Sometimes I feel like that guy on the cell phone commercials, talking into thin air. I blog fairly frequently, but generate few - if any - comments, and most of the comments I do generate come from Thursday Thirteen, and are limited strictly to those TT posts.

Steph at And She Knits Too asked an interesting question the other day, and it generated a lot of interest on why people blog if they don’t get any comments.

I guess I thought I’d answer that here, though I did comment over there, too. I don’t blog for an audience. I blog as a personal journal of sorts, a place to record accomplishments and thoughts, to post photos where I can find them, to play with web design, since I have nothing better to do. I blog for fun of it.

I don’t really check the stats often. Right now, it says I’ve had 849 unique visitors, but I’m skeptical. 849 unique visitors, and only a handful of comments on the TT pages? Must be a mistake. Or robots. Though I think those are counted separately… Maybe not, though. In any case, I don’t check them, because I don’t know whether they’re accurate or not. Clearly, I have a silent readership, if there is a readership at all, but since I didn’t start blogging with much intention of gathering comments, I’m not too concerned about it.

Steph mentioned that blogging is a discussion and a community activity. I suppose that’s true… if you have a readership. If not, it’s more like a journal. But sometimes, I, too, wonder why I bother to blog if no one ever reads it. Comments are a nice ego-boost, and frankly, one of the reasons I participate in TT (though I didn’t this week - too much going on.)

However, I’m also a person who rarely comments on another’s blog, though I read a couple dozen. I have little to say, and more, I generally read through a feedreader, and clicking over to the website just to drop off a blah comment like “Ooh! Pretty!” seems lame enough to me… (though funny, I never think it’s lame if I /get/ a comment like that… but maybe I would if I got 30-40 comments a post, I don’t know.) And commenting on super popular blogs (the Harlot, anyone?) seems just as pointless. Putting effort into being lost in the crowd over a comment that really has little enough worth to begin with doesn’t seem like it’s worth the time. I guess I was never someone to chime into the discussion at school, either, though. If you have nothing worthwhile to say, I thought, why bother saying anything?

So I understand both sides of the question. But I wonder… is anyone out there reading this? Drop me a line if you are!

I checked my email tonight (okay, okay, I check it every night, practically - hell, it’s set up to notify me the moment anything drops by, and usually, I’m on top of it within minutes), and happily, there’s another email from my SP10 spoilee and another from Shelby, my hostess, who’s set up the first of three contests for this round.

My sp10 questionaire is over to the right and should be easy to find, so yay - first part done. And second, I am to discuss my favorite thing on the needles at the moment.

Hard to choose, because I alternately love and hate it all. *laugh* I have two things on the needles, and a single mitten awaiting its mate. It doesn’t count, since said mate is not on the needles. The other things on the needles are my Kitty Pi and my Backyard Leaves scarf.

Hmm. Well, I admit, the scarf is my favorite at the moment. I mean, it’s nicer to knit. Okay, it’s a pain in the rear to knit, but I loooove the product, and I’m not quite so in love with the brown mud pie kitty pi. And besides, Aurora 8 is soooo much nicer to knit with than Wool of the Andes, which is a bit rough on my skin at this time of year, when my hands crack and I’m slathering on herbal salves and Aveeno.

Rant//
(Did you know that Aveeno tests on animals? I did not until recently, and even though this does not make me happy, I’m not going to stop using it because… it /works/. Really really well. Damn. Why must their product be so good for me, and not, say, someone who doesn’t test on animals? Now, I’m no animal rights freak - and no offense to those who are, but it just isn’t me, I was raised in too rural an area, I suppose, where we depend so much on animals for various things to ever be a big animal rights fangirl - but testing freaking cosmetics on animals pisses me off. It’s unnecessary and cruel. Especially considering its ultimate purpose. But I guess it doesn’t piss me off to use an inferior brand, so I guess I should shut up, eh?)
//Rant

Anyway. Back to the point of the post. Backyard Leaves, from Scarf Style (or, since I don’t actually have that book, though I want it, from Holiday Gifts, or Knits, or whatever the holiday issue of Interweave 2006 was called) is probably my favorite thing on the needles. I’m using size 7 needles (and boy did I have to dig those up from the bottom of my drawer… A has my usual pair) and Aurora 8 from Karabella. Pictures are… a few posts down from here. I’d post them, but honestly, I don’t want to repost the same ones, and the scarf really hasn’t changed much. It’s only a few repeats longer.

