A fun site for the children of the 80's and 90's

Greetings all! Had an interview for another job opening on Monday, it went pretty well (I thought), and I should hear something back from them soon. Sounds like it'd be a fun job, so I'm really hoping I get this one.
I have a fun link for you today, Retrojunk - Your Memory Machine. Lots of articles about old cartoons and movies and TV shows (mostly from the 80's and 90's), and video too - old commercials, TV show intros and stuff like that. Lots of nostalgic fun for those of us old enough to remember this stuff :)

I'm still here

Been a long while since I've written anything here, sorry about that! Still no happy news on the job search, I've got a few resumes out there and hopefully still have a shot at a job with the City of Columbus. I have no idea when I might hear something from them - I've found that the wheels of government tend to move slowly when they actually move at all. Anyway, in other news I've been playing with my new 60GB iPod a lot recently and I really love it. Just got a FM transmitter/car cradle for it last night, it's very cool. Also, not to change the subject, but since I haven't given you any cool links to browse to recently (and I've been feeling guilty), here's a fun one - Guimp, the world's smallest website. You can play games on the site like Pac Man and Pong and even Asteroids - but the site is a 18 pixel by 18 pixel box! It's crazy tiny - you should check it out!

Google makes video from the National Archives available on Google Video

This is a great idea - Google will be working on digitizing the video content of the National Archives and making it available to all through Google Video. There are some samples available on there right now, like this one - the 1969 moon landing. Very cool!

The search continues!

Still no definitive answers from anyone on the job front, I had an interview Tuesday and I think it went OK. They said I should hear back from them next week if they want me to come back for a second interview. Still waiting to get my results from the test I took for a job with the city of Columbus - I took the test over 2 weeks ago and still haven't received notification yet of how I did. I called them yesterday and left a voicemail, and they called back and said I should get something 'by next week'. So we'll see how that goes. I'd really like to know one way or another on these prospects soon, so I'm really hoping they do let me know next week as promised. It's so difficult to find a new job... but hey, at least I've had a couple of interviews! Up until recently I wasn't even getting THAT far, so getting to a first interview is at least progress in the right direction.

I wonder...

So I'm sure you've heard about Ritchie Sambora and Heather Locklear and their marital difficulty (if not, you can read about it here). I wonder... when she found out and they talked about it, did the conversation maybe go something like this?

Ritchie: Heather, what's up?
Heather: Ritchie, I found these emails, and frankly, I think You Give Love A Bad Name.
Ritchie: Ah baby, no... you gotta believe it ain't like that - I love you, I'm Livin' On A Prayer here baby!
Heather: Look, we knew it might never be a Bed of Roses, and now it looks like it's over.
Ritchie: Ah, baby no - that's some Bad Medicine!!

Yep, I'll bet it was just like that :)

The more things change, the more they stay the same

Greetings all! Unfortunately posting to the blog has taken a back seat recently to the big job search, and to being crazy busy at my current (cruddy) job. It's really been bad, but hope springs eternal! I have an interview with the city of Delaware on Monday, and I'm still in the hunt for a job with the city of Columbus (should hopefully be hearing from them soon). With any luck something will pan out soon, and I'll be telling you all about it right here folks!

Still hoping...

Haven't heard anything back on the "Matt needs a new job" front - yet. Got a few irons in the fire still, and unfortunately none of the places I'm in the process with are moving very fast. With any luck I'll find out something from one (or more) of them next week. I'm still hopeful that at least one of these will pan out... Wish me luck!!

Keep EVERYTHING crossed...

Cause with any luck, I'll have a new job soon. Haven't been able to post recently cause things have been CRAZY at my current job - it's just incredibly busy, and I haven't had time to write any posts up of any significance. So here's a quick post, just a fast update - I'm working on three different jobs I'm currently in the running for, one I am waiting to see if I get a second interview, another I filled out a pre-screening questionnaire and turned it in yesterday, and the last I have to take an exam to see if they think I'm qualified or not. I'll be taking that on Monday. So, we will see how things go over the next couple of weeks - but with any luck, I'll have a new job soon.

