And, the anti-climactic response.

Dear Mr. Lawrence,

Your e-mail below was forwarded to me as Assistant Director of Public Works. Thank you for taking the time to provide us with your input.

The construction activities you have observed along Three Chopt Road are related to the ongoing Department of Public Utilities (DPU) waterline installation project. Representatives from DPU have informed me the contractor will begin final restoration of the disturbed road surface including the replacement of the concrete median at Three Chopt Road and Cox Road later this month pending weather. In the mean time, DPU representatives are monitoring the roadway.

The signal at Pump Road and West Broad Street is maintained by the Virginia Department of Transportation. I will ask that they review the signal timings and make any adjustments they deem necessary.

In closing, should you have any further concerns or questions please do not hesitate to contact me at 867-5309 [number changed].

Sincerely,

Henrico County Department of Transportation

Henrico County Department of Transportation

To whom it may concern (likely no one):

I got an opportunity to drive down the new stretch of John Rolfe Parkway--between Church and Broad--this evening. It was a very smooth ride. You should work on that.

I realize that your laborers have spent the last 12 years working on the stretch of roadway that’s going to eventually (perhaps by the time I retire in 2040) become the full John Rolfe Parkway. I remember when you opened the first portion between Lauderdale and Ridgefield when I was first allowed to drive myself to Godwin High School in 1998. It had promise. It would be a fantastic way for me to get home easily while avoiding traffic after I dropped my friend off. He lived off of Lauderdale, and I was near Church and Pump.

This smooth, nearly flawless stretch of roadway (however minuscule it may be) is unacceptable in the Far West End. It just doesn’t fit. All of the roads around it have trenches and pot holes cut strategically into them so that our vehicles don’t have a chance to stop bouncing after barreling through one before slamming into the next. You’ve done well with Three Chopt, which was as newly paved as this stretch of John Rolfe not too long ago. You even managed to unevenly cut a ditch down the middle of Three Chopt in a manner that we’re forced to attempt to hold our vehicles steady with at least two tires bouncing back and forth between the edges for a stretch that seems like a mile. Heading from Gaskins to Pump in the afternoons, I begin to get the jitters as the road starts to level off, but am rewarded once again with the bone-shaking rumble as I near the apartment complex.

For a while there, during your constant roadway experimentation, you’d just thrown gravel into the ditches beside Three Chopt and made me drive there. I don’t know if you were just testing out a new strategy during that time or what, but I liked it. Not only did I have to navigate ditches, trenches and potholes, but I also had to watch for flying gravel, workers standing around looking at one another and eating donuts, and orange barrels rolling down the hills toward my car. It was like a gauntlet of potential vehicular destruction that really epitomized driving in the Far West End.

I will give you some credit, however. In the 12 year stretch that you spent paving this new section of John Rolfe (presumably pebble by tiny pebble), you have managed to wreak havoc, destroying several of the connecting roads. I used to take Pump all the time to get from Church to Broad. It was a straight shot from the many neighborhoods to all of the shops. Not only that, the traffic at the stoplight right there at Pump and Broad was always very fitting of the Far West End (Great Job on setting the timing of the green-light just long enough so that the first car THINKS they can make it through before the light turns! You’ve gotten me good a few times!). Now, I have to rumble across what used to be Pump before making a left turn onto the new (too smooth) section of John Rolfe in order to make another left onto Pump. You turned a single painless left turns into two lefts over what could only be described as a mine-field of potholes and jagged edges. Bravo.

In conclusion, please find time to do something about this stretch of even roadway before I get spoiled by not having my joints shaken every time I sit down in my car. I wouldn’t want to become accustomed to this, only to have it ripped away when someone there decides that it needs more holes and takes a jackhammer to it for gits and shiggles.

Thanks for your time and attention.

Sincerely,

A Concerned (Shaken, not Stirred) Citizen

Testes Tester

Just seeing if I can get the code formatting to work. Also, I hope no one finds my blog now by searching for Testes.

// comment
public class x-returner 
{
  public int x { get; set; }

  public int getX { int x = 1; return x; }
}

Testes Tester

Just seeing if I can get the code formatting to work. Also, I hope no one finds my blog now by searching for Testes.

// comment
public class x-returner 
{
public int x { get; set; }

public int getX { int x = 1; return x; }
}

Verizon and their glaring incompetence.

So, I got my bill from Verizon this month, and shock-of-all-shocks, it was wrong. They overcharged me for TV and Phone and didn't bother charging me for internet. Again. This isn't the first time, I'm sure it won't be the last.

First off, I pay them a LOT of money each month, as we are pretty loyal customers and have had our cell phones through Verizon Wireless for as long as I can remember.

As Laura recently lost her job, I started looking into ways that we could save a bit of money, and cutting back this bill was #1 priority, as it's our most expensive bill.

I started looking online and found a "Quad Play" package that seemed like a good deal at 134.99 for TV, Phone, Internet, and Wireless service. Granted, I'm sure I'll pay more than that for wireless service, as my wireless service alone is typically $170+. (700 minutes, two additional lines, two $30 data packages, and text messaging packages.. yeah, it's a ripoff.).

So, I start chatting up a nice rep named 'Rockie' that I imagine looks something like Rick Moranis from the original Ghostbusters movie. He assures me that the package is $95, plus my cell service charges, plus any equipment charges, plus taxes and fees. That's a lot of plusses.

Ok, so let's do the math.

My equipment (Set top boxes) comes to 14.98 a month, the "Taxes and fees" come to a ridiculous 15.50 a month (not including internet.. I don't know how much that is, they didn't charge me for it). So, 30.48 a month.

My Cell Bill this month was 173.82. Yes, I know, insane.. but I have $80 worth of data and text messaging plans alone over the 3 lines.

