RhymePhile's Rat Race

Thank the Lords of Kobol this week is over! (That was a geeky Battlestar Galactica reference there)

I have my relative pains when it comes to commuting 80 miles each way every day, but yesterday took the cake and ate it too.

Our bus broke down just outside the Lincoln Tunnel (headed home to NJ) only about 10 minutes after we left Port Authority. So at 5:20 we were stuck.

There were around 40 people on the bus, and what annoys me to no end is that the driver didn't say shit about what was going on, i.e. if he called it in, if they were sending another bus, what was happening, all that.

At first we thought we would get another bus, but NO! We had to wait for other buses that were headed on our route to pull over, and try to get on. Well, as Rhymey likes to sit in the back, I couldn't get on the first bus that stopped because most of the front of our bus piled onto the other one. Bitches. Then the second bus was too crowded. Fast forward to an HOUR AND A HALF LATER, the time we would have ALREADY BEEN HOME, and I finally get on a bus THAT'S NOT EVEN STOPPING WHERE I PARKED MY CAR.

But by that point I was ready to get on any bus that was going anywhere near south Jersey. Luckily, one of my bus friends was nice enough to drive me back to where my car was parked.

Thus...I left my office at 4:35 to catch a 5:10 bus. We broke down. What time did I finally get home? 8 effin' 30 at night. 8:30! Four hours door to door. GAH.

The universe is so lucky I had already set up Supernatural to be recorded. I'll have to watch it this weekend. *sigh*

I basically scarfed down dinner and went to bed. What a night.

Looks like the opening credits will be changing again...

In other news, I was hysterical at the final moments of SVU last night. I never actually "watch" the episode -- it's like a buzzing noise in the background of my evening. But after the *completely* WTF showdown at the end, I watched for Stephen Collins' totally laughable woobie face. HA! My comments during his scene: "They canceled 7th Heeeeeeeeeaven!!! Waaaaaaah!" LOL. Whoo, craptastic.

Well, my wireless router is, anyway!

I wanted to secure my wireless router a few months ago and did the research on it, but I never got around to doing it. If you're not following me, by securing I mean setting a password for my network at home, so that no one in my apartment complex can steal my innernetz via the juicy wireless waves. I pay $43 a month to Comcast for the ability to get online quickly, and I don't want anyone yoinking the precious, precious download speeds.

I didn't catch anyone doing it (there's a freeware program called AirSnare that allows you to see if anyone is trying to get into your network to steal free internet), but I wanted to be safe.

A lot of people advocate running an open network and allowing whomever to access the wireless waves whenever they want. Me, I don't like people stealing my shit. And I don't want to run the risk of someone using my connection to download bad stuff.

I was reading Lifehacker.com yesterday, and they had yet another post about securing your network, and I decided I needed to do it.

I have a Linksys gateway, which is a modem and router combined. After reading all about it online, I shut off my Windows firewall and virus software, reset the router (because the default password wouldn't work), and tried to access it. It didn't work, so I had to call my brother the computer guru to help me.

Me: Stsve, I need help with this. I shut off the firewall, reset the router, but it still won't let me access the default IP address to get into the router's setup menu to change the password...

Steve: (yelling in the background) Why are you out of bed?

Harmony: I wanna glass of water. I'm hot.

Steve: You're hot because you have too many covers on. You already had water before you want to bed.

Harmony: But I neeeeeed it. Who you talkin' to?

Steve: Chuchi [an Americanized variation of the word "aunt" or "auntie" in Polish, ciocia, a word our family always used in our mixed Ukrainian/Polish/Slovak heritage]

Harmony: I wanna say hi to Chuchi...

Steve: Go back to bed!

Harmony: But...

Steve: Harmony Grace!


LOL. I had to wait a while for the computer guru to help. I got it figured out following Steve's instructions, which was basically flushing the DNS and doing a release and renew via the command menu. It sounds complicated but it really wasn't. That got me the right IP address of my router, and I was able to go into it and change the name of my network to a super sekkrit one.

For more information, check out Lifehacker's post about securing your home wi-fi network.

I noticed blackchaps was squeeing about this, so I thought I'd give you high-res DVD box art, along with the disc breakdown:






( Entire set breakdown behind the cut, including extras )

Okay, so there was nothing else on tonight, and I half-watched SVU. I have to say, I was laughing hysterically at the thought of Olivia being shocked. PUSH THE BUTTON, Elliot! Bwahahahahahahaaaaaa. Awesome. In other news, Meloni is totally phoning his performance in. Damn, boy, sorry you signed on the dotted line now, I bet. Also? This episode was written by Neal Baer. This is what he comes up with? Lord.

Ahh, Mondays. I just did a skip=320. Cuz that's how I roll, y'all.

