journal for 2002-08-08
online retail, con’t
I got my reply from Amazon today. I’d told them that their form kept rejecting my attempts to submit it.
I am also sorry to hear that you have encountered problems while using our web site.From our end, we have not had any server problems recently--it is possible that the problem is with your provider, or somewhere in between.
Maybe I’m just too tired of them, but I find it hard to believe that some customer service rep can confirm in 24 hours that there have been no script or reverse proxy errors in the last day or so. I think, at this point, I’m just too annoyed at Amazon in general to keep using them.
Their “Gold Box” thing drives me nuts. Yesterday, they tried to sell me an automatic hair braider and a deluxe prenatal baby listening kit. How the hell are they generating these suggestions? Anyway, I think I’ll try the Lehigh U bookstore, now that the construction is coming to a close over there.
UPS tried to deliver the Black Adder DVDs today, despite the fact that I asked for them to be delivered to work. There is no way these guys are going to get positive feedback. They’ll be lucky to get neutral, if the discs are actually still sealed. I had them rerouted to work, so I should have them for the weekend. I just finished disc two of the Simpsons, though, so I’m not sure I can watch much more marathon comedy. I might save Black Adder for future viewing.
work
Work is going to get really really busy, soon, I think. Some long-delayed projects seem to be slowly overcoming their inertia, and if they all start moving at once, things might be like they were a year ago, when I was always really really busy. For the last six months or so, I’ve been really busy, but not really really busy. That extra “really” makes a big difference.
Our intranet server kept dying yesterday and today. Ever since the MCSE applied SP3, IIS has been dying semi-randomly. I wish I could convince The Boss to let us use Apache, but I think he’s pretty firmly against the idea. I think his reasoning is that no one at work (except for me) understands Apache. This doesn’t fly, since no one at work (including me) seems to understand IIS. It’s more failure-prone and far less featuriffic. It can’t even do good URL-rewriting, for Pete’s sake.
I need to install Apache on the spare Linux system in my office and show what it can do. Unfortunately, I have approximately zero time to do things like that. I’ll be lucky if I can even continue to leave within an hour of my “official” off the clock time. We’ll see!
updating the journal
I think that, pending a day or two’s thought, I will declare Monday and Thursday “Entry Required” days. Monday is good to sum up the weekend and Thursday is good to sum up the week without wasting precious Friday Night time.