Matt the Geek

I had started to type up an entry yesterday at work, but the computer had an "issue" and decided to shut down instead. Then it was time to go soon anyway. And today I forgot what I was writing about yesterday. I know I said something about being glad no one I know getting mauled in the Black Friday Wal-Mart Fight Club, but that is about it.

Anyway

Since Daemon Tools 4 has been released, I have been able to play the GT Legends game that I mentioned in posts past. And I am here to say it is everything I was waiting for and slightly more. It is a very fun, very frustrating game. Well, frustrating to me because I am a bit of a prefectionist, and if I have a bad race -or even just a bad corner- I am likely to restart the race until I win. That aside, the graphics are really good, the physics seems accurate to me, and I love it. In spite of all this, I still have a FlatOut addiction.

Delving deeper into Geekdom, last night I was configuring a different computer to use at work as a download station. I loaded on all sorts of utilities and tools and converters, one of which being SpeedFan. Just for fun I loaded the program to see if the older KT133A had a CPU monitoring sensor, because I wanted to see what my XP1600+ was doing for temperature. After all the sensors loaded, it became apparent SpeedFan was mis-reading the sensor for CPU temp. Had to be. My CPU couldn't possibly be at 80 degrees Celcuis (176 F) could it? I thought the Athlon XPs failed past 70 C. Either way, I immediately shut down the PC, reached in and touched the heatsink/fan, and it was burn-your-fingerprints-off hot! So obviously now I am rethinking the use of that PC at work, atleast with the current pocessor.

Well, that is enough ramblings for today.
Take care everybody.

With Thanksgiving tomorrow, I thought that I would take this opportunity to list some of the thing for which I am thankful.

I am thankful that my VW has been running and driving well again. Living out where I do especially, having transportation is essential. I don't know if God was working through my hammer to bring the fuel pump back to life, but I'm not complaining either way.

I am thankful to have a place to live. It may not be much, but it works for me.

I am thankful for having a job. I may not really like it a whole lot, but it gets me by now that I am getting more hours. Also, with the job market as it is, already having a job is a plus, because finding one now is not easy.

I am thankful that I have a loving family. My family, and my parents, grandparents etc... It's always good to see them, even if it isn't as often as I / they like.

I am thankful to have good friends. I don't have a whole lot of "close" friends, only a couple really, but most of the people LAN party people are good people too.

Last but not least, I am thankful that God has been good to me over all. Yes, I have had things in my life not go right in that past couple years, but things could always be worse.

Well, I'll stop there now.
Have a good holiday everyone.
Geekboy out

So I was out working on the Jetta a couple nights ago, trying to start it as I do about once a week. Granted, it only runs for a couple of seconds at a time, but it's enough to circulate the oil and move the parts. Just for fun, I opened the fuel pump access panel in the trunk and tapped the top of the pump with a hammer and wiggled the electrical connection around some. I didn't expect anything to change, but when I tried to start the car, it fired right up. On occasion it has run for a couple minutes, but whenever I would touch the gas pedal, it would just stop. After letting it idle for about 5 mins, I got curious and hit the gas. Revved up just like a car should. Very interesting. I moved everything out of the driveway and drove up and down the driveway a few times. Going didn't seem to be a problem, but stopping did. Ever since that big accident this past March, the car has had a blown out left rear wheel cylinder, the part that makes that brake work. After sitting for as long as it did, the brake pedal just went straight to the floor, though once there, you could push it more and the car would eventually stop. Having had it do this before, I knew use would bring the pedal back, so, since it was late and the road I live on is empty at that time of night, I took it out for a drive. But not too far if it decided to quit again, but it didn't, and the brakes came back.
I'm still not driving it to work though, because the plates and registration, not to mention my license, have now expired. I hope to remedy that shortly, and then maybe even get to drive my own car again!
Also, I have given the car a name. Bluestreak. Yes, I named it after a Transformer.

That is all, for now.

