Sunday, October 31, 2004

Things to do at Church

Here is a picture of my new game console at church...

http://www.mackie.com/products/sr56-8/index.html

(actually we have the sr40-8), but it looks about the same. We also have an effects module we run on an aux send and comes back on an Aux return so you can send some poor vocalist their own voide (made into a chipmunk) back on their monitor where no one else can here it... lots of fun things to do. We also have a bunch of mackie 450 speakers each of which is capable of nearly 120db without distortion and two large subs. Granted the system pales in comparison to what we saw at the Steven Curtis Chapman consert last night, but it's still fun and I'm actually starting to understand what is going on with all the sound stuff. Oh and we have something must churches never consider... an audio compressor. This is a really good thing, so when your vocalists decide to overrun the mix it just compresses them back into reality :). The compressor is setup for 8 channels so well run it on the sub group mixes with the insert send and return hoookups on the board. See the sr56-8 manual if you don't know what an insert send and return are. I finally got it through my head, took me a few months to actually get it straight which knob to turn in a reasonable amount of time to have the desired affect. (i.e. vocalist (unnamed) says hey more keys in my monitor... I search for the appropriate knob and they say "that's good"... I'm thinking wow that's some imaginary amplifer 'cause I still haven't found the knob yet...)

Anyway when you guys are here for t-day we'll have to stay later and play with the board a little.

p.s. Keith maybe you should try "working" at work, helps the time pass better. I have started to get board with test, too much production stuff (it's interesting but not relavent to any other company in the world) and too little new learning, so I accepted an offer and moved to PE... same pay, but now I get to interact much more with product issues and learn more about semiconductor crap and less pressure to resolve production issues. My official title (which will probably change in a few months) is "Semicondutor Product Engineer" sounds fun and I get a slightly bigger cube. Oh another difference from test... money, I have a wintel pc basic p4 2.8ghz, but they're gonna get me a linux box (since Cadence has ported all the design tools to linux ....) and they just mentioned casully oh they usually put a decent amount of memory in them (like 4GB). I guess that is and isn't impressive since I've logged into some of the solaris rnd severs and they have around 30GB of memory.

Saturday, October 30, 2004

happy halloween

happy halloween to all you reading bumpkins (or is it pumpkins).


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these three pumpkins survived my gardening skills, amazing huh?

kitty, frankenstein, pumpkin head

What does a kitty, a frankenstein and a pumpkin head have in common?



They were all lying dead on the cafeteria table! these minni cushball things were lying around. at about 1/2 tall, they are alot of fun. we took them to church.

10k words

I'm about the break 10,000 words according to my blogger stats. I just thought I better inform the lot o' ya.

stats since I know the rest of you are way to lazy to click something

Sarah: 104
dan: ?
forkev: 2572
k2h: 9198
Janell: 678
palegreenhorse: 52,278 (da big cheater)

math games

okay so criticize if you want. keith and i play games or do something slightly distracting during the sermon so that we don't criticize our pastor too much. we understand that the last pastor offered everything we wanted in sermons but that many people didn't like those sermons; so now it is those people's turn to have a pastor they like. so instead of getting all mad, we just try to pay attention enough to get something positive out of the sermon and not enough to be able to deconstruct the sermons since we don't like how information is presented (or sometimes the information itself).
today we played math pattern recognition games. as in fill in the next number (or in two cases item) in the sequence or just give the pattern function. so here they are for all you other nerds out there if you want a stab at them.

