"It comes with Office!"

     So I helped a poor gentleman set up his "new" laptop that he bought somewhere locally. While attempting to configure his Exchange account in Outlook, I noticed that it was a non activated OEM license. When I tried to activate it, it of course wouldn't.

     I explained to him that we needed to get a legitimate copy of Office installed before we could continue. He said he would hound the company he bought the laptop from as it was sold to him with Office included.

A while later, I received this:

Hi Piggy…

Well…the guy I bought the computer from finally came through for me…although I don’t know if this will “activate” the program correctly, although he says it will!

He sent an MS Office 2010 Disc, along with several instructions.  Here is what he’s asking me to do…does this sound right to you?

1. Un-Install the MS Office 2010 that is on my computer. 

2. Install the New MS Office 2010, contained on the disc he sent.

3. After installing, open “CRACK” folder.

4. Right Click on “Office 2010 Toolkit.exe

5. Running as administrator, click on “EZ-ACTIVATOR” to activate.  At this point, how do I know if I am running as administrator, or will the set-up ask me?

That’s all he said!  Of course the disc he sent is not one produced by Microsoft….it’s just a DVD-R that he created.

Anyway, I would really appreciate your comments, and your opinion.

Best Regards…

Someone who apparently got screwed.

 I don't know, does that sound right to YOU?

"Hey Cutie"

So over the weekend we had sort of a hurricane. I totally expected to be swamped with emails and messages about resulting technology problems I would be forced to deal with. This is the only message in my inbox:

I got this email and I’m not sure why…it is not even my address…..any ideas?

From: hayley lonergan [mailto:bumpdarapper@hotmail.com]
Sent: Monday, August 29, 2011 7:13 AM
To: xxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxx.com
Subject: Re:

hey cutie, did you still want to hook up for some fun offline? lol.....you should hit me up on yahoo messenger before I get off! Add astarte.rist9499 Im online now for a little longer!!!!! xoxo kisses
and had to call two or three times before she awoke.
into a sort of pillar of cloud in the room, through the top

Then came a sudden cry, "Look! Look! Look! See, two horsemen good women, whose lives and whose truths may make good lesson

driven with fury as it swept upon us in circling eddies.

Really? It's fucking 2011. Have you not received a piece of spam yet?!

Why I drink:

OK - here's a tech nerd post. I have several business clients, some large, some small. Some of what I do is difficult and advanced, and other times I feel like a glorified monkey.

So I have this one small client, and the business owner is a very nice woman. I would not however describe her as being computer savvy. I guess not many of my clients are. I mean Hell, that's why they're clients, right?

She is convinced that she is infected with a virus. Actually, she seems to be the only client I have who ISN'T. One of her complaints is that she receives viruses in her email, and they must be coming from her own computer, or something like that - I got confused. I looked at her email, and couldn't find anything terribly suspicious. So I performed some other fixes and repairs and gave it back to her. I also asked her to forward me any "viri" she received in her email, so that I could investigate.

This is what I received:
(I have done my best to protect the privacy of the uninformed)

Hi-
I am forwarding the ‘virus’ to you. Thanks!

-----Original Message-----
From:
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2011 9:54 AM
To: xxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.org
Subject: WWW Form Submission

Below is the result of your feedback form. It was submitted by
() on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 09:54:05
------------------------------------------------------------------------
fName: xxxxxx
lName: xxxxxxxx
phone: xxx-xxx-xxxx
userEmail: xxxxx@xxxx.com

userMessage: I've driven by your place hundreds of times over the years on my way to my farm in xxxxxx coming from xxxxxx. I am in the process of trying to start cultivating our land more and I'm looking for local sources of manure, and it occurred to me that maybe you were in need of a way to get rid of it as it piles up. Is that something you might be interested in?

submit: Send
------------------------------------------------------------------------

This doesn't look like a "virus" to me, something is definitely "piling" up. So this was my reply:

This appears to be a valid email sent from your website. There must be a form on your website that people can fill out to contact you, and the website forwards you these messages. When people communicate with you in this way, their name will not appear in the from field of the message.

But then I received this:

Hi-
This is not a valid message. In fact, I don't have a site...
If it was valid, why does it say WWW form submission? And where does it come from?

Hmm... She doesn't have a website? Well that does sound fishy then. But first, I decided to check for myself. I looked at the email address the "suspicious" WWW form submission came from and put a www in front of the domain - www.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.org.

Sure enough, a website pops up. Yes, it is the website for her business. And look, there's a link that says "Contact Us". I click it and -GASP- there is a WWW form to fill out.

So I sent along this:

Xxxxx,

This is your website:

http://www.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.org/

When you click "Contact Us", this page comes up:

http://www.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.org/Contact.htm

If someone fills out this form and clicks send, you get an email. It is called a WWW Form Submission, and your website hosting company forwards them to you. I will send one after sending this message.

..and then filled out the Contact form like this:
(well, I left out the "Piggy" bits - don't want to get sacked)

Thank You For Filling Out This Form
Below is what you submitted to xxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.org on Friday, June 3, 2011 at 09:08:49

fName: -Piggy-
lName: -Oink-
phone: -squeal-
userEmail: poop@angrypiggy.farm

userMessage: This is xxxx at xxxxxxxxxxxx sending you a WWW Form submission from your website.

submit: Send
FormMail V1.92 © 1995 - 2002

I am still waiting, with trepidation, for a response.

