Linux, musical road-dogging, and daily life by Paul W. Frields
 
Category: <span>Doom + Gloom</span>

Robocalls not appreciated.

According to a robocall we received yesterday, our school system has just found out they can automate the process of calling a sizable chunk (if not all) of the schoolchildren’s parents in the county to alert us about “important news.” And the chirpy message from our county superintendent of schools …

How I’ve missed your convoluted way of speaking.

Today I’m at the Red Hat Government Users and Developers Conference in Washington, D.C. As one would expect, the Ronald Reagan Trade Building has completely failed to deliver a working wireless connection without severely cracking the folds of my wallet. And of course I can’t live without connectivity, so here …

More than a footnote.

My wife alerted me last night to a terrible loss to the literary world — writer David Foster Wallace was found dead Friday night of an apparent suicide. DFW was already at 46 a giant of American literature and, even though he tended to the self-absorbed, his writing was passionate …

The curse of four eyes.

Last week my daughter, who’s seven, went for a regular eye check up. As a result, yesterday we went to order her first pair of prescription eyeglasses. Two, actually — we assume she’ll lose one, since she doesn’t have to wear them for reading. The optometrist told my wife, “Oh, …

Who watches the watchmen?

In front of “The Dark Knight” last night was a teaser trailer for “Watchmen.” To quote another geeky staple, “I have a bad feeling about this.” The Smashing Pumpkins music didn’t rattle me — very often there’s temp track music used for teasers to drum up a certain kind of …