Well THAT was annoying

Hello, and thanks for reading an official NOT 'spam blog'. Apparently Blogger has bots that sweep through blogs they host and flag them as 'spam blogs', disabling them from posting till the owner fills out a form and submits it to Blogger. And my blog was flagged yesterday - I just got access to post back today. So I had already written the post below this one, and decided to go ahead and publish it too. Silly automated processes, but it's all better because the Blogger admins have my blog on the whitelist now. Still was a pain in the rear though.

It was 20 years ago yesterday...

Yes folks, on January 19th, 1986 the first computer virus was discovered. It was a boot sector virus, and was spread from infected floppy disks (ah, those were the days...), a far less serious problem than the worms and trojans and other crud traversing the networks of today thanks to the internet. So in honor of this historic moment in history, let's all make sure our anti-virus programs are up to date and we do a full virus scan, what do you say?

Arrgh...

I hate cars. I totally hate them, with a passion. It never fails, just when you think one is running alright and everything is fine... BAM!!
I had a problem a few months back with the power window on the passenger side of my truck (this is not the actual truck (mine is magenta), just a picture I found so you could see what it looks like). It was stuck down, and I couldn't get the power window to roll back up! I could pull it up so that it was closed at least, but it would slide back down if you hit a bump. So it turns out that the regulator for that window had died, and after a few days and $500 (or so) dollars, it was fixed. Well, now (of course) the DRIVER side window is broken - only this time, I can't get at it to pull it back up! So it's stuck ALL THE WAY DOWN, and folks, it was a COLD drive to work today. I'm very annoyed and pissed off, and since I'll bet the regulator on that window is dead (cause it just figures it will be), it looks like I'm also out another $500...

iPod users are not as likely to steal music

According to a study conducted recently, owners of Apple iPods are less likely to steal music than users of other MP3 players. The survey of US and UK music buyers reveals that even though 25 per cent of people admit to downloading music from file-sharing services, only seven per cent of iPod owners do so. I guess we iPod owners are just an honest bunch, eh? This sure would seem to contradict Steve Ballmer's opinion of iPod users, back in 2004 he told reporters in London that "The most common format of music on an iPod is 'stolen'". Oh well, I guess you can't be right all of the time, right Steve?

Email spam on the decline - uh yeah... sure it is

Here's another quick post for today - I found a funny opinion article written for The Guardian that seems to think that spam emails are on the decline. Right - SURE they are :) I get quite a bit of spam still, but I'll admit that very little of it ever hits my inbox. The majority of it is filtered out by the spam filters I use - my ISP provided accounts (which are POP accounts) I pull down with Mozilla Thunderbird 1.5, and it has a really great built in junk mail filter. I also have a Google Gmail account, and their spam filtering works really well too. I still get spam - but I can just delete it easily and never really have to look at it much. Which is nice, since I'm not looking to buy any penny stocks, or help out the Nigerian Finance Minister, or increase the size of my member.

Computer problems driving UK citizens to alcohol and smoking to cope with the stress

Howdy all - sorry I haven't posted in so long, but I've been pretty busy recently. Having to come back to work after a vacation sucks, hard. Anyhow, I was reading this article from BBC News about a poll conducted by UK charity Developing Patient Partnerships about what causes stress for them. 30% responded that 'IT Problems' cause them the most stress, and out of the 1000 people polled, 27% of men and 23% of women said they would light up a cigarette in such situations. And more than a third of men and a quarter of women have a drink to cope with stress. So it looks like computer woes are leading people in the UK to ruin - I know that my problems make me wish I could have a few drinks every now and then!

Best wishes for a Happy New Year!

