My blog is back, unfortunately, missing the past two years of entries. Which, in my opinion, were probably the most interesting of the total six years I’ve invested into this site. I think it’s safe to say that this past July and the months following were pretty much the most difficult times of my life. In addition to my catastrophic personal life taking an unexpected nose-dive into oblivion, I had the privilege of God himself destroying what little of my life that remained, materialistically speaking.

With one stroke of lightning I managed to lose the following:

• TV
• DVD Player
• Nintendo WII
• Wired Router
• Wireless AP
• Mac Mini NIC
• Server NIC
• Desktop NIC
• Server Hard Drive
• Cable Modem

And yes, I use surge protectors and battery-backups. This is Murphy’s Law in full effect, folks. I got the Wii replaced, as it was still under warranty, everything else was either without warranty or literally had just expired the week before. Yeah, no kidding.

Looking at that list, I’m rather humbled by the loss, had this electronic disaster happened in..say, June, I probably would have been completely devastated, as everything in that list completely ruled my entire existence to an extent. I devoted so much of my time and passion into computers, web design, etc., that I neglected so many other precious things in my life that deserved my time, attention, and passion. I honestly never realized how consumed I was with all these “hobbies”. Too little, too late, as they say.

So that list, it’s not much of a loss, it was more of an eye-opening, reality check for me. My forced trip into technophile rehab, if you will. Everything on that list is replaceable, it’s what I neglected in my obsession with all of those items that’s irreplaceable. Unfortunately, the past is the only thing that I can not change. Not to say that my addiction to technology is the root of all of my flaws or the catalyst for everything else that failed to work in my life recently, but it had a role. What it comes down to, I guess, is sometimes you need to unplug for a while.

Also, if a computer gets a little sluggish, maybe unresponsive, you don’t have to throw it out and replace it, sometimes a good reboot is all you really need.

I think it’s time to end this entry, as I’m using computers metaphorically now to describe my own personal dilemmas.

I might be dropping Who Needs Oxygen.net in place of a new name. I impulsively purchased two new domains the other day, but I’m still feeling a bit indecisive. My two new choices for my blog title and domain are: alpha-geek.net or ilovetheinternets.com. AlphaGeek.whatever is taken in almost every variation you can think of, fortunately, no active blogs under those domains, so I grabbed alpha-geek.net. I bought iLovetheInternets.com because, well, because it’s just funny.

I’m leaning more towards alpha-geek.net, but I don’t know. I’m still going to keep whoneedsoxygen.net, but it will no longer be my blog’s name. I just can’t decide…

The USPS transformed some of their blue mailboxes into R2-D2 across several cities, to promote up and coming Star Wars stamps, and Tampa happened to be one of the locations. So here’s my picture of the droid, we found R2 downtown today at the corner of Kennedy and Pierce. The force is strong with Danielle, as she spotted the mailbox from miles away.

I had an amazing birthday this year!

This birthday I’m giving myself a present: I’m quitting smoking.

Today is my second day being smoke free.

It may not sound like much, but if you are a smoker, I’m sure you can sympathize. Wish me luck.

Things have finally started to wind down between all the holidays and other devastating things that have risen over the past few months. It was a long December and there is reason to believe that this year will be better than the last. [Counting Crows? How original of me.] Now that all of that is over with, commence posting!

Today, I ventured into the booming downtown Tampa Bay area to open up a checking account.

However, it turns out that my “three forms of I.D. were not sufficient enough to establish an account, PER THE PATRIOT ACT.”

Three hours of wasted time thanks to the Patriot Act.

But wait! There is more:

Now, I can only assume that The Patriot Act, in this element, is to help deter TERRORISTS from establishing an account. [give me a fucking break]

Okay, so you need all these forms to prove you are who you are to begin the process of opening an account, right? Okay, so I obviously wasn’t able to provide this to them, even though they’re looking at my pictures, looking at me, looking at my address and matching it to the others, this is not enough, and thus the Patriot Act is enforced. [thanks you fucking republicans!]

No! My HUGE plan of FUNNELLING money to terrorist organizations [ebay] online is foiled! [oh Allah, why?]

So, I figure, now I have to go get a passport or whatthefuckever else I need to give these people my money.

Too much of a hassle, so what do I do?

I go home and I call the 1-800 number and OPENED THE ACCOUNT OVER THE PHONE WITH JUST MY SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER. WTF?!

Does this make ANY sense to ANYBODY?

We’ve come to the conclusion that Saturns are built out of tupperware and cotton:

bizarre unnecessary drama.
car crash. ugh. car totalled? Out of state driver in F150’s can’t drive.
more to add. more to come.

a.r.g.h.

My (former) hosting company decided to drop my service without notifying me of it expiring. Of course, leaving me without a backup and a lot of phone rage. After explaining to them that they breached their own TOS, I was able to gain access to my account for 24 hours, with a cost! Bastards! They charged me $10 for 24 hour FTP access to get whatever I needed. Originally, they tried to charge me $20 for this “courtesy service”. Amusing, since they charge $7.95 a month for hosting.

The entire process took about 10 days, at which I was without receiving e-mail and the site was officially gone. I have officially recovered (as of yesterday) from ipowerweb’s complete ignorance. Not including the price I paid to backup the site, I have hosting, domain hosting, e-mail, sub domains, the whole nine yards…for free. So neener, neener, neener.

If you see anything funny, broken links etc., etc., let me know. I’m still trying to fix the comments so that a commenter can be e-mailed when someone replies to their comments. Whew, glad that’s all over with.

Last week, Danielle and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary. Unfortunately, George W. Bush and his cronies and the rest of the republican brigade of bigots, are still “protecting the sanctity of marriage”, so we were incapable of celebrating the solidity of our relationship the traditional way.

I remember this one time, at a friend’s house, as we sat around and the other women discussed the possibility of getting married. I interjected with, “Danielle and I are getting married.” Shrieks of happiness ensued and in a stereotypical fashion of women, immediate plans of the wedding began. One of the women, in sheer happiness, asked me what the date for the wedding was. I replied, “Never, because it’s not legal for us to get married.” Silence.

I’m not sure what surprised me in this situation, them being overjoyed about the wedding or them not even knowing that gay people can’t get married. I can tell you it’s the latter, as I’d find it hard to surround myself with people who don’t approve of who I love.

Which makes me wonder how many people know that George W. Bush proposes to change the constitution to include a permanent ban on gay marriages.

Now, some of you must be wondering how I can start a post with the joyous announcement of mine and Danielle’s successful 3 year relationship and turn it into a rant about politics. Well, it’s quite easy. To those that are close to us, our 3 year anniversary is great news but to others it’s just another political battleground. Ah, I’ve said this all before.

A vote for Bush is a vote for discrimination.