the bits

So :) Last night was indeed a night of ample wackiness, just the way I like it ;) I gotta say, the roller coaster effect really makes things interesting. Perhaps the most impactful thing that happened to me occured while watching Nick At Night… I was just planted there on the couch, sort of stunned motionless by the television, when an episode of Family Ties came on. Now, I’m thinking young michael j fox, happy go lucky family values shit, comedy… you know, good ol’ fashioned family sitcom action. I was *way* off. Tina Yuthers fucked me right up. It was an episode where she starts to get all issue concscious… acutely aware of all the major problems in the world… polution, radiation, energy supplies, foods… everything. She gets all depressed when she realizes that there’s really no fix for any of it, so her parents try to get her to essentially snap out of it. Didn’t work, so they take her to the school conselor, who also becomes quite depressed after hearing all that she has to say – truly legitimite concerns. Everybody’s worried about her, but the whole point of the episode is that maybe she’s not the person having the problems… maybe it’s everybody else for essentially ignoring the fact that the world’s going to hell in a handbasket. So the half hour drags on, and I’m desperately hoping for some resolution…. but it never came! They just left me there, feeling like crap about all this stuff, sorta worried, feeling like my life is a farce.

Then some really stupid superficial commercials came on, and I just laughed and laughed and laughed at the irony. Additionally, being in the special state of mind that I was in, I was especially prone to considering such momumental ideas and letting them roll and swish around in my head… I came out of it thinking that it’s pretty sickening how people (or at least the media soup that we all consume) for the most part completely ignores things of importance, instead focusing on commercialism or some other selfish consideration. I began to think that perhaps I have very good reason to be depressed, just like Tina goddamn Yuthers – after all, there is a lot of fucked up shit going on. Is it not partly my responsibility to deal with it all?

I don’t know if it is or not, but I can tell you this much: whatever happens, whether we all incinerate ourselves in some world war or life continues as it is, or even perhaps the slim eventuality of world-wide equity being acheived, I’ll be smiling :) To dwell on the negative aspects of existance and think of only the problems that we have… well, that just plain sucks, because it’s a goddamn downer, and I prefer to be happy :)

Is this happiness acheived at the expense of not thinking about more “important” things? Am I essentially being ignorant to issues that I should be ever-mindful of? Maybe. Probably. So be it :) Maybe I’m a bastard for thinking this way… again, so be it.

In other news, it feels very good to be here with blackmagic and inflamatio. yay :)

1:33 p.m., EST

Waiting at the gate in the Pittsburg airport. My flight doesn’t leave until 2:55, so I’ve got some time to kill… no problem there. Plenty of AppleScript Studio docs to read, plus I recently started over on Snow Crash, a most excellent novel by Neal Stephenson. I almost finished it about a year and a half ago, but instead of just finishing it now I decided to start over… picking up a lot of detail I missed the first time around :)

Words can’t adequately express how glad I am to be getting back to Seattle…. To date in this lifetime, Seattle represents the most ideal mix of technology, culture, attractions, and friends… I can say without a doubt that in general I’ve enjoyed my time living there more than any other single geographical location (not that it has all that much to do with geography ;) It seems only fitting to return now after the Islandless stint.

In truth, this whole thing feels like it’s just been an extended vacation from Seattle. I figured that after Islandless that I’d probably end up back in Seattle (… or elsewhere with Amy, but oh well…); it was just a question of how long I’d be with Islandless. My commitment was to do it as long as was necessary. That doesn’t sound right though… it’s not as if I felt chained in, even though it turned out that life in the BVI wasn’t all I thought it would be.

Of course, I greatly wanted Islandless to succeed – not only for financial purposes, but because I wanted the experience of having built an ISP. In the end, I got about as much experience and knowledge out of it as I could, without us actually deploying our network. The bulk of the wireless links that were set up were for testing or demonstration purposes; although we had everything else planned down to the last detail. Perhaps more importantly, I got to work closely with one Dan Carleton, whose fu is very strong… I tried to pick up as many habits / take as much advice as I could… it definitely made a positive contribution on me personally (and certainly we couldn’t have pulled off the whole Filemaker <--> LDAP thing at all without him ;) The fact that I could keep up with him (or even understand what he was doing) with some things made me happy :)