4 12 132 17,292
1 1 2 3 7 16 65
1 1 2 10 12 22 111 210 1021 (you've seen this sequence before just not in this way)
O | (insert picture of a square)
H He Li Be B C N
1.5 3 1.5 (not 3, ask keith for a hint on this one)
4 3 7 7 (think cheap calculator)

maricle on Casper st.

i get a call last nite at 6:15 pm (I was not home yet) that said the pastor's notebook had died and was no longer booting. I call him aback around 7pm and sure enough, it won't boot. so he's brining it over as the last backup was 4 months ago.
i go to boot it - and it's missing some core windows files. inturesting. he says he may have allowed a virus to run on it by clicking the wrong button in norton antivirus. no big deal.
throw in knoppix 3.3 and bloom - knoppix can't load - fatal error or something. strange. never seen that before - maybe it's some non-standard ide interface or something (oh yeah, and the cd was in a firewire cd drive)
SO - i install windows on top of it's self knwonig that the user accounts will be untouched.
right as it's finishing, John says "oh yeah, i had a password on my account"
i'm thinking - how bad can it be, it's windows xp home.
so it loads, we click on the old profile and 'error accessing folder' , ok, so it's encrypted. i just need a tool to feed it his old password and we're off and running, right?
WRONG - read this. i found a hairy walk through on recombining both keys (lost the link) - but home does not have all the tools. i stole one from xp-pro, but the other would not run.
i was conviced we were pretty much screwed and gave him a generous 35% recovery estimate possiblity - and sent him home at 10pm.
I started banging on google learning more windows security terms and came up with this which pointed to this. a close inspection of the win xp home demonstrated nothing fancy with keys. wow, it can't be this easy.
i almost didn't try it, but figured i'd nothing to loose.
it worked!@ - and 3.8gb was recovered. flawlessly.
i called him back at 11:10 so he could sleep easier and burned him a dvd around midnight while watching some sermons i found in his stuff. good sermons.

Friday, October 29, 2004

jen fixed something!

so since i took keith's laptop (and now he took mine to run knoppix which is looking pretty good) i added a log in for myself so i wouldn't trash on keith's special desktop. (it consists of random icons randomly spread on the page and still has the nasty compaq wallpaper.) so at home i couldn't figure out why the wireless card would work on keith's log in and not for mine. keith was saying something like i needed to clone his account and move all my stuff over to the cloned account. first off, he couldn't figure out how to do that with windows xp home. second off, that sounded like a lot of work when shouldn't there be a setting somewhere. indeed there was a setting. and i found it. in keith's account i looked at the properties of his wireless connection and he had set it to only work for his account! see on my old laptop (now keith's new one) i always installed things for all users even though i had only one account on the computer. it took a while for me to consider that keith wasn't that smart =) hehehe. okay he is way smarter on computer stuff than me and i am just happy that this once i was able to fix my own computer, see as i am so good at destroying them as of late.

alodia? dave?

so do alodia and dave think that they are too good to join our group blog? or did they just not get thier invites?

its my car syndrome

I've often wondered if I'm the only one, but it seems no matter what car I own, I actually see MORE of them on the road. If I have owned it, I am more often to notice it, if I"m currently owning it I deafinatly notice it, and admire how somone as intelectual as the other driver made a good choice like I did in choosing the car.

am I the only one here? or does familiarity make a person notice it? this could bring me down a slippery slope and I"m sure kev will blaze the trail for this is the reason that all men notice pretty women cause there 'familar' with them? yeah.. lets get an argument on that.

nerdy tales

something epic

it's back!
instead of working this morning i am doing random things, well i am kinda working i am waiting for crystallization and cleaning my frit. anyway i was just curious about sarah's blog and its current state because nanowrimo.org didn't have anything new to read and i was in the blog reading mood. surprise! something epic is back in a flush of pink. don't let the color turn you away though, it is suitable for all genders. =)

Thursday, October 28, 2004

New Halloween Puzzle

okay so i set myself up for kevin figuring out the last puzzle; but i learn from my mistakes. this time i didn't name the files with the answer. it is still halloween related but i won't say how unless you nerds can't figure it out after a handful of tries. all three molecules do the same thing, but not in the same place. also note these are just the active sites, the whole thing would be way too big for this.
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have fun kiddies.

nano rhino

a fello rimo for youall to readabout.

sidebar gone astray

jen thinks it not her pictures fault that nerdy tails sidebar is screwed up. let this serve to show that I have to disagree wtiht that. which one of you losers changed it? any takers? I thought not.

