J5’s Blog

Awhile ago I signed up for Blockbuster.com. At 21 or so dollars a month for three movies out at a time and the ability to return them for movies at the store up the road it just fit my lifestyle. Even when they alerted me that they were changing the plan where they restricted it to 5 in store exchanges or I could pay $4 extra dollars a month for the same unlimited service I was getting I felt it was still a fair deal. The key there was they notified me and gave me the option to pay my current level or opt-in to pay extra.

This time however they have alerted me that they are raising the price by $10 (a whopping 40% or so increase) a month which goes into effect automatically in my next billing cycle. I now hold a service that was once competitive with Netflix but now seems to keep increasing in costs every couple of months or so. What is really interesting is the pricing on their website doesn’t seem that bad (though they have gotten rid of the unlimited exchange option). I have to wonder if that is an unmarked introductory price.

I can appreciate that the program may have been an ill conceived marketing ploy that has been losing Blockbuster a lot of money but then I would have been happy to move to a more restricted plan had this happen just once and they canceled the unlimited plan then (I did move to the higher cost plan the first time). The fact that they did it a second time just has me looking over my shoulder for the next increase. So the value is gone and I will be leaving Blockbuster.com at the end of this billing cycle. Perhaps I’ll start up with Netflix again or just get outside more. I did just join a gym after all.

Davis Square is opening up a new Boston Sports Club and I finally decided to join. The tipping point came last week during the snow storm when I slipped and fell down a couple of stairs at the Porter T stop. Usually I would walk away pretty embarrassed but non worse for ware. This time I thought I actually might have injured myself. In the end I slept it off and felt fine the next day, if a little bruised, but I realized sitting in a chair programming every day wasn’t getting me any healthier. We already have a fitness room at our office but I figured having trainers around and a place to go when I am home and on weekends will get me a bit more motivated. We will see how long this lasts but as things go these days I had to sign a contract so they’ve got me for a year. Being the type of person who skips the ‘fillers’ at a buffet just so I feel I got my money’s worth, I think I will be utilizing the gym quite a bit.

Getting in touch with my Italian roots while running around Florence was great fun.  Thank you Dorothy and Karl for getting married and sharing the moment with all your friends and family.  I’m busy uploading all of the photos which I managed to save after my camera started corrupting the memory card.  More on my time in Italy later. Now it is time to go and check out buzzgrinder.com – a music blog one of the guests at the wedding maintains.

I’ll be in various places other than the Boston area for most of November.  Starting this coming Friday I will be driving down to NY where I am catching a flight to Florence, Italy for a friend’s wedding.  I’ll be there for a week and then am going to work from Atlanta, Georgia while visiting my best friend who is getting married next spring.  To round things off I will be working from NY through Thanksgiving.

The Italy trip is pretty booked but I should be visiting the ATL and NY Red Hat offices to say hi since I will be there anyway.  If any Fedora or GNOME folks want to grab a beer or just meet up let me know.

I won’t be at the Gnome Summit on Saturday because of prior engagements (literally, I am going to a wedding).  We were however fortunate to get money from Google to host a Beer Summit on Sunday night starting at 7:00pm at Flat Top Johnny’s.  There are a couple of pool tables reserved and free beer available so hackers can exchange ideas, build friendships and hustle each other in an enjoyable setting.

Now for a small update on the Cookbook.  I haven’t had much progress since a large number of unexpected distractions have popped up.  The good news is Lulu.com updated their site and one of the options is a wizzard for cookbooks.  Of the three designs for page layout submitted by,  Vinicius Depizzol, Silvia Miranda, and Diego Escalante Urrelo, I liked them all and they all fit very well with each other so you all are going to be the first to get a book, payed for by me, once it is published.

As for my name on this list, I would like to thank the Acadamy, my Mom – hi Mom – Roderick’s Mom, and…what I don’t get to make a speech for being on the “B” list and I still have to wait in line at Spagos?  That’s it, I’m firing my agent.

Was that you I saw getting ready for a hike in the White Mountains Saturday morning?  We would have stopped to say hello but we were going 50 miles per hour following someone.  Then again we were going 50 mph and I could have just imagined it.

