software woes & art
Tuesday, July 29, 2003
So I have this Wacom Intuos2 tablet. I decide on a whim I want to draw some things, so I install it with no problems. Included with the tablet is a "Power Suite" of software that includes Painter Classic. This is supposedly a program that mimics the effects of pencil, watercolors, etc., the different kinds of mediums that an artist might use. I worked in pencil and watercolors in high school so I figure I'll install this program and give it a whirl.
I install it, and try to run it. I get an error. "Not enough free memory". What?! I have 1.25GB of RAM for pete's sake! I go to Corel's website and do some digging. They don't have any FAQs for Painter Classic, so I look through a FAQ for Painter 5.5 (they are now on Painter 8), figuring that Classic is probably a toned down version of the old software. I find a "fix" because Painter 5.5 had the same issue. I apply said fix (lower virtual memory to lower than 1023), and bring my virtual memory from 1900ish to 1000. Still won't work. WTF?
I had written to Wacom since they packaged the software with their hardware, and also because I couldn't get support from Corel since I didn't own a full version (and I sure as hell wasn't going to pay a 'per incident' charge to call their support line). I was written back with the suggestion to put it below 900MB, or if that doesn't work, my last option would be to buy Painter 8.
Granted Corel has an offer for users of Painter Classic to purchase the upgrade instead of the full version, for $150, but that's really a bit too expensive for me right now. So I try lowering my virtual memory to 800.
Yay! Painter now works, although I wonder how this low VM is going to affect my other programs, since WindowsXP recommends over 1900...
So I just spent the last couple of hours sketching. I was going to draw something to add to my banner here, but I'm not quite sure if it'll fit, or if it will look good if I shrink it to 200px high. I don't think it will be too bad if I do that, the image itself is only 400px high. I just clipped off the extra white space and made it 350x350, I'll show it below, tell me what you think:
The shrunken version (150x150):
That's all, folks...
Company layoffs
Monday, July 28, 2003
The company I work for has been in bankruptcy since January 2002. I will refrain from naming it specifically, but will hint that it is a telecom and it is not WorldCom/MCI...
About three months before they announced the bankruptcy they RIF'd a couple thousand employees, including several from my department. About two months after the bankruptcy filling, they RIF'd a couple more thousand employees (one of which was my fiancee), and asked for several voluntary RIFs as well (people who would take their leave of the company at will and receive their entire severance package up front instead over so many weeks/months for the unvoluntary RIFs). I think my department lost about 25%-30% of its staff.
Then the company went through a period where it felt safe to hire some more people. My department hired seven people, a few of who had taken the voluntary RIF earlier that year. However, this was simply a trade-off because we had "acquired" a department that used to be based out of NYC, and it needed to be staffed by seven employees out of our department now that it was going to be in Phoenix. None of the new hires was my fiancee.
Now, the company is suffering again and has had to RIF some more people. I heard today through a colleague that our department lost three people (one of them was one who'd been hired last summer). I am keeping my fingers crossed that they are done taking away from our department as we're stretched pretty thin as it is. We're a 24/7 operations, and our workload requires, at the very least, four or five people at night, and about three times that during the day. We lost one person from the day shift, and one person from the swing shift (first half of the week). The third person was from another branch of our department that works along with us but does not do the same type of work our group does.
Two of the three people who were RIF'd, I feel were justified choices. The third person, in my opinion, was a poor choice. I won't go into details, but I think it was rather cruel to have chosen that third person over several others who would have been better choices.
I certainly hope they are done RIF'ing from our department. I would hate to go back to work Thursday after my four day weekend and discover they have some more people to pick off and find myself in their number. :o(
That's all, folks...
The personalities of cats..
I have two cats, supposedly litter mates. They're about two years old now, and weigh around 13lbs each. And their personalities are as different as night and day...
