choke on that causality

I’m so sick of cold weather. It’s freaking April already. This shit needs to stop. I suppose it could be worse; there could be snow…

I get to take both Sammy and Makalu to the vet today. That car ride should be fun…since they love each other so much.

My damn computer crashed today and it took seriously like 20 minutes for me to get it started back up, and everything in order like I had it. Ah speaking of everything in order…there is nifty little program that I like to use to help me organize all the windows I use. It’s called Taskbar Shuffle, and it is free! Go ahead and download it. It really kinda makes you wonder why that functionality isn’t already included in Windows…

So I get my big work bonus this week. I’d be more excited about it…if I didn’t know that I’ve already spent it in one way or another…Or at least a lot of it, the rest I figure I will try to save until our big San Francisco trip in June. But ya know I do have a weakness for the Gap and Banana Republic…so I might have to buy myself a few things. Damn Luxe Card…it sucks me in with all it’s free shipping and rewards.

Chad’s given me a great tip! Google Maps now has a “Customize Directions” feature where you can drag the blue line noting a route and it will automatically re-route based on your adjustment. I tried it out and it seems to work decent when trying to make small changes. Don’t try to get to complicated because what ends up happening is it creates a bunch of intermediate stops along the way in order to do all the computing. I routed a trip from my home to Cedar Point, and knowing Google always tells me a stupid way to get there….I was able to adjust it to a more sensible route. Yay…no more mapquest…hopefully.

Check out the before and after below. You can see how it put an intermediate stop in there to get it to go in the right direction after I dragged it. Also check out the demo.

I hate hate hate it when programs you install decide to change the default application association with your different file extensions…like .wmv for instance. Why the hell would I want to open that in Nero?! I didn’t even know Nero had a video player.

Does anyone use Real Player anymore? I really hope you don’t. If you absolutely have to view a real encoded media file, I’d suggest you use Real Alternative. Also check out QuickTime Alternative. Use them. You’ll thank me. But anyhow… Real and QuickTime are some of the worst offenders when it comes to this file association crime.

It’s pretty easy to fix, but I still find it very annoying. Just open up Windows Explorer (Or just double click on My Computer).

Tools
Folder Options
File Types Tab
Find the file extension you want to change
Click the Change… Button
(This is where it gets tricky sometimes… usually the program you want will be in the easily available list, otherwise you’ll have to hunt for the .exe which will be buried away in your Program Files folder.)
OK

Be careful though when you open programs because sometimes you might miss a message that says “Would you like to make blah the default blah application for your computer. Just say NO. Although I know I have that habit of just clicking through stuff that looks like warnings. Good luck.

I have to write these project approval documents all the time at work, and many times there are sections or even tables that will get split across pages. It’s actually quite easy to fix this, if it bugs you like it does me.

1. Just select the text you want to keep together
2. Format → Paragraph → Line and Page Breaks Tab
3. Select the “Keep with next” checkbox and click OK

There ya go. Works in 99% of situations.

If you are sick of POP3 mail like I was, then you should check out IMAP. The problem with POP3 is that once you download the email, it is no longer on the server, and you can only access your mail from the one machine and one client (like Outlook) that you downloaded it to. IMAP, on the other hand, keeps the email on the server, and an email client can sync with it. It is a great email protocol to use for those of us that want to access our mail from multiple machines using multiple email clients. I can access my email now at work in addition to my default exchange email, and I can access it from both my laptop and desktop home computers.

IMAP is not available through all email providers but there are some free services you can try out. IMAP services were included with my domain, but AIM offers this service for free. It’s worth a look.

Whenever Mike is about to sneeze, I have this habit of saying “Bless you.” And then when he doesn’t sneeze, suddenly it is my fault, and I get punched in the arm. But I can’t help but do it still. He tried to do it to me the other day at the movies, and it  totally didn’t work. I’m not crazy like that. Mike said he doesn’t even know why I say “bless you”. I just do it cause that is what you are supposed to do, right? It doesn’t really mean anything. I should start saying something different…can you imagine? Someone sneezes, and I say “Be Well”. Ha, maybe it’ll catch on.

Do you know what I just realized today for the first time, and now I feel totally stupid that I never realized it before…? I remember when I was doing a lot of web development that I would go to view source in notepad to find a particular line number and the Goto Ctrl+G would be disabled. That would really erk me. Well duh. It was disabled because word wrap was enabled….I’m such a freakin idiot sometimes. I hope everyone else knows this. What other surprises does sobriety have in store for me?