The Northward Contrail

There's more than one way to skin a Mac

There's a few things I have to get done today, and not too much worth saying, other than that I'm looking at a few necessities for the new MacBook Pro that's on the way.  On the other hand, this is one item I'm probably not going to get for it.  (Kudos to Liz for her initial post about it on The Park Bench.)

The best laid plans

A few days back I went on about how I was considering a new computer, and how I was going to try to get by using my old one until I'd saved up enough to basically pay cash for the new machine.  Remember?  Well, there's a funny story about all that.

While I don't want to get too much into this, last week we encountered a little incoming fire from the recession.  We still have income, thankfully (and my job is real stable), and we'll be able to keep the roof over us and food on our table.  Still, until things get better (which will, we hope, be soon), we're going to have to make it go a little farther than we had planned.  I can't say I wasn't expecting something to happen, so we always had a sort of Plan B.  Of course, though, you're never emotionally ready for the moment to come. Intellectually, you know it could happen, but you still feel like a Benihana chef has given your insides a working-over.

On the other hand, hubby and I have never lived high-side.  We're firm believers that you don't pray for luxury; you pray for just enough to have a happy life, and when you get that, you give thanks for what you get.

Anyway, with that, I was trying to figure out what to do about the computer and wondering if I should wait or proceed as planned.  I spent the weekend doing the numbers and straddling the fence, and even had an incredibly stupid dream about it Saturday night.  None of it helped things.

I'd been scoping around the Apple website.  There was a nice refurbished MacBook Pro at a substantial markdown.  I could afford it; the numbers worked with my budget, not as originally planned, but it still worked. But I was on the fence.  Yesterday morning, something told me to go ahead; it may not be there tomorrow, and it may not get better than that.  I'd missed out on an even better deal two weeks ago, so better safe than sorry.  And, you don't know how long the lean times are going to last, or how many more months your five-year-old machine has left, so grab the new one while you can and you don't have that to worry about later.  A computer has enough utility to it, both for business and pleasure, that you can justify the outlay.

So I went on the Interwebs to order the computer.  And, as I was getting the order put together online, something happened with my PowerBook that told me it was a wise idea to proceed with the new machine.  It's an intermittent glitch, one that's just irksome enough for me to say "enough."  All doubts were gone.

So, by this time next week, I should have a good-as-new MacBook Pro 15.4" in my hot little hands.  In fact, it's on its way as I write this.  (I'm a little irked that I've had to order a modem and a FW400 adapter for it -- dial-up modems and FW400 ports are no longer built into the MacBook Pro -- and I'm not crazy about the mandatory glossy display, but that's the breaks.  Considering what the rest of the machine will let me do, especially for what this one is costing me, I'm not going to quibble too much.)

I'm sure going to miss this PowerBook, though.  I'll write more about it later, but it's seen me through a lot.  It's been to a lot of places. It's never let me down, and it's an old buddy.  I'll find a use for it, I know.

:: The weekend wasn't without its other pleasures, either.  We got away for a bit on Saturday and had a good time.  Then on Sunday we watched an awfully interesting Formula One race (the first one I've truly enjoyed in a long time, complete with underdog victors).  Then, to top it off, a nice spaghetti dinner.  Followed by one of the greatest things you can enjoy in life: microwaved doughnuts.  (Not just any doughnut, mind you, but genuine Krispy Kreme doughnuts.  Bliss.  Even better than the gold-plated ice cream at Plunder.)

Seems like old times

Things have become quiet here, and maybe that's a good thing.  Hubby and I had some time together yesterday that we haven't had in forever, and something we'd been keeping an eye on got resolved yesterday, so it was time to unwind a bit.  We went into town and had a very nice, relaxing dinner together.  We hadn't done that on a weeknight in ages, so it was very nice.  It really was like old times again.  Sometimes you don't realize what you really have, and life zooms by before you know it.  I'm glad we had some time yesterday.  It felt good to be young again. 

See you Monday.  

Make me proud

There's a line I often tell my students when they're about to do something important, or when my graduates are interviewing for a job.  I tell them, "Make me proud."  It's a line from Mean Girls, when Ms. Norbury is wishing the Mathletes well before their big competition. (Yes, every line I use in my life is stolen from Tina Fey.  Oh, yeah, like you're really surprised by that if you've been reading this blog.)