Looking forward, I must say that I’m very pleased at what’s ahead :) Hangin’ with Damon again will be both relieving and loads of fun. Never underestimate the importance of having somebody close by that you can really connect with on a variety of levels :) Also, there is something about the Damon geek lair that exudes moxy and general badassness…. I always enjoyed being a something of a fixture in said lair, and am pleased and honored to be able to do so again for a while :)

The word is that housing is fairly easy to come by in Seattle these days… I will most likely look for a place that that is centrally located and cheap. I’m not much of the home entertainer, so as long as there’s room for a desk or two and my bedroll, I think I’ll be in fine shape. Frankly, spkz sdsl availability is more important than square footage or just about any other factor.

As far as the job scene goes… I could go in a variety of directions. I’ve got a desire to do quite a few different things, really… I’d love to get back into a nice tech. training role, as I’ve got many years of experience in that department and enjoy doing it. I also wouldn’t mind sticking to network administration for a while longer, as I’m also good at that and enjoy it. One thing I’ve never gone for is any kind of writing position… I think I’d make a pretty damn fine technical writer… I’ve got a lot of practice, but it’s mostly been personal project related, not for money (though I did write a shit load of courseware for the sessions I taught while working for the school board in FL). Also on my mind is …. RETAIL! *ghasp*. Well, not any kind of retail. In fact, there’s only one place in all of Seattle that I think I would like to work in retail – The Computer Store, for obvious reasons… mac evangelism and my generally amiable nature ;) I also want to be first in line whenever Apple starts accepting applications for their Seattle store, whenever they decide to build it… I also wouldn’t mind a general *nix administration position… I may not be a hardcore developer, but I’m confident enough in my current knowledge (and more importantly, my learning abilities) to feel perfectly comfy going for such a job… Then there’s the whole music thing, which has been largely untapped in my life except for personal entertainment. I would probably really enjoy getting in on the ground floor at some studio or something and working my way up. I think I’ve got a fair amount to offer in that area, what with my knowledge of music theory, intermediate playing ability, and nearly perfect pitch (I bet it could be perfect if I ever actually focused on training my ears better). And of course, there’s a whole slew of other stuff that I’m sure I could do, but haven’t thought of yet… I’ve been reading postings for about a week now, and will continue to do so until I find something that catches my interest and is still available… (I’ve applied for a few positions that had already been filled). The bottom line is, I’m multi-talented enough that the myriad of commerce / industry in Seattle should be more than sufficient to provide me with an opportunity for a job that I like. I hate to gush with confidence, cause I feel like it might make me look sorta conceited… really, though, I just enjoy all of these things a great deal :) Incidentally, keep your ears open for your good buddy dre for any positions related to the above criteria ;)

4:30 p.m., EST

At JFK, again :) The flight here was pretty nondescript… seems to be the norm these days. I don’t know how many times I’ve flown, but it’s a lot… enough that it all seems to run together. Got my first glimpse of the NYC skyline in a couple years…. when I was here a week and a half ago, it was pretty overcast / hazy, so I couldn’t see much…

The flight to Tacoma should take about 6:15… I just wish I had Escape Velocity: Nova to play on the way… alas, it won’t get released until tomorrow… oh well :) Actually I had nabbed a whole crap load of really old / small games, but I recently realized that I never actually got them to my workstation… they’re still sitting on a shell. No worries :)

Mom gave me some McDonald’s bucks (or whatever) that I used in Pittsburg to purchase some nugs, fries and a coke. I’m not getting anything to eat here in hopes that we’ll get some fine airplane food during the trek westward.

We’ve got some festivities planned for tonight, sponsored in part by the small plastic terrarium that belongs to nico and steph … wee :) Damon went ahead and got Monday off work, so we’ll have a nice long weekend in which to freak out / chill / geek / chill / geek… etc, etc ;)

Also, while I was staying at my grandparent’s place in Slippery Rock, granddad offered to put me through a certification crash course of my choosing. After asking me about certifications in general, I mentioned that I’ve been looking at Cisco certs for a couple years now, but never had the ability to pony up the ~$1000 it costs for an accelerated course that touches all the bases required to pass an exam. Sure, I could just buy books and study ’em myself… and really, I probably already know the majority of what’s required to pass a CCNA exam… but, my study habits are simply atrocious, so an accelerated course is by far the best way to go, for me. I found a few decent offerings; my favorite so far is one that starts in Seattle on March 23 and runs for 7 full days. The cost includes lodging and meals, plus the price of not one, but *two* exams… CCNA and CCDA. They even say that if you fail them, you can come back and take the whole course again for free… So, I sent email to them early this week, but have yet to hear anything back from them… my internal scam detector senses are tingling, so I’m most certainly proceeding with caution – especially considering that it’s $2350 of somebody else’s money. Cisco certification(s) would be sweet though… it’s stuff I’m into, and easily applicable in the ‘real world’.

