Just a small quick update regarding our visit to the new O'Learys restaurant the other day.
I mailed the HQ and got a very nice mail back tonight. He apologized very politely and even offered us a free evening off bowling and dinner which was really nice of him. Surprisingly nice. They could just have deleted the mail like most companies would and gotten on with their business but he not only read it but replied. I thought that was nice. Unfortunately me and Helena don't have the luxury of going out much, we pretty much have to plan logistics one or two weeks ahead of time so when we do go out we want it to be something or someplace special. And it was on Sunday so not very likely to happen again anytime soon and when it happens we're not likely to go there again. I think. Then again it is free... but as our old spam protection software said, "there is no such thing as a free lunch"...
O'LEARYS FAIL
When I left my job at Vinge my nice colleagues there got together and bought me two gifts. The first was a whisky that was really nice. And the second one was a gift certificate for 1.000 Swedish crowns (approximately $140) at O'Learys. They knew I liked going to O'Learys since I've gone there alot ever since my first Formula 1 at O'Learys experience in 1999. The gift certificate was for the newly opened restaurant in the north part of central Stockholm (Norrtull). And as this was the last race of the season, and it started at 5 pm in the afternoon it was a perfect time to use that certificate.
When we got there they made two things clear - alcohol wasn't covered by the gift certificate and there was no refunds. That seemed Ok to me since we were 5 people I thought we'd eat for 1000 swedish crowns. The food was good (above average for O'Learys actually) but that was about it. They forgot our orders left and right, they never even asked us if we wanted desserts (which we definitely did) and at the end me and my brother Jocke was left waiting for our beers but we got tired of waiting for that so when the race was over and the soccer game was done we just wanted to pay and get out of there.
And this is where basic math skills actually outsmarted my drunken math skills. I'd like to think I got some advanced math skills but after 4 beers not so much. The tab ended up at 1250:- swedish crowns. So I had to tell this waitress that we had a gift certificate we handed in when we got here 3 hours ago so go sort that please. Which she did and came back with two tabs. One for 250:- since the certificate was only for 1000:-. And one tab for the alcohol for 500:-. Which meant we paid 750:- for a tab of 1250:- with a gift certificate of 1000:-. If we hadn't wanted to get out of there so badly and if I didn't have 4 beers in my system I would indeed have protested their math skills saying that we really should only pay for the beer since the way they counted we in practice paid for everything but the beer. So they ripped us off of 250:-.
That combined with the lack of service and the fact that I was sober by the time we got home (which wouldn't have happened had we gotten that last orders of beer) makes me say "no more!". But I'm not sure I'll be able to honor that promise since there really is no other good way for me, my sister and brother to meet up and watch F1 while drinking beer and enjoying good food since we live too far apart, otherwise they could just come over to our place all the time for that :)
When we got there they made two things clear - alcohol wasn't covered by the gift certificate and there was no refunds. That seemed Ok to me since we were 5 people I thought we'd eat for 1000 swedish crowns. The food was good (above average for O'Learys actually) but that was about it. They forgot our orders left and right, they never even asked us if we wanted desserts (which we definitely did) and at the end me and my brother Jocke was left waiting for our beers but we got tired of waiting for that so when the race was over and the soccer game was done we just wanted to pay and get out of there.
And this is where basic math skills actually outsmarted my drunken math skills. I'd like to think I got some advanced math skills but after 4 beers not so much. The tab ended up at 1250:- swedish crowns. So I had to tell this waitress that we had a gift certificate we handed in when we got here 3 hours ago so go sort that please. Which she did and came back with two tabs. One for 250:- since the certificate was only for 1000:-. And one tab for the alcohol for 500:-. Which meant we paid 750:- for a tab of 1250:- with a gift certificate of 1000:-. If we hadn't wanted to get out of there so badly and if I didn't have 4 beers in my system I would indeed have protested their math skills saying that we really should only pay for the beer since the way they counted we in practice paid for everything but the beer. So they ripped us off of 250:-.
That combined with the lack of service and the fact that I was sober by the time we got home (which wouldn't have happened had we gotten that last orders of beer) makes me say "no more!". But I'm not sure I'll be able to honor that promise since there really is no other good way for me, my sister and brother to meet up and watch F1 while drinking beer and enjoying good food since we live too far apart, otherwise they could just come over to our place all the time for that :)
FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
I'm a huge supporter of freedom of the press. And freedom of speech and all those other beautiful things that democracy brings. Even if they can be used for bad things like oh say starting wars and invading countries left and right. But all in all it does more good than bad. But one thing one has to know and think about is not trusting everything you read and instead ask "what's their angle? what do they have to gain from this?". Everyone knows Michael Moore's documentaries that go into that grey area in between "telling the truth" and "not quite lying".
