Wow, I just looked up some old friends that I lost touch with years ago and tracked all the places they’ve lived since leaving Olympia. I’m not entirely comfortable with how consistently correct the information is in people search
I couldn’t find much info on the site about how to anonymize oneself. Sure am glad I’m not trying to remain anonymous from any sort of abusive past. But it was just a year ago that we had a local neo nazi infestation that tried to intimidate everyone who expressed displeasure at their behavior.
We desparately need to be in control of our personal data.
February 9th, 2007
I absolutely hate wasting my time trying to get a person on the phone when I have to deal with something that a phone bot can’t deal with. Anyway, gethuman.com lists out phone numbers you can call to get people. Very handy.
February 5th, 2007
Perspective on a “hypermart” as most of the world calls it. No wonder we’re obese.
January 26th, 2007
Bucket testing refers to testing a new feature, design or functionality on a small user base before launching it with the entire user base. For example, I participated in Amazon’s bucket testing of using an ajaxified tooltip widget on their book images for affiliate programs.
references:
December 26th, 2006
the flame keeps going out on our heater, which is propane. It’s been a couple years since we had it cleaned so I started calling around for a service person …. and couldn’t find one.
I called the local service, Acme, but they only service their own propane customers and were booked for “the next couple months”. So, I called our propane provider who referred me to Floyd who returned my call promptly but was also booked for 2 months and so was referred to a cell phone holder named Tom who was booked up for a month and a half.
Yeah, cleaning propane heaters must be booming business now that all us household procrastinators have been forced out of procrastination by the cold.
It really couldn’t be that difficult to clean the stove so I gave up on calling every potential propane heater service provider and their cousin and their cousin’s cousin by 3rd marriage. These are the inconveniences that spawn a diy’er.
So, I went to my trusty Google and searched for “how to clean propane heater”. Unfortunately, the only thing Google had to say on the subject for the first 5 pages of search results was “COMPARE AND BUY PROPANE HEATER!!!” I tried a few other search phrases with similar results. I’m not so sure that Google is winning the web spam battle.
So I turned to tried and true HowStuffWorks.com … but nope, just an article about how you might want to consider a propane heater for your shop. The diy network … nope just ads about buying a heater. and so forth. Apparently nobody in the google-searchable web is foolish enough to post instructions on how to clean your heater yourself.
So, I’ll rely on memory I guess. I seem to recall a handful of pipe cleaners and some windex when the heater was last serviced. My strongest memory however was the thought “Hey that looks easier than cleaning my bathroom! why am I paying this guy over $100 to wipe my heater with windex?”.
November 23rd, 2006
