I need a faster network (and a Windows quote)

Gleargh. So, figuring out that OpenSuSE 11.3 can bring Cecil online kinda-sorta-somewhat handles it for the time being...because if there's anything I've learned from using Linux for three years, it's that what works today will likely break at the next release.  Which means I should download a recent prerelease of 11.4...

In the "making shit up while not throttling my download" department:

Mom: what is with the connection? I had to drop my picture quality all the way down to minimal
Xyzzy: I noticed it was slow too but only on some sites...means the backbone at the border is probably bogged (or normally it would, had I not been downloading a distro at full speed...)
Mom: are you downloading anything?
Xyzzy: I've been mostly playing "hit the wrong key" on the netbook (not quite a lie; I just didn't mention my other system had been downloading)
Mom: I have ben tryng to access some pages, but it is still loading. for about 10 minutes now. not just one, but two separate ones
Xyzzy: could both be in places that go through that backbone (she replied, whistling innocently)

Yes, she believed me.  Knowledge is power (or download speed and power over which computers get network priority, at least)... Also, from an Arch forum I ran across in my quest to fix Cecil:

"Got myself an Acer Aspire One 721 yesterday, booted it up, laughed hard at the Win7 Home Premium that was preinstalled and dumped it..."

I love Exaile, shame it Has Issues

Exaile has been my favorite music player in Linux practically since my very first install three years ago.  It has what I want (usually including decent Shoutcast/Icecast radio support) without cluttering the screen up with stores, video interfaces, and so forth.

Today, I actually figured out the solution for a frustrating problem I'd been running into over the last year or two: when I clean-installed a distro and got Exaile set up, sometimes it would claim it was scanning my music collection for me, but never get beyond 0%.  As it turns out, this only happens if some aspect of Gstreamer -- I suspect either the ogg or mp3 codecs -- isn't fully installed.

So tonight, while typing in handwritten edits to one of my stories/novels, I wanted a particular tone to match what I was working on, but could only think of one song offhand that applied.  I decided to try Exaile's "dynamically add similar tracks to playlist" button with Danger Zone from the Top Gun soundtrack -- and was served up Take It On The Run by REO Speedwagon after it!  Well, if nothing else, it's good for entertainment value, even if it has absolutely no clue what songs sound like...

Fun screenshots and quotes...

While wandering the web today, I've managed to capture two screenshots that raised my eyebrows enough to make me chuckle... The first one came while I was doing a search over at Borders:

Gee, think we can get that in paperback?

Second one was actually just a few minutes ago... Realizing that I need to set up an AIM account for my netbook, I ran a Google search in hope of leaping straight to the account-creation page.  Normally its suggestions are based on typos or alternate spellings, but not this time:

No, I didn't, why do you ask?

I also ran across a number of comments that really amused me...

Regarding the controversial upcoming GNOME 3 environment:

oOarthurOo: The gnome mystics promised me it would transform the my relationship with the desktop, and it has; I’m using KDE now instead of Gnome.

Dan: ...the first few things which came to mind as I was wandering my way through a shockingly counter-intuitive interface were:
-- What the 'ell were these guys thinking?!
-- ... Or drinking?!
-- ... Or smoking?

Dan and his partner: After her machine was shut down [after trying G3], and I had the marker in my hand to label the disk, she saw what I was doing and offered the following by simply spelling it out verbally.  "A-B-O-M-B-I-N-A-T-I-O-N."

Dan again, later: In short, this is what you get when you subject Nautilus to a frontal lobotomy.

In an old review for Mercedes Lackey's book Exile's Valor, which takes place a bit before the original Valdemar book Arrows of the Queen:

(hockey plus lacrosse plus polo equals SHUT UP, I DON'T CARE)

I am eagerly anticipating the horrifying disaster or quiet fact of life that makes [Lackey's Mary Sue avatar] completely absent from her supposed role as Herald-Chronicler by [Arrows].

...the robes of the karsite priests, for example, are a mess, and so is this book.

QuickiWiki Look Up

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Can horses goose-step?

This might have been the weirdest movie-review debacle I've heard of... First, Salon's Andrew O'Hehir posted a what-the-hell-was-he-on review of Secretariat (seriously, it has to be read to be believed), to which I replied:

First, a side FYI: "Sham" was the name of one of the three stallions that all thoroughbreds can trace their ancestry back to, who was also known as the Godolphin Arabian.

Anyway... Several years ago, my brother gave me a copy of a bestseller about one of the great racehorses. The big problem was that the book was completely focused on the people around the horse -- the horse was more like a vague far-in-the-background plot device -- so I found it painfully boring.

So chances are that I won't bother with this movie... Sounds like it's mostly about the people here, too. Meh.