But the wheels on my car don't. Since my last update of rambling, the Deathwagon has become inhabited by Electrical Gremlins.
I stopped at a gas station for gas, dropped in my last $30, and went to leave. However somewhere in that time period the Gremlins invaded. Turn the key and absolutely nothing happened. Tried a couple times, same result. Frustrated, I sat there thinking, with the key still in the "ON" position.
This is how I know the problem to be Gremlins, the car all of a sudden "remembered" it had a battery and all the dash lights came on and everything, so I attempted to start it. Nothing. It didn't act like it had a dead battery, it acted like it had no battery.
I pushed the car away from the gas pump and around into a parking spot, and started off on the walk back to my place to get the charger and extension cord. The trip home and back took about 2 hours and 15 minutes, and I can tell you walking along a moderately busy road at midnight isn't a ton of fun.
Upon returning to the gas station and hooking up the charger, I tried to start the car again, thinking it may have just needed a little time to itself.
With plenty of juice flowing, all the car did was make the solenoid under the hood go nuts. However, leaving the key on, I couold hear other things now too. The fuel pump and fan were both on continuously, and the fuel injectors were on too, yet the car was not running. For the record, that's not supposed to work that way. Yes, the fuel pump will come on when you turn the key to 'on', but will shut off once it is primed. And in cars with electric radiator fans (vs pulley operated ones) the fan will come on if the motor is hot. But the fuel injectors should only come on when the car is running, otherwise they are delivering fuel to a non-running motor.
One theory I suppose is that the cars computer has been attacked by the Gremlins and still thinks the car is running therefore keeping the injectors on and not letting the starter engage. Or it could be that at 16 years and 206,000 miles old the car just wants to rest. Which would be fine, since it's turning cold and the Wagon has no heat anyhow, but my Jetta is still down with a broken fuel pump.

Tracy has been generous in being my taxi to work in the meanwhile. While I appreciate this greatly, having to be this dependant on someone else to go almost anywhere does not sit well with me.

The only other thing of interest since last time is that I have downloaded the first 4 seasons of the Transformers plus the movie. The original Transformers that is :) The files are not of the highest video quality, but still basically watchable. I also have Season 1 on a higher quality video setting as well, so I may re-download the other 3 seasons from the same source as well.

That is all the rambling for today.
Happy Veterans Day to any Vets who may happen to stumble onto this site.

Ok, so I couldn't think of a creative headline, so I modified the forum tradition of claiming "first post" and bent it to match my entry count here.
Went to the Boxheads LAN on Sat, and had much fun once I got there. About 10 miles from I-94, the car decided to develop a flat right rear tire. Lucky for me, the spare wasn't flat or dead, and upon changing it, proceeded with the trip. I chanced going 60-65 MPH on the do-not-go-over-50mph-no-matter-what mini spares, because I thought going 50 in a 70 zone that people regularly do 80-85 in would just be dangerous. Plus, that would take too long to get there then, 50 is tooo slooow :p.
Once there I noticed most people were playing the new games that just came out, so I set out on a "network shopping" spree to pick up Quake 4, Call of Duty 2, and F.E.A.R. The other 2 are fun, but FEAR is just...WOW! And I didn't totally suck at it! The graphics are just phenomenal in that game, all the attention to detail is spectacular too.
I also picked up the GT Legends game that I have been wanting badly, but thanks to Starforce copy protection, cant play it. Must...find...way...around, I don't want to wait till sometime in Q1 2006 for the US release of the game. Especially since its out in France and Spain and such, and will be released in the UK on Fri. And yet the US has to wait. Apparently they are not concerned with missing all the holiday sales over here.

Anyhow.

Sunday I worked all day, much like I am today. Yesterday, Tracy and I went to the local Saturn Tire and got 2 used tires for the Death Wagon. Got used tires since I don't want to put too much money into this car, rather fix Jetta. So I got both rear tires changed since the left rear had cords showing through too. Nice. but it rides so much nicer now!

Anyway, thats enough unfocused, uninteresting rambling from me.