All Narfed Up photography and words by Bryan Villarin

Begin rant.

I was mailing two envelopes (taxes) for my mom, and another one for myself (Verizon Wireless mail-in rebate). I wanted to use Certified Mail, so I’d know that it got there.

In the rare case that I have to go to the post office, I don’t wait in line anymore — I’ll use the Automated Postal Center (APC). The first IRS envelope went through fine (First-Class, Certified Mail). The next one didn’t let me; it just printed the stamp.

Why? Because the machine ran out of Certified Mail cards! The kicker: the machine didn’t tell me that. I thought I’d try sending it Priority Mail, but Certified Mail wasn’t an option there, either. So, I got Priority Mail for the second envelope for nothing.

So, I went from the Arcadia post office to the one in Temple City for my last envelope. I was able to send it First Class, Certified Mail, just perfectly.

My point: The APC interface is simple, but it’d be nice to know if it was out of something. That way, we’re not wasting our money trying various services.

End rant.

The past two days, I’ve been studying like crazy for the exam I took this morning. (How’d I do? I’ll be extremely happy if I got a 70. There was just so much reading!)

Yesterday, between 9am and 1am (16 hours), I studied ten hours, napped for one hour, and maybe three hours for meals. I gave myself other small breaks, checking email, going through feeds in Bloglines, etc.

Tuesday, I studied for 4 1/2 hours in the afternoon.

I gotta get this into my head: if you spread out your studying, you’ll make it so much easier on yourself (mentally and physically).

Please learn from me.

I need to say something positive about all this, because it’s not the end of the world.

• I had probably 3-4 cups of coffee throughout the day. But, at least they were all from the comfort of home. If I bought four Caffé Mochas from Starbucks, it would’ve been almost 12 bucks! That’s a little over one bag of coffee beans!
• I took notes from the reading using TiddlyWiki. The learning curve is small, and WikiBar helps with that. (see “How to install a TiddlyWiki plugin“)
• I recorded myself reciting the 34 vocabulary words, which needed to be memorized word for word. Then, I sped up the tempo in Audacity (which doesn’t change its pitch), added a split-second Sine chirp between terms, then listened to it while washing dishes, lying in bed, on the way to school, and right before class. If you listen to a song enough times, you’ll have it memorized; in my opinion, the same logic applies here. You could take this further, but perhaps that should be a dedicated post.

Some surprises are good. However, the ones associated with school aren’t.

I wasn’t keeping track of my syllabus, so I found out that this Thursday, I have yet another huge exam for this philosophy class, “Great Religions of the World.”

How many of you look at your syllabus on a daily basis? How about your calendar? That’s what I thought. The syllabus is reference material. You won’t look at it until you need to, or when it’s too late.

Lesson: The moment you get your syllabus, enter the important dates onto your calendar. When you’re doing your weekly review, you’ll be able to see when that next important paper or exam is coming.

If you’ll excuse me, I need to figure out how to schedule my study times before Thursday. I need an 84 to get a “C” before the final exam. (I also need to make a mind map and checklist for stuff I need to do at the beginning of a school semester or quarter, but that can wait until after the exam.)

After reading Ars Technica article, “Epson wins preliminary ruling against aftermarket cartridge manufacturers,” I’m dumping my Epson Stylus Color Inkjet C84 to buy a monochrome laser printer. I’m thinking of going with a HP LaserJet 1020. (At Public Counsel, almost all of our network laser printers are HP-based. You think it swayed my decision a little?)

Epson: I’m tired of one empty color cartridge not letting me print a black and white document. I’m tired of the alignment being all screwed up, despite my numerous attempts to fix it with your software “utility”. At least other companies seem to let third-party manufacturers make ink/toner cartridges for their printers. You were still pretty cool - until now.

See you around, Epson.

On a side note, if you’ve got any suggestions about my purchasing an HP LaserJet 1020, let me know. I’m still waiting for next pay period before I buy it.

The following email is being circulated by my friends, so I’ve gotta clear it up (my emphasis added):

I received a telephone call last evening from an individual identifying himself as an AT&T Service technician who was conducting a test on telephone lines. He stated that to complete the test I should touch nine (9), zero (0) , the pound sign (#), and then hang up. Luckily, I was suspicious and refused. Upon contacting the telephone company, I was informed that by pushing 90#, you give the requesting individual full access to your telephone line, which enables them to place long distance calls billed to your home phone number. I was further informed that this scam has been originating from many local jails/prisons.

I have also verified this information with UCB Telecom, Pacific Bell, MCI, Bell Atlantic and GTE. Please beware. DO NOT press 90# for ANYONE. The GTE Security Department requested that I share this information with EVERYONE I KNOW. PLEASE pass this on to everyone YOU know. If you have mailing lists and/or newsletters from organizations you are connected with, I encourage you to pass on this information to them, too.

