2003/03 on Brian P. Hogan

dada in MN

Mon, 31 Mar 2003 12:55:23 +0000

dada is playing in Minneapolis at First Ave on May 30th. Unfortunately for me, I can’t go because I have to be at a wedding that weekend. Damn. I wanted to see them twice.

A Family Again

Mon, 31 Mar 2003 01:46:58 +0000

My daughter is home again, and she’s driving me nuts… but that’s
good because in a strange way, you get to the point where you miss
that. We played together today and watched the new Simpsons episode
that was on tonight. Then, as I was reading her bedtime story, she
passed out. It’s never been easier than that to get her to bed!

Snow

Fri, 28 Mar 2003 12:39:23 +0000

It’s snowing here. My high school closed today…. why can’t they have closed this much when I was in school? It could be that since we hanven’t had much snow in the last few years, everyone up there forgot how to handle it. Today should prove interesting. I have a doctor’s appointment this afternoon at my wife’s prodding. I made the mistake of telling her I haven’t been in for a physical in quite some time, so she’s making me go.

Old Friends

Tue, 25 Mar 2003 01:18:53 +0000

I went out to Sam’s Club tonight to get some food and some other stuff. I ran into an old buddy of mine from college while I was walking into the store. I haven’t seen him in over a year, and I found out that he is still going to Eau Claire. He’s graduating next year. It was good to see him.

Some people are obsessive… and then there's this guy

Fri, 21 Mar 2003 16:17:30 +0000

This has to be one of the funniest things I’ve read in a long time. Man changes name to Optimus Prime. Now I liked the Transformers when I was a kid. I had a lot of the toys and spent a long time playing with them. I’ll admit I own the first two seasons on DVD and I also own the movie. But I don’t play with the toys anymore, and I certainly wouldn’t think about changing my name!

Cisco buys Linksys

Fri, 21 Mar 2003 03:36:00 +0000

CISCO buys Linksys

We're at War

Thu, 20 Mar 2003 01:48:29 +0000

The US just launched some sort of pre-dawn strike in Iraq…. more to follow.

Still feeling Crappy

Mon, 17 Mar 2003 23:14:24 +0000

At least the Strong Bad email today led to a Trogdor Video Game! That’s been amusing me for the last ten minutes. I’m eating dinner right now and getting ready to watch the president’s speech on tv tonight, and then it’s off to bed. I am still really tired and I have no sick time left so I have to drag it into work tomorrow.

Fever And Other Yucky Things

Mon, 17 Mar 2003 03:40:35 +0000

I’m really sick right now. I don’t think I’ll be going in to work
tomorrow if I still feel the way I do. I’ve had a really high fever
and I’ll probably go to the doctor in the morning to see if anything
can be done… I’ve been sick since Friday morning.

The Video Machine

Fri, 14 Mar 2003 03:43:11 +0000

Thanks to Erich, who was nice enough to loan me his firewire cable, I was able to capture some digital video into my new machine. It works great. It took only 18 minutes to export an AVI of my wedding, complete with transitions, and only 53 minutes to convert the video to a DVD, including write time! I’m quite impressed and very excited about the possibilites for the future.

Email In The Workplace

Tue, 11 Mar 2003 21:20:38 +0000

I read an article today about the “tyranny” of email. It made me think about how much e-mail has really impacted the way people communicate. I remember when our mail servers crashed in 1999 and people were absolutely frantic because they couldn’t communicate. I remember telling my boss “You do have a telephone” but the truth is that nobody is ever at their desks these days. The people I need to contact are often only available via laptops or cell phones, and so email is a way of life. The programmers that I work with are only a few doors away from my office, and yet I have caught myself composing an email to schedule a meeting or distribute information. Most of the time, I stop myself and slap my face a few times before walking down the hall to the person’s office and meeting face-to-face. Computer people are too impersonal as it is… why make it worse? Furthermore, I fear that we may be making otherwise outgoing people more intraverted.

It's Here!

Tue, 11 Mar 2003 19:22:51 +0000

My computer was delivered this morning!!!!

Customer Service is dead

Tue, 11 Mar 2003 01:31:57 +0000

I’ve said it before and I will say it again. I am very unhappy with the way companies treat people who use their goods and services. Let’s look at Airborne Express, the company that is supposed to ship my computer. After receiving notice that they attempted to deliver my computer today, I called my wife to find out what heppened. She told me that she had been home all day and didn’t hear anyone knock or ring the doorbell. I immediately called the customer service number and talked with a very helpful lady who told me that she would notify the delivery person to attempt a second delivery today. I thanked her and hung up.

Another Weekend Over

Mon, 10 Mar 2003 12:41:59 +0000

I spent the entire weekend playing with my daughter. We did everything
from reading books and watching movies to playing in the snow. She even
helped me put a new power supply in my computer. She’s such a nerd!

Charter's Cable Box

Sat, 08 Mar 2003 04:13:31 +0000

In case anyone cares, the Motorola DCT2000 cable box that Charter provides for digital cable is actually a Jerrold / General Instruments box, as Motorola accquired those companies. So, if your home theatre / universal remote doesn’t have an entry for Motorola cable boxes, you can try a Jerrold or General Instruments code. It worked great for me… thanks to this news post

Good news

Fri, 07 Mar 2003 04:44:22 +0000

My computer shipped out today. I had some rather angry words with some Dell customer service people last night and I finally found a really helpful guy who expedited my order. It shipped this morning thankfully, so that whole mess is over. I have my DVD drive working and I recorded my first disc. I am very much amazed at the quality of the video that Chris shot at my wedding.

Windows 2003 Server Pricing

Wed, 05 Mar 2003 06:03:04 +0000

Microsoft released the pricing for their Windows 2003 server thingy that
comes out on April 24th. They’ve got four versions coming out, and it
appears to be identical to the pricing for Windows 2000. That’s
not too bad, but I feel sorry for anyone who just migrated from Windows
NT to Windows 2000. Right now, statistics show that 70% of Microsoft’s
server customers are using Windows NT 4.0. I think this cartoon illustrates
why people don’t jump on Microsoft’s latest and greatest.

dada in Chicago!!!

Wed, 05 Mar 2003 02:10:52 +0000

dada is kicking off a 45 city tour this spring and summer. They’re doing a two-week run through the Midwest, and they may actually get to Minnesota and Wisconsin! However, I’ll probably hit up Chicago for this show… not sure yet.

Finished another project!

Tue, 04 Mar 2003 04:56:30 +0000

I am putting a website live right now… I’m waiting for the files to upload to the host. I just finished a site for a client and it feels good. I think the design is a bit dated, but it still looks good and the client is very happy. It’s true what they say…. web design isn’t about what makes you happy… it’s about what makes the client happy. I suppose that my designs have a “pattern” to them… but it sells web sites. I make money with my pattern… and I manage to get repeat business… so I can’t complain too much about the staleness.

Simpsons email

Mon, 03 Mar 2003 03:31:06 +0000

This is awesome… send mail to “chunkylover53@aol.com” and actually get mail from “Homer”? Read the article here.

Simpsons-O-Rama

Mon, 03 Mar 2003 03:17:45 +0000

Tonight was one of those nights when you see a show you like and
you immediately think “What the hell did I just watch?”
Those are the words I said to my wife after the credits ran on tonight’s
show.