The Google Calc

Whats the strangest thing you can come up with to solve with the google calculator? a long running joke is furlongs per fortnight as in something is going VERY SLOW, so I went ahead and verified that
30 furlongs per fortnight = .011 mph

exactly how fast is a knot? my coworkers guessed around a mile and they were right
knot in mph = 1.15

why I had google open my coworkers began to gather, so I asked exactly how deep is a fathom? my cube neighbor over the wall spent 8 years in the navy and he replied about a mile.
fathom in feet = 660 ft (jim was a bit off)

now another coworker began to explain to me that he was going to get something fabbed on a .14 micron process. well that doesn't mean jack to me cause all the specs I read give it in nanmeter
.14 microns in nm (ok, so this becomes obvious it is a prefix conversion, but still...)

130lbs in kilos for all you drug runners out there

it even knows pi to more digits than the babolonians!

so whats the best you guys can work up / compute with the google calc?


ssh and vnc

gnuWinII is kinda cool. inturesting stuff.
I'm trying to get some tools together so I can standardize onto a vnc flavor on a windows environment that is encrypted (hippa compliant crap) for support.
i'm thinking open ssh will help me out.
does anyone have experience with vnc over a reflector or port mapper in a windows environment?

winLinux

i'm getting fed up with people just pushing windows or linux.
common. use the right tool for the job.

Cooperative Linux (coLinux) claims to run linux inside windows - giving you the best of all worlds (no vmware, no wine)

anyone want to try it out?

itch

i know this is not nerdy, or much of a tale, but here goes.

there is this guy at work (who for the purpose of me keeping my job will remain un-named as he's above me in the corporate food chain) whom i've noticed itching his butt several times in the past few days.
now. this leads me to several reactions.
1) why am i watching/ noticing this?
2) LOOK AWAY!! (YET can't)
3) what could be so itchy?

I've concluded i'll try to avoid him so i dont' have to poder this too much.

this reminds me of church last weekend where alodia and I noticed this girl who kept pulling her underwear out of her crack during song service. alodia thought she could have used a better time to do that, like during prayer. oh yea, and she was in the 2nd pew. we all had a looksee.

maybe next week will be people wearing mismatched sock week, or something, but as far as this week is concered, i do cristen it butt week.

what do you get?

gotta love halloween...all kinds of little kiddies getting hyped up on sugar and (at least most of the time when i was little) freezing body parts, all while dressesed up as spongebob square pants or power-puff princess.
something else that will probably be seen that night is made of the following chemicals. can anyone guess what it is?

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Dump Truck parker

There was this dump truck parked on our street for about 3 weeks. It was very close to a stop sign and it was hard to see around it . I was wondering how long it was going to take to get ticketed. I drove past this thing every day as its on route in and out of the neighborhood. so after 3 weeks it gets funny chalk marks on the tires. TOTALLY chalked up. not just a single line or anything. wait.. maybe I remembering it wrong. maybe one day it had a single line on each tire and then the next day it was chalked up.. yeah.. that sounds better. it makes for a better story anyway.

so this guy shows up while I'm working in the backyard and starts it up (smoke everywhere) and drives it around the block about 5 times to try and get rid of the chalk marks. He started to slow to park it by my house and I Just glared at him so he fired it up and kept on moving.

He parked it across the street AT THE PARK. now I was sure that wasnt going to last long. When he parked he opened the door and looked at the tires so he could park it where the chalk marks wernt so obvious. he didn't make enough laps around the neighborhood.

sure enuf. after about another week it gets a bright orange ticket on the window. now I was SURE he was going to move that sucker outa there but he never did. 4 days later I think it got towed. I would have liked to see that.

Tuesday, October 26, 2004

Burnt Spicy Mustard

I wrote this in regards to the marylaw blog.

