I can now finally firmly say “No” to people who ask for help with some proprietary software, such as Matlab, Mathematica, or any of the Adobe products.

I can now feign complete lack of knowledge of these products (which is at least half-true—it’s been so long since I’ve used any of those, that I’d have to do some research to “remember” it) and instead offer a free alternative (GNU Octave, Python + Numpy + Scipy, Maxima, Scribus, … ).

I can now prevent myself from empathizing with those who put themselves through hell trying to use a proprietary application. After all, when there are perfectly functional free alternatives around (with which I am more than willing to help), if they would still suffer through a proprietary application, now I can honestly tell myself that it’s their own fault.

I can only hope this isn’t just a phase.

Unless you have a rare disease, like “fatal familial insomnia“, your body will do what it needs to do (fall asleep, go into a short nap, etc.). There is absolutely no reason for you to go through the ritual where, perhaps because to a lazy person spending 4 to 5 hours unconscious is not enough of wasting of time, spend additional 10 to 30 minutes trying to make oneself fall unconscious for a few hours or so. If you had needed to be unconscious, you will fall unconscious.

Anything else is a luxury and should be recognized as thus.

I am beginning to feel my years creeping up on me. Perhaps it’s because I don’t feel like I have done … everything that I should have done, at my age.

Should I be in hurry? Should I go out and try to do all those things that I haven’t accomplished yet but others my age have done? My mind says no—everyone at his own pace—but my heart says yes.

I spent a better part of this weekend transferring all my email from GMail to local storage, and I just finished reading (read: skimming headlines) all the items on the Google Reader, and I will be using offline RSS readers (at the moment, I’m trying out Liferea) only.

For the moment, I don’t see anything in my life (er… other than searching, maybe) that depends on Google, and given the recent privacy issues that has come up regarding some of Google’s services, that’s a good thing.

P.S. No, I am not a pedophile (and if I were, I would be smarter than storing incriminating information on anything but local, encrypted storage), but as the saying goes, “It’s first the pedophiles, criminals, and the rest of us,” as government encroachment on our civil rights goes.

I don’t want to fight. And I don’t want to make other people angry—no more than I would like to be angry myself.

But some issues (e.g. improper conduct by Microsoft re: OOXML ISO certification, and people sidestepping these issues in apparent support of Microsoft) get me so riled up that I can’t help but interject an acerbic comment.

Perhaps this is a good sign that I should close my eyes and plug my ears on this subject. It’s not like what I do (or say) matters in the grand scheme of things.

I consider this a great achievement … because this is the first randomly generated password that I managed to remember (all my previous passwords had obscure mnemonics that established certain patterns), and, well, it is something of a surprise to me that I seem to have memorized it letter-by-letter (rather than by finger memory; but that’s probably why it took so long).

When I finally find the time, I want to finally set up a decent, well-configured mail server (yes, novakyu.net will finally accept mail!), get it to encrypt received mail, and use that exclusively.

It’s not that I have any particular problem with GMail … it’s just that I am finding it increasingly harder to trust any corporate (or governmental) entities.

On the one hand, it’s a good thing that I have a monitor at my desk (in the office) that I used to use as the second screen for my laptop. I made a few adjustments to the xorg.conf file, and I can still use the laptop as a computer + keyboard.

On the other hand, that’s probably where the laptop will stay, until come up with a better use for the laptop. So, for the next couple months (I expect a few weeks waiting to consolidate my plan for next academic year, and then a little more looking for deals on parts—I’m almost decided on the MSI AMD whitebook), I just won’t have a computer at home, or a mobile computing device. I don’t think it will be that big of a problem.

After all, I could almost count on my fingers how many times I used my laptop not in my office or home in last half-year, and I can do without a computer at home for a while. I’ve done that for longer (oh, a year?) than that before, and maybe this means I will stay at office more (where I inevitably get more done), or get some good reading done at home.