(And please don't sue, Tina.  I do it out of admiration.)

Last night I had to stay late because of a function we were having.  It was a panel discussion with a few recent graduates giving presentations about what they do in the real world.  We had five really blue-chip presenters, spanning everything from being the reporter in front of the camera to being the person who pushes the buttons in the control room to working on the graphics packages and building the promos that air during station breaks.  Not only that, but we had a few more recent graduates show up for our little pre-show dinner.  It was like a miniature departmental reunion. There was time to catch up and find out what they're doing with their lives.  Not all of them stayed in the communications field, but they've all done something with their lives, and they seem pretty happy with where they're headed.

It's funny; you see them every day, and then they're gone. They used to drive you up the wall sometimes, and then the next time you see them, they've built lives and careers.  And you get so proud of them.  For so long the image you've carried of them was when they were kids, doing what kids do: alternately amusing you, seeking information from you, or making you want to pull your hair out.  Then a few years pass, they get their stuff together, they learn what the world is like, and your little kid comes back all grown up, independent, a little more savvy, and successful.  And you were a little part of that.  They do, indeed, make you proud.

There are times when I let my job get the better of me.  I've had a little bit of that here lately; heck, I had it yesterday, with a student or two who gave me the impression they were phoning it in on an assignment or two.  It made me crazy. But then my former students -- well, I call them "my kids," and I don't care how old they get or what they do, they'll always be "my kids" -- started coming in yesterday, and the reunion began, and by the time the evening was over, you couldn't have convinced me that any line of work in this world is better than the one I'm in, and I couldn't have been happier that my life led me to what I do now.

And that, when you get down to it, is what keeps me coming back.

The long day

It's going to be a long day.  Three classes today, a function I have to stick around for tonight, and when I have the time between chores today I have to get a newspaper layout done that's due no later than tomorrow.  As usually happens, I expect to be interrupted repeatedly while I'm trying to get that done.

Back tomorrow.

It's about time

One of the hazards of being a hobbyist is the limited-run item. Sometimes, you'll find a really interesting kit of a really interesting subject.  The catch will be that it's expensive and won't be available very long.  Some of these things are literally made by hand, using cast resin and rubber molds, and once the mold's life is spent, don't count on it coming back.

I've long been fascinated by an elegant flop of an aircraft called the F7U Cutlass.  It was one of those really unusual-looking postwar aircraft that had an innovative concept and design, but was let down by the era's technology.  The original Cutlass, the F7U-1, had a list of problems as long as your arm, and the much-redesigned F7U-3 saw some limited fleet service but didn't exactly win the Nobel Prize for Aircraft.  On those occasions when everything worked, the Cutlass was reportedly a delight to fly, but it was underpowered and had several other issues.  A good number of them were lost, and some pilots got killed in the process.  The Cutlass did not last long in fleet service.  A handful of F7U-3s survive as museum pieces, including one that's getting a very thorough makeover at the Museum of Flight.

I got interested in the Cutlass about 20-some years ago after I learned that Wally Schirra did some evaluation work on the Cutlass before he was selected as a Mercury astronaut.  That fascination coincided with the release of a couple of pretty good model kits of the Cutlass.  Fujimi did a trio of very nice F7U-3 kits in 1:72, including the rare F7U-3P photo variant, with its face only a mother could love.  A year or so later, Hobbycraft did an F7U-3 in 1:48; it was nice, but had some real problems, especially in the shape of the forward fuselage.

The forgotten F7U-1 hasn't seen much exposure in kit form.  There were a couple or three kits in the 1950s; the most well-known of these is probably Lindberg's 1:48 effort, which has been reissued numerous times.  I have one, and the shapes are pretty good...but it's basic, and you're going to have your work cut out for you.  Anigrand came out with a 1:72 resin kit several years back, and I bought it as soon as I could.  It's more detailed, but it's still a little less than I'd hoped for.