Well for the past few weeks my new employer Carema have suffered the fate of having the media against them. And reading the headlines and articles in the newspapers/web in the morning while going to work and when I get to work I get "our" version of the truth and although they have the same facts, it's just angled differently. And I don't have access to any classified information, it's all on the web. But most people aren't interested in reading our side of the story since it's much more fun / juicy / interesting to read the medias version than the other side of the story.
It's all pretty frustrating - but still, huge supporter of freedom of the press. I just wish people would care more for finding out the truth than taking the headlines at face value.
Well for the past few weeks my new employer Carema have suffered the fate of having the media against them. And reading the headlines and articles in the newspapers/web in the morning while going to work and when I get to work I get "our" version of the truth and although they have the same facts, it's just angled differently. And I don't have access to any classified information, it's all on the web. But most people aren't interested in reading our side of the story since it's much more fun / juicy / interesting to read the medias version than the other side of the story.
It's all pretty frustrating - but still, huge supporter of freedom of the press. I just wish people would care more for finding out the truth than taking the headlines at face value.
WTB DIABLO 3 BETA ACCOUNT PLX! :)
I'm actually thinking about buying some random Diablo 3 beta account out there but everytime I'm hit with the thought of "really?? pay money that you have a thousand different things to spend it on than a beta for a computer game" and I give up on it. Only to look into it again the day after!
Actually the only thing stopping me is really the risk of being ripped off, like I almost was when I sold my old Warcraft account. Not so much the money but the idea of getting ripped off so easily online when your better judgement is saying "no".
But I still wanna play Diablo more than a kid wants to open his presents on Christmas morning!!!
Actually the only thing stopping me is really the risk of being ripped off, like I almost was when I sold my old Warcraft account. Not so much the money but the idea of getting ripped off so easily online when your better judgement is saying "no".
But I still wanna play Diablo more than a kid wants to open his presents on Christmas morning!!!
STILL THE NOOB
Slowly getting how things are setup here and what's doing what. But it feels I could work here for a year and still I'd be surprised when some server popups up because there are so many everywhere doing things it's impossible to get them all.
The bad thing now is that the media here in Sweden is doing everything they can to paint the company I started working for as "the evil empire" because of things that went down in some elderly care centers and that wouldn't make anyone feel good about just starting working there. Kinda reminds me of the "did the subcontractors building the deathstar know that the empire was evil and did they condone the empire by taking the job there"-discussion from "Clerks" :)
The bad thing now is that the media here in Sweden is doing everything they can to paint the company I started working for as "the evil empire" because of things that went down in some elderly care centers and that wouldn't make anyone feel good about just starting working there. Kinda reminds me of the "did the subcontractors building the deathstar know that the empire was evil and did they condone the empire by taking the job there"-discussion from "Clerks" :)
GETTING USED TO BEING THE NOOB
If you wind the clock back 10 years I was just starting my career as "consultant" and driving around Stockholm doing all kinds of computer magic. Everything from installing a few PCs to travelling the world. But everytime I was either involed in how the computer system was built up and evolved or it was so well documented that I had it all under control. It didn't happen that often that I got to a customer and had no clue what their computer environment looked like.
And when I was eomployed by Vinge full time I had more knowledge of their IT systems than the people who worked there since they had only worked there a year and I'd been there on and off for four years. And after 5 more years I knew the IT systems inside and out even though it changed a lot over a year and I often had to find that out myself!
But now I'm at a big company with hundreds of servers and systems and I have no clue what's what or what server does what and most importantly where to look when something is broken! I'm doing all I can to learn it but it's going slowly. Thing is I have no reference point that I can use to know if I'm learning things fast enough or if I'm looking like a total noob! ... but it's only day two!
And when I was eomployed by Vinge full time I had more knowledge of their IT systems than the people who worked there since they had only worked there a year and I'd been there on and off for four years. And after 5 more years I knew the IT systems inside and out even though it changed a lot over a year and I often had to find that out myself!
