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“I ain’t talkin’ to you!”

That’s apparently what Ubuntu and VMWare Server 2.0 decided to say to each other after a recent Linux kernel update. Weird. Everything was just hunky-dory between Ubuntu and VMWare Server 2.0 before the kernel update. After? VMWare would NOT load any more. Period. Solution? Recompile VMWare Server 2.0. *sheesh!* That’s dumb.

Ah, well. At least it was a trivial task. All it involved was typing a command at the command line and hitting the “Enter” key… A LOT. When it asked for my regnum, I was even able to just keep hitting “Enter” and select “no” because my regnum was already entered in the config script. Stupid silly, an annoyance. But a trivial thing overall. Oh, and sure, I don’t like the new web management “feature”. It simply does not work as well as the console management did with version 1.X. Still, the ability VMWare Server has to load 64-bit clients on a 64-bit host brings it a notch above other options out there, so I guess I’ll stick with it as my primary virtualization tool in a Linux host.

So, for future reference, I’ll know: put another potta coffee on, invoke the config script and start wearing out the “Enter key” again. By the time the coffee finishes brewing, I should be halfway through having VMWare Server recompiled/reconfigured…

Petty annoyances. At least I have fewer of them than in a typical Windows setup.

Bonus gripe: Windows machines are sometimes simply too dumb for words. Take finding and using the printer attached to this Linux box. Never had troubles configuring a Linux box to use a printer attached to a Windows machine. Find it on the network, bang! I’m on. (Heck, I’ve never–well, in the last five years of using Linux boxes off and on–had to install printer drivers in Linux for the printers I have–admittedly, all pretty current models. Every Linux box I’ve built has just “automagically” configured printers. Nice.) Other way around? Hit or miss. Sooo… downloaded and installed Safari browser on the problematic Windows machines. *Huh?!?* Installed an Apple browser to fix network printing on a Windows machine? Yep. That’s because Safari comes with the neatest lil applet to solve Windows network printing that I’ve found: Bonjour.

Bonjour just finds and configures networked printers. Period. And does it well. Heck, I’ve even installed and used it with a Windows VM running inside a Linux host to see if it would work there. It did.

Easy-peasy network printer configs.

BTW, Safari browser isn’t bad. Limited deature set (not even as configurable as Firefox from what I’ve been able to tell) and minimalist controls. For folks who like that sort of straightjacket, very nice indeed. Rendering engine is fast and reasonably accurate. Better overall than Internet Exploder, a step down from both Firefox and Opera, IMO, but still a pretty decent little browser. About on a par with using Konqueror (which is fine as a file browser) as a web browser.

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I Am Joe

Join in, everyone. Iowahawk shows us how.

I am a Wal Mart schlub in flyover country who changes my own oil and unclogs drains without a license. I.. drink beer and toss the [frisbee*] in the front yard with my kid, and I figure I can fend my way without handouts from some Magic Messiah’s candy bags. Most everyone in my family and most everyone I grew up with is another Joe, and if you screw with them, you screw with me.

What the Mass Media Podpeople Hivemind’s Chosen One and his Obamabot minions have chosen to do with their attacks on “Joe the Plumber” for asking the questions that revealed The One as a raging socialist is nothing short of declaring war on free political speech, on the middle class itself, on The American Dream.

It’s time to answer their declaration of war with the “I am Spartacus” of the 21st Century:

I am Joe, and when you screw with Joe, you screw with me.

Whatever you vote for, it is time to vote NObama. NObama is a vote FOR free speech, a vote FOR middle class values and a vote FOR the American dream, not Karl Marx’s (and Obama’s) Americas of class warfare, rampant socialism and the neutering of economic freedom.

BTW, I echo Iowahawk’s injunction:

…If you want to use it [the graqphic] as a bumper sticker, please feel free to download the image and apply with duct tape. If you want, office supply stores sell blank bumper stickers that you can put in your printer. PLEASE do not patronize any merchandise vendors (Cafe Press, etc.) who are trying to make a buck off this, unless EVERY LAST RED CENT of the proceeds go directly to Joe Wurzelbacher.

(*Yes, I changed a word and cut two to make the diatribe fit me more closely.)

Trackposted to The Pink Flamingo, A Blog For All, NN&V, and Democrat=Socialist, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

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“Mad as hell… “

When I saw the article below, it was attributed to “…the San Francisco Chronicle (the most liberal newspaper and city in the nation),” but I can find nothing to verify that, and found it elsewhere at a website that styles itself as, “a counter force to the liberal advocacy so dominant in today’s media.”

False attrribution where I first saw it or not, it’s a pretty clear outline of the financial meltdown we’ve recently witnessed:

“The average American listening to all the news of bank failures, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (who?) being taken over by the government, and now a “bail-out” of large, privately owned and well known companies, is at first bewildered, and then angry. The average American should be furious.