Collect-Aire Models came out with a F7U-1 Cutlass in 1:48 a few years back, and made much about the use of source materials that had come from private collections and so forth.  I was a bit skeptical, but inside I knew that if I could ever afford one, I'd get one.  Making matters worse was the release of a set to correct the flaws in the Hobbycraft -3 kit.  I'd wanted that, too, because I'd always felt the kit had a lot of potential.  Still, the cost of those kits had put me off, and I always figured I'd do it on my own.  Correct the Lindberg kit?  A tall order, yes, but where does it say you can't?  Never mind how tall an order it is, mind you, or how much I secretly told myself that if I ever could, I would.       

Well, fast forward a month or a year or so.  A few things have changed.  For one, I'm able to afford an occasional nice thing or two.  And I'm starting to realize I'm not going to live forever.  Why reinvent the wheel rebuilding the Lindberg kit when Collect-Aire has done most of the work for you?  Yeah, it's expensive, but what is your time worth these days?  Plus, if you want it, get it now.  It won't be around forever.

So last week I sent off a money order (we save up and pay cash for these things now, remember?) to Collect-Aire for both Cutlass kits.  And, yesterday, there they were at the post office, waiting on me.  The last Collect-Aire kit I'd inspected was one from several years before; it had clunky castings made with really stinky resin, and that's what I expected with these kits.  These kits, though, look much more user-friendly, and are cast in light-colored resin that doesn't stink. Some test-fitting indicates they won't be World War III to build, either.  There's a bit of flash going on and some molding lines I'll have to clean up, but it'll be less work than some things I've had to do at the workbench.   I'm glad to have these at last, and I look forward to having some time to work on them.

:: Then, yesterday evening, I came home to find a package waiting at the doorstep.  Inside was the hard drive I'd ordered for backing up the laptop.  It's one of the Neptune FireWire 400 drives from Other World Computing.  This hard drive doesn't have the sexy aesthetic a Mac user might expect; it's in a blue plastic case that looks so 1998 or so (it reminds me a lot of my old plug-and-play Zip drive.  Remember Zip drives?  Ah, how technology eats its young.)  But I'll sacrifice aesthetics for affordability if the hardware inside is sound, and if I can spend $100 for a clunky-looking case with 500 gigs inside, I'll gladly do so.  Looks don't matter as much as ability.  This hard drive did not let me down.  I just plugged it in, turned it on, and it was time to rock and roll.

With this little giant, last night I backed up my hard drive for the first time in...oh, forever.  It was three hours well spent.  I still can't believe that I waited this long to do a full backup of my hard drive, and I still can't believe I got away with it for so long.  You would also think that, given the hard drive crash I suffered about 14 years ago, I'd know the value of regular backups.  I can only say I've been lucky, probably more than I deserve.  Better still, this will make the move to the new machine in a few months that much easier.

:: I have vague memories of seeing these guys on Hee Haw when I was a wee one.  They simultaneously frightened and fascinated me.  I learned how to do a really slow version of it from a Mac Davis B-side back when I was seven or eight, but I would dearly love to be able to do it with the proficiency Jimmie Riddle shows in that clip.

Progress

It's the start of a long day, a longer day than I would like, at the start of a long week, a longer week than I would like.  On the other hand, I did get some work done over the weekend, and perhaps I can feel like I did get something done after all.  The R4D is now finished.  The JetStar awaits the printing of a few decals and one last widget or two.  After that, this combined project is over.

Worth doing right

Yesterday went well.  Seldom do you feel better than you do once you're recovering from a case of something, and that was true yesterday.  Today I'll find out if I really am feeling better, as I'm going to try the day's full schedule.  If my kids (especially in the day's first class) cooperate with me, it should go well.  

In between tasks yesterday I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what to do about this new computer, and the MacBook vs. MacBook Pro question continued to bother me.  As did how to pay for the thing.  And, really, so did timing it so the acquisition would go without any hassles.  I spent a lot of time playing with my spreadsheet yesterday, trying to figure out how best to do this.  And, in the process, I came to a realization about some things.  

Here's the difference between the me of a couple years ago and the me of right now.  A couple years ago, I would have seen it, gone through the whole "oh, crap, I need to get it now or else it won't be there later!" deal, fired off my credit card number, and said "I'll worry about it later," yet even though I'd be elated about the new acquisition I'd feel guilty about putting myself that much further in the hole, and reminding myself that this is no way to get out of debt.  Or I'd have some sort of silly financial plan in my head about it that I'd end up abandoning a couple months later.  