Some minor things of note:

1. Battlestar Galactica on Friday. I love Aaron Douglas as Chief Galen Tyrol. However, seeing him face off against Edward James Olmos -- a notoriously Bring Your A Game Actor -- was icing on my luv cake. Did I mention I bought a Tyrol action figure autographed by him at Comic Con?

2. Children of Men was effin' depressing. I was looking for something sci-fi-ish to watch this weekend that didn't include whiny hipsters and shaky camera work (Cloverfield), or anything (I Am Legend) starring The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (because Big Willy, you will always be the Fresh Prince to me, I don't care what you say). I rented CoM for the sci-fi factor, but also for the Clive Owen factor (and I enjoy his work so much I even watched Bent). I get the whole end of the world, dystopian no-babies future, but GAH, depressing!

3. I cleaned out the large fish tank this weekend which previously held Big Guy, my huge freshwater shark that I had for almost 8 years. When I got him he was the size of my little finger, and eventually he outgrew two tanks and was over a foot long. He died Thursday. I didn't feel like posting about it then because yes, I cried over a fish, okay? I might have cried a lot, in fact. He barely fit in the Amazon box I used for his fishy coffin. *sigh* I'm still sniffly over it.

4. I'm taking my mother to go see Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull. Mom can fangirl with the best of them.

5. I'd like some of that Doctor Who Adipose stuff so I can lose like 30 pounds before May 31st. I wouldn't even mind those cute Tribble-like blobs of fat!

Am I the only person that watches 30 Rock? Well, technically I watch it online on Hulu.com on Fridays because it airs opposite Supernatural, and there's no way I'm missing the Winchester boys.

Anyway, just thought I'd say that I love Will Arnett as Devon Banks. When he and Alec Baldwin are in the same scene together it's like a battle of the basso profundos. Arnett's Banks is a gay guy who's marrying the boss' daughter in order to get a hold of NBC, with Baldwin's Jack Donaghy fighting him every step of the way this season.

We now return you to the few hours you must watch the clock until you can get the hell away from your job for the weekend. In the words of Liz Lemon, "Aw, blurgh!" TGIF.

Mom e-mailed me telling me what my four-year-old niece, Harmony, did this morning.

My brother works from 7-4 and is out of the house really early, so he was already gone when this happened.

Apparently Harm woke up at 6:30 a.m., and went in to wake up my sister-in-law, Angie, telling her it was time to get up. Angie looked at the clock and told Harmony to go back to sleep because it was too early to go to "school," which is the daycare center approximately 4 houses down from where they live. I guess Angie rolled over and went back to sleep, thinking Harmony would do the same.

Harmony, it seems, didn't believe Angie that it wasn't time to get up (now that the sun is coming out earlier). She then proceeded to go into the bathroom, wash her face, brush her teeth, comb her hair, and get dressed. Then she went downstairs into the kitchen and got her lunch out of the fridge. Since she knows how to unlock the front door, she did that as well and walked down the block to the daycare center, all without my sister-in-law knowing!!!

She got to school at 7:30 and rang the bell to be let in. Seeing other kids that come in at 7:30 instead of her time of 9 a.m. (and she didn't recognize anyone, I guess) she started to cry. The school had to call Angie to tell her that Harmony was there!

She has been rasied with a lot of independence, and that kid is very headstrong and defiant at times because she knows what she wants. It can make things difficult, obviously, when you have a 4-year-old who can be obstinate when she's told to do something. She's going through what I call the "Ferocious Fours", LOL.

Anyway, my brother had to put a lock at the very top of the door so she can't reach it, and he now has to exit the house through the garage. Although...who knows how long it will take her to figure out how to work the garage door opener!

It's another nice morning here in Manhattan, so once again I decided to walk the 26 blocks to the office. It's partly because I'm in no particular hurry to get to work, and partly because it's good for my fat ass.

On the way this morning I saw a Tylenol billboard that said for every one pound of weight lost, four pounds of pressure are taken off your knees. I'm all for that.

But the most iconic NYC thing, if you will, I saw this morning was a guy taking a pee completely in sight of everyone on 9th Avenue. This wasn't one of those crazy homeless guys; oh no, it was just some worker dude who didn't even bother to find a john. Or even walk farther down the street to at least hide the fact that he was pissing in front of everyone for that matter.

As I passed him, by strange chance a female cop was walking my way. She didn't look like a parking cop as they have different patches on their uniforms. I told her there was a guy pissing around the corner. Her response?

"I don't wanna see that!"