That said, what you described is how virtually all horse stories work -- they're supposed to tell of how the horse went from being a nobody to something great. Somebody (often a kid or cynical adult) gets a horse that's supposedly unsuitable for whatever it was bred for, stick with the long days of training through various small crises or setbacks, and emerge victorious.

That that narrative is precisely why Secretariat, Man O'War, and other top racehorses were so beloved back in their day. While you sneered at it for not focusing on current events, the reality is that Americans saw the horses as symbols of their own ability to potentially succeed, and focused on racing to escape the events around them.

The reality is also that for many people, the turmoil of that time basically didn't reach them. My parents were hippies, and from the many stories they've told, their siblings, parents, and grandparents *were* isolated by their upper-middle-class communities. It was the equivalent to what the Haiti disaster is for most of us.

I'm definitely curious whether the movie mangled the facts about Secretariat or his handlers. I'll have to look into that... For what it's worth, I'd say that for a female protagonist, an industry that refuses to accept women *is* a significant obstacle -- it's unclear whether you dismiss that issue, or if the movie did a poor job of depicting it.

Slate's Dana Stevens agreed with him, but added more interesting information with Bio-pics of Lennon & Secretariat an oddly fitting pairing .  I figured I'd toss in my ten cents there as well:

Actually, I like your review a lot better than the one at Salon that you referenced... Among other things, he didn't mention what the woman's obstacle was regarding the farm, just that there was a tax problem, which is different from losing her father's farm. I get the feeling that before commenting on specific things, you'd look up a little about it first. (Like "Sham": anyone that read Margurite Henry's books as a horse-crazy kid can explain that "Sham" was one of the 3 stallions that all thoroughbreds are descended from.)

It sounds like "Secretariat" is designed the way virtually all horse movies are -- the problem is in the current tendency to market them as being for general adult audiences, when horse movies are almost always basically for horse-crazy types, especially kids. That's why the genre focuses on the bond between the horse and a human or two: that's why we watch. Or put another way, when I watched "The Black Stallion", I wanted to be reminded of how amazing animal-human bonds can be; with "Phar Lap", I was curious about the life of a famous race horse in historical Australia and his bond with his caretakers.

Back in the mid-20th century, Americans adored racehorses because the horses were both a symbol of the ability to become one of the greats through talent & effort, and of their own ability to use knowledge & dedication to succeed. In other words, their obsession was a way of escaping the reality of their lives; they didn't want a reminder when watching related movies. Also, according to my SF Bay Area former-hippy parents, an affluent mother back then would hear about some of the events through gossip or the news, but it was like far away problems we're not directly affected by today.

Here's where things swung towards weirdness straight into really funny.  Evidently the cluster of readers at Salon & I that disagreed with O'Hehir's weird review weren't quite alone, because Roger Ebert felt the need to post a grand, extremely funny smackdown, called Secretariat Was Not A Christian.  (Muahahahaha!) My two favorite quotes:

I question if a single American, right-thinking or left-thinking, thought even once of Secretariat as a Nietzschean Überhorse. Nor did many consider the Triple Crown victories as a demonstration of white superiority, because race horses (which seem to enjoy winning for reasons of their own) are happily unaware of race. Does a horse think of a human as belonging to another race? I speculate that a horse considers a human as a differently-abled horse. A cat, now, may belong to another race. ...

I am so totally not kidding if I ask, must a man who does indeed look like Pancho Martin therefore be "villainous, swarthy and vaguely terrorist-flavored?" And as for the hapless Sham, the horse with the evil name, for Christ's sake, O'Hehir, that was the horse's damn name.

The record industry said to do *what*?

Hanging out listening to the Grateful Dead's old album Workingman's Dead for the first time, I got an entertaining little surprise from the last "bonus" track... It started up with the song Easy Wind in progress, then a relaxed fellow's voice said over it:

"The Workingman's Dead, by the Grateful Dead. Available on Warner Brothers** tapes and records; you should be able to get your copy by May 15th. Workingman's Dead by the Grateful Dead."

The song continued for a few seconds, and then the guy came back to add:

"Steal one."

**which recently had YouTube remove all Frets On Fire videos that use Grateful Dead music.

Absurdity saves my sanity (or sense of humor)

I just spent 2-3 frustrating hours trying to sort out what was trashing my internet connection, only to discover that (surprise, surprise) it's a trojan on my mother's XP system... Well, after blocking the port it was hammering, I was irritably looking up overload on another port when I saw this comment from someone else with the same issue:

"Maybe its the aliens contacting me@#$%^!@#$!~"

Amazing how a silly little comment like that can do wonders for my mood...

(Listening to: Ultima 7 soundtrack)