8:00, EST (though I’m not sure what time zone I’m actually in…)

The in flight movie was Behind Enemy Lines… High production value, whiz-bang, a few pretty sweet action sequences. Excessive use of the overcrank / undercrank (but then, isn’t it almost always excessive?). I went ahead an opted to not pay the $5 “entertainment charge” and just use my own headphones instead… (I hate those cheap-o ones anyway).

The food served was quite decent. This bigass 767 is only about 60% full, which means I’ve got an entire center row to myself… woot :) I’ve also noticed a large number of laptops on board… one in almost every row (some lady behind me has a TiBook…). One of these days I’ll travel with a fellow geek that also has a laptop + airport card, so we can do some wlan gaming at 35,000 ft ;)

I think there’s somewhere around three hours left in this flight, so I think I’ll read some ASS documentation now :)

(I’m half way through building the interface for the Watson tutorial app – this shit rocks!!)

11:45: PST

Got here a while ago. Chillin :) oh yeah :)

That’s where my grandparents live. They moved out here right about when we (my mom, dad, and very young brother) moved down to Florida from PA some 20 years ago. Up until about 5 years ago, I’ve been coming up here every summer for as far back as I can remember.

So now, laying in the same bed I’ve slept in over the years while visiting, it’s impossible not to think about where I’ve been and how things have changed, and also where I’m going. This place is one of the very few things that’s been consistent over the years, but it too has evolved… no more garden out by the shed (too much work, too few results ;), constant supply of new pictures of aunts, uncles, cousins strewn about, memento of a large and healthy family… now there’s a computer where the tv used to be in the guest room. Even with all that, though, it still feels the same. The same dinner plates and drinking glasses, the same front and back porch, the same light on top of the shed out front, casting it’s old familiar pale shadow through the slited blinds into the guest room…

I’ve always enjoyed being here. It is, I believe, the most peaceful place on the planet. There’s always good food to eat, always comfortable blankets at night. Never any rush… “easy does it”, as granddad says. That’s not to say that it’s boring. Usually my visits here would last several weeks, and I’d go fishing with granddad once or twice a week (he usually goes every day when it’s warm). It’s funny, because these days you wouldn’t ever catch me fishing… and I still don’t think it’s all that “interesting”, but something about going out on his small bass fishing boat at the crack of dawn to the lake at Moraine State Park… I don’t know, it’s just so incredibly tranquil. Then there’s the Stanley’s, across the street. Three girls, right around the ages of myself and my brother, so there was always good times hanging’ with them.

More recently, I’ve begun to realize how cool my grandparents are. Despite some heart problems, they’re both quite healthy and take care of themselves well, and don’t look nearly as old as they are. I think I inherited a lot of really good genes from them, too. My grandmother has quite the ear for music… always humming harmonies to this and that. Since I was very young it was clear that I’ve got innate ability in that department as well… thanks grandmom :) My grandfather is an incredible technician; he was an instructor in the Marine Corps school of mechanics (went on to head up the entire school, eventually being the guy that researched / reviewed all new material before it got published). About a year ago, one of my uncles brought him a computer, and basically just dropped it off… no lessons, no how-tos, nothing. Granddad started from ground zero, finally figured out how to double click, and is now sending email and surfing the web like a champ :) As in any technical endeavor, it’s just about logic and process; I’m pretty sure I’ve got some kind of abilities there as well… Thanks granddad :)

I never really paid too much attention to my “roots” growing up… just sorta took the solid foundation for granted. Now, however, I’m realizing more and more how fortunate I am to have had such a good upbringing with such excellent influences.