But now I'm at a big company with hundreds of servers and systems and I have no clue what's what or what server does what and most importantly where to look when something is broken! I'm doing all I can to learn it but it's going slowly. Thing is I have no reference point that I can use to know if I'm learning things fast enough or if I'm looking like a total noob! ... but it's only day two!
DICE / BATTLEFIELD FAIL
Yeah, it's that time again - time for abig whine post about some small little thing that ruins bigger things.
I've always liked Dice´s products. From their early pinball games to Battlefield, I liked them. Ok most of them. So when BF3 was announced I was ofcourse a little bit excited although the first trailer was very annoying (more annoying sound than exciting visual). Then I saw the gameplay trailers and it looks sweet as hell. And for the past month EA have gone all out on the PR for the launch of BF3, here they are marketing it with the "Made in Stockholm"-slogan. And the launch is just two weeks away from Modern Warfare 3, another hyped shooting game. But when I got home last night I bought it through their own Origin-system ("Steam"-wannabe), downloaded it and got ready to rock.
That's when the excitement died. Was the graphics not good enough? .. nope, it was good. Was the story terrible? Nope, it's good. Was the multiplayer maps sucky or buggy? Nope.
After spending all this time, money, work and ideas creating this behemoth of a title, with the best graphics engine ever, they missed out on a very small tiny detail... making it easy for the user! At first I couldn't launch the game. It doesn't launch at all actually cause it starts my Internet Explorer (which is NOT my default browser!) to a website that I have to log into. And when I'm logged in my browser reports that the active x controlers are causing issues and the certificate isn't valid for this https site and when all of that is done I get to the "launch campaign" and click it.. and then it downloads a game launcher that I can't install in MSIE! When trying through Chrome there's no technical issues.
But technical issues aside - who came up with the idea "to start the sing player campaign, you log into origin, you start the game, browser directs you to a page where you have to log into origin again, and then click 'launch campaign' and install another third party addon and then the game starts"?!? What the f*ck is that about!? I know I know, it's probably their version of DRM to make sure pirates have a harder time to launch it but don't they get it!? Every time you have some kind of DRM system, especially like this, all you do is encourage people to use the pirated stuff!!...
I've always liked Dice´s products. From their early pinball games to Battlefield, I liked them. Ok most of them. So when BF3 was announced I was ofcourse a little bit excited although the first trailer was very annoying (more annoying sound than exciting visual). Then I saw the gameplay trailers and it looks sweet as hell. And for the past month EA have gone all out on the PR for the launch of BF3, here they are marketing it with the "Made in Stockholm"-slogan. And the launch is just two weeks away from Modern Warfare 3, another hyped shooting game. But when I got home last night I bought it through their own Origin-system ("Steam"-wannabe), downloaded it and got ready to rock.
That's when the excitement died. Was the graphics not good enough? .. nope, it was good. Was the story terrible? Nope, it's good. Was the multiplayer maps sucky or buggy? Nope.
After spending all this time, money, work and ideas creating this behemoth of a title, with the best graphics engine ever, they missed out on a very small tiny detail... making it easy for the user! At first I couldn't launch the game. It doesn't launch at all actually cause it starts my Internet Explorer (which is NOT my default browser!) to a website that I have to log into. And when I'm logged in my browser reports that the active x controlers are causing issues and the certificate isn't valid for this https site and when all of that is done I get to the "launch campaign" and click it.. and then it downloads a game launcher that I can't install in MSIE! When trying through Chrome there's no technical issues.
But technical issues aside - who came up with the idea "to start the sing player campaign, you log into origin, you start the game, browser directs you to a page where you have to log into origin again, and then click 'launch campaign' and install another third party addon and then the game starts"?!? What the f*ck is that about!? I know I know, it's probably their version of DRM to make sure pirates have a harder time to launch it but don't they get it!? Every time you have some kind of DRM system, especially like this, all you do is encourage people to use the pirated stuff!!...
LAST WEEK AT VINGE
And so after 6 years (10 if you count the time as a consultant) here åt Vinge I am now starting the last week here before I am off to Carema Care.