How does one go about answer the question of what burnt circuit board tastes like? Well.. I can assure you when you stick your head really close to something and it blows up in your face it lets you get right down and personal with it on so many levels. you see the sense of smell is directely tied to the sense of taste. I think the passages may be connected as well, but I can't get my finger all the way in to verify. From this level of personal diagnostics I have determined that my exposure to burnt circuit board is sufficent to make the claim that the BURNT SPICY MUSTARD we had at that chineese restraunt was for sure made out of BCB (burnt circuit board). in china they must route the recycleing program to the back of the restraunt.

Knoppix

Dave and or Kev told me about knoppix awhile ago. I have version 3.3 ISO on my HD and when I can't find the cd I just burn out a new one. some day I'll actually start writing what is on the cd ON the cd so I know what is on the cd... ok.. nuf of that.

anyway.. in the never ending qwest [kevs phone company] to get jens laptop back up and running I first start with a data backup. seems simple enough right?

welp.. xp 'recovery' console is about as worthless as it comes. maybe you can do alot in it, but I'm not one to waste my time and find out. I can't figure out how to see network stuff from recovery console, and i can't figure out how to see external USB drives from recovery console, so short of actually recovering anything, theres nothing I can do with it. since I was UNABLE to get xp to start back up (despite a manual uninstall of SP2 from the console) I have turned to Knoppix.

yeah.. I suck at linux, some day i'll learn, we picked up the phone, called neal and he gave me a quick rundown on how to connect across the network with samba shares. worked like a champ. heres my notes for when i have to repeat this in a month when the laptop crashes again.

from within the console of knoppix
see if I can see the XP box
Type: ping 192.168.0.5
view my network settings
Type: ifconfig
To make sure we have samba services stuff
Type: smbclient
To see what we have mounted
Type: Mount
for a little different view use
Type: ls -la /mnt
Change directory to MNT
Type: CD /mnt
To view what we got
Type: ls
Make a new mount called network
Type: mkdir network
This didn't run because I didn't have the right access
so we need to act like we have root access?
Type: sudo mkdir network
View that we made it
Type: ls
Mount our network share
Type: sudo mount //192.168.0.5/shared ./network -t smbfs
now we see its in the mount list
Type: mount

To view our new mount point in the graphical environment, open a browser and for the URL
Type: file:/
and now we get to browse our mount points.

for some reason i don't have root access when knoppix starts up. when I try to write to my network share it says I don't have rights. I know the sudo command works at the shell window, so I use that to recursive copy to network share
Type: sudo cp * /mnt/nwhd/jen -r


a quick comparison to DOS helps me learn more.
http://www.satlug.org/~dubose/linux_basic_commands.html

Studded Snows

I just had a 'debate' with a coworker, defending myself as to why i'm not a loser for using studded snow tires. according to him the only people that should use them are people that live in heavily snowed upon climates like lake tahoe. His argument was that the studs TOTALLY DESTROY the roads and make for terrible commuting times because the roads are getting resurfaced because a few people use studded snows.

At the time I didn't have much of a defence. I muttered something about how I only use them after the snow has set in (will probably put them on in november) and that I take them off early in the spring. I don't run the whole season with them. THen i said something about how studded snows have kept me from sliding through intersections.

His response was I was going too fast.

My new defence, since I've had time to think about it.
* my car weights 2900 pounds. studs are small, and last 30-40k miles. tell me again exactly how much damage i'm doing to the road?

* america is still free. you have the right to drive a jacked up F350 and never haul a load in your life. You get 10 miles a gallon, polute the environment, make tons of noise, and hog the road. you risk killing someone when you crash. I have the legal right to run studs. I also pay for it just as much as you do with my tax on my (current) $2.35/Gal Fuel.

* studs are something I can do to increase my safety and those around me. it is a cost almost entirely on my shoulders since the cost of my studded tires probably way exceeds the 'damage' i'm doing to a public road. don't make me whip out a calculator cause I could probably prove it.