So, 95 + 173.82 + 30.48 = 299.30.

That's not too bad, under 300 bucks.. although tacking on whatever the taxes and fees are for internet will probably be a little over that.

My bill? 292.45. That doesn't include internet. I doubt I get 15/5 FIOS for a grand total of like 8 bucks a month. I really don't have too many complaints with verizon other than that their billing practices are batshit crazy. If they could just get it right and keep it right, I wouldn't complain. They have automated systems to do that stuff, how is it wrong so often?

Moral of the story is, pay attention to your bill, as they nearly never get it right. Then they expect me to pay for their incompetence. Yeah, I don't think so.

Eesh, I feel better.

The Gimp

PiBG
Originally uploaded by unafragger

This is the BG image that I created (mentioned last post) with the Gimp. As I said, I love the Gimp, and I think this came out quite well, but it just doesn't handle 3d as well as it could.

Blender Rendering

dice
Originally uploaded by unafragger

I downloaded a program on Saturday called Blender on Ubuntu. I was goofing around with the Gimp making some desktop backgrounds, and I was able to get some pretty decent 3D backgrounds, but it was difficult to do, and as much as I love the Gimp, it isn't the best 3D Rendering tool.

So, I picked it up, got into it, found a fantastic tutorial page on wiki books and started following through. I love it. I've been messing with it seemingly non-stop for a couple of days now. This is about the most advanced thing that I've created so far, and it was pretty much directly out of the tutorial (or, a single die, anyway). It's pretty sweet looking, though.

It even has a pretty sweet animation utility where you can actually animate the 3D objects you create. Making it even more powerful, it has some sort of game engine built in. That's way beyond me at the moment. I've made a few animations, and they're very simple. I can't wait to get into the Game Engine. :D

More to come.. hopefully!

New Riiide

So, I got a new car about a week ago. Yes, I used to drive an Acura Integra, and it was old. It was slick, though.. low rider, hugged the ground and could really get up and go. Had a very zippy 140 hp, and I loved driving it.

After about 10 years of owning it, I was about ready for something else. I'd never had a NEW car before, so I'd decided I wanted a new car, not a used one. I figure, I'm still childless, most of the money that I make goes to eating out anyway, so why not treat myself to a nice new car while I still can?

I'd looked around for a while, but I wanted something bigger! I certainly didn't want a full size SUV or anything, but just something bigger than what I had. Also, after last winter's snow, I figured it'd be nice to have a 4wd around the house too. Laura's car did OK in the snow, but certainly not great.

SO, after much (ok, not that much) deliberation, I went with a shiny new Toyota Rav4. Like I said, I figured since I was getting something, I may as well treat myself. It's a V6 269hp 4WD Limited Edition Rav4 (Black Forest Pearl.. sparkly) with mostly all the fixins. It's got a 9 speaker JBL sound system, dual automatic climate control, heated leather seats, backup cam.. the whole nine yards. I love it so far.. it's hard to keep clean, but worth it when it's nice and shiny.

Surprisingly, it's about as much fun to drive (so far, anyway) as the Integra was. It certainly can't zip through the traffic like the ol' Ac could, but it can get up and go when it needs to, and it's no slouch going around the corners either. So, if you see me go by you on the road, just know that I'm still having a good time with the new car, and wave hello. :P

Programming muscles!

I've had a great last few weeks at work, I've been working on a new project. I've got an old application written in VB.NET for the old 1.1 framework. While it's a decent application, has a good handful of users, and accomplishes what it's set out to do, it's somewhat clunky, has many 'add-ons' that don't exactly tie in perfectly, and is becoming "too big for it's britches" as my mom would say.

SO, I'm getting to re-write it using the Entity framework in C#. C# is certainly not my strong point -- I took a single class in college that used it. I'm learning it, though. I've always felt that if you have a good programming base and understand one object oriented language (I'm much better in VB and Java), then it's easy to pick up the others.

So, I'm learning all kinds of new things, getting to use technologies that I haven't used before, and getting to really "flex my programming muscles." As work goes, it's been a really good couple of weeks.

Ubuntu!

As a previously devoted Windows user, I have finally seen the light. No longer do I have any interest in working with Windows, as Ubuntu now holds a special place in my heart.

Sure, I still get a lot more hardware and software support on Windows, and I still have the copy of it that I bought, however, I feel as though I don't need to really use it. Ubuntu does everything that I could possibly want it to do for the moment.

Once I get back into wanting to play games, I have a feeling that it's going to be a bit tougher, but for now, I LOVE LINUX.

:D

Physical Phitness and Photography.

I can't wait for the spring to get here. The last few weeks have been so snowy, that we haven't been able to get out of the house. My gym-going in the mornings has stagnated entirely, I haven't been in like a month.

I was thinking the other day, and one of the (many) reasons that I'd like to get into better shape is that I'd like to be able to take up hiking. Perhaps not permanently, but I've always been interested and thought it would be something fun to do. Problem is, I haven't ever really been in the shape for it.

I'd like to be, and one reason is that I think it would be a fantastic photo-opportunity. I don't go very many places, and most of the places that I go don't provide too many things to shoot. Sure, a good photographer can find a shot in anything.. but I'm not a good photographer. YET.

Not only do I feel like it would give me a chance to get out of the house, it'd also give me a much better chance to get a bit more use out of the camera. That would be fun.

Something to bitch about?

I was going to make a post on how I was annoyed because I haven't (at all) been able to stop eating out like we'd wanted to, and how we still spend ass-loads (though smaller asses) of money on eating out.

I've decided not to, however. I only seem to make blog entries when I have something to bitch about. I guess that's a good sign, as I certainly don't post very often. Maybe I don't have a whole lot to bitch about.

Good times!