*sigh*

And in semi-related NYPD news, could last week's teaser for last night's episode "Closet" of SVU be any worse? I'm guessing NBC chose to purposely ignore the gay athlete storyline and instead chose to focus on Bill Pullman's 2 minutes on screen? WTF? I tuned in last night more than halfway through, and when I saw the pretty, pretty guy Lincoln (played by an actor named Bailey Chase if you're interested) I was pissed that I might have actually enjoyed the episode. But noooooo, don't tell us that the storyline might actually mention homosexual reltionships, NBC! Instead, show us the awkward weird kiss between Oh I've Been Dating Her For Months Offscreen, Why Don't You Move In With Me Bill Pullman Character and Worst Detective EVAH Olivia Benson Who Had The Audacity To Be Annoyed When It Was Her Fault Cute Gay Sports Guy Almost Got Killed?

GAH, this show. Next week is Robin Williams chewing the scenery and shitting out Emmy nominations. That's a big HELL TO THE NO. I'll hold up my end of the bargain to the 170+ people that subscribe to my YouTube channel in order to watch the teasers, but that's it.

Meloni, when you're done with that poorly-written crap, let us know, okay? Even you can't get me to watch anymore.

I was up too late last night to write about Comic Con here in NY, so now that I'm more awake here's the full report.

( Geek overload )

I'm headed off to bed. The full report of my New York Comic Con experience will come when I'm more coherent, but for now, some shots of Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz during tonight's panel about X-Files: I Want To Believe. More tomorrow.

Life is beautiful, and sometimes difficult, but always fleeting.

For most of us, finding a group of friends online is an added gift. "People just don't understand me" is my preferred way of explaining myself, except when I'm online. Here I'm embraced.

Thus, those who "get" me online are often more precious than anyone I meet in real life. I consider them friends, despite never having met most of them.

When I first entered online life, my mother wondered why I worried about the people online. They were just names to her, not people in front of a keyboard. It's a mysterious connection one can never explain to those that haven't experienced it. You write a story/post something/share a thought. In turn, someone, out there in the ether, reads it and responds. You then discover that you share many of the same interests, and just like that, you have a friend.

I've met many people because of my fan fiction. One of the sweetest and most kind-hearted of the bunch was vestafour, who passed away late yesterday/early this morning after a very long battle against cancer.

I first met her on RATales, our long-running Krycek message board at YahooGroups. When I made the jump to LJ, she would visit and leave comments on my fiction or posts. I admired her strength of spirit, because she had such a lust for life despite all her setbacks and hospital stays. She was only 53.

I never met her, but in her last response to one of my comments, she said something that sums up my feelings about online friendships.

Someday I want us all to find a reason to be in the same city. To meet everyone and just be able to talk real time for hours would be incredible. Many hugs!!!

Peace on your journey, L. You will be missed.

With this stretch of pleasant weather we've been having here in the New York area (clear blue skies, 50s), I've walked to the office yesterday and today. It takes me exactly half an hour to get from 42nd Street down to 16th, walking along 9th Avenue. Walking along other routes gets me agitated because the sidewalks are so crowded. This is my preferred stretch of pavement.

Along with not tripping over my feet, there are two very important things to consider when walking in New York City. One, pay attention to the walk signals. People are in a hurry in the morning and have no problems running you down. And two, try not to step in anything.

With those two caveats in mind, I try to take in as much of my surroundings as possible. I'm never in a hurry because I get into the office at 8:30, an entire hour before my boss gets in.

I saw some interesting things this morning.

+ There was Nathan Lane grinning at me from a poster, which seemed to be advertising an upcoming movie or play or something. I was crossing the street when I saw it and couldn't stop. I thought of colleendetroit when I saw him, though.

+ An ad for the Gay Men's Health Crisis on the side of a phone booth, with an image of an African-American man kissing a Latino one, and the caption "I love you, boo." It's meant to draw attention to the large gay minority population that should come in for HIV tests.

+ A woman walking a rather large pit bull, where the dog was carrying her purse in its mouth. I'm not kidding. That's one way to discourage a mugger.

+ Finally, a mounted cop whose horse trotted all the way down 9th Avenue from about 25th Street. It was such a unique sight in Chelsea (as the mounteds tend to patrol the heavily trafficked touristy areas) that the cop was waving to kids going to school, and dogs -- most of which had never seen such another huge dog before (LOL) -- were barking and pulling on their leashes for a closer look.

When he stopped for a light I actually pulled out my camera (my handy dandy Sony Cybershot that hangs from a chain inside my messenger bag) for a picture, and also got a photo of a curious dog looking at the giant horse. I'll try to upload those tonight as I don't have my Sony camera cable with me in work (I need to buy a second one for just this reason). Uploaded!




Mounted cop on 9th Avenue




Hmm, I've never seen a dog that big before! The dog's owner is laughing in this shot. I like this shot so much I uploaded it to Flickr, in the hopes that Gothamist might use it.

And if that nice walk in this morning wasn't enough, my boss is working from home today. Whoo!

