I've lurked at /. without posting for ages, mostly because I just don't have the time to interact like I used to.

But I've been clicking through the old RSS feed more and more lately, and when I saw the PAX Plague thread today, I came over to comment, since I'm kind of affected by the whole damn thing. I thought I'd take a look around since I haven't been here in awhile, and I saw that there are freaking ACHIEVEMENTS associated with our accounts. It's silly, and I'm sure it's been here forever, but I thought it was awesome and I was delighted when I read it.

I didn't realize how much I missed Slashdot until I spent some time here today, and I bet that anyone who joined in the last 2 years doesn't even give a shit about my stupid comments or anything, but it felt good to come back here, and feel safely among my people again.

First of all, I don't want this published to the frontpage...
Having said that, I have a quick question. I'm a Java guy that manages a few younger java guys. I have been asked to tech a .net guy that (according to his resume) has managed over 30 developers. How do I tech a guy like that? Do I just stick with OO/patterns questions? I know how to tech a java guy, but one that has more experience than me is a daunting task...

fyi - can't multiply cause of work, so I've become a twitter man... that's where I do my updating... if you twitter, my id is my last name...

Yeah, really.

Only took that organization like five years to see what the rest of the football world sees... 'bout time!

New job (back to consulting) and current client blocks 'social networks', so I may have to make my return here until the situation changes.

What really sucks is hurricane ike destroyed Cincinnati, and I've been without power at home since Sunday, so even if I wanted to blog on multiply, I can't...

Stay tuned, I suppose...

Yes, yes yes! It has finally happened. According to slashfilm, Uwe Boll has mentioned that if an online petition gets to 1,000,000 votes he'll stop making movies. For all of humanity, please go sign this petition! Last I saw, it was only to 96,543... we need more signatures!

I'm trying to figure out a derby name. As I've joined in the local rec-league, kinda like the minors for roller derby. I've got a bunch I'm toying around with:

Misty Kill #42
Panda McFlu #H5N1
Rachael Rage #ev00
T.Wrecks #7x10^7

I've been on the fence on them all. I'm leaning towards the 3rd one. But I get hung up on the decision, as it's what I'll be known as for the next couple of years in a rather large social circle.

UPDATE: And the winner is ... Rachael Rage ... So I submitted it so I should get on the international roster soon so noone else will be able to take it while there are skates on my feet.

This comes from shadow wrought, stoolpigeon, JC, Smitty, and originally, I think, RM6f9

Post a comment to this thread, and I will:

1. Tell you why I befriended you.
2. Associate you with something - fandom, a song, a color, a photo, etc..
3. Tell you something I like about you.
4. Tell you a memory I have of you.
5. Ask something I've always wanted to know about you.
7. In return, you must post this in your Journal/Blag/whatever.


Update: Ahh, the 2 minute rule... killing my productivity from answering all these... I'll get to you eventually, but it'll be off and on over the next day or two. Sorry!

This feels like a mega-spam entry, and I'm very self conscious about posting it, but I'm excited about this and I wanted to share . . .

I just published my third book, The Happiest Days of Our Lives. I mention it here because it's all about growing up in the 70s, and coming of age in the 80s as part of the D&D/BBS/video game/Star Wars figures generation, and I think a lot of Slashdot readers will relate to the stories in it.

I published a few of the stories on my blog, including Blue Light Special. It's about the greatest challenge a ten year-old could face in 1982: save his allowance, or buy Star Wars figures?

After our corduroy pants and collared shirts and Trapper Keepers and economy packs of pencils and wide-ruled paper were piled up in our cart, our mom took our three year-old sister with her to the make-up department to get shampoo and whatever moms buy in the make-up department, and my brother and I were allowed to go to the toy department.

"Can I spend my allowance?" I said.

"If that's what you want to do," my mom said, another entry in a long string of unsuccessful passive/aggressive attempts to encourage me to save my money for . . . things you save money for, I guess. It was a concept that was entirely alien to me at nine years old.

"Keep an eye on Jeremy," she said.

"Okay," I said. As long as Jeremy stood right at my side and didn't bother me while I shopped, and as long as he didn't want to look at anything of his own, it wouldn't be a problem.

I held my brother's hand as we tried to walk, but ended up running, across the store, past a flashing blue light special, to the toy department. Once there, we wove our way past the bicycles and board games until we got to the best aisle in the world: the one with the Star Wars figures.

I'm really proud of this book, and the initial feedback on it has been overwhelmingly positive. I've been reluctant to mention it here, because of the spam issue, but I honestly do think my stories will appeal to Slashdotters.

After the disaster with O'Reilly on Just A Geek, I've decided to try this one entirely on my own, so I'm responsible for the publicity, the marketing, the shipping, and . . . well, everything. If this one fails, it will be because of me, not because a marketing department insisted on marketing it as something it's not.

Of course, I hope I can claim the same responsibility if (when?) it finds its audience . . . which would be awesome.

