erica's joys :)

I'm SO traumatized. My laptop upped and died this weekend. My iPod decided it liked how my laptop did things and followed suit. I fly to Chicago tommorow. The boredom I am going to endure as a result of these occurences is going to be immense. The laptop issue should be solved fairly shortly. The iPod is another matter. I'm going to listen to what Apple says about what to do if my iPod won't turn on but I'm not holding out a lot of hope.

Anyhow, I arrived home safely from Pittsburgh on Friday (obviously) and I must say the Pittsburgh airport is quite impressive. I think if I have to have a layover anywhere, it may just be Pittsburgh. Why? Because the Pittsburgh airport has a mall inside the terminal. Apparently the same thing is included in Thurgood Marshall and Logan International airports. I guess layovers at those airports wouldn't be so bad either.

Moving on, today I resolved to start saving. Yes, its a little late but better late than never. I signed up for that Keep the Change thing that Bank of America has going. I also set my bank account to transfer some money to my savings account every 2 weeks. This may not seem like much to some of the people who read my blog, but to me, its a big deal. I want to be able to send my kids (if I'm ever blessed with them) and nieces/nephews to college one day. This is just a step towards that.

Meanwhile, back to laundry, I have to go to the airport tommorow at 8:30 am and I haven't packed anything. I need to not procrastinate so much.

So to answer your question misterboston, I'm in pittsburgh right now, chillin at the Holiday Inn. This entry will be fairly short as I'm tired as a muthatrucka. So yeah, Pittsburgh is...well just another city. A smaller city, but a city nonetheless. No pictures as I lost my camera and haven't purchased another one. I'm waiting for this bad boy to be available for purchase:



Once I get that (it goes on sale May 1) I'll be all over the pictures again. Meanwhile, yeah, Pittsburgh. I went to eat at a place called Union Grill last night. Hello yummy. I was so impressed with this place! We ordered the baked brie for an appetizer and it came with fresh fruit...honestly the best, freshest fruit I've had in a loooooong time. I had some chicken w/ capers, I forget the name of the dish. However the portions are HUGE. I couldn't finish mine and thats saying something. The prices are pretty reasonable too. So to sum up, Union Grill = great food + big portions + good pricing. I think that may have sounded like a complete sales pitch, but promise on everything I love, it wasn't.

I planned to make this a little longer and seriously, I probably shouldn't even post this in its current state, given that I'm half asleep while typing this. However, I will post so as to inform misterboston of my whereabouts. Time for sleep!

Do these questions look familiar:

What was the name of your high school?
What was your high school mascot?
What is your favorite color?
Where were you born?
Whats your favorite sports team?

If you have a MySpace profile, a Xanga account, even an e-mail address in some cases, you probably recognize these as questions from surveys you may have received. Now how a look at this:



Those are the security question options from a major financial website. The similarity of the questions to common survey questions is alarming to me. If its not already happening, I'm sure its only a matter of time before some unsavory phisher and/or scam artist hops on MySpace (or any other social network), creates an account, and begins collecting friends and sending out surveys. In a matter of hours, the scammer would have information good enough for authentication about many of the "friends".

It seems as though social networking can easily cross the line into social engineering. Sure people know not to share their passwords and social security numbers but what about the other identifying information? How much information is too much information? The line between social networking and social engineering seems to be really fine and really fuzzy. Here's hoping some education for companies (because the example given above is really piss poor) and individuals will help to make this line a little more broad and definitely more clear.

Original digg:

Paul Thurnott, who is usually excited about all things Microsoft seems very dissapointed with Windows Vista. Here is the conlusion of his review of the latest CTP. He still gives it 5 pauls though.

So I guess I'm not the only one who isn't so thrilled with Windows Vista. Honestly, I really am not expecting much from this release and its quite likely I won't bother to upgrade.

Speaking of operating systems, I read an article yesterday that deals with the barriers people encounter in switching to Linux. This got me to thinking, why is there not a movement for switching to Linux, similar to the one like there is for Firefox? So I check Godaddy to see if getlinux.com is available. Sadly, no. However, when navigating to http://www.getlinux.com, there is nothing to be found. So I check out the registration for the domain and this is what I get:

Registrant:
BUSEY, ANDREW
*** *** ****
AUSTIN, TX 78701-3636
US

Domain Name: GETLINUX.COM

Administrative Contact, Technical Contact:
BUSEY, ANDREW busey@oxygencapital.com
*** ****** ****
AUSTIN, TX 78701-3636
US
********** fax: *** *** ****

Record expires on 04-Nov-2008.
Record created on 05-Nov-1998.
Database last updated on 19-Apr-2006 23:00:50 EDT.

Domain servers in listed order:

NS1.OXYGENCAPITAL.COM 66.136.194.122
NS1.CRAYON.COM 64.128.30.229

Registry Status: REGISTRAR-LOCK
Registry Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Registry Status: clientTransferProhibited
Registry Status: clientDeleteProhibited

(I edited out some of the address details because maybe Andrew doesn't want his info posted all over the internet.)