I’m here until Tuesday, and I will most definitely enjoy staying here, as always. My step dad has surgery tomorrow… fairly major, but he’s in good health and it shouldn’t be complicated or touchy. Mom got a couple / few days off later this week, so we’ll have more time to hang before I split on Saturday. Of course, I’m scintillating with anticipation of returning to seattle, re-uniting with damon (and all my other seattle based friends), and embarking once again on endless chains of good times :)

In the short term, looking forward to a nice hot bowl of oatmeal with raisins in about 9 hours or so :)

3/5, 1:19 p.m.

At Tampa airport… the security was a bit different here than at Ft. Lauderdale… this time around, I tried to check in curbside, knowing that I’d be a “selectee”, and that they’d have to search my stuff (one way ticket, recently entered the country, etc)… but the lines for curbside checkin were virtually nonexistent, while the lines inside were quite long. So, the skycap dude kindly placed me in the fast line inside, so I was through the whole process in like 25 minutes… They made me consolidate my laptop bag and mini-backpack detachment into one piece, since those two plus my bed roll (which had to detach from the larger portion of the backpack). blah, who gives a shit :)

Anyway, there was some stuff in my suitcase I didn’t want found, but they didn’t open it and search it by hand, as they did in lauderdale… instead it went through a giant xray machine, and as far as I could see, the only indicator the staff had was a big red / green light on top of the device.

My flight should be ready in a bit less than an hour… I hope to be able to stay in the gate area at jfk so I don’t have to go through all the screenings again… I mean, I know it’s for good reason, but I just can’t help but feel a bit un-nerved about it, even though I have no contraband on my person.

2:26 p.m.

On the plane. Flight time is 2 hours and 5 minutes… wee :)

5:17 p.m.

In new york, at jfk. The old coot in front of me on the plane had to recline his seat *all the way*, leaving me with no room to operate the laptop… bastard. I’ve always felt the idea of consuming somebody else’s space for your own comfort is fundamentally flawed – especially on a cramped airplane.

6:12 p.m.

On a smaller plane to Pitsburg. Flight time is 1 hour and 5 minutes… wee :)

11:07 p.m.

At the house now… Everything is pretty much the same as the last time I saw it :) My dog and cat were very happy to see me :) There’s still a second phone line here for ‘net action, so I shall remain in touch with the real world while I’m here in PA. My step dad has hernia surgery tomorrow, but seems just fine. Looking forward also to seeing the grandparents who aren’t far away… and uh… that’s about it :) I shall have plenty of alone time to be introspective, so we’ll see what comes of it I guess…

Day 5 here at the isteph and gren residence, and things are just sliding right along. I get the feeling that they feel sorta bad leaving me at their house to play online all day while they work, but this is pretty much what I do, so I’m quite content :)

Nico left his car for me yesterday (rode to work with steph), so I could visit the old stomping grounds of Bradenton. I hung out with a friend who used to do on call work for the Planetarium (where I worked for a while), and then went over to the school board office where I also used to work and saw folks there.

Gearing up for a couple of wacky days… it’s steph’s birthday soon, and nico’s not working on monday and tuesday, so I’m sure there will be much merrymaking :)

That is all.

Flying out to Tampa in a few hours to stay with gren and isteph.

Spent like $110 yesterday on boxes and packing materials, so that when the containers arrive, rob will have something to pack my stuff into for the UPS shipment westward to Seattle.

Looking forward to loosing myself to PS2 for a while, and also the other forms of hospitality that I know I’ll find :)

Many good times await :)

Starting tonight, each of the newest lj posts will be embedded in my site, www.dreness.com (incidentally, this isn’t a shameless plug… the site hasn’t seen a whole lot of updates; this is a lazy man’s attempt to keep it phresh ;) The lj support page has some great docs on how to do it using a variety of methods… I opted for javascript for simplicity’s sake, though I’ll do it with php eventually so that it’s completely serverside… (so all of you with pre 2.0 browsers won’t miss out ;). I’ve created a new lj style that is heavily simplified which is used for the content that’s embedded in my site… the only clue that it’s from lj at all is the “current mood, current music” bit… decided to leave that in. Decidedly out, however, are the links to user comments… so you can all continue to be your lewd and lascivious selves without fear of having your tomfooleries being seen by the millions of people that visit my website every day…

In other news, I’m probably heading out to nico / steph’s pretty soon… I found cheap airfare, too. Tomorrow I’ll figure out how I want my stuff shipped so I can let rob know + give him some monies.

