Category: MakerBlock

All things MakerBlock: RepRap, MakerBot, Cupcake CNC, open source, and plastic building toys!

On Being A Bad Consumer

The Christmas season always reminds me how much I dislike and avoid shopping when I can.  I especially avoid retail stores and do my best not to enter a mall. 1 2  If there’s something I’m interested in, I’ll typically window shop for ages. 3  This process, much like the process of me researching my MakerBot Cupcake, takes forever while I read basically everything published online4 , including the manuals, raves, complaints, any every little thing about it.

I’d say about 80% of the time I’ll window shop and then just decide I can live without whatever it is I was fawning over.  About 10% of the time I’ll try to build or make one of whatever it.  And, that last 10% of the time I’ll eventually pull the trigger.

  1. I think I’ve entered a mall thrice this year – once for some appliance I can’t recall, once for a new pair of sneakers, and once to take my kid to see Santa. [↩]
  2. Who the hell says “thrice”?! [↩]
  3. I guess, technically, it’s Windows shopping since I’m doing this online. [↩]
  4. Wait, people can publish offline?! [↩]

The Downside of Blogging

I have another website/blog that I’ve really basically neglected the hell out of.  Due to some new developments related to that other blog, I put up three posts in the last month.  Which is cool and all except…

Now I’m getting pelted with spam through that blog and to the address associated with that website.  I suppose as the spam kings realize a blog is even slightly active, they decide to start spamming the authors.

How PayPal Stole Christmas

Apparently PayPal has decided to royally screw up Christmas for needy families.

PayPal, here’s the thing.  Assuming any truth to these descriptions, one of your representatives was drunk with power and went off the deep end.  Throw them under the bus as fast as you can, apologize, and fix everything.  Fix everything in such an amazing way that everyone will want to entitle their blog posts “How PayPal Saved Christmas (from PayPal).” 1

  1. They can’t all be victories… [↩]

More than the sum of its parts

I just searched for the Pet Shop Boys song “Opportunity” for adding to my late-night-coding-and-working mix.  This was not the song I was thinking of.  The song I really wanted was “Opportunities” by the Pet Shop Boys.

Let’s just say this, listening to “Opportunity” twice would NOT be a good as listening to “Opportunities” once.

WordPress makes all the difference

…I don’t care what FakeGrimlock says.1

I finally updated the WordPress installation on this other blog of mine. 2  I’ve more or less neglected that other blog for almost two years – about as long as this blog has been in existence.   ;)  In any case, one side effect of not having an updated WordPress installation is that that other blog couldn’t take advantage of all the cool new features that make writing a blog much easier.

I’ve been using WordPress for about 4.5 years now and it has come an amazingly long way in this time.  The ability to quickly search for and add links to prior posts is pretty huge.  Anyhow, my point with this is that creating a post with a newer installation of WordPress is so much easier that I might actually start blogging on that other site more. 3 4

  1. No matter how hurtful it is… [↩]
  2. Yeah, I know.  Three blogs?!  It’s true!  But, it’s far less frequently updated – more on this in a second [↩]
  3. But, believe me, it’s far less interesting. [↩]
  4. As if that were possible amirite?! [↩]

Fakegrimlock… how could you?!

Everyone has to take a stand somewhere.  Mine is with WordPress.  Fakegrimlock, how could you?!  I’m pretty damned sure the REAL Grimlock would NEVER say such a thing. 12

Just for this, I’m only going to keep your awesome artwork as my desktop background for a slightly shorter duration than my normal background.

And, for good measure, Kevin is now my favorite robot dinosaur.3

  1. Plus, I mean, just who the hell is a robot dinosaur to give out opinions on the benefits of one blogging/CMS platform over another?  With those itty bitty arms, there’s no freaking way they could do a decent bit of code review. [↩]
  2. Also, just how the hell does a robot dinosaur tweet?! [↩]
  3. Seriously, though – why was I not consulted on this?  Robots, dinosaurs, and Doctor Who is like 95% of this blog’s content! [↩]

It feels good to finally get this over with…

I have this other1 website for which I’ve been avoiding upgrading WordPress. 2  This is basically a developer sin, I know.  I wrote some plugins and some features for this particular website and my concern was that by upgrading I might break some parts of the site.

Well, tonight I just upgraded WordPress along with all the plugins and themes.  I’ve kicked the tires a little and I think everything is okay.  There’s still a little apprehension about having missed something …  but that will pass.  I’m actually quite relieved to have finally done this.

  1. Mysterious [↩]
  2. It’s an uninteresting niche business website – you’re not missing anything. [↩]