Here's hoping that everyone out there (all three or four of you who read this blog) has a wonderful New Year - get out and party tonight like it's 2005! I'll be taking next week off, and will be working on my New Year's resolution... get a new job (I really need one). I definitely need the time off, it'll hopefully help me start 2006 right. So here's to Auld Lang Syne and all that - Happy New Year everybody!

AOL's Top Ten list of Spam e-mail subjects

AOL published it's yearly list of the top ten spam email subject lines recently, and here it is -

1. Donald Trump Wants You - Please Respond
2. Double Standards New Product - Penis Patch
3. Body Wrap: Lose 6-20 inches in one hour
4. Get an Apple iPod Nano (or PS3 or Xbox 360) for Free
5. It's Lisa, I must have sent you to the wrong site
6. Breaking Stock News** Small Cap Issue Poised to Triple
7. Thank you for your business. Shipment notification
8. Your Mortgage Application is Ready
9. Thank you: Your $199 Rolex Special Included
and 10. Online Prescriptions Made Easy

In this article from InformationWeek.com, they talk about the list and also mention that AOL is reporting that they blocked an average of 1.5 billion spam messages each day. The total number of emails blocked in 2005 was OVER 556 billion. Damn! Are enough people actually BUYING penis patches to justify sending out that much spam? Seems like the problem is only getting worse, but the article also mentions that the average amount of spam that actually reached their user's mailboxes declined 75% over last year. Well, that's something, I guess.

Wish I'd come up with this idea...

Alex Tew, a 21-year old student from a small English town, came up with one hell of an idea to come up with money to pay for his education. He decided to start a website, appropriately named milliondollarhomepage.com, and sold it as a billboard site - anyone who wants can buy 1 pixel on the page for $1. So a 10x10 section would cost $100, etc. He sold a few sections to some friends and family, and with the $1000 those sales raised he issued a press release. Which was picked up by the news media, spread around the Internet, and soon advertisers for everything from dating sites and casinos to real estate agents and even The Times of London were putting up real cash for his pixels, with weblinks to their own sites of course. So far he's raised $936,700 - in only four months. Damn, that's quite a lot of money!! If you want to get in on the action, you'd better hurry - there's only 63,300 pixels left.

Coming to a PC near you - an unpatched Windows flaw that exploits Windows Meta File (WMF files) - The zero-day exploit

It's time yet again to watch what emails you open, which sites you visit, and what IM's you click links on VERY carefully! A flaw in the way Windows XP and Windows 2003 Server OS handles Windows Meta File (WMF) files has been exploited, and it can affect your PC even if your copy of Windows XP is fully patches and you run up-to-date anti-virus. As of this writing, Microsoft has no patch ready to fix the flaw in Windows, and the exploit is rampant on thousands of malicious websites. Read more about it here.
There is a workaround available, thanks to Verisign's iDefense. I've copied the procedure (and the possible drawback) below.

According to iDefense, Windows users can disable the rendering of WMF files using the following hack:

1. Click on the Start button on the taskbar.
2. Click on Run...
3. Type "regsvr32 /u shimgvw.dll" to disable.
4. Click ok when the change dialog appears.

iDefense notes that this workaround may interfere with certain thumbnail images loading correctly. The company notes that once Microsoft issues a patch, the WMF feature may be enabled again by entering the command "regsvr32 shimgvw.dll" in step three above.

Hope that helps you if you are worried about this - and I think you should be!

A well deserved honor - TIME names Battlestar Galactica the best show of 2005

And I'd have to agree - it was the best show of 2005. Here's a link to the article so you can read the rest of the list. I don't agree with everything (come on - How I Met Your Mother? Except for Neil Patrick Harris that show blows!!) but most of it is right on the money. Although I would have put My Name Is Earl up higher on the list. The new season of Battlestar Galactica starts on January 6th - and I can't wait!!

Track Santa's progress using Google Earth

Have Google Earth? You can use it to track Santa today - it started 2pm GMT. Here's a link to the post about it from the Google Blog. If you want to download Google Earth, just click the Google Earth link above!