That is all :)

2/21/02 – 10:16 a.m., AST

We finally got everything taken care of with the two shipping containers, though 2 days behind schedule. Luckily, it didn’t require a change in our plans… just ate up 2 of our “relax and kick it at the beach after all this shit’s done” days. We ended up having to hire a couple guys to help us move some of the stuff into the first container, as we just couldn’t do it all ourselves. 5 or 6 of the items are really heavy, and we had fewer people loading out than when we got here… so, more help was needed. Got some guys from a local “services” company (couldn’t find movers anywhere in the phone book). The first container went out Monday, and Monday afternoon, the second container was delivered to the house. Tuesday we loaded the second container, which is all of our personal belongings (as opposed to the office furniture and other stuff that belongs to Islandless which is in container #1).

Neph was to leave on Wednesday morning, so Tuesday after we were done working for the day, I ran over to where he was staying (Richard’s mom’s place), picked him up, and brought him over to our pad. We then proceeded to drink heinekin, watch south park, and burn. He had to be out early in the morning, though, so we didn’t hang for too long…

Most of wednesday was used for the final odds and ends… Rob went into town and settled up the phone bill with c&w and the auto bill with the rental car company (we rented a car the whole time we were there; it was very expensive). Meanwhile, Dan and I cleaned most of the house. We ended up leaving it cleaner than we found it; not too tough considering it was sorta dirty when we got there – not to mention the fact that only one of the toilets worked (we got them all working). We also left our appliances there; Islandless had purchased them before we left Florida. We offered them to our landlords, and they decided to buy them from Islandless. The second container still hadn’t been picked up by Wednesday afternoon, since it rained most of Tuesday. Normally rain does not preclude container transportation by road, but on Tortola high in the hills, with the very twisty-turny and steep roads, it does. Finally got ahold of D.A., our trucker-thug extraordinaire, and he made it out late in the afternoon. That evening, Dan finished moving his stuff over to Richard’s, and rob and I stayed at the crib and watched south park and burned some more.

Our flight leaves St. Thomas at 11:30, so we took the 7:20 ferry from West End, Tortola to St. Thomas. We breezed right through customs, both at the ferry dock in St. Thomas, and also here at the airport (in the lobby of which I currently sit, clacking away on Bish). This is the first time I’ve dealt with travel security since Last September, and hardly anything seems to have changed (from the outside, anyway). There’s a uniformed militarist (rotc?) standing on the other side of the airport security checkpoint, and they have this neat little machine which checks for explosive residue, I think. The lady takes this little plastic wand, and clips a piece of cloth through this little eyelet thingy on one end, and then wipes it over one’s bags and such; then she removes the cloth and places it inside a little slot on the side of a big boxy machine for exactly 6 seconds, after which point you can proceed to put yer shoes back on and move along.

Paid $10.50 for some pretty nasty airport breakfast food. Still 45 minutes until we board. We go to San Juan from here, then on to Ft. Lauderdale – back the way we came. First thing I’m doing when we land in Puerto Rico is turning my goddamn cell phone back on – it’s charged up and ready to go. I cannot wait to pay $45 for thousands of minutes per month!! Living in the BVI, I all but gave up on phone use completely, as it is prohibitively expensive, seriously. During the time we were there, we routinely had phone bills ranging from $500 to about $1,200. Granted, there was some long distance calling going on (in some cases, lots of it); but very very little by yours truly, so I just paid my share of the standard connection fees. It will be *so nice* to get back to the USA where people understand competition, and goods and services are provided in a competitive manner… but I digress… not getting into the philosophies involved until this is all through, as I’ve said before. I’ve made some fairly significant realizations, and I want to give everything time to sink in a bit before I write about it.

Oh yeah, check this out… so in dealing with Tropical Shipping to coordinate the return of our containers, we found out that they won’t make it back to Ft. Lauderdale until Sunday, March 10th – way longer than it took them to get down here. None of us expected this; we all made plans based on a relatively timely return of the containers. Since I’ve already got plane tickets, and since waiting around for an extra two weeks would be kinda lame, Rob’s offered to do the ground work with the containers himself, which means I’ll be on my merry way from Ft. Lauderdale at any old time. I’d alloted about a week to deal with the containers, but since I don’t have to now, that’s extra time to do whatever… still want to keep my plane tickets unchanged, though, so that’ll probably translate into extra time with nico and steph ;)

12:52 p.m., AST.

