Drove out to mom's house again to clean up more
I discovered that mom had somebody cut down the trees in her front yard . . .
I put the side fence back up again, and cleaned up the rocks in the yard
I used my lawn mower to cut up a lot of the weeds
I'd feel like I'm accomplishing more if I was doing more than basic maintenance
And if I could fill up more than just two garbage cans
Voting Day
I've never been politically active
If I'm asked who I'm voting for
I say "i don't vote FOR any politician. i decide which is worse and put a mark next to the other person"
And I don't understand people that deify a politician
I've recently heard the idea that MAGA people are stuck in the need for a community
Unfortunately, it's near impossible to convince people to leave their cult
They need to come to the realization themselves
I was hoping the universe wouldn't let the stupid evil bastards win again
but here we are
I got it in my head that it's time to build myself a new gaming computer
My plan has always been to see what Microcenter has for sale
then use Newegg to check reviews on the hardware
I chose the parts I wanted and was surprised to see that it was going to cost $1000
I was fully expecting to spend at least $3000
My last computer cost $2000
I double checked with everybody at work to make sure that I'm not making a mistake
but every thing looked good
I drove up to Microcenter after work
I took a print out from the website, handed it to a worker, and had him find all the parts I wanted
For me it was an exciting day, but I suppose this is a common occurance for the people in this store
The guy at the checkout asked if I wanted to check the CPU pins on the motherboard
because they sometimes get bent
I said yes, and he spotted a bent pin and got me another board
Too bad he doesn't have a tip jar
I think the total cost is so low because I'm not buying the brand-new top-of-the-line parts
But my advice has always been "you want last year's top-of-the-line. so you're not over paying for stuff that might not work"
So I think I did well
Five years ago, I finalized the purchase of my house
I knew that I couldn't live in the Southfield house forever
assuming that mom could die at any time
so I was already making plans to buy a house in the Melvindale neighborhood
It was Rocky and Tom that pushed me out
I worked with Bank of America to get pre-approved for my house loan
I used Zillow.com to find the cheapest houses
I've got a cousin that works in real estate
I'm glad I didn't take the first house he showed me
I picked another house from the website , and contacted he agent listed
She helped me go through the whole buying process
I only met with the seller at the signing of the paperwork
I would have like to chat with her a bit to get some tips and tricks about my new house
I didn't actually move into my house until the following June
because the city inspection made me fix up the driveway, water heater, and electrical outlets
It took me all weekend, but I finished assembling my new computer
Everything seemed to slot into place much easier than last time
The manufacturers of the different components seem to work together to make sure everything is compatible
The cabling is much neater this time
The M.2 hard drives fit on the motherboard
and the case has space behind the motherboard to run cables
and the power supply is modular, so I'm not using any cables I don't need
The two 2TB hard drives I bought for storage, I fit inside
I spent a lot of time checking the manuals for the motherboard, power supply, and case to make sure I'm inserting the cables into the correct slot
The moment of truth, I pushed the power button, and nothing
CRAAAAP! oh wait, i need to flip the power switch on the power supply
It turned on after the second time
I spent some time exploring the BIOS, it's a lot more graphical than others I've used
I dismantled my old desk, and moved my old computer aside
I wiped all of the dust and dirt off of the table
Then I placed down the new computer and re-ran the cables
It looks so clean
The case has two large fans in the front that light up RGB
I turned off the lights because I don't want the lights showing through the window into the street
Several years ago, I bought a retail copy of Windows 10, so I used that
I have no intention of upgrading to Windows 11
In fact, I disabled the TPM on the motherboard so it won't install
My new computer has three M.2 drives, and two 2TB storage drives
I'm using the M.2 drives for the OS, Blizzard games, and Steam games
The storage drives will hold my files, and my porn
It took a long time to re-format the drives
and re-download the game files
I am able to turn up the graphical settings on the games, which is nice
but it doesn't change the gameplay
My phone made a strange ding
I looked and saw that I had set a reminder for today that I am 18000 days old
I set future days in the calendar for 19000 and 20000
This fall commemmorates two twenty year anniversaries for me
When I first started working for th PC Renewal team
and when World of War craft released
Twenty years ago, I was twenty-nine years old, still unemployed, and had just moved to Grand Haven with mother
I hadn't found any long term permanent employment, so I was fine with whatever temp work I could get
I had identified myself as an "IT professional" and was searching for some job involving computers
But there wasn't a lot of that kind of work in the Grand Haven area
Then one day, I got an offer from Manpower Temp Services for a three month job installing computers at Ford for Dell
I was thrilled to get it
I moved back into the Southfield house again, and started paying the bills
I started by working out in Livonia at PDEM
The PC Renewal project was much different back then
We would "bulldoze" buildings by replacing almost every computer in the place at once
There would be a group of field technicians led by a team lead
I worked for Manpower, until I was offered a position as a team lead working for Tech Team
Those were good days . . .