I’m really, really hoping I have enough yarn.

Stole this from here while checking out a 52 socks in a year knitalong that I love the idea of, but could never possibly complete. Hmm. Another good booklist. Will have to work on it sometime!

Look at the list of (100) books below.
Bold the ones you’ve read.
Italicize the ones you own.
Movies don’t count.

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban(Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25 . Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie(Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. Bible (not all of it, though)
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy) (reading currently…)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

January has been a month of reading. To be honest, I haven’t done a lot else. Knit 1/3 of a scarf. Finished up a sewing project I should’ve finished in November (the advent calendar - which, by the way, is totally super adorable), no baking, no intriging projects, nothing but cozying up and reading.

January’s a good time for that - unpredictable weather, harsh winds, chilly snow, so very little daylight, so very little warmth and energy. The rush of the holidays and the excitement of autumn long gone, I just sort of… curled up and rested all month long. I suppose I might have went into a bit of a hibernation like the bears. Is that so bad? All this month, I’ve been berating myself for it. Lazy! I’d write in my planner for the day’s events. Sometimes I wouldn’t write anything at all. Lazy, lazy, lazy.

But then I think of the animals that curl up and rest in the winter, and I think of all the furious knitting I did throughout autumn, and I think of the sewing and the crafts and the moving and the baking and the rush, and I think that perhaps a month-long resting period wasn’t so bad at all. Maybe it’s just what I needed.

I’m starting to feel the fires of creativity burn again. I want to sew, I want to knit, I want to /do/. I wanted to knit tonight, but it’s been a couple weeks since I worked on the scarf, and I’ve forgotten the pattern, so I’ll have to dig it up. Perhaps tomorrow.

But I read! Tonight I finished a book I would recommend to anyone who loves an enchanting story: The Thirteenth Tale, which is lovely and haunting and mesmerizing and too many other words to put down. If you have a love of books, read it! I also read On the Banks of Plum Creek - one of the Little House series books tonight, and those books always make me feel so warm and cozy and wanting to have a little house and a little family somewhere out in the middle of nowhere like that.

I read 14 books in January, and you can see which ones, and short, semi-coherent thoughts on each, on the 101 Things Booklist, linked to the right. Not bad. Approximately one book every 2 days or so. Not too shabby at all! A good way to kickstart my imagination.

Soon, it will be Imbolc, and then, I will pay homage to Brigid/Brigit, Irish goddess of creative inspiration, among many other things, and perhaps then, I will rise from this hibernation to return to life again with the growing light.

I’ve been reading. Read 9 books this year already. They’ve all been good, except this last worthless pile of paper called The Two Minute Rule. I cannot believe the author, Robert Crais, has a dozen or so books published, because this was one lameass book. Did he ever get the “show, don’t tell” lecture? Because he needs to.

He also needs to get the “contrived endings don’t make for good endings” lecture, because this one made me gag. It made no sense at all. None. Nada.

I consider myself a writer. I write, after all. Lots. Never published a bloody thing, probably never will [frankly, I’m a chronic unfinisher], but obviously, I /could/. I mean, I could write this shit. Is that all it takes to get published? Words on paper, even if they’re deader-than-a-doornail words with no emotion, no feeling, no life?

Oigh.

So here’s my TT for the week - 13 Ways To Write Badly. This book didn’t violate all of them (though a good lot of them, I’ll say), and I could go on for a lot more than 13, but this’ll do.

Thirteen Ways to Write Badly!