I was bored one day and started rifling through GNOME Games. I played the usual Blackjack, Tali and Nibbles when I happened upon a game I had not seen in the set before. It was GNOME Sudoku. It was simple enough to pick up – you get nine large squares, each containing nine smaller squares all laid out in a 9×9 grid. In each of the smaller squares you place a number between one and nine. Each of the bigger squares can only hold one of each number. The catch is that each row and column can only hold one of each number in the set also. What you get is a perfectly balanced board where each number is used nine times yet they do not repeat within a row, column or the nine smaller squares which makes up one of the bigger squares. It is a pattern matching game which sounds easy enough but can get quite frustrating if you happen to make a mistake. This is because each “move” effects the outcome of successive moves. If you make a mistake early it can compound to the point where it is hard to unravel without erasing the whole board and starting over again.

So because of GNOME Sudoku I picked up a sudoku book on my flight home from Amsterdam. That was a huge mistake. Now I can’t get to bed without finishing one of the puzzles and I can’t get out of my apartment in the morning without finishing another. I feel somehow incomplete if I can’t finish the puzzle I am working on – and they keep getting harder. If it gets bad enough I might need an intervention. Thanks GNOME Games.

Just thought I would chime in on Dave’s post since I had the oposite experience with Facebook.  Ever since I started using it, it has been immensely useful, mostly in keeping track of friends in a spam free environment.  I first checked it out in order to see the integration with Mugshot.  I quickly found a friend I had in High School and started messaging her.  Then someone I took a cooking class with friended me and sent me a message asking about the other classes I had taken.  I’ve ended up gathering information about a dental office she works in and will be making an appointment when I get back home.  From there I was friended by someone I had met in Thailand who’s family was friends with my family.  We used Facebook to meetup in London before I flew off to Amsterdam last weekend.  I was also able to find a Swedish friend who I had worked with at E-Trade some years ago.  Not to mention I can see what my brother is up to.

For people who have a very centralized life, Facebook isn’t really that compelling but for someone like me who has good friends all over the world but am often only in a place for short periods of time it becomes the ideal tool to keep intouch and plan.

BTW – The one thing I found interesting in my travels is the progression of contact information which people ask for.  First it was address to send letters, then it was phone number when cell phones became prevalent, e-mail and AOL Instant messenger were big the last few years and on this trip it’s been almost exclusively, “do you have a Facebook account?”

On Friday night a bunch of us went to a Birthday party some random people staying at the E-Tap hotel were going to. It was loads of fun to hang out with some locals, discuss politics, play some guitar and generally get smashed.

The next morning I barely met up with Richard for a ride back down to London at 2:00. I apparently just passed out in his car and I have no idea how he made it to Heathrow in a little over 2 hours. At this point I owe him a whole keg of beer.

I ended up stashing my bags and hanging with one of my friends from Thailand who just graduated her masters program in London. Her friends had a BBQ which was a bit more mellow but just as fun as the last party. After the party I caught the last train up to Heathrow and spent the night there until my flight into Amsterdam for a bit of holiday.

On the Dublin to Amsterdam leg of the trip I was nodding off waiting for my flight due to the lack of sleep. When I came to there was a guy with an OLPC tee walking by. I stopped him and started asking him questions. Turns out he is doing the port for sim city to the OLPC.

I’m in Amsterdam for the next week. GUADEC was great but now I just need to unwind. Tomorrow we are going to catch the Mike Bikes tour to check out some windmills, a cheese factory and other landmarks both in and outside of the city.

Just a quick cap of what I have been up to.

• Flew into London – good thing I showed up 3 hours before my flight because I found out it was canceled and I was bumped to an earlier flight in a different terminal.  Luckly it was the flight Bernie was on.
• Got into London around 9:00 on Saturday where Bernie had rented a car. We drove in and parked near Marble Arch and walked into town.  Walked around a huge portion of London from Picidilly to Southwark and places inbetween and managed to leave London at 6:00 the next morning.
• Drove out of town and kept getting lost trying ot get to the M40.  Finally managed it and found ourselves in Birmingham where we proceeded to get lost and drive in circles.  We eventually found the venue.  I was totaly wasted the whole day but did manage to take a one hour nap and get some beer into me to wake me up for dinner.
• I’m totaly acclimated now and am getting ready to see Jono’s  keynote.
• Networks sucks so I will most likely have to update this when I get back with more relevent GUADEC info