WEll I haven't really written for a while, though I have kept /. in my morning coffee clicking to see what's going on even though things have dwindled down significantly.

Anyways, I'm just friend right now. Overloaded with work at both my day and home biz. Not to mention trying to have a personal life thrown in there. I've got some things in boxes I still need to unpack and I have to get a bunch of shirts ready for Roller Derby Nationals at the end of the month. Which, thank god, my dad and sister are coming out so I'll have some help at the booth. As at Rollercon I did really well, but had no down time, and I can't imagine my lapse into lunacy if I didn't have any help.

Well, I need to write more, as this helps vent some steam while I'm at work. At work right now with th erest of my group at a conference fro the week in San Antonio. Of which I was completely left out of, no one even talked to me about it. Super fun being excluded by my boss. SO I'm keeping a txt file documenting all these occurances so that I have something to cover my back if something unwarranted happens in the future.

Laters.

Oh and I printed with a fish last night. I'm taking a creative clothing modification class and the teacher brought a bunch of things to spread shirt paint on and press into fabric. One of which was a fish. It turned out looking real cool. So I plan on going to the Asian market and getting some tentacles to press with copper paint into a black hoodie.

Someone stole my scooter this afternoon.

Mother Fucker.

Tons of stuff this month. I'm about to become a homeowner. Well, the owner of some airspace between walls. But I'm super excited. It's in the perfect location that I was looking into, one where I can walk to the cool places, has a great view, and good potential for increased valuation. I should have the keys in hand Friday :)

And my friends brought up in conversation the other day how they thought my ex-bf was gay, and that they didn't even realize we were a couple until the 3-4 time we met. They even asked their gay friend if he was, so they wouldn't make the wrong assumption, and he said that yes he was but doesn't even know it yet.

That possibility hadn't even crossed my mind until they mentioned it, and it makes so much sense. It fits with all the problems we had with the physical portion of the relationship, as well as psychologically with me. How people tend to get into relationships that mirror their parents, well I'm sure my mom is gay and talked to my dad about it and he agrees, and sees the parallel.

Other stuff going on, is that I'm joining up with a ska band to play trombone (and maybe they'll let me sing too). I get together with them for practice tonight.

I just had my min-year review at work and I got in trouble. But for an odd reason. For being anti-social. Yep, for not talking with my co-workers and not fully "integrating" myself with my group.

Funny, because when I'm not at work I'm chatty, talkative and goofy. But put me in the boring world of civil engineering and I'm just fine hanging out in my head. OF course it might be because I'm in a remote office of only 5 people in my team and a total of maybe 20 people in the building. Or maybe the fact that I'm the youngest person here as well as the only woman engineer. So people don't really come to chat me up about their kids and I don't feel like telling them about the jello shots I made for the kickball game the previous night.

That and most of my mental energy has gone into starting up my side business of making roller derby t-shirts. I actually got a gig being a vendor for a motorcycle rally at the end of the month. So if anyone is in Austin for the ROT rally, stop into the 4-day concert that Havana resturant on 6th street is putting on and have a beer and check out my t-shirts.

Engineer by day. Creative Entrepreneur by night. Makes me really busy and wish I had more time to get to the Aikido classes I'm signed up for. I should have more time next month.

Simple tasks like switching between Firefox and Thunderbird are driving the load on my machine up over 4, and if I'm trying to run Amarok at the same time, it drives it up to 8. In fact, my machine frequently climbs up into the 7-9 range, bringing my apps to a crawl and frustrating the hell out of me.

So I've decided it's time to buy a new computer. I'm going to replace my aging Sony Vaio desktop machine (which runs Linux) with something newer that has more RAM, a faster processor, and a bigger hard drive.

The thing is, I'm not entirely sure where to start looking. A quick walk through Circuit City a month or so ago lead me to believe I can get a rather "big" computer for as low as five hundred bucks, which further leads me to believe that if I were to buy something online, I can get a huge pile of RAM, a fast processor, and a big honkin' hard drive for even less.

I run Kubuntu, and use KDE as my desktop (though I occasionally switch to Gnome when I get bored) and I mostly use Firefox, Thunderbird, OpenOffice.org, Amarok, and run PokerStars in wine. I'm looking for something that can do all of that without slowing my machine to a crawl.

Anyone have any suggestions on where to start looking?

Edit: I don't think I have the patience to build my own machine out of individual parts. I also don't have any real loyalty to any particular company or architecture. New Egg has lots of machines with AMD processors, and though I've always had Intel processors because more things seemed to run on x86, that's not as much of an issue as it once was, right?

Yea, I might be getting a kitten. My friend works at a vet clinic and they need a home for a cat that just got done with surgery. See, most people don't want a cute cuddly cat with a physical defect, but dogs get snatched up in a heartbeat if they do.

So I'm getting a 3-legged kitty.

Any ideas on names?

And how to house train a cat... I've always benefited from being around my sisters who had cats and they would take care of all that dirty work like pee abatement and such and I just reap the cuddly benefits of a purring ball of claws and teeth.