But with whom should Americans be furious? That seems to be the big question as political fingers are pointing in every direction. Was it greedy CEO’s with their “golden parachutes?” Was it the Democrats? Was it the Republicans? Was it Wall Street? (Who, exactly IS “Wall Street?”) The simple answer is that it is all of the above.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Jr., and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke were on Capital Hill taking a verbal beating from some of the very people who should not be asking the questions, but answering them and answering those questions under oath.

Senator Chris Dodd, (D-Conn.) and Congressman Barney Frank, (D-Mass.) are the first two who should be grilled, not by fellow politicians, but by an independent and hopefully very clever, angry, and mean attorney hired by the American people. No one from the present Justice Department need apply. Both should be asked how much money they have taken from lobbyists hired by the CEO’s of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. Since that is public record, they should then be asked what Fannie and Freddie got in return for that money. Barney Frank should be questioned about his House Bill, H.R. 3838, that is clearly designed to keep Fannie and Freddie afloat as long as possible despite all the signs that there was serious trouble ahead. But all his bill did was make the hole bigger in the side of the Titanic. Basically all H. R. 3838 did was: “To temporarily increase the portfolio caps applicable to Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, to provide the necessary financing to curb foreclosures by facilitating the refinancing of at-risk sub prime borrowers into safe, affordable loans, and for other purposes.”

…

It’s time for Americans to go to their windows and throw them open and yell, “We are mad as hell and we aren’t going to take it anymore!” Then, in November, vote the lot of them out of office!”

Read the rest here

Trackposted to , Rosemary’s Thoughts, Allie is Wired, Faultline USA, A Blog For All, Woman Honor Thyself, McCain Blogs, The World According to Carl, Pirate’s Cove, The Pink Flamingo, Cao’s Blog, Democrat=Socialist, Conservative Cat, and Right Voices, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

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The World is Too Much With Us

The “fear and trembling” that comes over me at times when I consider the state of our society is not that wholesome awe one feels in the presence of greatness, but a quivering aprehension about what the future holds for my children–a future that does not seem to hold the sort of promise that it held for me when I was their ages.

I ran across a link to this over at Jerry Pournelle’s place. Read more than the snippet below. I believe you’ll find it time well spent.

We live in a society saturated with information. The paradox of this spectacle is that we no longer possess the ability to integrate and evaluate the information which assaults us from every direction. One moment the news ticker at the bottom of the screen shows some mind-numbing drop in the stock market; the next moment, we are enthralled with some bitch queen trying to kick the shins of his lesbian competitor on Project Runway. The news media jumps from the crisis of the second to the latest Hollywood dalliance, and from there to some hopeless hyped hysteria about global warming or the health scare of the week, providing no sense of perspective about which of these might be the more important.

So it behooves us to stand back; to turn off the TV, shut down the browser, put down the paper, turn off talk radio, and truly listen — not to the screeching banshees with their banal hysteria, but rather to that inner source, be it spirit, or soul, or mind, or the wisdom acquired by life’s experiences.

And later, speaking to my own discomfort with the political landscape before ue,

We have elected those politicians who are like us in every way — and we hate them for it. They are, after all, created in our own image.

Go. Read.

Take a deep breath. Slow down. Consider current events in light of your own life’s experience, your (hopefully rich) knowledge of history and the wisdom of the sages of the ages, if you can bring yourself to even consider–as my spirit is wont to avoid doing because my own “wisdom” is such a weak and palid thing by comparison*sigh*–wisdom that has actually stood the test of time.

Stop. Look. Listen. No, really listen. Is that light at the end of the tunnel a train or what?

Just asking.

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.–Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

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I Really, REALLY Need to Get Off My Lazy Butt…

I just wasted a few minutes goofing off over at the Computer Hope website taking a quiz. Yes, I guessed on four or five questions (although since it was multiple choice, even there I eliminated all but two of four answers and only had to mentally flip coins between two options each time). I’m rather disappointed with my score:

I really prefer sauntering to the front of the class and saying to the prof, “Here’s your key,” but oh, well. Better luck next time.

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Beautiful Nonsense

This post is entirely out of order, a “response” to a post one of the voices in my head has scheduled for posting tomorrow. (And “they” say I’m crazy. They’re the ones who’re in my head! :-))

First, what I think (and hope!) is a one-minute fair use excerpt of Bryn Terfel singing a piece of beautiful nonsense powerfully and beautifully:

(Or CLICK HERE and play with your own media player)

Sure, it’s nonsense. A paean to a shade tree. Trivial lyrics. So? Unlike the nonsense songs that are common top 40 fare, it’s at least

a. beautiful music
b. beautifully performed and
c. the lyrics are not actively harmful

Those are all hallmarks of a really good song. And those are all things missing, by and large, from popular music today. I wonder why?

Go buy and listen to some Terfel of your own. It’ll be good for you.

(Completely inconsequential, niggling complaints after the jump.)

Continue reading “Beautiful Nonsense”