Stu-stu-studio!

It’s been awhile since I’ve had a hobby that’s been all-consuming, the kind that both fulfills you, and drives you bonkers while you piece it together. In this case, I’m talking about the home studio that I’ve been building for the last two years. At first, I started with the cheapest audio components that I could find. That is, I played parent to a teenager — on myself. My rationale? If I overbuy, will I use this stuff? Will this stuff sit here getting dusty until one day I sell it dirt cheap or give it to Goodwill?
	Building a studio, I’ve learned, is like building a model clipper ship. While I’ve never built such a model myself, those I know who have do it in bits and pieces. Of course, with the people who’ve built such things, they know that either the pieces fit … or they don’t. For them, the model is ruined if they add the wrong parts, or at the wrong time. Lucky for me, home studios are a great project for the eternal tinkerer. And yeah, I’m the eternal tinkering type.
One of the most critical — and crappy — pieces to buy for a PC-based home recording studio has got to be the sound card. Now, I’m not talking about the Soundblaster and friends. Those cards are fine — to a point — but they’re also inflexible, and prone to error. Of course, I’m on my third audio card right now, so maybe I shouldn’t harp on the Soundblaster too much. The biggest shortfall of soundcards is the drivers which support them. Microsoft Windows 2000/XP products support (WDM) drivers, which allow you to do latency-free input monitoring. Of course, despite the fact that we’re dealing with technology that’s almost three years old, some sound technology manufactureres are unwilling or unable to write (WDM) drivers, so the user never gets the benefit of the (WDM) technology. The (lack of) driver support for the first card lead me to jettison it within a month of buying it. The second card had much better (WDM) driver support than the first, but experienced problems when used in tandem with a second sound device, OR when I did certain things to maximize my I/O. Granted, I got 8 months of great service out of the card, but recently my recordings have been permeated with *clicks* and *pops*. I decided to sell the other cards on Ebay, and spent a little bit extra to get a total pro quality card and breakout unit. The differences are, well, totally obvious.
	Crazy awesome stuff. This card has 8 quarter inch outputs, and 8 quarter inch outputs and MIDI onboard. It eliminates both of my cards completely.

The Great American Propane Rant

In general, all junk mail of the non-sexy kind, ends up in the trash. So, when I’d received a non-bill from my propane company the other night, it was almost autochucked. But gosh, upon re-reading it? I’m glad that I didn’t!

Enclosed in the envelope was a long-winded, one-page letter. “Hello, what’s this?”, I said to myself. And sure enough, it was well worth the read. Allow me to paraphrase:

“Dear Customer:

2003 has been a difficult year already. Between the frigid temperatures, cost of materials, shortages of resources, terrorist threats, and impending war, it’s been hard on all of us.

We’ve been in the propane business for over 60 years. During this time, we’ve dealt with X amount of people, and we thank you for your business! Also, during this time, we’ve never seen this many difficult factors, as we do now.

Between the hard winter, and the cost of materials, we’ve been unable to deliver on time for a variety of factors, including the shortage of materials, and our inability to access properties due to snow/ice. We recently had a situation where one of our trucks slid off the end of a customer’s driveway, causing $750 property damage, and loss of deliveries for a 24-hour period from that driver. We urge you to keep your driveways and walkways clean.

Aside from the shortage of resources, we’ve also experience a higher demand for our services, to the extent that we have drivers working around the clock, 7 days a week, often times 70 hours a week per driver. We will, however, get you your propane, as soon as we can.

… etc …
“

So, what does this note mean? I came up with some possibilities:

1. This was a rant, pure and simple. If so, I loved it!
2. This was a newsletter, not labeled as such, that came out as a rant.
3. My propane company hates everyone, and doesn’t mind sharing.
4. The propane company is for sale, liability and all.
5. As a customer with us, you’re screwed. Here’s why…

Makin’ Babies and Puppets

Americans, or at least the Americans that I know, seem to have undergone a very discernable metamorphasis after September 2001. After sadness, uncertainty, rage, or whatever else, Americans have been producing babies at an alarming rate. I can’t tell you how many couples I know who are expecting children right now.

The fear of taking airplane trips or mingling in crowded places has driven Americans to procreate after a few hours spent having a Blockbuster night. Make tonight a Blockbuster night? No. Make tonight a babymaking night! Just push “play”. Aww yeah.

Thinking of all these arriving babies makes me think of Muslim extremists, who will no doubt be spited by every last one of these children, the same children who’ve come to an unfortunate realization that they were conceived in between viewings of “Spider-Man” and “Training Day”.

But, as usual, I ramble.

On this eve of war, I have mixed feelings about Saddam Hussein and the interesting foil he’s proven to be to the United States. To put it another way: in days of old, Saddam was a United States puppet of sorts. But the problems started when the “puppet wanted to become a real boy”. Now, it appears that Gipetto is headed back to town.