The "me" of now, though, was sorely tempted to throw caution to the winds and send the order yesterday, and spent a lot of time trying to get the numbers to work (or considering the financing plan Apple offers, but the more I looked at that, the more it looked like a potential landmine).  But, the more I thought about it, the more I figured there had to be a better way, and one that wouldn't get me deeper in the hole than I otherwise would be.  This was especially true after I did the numbers on my debt to credit ratio; though the numbers there are very favorable, I want to keep them going in the right direction.  (I would be saying this even if the economy was going well.  It's a matter of personal honor.  The best analogy I can come up with on a moment's notice is that it's like trying to lose a lot of weight, and you find you've lost your first 20 pounds.  Do you shrug and eat a box of microwaved Krispy Kremes, or do you stick with the program and go for the next 20?)  

Out of it came a plan: Save up for the thing.  This has several advantages.  First, and most obviously, it means I'm not paying it off over time.  Second, it's money I've saved up after paying the month's existing expenses, which includes the substantial chunks I set aside each month to pay down my debts.  Best of all, if I do it this way, I can afford the machine I'd really like to have instead of settling for the quicker fix and doing the "what if?" deal with myself.  Nope, wait for what you really want and enjoy the delayed gratification.  

There's another benefit to waiting.  Were I to order it now, not only would I have a guilty conscience about it, but there'd be a hilarious square-dance about its delivery.  If I had it delivered to my home, chances are the delivery guy would come while I was at work, and if the hilarity with the package from Helen Ficalora the other week was a collision course with wackiness, I can only imagine what this would be like.  If I have it delivered to the office, that opens up a whole can of worms.  There'd probably be at least one phone call from either the computer manufacturer or the credit card company (or one from each) about a substantial electronics purchase being shipped to an address that differed from the billing address.  Then, with my luck, I'd be busy and miss the day's mail call; with the kind of luck I sometimes have, I'd miss it on Friday and the thing would be waiting the weekend for me (and me for it).  Worse still, there's the chance someone in the post office at work would think it was a shipment for our IT department and send it over there, and then Heaven only knows when I'd see it.  

So it's best if I wait.  According to my spreadsheet, come mid-May it'll be safe to proceed.  This will be a very good time.  The term will be over and I can wait around the house for the delivery guy.  I'll also be back from my trip, so that will be out of the way and it'll be paid for, too.  Best of all, I'll have the machine I really want, and it'll be paid off without inflicting trauma on my debt reduction plans.  I like how my finances are turning around, and I sure don't want to louse it up now.  I have rediscovered the joys of paying cash for things, and I've developed a real taste for it.  I paid cash for the Twogar kit, and I just paid cash for a couple more rather substantial chunks of molded resin I ordered the other day.  And I love the satisfaction that comes with knowing that they're paid for.  I want the same thing to be true about this new computer.

In the meantime, I'll keep using my trusty old G4.  As for the concerns about the hard drive, last night I ordered a rather substantial FireWire hard drive.  I've been needing one forever, anyway.  This will let me keep an ongoing backup on the G4's hard drive, with plenty of space left over for a bunch of other things I need to archive.  And, once I have the new machine, I can use it to keep backups of its hard drive and for other needs.   Life will be good.

So that's how things are, and I slept well last night once I'd figured it out.  But, man, if I'd had this kind of foresight and patience ten years ago, I'd own the world now.

The devil's workshop

Yesterday's decision appears to have been the right one.  I'm not yet ready for a Half Ironman or anything like that, but I do feel like I'm again among the living.  A couple of brief naps -- one in the morning, another after lunch, and thankfully none of them included dreams that involved Bernie Ecclestone, as happened the other night -- worked wonders for me.  I kept tabs on things at work through e-mail, and that made me feel a little more at ease about missing work.  