1. Tell. Don’t show them anything - your readers don’t want to experience the story, they just want to hear it like news on the radio.
2. Introduce characters in the first chapter by first and last name, give them a point of view to tell their side of the story, make like they’re an important character, and then never look at them again. Ever. This gives your story an aura of mystery, even once the readers finish! Excellent!
3. Give everyone stupid nicknames and throw them around every now and then just for the heck of it. Readers love that shit.
4. Talk brand names. Who needs honest description when a brand name will do?
5. Contrive an ending. Your character was a bank robber? Make him rob a bank at the end to save the day, even if it’s unnecessary and more, outrageous. Excess drama makes for a bestseller!
6. Pitable characters are good characters. How can readers possibly like your character if they don’t pity them? Make sure your character is depressed, unhappy, and miserable, and then make sure he’s a complete failure, and then make sure he knows it and thinks it… often. That’s right.
7. And don’t forget to tell them so. None of that showing business. Your readers don’t wanna think! This is important here!
8. Flat, one dimensional characters are the way to go. Don’t put any more time into the characters than your readers will - a few thoughts on the matter is good enough. I mean, giving anyone but the main characters personality is a total waste of time.
9. Characters shouldn’t change. Not in the book, anyway. If you make the characters grow or change, people will just think you’re a crappy author because you couldn’t make up your mind.
10. If you must make them change, make it big changes. Instantaneous ones. No pressure needed. Just do it, and get it over with fast. Don’t make them dwell on it, or your readers will, too, and then you’ll be that crappy author who can’t stick with anything.
11. If you’re not writing about a miserable, pitiable character, make sure you’re writing about Superman. Everyone loves superheroes, because they can do no wrong and know everything.
12. If you don’t have a plot, put lots of drama into things - sex and emotion and turmoil and things that go round and round and round so nobody ever realizes your mistake. You’ll be fine. I swear.
13. If you DO have a plot, don’t make the above mistake. Plot should strictly be plot. No emotion. Don’t let those characters have feelings, or it’ll sideline you. Well, not many feelings. And for god’s sake, don’t show it if they do. A quick: “He was surprised.” will do the trick. Point A to Point B. Nothing more.

1. jenny 2. Julie Doe

3. bonnie 4. You're next!

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here
View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

In my 1001 Days project, among my goals are to read BBC’s Top 100 Reads. I’ve read 13 of the 100 since March 21st. However, I’ve read a handful more of those in the past, and so, they’re at the bottom of the list, to be read only if time and desire permits. After all, I read all the Harry Potter novels, and cute as they are, I don’t have a pressing desire to go back and reread them all immediately. Though maybe I will sometime between now and when my 1001 Days is up. I don’t know. But things I’ve already read are not on the “must do” list for me to complete this goal. Reasonable? I think so.

With the ones I’ve already read at some point added in, I’ve read 22 of 100. Not bad. 1/5th of the books done. Frankly, this goal is harder than I expected. My library is really… not quite so good. Even the libraries it’s allied with fail miserably when finding some of these - even though the books in question are not what I’d call incredibly rare reads.

I don’t really want to have to /buy/ all these books. Especially since some of them are books I’m really quite certain I will not enjoy so much that I’d like to own them.

I have found good luck in finding the old classics online, however, in libraries like Literature.org and Online-Literature.com - in fact, several of the reads mentioned were found online. However, I suspect that /these/ might be the reads more aptly found in my libraries. Nevertheless, it makes for a quick way to read a few chapters while at work.

For example, I’m currently working on Treasure Island (7 chapters in) and War and Peace (oh please, shoot me now) (somewhere in the midst of Book 3). Confession - I /hate/ war novels. I really do. Especially war novels like /this/. Flowery and dull as sin. To be honest, I feel that way about a great lot of ‘classics’. Flowery, and dull as sin. I guess I’m too conditioned to thrillers, myseteries, dark fantasy, and romance, eh?

A downside of this reading books online thing is that it’s not an actual /book/. I like books. I like to hold them and feel them and smell them, even. Reading online doesn’t quite do it for me in the same way. So I’m glad to also have a friend, A, who likes those flowery classics, and who has a good handful of them that I can thus borrow, read, and return without resorting to the library’s painfully plastic-ized hardcover, or to an online version of the same thing. So yay, A!

Anyway. That’s it for the book update.

So I use Linux - Ubuntu (or rather, Kubuntu - the version with KDE as the standard desktop environment) to be exact. It’s been a year and… 3 weeks or so since I switched my main computer over to Linux now. A year of using Kubuntu fulltime, except for a few tasks I still relegate to the windows computer, just to give the thing something to do. Or maybe because I’m too lazy to migrate when it’s already set up and working fine on the other computer. Sure, Linux has its share of problems. But so does Windows - anyone, even a Windows enthusiast, will tell you that. The difference is this - I’m more willing to put up with Linux’s problems than Microsoft’s. Not to mention, Microsoft’s overbearing, threatening, and downright frightening business practices really put me off. And while there’s a place for every Operating system in the market, Linux is the one that belongs on my main terminal. Period. And here’s why.

