My Corner of the Interweb

Where To Begin...?

Mood: Sleepy
Music: The Theme from the Love Boat (hey Paul!)
Game: World of Warcraft (duh.)
Book: Road Work, Mark Bowden
Muffin: Strawberry-Sweet Plum (yum.)

Let's start at the very beginning...that's a very fine place to start...

My weekend begins with Panix.com getting hijacked.

What does that mean? Well, this blog, my primary e-mail address, a couple of other things I run through Panix...all gone. Not gone, per se...just hiding. Someone, nameless at this point, managed to mess with the DNS nameserver infrastructure to point panix.com to some unsuspecting box in England.

Frankly, I'm not sure how something like this happens. You'd think there'd be pretty tight controls on such an event. Yes, I know there are only 15 top level domain name servers, and yes, I know it's theoretically possible to hack one...and due to the process by which domain names propagate, it could be fairly simple to do it...but if someone tried this little number on Microsoft, do you think it would have worked?

Anyway, I ended up not getting any email this weekend...so if you sent me something, please resend it. The one you sent is floating in ether, never to be delivered. Sorry for the inconvenience.

If you tried to get to my blog this weekend, unlikely based on previous weekly visit patterns, you got some holding page in England. Trust me, we're still here. Finally got service back this morning some time...I could probably figure it out based on when the spam started pouring in again, but whatever.

So that was fun.

Then, Saturday. Was going to head over to my mother's house, got dressed, put my keys in my pocket, grabbed my mobile phone, got my cash off the desk...and no wallet.

Huh. Checked my pockets, the desk, the bookshelf. Nope. No wallet. Living room, settee, coffee table, coat pockets. Nope.

Now I'm getting a bit flummoxed. If you're anything like me, you come home, drop your bag, throw your keys, wallet, change, anything in your pockets on your desk/table/dining room table, and go about your business. I do it, and I drop my stuff in one of three places. My wallet was not there.

So now I'm getting ticked. I remembered I stopped at the deli on the way home from work, and took cash out from the ATM there, so I know I had it then. I began to figure that I lost it on the way back from the deli, like it slipped out of my pocket, or I missed my pocket somehow when I was putting my wallet back after using the ATM.

I've misplaced my wallet in the apartment before, and my mom was waiting for me, so I grabbed my coat, and headed uptown, buying a $10 metrocard, figuring I would check my house more thoroughly when I got back...but my missing wallet was on my mind. I hate losing my wallet, and yes, I've lost my wallet exactly twice before.

Once, when I was in high school, I lost my wallet, but someone dropped it in a mailbox, as I was taught to do, and it ended up back in my possession a few weeks later, missing the 10 bucks, but with everything else in it.

The next time, it was really gone. Don't know where that one is.

Anyway, I don't believe I'm all that typical, because I actually don't keep much in my wallet. I keep my cash card, my business cash card for Limewear, a few pictures of my nephew Ethan, my Rangers Season Ticket Holders card, my monthly metropass to get on the subway, my father's teacher id card, my fookus' business card, a spare ten bucks and a laminated password card for the servers at work.

Now, yes, this is all inconvenient. The personal cash card is the worst. I try to carry some cash at all times, but living in New York is tough that way, and so I'm always scooping 20-40 bucks every few days. The business cash card is no big deal...there's not much in the account, and I never use the card, anyway. The pictures of Ethan can be replaced, even though I don't like losing pictures. My Rangers Season Ticket card is most likely not getting any use this year, so that's no loss. The monthly metropass is a fucker. Work now gives me a monthly pass instead of the roughly $80 to buy one, and I've just started using it that week...so I've basically screwed myself out of $65. Not great. My father's teacher ID card will hurt...it's really the only thing I truly can't replace, and I carry it everywhere, so that kinda sucks. My fookus will give me another business card, I'm sure, so that's not too bad. The laminated password card would normally concern me...save for the fact that it's actually not accurate, as I've jumbled some characters, and left some out. So in reality, it's really just a password reminder card. No fear there...been doing this too long to write down passwords, especially root passwords.

