weird weird weird day

[susandennis]

It started out this morning in traffic redirection hell. On Saturdays I pick up zimzat on my way to swim class. He lives in Capital Hill. Capital Hill is a charming neighborhood. Charming = confusing streets that twist and turn and lead to confusion. Add road fixes. I missed the turn back to the interstate and just lost my shit. zimzat was not helpful but still I should be able to weather that kind of crap. I am sorry, zimzat. I was not cool.

I got cooler during class. I did not swim on Friday which I thought at the time was fine but this morning, it felt like I hadn't been in the pool in forever. After class there is about 15 minutes when the pool is available for anything and so I stayed and did some laps and some more exercises. It felt very good.

Then I had a lovely breakfast at a new place. And went to Petco to do some research on cat foods. The Petco north of Ballard has the nicest staff in the world. They really do. From there I stopped by JoAnn's to get some bear stuffing and ended up getting yarn and bear stuffing.

Then home. I emptied the dishwasher and then decided to make some dressing (stuffing) to go with the chicken I had thawed for dinner. So I did. And I cleaned up after. Then I sat down to write my review and I had no internet. Well, precious little and by the time I finished poking around, none. I called Comcast and they said I was good. So I started there and, sure enough, lots o' juice.

Yet another dead router! ARUGH. Crap on a stick. I stopped a minute to consider options. It was 3 pm. The Seahawks game was to start at 7. Did I have time to get out, buy a router and get back ... in the heat... when I was tired and frustrated and hot and sweaty already??? Yep. Office Max - holy crap routers have gotten cheap. $40 and I made it home without maiming any football fans.

Then I couldn't get it set up. It was one fuckup after another. All operator error. Hot, tired, frustrated. I finally got the wired part cooking but wireless still sucked donkey balls. I had whined on G+ and my brother, who had already noticed my webcam was down, offered a hand. And he knew what he was getting into. Me, tired and frustrated is not that pretty or fun to deal with. And, yet, he soldiered on and called.

It was not obvious to him but he had the glorious advantage of more experience, a stress free mind and network to google on and he found the problem. And fixed it. Whew and thankgod.

He also told me that our sister's husband died last night. My sister is no longer a part of my life and my brother understands this. He keeps me as up to date on stuff as I need to be. I am sorry her husband died. I understand from my brother that they made the very most out of the two years they had between his diagnosis of brain cancer and his death.

Now things here are back together again. I still have to rehook up the Tivo's and one of the radios. But I think I'm going to knit for a while. The Mariners are tearing the Angels a new one which is kind of nice.

Comments

[zimzat.livejournal.com]

I would also like to apologize. I didn't realize it was bothering you like that until you said what I was doing was not making matters any better. Even as you said that you still sounded jovial, yet what you said conveyed that a line had been crossed and it was best to just be quiet. The last time I said anything about getting on the interstate turned out to be wrong, but I am also sorry I didn't speak up sooner this time. I hope this hasn't soured your experience with regard to me going with you on Saturday mornings. I will try to stay serious and mostly quiet if things start to go anywhere near as badly as they did this morning.

[susandennis]

When I am clearly having problems caused by my picking you up, your obviously enjoying it (as demonstrated by your derisive chortling) added insult to injury.

Picking you up takes extra effort and concentration. It would be way easier for me to just take myself to the pool. But then you would have no way to get there so I make the effort.

I beg you not to make the trips awkward and uncomfortable. Ok? Please? I will come next Saturday with a fresh attitude. Let's put this behind us.

[zimzat.livejournal.com]

Okay, fair enough. I really am sorry. I don't know how to express in words how sorry I am that I stressed you out.

[susandennis]

your apology is fine. thank you. i've moved it all to the history file.

[shutterbug.livejournal.com]

Yipe.

Glad it seems the dust has settled.

Goofy history question (that you can tell me to bugger off about): Why aren't you and your sister involved anymore? Just curious.

[susandennis]

Feel free to peruse back through this journal for history - I written about it many times over the years and, honestly, it's not something I want to rehash and retell over again. I made the decision years ago that the quality of my life was denigrated severely by having her in my life so after my parents died and making sure my brother understood, I removed her from it.

[shutterbug.livejournal.com]

Good call.

[howeird]

I've had three routers quit on me this year. Two were el cheapo, one was a top of the line D-link. I think what is happening is companies have found it much less expensive to not spot-test their products before shipping them. It costs so little to build them now that a minimum-wage tele-slave sending a replacement is way less expensive than a team of well-paid test engineers solving the problems up front.

[susandennis]

Thank you. It's so hard for me to believe that I can burn through router so fast - I think, in the back of my mind, I feel like there's something I should be doing to prevent the deaths. It's nice to have evidence that it might not be me!

The one that died was a linksys (cisco) top of the line. I replaced it with their near bottom of the line (e1200) - $45 at Office Max. I did no research beyond perusing the Office Max shelf o' routers. I was relieved to discover that $45 is the going rate for this sucker and it has ok ratings.

I assume it won't last long - at least each set up is less and less painful.

[(Anonymous)]

My last purchase was a top of the line Netgear, mostly because it supports 5GHz, which is faster and has a longer reach, and Tivo, both my blu-ray players and my cell phone support it. I can't remember if the Internet radio does, I think not. This one, I think: http://netgear.com/home/products/wirelessrouters/high-performance/WNDR4000.aspx

[susandennis]

I don't understand xxx "supports it" - Wireless is wireless, yes? Any wireless appliance should be able to operate on the wireless of any router (assuming it's n or g or whatever compatible which the top of the line Netgear would be)... The internet radio does not care which router as long as it can see the signal, yes? no? I r confused.

[howeird]

Nope. 802.11 a b g and n are different bandwidths, but in theory they can all operate at both 2.4 GHz and 5.0GHz frequencies.

An analogy would be your electrical outlet. It's 110 volts, but can carry 1, 5, 10 or 20 amps. In most of the rest of the world they have 220V but half the amps.

Or a knitting example, you can use different weight yarns, or different colors. Most weights come in most colors, but some colors are harder to apply to heavier weight yarns.

2.4GHz conflicts with cell phone, cordless phones and some appliances like poorly insulated microwaves. And the higher the frequency, the further the signal will reach under most conditions. But 5.0 requires faster processing and more memory in both the router and the receiving device, so until the last year or so the affordable tech just wasn't there.

At the moment the best routers are 802.11N with dual 2.4-5.0GHz support. Three months ago it was 802.11N with 2.4GHz only.

[susandennis]

ok, lemme be way more specific. which routers are NOT compatible with the Squeezebox radio?

[howeird]

All routers currently on the market are compatible.

[susandennis]

ahhh ok. thx. that's what had me confused about what you said. cool.

[howeird]

One thing the router/wi-fi manufacturers have done right is each time they make an upgrade, they continue to support all the formats which came before. So even if a router is 802.11N 5GHz, it will support 802.11b and g and 2.4GHz. No worries.

[howeird]

Oops. That was me.