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Some of what I've been up to:
On Saturday I went a little crazy and to Microcenter (hey look, zeugma!) and bought a laptop. It was less than $1k (after mail-in rebates, grumble) and seemed like a pretty reasonable deal. I especially like the widescreen display (1280x768). So far I've pretty much gotten used to the trackpad, although it's still a big pain to drag things (e.g. scrollbars, although the scroll-slide maneuver is nice, when it works). So far Windows XP has managed to wedge twice in 3 days. I will probably try to install Linux eventually, at least dual-boot, although my plan was actually to just test-drive this for a few months and then maybe think about selling it and getting a custom-built Linux laptop from PCs For Everyone. (Oops, I keep forgetting they're called "notebooks" now, probably because they'll burn your lap if you actually put one there. I prefer to use that term for, you know, actual notebooks.) Oh, and I got a printer, too, because it was only $30 (after mail-in rebate, because I bought it with the laptop), but I haven't actually taken it out of the box yet. It claims to do 2-sided color printing, which would be convenient.
Sunday was a team meeting/warm-up session for the MIT Mystery Hunt next wekeend. It was good to meet my new team, although I already knew 5 or 6 of them. There were about 20 people there, which is somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of the expected team size; part of the purpose of the warm-up was to work out some of the logistics of managing the workload to maximize enjoyment and efficiency (in that order). I think there are still some organizational kinks to work out (like how best to do triage when new puzzles are available, and in particular how to make sure people know about new puzzles that they would enjoy more or be better at than the ones they're currently working on) but overall I think it will go fairly smoothly. The warm-up mini-hunt was a bit frustrating (but probably the perfect preparation) because it was really made for more of an all-day affair than an afternoon, so we only managed to finish 4 of the 10, got about halfway through most of the rest, and never even really looked at the meta-puzzle. One puzzle had the clue "Surname of guy from Half x", where x was meant to be filled in from the answer to another clue (but we didn't know which one); what instantly came to my mind was Jad Fair of the band Half Japanese, which seemed unlikely (and which nobody else knew) but turned out to be the actual answer. So I guess my trivia knowledge may come in handy. The laptop was handy too, although I spent much more time with just a pencil and paper.
Monday I got a nice taste of my old pre-dissertation-death-march life, going to the Brattle Theater and the Twisted Village record store, neither of which I had been to in many many months. I saw a matinee double feature of Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2 and bought 7 CDs: Major Stars 4, Six Organs of Admittance The Manifestation, Skye Klad The Musick of Cupid's Orkustra Asleep Within the Magick Powerhouse of Oz, King Kong Kingdom of Kong, Science Kit 7 Times Around, The Leaving Trains The Lump In My Forehead, and Love As Laughter Destination 2000. The first three are 2004 releases, and the rest were used discs in the 4/$10 bin. If you're especially curious about any of these, let me know and I can put up a sample track, otherwise if anything particularly sticks out when I get around to listening to them all it will go into the queue for a future music sharing post. Which, by the way, I think I've decided to cut down to once per week, to prevent it from drowning out the other content in this journal (which has been somewhat sparse lately). Unless there's a hue and cry for more frequent posts, that is, or unless I get impatient or bored.
On Saturday I went a little crazy and to Microcenter (hey look, zeugma!) and bought a laptop. It was less than $1k (after mail-in rebates, grumble) and seemed like a pretty reasonable deal. I especially like the widescreen display (1280x768). So far I've pretty much gotten used to the trackpad, although it's still a big pain to drag things (e.g. scrollbars, although the scroll-slide maneuver is nice, when it works). So far Windows XP has managed to wedge twice in 3 days. I will probably try to install Linux eventually, at least dual-boot, although my plan was actually to just test-drive this for a few months and then maybe think about selling it and getting a custom-built Linux laptop from PCs For Everyone. (Oops, I keep forgetting they're called "notebooks" now, probably because they'll burn your lap if you actually put one there. I prefer to use that term for, you know, actual notebooks.) Oh, and I got a printer, too, because it was only $30 (after mail-in rebate, because I bought it with the laptop), but I haven't actually taken it out of the box yet. It claims to do 2-sided color printing, which would be convenient.
Sunday was a team meeting/warm-up session for the MIT Mystery Hunt next wekeend. It was good to meet my new team, although I already knew 5 or 6 of them. There were about 20 people there, which is somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of the expected team size; part of the purpose of the warm-up was to work out some of the logistics of managing the workload to maximize enjoyment and efficiency (in that order). I think there are still some organizational kinks to work out (like how best to do triage when new puzzles are available, and in particular how to make sure people know about new puzzles that they would enjoy more or be better at than the ones they're currently working on) but overall I think it will go fairly smoothly. The warm-up mini-hunt was a bit frustrating (but probably the perfect preparation) because it was really made for more of an all-day affair than an afternoon, so we only managed to finish 4 of the 10, got about halfway through most of the rest, and never even really looked at the meta-puzzle. One puzzle had the clue "Surname of guy from Half x", where x was meant to be filled in from the answer to another clue (but we didn't know which one); what instantly came to my mind was Jad Fair of the band Half Japanese, which seemed unlikely (and which nobody else knew) but turned out to be the actual answer. So I guess my trivia knowledge may come in handy. The laptop was handy too, although I spent much more time with just a pencil and paper.
Monday I got a nice taste of my old pre-dissertation-death-march life, going to the Brattle Theater and the Twisted Village record store, neither of which I had been to in many many months. I saw a matinee double feature of Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2 and bought 7 CDs: Major Stars 4, Six Organs of Admittance The Manifestation, Skye Klad The Musick of Cupid's Orkustra Asleep Within the Magick Powerhouse of Oz, King Kong Kingdom of Kong, Science Kit 7 Times Around, The Leaving Trains The Lump In My Forehead, and Love As Laughter Destination 2000. The first three are 2004 releases, and the rest were used discs in the 4/$10 bin. If you're especially curious about any of these, let me know and I can put up a sample track, otherwise if anything particularly sticks out when I get around to listening to them all it will go into the queue for a future music sharing post. Which, by the way, I think I've decided to cut down to once per week, to prevent it from drowning out the other content in this journal (which has been somewhat sparse lately). Unless there's a hue and cry for more frequent posts, that is, or unless I get impatient or bored.
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From: (Anonymous)
Laptop from PCs for Everyone
Despite being a 13-year user of linux, I must admit, I love my PowerBook. I wrote about it a while ago:
http://mkgray.com:8000/blog/Technology/General/Switched.html
Definitely think twice before getting a PC4E laptop though.
...Matthew
From:
Re: Laptop from PCs for Everyone
WHen I last bought a computer, I looked at getting a laptop from PCfE. The problem was, while they built and did quality control for their desktops, they were basically a reseller for their notebook lines. Significantly fewer customization options, and they couldn't do in hosue repairs or the same level of QC. After finding a few bad experiences with PCfE online, I decided to use them for a desktop, but if I was going for something smaller, to look elsewhere.
From:
Re: Laptop from PCs for Everyone
Matthew: I can't get to that link.
From:
mobility envy
Now I want to buy a laptop/notebook/tote-able computer.
From:
Re: mobility envy