In conclusion:
I've never meet someone so passionate about me recking THEIR road. wow. I hope the guy that slides into him doesn't have studded snow tires so he can be proven correct by his own ignorance.

Sony QRIO Robot

ok.. that sucks, if I change where to post my thing in BLOG this it erases what I wrote. stupid interface.. so AGAIN, i type it all over again.

if you guys haven't seen the sony QRIO robot your not really geeks. it seems to be jam packed with geeky technology that makes us all drool. To bad its going to put the 3rd world counties out of work, the very people that assemble its little mechanical hart. see it try to fall here.

nerdy tales

NTale, Ntail, Entrial....

its kinda like a little rhyme. lets all sing it together!

NTalel, Ntail, Entrial......

N-Tails

a Nerdy Tail is an extra long tailbone with glasses

nerdy tales vs nerdy tails

i was browsing k2h and decided to head over to nerdy tales to see what was up. it was interesting becuase just before the page loaded i realized that keith had spelled it nerdy tails. now that's a mental image for you.

keyboard rundown

Sarah.
Give us the rundown on the pda keyboard.
Working yet?

the recording

I got a copy of my credit report from the big 3. score 774 (excellent) - lowered probably 'cuz of my 2k in credit that i hardly ever use and never carry a ballance.
I called to cancel my account with privacyGuard after getting my info, and got the song and dance about identity theft, get a report for someone else in your home for more money/time - track usage of you SS# - 10$ per month.
i finally convinced them i was happy without their service. they asked me if I wanted a free 25$ gift certificate. I said 'well, ok' (the words of a fool)
and was transered to a *recording* about how i'd get this 25$ cert. if i paid 1$ and activated another account.... and then it asked me at the end "Does that sound good to you"
I thought out loud and said 'not really' and it asked 'why'.
Amazing! that speech recgoniztion sofware is really moving up in the world!
I then thought for a split second,and realized someone had been READING this all to me,and there was actually a person on the other end. I had to do a bit of backpeddling to justify my answer so the PERSON could understand - and here i was just expecting to press 1 or something.

Monday, October 25, 2004

new shoe



This here is my new pair of shoes. $22 from sierra trading post (kev, they arn't from the goodwill). The toes are kinda square. a bit hideous actually. perfect for work. to the trained eye it looks like i'm stylish and to the rest I look a bit odd. just the way an engineer should.

dead laptop

jens laptop won't startup. I'll have a looksee at it tonight but it may be another awesome warranty RETURN. hahah... if people would just make quality stuff we'd consider keeping it! oh.. btw, it is a bottom of the line compaq.

Anonymization

Kevs google link WAS successful. it revelead a good list of anonymizers (from russia?, as well as a particularly fast one. but, you see the problem is, this blog does not take anonymous posts. I can't authenticate through the anonymzer (i tried). after trying I thought 'that was stupid'. cause even if it DOES work I just gave my logon to who ever runs the anonymzer.

in conclusion. Nice idea, but bad idea for security. thanks.

proxy this.

man... the smoking K2'er must be really good cause its blocked by the company proxy. speaking of proxy's. that is also the reason I am posting a post instead of a comment. the comment link is blocked by the proxy as well =( gotta hate proxys.

k2h... name

k2h is pretty unique: for a screen name.
yet if you stretch it a bit, you can find people in Minnesota.
I think this k2'er smokes regularaly. bummer.

