe not. Maybe I am just a guy on the back end of my life wishing I had done things differently, knowing that my best years are behind me and I don't want to admit that. Who knows but with the power of the internet and even this very blog, all of us can be what we always wanted to be.

3.02.2008

Windows (you know, Microsoft) is so yesterday...

Some time back I downloaded a copy of Puppy Linux as I read that it was a pretty good version of Linux and it was designed to boot off of a cd disc. I did boot up with it but just never had the time to really see what it could do. Well, this weekend I finally got around to really getting into it and I have to say I am very impressed. the whole operating system is only 99mb in size and yet I have been able to everything I could do with Windows. Now I have attempted to connect external items such as printers and scanners (it does come with a built-in pdf print driver) yet but that is the next step and I am quite confident I will be able to get them to work. The really good part about this system is whenever I watch video or listen to audio I don't get the broken sound and pictures like I do with Windows. My laptop is at the lower end of todays systems (1.4 Celeron, 1 gig memory) and I usually have to wait for the video to load before I can decently watch it. Not so with Puppy Linux, the video loads quickly and plays back flawlessly as it is loading. As I type this right now I am using Puppy loaded directly into ram without installation to the hard drive. I am now sure just how much better this can get and it boots up on less than a minute (compared to 6 minutes with windows) and shuts down in about 20 seconds. That will mean 6 more minutes of battery life if not more due to less power consumption ( I am not sure if that is true or not but I would think less processing power need would equal less power usage but I am not sure about that). I already know that all of my pen drives work with it including my 120gig portable hdd. Even though it comes with a full suite of office-type programs I primarily use Google's online documents tools so that is not a problem either. I did download what I felt was a better music player than the one it came with but that was a minor detail. Overall I feel it is a very strong alternative to Windows XP and I am quite sure I will be using it more than I will use Windows. Well, after 2 1/2 days on the job I am very pleased with it. I wish I earned more money but don't we all. I am having to start over on the ground floor but I really feel there is room for advancement and earning potential at this employer. It is a fairly large company owned by a really large company so there is plenty of ways to go. I believe that if I work hard and perform at a high level the rest will take care of itself. The benefits as a whole are better than I have ever had before so I am looking forward to that part of the deal. My medical will be paid for, PTO time earned at a good rate and more holidays off than at any point in the past. The work is not all that hard, booking and warranty administration had more to remember than this but that is not to say there is not a lot to learn. Within an month I will be proficient at my job and by the end of my 90 day's a s a Manpower temp I will be quite proficient. I like the people I work with, it is a good, stable company to work for and they really seem to like my attitude and work ethic so it should work out quite nicely. Air conditioned without air hammers going off in my ears all day and without worry of grease getting on my clothing. Almost everyone there wears jeans but I like wearing slacks and dress shirts so I will continue for the time being.