At the San Juan airport. I didn’t realize how big Puerto Rico is last time I was here, but this time, flying in from the other direction, I got to see most of it from a few thousand feet up, and it’s much more populated than I thought…. the zoning is really distinct from the air, with clearly defined industrial, residential, and commercial sections… (some classic shanty town action too).

The flight from St. Thomas to here is a short one; only about 25 minutes in the air. Consequently, we only toped out at about 5 thousand feet, which is the perfect viewing altitude. The Caribbean really is beautiful… blue water, beachy or rocky coast, mountains, hills, un-inhabited islands… it’s all quite tropical :)

Tried to re-activate my phone just now, but I forgot how to dial Sprint operators, and all I get is some error message in spanish.

I wanted to charge up my iBook battery a bit before getting on the plane to FL., so I found a nice conspicuous spot against a wall, such that Bish might attract passers by. Got one guy :) (has a pc, needs something small to travel with for Photoshop and such, will be getting an iBook soon :)

1:57 p.m., AST

In the air to Ft. Lauderdale now… After we got on the plane, but before we took off, I noticed that the numerous TVs that hang above the isle were showing some sort of pre-flight programming. Apparently American Airlines has a new policy of soothing passengers with a collage of nature shots + classical music. Dew drops reflecting sunlight. Time lapse shots of clouds though a bunch of bare trees. Extreme close-ups of plant life. Ahh, I feel better already :) I wonder if anybody else (besides Dan, who commented on it also) saw it as an obvious attempt to appease passengers…

Things to do once back in FL:

– Activate cell phone
– Make frivolous calls to people across the country
– Find some great Indian food

There isn’t a great deal of material things that we wanted but didn’t have in the BVI. As I’ve mentioned before, my basic necessities are pretty slim, especially in terms of belongings. I’ve always been big on not owning much more than I could carry; if it came down to it, I could ditch everything but what I could carry and be okay with it. The past months have reinforced this philosophy for me, as I’ve moved all sorts of stuff all over the place. I realize of course that physical equipment / items (furniture, etc) are necessary in some cases; certainly in the case of a .net startup. My participation in Islandless includes help in setting up / breaking down, and of course I did make use of some of the furniture (sweet bigass desk). Having said that (and also knowing that I won’t be unloading either of the two containers), I can say with relative certainty that I won’t be hauling around another heavy-ass [insert large, unwieldy, heavily polished and thus nearly grip-less piece of furniture here] for as long as possible. I hate to bitch, but god damn, I hate moving. This hate is not based on a small sample, either ;)

One good thing I think I’ll take from the BVI is my newfound ability to not spend lots of money on stupid shit. I didn’t realize how quickly it adds up, or how hard it is to pin down a constant expenditure of small amounts of cash on little things like chai or food or cab rides or whatever… but once I was removed from the land of consumer temptation, I became more conscious of just how much money I can save if I don’t spend it :) Working for Islandless, I made about the same as I did working for VoiceStream; even though my major expenses were fairly low back then, the minor ones pretty much kept me from saving any significant amount of money. In the BVI, both my major *and* minor expenses were quite low, so I ended up with a chunk of change that should hold me until I start getting paychecks again.

I also now have better eating habits; much of that I think is rub-off from Dan and Rob. It’s not that I was eating horribly before, but I didn’t pay as much attention as I should have. Now I’m used to eating rice and fake meat and all that stuff, and I like it. I plan to get myself a rice cooker once I get back… rice prepared with a rice cooker is at once cheap, fast, easy, and tasty (with a little soy and perhaps some steamed broccoli or tofu)… just can’t go wrong :)

I really want a new g4, but of course it must wait until I get a job (though believe me, the temptation to just buy a top-end dual ghz powermac is very strong). I’ve never used anything faster than a 733, so I’m sure I’ll crap in my pants when I sit down at Damon’s dual ghz mac. It’s okay though, I’m sure I’ll have hardware lust in some form or another for many years to come.

