Help me out here

On May 14, 2026 By Luther M. SilerIn Uncategorized1 Comment

Does anybody know what this thing is? Several of them have popped up on intersections near me; I’m pretty certain they aren’t cameras because, well, they don’t look like cameras and some of them are on intersections that definitely do already have obvious cameras. There also tend to be just one or two per intersection and so they aren’t covering all four directions. I mean, it looks like a bell, but as far as I can tell they don’t make any noise and why the hell would anyone be mounting bells on the roads at intersections anyway?

I was dead to the world by 8:00 PM last night, and considered making it twice in a row tonight. I can’t explain it; I am genuinely not having bad days at work by any standard but my god am I coming home exhausted. I’m back to wondering if signing up for summer school was a mistake again, but I still feel like passing up all that money for a job I’ll be done with by noon every day is a horrendously poor decision.

In other news, I got an email today that is almost certainly a scam. I’m following up on it; if it’s a scam, it’s a quite detailed one and I’m going to follow it down the rabbit hole until the part where they ask me for money just for the lulz. If I’m wrong and it’s not a scam, it’s big news, but obviously nothing I can share just yet.

(It’s gonna be a scam. It’s definitely a scam. But at least I’ll get a post or two out of it.)

In which I demonstrate restraint

On September 10, 2016September 9, 2016 By Luther M. SilerIn Geek4 Comments

I am… not immediately pre-ordering an iPhone 7? Like, for real? This is a thing that’s not happening? I don’t understand; I currently own an iPhone 6, and before that I had a 5. I re-order my phones when a new number comes out. The 7 is out, or at least it’s about to be. And yet I paid my phone bill this afternoon, meaning that I went directly to the very place where one might go to order a new iPhone, and yet somehow there is no new iPhone with my name on it either beginning to be shipped to me or being manufactured for my eventual ownership.

I’m confused. I’m New Tech Guy. I’m Ooh Shiny Guy. What the hell?

Actually, I know the answer, if I’m being honest. I’m perfectly happy with my current phone– the upgrade to the 6 from the 5 was a no-brainer because of the bigger screen, and I’ve got no complaints about it, no matter how hard I try. And I will have complaints about the 7, because one of the ways I use my phone a lot is in the car, with the phone plugged both into the auxiliary jack on my car stereo and the… well, power thingy. I don’t mind the idea of ditching the audio port in general, but it interferes with how I use the phone in my current car, and the phone gets a lot of use as an audio device in my car. I don’t often use headphones one way or another, so the idea of eventually spending $140 on a wireless set doesn’t appeal. I’m not gonna whine about it much, but right now this change doesn’t work for me.

Additionally, from what I’ve seen the best change to the device is the camera, and the biggest change to the camera is on the Seven plus. The two-camera thing looks really cool. Being able to shoot bokeh photos with my phone seems really neat. But I’m not sure I need (well, okay, need has nothing to do with this, I’m not sure I want) the bigger phone that I would need to buy in order to get the better camera– and, again, I have no complaints about my current phone, which includes the camera. I love the idea of a better camera but I don’t really need it right now.

So… am I, like, maturing or something, or is the fact that I’m thinking new car, then new phone so that my phone can interface properly with the car a sign that I’m actually a bigger idiot than I was before?

(Oh. Let’s not talk about the new Apple Watch until I have hard data on the battery life. As soon as I don’t have to charge it every single night, I’ll jump ship. I love my Pebble, but I’m waiting for Apple to catch up in a couple of key areas and then I’m done.)

In which everything is awesome

On August 27, 2015August 27, 2015 By Luther M. SilerIn Geek15 Comments

Just spent about half an hour outside playing with one of these babies:

That’s a Phantom 3 Professional quadcopter, with a 4K camera on a goddamn gimbal, meaning you can swoop past things at an angle and the image stays smooth and level. The shots look outstanding; I haven’t pulled them from the SD card yet to check them out at full-res, though. I did make a dumb mistake where every picture I took shows my address, so you don’t get to see any of my footage yet, but I’ll keep fiddling with it this weekend.

It’s not mine, sadly. We bought it with the last of the grant money last year, and are going to use it for our media productions class– the camera is that good. But someone had to learn to fly it first, so I demanded first right of geekdom and brought it home. It costs roughly $usedcar, so I need to be damn careful I don’t screw it up. But damn, was that fun.

After

On July 23, 2015 By Luther M. SilerIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Well… uh… the carpet looks *great*, but photographs do not do it justice. Like, my phone is showing phantom dirt, or maybe it’s got a little time machine attached to the lens that I didn’t know was there before, or something like that, and the carpet looks muddy and disgusting despite no longer being muddy and disgusting.

The grout in the entryway actually looks about the same, which is moderately disappointing.

Here; I dry-fit some of the floor tile in the bathroom today. Have a picture of that.