2021 is coming to an end, and I'm a little on the low side for one reason: odd numbers. My whole life I have had very bad luck with even numbers, whereas odd numbers are a sign of luck for me. It is currently 2021/12/31, and it's going to be the last time for quite a while there are that many odd numbers in the date. In case something terrible happens, I will say this now just so it's on record: back in 2010 at the age of 9 or 10 I made a YouTube comment stating the world will end in 2024. Curiously, I remember why I made that comment: I was scared about 2012 and either my dad or my uncle assured me there are Mayan calendars that go up to 2024, so I still have time. I Googled this, and other than some conspiracy nut on Reddit this doesn't seem to be a thing. Though with my luck I'll be sitting at my computer desk with 30 seconds until 2025 and I'll take a sigh of relief. "Ah, well I see the world DIDN'T end in 2024-" and at that moment the ceiling fan is going to break apart and hit me in the back of the neck. Hey, the world goes on for you! ...but not me.
It's just a theory. My whole life predictions I made long in advance came true in a sort of "That is HIGHLY inaccurate, but there seems to be some similarity there, I guess.". Will something terrible happen to me in 2024? I dunno. Have I jinxed myself into a terrible fate in 2025? I dunno. Am I going to get hit by satellite debris the moment this very article goes online? It's pointless to speculate. At least this article is here for in case something weird does happen.
To keep me company during New Year's I've got a whole backlog of vinyl records I haven't had time to listen to until now. I actually didn't know what was on any of these, The present I bought myself with gifted money is Omnimusic OM 152, also known as Fusion. It's a library music record, aka stock music. Released in 1986, this record is entirely electronic music that sounds like you would hear it in a warehouse safety training video. I only knew two songs beforehand: "Zenith", which was the opening and closing credits theme for The Computer Chronicles from 1989 to 2002 (If you are a tech nerd and have not seen this show, pick any episode right now, any at all. It's all free on the Internet Archive.) and "Information", which was uploaded to YouTube by some guy. Not knowing any other songs, I took a gamble and bought the only copy on Discogs that claimed to be in playable condition. I ordered it on December 3rd and it arrived ONE day after the Christmas party we held on the 18th. It seems like a long time to ship, but it's actually pretty damn impressive when you learn I had it imported from the U.K. So what do I think of the other mystery songs? I think they're all great, legions better than the shitty stock music we're using today. I imagine I'll be listening to some of these on my iPod for quite a while. Formula One is actually a legit banger, so if you want some genuinely kick-ass 80s stock music, look that up on YouTube.
The other albums? Feeling Cavalier by Ebn-Ozn, for one. It's kind of trash, but at the same time it's fun in that goofy kind of way. Discogs describes it as a New Wave album, but by today's standard it's very much a novelty record. It manages to come across as both catchy and annoying, with infectious hooks and rhythms that fit both descriptions at the same time. It's actually quite impressive, the only other song I know of that fits the bill for being an ear worm that you don't mind playing on infinite loop is Granny Cream's Hot Butter Ice Cream from the Hypnospace Outlaw soundtrack. And every song on this album is like that! One song that stands out is AEIOU Sometimes Y, whose verses sound like rejected dialog from Pulp Fiction ten years ahead of schedule. There's also the opening track, Bag Lady (I Wonder) which all there is to say is that it shares an uncanny resemblance to Bouncing Off the Walls by Matthew Wilder, which came out the same year, 1984. And then there's the ending track "The Dawn" which doesn't fit the tone of the album at all. The whole album is goofy 80s camp, and then you get to the final track of the album The Dawn, which is this depressing, distorted and all around unnerving ambient track with no lyrics. It's just there, it's not in the liner notes, and no context to what it is doing there. And it's the end of the album, the last thing you hear before the needle hits the end. Like, what the fuck?