Thirteen Reasons to Love Linux

1. Free - as in beer! No more shelling out a couple hundred dollars for the latest operating system - or more for a new computer with it already installed. Linux is completely free - download it straight from the internet and burn it to a cd, or, if you like, order one for a minimal cost (from a few dollars for postage and CD costs, up to around $40, if you want a distribution with a manual in it). But honestly? All you need is a broadband connection and a cd, and you’re good to go. No need to spend more - and virtually anything you’d like to know how to do in Linux is online - no need to purchase books, unless you want to!
2. Free - as in speech! Open source software is great. Sure, you may not want to know what goes on under the hood of your car, but they don’t weld it shut, so you can open it up to take a look every now and then - and heck, you can check your oil and add fluids, too. Linux is like that - you may never have the desire to look at the code and make some changes - but if you do, the option is available to you, unlike proprietary systems, which ‘weld it shut’, so to speak.
3. Choice - There’s dozens of distributions of linux available - something for everyone’s taste! Like a lightweight OS that uses minimal resources? Linux can do that. Like something more like Windows - with loads of features and eye candy? We can do that, too. Like simple and easy? Try Ubuntu. Like something you can really dig your hands into and get dirty with? Try Slackware.
4. KDE & Gnome - Two incredible desktop environments with a far broader range of customization options and much better performance than Windows could ever offer. Much prettier, loads of gorgeous themes, and the ability to customize just about everything. Learn more: KDE / GNOME
5. BASH - the command line shell is wondeful. Ever been frustrated by Window’s “command line”? Hate DOS? Try BASH and be delighted. For you windows users, you can experiment with Cygwin, which actually installs the bash shell for windows!
6. Software - Thousands of applications, free and at your fingertips. Many of these programs rival expensive or proprietary Windows counterparts - Gimp, Firefox, OpenOffice, Gaim, gnucash, amarok. While some distributions of linux can indeed make installing software difficult, as you’ve probably heard, Ubuntu and other newbie-friendly distros actually make the process simpler than it is in Windows. You just open up your package manager, select the programs you want to install (and there are thousands in the database - all tested rigorously and compatable with your distribution - and click “install”. And it does all the work for you - downloading the program, installing it where it needs to be, and setting it up to run properly. Uninstallation is just as easy.
7. No Spyware - That’s right, no spyware. So far, there has been absolutely no spyware for linux. While it’s inevitable that some programs may crop up, if you stick with the thousands of tested applications in your repositories, you will NEVER come across spyware again. In open source software, spyware has literally no place to hide, because ANYONE can look at the code - and better, anyone can modify it, too.
8. No Viruses - Same deal. A small handful of prototype viruses have been forged for linux - but none of them went far - when they did anything at all. Linux is a secure OS - and its system of user priviledges tends to limit what a virus would be capable of. For instance, software simply can’t be be installed anywhere outside of a user’s home directory without root (administrator) permissions. Therefore, any virus that a user ran across during normal computing simply wouldn’t be able to do damage to the system as a whole - if it could do much of anything at all. And again, open-source software simply has some built-in protections against viruses, and linux, more so.
9. Stability - Linux is hailed for its stability; crashes are not the daily occurance that they are on some Windows desktops. Many linux boxes are never rebooted, except for important upgrades to the system. Most upgrades to a home user’s system do not require a restart at all. Installing software in Windows almost ALWAYS requires a reboot. Not so in linux - only for major kernal upgrades, and similar services. Also, when programs crash in linux, it does not typically bring down the whole system - just the program that’s failed to respond.
10. Servers - Run your own servers! Yes, you! I run an ssh server that allows me to log into my computer from anywhere in the world and read my files, access other computers on my network, perform system maintenence, check my mail, and more. Free and simple. You can also run a mail server, web server, file server, print server, or anything else you want… without buying expensive software!
11. Installation - Ubuntu, in particular, is a very fast, very easy install. Virtually no technical questions asked, and even when downloading the OS, it’s very quick! Lately, they’ve evolved to a LiveCD dvd install disc - where you boot directly into the OS from the cd, and you can actually surf the web and play games from the CD while it installs!
12. LiveCds - This is great, especially for troubleshooting. LiveCDs are cd boot discs that can boot you straight into a fully graphical operating system - or not, your choice - without installing a thing. Carry a livecd, and pop it into any computer that will boot from a cd (most newish computers in the last several years do this by default, though some may need a bios setting change, first) and instantly be immersed into the environment of your choice. You can even download and “install” software - all without touching the data on the machine’s hard drive!
13. Hardware Support - Better than you’ve heard, especially for fairly standard machines made in the last few years! (Getting cutting-edge hardware is a bit riskier, as it takes time to develop support for them.) My camera, printer, graphics card, sound card, usb key, etc. were all automatically detected and set up for me. The only driver I needed to install was for the graphics card, and it was an incredibly simple process.
14. And a bonus - dual booting. You do not need to throw away windows to use linux! You can run them both from the same machine - easily! :) Learn more at Ubuntu.com - or choose another distribution, such as Debian, Fedora, Mandriva, SuSE, Mepis, or more.

