No, I haven’t dropped off the face of the planet–I’ve just been crazy crazy busy this past week.
On Sunday, after one BSOD too many, I finally switched from Windows to Ubuntu. I’ve wanted to give Linux a try ever since high school, but I’m not a computer programmer or anything so a lot of it is way over my head. So far, though, it hasn’t been too bad. The most complicated thing I had to do was change the firmware on my mp3 player (an iRiver T10 … yeah, laugh, whatever).
This is just an initial impression, but it seems that the difference between Linux, Windows, and Apple is a lot like the difference between cooking your own food, popping a frozen meal into the microwave, and paying someone to cook for you. With Linux, you have to at least dabble in the actual code in order to get anything to work, but it works WAAAAY better than anything else (just like real food is healthier than fake food). With Windows, yeah, you can kind of hack stuff, but you’re still at the mercy of Microsoft. And with Apple, you’re basically paying through the nose for someone to hold your hand every time you use your device.
So anyways, that’s been quite an adjustment, with a steep learning curve that I’m still trying to climb. Hopefully, I’ll get it all figured out before I publish my next book, because otherwise there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Actually, scratch that–the wailing and gnashing of teeth will happen anyway (heck, it’s happening now!), but if I don’t have it figured out, there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth AND a delay getting the next book out. But that’s not going to happen.
The other thing that’s kept me busy (and really, the main thing sucking up all my time) has been a construction job that the temp agency suckered me into taking. They said it was supposed to end on Monday … but no, it lasted all week. I did learn a lot of interesting things, though. For example, I learned how to take out and re-install a toilet. I also learned that painters are among the most disgusting creatures on Earth, so if I ever want to paint the interior of my house, I’d be better off buying the supplies and doing it myself.
There were a couple of other things that kept me busy, but I’m not sure how much I can talk about them yet. The most exciting thing has to do with the next issue of Mormon Artist magazine, which should be coming out in about a month. Also, I’ve been working with some other sci-fi indie writers to put together a group promo–more on that later.
So that’s what I’ve been doing instead of blogging. I’ve also made some progress in Sons of the Starfarers, though not as much as I’d like. Ideally, I’d like to finish the rough draft in about two weeks, which is pushing it but definitely possible. I figure that writing is more important than blogging, so if you don’t see another post here for a while, that’s what I’m up to.
So much for that. I’ll leave you with this:
Okay, chances are you’ve probably seen it already. Maybe it made you sad, maybe it made you cry, or maybe it made you laugh in a guilty, self-conscious sort of way. However, I am not ashamed to say that I found this clip absolutely hilarious. Sure, maybe it left that poor little girl a bit traumatized, but I’d rather her learn about death from an eagle and a rabbit than from someone in her family passing away.
Rabbits are pests. Eagles are beautiful, majestic creatures who have every right to live as rabbits do. What the eagle did was not malicious, or hateful, or evil–it was natural. Eagles have to eat too, and by golly they sure work for their food a lot more than rabbits do. So here’s to the eagles, the hawks, and all the other majestic birds of prey for being awesome.
I could make a joke here about the rabbit being a PC and the eagle being a Linux user, but it’s getting late and I’d better go write. Later!