It's bitter-sweet kinda as it should be! Vinge has been a great employer. Some really Nice benefits here that I am going to miss but I really have to move on with my career and this feels like a good step. We'll know in about 6 months if it was a terrible step! (that's the trial-period here in Sweden for you and your employer. If during that time one of you thinks it isn't working out you just say thanks but no thanks)
But if for some reason it isn't working I'm fairly sure I'd be welcome back here :)
And during this last week I'll be working 4pm 'till midnight or more if needed. Cause we're reinstalling all the computers here one last time (for Me). So kinda going out with a bang :)
It's bitter-sweet kinda as it should be! Vinge has been a great employer. Some really Nice benefits here that I am going to miss but I really have to move on with my career and this feels like a good step. We'll know in about 6 months if it was a terrible step! (that's the trial-period here in Sweden for you and your employer. If during that time one of you thinks it isn't working out you just say thanks but no thanks)
But if for some reason it isn't working I'm fairly sure I'd be welcome back here :)
And during this last week I'll be working 4pm 'till midnight or more if needed. Cause we're reinstalling all the computers here one last time (for Me). So kinda going out with a bang :)
WHY ARE MEDIA SO NICE TO APPLE?
I read an article yesterday slamming media for not being more critical in their coverage of Apple. And it's true, very rarely do you see, in Sweden anyway, some news that are criticizing Apple for anything. Sure we had that small little debate about Apple and Google geotagging everything (but as opposed to Google, Apple cached everything in a local file meaning if you managed to hack in to someones computer you could backtrace where their i-Device had been).
I can't say much about Mr. Jobs, not because he's recently passed but because I just don't know enough to say anything about it. Most of my knowledge about him comes from "Pirates of Silicon Valley". And I can't say much about Apple as a company since I'm no business analyst.
But what I can say a lot about is their mobile products, iPhone and iPad. What positive I can say, and I said this a week after owning my iPhone I had for over 2 years, is that Apple has a very, very keen sense for interfaces. They make so much stuff easy for the average joe. But in my opinion it ends there with them. To my knowledge everything they've ever put into their iPhones have already been done by someone else. They just make it easier to use and overprice it. For example, I recently switched to Samsung Galaxy SII. It cost me about $600. How much would an equal Apple product cost? .. according to Webhallen it'd be around $1200. That's double the cost. For what? I still can't play my MKVs "out of the box" and all that other stuff. And I still can't update my firmware without iTunes (or has that finally been unlocked now?). The Samsung phone already has everything that Apple introduced as "new!" with the iPhone, they even have the "S" in the model name. And did anyone, anywhere write that? Cause on a tech level it's true but noone (except tech bloggers) seems to put that in print! No, instead Aftonbladets and Expressens webservers went down one night when I was working and for a second I thought we had internet connection issues. But nope, they just got overloaded thanks to their "Apple releasing a new product!!" coverage.
By the way - what happened to all those "win an iphone 5"-competitions I saw banners and links to? :)
No, I think it's down to the fact that people just love an underdog that wins! It's like the Brawn team in Formula 1 a few years ago. Very close to bankrupt, the boss keeps believing and somehow manages to pull the team together and they kick ass and win the championship against the evil competitor that has for a long time owned the throne, Ferrari. And people wrote alot of good stuff about Brawn as a person and the team as a "wonders can happen!"-thing. Not many dared to say "they exploited a loophole in the rules that allowed them to go between 2-3 seconds faster per lap and after everyone had caught up they didn't win a single race". And it's the same here, Apple was very very close to bankruptcy when Jobs came back and started the whole i-Device thing and they've now won over the evil competitor, Microsoft. And little does anyone ever mention "the first thing Jobs did was kill the Newton and now, some 15 years later their iPad is one of their strongest products!".
So my grief isn't with Apple or the entire "iOS v. Android" thing, my grief is with the media not being the least bit critical when reporting on Apple, that annoys me.... Damn no I need cookies to make me feel positive again!
I can't say much about Mr. Jobs, not because he's recently passed but because I just don't know enough to say anything about it. Most of my knowledge about him comes from "Pirates of Silicon Valley". And I can't say much about Apple as a company since I'm no business analyst.
But what I can say a lot about is their mobile products, iPhone and iPad. What positive I can say, and I said this a week after owning my iPhone I had for over 2 years, is that Apple has a very, very keen sense for interfaces. They make so much stuff easy for the average joe. But in my opinion it ends there with them. To my knowledge everything they've ever put into their iPhones have already been done by someone else. They just make it easier to use and overprice it. For example, I recently switched to Samsung Galaxy SII. It cost me about $600. How much would an equal Apple product cost? .. according to Webhallen it'd be around $1200. That's double the cost. For what? I still can't play my MKVs "out of the box" and all that other stuff. And I still can't update my firmware without iTunes (or has that finally been unlocked now?). The Samsung phone already has everything that Apple introduced as "new!" with the iPhone, they even have the "S" in the model name. And did anyone, anywhere write that? Cause on a tech level it's true but noone (except tech bloggers) seems to put that in print! No, instead Aftonbladets and Expressens webservers went down one night when I was working and for a second I thought we had internet connection issues. But nope, they just got overloaded thanks to their "Apple releasing a new product!!" coverage.
