Category Archives: Gadgets

Tweaking the X5 for fun and profit… Plus: rabies!

In which that tiny little screwdriver comes in handy!

PPCOnce upon a time, I bought a little glasses repair kit. It came with a little magnifying glass, four tiny little extra screws, and this kick-ass little screwdriver all snug in a plastic case. I use it to tighten my glasses once in awhile, and I cleverly keep it someplace utterly random — my knitting bag! — where I can always find it.

I just used the kit’s little screwdriver to take the X5 apart. There it is, guts exposed! My new toy isn’t working properly at all; the screen either doesn’t respond or it responds incorrectly, and a touch screen device with a FUBAR touch screen is basically a paperweight.

I dug around here and found that the precise symptoms my X5 exhibits are common with older X5s, so I’m mid-fix as I type. Once I’m done with this post, I’m going to reassemble the thing (and then REINSTALL ALL THE CRAP I’D INSTALLED JUST A FEW DAYS AGO) and if it’s fixed, I’ll keep it. If it’s still a glitchy POS, I’ll send it back.

In other news, now that I live in town I have to register my dog [ordinance #1000 on the link] at City Hall. Which means I have to give her annual rabies shots, which pisses me off. I vaccinate my animal/s every three years because vaccines last for three years, they’re expensive, and over-vaccinating kills pets just like it does people.

Gah. I hate stupid regulations. I don’t mind paying $10 a year to license my dog, but there’s just no way I’m going to vaccinate my 10-year-old bitch for rabies each and every year, no way at all. I tell you what: there’d better be an elderly animal exemption, or my bitch ain’t gonna be legal.

A Brief Overview

In which this is all the news that’s fit to print, and it ain’t much.

We had friends over so I stayed up way too late last night, and now I’m sleepy. You’d think someone pushing 40 would have figured out how to go to bed on time, but no. I act like a little kid and stay up too late even though I know I’m gonna suffer.

Today I had a Subway sandwich for lunch because I’m not convinced that Mexican food alone provides enough dietary variation.

My new PPC arrived yesterday! It’s not refurbished, it’s used. Fairly heavily used. It’s a little glitchy — it doesn’t respond to the touchscreen properly while the sync cable is plugged into it — but I surfed around and found out that the glitch is something I can easily fix if I’m willing to take the unit apart, which I am.

The best news in the PPC so far world is that the latest version of Mobipocket Reader Desktop is fuckin’ hawt! It puts me in mind of iTunes, actually. One can finally organize books in useful ways, and it connects directly to ebook stores (my favorites Mobipocket and Fictionwise, as well as several others) so that purchasing, downloading, and syncing ebooks is effortless. Yay! And the Pocket PC version is also updated, and allows one to have more control over how the library is organized.

In other news… I feel this terrible, dark, foreboding depression this afternoon… it feels hormonal, like I’ve got PMS, but it’s not time for PMS. I sure hope an after-work nap takes care of it because I don’t particularly enjoy feeling as if my dog just died.

Update: A nap totally helped. Now… what to do this evening? Laundry? Dinner? Hmm.