Life is a State of Mind

Gah, I find myself once again dipping a toe into the murky waters that make up the Windows(tm) experience.

I consider myself extraordinarily fortunate that I have not had to touch any MicroSoft crap for many years now… but I inherited an old Compaq desktop and my boss suggested we put XP on it so I could do the occasional web-form written by idiots that require MSIE as the only browser. It makes sense. I can also test websites I make for MSIE compatibility (since IE can’t handle CSS properly).

So I find myself setting up the whole uber-paranoid security software suite because Windows is so vulnerable… and I discover that my information is dated… I last dabbled in the Win 98/SE era. Yikes.

Update: I have a much newer page of XP information available here. The rest of this post is for posterity only…

Here is what I have so far:
Firefox 2.0.0.1 (secure and CSS aware browsing)
Ad-Aware SE Personal 1.06 (generic spy-ware/mal-ware remover)
Spybot Search & Destroy (alternative spy-ware/mal-ware remover)
McAfee VirusScan (corporate license, thanks to the company I work for)
cygwin DLL (because I still type like a UNIX/Linux geek)
putty (because Windows Telnet/Terminal sucks enormously)
gvim70 (because vim is better than notepad)
Opera 9.1 (alternative fast browser for low memory Windows boxes)
VideoLAN 0.8.6 (best media player with no spyware in it at all)
Synergy 2 (lets me treat side by side desktops like a two headed machine, cut & paste and same mouse/keyboard shared over both monitors/machines)

It appears that ZoneAlarm is no longer essential because the built-in XP firewall is pretty good, but is that really true? I really liked ZoneAlarm’s program manager, which prevented bad Windows software from getting out to the network… not sure yet if XP firewall can do that.

XP has a built-in graphic file viewer, so IrFanView is not needed anymore.
XP has a built-in xntp network time protocol client, so Dimension 4 is not needed anymore.

SecureCRT and NetTerm are competitors with Putty - looks like they all work equally well.

What other suggestions do people have?

What makes your Windows XP box useful?

So I had no interest in getting myself an iPod nor any other portable music player since I left the military. I had a Walkman, and later a portable CD player - but then I stopped traveling regularly and no longer needed portable music. I listen to music all the time on my computer, home stereo, and in my car, but I have not needed portability.

Years ago my wife snagged a Diamond Rio 500 (slick little MP3 player) and it was an interesting novelty, and remains a decent MP3 player because it uses standard memory cards and can be expanded easily. When she later got an early iPod, I inherited her old Rio 500 and used it for short bike rides. That has been good enough for years.

She upgraded her iPod, and sold her old one to our dance teacher. Recently she just upgraded again (she has a shiney new black 60GB iPod Video), and once again I inherited her old device, this time a very nice 20GB 4th generation iPod. Initially I was thinking, what would I do with this thing…

After a few days I figured out that I needed some accessories to make it work, so I grabbed:

Dock everything combo adaptor ($23):
http://www.sendstation.com/us/products/pocketdock/combo.html ( it is smaller and handles both firewire and USB connectivity and charging)

Y-adaptor with volume controls ($16):
http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/smartshare/” (for sharing your audio with someone else’s headphones)

Headphones for travel:
Etymotic ER-4P ($160) - noise dampening Canalphones (http://www.etymotic.com/ephp/er4.aspx)

Belkin headphone to headphone plug cable (apple store) - this plugs my iPod into the Prius

So the noise blocking Etymotic headphones are stunningly awesome, both as ear-plugs (-38dB makes for a really quiet airplane ride) and as fantasically clean audio monitors for great music and really easy to hear spoken words. Shure and Ultimate Ears both get good reviews too, but for the music I listen to the Etymotics have cleaner crisper sound. If you like rap and never listen to classical, you might check out the Etymotic ER-6i, Shure E2C/E3C/E4C, or Ultimate Ears Super.fi 5 Pro instead (for less money than the ER-4) or the Shure E5C or E500PTH if money is no object.

I spent the recent trip to the Bahamas listening to fun podcasts and music, and I gotta confess that though I am a late adoptor to the whole iPod/portable music scene, I am now thoroughly infected with the bug.

This is a novel way to beget a Soccer buddy:

Thanks Kate!

I know it’s a paid for commercial for the music group “The Bastard Fairies” and that it was all scripted, but the truths coming out of this little girl’s mouth are so profound and so awesome that I had to share it. Also, the band is giving away their first album in MP3 format and asking people to download and share it if they like the music, I do.

I am reading Sam Harris’ “The End of Faith” right now - so her diatribe about religion causing violence strikes a familiar chord in me. Anyway, enjoy. I downloaded the album “Momento Mori” and I am enjoying it - though I’d like to buy higher quality version I think.

So for about ten years I have had sinuses blocked pretty regularly. I have gone to over a dozen medical doctors and perhaps a half-dozen nurse-practitioners in at least two different medical clinics (changed from FemCare to Herndon Family Medicine years back following changed insurance coverage). I have made appointments and been seen for sinus infections at least quarterly, and general sinus blockage at least as often.

Sometimes it is clearly an infection, and anti-biotics usually help kill the infection. Occasionally I was told it was a virus; and the usual rest and hot liquids regime are typical. Most often I have been told it was general airborne allergies and I’ve had a long list of anti-histamines prescribed over the years; none of them particularly effective. I was told that as I got used to one, it became less effective so they’d switch me to another.

For three years now I have been unable to exhale through my nose except for rare 1-3 minute periods after I take a steroid spray or when taking Neo-Synephrin (which I refrain from taking except when particularly blocked because medical people said it has long-term effects - so I’ve only hit that about once a quarter since 1998). Nothing works and I am getting worse.

Rant and light at the end of the tunnel after the fold…
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Home Again, Jiggety-Jig.

A week in the Bahamas was nice, but I had enjoyed Curacao, Belize, and Cozumel much, much more. Nothing horrendously wrong in Nassau, but nothing overwhelmingly nice about it either. Erci wanted to declare a few extra pounds of body fat at customs because we ate pretty well most of the time we were there.

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We got out of Washington National Airport just fine on Saturday, transferred in Charlotte flawlessly (as usual) and landed in Nassau, Bahamas with no problems. This time US Air did not lose any luggage and we were able to get to our hotel, the Wyndham Resort Nassau with no problems.

Word of advice, don’t arrive early at the Wyndham Resort Nassau. They are on “island time” here and you should arrive several hours after the nominal 4pm checkin if you want your room ready when you check in. Desiree at the check-in desk wins the award for the rudest hotel staffer we have ever met on any trip in our lifetimes. The room has two beds, one with mid-1970’s mattress and box spring, the other with a late 90’s (which is ok). We have an “island view” room rather than “ocean view” and frankly it would not matter except we are directly above the busy street and traffic noise is an issue.

Now for the good stuff… The hot tub is very hot, the pool is very cool, there is a waterfall, a waterslide, and a swim-up bar. The ocean off the hotel’s beach is not particularly nice to swim in, but the sand is nice and the beach has plenty of shade from our hotel towers as the beach faces North. Moso (asian fusion food) was fabulous, and so was Twin Brothers over at “Fish Fry” (a strip of local places halfway between Nassau town and Cable Beach). Skans cafe in Nassau is awesome and cheap (going to write a glowing review for chowhound when I get back). Mike and Joan got in last night and were missing one bag (dive gear), but the bag caught up with them by the time we finished dinner.

So far it is just good to get away from work for a while; this is the most I have needed a vacation in a long time. I post more on the trip and embed photos later. We cancelled yesterday and today’s planned diving because my sinuses are still blocked. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll be ready to ‘get wet’ in the Bahamas.