2/22/02, 3:50 p.m. EST

We arrived yesterday in Ft. Lauderdale without incident. Rob’s dad left his car at the airport, since he’s out of town, so we just drove it back to his place, which is where we’re staying anyway.

Almost immediately after we got to the house, we headed straight for the goddamn tv. Yeap, still pretty bad… possibly even a bit worse than I left it a scant 6 months ago.

Ordered some Thai takeout last night, watched Hunt for Red October on VHS.

Today we went grocery shopping. It was most excellent to return to the expected selection of goods and prices… even though we shopped at a health foods store, we still paid less than we would have for the same stuff in the BVI (not that we could have even found half of the stuff we bought today in the BVI).

JPC got Earthlink DSL right before he split town, so it’s currently in a non-functional state. The DSL itself seems to be provisioned and linked, but we don’t know the PPPOE login info… but JPC returns this evening… of course, once you read this, I’ll be back online ;)

I got my phone re-activated, at high cost. I foolishly didn’t cancel my service before I left for the BVI. Actually, there’s a bit more to it… I did call to cancel, but the Sprint phone lady told me that Sprint would soon have presence in the BVI. That, combined with the fact that there was a $150 cancelation fee, allowed the phone lady to convince me not to cancel my service, but rather to move to the cheapest plan until service was available in the BVI, at which point I could return to my previous plan. What ended up happening is that I had to have my credit card changed, since I got ripped off before I left, and I don’t think Sprint ever got the new info. Consequently, my account racked up several months worth of service charges, plus a cancelation fee. It cost me almost $500 to get the damn thing turned back on, but now it is indeed functional. I’ve got a new number, too… I’ll let you know ;) Once off-peak time rolls around, I think I’ll make some calls tonight.

2/23/02, 1:33 p.m.
Just chillin’ :)

We leave the BVI by way of ferry, since we’re flying out of St. Thomas, USVI, next thursday, Feb 21st.

I’ll stay at rob’s dad’s place in Ft. Lauderdale and help with the assimilation of the containers; I think I’m gonna ship my stuff via UPS, since I really only have about 6 items (two container tub type things, two mid sized cardboard boxes, my chair, and my garment bag full of suits that I’ll probably never wear). I’ll travel with my big-ass suitcase, big-ass backpack, and little-ass laptop bag…

I’m not sure how long it’ll take to get the containers settled in Ft. Lauderdale, but probably not more than a week… From there, I shall head over to the west siyeeed to stay with gren and isteph for a bit, which will be fun I’m sure :) There is even a possibility of coordinating the Ft. Lauderdale => Tampa expedition with lenox and co., which would be quite a hoot :)

From Tampa, I’ll fly to PIT (by way of JFK) on the 5th, then stay at the house in PA until the 16th. Then, out to Seattle, again via JFK. Woot!!

We’ll probably break down our network + workstations sometime later today / this evening, at which point I’ll be offline until next Thursday.

Met Nate (neph) yesterday; he stopped by with Richard for a few minutes. We’ll hang again probably next week, after we’ve got the containers all dealt with.

I’m saving the final Islandless / BVI wrap-up until this is all over and done with, so stay tuned ;)

Well, that’s about it from the BVI… next post should be made stateside :)

Both shipping containers will go out this weekend… We’ve contacted the local trucker guy, who will bring the container Islandless owns from our tower site down to the house, we’ll load it, then he’ll deliver it to the Tropical Shipping docks. Then he’ll get an empty container from Tropical, bring it back up the hill, we’ll load it, and it’ll get trucked back down.

Still no solid arrival date for getting stateside, but it should be towards the end of feb. We’ll get our stuff delivered from Tropical in Ft. Lauderdale back to Rob’s dad’s place, which is where I’ll stay temporarily whilst dealing with all this. From there, I’ll have it loaded into a truck or something, Seattle bound.

For the duration of the shipment, I’ll be visiting friends in the Bradenton area, and also spending some time up in PA at the house. Then back to Seattle, finally :)

Also, neph arrives this evening from Boulder… it’ll be cool to hang out for real, after years of IRC :) A couple months ago, I put him in touch with a friend of ours here that needs the help of a skilled, unix savvy type like neph, so hopefully all goes well with that.

If this schedule holds, I’ll go offline friday or saturday until we reach the states.

More later…