I gotta throw something about techie stuff in here right?

I was thinking about this blog as I find it is consuming my thoughts to an extent. This is how I am when I get started on something I'll obsess about it at first, then I usually fall into a pattern which eventually bores me and I'll blow it off. I'm not saying thats going to happen here because I am finding this somewhat cathartic but I'm warning anyone who reads this about me being me. I'm so sure there are people out there who might just die if I didn't ever blog again.

I got some great advice from an e-friend who also blogs, here and I love what she writes, so read it when you get a chance. Hopefully I'll see things a bit differently and it'll help make this more interesting to read.

On to the tech tip I promised. I was thinking the other day how can I involve technology here and then started questioning my choice of blog titles...blah, blah, blah. Then I thought aren't I driving to get a minor break from working with computers. Of course as much as I say I hate them computers are an important part of my (and probably yours too so ) life.

Everyone I know has lost something important when their computer up and takes a shit on them. In all my years working on computers I can't begin to count how many times I would get that blank stare and dumb look when I asked a customer, "Didn't you back your pictures and documents up onto a disk?" I've had it happen to me more times than I'd care to admit and it sucks. Backing up can be a pain in the ass and people get lazy about it.

My most recent hard drive crash was actually a 2 pronged attack by cosmic forces out to fuck me. I lost one hard drive with a short warning and I transferred everything I could to another new one just in the nick of time. Great, right?? Wrong!! Most hard drives give you some kind of warning before they fail. Not this one, The brand new server drive I purchased replacement shits the bed on me!!! I'm sitting there watching some videos that I downloaded and then all of a sudden a loud click and the whole computer freezes up. I restart and of course the computer is acting like the hard drive isn't there. Damn it, I paid more for a high end drive to prevent this and poof. There I am feeling that same blank stare and dumb look of someone who lost important stuff in a computer crash come over me. And I'm supposed to know better. Fucking Seagate!!!

I lost my last 3 years taxes which I don't have hard copy of, 3 years of emails (I'm a pack rat so sue me). Not a huge deal but I like having that stuff in case I need it. The worst of it was losing a few .wav (sound) files from my voice mail from my grandmother that I had saved. She died a few years ago so there is no replacing them and I loved her more than anything. So after that I will really never hear her again. It really sucked and I was truly sad to lose them. I got real choked up about it and contemplated smashing something to pieces but didn't, But in the words of the great Artie Lange, WAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH FUCKIN WAAAAAAAHHHHH!

I also have another issue which most people wouldn't. I have a dual boot system using both Ubuntu Linux and Windows Vista. I use Windows mostly for games and just to stay abreast of the computer field and Linux for everything else. Most solutions you find or Windows systems. My Mac friends in particular like to cry about this but I have found a great cross-platform solution. This works for everyone, Linux, Mac, or Windows users.

Here is Dropbox. This is very friggin cool to a geek like me, all it does is set up a folder of your choosing and everything you put in it is backed up to their secure server using encryption. It has the ability to easily share things you want with others. It's also accessible from anywhere with web access, so even if you're away from home you can get to your files. And it allows anyone with a computer regardless of the operating system to use it. They start you out with a FREE 2 gigs of storage which is not bad, and they plan on allowing people to upgrade to more space for a small fee in the future. check out the site and take a tour of what it can do for you. Here is an article about it from the Linux users perspective. I've set it up on both the Linux and Windows partitions of my system and it works great.

I hope this helps someone, don't expect much tech only content here unless it some how ties into my driving a cab. I just liked this so much and wanted to post something here to keep it fresh. I just need to get the shifts I want and start working more steadily so I can have some stuff to write about here.