Sunday, December 20, 2009

Vanity of vanities

Listening to Norah Jones, watching the text scroll off the computer screen. I am basking in the technology, while a voice in the back of my mind is saying, "vanity of vanities, all is vanity."

Saturday, December 12, 2009

From a Computer Desktop in Los Angeles, CA, 2000 Years after Christ walked the Earth, and how many Thousands of Years until...

The night has fully come. I sit at my table, watching the cars go by. The trees sway in endless dance above the traffic. The rain has finally let up. I have turned down my stereo so as not to disturb my neighbors downstairs. I have started to think about bed. I hope it's not raining when I get up to go to work tomorrow. Goodbye, all!

This is my new Open SUSE computer. I am enjoying it. Sometimes I feel it is a vain pursuit, and it probably is. I don't find too much interest in things these days. The term for what I have is anhedonia, I believe. I believe it was coined by the psychologist, William James.

Anhedonia: an inability to experience pleasure from normally pleasurable life events such as eating, exercise, social interaction or sexual activities. That is from Wiki. Researchers theorize that anhedonia may result from the breakdown in the brain's reward system, involving dopamine pathways. Two 2005 studies by Paul Keedwell MD of King's College found that certain sections of the brain in depressed subjects had to work harder to process happy thoughts.

Well, anyway. I have developed an interest and fondness for Linux computers. It is somewhat of a clandestine pleasure to get them working and configured, and thus escape all the problems of Windows: malware, virii, nagware, licenses, etc.

I now have two distros installed: this one, OpenSUSE 11.2, and Mint Elyssa (Fluxbox Edition). I am thinking about installing Fedora 12.

Well, enough for now. I love My Open SUSE. I hope I don't break something in it or discover a fatal flaw.

The end to another pleasurable, meaningless day.It did have some value. The sunset was gorgeous even though it was raining and you couldn't see the sun. There is something about the sunset that stirs something in me, and temporarily breaks up the iciness.

I can live forever with this OpenSUSE 11.2, even though I don't do anything with it except fetishize it and obsess over it. I guess there's a value to that, however miniscule. It is one of the few unadulterated pleasures left to me.





Thursday, April 17, 2008

Tip for the Day

Get yourself a clear conscience, and do as you will.
Update on the Tuberculosis front: I don't have it. I still have to take some medicine for six months to lower the chance that I will ever get TB. I have been going through the county, as I don't have insurance. So far, everything has cost me a total of 25 or 30 bucks. The only drawback is I have to wait in a crowded waiting room for a couple of hours to be seen. As I work swing shift, this is not such an inconvenience.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

One of these days

One of these days, I will have enough confidence to put What4 in my signature file....

"Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance..."

I haven't added to this blog since I added a counter. Perhaps this was poetic justice for caring anyway if anyone read what was on my heart.

Another reason is that what has been on my heart has been all religious. I know how sanctimonious that can sound.

I have been listening to lastfm.com a lot. If you haven't check out LastFM, you really should. It's pretty popular in Europe, and offers alot of free listening, but not so many free downloads. The custom playlists are pretty amazing, though.If you want to visit my lastfm homepage, here it is: Rwinner's LastFM Home Page.

Bought this picture from deviantart for 100 bucks. It looks nice behind my red leatherette sofa I bought from coolsofa.com. The room is shaping up nicely. I still have to buy the blinds and drapes. I did buy an oil lamp on the net from Vermont Lanterns. This is going to look awfully cool at night, don't you think?

It's fun to decorate the room, though. I am taking a California minimalist approach: one or two things on each wall, no clutter, and simple basic colors. Will show you all the stuff when the room is (almost) finished!

Bye!