Email from an asshole.

So according to some random twat, I am a fraudulent eBayer. This pisses me off more than it should, so consider the airing of this grievance in this forum as therapeutic.

Twat: "I was going to buy this phone until I noticed the shill bidding going on. Reported...Ooops."

Piggy: "Well thanks for being so diligent and reporting me, but I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about."

Twat: "current bidder has 50% of his bid activity with you, previous bidder has 100% of his bidding activity with you. I's not rocket science. After they check the IP address will tell the tale. Either way it's shill bidding. 324 bids all on your auctions get real."

Piggy: "Once again, thank you for your diligence on this matter.

But you are accusing me of bad behavior, and that makes me angry. I have no control over other bidders, and if some person with 1 feedback wants to bid on my auction eleven times, I cant stop him or her. I can assure you with 100% certainty, that I am not acquainted with any of the bidders on this auction, and can produce email exchanges with two of them. I doubt that you can be 100% assured of my guilt, your incredible knowledge of how the internet works notwithstanding.

All I ask is that if you are going to report me for bad behavior, that you be sure it is for something I am actually guilty of, like telling you to shit in your hat."

BREAKING NEWS!!! Facebook is a business!

I heard on the radio this morning that Facebook will be making security changes, and hopes to avoid possible Congressional regulation. CONGRESSIONAL REGULATION?!? Christ! Aren't there bigger problems in this damned country that need tackling? There is a motherfucking hole in the Earth that is spewing oil into the ocean, and people are whining about their privacy on Facebook. Yes, Facebook privacy settings are complicated, but they are also very effective. Oh, and Facebook is a FREE, OPTIONAL service, whose SOLE purpose is to facilitate the sharing of information! Nobody NEEDS to be on Facebook, unless you absolutely have to see how successful, bald or fat all of your old classmates are. I happen to be balding, underpaid and slightly overweight, by the way.

There are many privacy options, learn to use them. Drilling through those settings took me no more than 10 minutes. People spend that amount of time playing fucking Farmville and Bejewled every day. If you are too lazy to do that, fall back on common sense. Remove your most private information. Do you really want everyone from your college to have your cellphone number? No? Then don't fucking put it on Facebook. It might be a good idea to leave off your address also, unless you want to be robbed next time you post "Leaving for Cancun, enjoy the snow!". You also might not want to upload pics of your naked kids. Nobody wants to see them, except for the creeps you don't want seeing them. Avoid posting anything that would mortify you if the whole world saw it. Lie about where you live. Use a secondary email address. Abstain from "Liking" things such as the Nazi party and NAMBLA. Just fucking THINK!

Look, I find it odd that I am defending a corporation with obvious goals towards monetizing its content. They could definitely do things better, and be more up front about their system changes and business goals. I just think people should take some fucking responsibility for controlling their own informational leakage. Is Mark Zuckerberg an ego-maniacal douche? Who knows, maybe. But it's his baby, and we all lined up to pinch its cheeks. I am there by choice, and I do my best to use its services responsibly.

And if there is just one person out there who is bitching about Facebook and also uses Blippy, I am willing to pay $25 to punch them square in the face and then tweet about it.

Trying something new.

Yup.  Haven't posted in a year.  I suck.  I suppose I have less to be angry about, seeing how I got married last year.  But that's no excuse.  I sincerely apologize to all six of you. 

Have no fear however, be assured that shit still pisses me off.  Like the old guy I saw this morning.  The one with four ex-military bad-ass bumper stickers on his car ranging from "Don't piss me off, I'm running out of places to hide the bodies!" to "Marine sniper.  Don't run, you'll only die trying." 

Thank you for your service. 

There.  I got that out of the way.   But dude, what the fuck?!  Aggressive much?  Try some chamomile tea.  Why not a simple bumper sticker that says "Veteran".  Either way, point taken.  I won't key your stupid Volvo.

But I digress.  I simply wanted to point out the silly little Facebook and Twitter icons to the right.  Perhaps I will be able keep up with this better if I try a more direct and instant medium.  Seems like by the time I have something to write about here, I have often already drowned the idea to death with a beer.  Or six. 

Pop quiz.

I have a question for you. What is the brand name of this product? Too small, hard to read? Here is a hint:

It is "Linksys". It has two syllables, "link", and "sys". It would be pronounced [link-sis]. Where am I going with this you ask? Well if you pronounce it linsky or lingskees, you may very well be a FUCKING IDIOT! I shit you not, less than 30% of the people I encounter who have the need to utter this proper noun in conversation with me can pronounce it correctly. If there is some specific sort of mass dyslexia that I am unaware of that causes this condition, then I apologize profusely to those afflicted. But holy fucking shit, it is not an intimidating word by any stretch of the imagination. Today, for the first time, I actually saw someone write it "L-I-N-S-K-Y." I must naturally assume that this person then went to Kurger Bing and ordered a chacon-double beeseburger.