What else? X-Periment by The System. I have never heard of them, and it seems most people haven't either. What is it? Electronic Funk/Soul from 1984, possibly the most stereotypically 80s synth album I have ever heard in my life. And I don't mean that in the Lazerhawk way, this is the GOOD stuff. If you are looking for some Beverly Hills Cop type music and you haven't heard of X-Periment, I highly recommend you start there. That is a personal recommendation. It's funny, other than the imported library music, all of this stuff has come from my neighborhood Goodwill. It seems that Goodwill has better records than any dedicated record store I've been to. A few months ago I discovered a record from 1977 of Tchaikovsky played on ARP synthesizers. It is by an immeasurable amount the greatest switched-on album I know of, and again, nobody seems to have any clue this exists. The upload of the album on YouTube really sucks, so I might have to upload it myself if nobody else gets around to it.
So I have plenty of new music to keep me company on New Year's Day, but other than that I have the fine folks on the Internet. But logging back on after a few days of inactivity seemed lukewarm at best, as it wasn't long before I got in argument with someone I will call ALBOW. The premise of the argument was simple, or at least I think so. Windows 10 is bloatware and takes too damn long to boot, which I understand is background processes ran on startup, but which I believe is unnecessary. Now that I have extended time to think of the best explanation, I'll put it as simple as I possibly can.
If you need a feature, you can use it. If you don't use that feature, you shouldn't need to run it.
Now, for the hard details.
I am running Windows 10 on a computer I built from new parts in 2018, and it takes two and a half minutes from the time I log in to the time I can actually use it for anything. Notably, the system is so bogged down on boot-up that it takes a full minute before I can even open a folder in Explorer. Before I ran Windows 10 on this machine I ran Windows 7 until just before the end of extended support, upgrading to Windows 10 sometime in the winter of 2019. I never had this much slowdown on Windows 7 at any point, and what is important to note is that I am mostly following the same workflow now as I was then. I use the same versions of the same software and I do the same tasks. Any new features added to Windows 10 don't mean anything to me because Windows 7 did everything I needed it to. My workflow ran without them then, and it goes on without them now.
Let me go through a summary of the scuffle. I said, and I quote: "Windows 10 takes twice as long to boot as Windows 7, presumably to run background processes that aren't of noticeable benefit to me as I'm still doing the same tasks in the same software I was using in the age of 7". To which ALBOW replied "The computer is _not_ doing the exact same tasks for you, that's the thing." and then suggested I upgrade from a HDD to an SSD. I asked why Windows 10 needs to read/write so much data on boot up, to which ALBOW explained Windows 10 is expected to do a lot these days, and accused me of "ignoring everything internal to the OS while continuing to complain about it". In their own words, "Would you rather have it be like Windows 95, where it works somewhat faster most of the time, but every so often you have to fire up the fragmented and such and just stare at it for an hour or two?", to which I stated the simple fact that whatever Microsoft is adding to Windows 10 is, at least on my computer, making it slower, not faster. And besides that, any improved behind the scenes tasks to add functionality seem like a waste of resources to me, as I am still using software that ran on stock Windows 7.
ALBOW suggested I just use Windows 7 then, and I tried to explain the reason I don't use 7 anymore is because I'm ripping off the band-aid in anticipation of Mozilla cutting off Firefox support for 7. ALBOW replied with "You do realize you just contradicted yourself, right?" to which my response was "Maybe I did.". I couldn't be bothered to fight with ALBOW at that point. I never feel like dealing with ALBOW, it seems no matter how hard I try to keep a discussion civil they treat it as an argument that they need to win. In general, they don't seem to like me and will go out of their way to 1-up me when I want nothing to do with them. If they ever read this, I'm know how they will respond. I don't know what they will say, not a clue. But I know what their message would be.
To close off this rant, I will address what ALBOW was calling me a hypocrite for: Windows 7 could run a modern version of Firefox if somebody wanted to support 7 indefinitely. But the world has moved on from 7. It lacks features most people today want, and many applications have already dropped support entirely, largely killing its usefulness. Windows 7 could keep up with today's world, but developers aren't interested. Windows 7 is obsolete by public opinion, I agree with that. But if I am using Windows 10 for the exact same tasks I did in Windows 7, why do I need to be running all of this extra bloatware? Other people use the full capabilities of Windows 10. I don't. For the time being I need 10 to do what 7 did and nothing more. If I start using newer software I would expect to use more horsepower, but I'm not running new software yet. Until then, why run the extra features?