By the way - what happened to all those "win an iphone 5"-competitions I saw banners and links to? :)
No, I think it's down to the fact that people just love an underdog that wins! It's like the Brawn team in Formula 1 a few years ago. Very close to bankrupt, the boss keeps believing and somehow manages to pull the team together and they kick ass and win the championship against the evil competitor that has for a long time owned the throne, Ferrari. And people wrote alot of good stuff about Brawn as a person and the team as a "wonders can happen!"-thing. Not many dared to say "they exploited a loophole in the rules that allowed them to go between 2-3 seconds faster per lap and after everyone had caught up they didn't win a single race". And it's the same here, Apple was very very close to bankruptcy when Jobs came back and started the whole i-Device thing and they've now won over the evil competitor, Microsoft. And little does anyone ever mention "the first thing Jobs did was kill the Newton and now, some 15 years later their iPad is one of their strongest products!".
So my grief isn't with Apple or the entire "iOS v. Android" thing, my grief is with the media not being the least bit critical when reporting on Apple, that annoys me.... Damn no I need cookies to make me feel positive again!
HOW HARD CAN IT BE TO GET IT RIGHT!?
Let's talk toys. Specifically media players, or media streamers or whatever you wanna call it. Small boxed that you connect to your TV or projector to play your digitalized movies. I started that project about 3 years trying to find a good solution to it. And I'm still not happy! The closes to "satisfied" that I've come is actually Popcorns A110 which is so low tech and "just the facts"-scaled down you can get. But the fewer "cool features" you have the less things can go wrong!
I've tried having a PC but in the end with their fans and harddrives it just makes too much noise to have it at the TV. So I'ved tried it with the PS3 and that kinda worked but doesn't play all the stuff I have and some stuff bugs out. Lately I've tried two "Xtreamer" products. First I tried their "Pro" which was suppose to be media player and network storage all in one, so I could have 2 2tb harddrives in the same machine where I store the movies, awesome to combine them. But their idea of "network storage" didn't exactly jive with my idea of it so after playing with it over the weekend I exchanged it for their "media player only" product "Sidewinder 2". So far it looks awesome and it plays everything I've thrown at it.... BUT!!! they have a major error in their software. Either that or they have a weird since of "interface"! Because their "Back" button is really an "Up" button. For example, I have shortcuts that points directly to my Movies directory on my server. And I have a shortcut pointing to my TV directory. When I go into the shortcuts menu and click "TV" I come to the TV directory fine. Now when I click "Back" I, and I believe the rest of the world, would expect to get back to the shortcuts menu. But instead I'm take to the parents directory of "TV" which is just wrong and I have to go back to the home screen to go into the shortcut menu to go to the movies catalog again. It's messed up and you'd think a very small thing but it's actually a big deal when browsing around!
This all just means I'm left wondering ... "how hard can it be!? Why don't I get together with Ricki and Jimmi and design one ourselves and just make three copies of it for ourselves and leave everyone else wanting one"...
This is what you'd in sweden call an "i-lands problem", a small insignificant problem that someone in Africa would say "I wish I didn't have bigger problems than that". But it still annoys me!
I've tried having a PC but in the end with their fans and harddrives it just makes too much noise to have it at the TV. So I'ved tried it with the PS3 and that kinda worked but doesn't play all the stuff I have and some stuff bugs out. Lately I've tried two "Xtreamer" products. First I tried their "Pro" which was suppose to be media player and network storage all in one, so I could have 2 2tb harddrives in the same machine where I store the movies, awesome to combine them. But their idea of "network storage" didn't exactly jive with my idea of it so after playing with it over the weekend I exchanged it for their "media player only" product "Sidewinder 2". So far it looks awesome and it plays everything I've thrown at it.... BUT!!! they have a major error in their software. Either that or they have a weird since of "interface"! Because their "Back" button is really an "Up" button. For example, I have shortcuts that points directly to my Movies directory on my server. And I have a shortcut pointing to my TV directory. When I go into the shortcuts menu and click "TV" I come to the TV directory fine. Now when I click "Back" I, and I believe the rest of the world, would expect to get back to the shortcuts menu. But instead I'm take to the parents directory of "TV" which is just wrong and I have to go back to the home screen to go into the shortcut menu to go to the movies catalog again. It's messed up and you'd think a very small thing but it's actually a big deal when browsing around!
