San Francisco can be a cold, hard place when you don't have a friend to lean on. A buddy. Someone to call on those dark nights when your oil level's low, your air filter needs to be replaced, and your last alignment was 15,000 miles ago. Someone who can lend a sympathetic ear to your tales of six-day cross-country blitzes, 500 mile days in the August heat, dirty windshields, and unrotated tires. We were happy to see that Otto found just such a friend in this vintage VW Transporter. You can almost see the empathy flowing between these two. Or is that just exhaust?
Alas, I had to interrupt whatever conversation these two were having to drag my sleepy sack on down to Menlo Park for more help file writing. My legendary work ethic was beginning to falter a bit -- I had hit the snooze button on the alarm this morning and was leaving the house fifteen minutes later than the previous two mornings. Would I be able to beat the rush-hour traffic that plagues the Bay Area in much the same way that third-rate sitcoms starring washed-up has-beens plague ABC's fall lineup?
As it turned out, I would. However, now that I've mentioned ABC, I feel as if I need to address a certain subject that has lodged in my craw and will not be removed. I'm talking specifically about ABC's sub-moronic new billboard advertising campaign, featuring slogans like, "You can always play with your kids later," or, "Your couch is getting lonely," or my personal favorite, "That beer in your fridge isn't getting any fresher, so you should open it, drink it, get drunk, and watch Monday Night Football with Al, Frank, and Dan. And try not to soil the sofa." The idea being, of course, that one should be watching TV instead of engaging in other activities. OK, right, blah, I hate it. But that's not the problem, nope, no way. No, the problem is that these intellectual blackguards have blatantly stolen our yellow background color and put it in their billboards! Wretched scum! No one was using yellow when Kristanne concocted our background and now everyone is...even USA Today! It's a hard business being in the creative vanguard, I tell you, watching your ideas being coopted by the media power-elite. Grrr...
Where was I? Work, right? Well, I'd rather rant about ABC some more, but our day's story cries out to be told. The office was once again empty when I arrived. I checked the Telecommuter board to see whose office I could take today. Bad news -- everyone was coming in. Full house. I would have to improvise, take my network access where I found it. As you might imagine, this is something at which I excel. The Office Odyssey has trained me well when it comes to finding ways to get the laptop onto a network. In a trice, I was on the floor looking for free network taps. But soft! What Ethernet hub under yonder soft-walled office breaks! Tis the Internet, and I am the thief!
One of these days, I'm going to write an entire episode in iambic pentameter just to see if anyone notices. That day, however, is not today. Sorry. Anyway, that glowing box you see up there is technically called a, "whatchyamajigger." It's closely related to its bigger brother, the "doohickey." Ok, ok -- it's actually an Ethernet hub with about ten network taps. You plug your computer in, and bang, you're on the net...sort of. You also need something called an "IP address." An IP address is just like a house address -- it tells the network where you are so you can receive and send messages. Now, some networks use "dynamic IP addresses." This means you plug in your computer, it asks the network for an address, and bingo-bango-bongo, the network gives you an IP address. No fuss, no muss. The network keeps track of all the IP addresses in use so no two machines have the same one at any time. Pretty cool, huh?
In contrast to "dynamic IP addresses," some networks use "static IP addresses." With a static IP address, you use the same IP address every time. The address is programmed into your machine and you always use the same one. That's what our network at work does. Now, here comes the big problem -- I don't have an IP address. Nope. None. Our MIS department never gave me one. If we used "dynamic IP addresses," this would be no problem. I'd plug in and the network would just give me one. Too easy. We use static IP addresses, and I think you can see where this is heading. Static IP addresses mean that I have to steal one from someone else. Find it wherever I can.
See that cube up there? That's Jerome's cube. Jerome isn't at work yet. Jerome doesn't know that I'm about to boot up his computer, find out what his IP address is, and then program it into my computer. Suffice it to say that when Jerome does find out about this, he won't be very happy. Since no two computers can have the same IP address, he'll be out of luck. He'll either have to track me down (and I'm elusive when it comes to onsite network access) or get another one. Neither of these things are fun or easy. Oh, I'm a naughty one, Saucy Jack.
I'm a naughty one, but I'm also up and running on the company net in mere minutes, checking email, cruising the web, doing all those computer network things you can do when you've got an IP address. And I've got an IP address, now. Oh, yes. I've got an IP address.
Boy, I just reread those last couple paragraphs, and I've just got to apologize. I feel like I've got a big neon sign in my forehead flashing, "Geek! Geek! Geek!" I'm done now.
Anyway, Jerome ended up never coming in, so I was good to go with his IP address. Work was work, and then it was done. I slept so that I might do it again tomorrow.
We close today with an action shot of Arlene, my favorite Technical Editor in the world. Arlene is also known as the Crack Technical Editor. Today, Arlene is sporting what might be the world's most intricate sweater. She numbers among her hobbies rubber stamp collecting and button collecting. She even belongs to a button club. Though we don't share many interests, I can honestly say that Arlene rocks! Rock on, Arlene, and we'll see you all tomorrow.
Total Miles for 8/20 = 82 again!?!