...And Now The Model M

     Decided to give the nice, big Unicomp keyboard (an IBM Model M in all but name -- and maybe that as well, since the bottom is still marked "MODEL M" from the mold) a try, after a disassembly and cleaning so thorough that I wasn't entirely sure it would still work after I got it back together.

     It does.  I'm using it.

     There's a little bit of desk-cleaning yet to do, and I don't have the computer back in the usual location, but when it's done (or sufficiently cleared -- an open workspace is a process, not an end-state), I'll take a picture to share.  I'm unlikely to ever achieve 5S levels of orderliness but it's better to make the attempt than to wallow in bad habits.

Well, Here It Is

     New computer, online.  Haven't tried the clicky keyboard, but I've got Q10, Scrivener and Dropbox running.  Here's hoping for the best!

Computer Update

     So... it took most of two days to excavate my desk sufficiently to get the peripherals of the old computer out -- the physical desktop was, literally, three years deep in paperwork.  I am hoping to not restart that very bad habit; I have a filing system, I just wasn't making much use of it.

     As I write, I'm getting the new computer up and running.  Wish me luck!

     --I did find the photograph that proves I have ridden an elephant, for whatever that's worth.  And I found several items I'd forgotten about, including a $25 gift card for Macy's. 

It's Saturday, Let's Watch A Steam Engine

     One of the oddest stationary steam engines I have seen, a vertical-crankshaft triple-expansion radial engine that, until fairly recently, was used to run a wastewater transfer pump in Boston, MA.

     Look closely; you won't see many engines like it and this one, per the comments, is gone.

Still On The Surface Pro

     UPS supposedly tried to deliver my new computer yesterday, signature-required for some idiotic reason (it's a hundred-dollar refurb job; they've dumped plenty of boxes worth way more on the porch without so much as honking the truck's horn.)   Tam was home and in the office (just off the porch) all afternoon, so as near as we can tell, the driver parked a half block away, put on toe shoes, tiptoed down the walk, up the steps, and left a sticker on the front door as gently as a butterfly lands on a tiny violet, then turned and tiptoed away, pushing his truck a half-block further away before starting it and driving off, grinning and chortling like a Gibraltar ape at his great cleverness.

     Why?  I don't know why.  Perhaps he has been driven mad by the demands of his trade, the constant push for greater speed and volume.  They get dressed-down if they're seen so much as sauntering instead of scurrying or trotting.  But compassion doesn't make me any less disappointed or Tam any less annoyed.

     She is hoping to go pick it up for me today.  We'll see how that goes.

     Edited to add: the autocorrection feature in this version of Exploder is driving me as mad as the hypothetical UPS driver.  It's got about a thousand-word vocabulary and "sauntering" ain't on the list. 

Geopolitical Update

     Here it is, as I understand it: until late yesterday, the debate was over if it was good or bad if Oceania was run by a ruler suspected of favoring Eurasia instead of Eastasia, but as of today, both factions firmly despise Eurasia while suspecting the motives of the opposing faction for so doing.

     And Great Leader is still a hapless, crude mastermind, as well as being a puppet and a loose cannon.  And perhaps a square circle, cold heat and a skinny fat man.

     I'm supposed to care deeply about all this but somehow, I just don't.  World War Three?  Total yawner.  Pax Americana?  Dull as ditchwater.  Proxy wars fought anywhere too broke or torn-up to matter to the civilized world?  An old, boring meat-grinder.*  No matter who does what, the barbarians keep building themselves thrones on the bloody bones of mothers and children, just as they always have.  It's not safe to leave them to it and you can't stop 'em without adding to the death-toll.

      It is snicker-worthy watching Uncle Vlad get all huffy about the "violation of international law" in the U. S. sending a missile salvo on a badwill tour of a Syrian air force base.  Tell it to the Ukrainians, you scheming weasel, and then yank the veto chain from your comfy seat on the UN Security Council just like all the other Great Powers do after they've beat up some two-bit country that doesn't have that option.
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* The day I see a significant minority of maimed veterans in the U.S. Congress will be the day I start to think we might get a generation's relief from that wretched game.  It took a Civil War to buy that much peace last time, 1865 -1898, and amateur historians are probably going to cite examples showing even that hindsight is overly rose-colored, probably from all the Army and Native American blood spilled.

Optionally Nuclear

     Oh, Chuck, you still can't rewrite history--

     To give Senator Schumer his due (and let me be quite clear, I regard public sanitation workers as an inherently more honorable class of civil servants than U. S. Senators, since when the garbageman or sewer tech has done their work, the world is inarguably bettered), he wasn't in favor of the "nuclear option" when his fellow Democrats pushed it through for Cabinet nominees in 2013.  On the other hand, I don't recall him showing Majority Leader Harry Reid any dramatic opposition at the time; even sympathetic accounts have Mr. Schumer "working quietly behind the scenes" to forestall what eventually happened, on a party-line vote in favor.  Including his vote. 

     And yet there he was on the evening news last night, cheaters sternly low on his nose, as serious as a boiled owl, intoning, "...Democrats have never believed in changing the rules...."  No, dammit, no.  Maybe you do not, sir, and if so it's one of your few admirable positions, but your Party fellows have an irrefutable history of changing the rules of the Senate when it suits them, and most of the Democrats who voted to yank the ol' filibuster when it was in the way of their President four years ago are still around to vote to preserve that hallowed tradition now.  Go be a good soldier for your side, but don't stand there and lie to people with access to search engines like you were acting in a summer-stock production of 1984.

Is This The Face That Launched A Thousand Ships...?

     Whatever; the virus was a Trojan and not a good one.  I may have got it, but I'm seeking expert help at work to make sure.

     Any recommendations on anti-virus software for Windows 10? 

Bad Computer News

     There's something wrong with my Windows 7 desktop computer -- and it is almost certainly a virus.  I thought it was just an iTunes update goes wrong; removing iTunes fixed it... for one boot-up.  Next time I started the machine, the same symptoms as before: it won't run any of the installed software but the Web browser, my antivirus is off and can't be started, Task Manager comes up but stalls with a (not responding) tag.

     This is not good. 

Heigh-Ho?

     It's off to work I go.  And no seven little helpers, either, but I will be up at the North Campus unless they cancel the morning's festivities on account of weather.

     And maybe even then.  Sure, nobody works up there as a regular thing, but we still have all manner of Critical Items at that location and they do want looking after.

Food Day!

     Saturday, we went to The Gallery Bakery for brunch -- astonishingly good food!

     And, much later, for supper I did reverse-seared steaks, "popcorn" asparagus (crunchy and delicious!) and sliced tomatoes with Italian herbs and black olives.

Tamara Keel Photo

     It was a good day for food!

Mom's In The Hospital

     She went in Friday morning with suspected pneumonia, but the doctors decided maybe not and are working on figuring out just what is going on.  I visited her last evening and she's alert, lucid -- and about as happy anyone having to remember to breathe in through her nose and out through her mouth ever is.  Supplemental oxygen is a wonderful thing but it's awkward, especially when you doze off.

     Please keep my Mom in your thoughts.