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Silence.
The very thing my dear wife so desperately craves...is what keeps me prisoner.
I purchased my Bose MediaMate Multimedia computer speakers from the Nebraska Furniture Mart in 1996 for $250. They have a manufacture date of March 1995 on them, and they went out today. Plunging me into silence. I feel as though I am in solitary confinement. Ah, another thing my wife so desperately craves - solitude. Another prison for me.
It's true that the prices have plummeted on these speakers, now called the Companion 2 and only $99. They might as well be $1000. I no more have a hundred dollars to spend...and if I did, I'd be on my way to Wichita. Not sitting here in the dark, alone, in the silence.
I do have another set of speakers in Wichita, in storage. They suck. Still, what I wouldn't give for having the foresight to have brought them with me. It's been a month since I set foot in Kansas, and I'm ready to go back. Ready to leave St. Louis and hit the open road once again. To travel more than 11 miles at 45 miles per hour. Ready to...fly!
I suppose, as a last resort, I could burn mp3's from iTunes, then play them on my Dream Machine. I had just started Equinox, Part II, the first episode of Voyager Season Six when my audio died. I am at hotel nursing a cold which started around 0100 Friday morning. Was this brought on by the sharp change in weather we've had this week, or lack of proper sleep since my family left? I don't know.
Audio Device: RAW sample output
Playing: calling_sky_captain.ogg
Ogg Vorbis stream: 2 channel, 44100 Hz
Title: Calling Sky Captain
Artist: Shearmur, Edward
Genre: Soundtrack
Date: 2004
Album: Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
Track number: 04
Assuming raw pcm input filef 03:26.24 (170.9 kbps) Output Buffer 3.1%
LAME version 3.93 (http://www.mp3dev.org/)
Using polyphase lowpass filter, transition band: 18671 Hz - 19205 Hz
Encoding to calling_sky_captain.mp3
Encoding as 44.1 kHz 192 kbps stereo MPEG-1 Layer III (7.3x) qval=2
There are quite a few things that Darwin can do better than Solaris, or shall I say PPC can do better than SPARC? I never could get LAME to do well, anything worthwhile on my Sun boxes. Those of you who run x86 exclusively won't have a clue as to what I am referring to. Suffice it to say, not EVERYTHING just 'works' outta the box on non-x86 architecture where OpenSource software is concerned.
I don't know if I can go a week plunged into silence. I tried unplugging everything and listening via the built-in mac speaker. That was the worst idea I've had in a long time.
My mac mini is slowly degrading. Because of the network set up I have constructed in this hotel, the Operating System cannot gain access to some online functions. The ports required to be opened are blocked and my research thus far has been unsuccessful in determining which ones are required. Software Update is disabled, as are various application optimizers which try to run, but lack the ability to access their online updated definitions. I'm hoping the box lasts another 5 months or so, and that I can restore her to full functionality once I'm free of this kludge.
Then it hits me. I purchased a holder for my cell phone which was ineffective and I was going to take it back to Best Buy. I could use that return to exchange it for some speakers. I'm really in no condition to travel, but what is the alternative?
No one at home when I try to call my wife. They have their own life now. Just have to hold on 6 more days...
Picked up some Logitech X-230 2.1's. They actually sound better than I thought they would. Maybe this weekend won't be so bad after all. Things are starting to look up.
The very thing my dear wife so desperately craves...is what keeps me prisoner.
I purchased my Bose MediaMate Multimedia computer speakers from the Nebraska Furniture Mart in 1996 for $250. They have a manufacture date of March 1995 on them, and they went out today. Plunging me into silence. I feel as though I am in solitary confinement. Ah, another thing my wife so desperately craves - solitude. Another prison for me.
It's true that the prices have plummeted on these speakers, now called the Companion 2 and only $99. They might as well be $1000. I no more have a hundred dollars to spend...and if I did, I'd be on my way to Wichita. Not sitting here in the dark, alone, in the silence.
I do have another set of speakers in Wichita, in storage. They suck. Still, what I wouldn't give for having the foresight to have brought them with me. It's been a month since I set foot in Kansas, and I'm ready to go back. Ready to leave St. Louis and hit the open road once again. To travel more than 11 miles at 45 miles per hour. Ready to...fly!
I suppose, as a last resort, I could burn mp3's from iTunes, then play them on my Dream Machine. I had just started Equinox, Part II, the first episode of Voyager Season Six when my audio died. I am at hotel nursing a cold which started around 0100 Friday morning. Was this brought on by the sharp change in weather we've had this week, or lack of proper sleep since my family left? I don't know.
Audio Device: RAW sample output
Playing: calling_sky_captain.ogg
Ogg Vorbis stream: 2 channel, 44100 Hz
Title: Calling Sky Captain
Artist: Shearmur, Edward
Genre: Soundtrack
Date: 2004
Album: Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
Track number: 04
Assuming raw pcm input filef 03:26.24 (170.9 kbps) Output Buffer 3.1%
LAME version 3.93 (http://www.mp3dev.org/)
Using polyphase lowpass filter, transition band: 18671 Hz - 19205 Hz
Encoding
Encoding as 44.1 kHz 192 kbps stereo MPEG-1 Layer III (7.3x) qval=2
There are quite a few things that Darwin can do better than Solaris, or shall I say PPC can do better than SPARC? I never could get LAME to do well, anything worthwhile on my Sun boxes. Those of you who run x86 exclusively won't have a clue as to what I am referring to. Suffice it to say, not EVERYTHING just 'works' outta the box on non-x86 architecture where OpenSource software is concerned.
I don't know if I can go a week plunged into silence. I tried unplugging everything and listening via the built-in mac speaker. That was the worst idea I've had in a long time.
My mac mini is slowly degrading. Because of the network set up I have constructed in this hotel, the Operating System cannot gain access to some online functions. The ports required to be opened are blocked and my research thus far has been unsuccessful in determining which ones are required. Software Update is disabled, as are various application optimizers which try to run, but lack the ability to access their online updated definitions. I'm hoping the box lasts another 5 months or so, and that I can restore her to full functionality once I'm free of this kludge.
Then it hits me. I purchased a holder for my cell phone which was ineffective and I was going to take it back to Best Buy. I could use that return to exchange it for some speakers. I'm really in no condition to travel, but what is the alternative?
No one at home when I try to call my wife. They have their own life now. Just have to hold on 6 more days...
Picked up some Logitech X-230 2.1's. They actually sound better than I thought they would. Maybe this weekend won't be so bad after all. Things are starting to look up.