This all just means I'm left wondering ... "how hard can it be!? Why don't I get together with Ricki and Jimmi and design one ourselves and just make three copies of it for ourselves and leave everyone else wanting one"...
This is what you'd in sweden call an "i-lands problem", a small insignificant problem that someone in Africa would say "I wish I didn't have bigger problems than that". But it still annoys me!
Online identity
Saw a really good story yesterday on the TV4 News about abusing online identities, in this case for political purposes. It's basically about two young "everyday" women who found out that someone have set up Facebook pages in their names, using their personal details and photos and joining political groups. And the person doing the story, Lena Sundström, got some first hand experience about this when someone set up a fake Twitter account in her name pretending to be her. Ofcourse there's nothing new about fake Twitter/Facebook accounts, that's a rather old story but using it for political purposes was a new angle for me! Especially with Lena Sundström (who's from South Korea but raised in sweden since she was like 6 months) who have done numerous stories about Sverige Demokraterna, a political party in Sweden who wants to send all immigrants back home and it's been interesting to see her meeting people and they having no idea she's an immigrant until they meet her for the interview.
I'm pretty grateful that even though I've had an online presence since -98 when I set up my first website and started a blog nothing like this have happened to me. Maybe that's because I'm too boring, I dunno...
I'm pretty grateful that even though I've had an online presence since -98 when I set up my first website and started a blog nothing like this have happened to me. Maybe that's because I'm too boring, I dunno...
A GOOD DAY TODAY
You may remember a few weeks ago I made a post that we were now "leasing" a car instead of owning it so we wouldn't have to worry about stuff. Well what I forgot to mention was that we did have another car, a Volvo that has server us well. I bought it 2 1/2 years ago for 30k SEK (it really was 40k but I got 10k for handing in my old Mitsubishi) and it was the car on all our photos of when the house was built. It was the car we raced to the hospital in when H was going into labor. But it was also the car that last year cost us 10k SEK in spare parts alone (thanks to H's brother the work was more or less free). And now was the time for it to go through the annual inspection. And the verdict was surprisingly good - green across the board! That's only happened to me ONCE that my car went through on the first try and that was so many years ago I can't even remember it!
And right after we got the all clear I called the car dealership where I bought it and asked if they wanted to buy it. They said "sure, bring it by and we'll have a looksy". We were expecting to get like 10k for it but asked for 15k.. and we actually got 15k! Well needed 15k! First thing we did was buy a sulky for Sam since our old stroller was a bit too cumbersome for the new car. But that too served us very well for these 17 months!
And then we went to Stinsen to blow some money on clothes and stuff and the rest I guess goes to our house account that's bound to take a beating soon.
And right after we got the all clear I called the car dealership where I bought it and asked if they wanted to buy it. They said "sure, bring it by and we'll have a looksy". We were expecting to get like 10k for it but asked for 15k.. and we actually got 15k! Well needed 15k! First thing we did was buy a sulky for Sam since our old stroller was a bit too cumbersome for the new car. But that too served us very well for these 17 months!
And then we went to Stinsen to blow some money on clothes and stuff and the rest I guess goes to our house account that's bound to take a beating soon.
DEUS EX
Been busy the past week. "Deus Ex : Human Revolution" was released last friday and I gave it shot and got stuck right away. And man is it deep!! The gameplay was really good and the story is really good but when I finally got to the end there are four different endings to it and they are all unique views and opinions on the old question of ethics and technology. The story centeres around "augmentation" which is basically either enhancements to a human or replacing an entire limb. The technology can ofcourse be used for good and for evil and in the game you run across them both. And then the speeches in the four different endings, it's like they are arguing against themselves. One ending is very "pro-tech/pro-capitalism", one very "pro-tech but controlled", one very anti-tech and let anarchy rule and the last one "let the people decide for themselves". I loved it! And the replayability of the game is also great, gone through it 3 times now and still discovered different things!