Sunday, October 24, 2004

fog lamps

keith got me some excellent 55w fog lamps a few years ago for the red beater for about 15$ - mine are like the qh-6cc.
i rescued them from the beater when it died, and still managed to net 60$ from the junkyard!
so, i'm gonna put them on my subaru, but want to do it right this time.
requirements:
1) the lamps be mounted out of emediate sight under the bumper (less ugly)
2) an indicator light must be in the cabin to verify the fog lamps are on.
3) the primary circuit (the one powering the fog lamps) is properly fused at 10A.
4) the source of the power is not coming from some other circuit (I don't make it cheap and just tap into the headlights)
5) there be no less then 3 options for fog lamps
a - always off
b - on, but only with high beams
c - always on (if ignition is on)

rough idea.
toggle switch: selects head lamps high beam or ignition as source of logic
toggle switch with indicator bulb: turn circuit on (and if lamps are on it lights up) else off.
single throw, quad pull 28v 5a (will run off 12v) relay to activate the circuit - found it in my grab bag
and then, of course, the two fog lamps.
anyone want to rough out the circuit for me?

community bonus pack 2

anyone play any of the unreal2k4 community bonus pack 1 or 2?
i think we played 1 last year, but i'm hopping to spice things up with 2 this year.
anyone game?

Frugal nerds

Given that I'm cheap and I know some of you are, too, I thought I'd share my latest bargain hunting tip. I get coupons online from one of two places (The Coupon Master or The Coupon Clippers) for a small handling fee. The beauty of it is that I find coupons for things I'm going to buy anyway and then they're mailed directly to me and I save a bundle (also, a boodle). So far, all members of the household have been pleasantly surprised... for instance, one order I spent $5 to get the coupons and we saved over $30 on the next shopping trip.

It's so umm like some one we know

I'm gonna name it Kevin!

massive WB launcher

A massive Water Balloon launcher! now thats an interesting idea. I think we should get one of those CHEEP ratcheting tie down straps from harbor freight (or similar cheep chinese import place) and use that as the device to add energy to the design.

the way I see it is we tie/staple/glue (or all 3) tons of inner tubes to a Y 2x4 frame or what ever dans genious mind works up and then use the cheep ratchet thing to pull it back. we use a string connection to the launcher and when its loaded someone takes out the biggest knife, hatchet, machette or gun and blows that string away.. thus releasing the full fury of the design.

Saturday, October 23, 2004

Wow, is this what the internet has come to?

Hello all, life is good, next week I get time off of work. Granted it is for surgery but you take what you can get :).

Kevin, quit causing trouble for the poor sex workers... just accept that your number is out there now.

Keith, when you get some transparent aluminum bring it up here so we can see it (or not sse it). Just remeber if you do get some, where you set it down.

Oh, and for t-day I've been saving bike inner tubes and I was thinking about making a rather large water balloon launcher. Whose gonna bring the come-along?

Other possible projects include a van-da-graph generator seeing as we have an old food processor that sarah burnt the gears out on... motor still works, could be SHOCKING....

Good job to Jen for setting this up.

Fishing?

yup.. thats me at one of the stops on the motorcycle trip in canada. I wasn't able to catch anything.


StereoTypes

Stere0Types offers some fun. combine the top half of an image with the bottom half of another. and they all fit together so nicely.. maybe to nice. a little scary really.

forkev.avi

forkev.avi REALLY sums up what kevs life is all about. The part with the sheet on the head is particularly good.

alas... these are the problems we run into when we search for our names or nicks with google. its awesome when it turns up what you want and just plain embarassing when it reveals the truth.

Friday, October 22, 2004

almost transparent aluminum

Transparent Alumina and it's slashdot discussion wich conclude it's not new.

I read somewhere recently (was it popular machanics, scientific america, wired... i can't remember) that transparent aluminum had been created. Now, like the article suggested, my thoughts turned towards star trek 4 (themovie)

In reality it's not aluminum, but aluminia.

I brought up this topic at work - and some coworkers laughed at the idea star trek actually gave us some good ideas (they found it amusing, not in the context of making fun of it)
I figured i'd better check my facts as i'm prone to not always read correctly or spew 'facts' (I tend to entrepret more then recite) - and it appears I was right (as usual). there, have some of that, coworkers.