Until 2008 happened . . .
One December day, I was working out at MAP, when the boss called up and asked me to report to "The Atrium"
and he informed me that I was being laid off
I had often remarked that this is good job security
because what's Ford going to do? _Not_ renew their computers?
Well that's just what they did for the next few years while I worked at the Earnst and Young help desk
After I was terminated from that position after five years
I made myself voluntarily unemployed for the year of 2014
Then when my savings ran out, I started job hunting again
and with the help of Bob Swanson and Vince Wojciechek, I came back to the PC Renewal team
Vince had originally wanted me to be a Planner, but after a while I went back to being a Field Technician
I did that job until 2020, and had myself a three month break
Chris Jamison brought me back, and put me in the warehouse as a repair technician
Then once things got back to normal after the pandemic, I was a field technician again
So, I did start the PCR job twenty years ago, but haven't worked consistanly at it
Blizzard is currently celebrating the 20th anniversary of World of Warcraft
A few months earlier, I had stopped playing EverQuest
I can't say I was looking to start playing another MMORPG
but I did get swept up in the hype
I went with a few other PCR techinicians to buy a copy of the game from Best Buy
The lack of network infrastructure and lag made it almost impossible to play the game at first
I created several characters of different races and classes to see what the game had to offer
One thing I learned from playing EverQuest is that
if you want to have fun, play a hunter
if you want to find a group, play a healer
A bunch of people from Theta Tau created a guild, and I decided to create a healer type
I created a cleric because I assumed they'd be the strongest healer
and I created a human because they had the trait that gave them a buff to reputations
Thus, Amity the Human Priest was born
The game has changed a lot over the years
and each expansion seems to follow the good-bad-good-bad pattern
I'm still playing it after all these years
but I'm not as addicted to it as I used to be
Another drive over to mom's house
I took a longer route along I94 to avoid the problems on I96
The new scenary was nice, but added a half hour to the trip
I cut my way through the weeds and trees along the driveway towards the backyard
I've got the idea to cut the lower branches off of the pine tree in her backyard
but I didn't make it that far
There has to be a better tool for this kind of work
I'm imagining a weed-wacker with a metal blade on the end
I put a glass ceiling over the world
I finished my project of covering the game world with transparent tiles
It's about 1000x1000 tiles
I was able to use a 5x5 blueprint
and automatic delivery of materials to speed up the process
but it still took months to complete
There are mods and cheats I could have used, but the end product wouldn't have been as satisfying
Luckily, the game developers optimized the game so the lag isn't as bad as you'd think
The next step is to bring all of the ore and fluids up to my level
It has been unusally warm this fall
so I've braved the cold and not turned on my furnace yet
This morning there was a light powder of snow
which means it dropped below freezing last night
There are a series of switches to power on the furnace
First, the circuit breaker
Next, the switch on the furnace
Then the switch on the thermostat
Finally, turn up the temperature on the thermostat
I didnt get invited to any thanksgiving parties this year
Which I'm very okay with
I get to stay inside by myself
and I don't have to worry about creating new socially awkward memories
I think I'm going to be spending every other saturday cleaning mom's house until I'm done
I bought an air pump to fill the tires on her trailer
I brought my jack to get it up in the air, and put it up on blocks
There's a layer of snow over everything, so I can't pick up much trash
I cut off all of the low hanging dead limbs under her pine tree, so now we can walk under it
but I created another huge pile of branches
We're going to need to rent a wood chipper to clean everything up