STEFAN LIV R.I.P
Just a small quick little "rest in peace"-note about Stefan Liv (1980-2011). Never knew the guy, but I saw him play a lot of hockey since it DIF played against HV71 alot back when he played in Sweden. And I never missed a game when Sweden was playing so saw him alot there. And even though they guy stopped DIF from winning the trophy at least once he did it in style and he did it with raw talent and skill. There was not much luck with that guy, he was simply the best goalie. And in 2006 he helped the Swedish team not only win the world championship but also the Olympics. And he always seemed like a nice guy in all the interviews.
And then he goes and board the wrong jet and dies.. such a damn tragedy. And after watching alooooot of "Air Crash Investigation" episodes on national Geographic I'm pretty sure that once the cause has been determined it will seem even more pointless.
Just sad when stuff like this happens and it reminds you of what really matters. So what if the train is 10 minutes late, atleast it didn't crash...
And then he goes and board the wrong jet and dies.. such a damn tragedy. And after watching alooooot of "Air Crash Investigation" episodes on national Geographic I'm pretty sure that once the cause has been determined it will seem even more pointless.
Just sad when stuff like this happens and it reminds you of what really matters. So what if the train is 10 minutes late, atleast it didn't crash...
THIS WEEKEND'S PLANS
So this weekend we're going out fishing for crabs! Yeah, I know, I don't even eat crabs, but what tha hell, I've never done it so here goes! Then on saturday we're gonna have a gettogether with alot of our neighbours and eat those poor crabs (or in my case shrimps). And then on sunday we have a relaxing day with Formula 1.
And Sam is spending the rest of today with my parents and tomorrow morning my sister AC takes over until we're picking him up in the afternoon. We'll see how long it takes us to really, really miss him and want him back. But we'll probably have our hands full with crabs by then :)
Have a good one!
And Sam is spending the rest of today with my parents and tomorrow morning my sister AC takes over until we're picking him up in the afternoon. We'll see how long it takes us to really, really miss him and want him back. But we'll probably have our hands full with crabs by then :)
Have a good one!
GETTING A NEW CAR
I'm not content changing jobs, I have to change car too!!
No seriously, what happened was that me and H (neither of which are very handy with cars) are just fed up with worrying about the car, if something's gonna break, and most importantly what it's going to cost us. And the annual road worthiness test is always something you worry about what they are gonna find and what that's going to cost.
So we looked for options.. buying a new car? Sure that was a possibility but after 3 or so years we were back to worrying about something breaking and all those stuff. Sure we could buy a new car and sell it after 3 years and buy a new car again, but our limited experience selling cars isn't anything positive at all.
So thankfully for us Volkswagen had a drive this august for consumer leasing a pretty spacious brand new Polo for only $300 per month for 36 months. "Are you mad, paying $300 per month for three years and you won't even own the car or anything!?" - yeah sure, that may seem like an idiotic thing to do. But the way we see it is we don't pay for the car itself or anything that can be measured physically. We're paying for not having to worry about having car problems for 3 years. For 3 years we have the knowledge that no matter what happens with the car we're not gonna pay for it. Either the insurance, warranty or service-deal will take care of any and all costs... that's the theory anyway. I'm kinda skeptical so we'll wait 'till after the first breakdown to say if it works in the real world.
No seriously, what happened was that me and H (neither of which are very handy with cars) are just fed up with worrying about the car, if something's gonna break, and most importantly what it's going to cost us. And the annual road worthiness test is always something you worry about what they are gonna find and what that's going to cost.
So we looked for options.. buying a new car? Sure that was a possibility but after 3 or so years we were back to worrying about something breaking and all those stuff. Sure we could buy a new car and sell it after 3 years and buy a new car again, but our limited experience selling cars isn't anything positive at all.
So thankfully for us Volkswagen had a drive this august for consumer leasing a pretty spacious brand new Polo for only $300 per month for 36 months. "Are you mad, paying $300 per month for three years and you won't even own the car or anything!?" - yeah sure, that may seem like an idiotic thing to do. But the way we see it is we don't pay for the car itself or anything that can be measured physically. We're paying for not having to worry about having car problems for 3 years. For 3 years we have the knowledge that no matter what happens with the car we're not gonna pay for it. Either the insurance, warranty or service-deal will take care of any and all costs... that's the theory anyway. I'm kinda skeptical so we'll wait 'till after the first breakdown to say if it works in the real world.
GETTING A NEW JOB
You may remember I mentioned a few weeks ago that I there was something big going on. Well now it's done. I have officially quit my job. Not before securing a new one ofcourse!