Family Business

I seem to be one of those people who finds all of the best and highest quality programs on television. My most recent find, as of a week or so ago, is “Family Business”, which is a half-hour documentary. Actually, I didn’t find the show; Tivo did. Blame Tivo. It had no reason to find it, considering that my other selections are sitcoms, cooking shows, and real-life emergency room shows.

Premise of the show? A single dad tries to find love and happiness. Well, okay, that’s not quite it. A single dad, who’s also a porn magnate (movies, toys, magazines, etc), is looking for love and happiness. To make matters more, uhh, interesting, his business partners in porn include his mother and his uncle.

The best part of the show, I think, is when his mother is interviewed. “Adam is such a nice boy”, she gloats, while in the background Adam is heard saying, “it’s a dildo with a tip that has a ‘come hither’ motion…”

Psychology of Door

As a big man, I’m a “long stepper”. That is, without trying, I end up 2-3 strides ahead of everyone when we’re walking. This leads smaller people to trudge behind me huffing and puffing, and making faster, shorter strides to keep up. I just don’t like walking slowly; I have places to go, people to see, of course.

No. Actually, it’s more the case that I don’t like tripping over my own feet, which is exactly what happens when I’m (stuck) walking behind a pack of people who are walking slowly.

Since September of 2001, companies have seemingly made every attempt to, uhh, “enhance” their physical security: more security guards, more passcard locations, super-extra locked doors, earlier building lockouts, etc. Of course, these changes are all about perception; if Al Qaeda — or even Al Roker — wants to infiltrate your company, they’ll probably do it from the inside, so your company’s putting a passcard entry on every single door is probably a horrendous waste of time and money.

In theory, new security measures are supposed to run counter to etiquette. That is, everyone who enters or leaves an area does so with their own passcard, and nobody is to let anyone else in. Of course, it doesn’t work that way. Why? Because people are lazy, or courteous, or both.

The worst part about multiple layers of doors and passcards has got to be when someone is trudging, or slow walking, behind you. Now, you don’t want the door to slam in their face, but you hate waiting for them. In general, slow walkers are of a benevolent type, and will thank you for every door that you open.

Now, I’m all in favor of manners, when applicable. But there’s something really irritating about *plod* *plod* *THANK YOU* *plod* *plod* *THANK YOU* etc. In fact, I’ve declined to acknowledge the excessive “THANK YOU’s” in any way. I’m happily a non-welcomer. You’re welcome? NO, absolutely not.

A few days ago, someone called me on it.

They: I noticed that you didn’t say “you’re welcome”.
Me: Sure I do.
They: Well, you didn’t just, and every time I see you here, you don’t.
Me: Oh, the doors?
They: Yeah.
Me: No, I don’t do that.
They: Well, don’t you think that it’s impolite?
Me: No. I think that it’s awkward.
They: Why do you think that?!
Me: Because, I was nice enough not to let the door slam in your face, despite the fact that you were walking slowly enough where I could have.
They: You see, that’s what I mean.

And what was that you mean? I will plod to kill you!

Mumble, stumble, gurgle, BEEP.

Given the new stuff that I’m writing about, I needed to do some work with my machine and sound recognition last night. That is, if you’re going to write something that includes a code example for speech recognition, it would be nice if the code actually, well, worked. So, after making some minor modifications to my notebook computer’s configuration, I started talking:

“open application whatever“

No response.

“open *pause* application *pause* whatever“

No response.

Finally, after some more playing, I got things working — or somewhat. Speech recognition, or at least with my configuration, is highly unreasonable. For instance, it appears that speech recognition closed an application because it heard comedian Dave Chapelle ranting about white women. And twice, when I scratched my shoulder, speech recognition responded: “page up.”

I’d like to write an ebonics speech recognizer. That would probably make more sizzense.

Fredericks’ II

The problem with the Fredericks catalog is that, well, you have to peruse over 50% of it to find their lousy number for customer service.

(By this time, of course, I was so amped on panties and garter belts that I almost felt compelled enough to give all passer-by’s dollar tips!)

So, today was day #2 of the Great Fredericks’ Mailing List unsubscription. And why did it take 2 days? The first day, I spent laughing uncontrollably everytime I saw the catalog sitting there on the kitchen counter. And of course, I needed a companion while I watched tv — and doing some writing last night — that I decided that “Miss Half-Dressed Spring 2003″ should sit on the couch next to my recliner.

Finally, I decided to give them a ring today, and after some terseness on the part of the (male) customer service person, was told that I’d receive no more catalogs. Now, let’s see if it works out!

And, if you want to send me one as a joke, it’ll cost you $3 per. So, don’t do that.

Pissed.

As I’ve stated before, I pretty much refuse to use urinals. I don’t like dangling my thingy basically in public, and I don’t like running the risk of getting into conversations with other men in the bathroom. That’s why, I’d guess, they call it the men’s room. Farting? Fine. Small talk. Bad. Asking for a square of toilet paper from the next stall? Suicide.