Now it's also true I'm out one black leather Coach wallet that I've had for quite some time, and it's been a real trooper, and I will definitely miss THAT. A good wallet is always tough to find.

OK...so I get home, I tear the place apart, clean everything, check for my wallet...nowhere. So I sigh, resign myself to the fact that it's gone, and I call up the two banks to notify them that my bank cards got lost, and could they please send me new ones. They are more than happy to oblige, and they tell me it'll be 3-10 days before I get another card.

Well, I'll tell ya, I have $30 bucks in my pocket, and it's gonna have to last me until I get a new card, or until I can get to the bank...like people used to do in the Dark Ages. What else can I do? So, I tell 'em to go ahead and replace 'em, and I go back to watching the Jets choke hardcore. Let's be blunt here: If I play defense for the New York Jets, I'm wondering how much it would cost to kill Doug Brien.

Anyway, after that, I'm deep in the throes of clearing the cathedral in Scarlet Monastery with the rest of the gang when my computer crashes pretty hard. Happens sometimes, mainly as a result of a sound error, because we run Ventrilo while playing, and it makes for a great experience...save for the occasional crashes. So I open up the front of my case, you know, that panel that covers my power switch and ROM drives and such...and my wallet falls out.

I'm not kidding. My wallet. Right there. Here's the funny part...It didn't register. I just reset the computer and started playing...and about an hour later, I look down at my desk, and my wallet is there. And I freeze. Did some sort of weird time stop thing happen, and aliens place my wallet back where I left it before stealing it for some bizarre wallet probe experiments? Then it dawns on me where it was, and I laugh, shortly before getting well and truly pissed that I had already cancelled my cash card.

Well...WHY was the wallet inside my computer case? I'll tell you. On the front of my Alienware Predator case (in Plasma Purple) is a blue led light that indicates power. I have it on good advisement that this particular model of LED is used in airport landing lights, used for signalling the space shuttle while it's in orbit, and used on Coast Guard cutters to blind drug dealers. In other words, it's bright enough to vaguely illuminate my room if there's no other light on in the room. The light on the face of the case is just a piece of clear plastic that transmits the light from the actual case to the front of the cool curved cover.

I left my computer on the night before, because some kind individuals are loaning me their copy of the first season of Alias. However, at 3am, I was getting a face full of glowy blue light, and couldn't sleep, so I got up, staggered over to my desk, grabbed the first thing that I could feel on my desk, opened the case, jammed my wallet in there to block the small sun that is the power light on my computer, then closed the case again, and went and passed out in the blissful darkness.

Only I forgot that I actually used my wallet to do such a thing. I have been told that I can carry on a complete, perfectly lucid conversation while asleep and not remember a single thing the morning after. So went the wallet.

Duh. So I have my wallet back, and all the important stuff in it, but I'm still without a cash card until they send me a new one, while the old one sits, laughing silently up at me, on my desk.

Then, last night, while I was making some yummy lamb stew, I accidentally left it on high too long, and burned it. Yes, I was distracted by World of Warcraft. Such a moron. Ended up woking up some beef and snow peas instead for dinner...but burnt stew just smells...awful. And it's a waste of perfectly good lamb...which pisses me off.

Anyway, alls well that ends well. I'm still alive, I'm pretty happy, I have my wallet again, the burnt stew's been thrown away and the house has been aired out, the Jets are wondering who they pissed off in the grand scheme of things, and I am at work, ready to attack the job at hand.

Lastly, I'd like to thank all the folks who called, wrote, and IMd me to make sure I was OK after my previous entry. I'm OK...better than OK. I also have some kick-ass friends who care about me.

I apologize for the long entry...but I was just in the mood to write this morning. Enjoy.

Posted by Glenn at January 17, 2005 10:28 AM