After I had been on parental leave for 8 months and came to work I started getting more and more frustrated over some issues at work and after coming home day after day being pissed off and bitter about things my wife told me to take the bull by the horn and if it wasn't gonna get better I should try to find another job. And after landing an interview with a bank I informed my boss about my intentions and he kinda felt it coming and wished me luck. I didn't get that first job but I got another interview and they liked me and I liked them and then it took some time for the paperwork because of all vacations but now the paperwork has gone through so from november 1st I'll be working at Carema in Sundbyberg, which is alot close to home too. And it is a promotion of sorts since I'll no longer be on first- or even second-line helpdesk so all is good.
And as I went to bed last night I realised that this is the first time I've ever quit a job! :)
After I had been on parental leave for 8 months and came to work I started getting more and more frustrated over some issues at work and after coming home day after day being pissed off and bitter about things my wife told me to take the bull by the horn and if it wasn't gonna get better I should try to find another job. And after landing an interview with a bank I informed my boss about my intentions and he kinda felt it coming and wished me luck. I didn't get that first job but I got another interview and they liked me and I liked them and then it took some time for the paperwork because of all vacations but now the paperwork has gone through so from november 1st I'll be working at Carema in Sundbyberg, which is alot close to home too. And it is a promotion of sorts since I'll no longer be on first- or even second-line helpdesk so all is good.
And as I went to bed last night I realised that this is the first time I've ever quit a job! :)
KINDERGARTEN AGAIN
This week I've been with Sam to his new kindergarten for 3 days, spending time with him from 9-15. And I gotta say I should've spent this much time with him before! When I was home with him for 8 months I never really REALLY spent time with him compared to now. And the big thing is that when I've been at the kindergarten I haven't had the option of doing anything else than being with him. Not watching TV, not checking my mail, not playing computer games, not cleaning the house, making dinner, mowing the lawn etc, there's always been something else to do. But for these 3 days there's been nothing but him. Which has been great cause it feels like I love the little guy much much more now than I did 3 days ago!
But tomorrow I'm leaving him at 9 and going home. If he's ok being there all day I'll pick him up at 4 and same thing on friday. Which means I'll have 2 days of me-time. But considering how many days of vacation I've taken this year that's not alot. But I'll take it!! :)
But tomorrow I'm leaving him at 9 and going home. If he's ok being there all day I'll pick him up at 4 and same thing on friday. Which means I'll have 2 days of me-time. But considering how many days of vacation I've taken this year that's not alot. But I'll take it!! :)
GAME OF THRONES
I don't get what the deal is with "Game of Thrones"? Everyone is totally raving about it, and I'm at episode 8 and totally bored. The only thing I'm liking is the scenary, but that's it. Ok maybe Sean Bean. But storywise it's so completely un-original as you can get. I don't know if it's just me, but it really feels like we've seen most of the things on this show so many times before. Maybe not on TV because I have to admit it's beautifully made for a TV show's budget, but still...
ANOTHER 2 WEEKS OFF
I got another small vacation coming now! After working for 2 weeks I got 2 weeks off. The first one will be spent trying to keep Sam entertained and stimulated which is getting harder and harder all the time it seems. Can't wait for him to become a slacking teenager lying in the couch watching bad TV... just like his old man!
And after that he's gonna be starting kindergarten. And this time a real kindergarten! Not one made up of some barracks and people picked from here and there, no this is a real established kindergarten that's a few hunder meters from the house. Which will make dropping him off and picking up a bit easier. I'll be with him the first few days at the new kindergarten so he eases into it a bit and by thursday I'm counting on dropping him off at 9 and go home to just slack and slack all day for once! I am after all on vacation!
Unfortunately we're in a bit of a Formula 1 drought because the crews needed a vacation too after two back-to-back races and just when it got interesting as Ferrari are getting their act together :)
And after that he's gonna be starting kindergarten. And this time a real kindergarten! Not one made up of some barracks and people picked from here and there, no this is a real established kindergarten that's a few hunder meters from the house. Which will make dropping him off and picking up a bit easier. I'll be with him the first few days at the new kindergarten so he eases into it a bit and by thursday I'm counting on dropping him off at 9 and go home to just slack and slack all day for once! I am after all on vacation!
Unfortunately we're in a bit of a Formula 1 drought because the crews needed a vacation too after two back-to-back races and just when it got interesting as Ferrari are getting their act together :)
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