Personal

Following a loud pop that caused my heart to stop for a moment, my computer power supply decided to head on to greener pastures. Being who I am, I figured I would rip it apart to see the reparability of it all, thinking it was likely a blown capacitor or transformer. Capacitors that make that exploding sound usually show some outward sign of such action, where as transformers are generally more subtle. Worth a shot at the very least, right?

With no signs of capacitor damage and 16 transformers soldered into the circuitry, it was apparently a waste of my time. I suppose I could have started desoldering parts to test them individually, but even were I successful in locating the culprit (and hopefully the root cause); I would have to locate some oddball replacement component. Hardly worth the time for all of that.

Instead of jumping through all the self-repair hoops, I looked online for an aftermarket replacement... with no luck. It would seem this is a proprietary power supply specific to this model of Dell. And that just sucks. The good news is that everyone and their brother seem to carry this power supply as a refurbished unit, including Dell. That meant two things to me: first, this particular type of failure is likely a common problem with this power supply, and second, they are likely replacing the bad component with a better one. That last part is just a guess, but makes sense when you have a common source of failure.

Anyway, the moral of this story is that I am without my main computer until sometime Friday when my replacement power supply arrives. The big problem is that my life is on that computer, including all the pictures and notes for this here blog thingy of mine. I do have backups (and the hard drives are obviously still OK), but with under a weeks wait for repair time it hardly seems worth the effort to build out a computer just to restore a few files for a couple of days use. At least that is my thought.

While we wait for a real blog entry from yours truly, you can just sit back, relax, and enjoy the music. What? You can't hear that music? Sorry, the voices must be singing again. They really are getting pretty good you know. Just skip that last part about enjoying the music. I'll get something more entertaining up as soon as I can. Until then... Ciao.

The world does not change itself to who I am, so I must change who I am in order to change the world.

Tough one to learn, or perhaps just accept...

This has been a bit of a hectic week for me. My first set of assignments and tests for Calculus are all due this week, along with the work from Intro. Chemistry. Two classes I can normally balance with my professional and personal life, but I have the addition of my mom visiting with me for the week. All and all it makes for a little more of a hectic week and unfortunately my blog suffers a bit as a result.

Should you be one of my handful of regular readers, I would like to suggest only checking once a week for the next month. I am certain I will find my professional, personal, and academic groove (again) before too long, but do not want to frustrate any of my readers with hopes of consistent updates. I have stopped reading several web comics in the past for that very same reason and do not want anyone to have to feel that level of loss. The image of the same exact comic showing up on my computer screen every day still haunts me at night. It was, and still is, a horrifying experience. Really.

In other news fronts, the reason for my mother's visit (and part of my week's schedule) is that my daughter is graduating from High School, with today being the actual ceremony. It is finally happening, and if her turning 18 did not make me feel old, her graduating from high school pushes me over that limit. I am an old man. I need a Porsche. Actually, a Tesla Roadster. Porsche are so last year’s mid-life crisis. Anyway, everyone repeat after me...

Congratulations Phaide on your graduation from High School!

A quick note to point out that I have updated the About Me page with a link to my O.O.T.S.S.O.E.R.A.A.A.P. Badges. I am quite proud, so go take a look. Go on.

About a month ago I received my notice from the H. John Heinz III College at Carnegie Mellon University that I was not to be accepted into the Master of Science in Information Technology program. With all the reasons I had given for wanting to attend CMU in my article, aptly entitled Carnegie Mellon, you might have guessed I was a little disappointed in being turned down. It had been a long shot though, so I wasn't completely heartbroken when I read the letter, and I would be lying if I said I did not breathe a sigh of relief over not having to figure out where I was going to come up with over $5K per class. I still think the price is worth it and the school is the best choice for this particular program, I just now know it is not the right school for me (or rather I am not the right student for the school).

The second choice on my list for Master Degree programs was, and still is, the Harvard Extension School. It is Harvard; need I really say more on that subject? UC Berkeley would actually be my true number two choice, but they do not have a distance learning program at this time and, despite some people's belief that I have liberal views, I am not enough of a hippy to step foot on the campus of Berkeley. I would probably pass out from the smell of patchouli and sweat. Anyway, as fortune would have it, I missed the last course startup at the Harvard Extension School while waiting for news from CMU and the next registration for courses does not open until August. Enter idle mind syndrome.

