Category: English

VirtualWoes

I find myself in a position where I have to run Windows on my laptop, and use it on a daily basis. This does not make me a happy moggie, as I have run Ubuntu exclusively (except for gaming) for several years. I finally decided that the best solution would be to run Ubuntu in VirtualBox on top of Windows.

(Yes, I still run Hardy, as I still haven’t recovered from trying out the unmitigated disaster that was Intrepid. I may give Jaunty a spin some day; VirtualBox makes this so much easier… but in the meantime, Hardy it is. Besides, it’s an LTS release.)

Why not the other way around? Three reasons: Windows is a PITA to virtualize (not least from a licensing POV); I never do anything really performance-sensitive in Linux, but I do in Windows; and doing it this way around means I can suspend and hibernate, something Linux still can’t do. (Cue angry comments from Linux fanboys insisting that suspend and hibernate work just fine and I’m an idiot; sorry, but no, it has never worked for me on any of the laptops I have owned or managed—even those manufactured by companies that spend millions of dollars every year on Linux development.)

Running Ubuntu in VirtualBox is not as easy as it sounds, though. You can’t just create a new VM, pop in the CD, and install. There are several issues that took me quite a while to resolve, and the VirtualBox web forum was no help at all: the moderators arrogantly shut down any thread touching on issues covered by the FAQ, even when the answer given in the FAQ is incorrect and / or insufficient. Continue reading “VirtualWoes”

The brave ones

K is away, so I stave off the loneliness and boredom* by playing Morrowind and spending some quality time with the idiot box. Yesterday was Madagascar 2 (not as good as the first one), today was The Brave One.

I didn’t expect much of a film I found in the DVD discount bin barely more than a year after its release, but I thought it was pretty good, although I agree with the critics that its artistic pretensions came off as, well, pretentious, and did more harm than good. The rolling camera angles in some of the scenes (such as immediately before the attack where David is killed) made me seasick, and the sitting-in-the-diner-talking-not-looking-at-each-other-except-they-are-actually-looking-at-each-other-in-the-mirror-behind-the-bar trick passed me (and probably 99% of the audience) by until it was pointed out in the behind-the-scenes featurette, and even then it just seemed… lame.

Still, I’m never one to turn down a Jodie Foster flick. She’s one of my favorite “strong woman” actors, along with Sigourney Weaver and Linda Hamilton. Continue reading “The brave ones”

My calendar wall, July 2009

Ha! I beat Leisha!

At the 2008 24 Heures du Mans, car #2 (an Audi R10 TDI run by Champion Racing under the Audi Sport North America brand) passes a screen that displays real-time video from a camera placed in its unoccupied right seat. I’m not positive, but from the helmet colors (silver with red stripes and yellow highlights), I think the driver is living legend Tom Kristensen. This car went on to win the race, while their #1 car ranked sixth and Audi Sport Team Joest‘s #3 car finished fourth.

The lighting was difficult—despite the flash, you can see patches of light from the window shining onto the calendar, which is printed on very shiny cardboard.

Sharpened rooms / Chambres affutées

For your convenience, this blog entry is bilingual. Pour mieux vous accomoder, cet article est bilingue.

Missed the plane back from Paris (Depeche Mode were awesome; more about that later—as soon as I take delivery of a new batch of round tuits), and had to stay overnight at the Ibis Orly hotel, which for your information does not have a Tex-Mex restaurant. What it does have is a typical French grill restaurant (think Hippopotamus but double the prices).

Ayant raté l’avion au retour de Paris (Depeche Mode étaient épatants ; j’en vous rendrai compte à l’occasion), nous avons du passer la nuit à l’hôtel Ibis Orly, qui, je vous signale, n’a pas de restaurant Tex-Mex, mais simplement un restaurant grill typiquement français (genre Hippopotamus mais deux fois plus cher). Continue reading “Sharpened rooms / Chambres affutées”