So, imagine my surprise when I heard a (somewhat) loud conversation get striked up from the urinals while I was in a stall.

Delivery guy: So, this bathroom was a real God-send!
Co-worker: What?
Delivery guy: Well, I’m a delivery guy, and it’s hard to find a place to pee.
Co-worker: Oh, I can see that.
Delivery guy: Actually, not to be gross or nothin’, but I keep a collection of plastic bottles in the truck that I’ll use in case of emergency… right there when I’m driving.
Co-worker: That’s good to know.

Now, I’m trying to contain myself. This conversation was, well, fucking excellent. I almost laughed out loud! Be calm, Gods of the rooms of men!

Upon returning to the office, I spotted my co-worker.

Me: Hey, dude.
He: Yeah?
Me: Well, not to be crass or nothing, but sometimes at my desk? I really have to pee, and don’t want to go to the men’s room, so I just open the upper-righthand drawer.
He: (laughing)
Me: (walking away)

Fredericks of Hello?!

A funny thing happened three years ago. Upon getting home from work, I’d do the same thing: collect the mail, take the dog out, eat dinner. Bills, bills bills. Pee and poop. Bachelor-style poop with barbeque sauce. Always the same, you know? After I took the dog out, and put my dinner in the microwave, I started weeding through bills:

Gas bill. Check.

Phone bill. Check.

Junk mail #1. Garbage.

Junk mail #2. Garbage.

Fredericks of Hollywood catalog. Check.

Cable bill. Check.

Fredericks of Hollywood catalog? Where’d that come from?!

Now, I should’ve known the answer to that one. But sadly, even after conjuring up fantasies of how such a catalog could grace the presence of my mailbox, I couldn’t come up with a reason as to how, or why, I was receiving such a catalog.

Did I order anything from Fredericks of Hollywood without remembering, so I ended up on their mailing list?

Girlfriend? None.

Spouse? None.

Crossdressing? None.

Hmmm. For whatever reason, my name was on the catalog. Well, my name and address or current resident. I called Fredericks to correct the error, after reviewing the catalog carefully to ensure that I’d called the correct number. They assured me that catalog delivery would cease. Thank goodness!

Of course, that was in 1999.

Before I moved out of my old house in the summer of 2002, I was still receiving the stupid catalog. I called again, and was promised that my name would be removed from the list.

Now, I had to laugh to myself a bit, seeing Fredericks’ track record with catalog delivery, and knowing that the person who’d moved into my old house was a single female. What on earth would they think of me?!

But today, I was literally rolling on the floor laughing when the Fredericks catalog found its way to my new address. (In a way, it reminded me of the time that my cat was lost for 3 days, and appeared at the door on the 4th day.) It’s not so much that I now have to contend with seeing the catalog in all of its glory once a month. It’s more the laugh I get when I think of how the Fredericks catalog came to be delivered to my new address. I mean, did the chick who moved into my old house get sick of seeing it be delivered (with my name on it, no less), and call someone like the realtor to get my forwarding address? Or does Fredericks have a smut squad that keeps track of such things?

Chick in house: Realtor, I’m sick of seeing the Fredericks’ catalogs that are getting delivered to this house. Do you have Nate’s address?
Realtor: What?!
Chick: Fredericks’ catalogs.
Realtor: As in the lingerie?
Chick: Yes.
Realtor: But I thought he was single.
Chick: Clearly.
Realtor: Oh. Ohhhhhh. Right. The catalogs.

So it Begins

This is a chronicle of NVP and CMS, on the trials and tribulations of writing a book for hire — with a heavy emphasis on trials. As always, the names have been changed to protect the guilty, the innocent, and the needlessly clueless.

Cast of Characters:

• NVP. NVP has been a publisher author since 1995, with his last title having been published in 2001. He was looking to write a technical book that wasn’t strictly about programming languages.
• CMS. CMS was a former colleague of NVP’s, and first-time author who’d originally come up with the subject matter for the book. An advocate for free software and publications, this would be CMS’s first book for hire.
• The Book Machine (TBM). TBM was the publisher with whom we’d signed a book contract. TBM was a “commodities” type of publisher, that is, one formed when a gigantic publisher bought a number of smaller publication houses — some of whom were still in fierce competition with one another, despite the fact that they had the same employer. Neither NVP or CMS had any previous working experience with TBM, so the unexpected — was to be expected.
• Hen House Publications. Hen House publications is a smaller competitor of TBM. NVP had a previous, and long-standing relationship with Hen House, so he brought the book proposal to Hen House first. Hen House, after several months of deliberations, turned the proposal down.
• Saturday Rage. Saturday Rage is CMS’s wife, to whom he’d been married for 6 months when we’d started working on the book.
• Special K. Special K was assigned by TBM to be NVP and CMS’s “editor”.
• Annie Warbucks. Annie was assigned by TBM to be NVP and CMS’s second “editor”.
• Ripper (”John”) Gore. Ripper was the publisher, who was responsible for overseeing all TBM book projects.