Ultimate Show -what?!-

Answering machine: Friday, 1120 AM

Veronica on ansering machine: Hi, Mr hebly, this is Veronica from The Ultimate Show Girls.
I, umm, see on here that you ordered a couple of strippers for tomarrow night at about eight o'clock.
We have to cancel your order.
If you'd like to give us a call, please call us at 1800ShowGirls.
Thank you.
(hick) -CLICK.

Alodia: I know why you don't want to go to the car rally tomarrow night, you had strippers comming over.

Kevin: What?!
Lets give 'em a call.
showgirls is not 7 digits.

Alodia: You just start dialing, and it goes through.

Kevin calls 18007469447:
(-crappy background music starts-- elevator anyone?)

OH, hi sexy, i'm so glad you called. you are about to be connected live one on one to one of my wild and hot friends who is ready to satisyfy your wildest fantisties. If you are an experiecned caller, you can enter your credit card number any time. Don't forget, if you are experienced ... as a caller, you can enter, mmmm, your credit card number at any time. Mastercard is the card of choice where you credit is instantly approved.
We also except Visa, American Express, and Discover. Or use your checking account by just pressing the # key. (-voice changes-) One more time, mmm, you can give it to me anytime you want. That's right just enter your credit card number at anytime during this message. This call will be billed at 1.99 to 499 per minute depending on menu selection and will descretely appear on your credit card statement as Fronteer or Network Telephone. A tollfree customer service number will be provided later in this message as well as on your creditcard statement. In most cases, we can help you emediatly, so please call us 24 hours a day if you have any billing questions. Each call has an access fee of 599. Take out your credit card and put in your nubmer so I can talk to you now. This is a hot, sizling adult line, so you've got to be at least 18 to join us.
Customer service time may be billed at the prevelaing permament rate. For customer service please call:

18007771249 or write to
6433 Topanga Canyon BLVD # 150
Canoga Park, California 91303

mmm, I'm waiting for you, stud (almost a whisper). Enter your credit card number now. If you hear the following tone (beep) then you've been approved for the SBS billing network. Should your credit card compnay not approve this transation you will be billed directly by SBS.
i'm sorry, please re-enter your card number now
i'm sorry, please re-enter your card number now
i'm sorry, we were unable to process the credit card number you entered, please re-enter you card number or enter a different card number now.
i'm sorry, please re-enter your card number now
i'm sorry, please re-enter your card number now
i'm sorry, we were unable to process the credit card number you entered, please re-enter you card number or enter a different card number now.
i'm sorry, please re-enter your card number now
i'm sorry, please re-enter your card number now

kevin calls customer service 9:30pm. and is greated by a message promissing quality.
Gloria answers.
kevin demands the number be put on do not call - she can see it on her caller id
she says they just handle billing, they don't even know who that company is.
she puts me on hold, tries to dial 1800showgirls number
a long time passes, she can't figure out the real number
i have to convert it for her (kevin's not too good at this sort of thing)
i give her the number, she calls, and verifies that they do billing for them.
i ask to be taken off their list. and how do i contact them directly
she says i use their 800 number - i say, but i don't want that phone number, i want to talk to person to get off their list.
she recods my name (wrong): kevin hebley - as it appears in the phone book.
i read her the message I received, and she said it sounded fishy - she said that their customer does not make house calls, it's done all over the phone. I said i thought so, and that i wanted to talk to that company directly to complain.
i read her the message verbatum, she tooks notes of it, and she recommend i call during regular business hours (customer service there) and ask for the Day Supervivors or Manager.
I pressed her for how to contact the Ultimate ShowGirls company directly, but she would not budge, only the recommendation I talk to someone above her during normal hours.
I thank her for her time.

Maybe i'll call them monday.

Moral of the story: Alodia will help you call porn numbers. Porn number companys are hard to get ahold of if you want to talk about something other then sex AND get them off your phone. It's turning out to be really cool that the phone company put our names wrong in the phone book - it helps us sort out junk voicemail and mail.

Interest?

sarah suggested a group blog.
keith didn't like the idea.
any takers?