Googling Andrew Busey returns http://www.pluck.com/company/team.html as the first result. A little research shows that yes, this is the same Andrew Busey. I'm not going to walk through all the steps, an enterprising internet user such as yourself should be able to do the same thing I did. Meanwhile, here's hoping Mr. Busey has some sort of purpose for this gem of a domain name rather than just squatting on it.

Speaking of Googling names, I wonder how many other Erica Baker's there are out there. Of course there is the Erica Baker who has been missing since February 7, 1999. :( Then there is the Erica Baker in California that works in advertising. She tells me that there is another Erica Baker in LA who works in advertising as well. I think I'm going to start an Erica-roll. If any Erica Baker's out there have webpages you'd like me to link to, leave a comment and I'll add it. :)

I think that will do for today's babbling.

In case you’ve not noticed the hordes of fanboys peeing their pants, Google released the much awaited calendar last night. I’m glad because now I can talk about it here without spilling some super top secret information. :-P Please to be clear that even though I work for Google, my views here are mine alone and not the views of Google or any other employees of Google.

Okay, so the calendar? Love it. My only gripe is the lack of a yearly view. I may be one of fiftyleven who uses a yearly calendar but dangit, I have good reason. Planning large blocks of time months ahead is hard when you can only see one month at a time. I hope they implement a yearly view…a 3 month view…something, at some point. Aside from that gripe, I love it. I also love that the calendar has brought the iCal format to the masses. Yes, many mac people have used this for ages but not everybody has a mac. The fanboys tend to forget that from time to time. Oh by the way, if you’re looking for a good public calendar resource, you can check out http://www.icalshare.com.

Moving on, I’d like to deviate from techdom to girlyworld. Men, avert your eyes if such discussions chill you to your core. Feel free to navigate away as this message from girlyworld will end this post.

Now then, a message to bra makers: Women don’t like pointy boobs. Men don’t like pointy boobs. Stop making bras that come to a triangle in the front thus making the boobs pointy when the bra is put on. I don’t know how this trend got started but for the love of sensuality, please stop making bras that make boobs look like weapons of mass destruction. Thank you.

I settled in to my new office today. I've come bearing pics for your viewing pleasure. Meanwhile, not much to post as I'm quite tired. More later. :)

A website aimed at preparing people for the process of getting a programming job at a major corporation. The interview questions are pretty interesting.

read more | digg story

Back in Atlanta

So I got back to Atlanta Friday night. I would like to say that I am never again flying American Airlines. Why? 2 hour and 15 minute delay. Upon landing captain has the audacity to say “Well at least it was same day service.” Whatever. Then when I get inside Hartsfield Jackson to get my suitcase, the front pocket of it was ripped all the way open. I go to say something about it to the baggage people and they’re all, if its not part of the main compartment we won’t do anything about it. So basically all the pockets of your suitcase can be shredded, handle broken, wheels pulled off, etc, so long as the main compartment of your suitcase isn’t damaged, they consider themselves not liable. Screw you American Airlines. I may be an insignificant nobody to you but I will feel much better giving my dollars to another airline, thank you very much.

Oh, horror of horrors, I left my camera in the cab in New York. *sigh* No that’s not sarcasm, that is true dismay I am conveying in my words. Even though it wasn’t a digital camera, it was my baby. It was a 16th birthday present from my dad and now I have zero camera. I can’t tell you how much that sucks. *sigh again*

Anyhow, I went to see Failure to Launch yesterday. It had its funny parts but overall it was pretty cheesy and poorly edited. Now I’m no movie critic but I have to say, when I can tell where they combined different takes on more than one occasion, there is a problem.

A comment on movie theatres while I’m on the subject. The MPAA is very adamant that illegal sharing of movies is what is causing the decline in movie ticket sales. I submit that the decline of ticket sales is twofold. First, the price of tickets is ridiculous. No way should a matinee ticket cost $6.75. A former coworker of mine said that he rarely takes his family to the movies because the total cost would exceed $100. Secondly, the choices as the concession stand are equally ludicrous. Back in the 50’s popcorn and soft drinks may have been ground breaking. However in 2006, I would rather not spend $20 on stale popcorn and flat Sprite. Frankly, the new offerings (nachos, pretzels, etc) leave much to be desired as well. How about offering some healthier fare? Soy chips maybe? Odwalla or Naked juices? All natural candy? I mean offer me something I’d WANT to eat rather than making me sneak in my food. Gotta love the oversized purses for that. ;-)

Well those are my ramblings for the moment. Have a wonderful week folks.

I just finished two slices of NY Pizza and I have quickly come to realize what all the fuss is about. However I have also come to realize that one should not eat 2 slices of NY Pizza unless one wants to feel like a bloated whale.

Meanwhile, I started my new job! Where? I'll give you a hint..."Search don't sort."

I'm in NY right now for work and it's the second time I've been here ever in life. I don't really care for NY too much (please don't flame me). I guess there is just too much going on. I'm accustomed to life in a city but not a REALLY BIG SUPER CROWDED city. There are definitely nice people at the office here though, so thats a plus.

For a final thought, you have to love this quote by Billy boy. Stop me if you've heard this before:

I have embarked upon a quest....the quest of the t-shirt. I would like to amass the largest collection of Google t-shirts, bar none. Check here for all the shirts I've collected. :)