I have been aware of my need for an electronics refresher for a while now and I actually have a few books in my library for this purpose, but these books never get as in-depth into electronics as I would like. I thought about completing the MIT OpenCourseWare courses on Electronics, as I am certain these courses would cover all that I was looking to remember. The idle mind in me then figured that if I was to take actual electronics courses, I should get full credit for these courses this time around (little real credit for Nuke School courses). Thus I should enroll in electronics courses at one of the local colleges. Simple enough, except that idle mind of mine figured that if I am getting college credit for something like this, then I should put it to use and go after a second degree in Electrical Engineering.

One thing lead to another and it turns out that just about every EE program out there requires at least three semesters of Calculus, as well as Differential Equations. And you can't take Physics without taking Calculus I, either. So now I am spending the summer in classes at my local college in support of the possibility of enrolling in an Electrical Engineering program at some unknown time in the future; rather than taking a couple simple refresher electronics courses. And people wonder why I immerse myself in all sorts of projects to keep my brain busy. Idle mind... More like insane mind, but that is where I am at.

Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's, once said that it was easier to make a million dollars than to coin a catch phrase. I believe he was referring to the Where's the beef? campaign in the 1980s, but I can't remember all the details of the speech to be certain. I do not have a million dollars, but it would be nice to have. I also do not have a catch phrase that I could coin. What I do have is a job title, Information Systems Diagnostician, and I intend to popularize it.

Backing up a bit, during my discussion of the Fox TV show House I made the comment that I should change my title to diagnostician. In my typical smart ass manner, I did just that very thing in my About Me page. All fun and games so far. On a whim I performed a Google search for the phrase (including quotes) "Information Systems Diagnostician" and something amazing happened: I Am. When? was the only website to contain the phrase.

I was only partially shocked at these search result. On the one hand, I had never heard the title prior to bestowing it upon myself, but on the other hand, this is the Internet for FSM sake. It should have been there someplace; at least that was my thought. That is when the little voice spoke to me, "Andrew, you are a slacker. Your life is meaningless and you will never accomplish anything of importance."

"You are wrong," I replied in an even tone. "I will popularize the job title Information Systems Diagnostician and that shall be my legacy." Feeling overly dramatic at that point, I hung up the phone on my brother.

True story. Alright, maybe I didn't hang up on my brother Greg. And maybe I just thought about my reply, but didn't actual say anything. Fine, I made it all up. Except the Google search part. That's real. Deciding to popularize the title is real as well, I am just not entirely certain why.

It is a cool title. The title also fits with what I do. Not just now, but wherever I work. I might get hired as a Computer Technician, a Systems Engineer, a Network Architect or an Information Systems Manager, but before long I wind up handling all the I.T. stuff that no one else can handle. It has always been that way. Might as well have a title that fits that, right? Except that is still just a title. It still doesn't explain my desire to popularize it.

I am also not certain exactly how I plan on going about popularizing the title. Or, for that matter, how I will ensure the title fits the actual job performance that I have in my mind. That hasn't stopped me from starting my crusade though. Small things for now. Message forums. Yep, that's correct; I've changed my job title on the message forums I belong to. Granted it doesn't show up anywhere except my user profile, but it's there. Oh yes, it's there.

This blog entry is my obvious next step. Another small step, but it is still a step. I imagine a Wikipedia article at some point; they do have many job descriptions listed already. I guess that means I have to come up with a concrete job description first, which would help to fix the title fitting the job performance aspect I just mentioned.

See? Ideas are flowing and moving already. This is good. Vive La Revolution! And my brother said I wouldn't accomplish anything. Oh, right. He never actually said that. I made that whole part up. Sorry. Something I still haven't made up is the reason why I want to popularize this job title. And the only thing that comes to mind is "Why Not?" And there you have it.

My name is Andrew Maxim and I am an Information Systems Diagnostician.