After checking with Verizon they said it was true so do not dial (9), zero (0), the pound sign # and hang up for anyone.

Why would they choose e-mail as the medium of communication? Why would they do it by word-of-mouth? It’d be worth it to use a more popular channel, such as television or radio, in addition to sending all customers a letter of warning.

From BreakTheChain.org:

Primarily, the scam was targeted to business and only applied to Private Branch Exchange (PBX) phone systems that require users to dial 9 or 9-0 to get an outside line. Since this letter builds on the original and tries to apply the exact same scam to mobile phones, it is hard to believe it’s accurate.

Go through the sources, use common sense, and don’t be scurred.

Sources: Don’t Dial 90#, Don’t Dial 90# on your Cellular Phone (BreakTheChain.org); Snopes.com

I wanna see this Conan O’Brien talk about this ASAP.

I was updating a coworker’s computer, and upon restarting, I couldn’t log in. (He told me the wrong password.) I left a note on his monitor telling him to call me, then he left this note:

The following thoughts came to mind, in this order:

1. Terminator
2. Kindergarten Cop
3. Detective John Kimble
4. prank phone calls using audio clips from “Kindergarten Cop“

C’mon. You know what I’m talking about.

I saw Merlin’s Pick of the Week: VLC Remote Interface Widget. That’s cool, and I’m glad, but is there one of these apps for Windows users?

“I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.”

I currently burn the Divx or Xvid video file(s) files to CD, then play them on my Philips DVP642 DivX-Certified Progressive-Scan DVD Player.

Today, on the KTLA morning news, Kurt the Cyberguy featured a news story, “Dangerously Dirty Drive“.

“In order to ensure that no data can be retrieved, it does take a number of hours, typically, to go through and erase the drive effectively.” - Joe Gugel, GeekSquad *

“Everybody needs to take it in to a professional, and make sure that this drive [...] is clean and wiped off.” - Cathy Ferrari, home user

“Download the free wiping software, free shredding software you’ll find online. We’ll make a list at our website later this morning. Or, you could take it in. It’s $160, though, if you have them do it.” - Kurt the Cyberguy

I haven’t seen the links yet, so here are the two utilities I’ve been using for years:

• Eraser (freeware) - “an advanced security tool (for Windows), which allows you to completely remove sensitive data from your hard drive by overwriting it several times with carefully selected patterns.”
• Darik’s Boot and Nuke (DBAN) (open source, free) - “a self-contained boot floppy that securely wipes the hard disks of most computers. DBAN will automatically and completely delete the contents of any hard disk that it can detect, which makes it an appropriate utility for bulk or emergency data destruction. DBAN is a means of ensuring due diligence in computer recycling, a way of preventing identity theft if you want to sell a computer, and a good way to totally clean a Microsoft Windows installation of viruses and spyware. DBAN prevents or thoroughly hinders all known techniques of hard disk forensic analysis.”

If you’re completely wiping a hard drive with DBAN, the only work you’ll do is downloading the program, burning it to CD (or installing onto a floppy disk), then running the program. That’s it. Sure, it’ll take between 30 minutes to several hours, but you’re not doing anything. Why pay $59 to let your computer sit there? (See “Clean and Remove [Hard Drive Erasure]“)

As for deleting files on your main computer, use Eraser to overwrite the file multiple times. Anybody that tries to recover deleted files will only see gibberish. The program also has an option to wipe “unused” hard drive space, so you can run that overnight periodically.

Lastly, realize that it’s really simple to copy your files off your computer to an external hard drive. If you can drag and drop files from one folder to another, you don’t need to pay [insert company name here] to move your files to an external storage device.

Save your money and do these simple tasks yourself! (I’m glad Kurt said this at the end. Good for him!)

* The amount of time it takes to wipe a hard drive is relational to its capacity. Wiping a 120GB hard drive will take substantially longer than a 10GB hard drive.

Last night, I went to Gin Sushi in Pasadena with some friends (from Esther’s recommendation). It was pretty sweet. The place received a “B” at their last Environmental Health Restaurant Rating, but the place was packed, so I didn’t feel that uneasy.

I think it’s comparable to Ichima, and definitely better than Kabuki. It wasn’t overly nice, which I think Kabuki partially gets its prices from. The prices there for simple “sushi” items were $2.80/roll. Nice. Service was pretty good, too. I had the salmon dinner, and I was quite pleased.

Try ‘em out sometime!

I’m not affiliated with the Gin Sushi restaurant.