And for all that is good in this world, let the word be known, LET THE WORD BE KNOWN: I am NOT a tech expert. I am an average joe who doesn't know how this shit works. Addressing ALBOW, if there is a perfect, sensible, justifiable reason Windows 10 needs to be this slow that has to do with more advanced computer theory, don't assume someone with minimal knowledge of computer theory understands advanced computer theory.
New Year's resolutions for 2022. Be more productive.
I've been writing a book for years now, and while I don't expect to finish it in 2022 I hope to make it the year of massive progress in getting it done. For the past year and a half I have been suffering from scope creep bad. I recently decided this book is never going to get done if I try to create the magnum opus I originally anticipated, so I'm cutting the book down to the basics. There is simply no other way it can get finished, for years I was adding half-baked ideas that sound fantastic on paper but would take a ton more work to actually be usable. I have a ton of ideas that go nowhere and do nothing, and are only in my notes because they sound cool when truncated to one sentence. I am making the story simple, easy to follow and light on the complexity. I'm shortening it as well, no need to drag it out considering I have calculated it won't take much story telling to get the core plot across.
Besides that, this will be my first book I ever release. Yeah, I have been writing stories since I was five years old, but I have never been critiqued on any of them because I have never shared them. I know the story I am writing has a unique and fascinating premise, but I doubt I can write what's in my mind to the level of perfection I could get if I had experience. It's a great idea, but I doubt I could work it into a masterpiece at my current skill level. At best, the engaging premise and plot will save me from my own incompetence as writer. Hence, another reason I am simplifying the story. What's something an inexperienced writer shouldn't do? Well how about bite off more than they can chew? I'm keeping the plot down to its basics, the worst thing you can do to your audience besides leave them disappointed, is leave them disappointed AND confused.
What other resolutions do I have? Well, I have a ton of old computer equipment in half working or broken states, and for many of them I have the parts and tools I need to fix them. So how about spending some of 2022 fixing them? It's a daunting task seeing how much broken stuff I have, but if I can get everything backed to a working state it will not only be a great accomplishment by my standards, but will also be very useful for getting stuff done. For example, I have ten computer monitors that don't start up, and with most of them the problem is just bad capacitors. I can think of a lot of uses for another ten computer monitors.
I don't want to reveal everything I have in my possession, I want to keep that a secret for when it's all ready to demonstrate. Speaking of demonstrations, making content in general. I have a long list of ideas for good YouTube videos, both sketches and general technology. I have the ideas, I just need to get the time and resources to put them to film. Oh yeah, I've been doing film photography for eight years now, I think it's about time I learn to develop film myself. I at least want to learn photographic printing. I have an enlarger and some of the other basic printing tools thanks to a mutual friend who didn't need any of it anymore. I mean, finding that kind of equipment is the toughest part of printing film, I think I'm more ready than most people.
Well, what else has happened? Well, I took a break from writing this article to get a snack. Now, it's 3AM as I'm writing this and I haven't slept since 6:20AM yesterday. So I go down to the kitchen to cook some Strawberry Pop-Tarts, and we have this Sunbeam Radiant Controlled toaster, as in the one featured in Technology Connections, only this one was built very late in production. It seems Sunbeam never polarized the plug, even at the end of production in the 90s. So I drop in one pastry, then I drop in the second into the activator slot, and what happens? One of the corners goes straight through the grill and topples over sideways. It was stuck in there so firmly I had to use steak tongs to get the bulk of it out, but that very quickly proved to be a mistake as the bottom half broke off and got stuck deep. I ended up having to open the hatch on the bottom and push the remains through with a knife while being careful not to drop the toaster in the trash can. I did make another round, and by the time I got upstairs they were already cold. The darkness meter on mine is not well calibrated.
Well, at this point I have run out of things to say. I could talk about the video I uploaded to YouTube today, but if the video doesn't speak for itself the description fills in the blanks. Check it out HERE if you would like. Maybe I'll add more content to this page later in the day, but until now I'm publishing this as-is. Happy New Year's, everyone. Here's to 2022!
Argot
Page created: Friday, December 31st, 2021