Reality TV? I don't care for it. BUT...this is what reality TV should be made of. I dare you not to cry when he sings. It's beautiful. This is 13-year-old Andrew Johnston from Carlisle on Britain's Got Talent. Now I'm going to have to follow him on YouTube.



PS...linked from Towleroad

As I posted yesterday, my Visa check card was compromised and $9.98 was fraudulently removed from my account. I already canceled it, don't worry. callmerizzo linked to a site where people have been complaining of this same company taking money from them.

Thanks to the link and with a little research, I discovered that:

1. This has been happening to multiple people, with similar domains as the culprit -- funworkdesign.com, funwork-design.com, and other iterations of the same

2. I called the Arizona number that was provided with the charge, and an Eastern European-sounding recording came on saying that operators were busy and to e-mail a specific address. Yeah right. I don't want the scammers getting my e-mail addy too.

3. This scam is being perpetrated from Eastern Europe

and 4. A website that I purchased a T-shirt from about a year and a half ago, Ranger Joes, was hacked (among others). I'm thinking this is where they got my information. But these scams are really easy to perpetrate, it seems. There are complaints all over the net.

I already called the bank and listed it as a disputed charge, but what I did this evening was issue a chargeback and file it as fraud. This means the scammer will have to pay a fee to get this done. Ha ha, bitches! Try to pull one over on the mighty Rhyme, eh? Foolish mortals!

At least I know I'm not the only this has happened to, which makes me feel a little better. But when you think about it, the scammers already got my $9.98, along with probably hundreds of others. The bank is stuck with repaying that money, and the scammers get away scot free! It doesn't seem right somehow.

If you don't already utilize online banking, consider this post as your impetus to do so.

I have a Visa check card that I use frequently. I never carry cash. When I do buy things online with my card, it's generally through PayPal for an eBay purchase. If it's not eBay, it's for items with a specific pricetag, like the $60 I charged for tickets to the New York Comic Con next weekend.

Now, if someone out there gets into your bank account, the rules are much different than with credit cards (at least here in the US). Banks only allow you 48 hours to dispute a charge on your account, whereas with Visa/credit cards, you have 30 days. This is why you should get into the practice of checking your bank accounts online frequently. I do, and on Thursday I discovered this strange charge on my account, made with my Visa check card:






I looked at the $9.98 and thought it was weird, because I didn't remember making it. The "WWW" told me it was made online, obviously, yet the only charges I had made recently weren't for that amount, and were through PayPal.

After double-checking PayPal, I knew something was fishy. Curious, I called the bank this afternoon, and asked for the full domain of the website, because as you can see from the image it's not provided. He told me it was for "funwork.com", which, if you were to plug it into your browser right now, would result in no such website.

Obviously my check card had been compromised.

Luckily, my checking account was not affected, just the card, and because it's through Visa, the 48-hour window didn't apply. I immediately canceled the check card, and the bank will issue me a new one within the next 5-7 days (with the new pin arriving 2-3 days after that). This, unfortunately, necessitates me borrowing money from my parents for the New York Comic Con next weekend, as the card won't arrive in time. No big deal.

If you haven't signed up for online banking, I would urge you to do so. Checking your balances by using a bank's automated telephone system isn't always up to date, whereas online banking gives you charges that are pending, along with other information. This goes for your credit card accounts as well. If you haven't signed up to manage your account online, you should.

I have no idea how this happened. It's becoming more common though. I like to read Consumerist.com, and they have documented similar occurrences this year.

I also have to sign an affidavit from the bank about this charge, stating that I didn't make it. I should expect that in the mail as well.

So kids, pay attention to your accounts and be vigilant! Hackers are everywhere.

I was reading my video gaming blog this afternoon, Kotaku, and they linked to this interesting article from Wired magazine that discusses a poll about offensive things in video games.

A website called What They Play gives parents information about recent video games so they know what Dick and Jane are playing. Fair enough, as I'm sure parents are oh so busy with other things in life than paying attention to what their kids are doing on their $450 Playstation 3.

But I digress.

The site offered a poll which stated: "As a parent, which would you find most offensive in a video game?" The answers:


Man and woman having sex: 37%
Two men kissing 27%
A graphically severed human head 26%


This country is fucked up.

I just ran out to the cheap Chinese place down the block for lunch. My requirements for a good Chinese place: 1) it's cheap, and 2) I've never gotten sick (knock wood).

Anyway, as I was sitting there waiting for my tofu and brown rice, three kids came in for their after-school dinner-ruining. They couldn't have been more than 10, and one of them was wearing a green Police T-shirt, as in the band. It had images of an early-80s Police incarnation, with the band members in shaggy hair.

Kid 1 to T-shirt wearer: Who's that guy? (he was pointing to Sting)

Kid 2: It's a band.

I really had to chuckle to myself, because I doubt the T-shirt wearer knew who they were either.