The long haired one, Fawkes, is very laid back and mellow. Very few things spook this fellow. When someone rings the doorbell, while the other runs and hides, he will be heading toward the door (not running like a dog might) and will greet the person who comes in whether they want it or not. He simply rubs against the person's leg and looks up hoping for a scratch on the head or behind the ears. He also can't meow worth a damn. It comes out sound more like a pathetic squeak, and when he tries to be loud it is damn annoying. He saves his loud 'squeaks' for announcing that he wants food, even if there is food already in the dish. He also prefers men, especially those with facial hair (he will hop on their belly and start to chew on beards or mustaches). I think he might be gay.
The short haired one, Hobbes (no, not of "Calvin & Hobbes", I'll explain their namesakes later), gives new meaning of the phrase "scaredy-cat". Like I mentioned earlier, he runs and hides when the doorbell rings. And doesn't come out for at least two to three hours after whoever rang the doorbell, leaves. I think sometimes he sees things, as he'll occasionally freak out for no apparent reason (this is usually what will get Fawkes spooked), and get all poofed up and just
stare at whatever it is he thinks is scarey.
Otherwise he is a cuddle-bug. As I type this he is crammed in the little space behind my back on my chair because I won't let him sit on my lap. Sometimes he'll try to climb onto the top of the back of the chair (which is very funny looking since his body is just a tad longer than the chair back is), but that annoys me because he has to brace himself with his claws and they get stuck. My chair is cloth (thank goodness) so it's not really being damaged, but I usually have to help him get his claws unstuck. He also gives head-butts, where he butts his head against your face and purrs. He tends to prefer females (which is why he's often near me), and seems to be afraid of some men. He doesn't necessarily run when he sees a man, he just watches them with a wary eye.
They're both black cats, so Hobbes did not get his name from the comic book. If anyone remembers the Sci-Fi show called the "Invisible Man", the cats are named after the two main characters. I got the two of them when they were two months old while that series was on, and named them before their true personalities came out. Oddly enough, their names seem to be quite fitting.. Fawkes on the show was rather laid back, and he was a former thief; our Fawkes will steal any twist tie he lays his eyes on. Hobbes on the show was rather spazzy and nervous, and took meds; our Hobbes is also spazzy & nervous, and maybe he should be on meds, too.
Anyway, those are my cats. I've got photos of them, both when they were little and current ones, which I may post at a later date. Not that any non-cat person would care. :o)
That's all, folks...
Feh…
Sunday, July 27, 2003
I think I understand now why MT's time stamp is acting like it does.. Probably because "majority rules", and in this case, the majority of the world moves its clocks forward & back for DST. So rather than piss off the majority of MT users, the minority who don't typically change their clocks must find alternate ways of getting the time stamp to mesh with their zone. I was going to tinker around with some plugins, but I don't feel like trying to grasp the concept of perl and trying to make them work, so I'll change the timezone to UTC -8 until I feel like noodling with the plugins again.
Time zone faux pas
Ok, since when does GMT spring forward for DST? GMT is a standard, and remains static. Arizona also remains static for DST, so we never have to change our clocks (just our internal math when dealing with people in other states). So why in the world is MT saying I'm posting after 10PM when it's really 9:15 here, and I've got it set to GMT -7? AZ is *always* GMT -7. I really don't want to have to re-set my time zone when DST is overwith. Sheesh..
Time zone?
Checking the time zone MT thinks I'm on...
Much better..
Looking much better, at least I think so. I want to create my own banner though. I think that text is just way too... well, too
blah. Maybe I'll work on it this weekend.. I get a four day weekend this week! Whee! (normal weekend for me is 3 days).
Anyway. That is all.
Eww..
<style="text-decoration: line-through">Ok, so this is looking pretty nasty at the moment, but it will look better before the end of the day, I promise!
(edited to add: It really did look awful. I think it looks much better now.)
First Entry
Ok, I think have this thing down now. Made some silly mistakes upon installation (misplaced files, etc), but hopefully most of the rough edges have been smoothed out. I have more tweaking to do with the colors here so it matches my main page... What a way to spend my workday.
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