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

I got two packages today in the mail! Hurrah! I first got my little hummingbird stitch markers - which /are/ far prettier than the picture shows, though I can’t get a decent picture of them to save my arse - and my second Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell book! Though I had a surprise with that one. Namely, it turned out to be a softcover, not a hardcover book. Like… wtf? I specifically ordered a hardcover. But oh well. For something like $5.50, I’m not complaining. Even the softcover is priced at $15.95 - and the softcover’s in near-perfect condition, except for the tiniest wrinkles at the corners. Anyway, I caught my cat admiring it, so I snapped this photo.

I’ve been reading an incredible book these last few days, and this morning, I’ve finished it at last. It doesn’t usually take me a long time to read a novel - even one as impressively long (973 pages!) as this one, but to be honest, I wasn’t prepared for the emotional ride Ken Follett had crafted in Pillars of the Earth. The book is stunning, in every way - realistic from the start in both characters and setting in 12th century England. There isn’t a bland moment despite the fact that the entire novel revolves around the building of a cathedral, and much of the novel takes place from the eyes of a monk. Follett is a master of suspense, and ruthless in his depiction of the cruelties certain characters demonstrate in their quest for power.

Frankly, I haven’t read many 1000 page suspense novels (if any). By the time the first three hundred pages were through, I was all but shaking - and well aware that the tragedies, hardships, and sorrow mounting atop the main characters’ heads were only beginning. In most novels, as you’re aware, at this point, things should be wrapping up and turning for the best. An epic it is, and an epic worth reading.

I’m still in awe, and am tremendously grateful that I began to read the books on the BBC’s Top 100 list… because without it, I never in a million years would’ve picked it up.

I haven’t done anything overly interesting lately. In fact, my days have been, on the whole, rather dull. But I /have/ been reading - several books in the last week or so, in fact, a couple on my 100 Top Books to Read list for the 101 Things project, and several others that were /not/ on the list. I confess - the ones /not/ on the list were better, mostly. I’m currently in the midst of War and Peace - which is bloody boring, to say the least, and The Wind in the Willows, which, despite being an illustrated kids book, is incredibly long and also quite dull. Just finished Interesting Times, by Terry Pratchett, which was better than I expected. It also wasn’t on the list. There /are/ five books by Pratchett on the list, but naturally, this podunk library in town doesn’t have a single one of them. Hah.

I’ve also been doing a lot of work on my linux box lately. In plain english, that means: “I’ve royally f*cked up my computer, and have been working my ass off to make it right again.” The good news? It paid off. I’ve now upgraded to Ubuntu 6.06 (aka Dapper) and I’m /very/ happy with the results, except for small… er… large… bug involving /etc/fstab and samba shares. But really, it’s working good now. All that’s left is to attempt swapping out my RAM to see if that will solve my freezing problem…

Now, I’m off to mess around some more, and will soon be reading Pillars of the Earth, and Artemis Fowl.