Spectrum staircase

08 Aug 2006

Opera is an evil

08 Aug 2006

baby-eating email-eating monster that erratically crashes.

I’m not even running a Beta! I have not-many theories about why it’s suddenly become so unstable, but Gmail seems to bring out the worst gremlins. No matter, I need to upgrade to 9.01 soon in the hope it’ll improve matters (currently 8.54).

MacPro

08 Aug 2006

It’s kinda nice and all, but seriously, so expensive. I’m sure the parts are all really high quality, but that I can source pretty much all upgrade options offered for half the price or less — for example, adding a meagre two 512MB sticks costs an obscene $AU499, whilst even the most ridiculous gamer-marketed RAM (you know the stuff, it’s supposedly ‘tuned’ in pairs, etc.) can be had for $135 for two 512MB sticks (OCZ brand) — is rather telling about their horrific markup.

And yeah, I’m sure it’s all great quality and magically never crashes and all the rest of that marketing crap. Good for you guys. I’m gonna wander back over the other side of the room here and install Windows on my equally-powerful system for, oh, about 40% of the cost. And don’t get me started on the absurd cost of your monitors. I can pick up an equivalent Dell 30″ for $600 less than your offering… and if I’m content with a meagre 23″ then I can get a 24″ Dell for $400 less! Even the 20″ screens are $500 apart. Seriously, it’s completely unjustifiable and no-one in their right mind should be prepared to spend that much more for a brand.

Sigh.

I need to open a buy-a-new-computer account and start putting money into it. Well not really… I just need a new harddrive and various software licenses I guess. I think I’d miss Ubuntu too much (maybe)… I don’t even know why, nearly everything I can do here I can do in Windows (haha – does anyone else notice the beautiful inversion of that argument? I actually think I’ve been running Linux for too many years now to have posted about it in any currently-stored online blog entries! Crazy) except anything requiring a terminal. That’s almost definitely my greatest frustration, but no matter. I need software that doesn’t run in Linux and is too intensive to work well in virtualized conditions. Best option for me would be to get a whole separate computer, but then… well, this thing can feel flaky after being on for two weeks. Windows I’d probably get that every two days or so, but at least I’d think to reboot. Here, I just kill processes and at worst logout. Kernel patches are the only thing taking this down, basically.

Moral of the story… something like don’t waste your money on a shiny new Mac.

Photos, because I have been taking them and apparently have a populist streak

07 Aug 2006

Can anyone guess where this is?

Could be a social comment on the nature of emoticon-based expression, perhaps? Imprisoning, unmoving, cold… how odd! Who would think such things? :p

There is a massive building being demolished in the city at the minute. The fact they’ve left one incredibly thin wall (left of frame) standing is completely absurd, but I’m sure there’s some sophisticated engineering decision behind it. It barely looks strong enough to withstand a decent kick were one to somehow reach high enough, being (apparently) a layer of bricks thick with slightly crumbling mortar and a flimsy wooden internal support system that’s probably well and truely rotten by now.

Discourse and memory

07 Aug 2006

Stories, in the retelling, become consecrated to that circumstance. Insofar as that circumstance is allowed to persist (‘circumstance’ itself being a broadly-defined concept of context), the story (intimacy excepted) may be retold to others. But it is not anything about the story itself. The most benign of ideas may, in discourse, become of great significance — this significance stems not from the retelling; rather, the process of retelling is used to attach personal meaning that the mediocre might become magnificent.

A row of absurdly painted faces turn.

This has two links: of the context of discourse, and of the geography of events related. I do not relate the events here, but after writing this perhaps I may [wish to]. Words evoke memories, basically. The fascinating thing is not just that, but rather the ability of words evoking memories to evoke memories (that is, the words, not the memories, were the catalyst for other memories). Way to go taking a simple concept and making it complex!

The point is, the mind is awesome yet simultaneously twisted…