At 2:30 PM Central time, Dr. Jennifer Fryer gave birth to Robert William Fryer. Robert weighed in at seven pounds and two ounces and was pronounced to be in good health. Both mother and son are doing well.
The eight hour labor went better then expected and much better than the pregnancy had gone up to that point.
Best Regards,
Jennifer,
Robert (W),
and James Fryer
Cons:
Not well crafted
The Bottom Line:
If you like Douglas Adams, you will like Terry Prachett, not necessarily this book, but definitely his later work.
Review:
Ok, maybe not the most original or clever way to start out a review, but I think it is the fastest way to get the most people to understand the basic concept of the book. The book is one part typical fantasy world and one part comedic satire, smashed together to make an original read.
The Color of Magic
Be aware that this is the first book in a long, long series. Though series might be the wrong word. Most of the books can actually stand alone, but together they create quite a world. However, this book is not a masterpiece in itself. It lacks polish and seems to be in a rush to get through with itself. Youthful exuberance got in the way of craft.
The two things that got me through this book are, 1) the idea of a fantasy farce is brilliant, 2) I had already read “Good Omens” which is truly a gem, so I knew Pratchett had talent.
And I have kept on with the series. The first several books are packed with great ideas but still suffer from a lack of craft and subtlety. Pratchett eventual works out his issues and has been writing great books ever since.
Back to my opening, this is very similar in spirit to Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. If you like that, my bet is that you will like Terry Pratchett, maybe not the first few books, but certainly the last twenty or so. Both Douglas Adams and Terry Prachett take genres that are often too serious and stuffy and busted them wide open with satire.
Holy Crap, HOLY CRAP, NO, I MEAN HOLY CRAP!!!!
OK, I think I am better now. But wow, people are dumb, I Mean People Are Dumb, NO REALLY, PEOPLE ARE DUMB!!!!
OK, really, I will be fine.
But boy, how dumb can people be?
So here is what is happening, people (supposedly smart people with PhDs and Yale professors) are throwing out their computers because there is too much spyware on them. I know what you are thinking (Holy Crap, am I right?).
Don’t believe me? Have a look at the NY Times.
See, I was telling it straight. Now that I have had a bit of time to think on it, it strikes me as funny. Hey, you can either laugh or cry when you see the world falling apart. I prefer to laugh, because frankly, crying is a bit too damp for my taste.
One of my favorite lines was by a Microsoft exec, “We saw that a significant percentage of crashes and other problems were being caused by this.” Ya, thats it. It has nothing to do with your crappy software, it is all the spyware’s fault. It is a great scape goat, is it not? I am a little afraid that Microsoft will start making spyware so they can create an even larger smoke screen for the real problem, them. I am only a little scared, because I doubt their spyware would actually work.
OK, enough MS bashing, sorry, but you guys really asked for it that time. Really, I don’t hate MS, they make it just so easy. I actually like the Xbox (except that it is really ugly and loud). To be honest, I have more computers running windows than running OSX.
So back to the article. People, send your computers to me. I know how to fix this stuff, pretty simple really. Do a web search and most times you can get detailed info on how to fix each problem. It certainly does not take 15 hours to learn how to do this as one guy said. What was funny about that guy was that after fixing his box, he wipes his drive, nice. If all else fails, wipe and reinstall windows. It is not that difficult. And once you have a clean install, try putting some decent (and free) anti spyware on your box:
SpywareBlaster
Spybot Search and Destroy
Ad-Aware
Though, to be fair, some of the people in the article had four year old machines, so replacing them was not unreasonable.
But, overall, the article does prove my point: dumb people are stupid.
I have lived with COX in the Bryan/College Station, Texas area (internet and cable tv) for three years, the last two have been truly dreadful. My main complaint is that they continually change their services without notice in an effort to get the customer to pay more. For instance, they have changed their internet services four times since I have been with them. First I had 1mb for $30 a month, then they canceled that and I had to switch to 128 kb for the $25, then they canceled that and I had to go back to dial-up. Then they reintroduced 1mb for $30, but recently canceled that again and now I am at 4mb for $40. OK, so at least I am getting more for my money, but I don’t need 4mb, I would rather have 1mb and pay $30. There is no technical reason why they can not sell me 1mb for $30, or like the local DSL 1.5mb for $25. They just like my money and look for every angle to get more of it. Hey, I know that is business, it is just that they are so sleazy about it and I have to constantly watch my services and charges.
They are just very sleazy in the way they go about changing their services, not to give the customer better choices, but to squeeze more money out of them. I am in an area where DSL is unavailable, otherwise I would have dumped Cox and gone with DSL and DirectTV.
Cox’s Cable TV service is no better. Over the past month my channel line up has changed three times. With the last change they took away CNN, so I am left with only local channels, but I have Spanish channels. I need those like I need another whole in my head. But, I have to pay for it to get the internet access, so really, I am paying $60 for 4mb, not so much of a bargain.
Their customer service is dreadful, hold times are regularly over ten minutes and that is when I can get through, often the line is busy. Then I get bounced around from one department to another because I have multi part questions, which never seem to get answered.
Their advertising is very misleading, they are currently offering Digital Cable with a DVR for $25. Sounds great, except it is bogus, you first have to order, not one, but two tiers of digital channels to get this deal (the $25 is on top of the charge for the two tiers of digital channels) and the $25 is for the first two months only, what a joke.
And to add insult to injury, Cox’s service is unreliable. Their internet drops anywhere from one to five times a week. Usually, after restarting the modem, it comes back in just a few minutes. It typically does this at very inopportune times, like when I am sending a large email attachment or playing an online game. Ironically, their advertisements focus on how their service will not go down in a storm, like satellite, but it does. Curiously, the internet service goes down much more frequently then dose the cable tv.
I am moving next year and will be glad to be rid of Cox once and for all.