I feel really guilty when I'm not at the office.  I feel like I'm derelict in my duty if I'm not there.  There's this subterranean dread, dating from before my earliest days at this job, that something will go wrong and I'll get in trouble for not being around.  In practice, that's only happened once in almost eight years at this job, and that was more due to stupidity on my part than anything else.  But, still, I retain this feeling that my success is fleeting, and it motivates me.  It's like why Jim Bouton wore the number 56 during his major-league career; the high number was a constant reminder to him of how close he was to not making the big leagues, and that demotion was always a constant threat.  

In between naps, and in between checking in on things at work, I spent some time thinking about some things that need to be done.  (None of it was upstairs, though; I learned that the hard way the other day when I tried working on the JetStar and found out that my cold was causing some fumbling, clumsiness and other antics that will require repair once I'm well again.)  So, instead, I spent most of it working on computer stuff and what not.  

In fact, that's one thing I spent some time looking at: computer stuff.  It's coming time for a new computer again.  My PowerBook G4 has been a wonderful machine since I got it a little more than five years ago; it's been a faithful servant, and it's been through a lot (including being dropped once), and it's never let me down.  But it's showing its age. It's got a PowerPC processor, and hubby's Intel-powered iMac leaves my PowerBook in the dust.  My OS has hit the wall so far as upgrades go. And my biggest concern is that, by five years, things inside a computer start to conk out on short notice.  (I'm keeping an eye on the hard drive, in particular.  It's working fine, but you never know.)  There are also some peripheral (ha ha!) considerations, too; certain things I'm looking at acquiring in the next few months require capabilities my PowerBook doesn't have if I want them to play nice with my computer.  

So I'm trying to figure out which way to go on the new machine.  If I wasn't so concerned about money, it would be easy; I'd get a new MacBook Pro with all the bells and whistles.  But money is indeed a bit of an object, and I'm also trying to figure out if I would really need the Pro's capabilities.  I do some video editing, but it's not heavy-duty stuff, and I certainly don't do gaming or anything like that.  Most of what I do on this machine is e-mail, word processing, spreadsheets, photo editing and some work in Illustrator.  The more I look at it, the more it looks like a mid- to top-range 2009 MacBook can handle everything my current computer (a 2003-4 PowerBook G4) does, and I can get one of those for half to two-thirds what a Pro would set me back. That's probably the way I'll go, but I still have to do some research on it, research more extensive than I was able to do yesterday.  I want to make sure I've made the right decision when I pull the trigger on it. (And I also want to make sure that, when I do it, it's paid for within a couple months.  So I was also doing some mental spreadsheet work, too. I'd buy the thing today if I wasn't so determined on making sure it's paid off within two or three months of my acquiring it.  I like not carrying balances on credit cards.  I'd say that even if the economy was going like gangbusters.  I just don't like owing people money.)  

There were a couple other things I did, too.  A friend and I are working on a web venture, and I spent some time getting some domain-related tasks completed on that.  While I was there, I got this domain renewed (congratulations, folks; you're doomed to another year of my ramblings!) and I was also able to tack on my name's URL for cheap, too.  I've thought about putting up a simple little personal website as a Google search foil, and also to display some of the things I've built, photographed and accomplished over the years.  So that's done, and one less thing I have to do.  

So it was a good day with some nice housekeeping done.  And, today, I'm giving the work deal a shot.  So far, so good.  (Though there was amusement when the cashier at Wal-Mart, when I got to the register with a six-pack of water bottles, a box of tissue and a two-pack of ibuprofen, asked "how are you today?"  Didn't matter; she was too busy carrying on her conversation with her fellow cashier to care anyway.)  Thankfully, it's a good day for it; my tasks for today are light, and if I play my cards right, I won't have to stand in line at the post office today for 20 minutes the way I did Tuesday.  (That's a story for another time, but suffice to say I don't think it helped my recovery any.)

Molecular combat

I'm doing something today I haven't done in a long time, and that's take a sick day.  I felt I was honor-bound to be at work, and that's kept me going.  But, this morning, the sore eyes, weak knees and general malaise were too much.  Halfway to work, I turned the car around and came back.  It's not worth it -- besides, something was telling me that if I went ahead and tried to get to work, I'd probably be coming home early anyway -- and maybe a day at home sleeping it off will do a lot of good.  Better to take a day today and try to lick it, rather than grunt through it and have it last another week, or worse.

See you tomorrow.