I went home this weekend. Chris called me saying that he messed up mom's computer and he needed Mac OS 7.6.1 so he can install a good web browser. Since there's no gaming this weekend -- I not wanting to run with only two players -- I quickly decided to go home, fix mom's computer, maybe hang out with Chris and help him move. Alas, it didn't quite work out that way.

First off, I got off early on Friday. The Oracle campus was going to shut down at 19:00. Literally no power as they do something to our company substation. Can you believe that? We have a little substation on campus, and it's our substation. We use enough power that it's cheaper to build and maintain a power substation.

But, if the power is going to go you need to shut down everything orderly. So round about 17:00 everybody starts shutting things down. I've only been there for a few hours (it's so hard to get to work before noon) and I'm working on something when suddenly I lose connection to our workgroup file server. Hmm, must be time to shut down the switches.

Reminds me of my days back at West Coast. Whenever we lost power (and it happened a few times when we initially moved to Benicia) we'd wait about half an hour before shutting down the DEC mainframes. It's a lot of trouble and it takes a while to start up too so we would wait until the last minute before doing the shutdown.

Anyway, we shut down everything and I get to leave early, fighting the standard Friday traffic. It takes me an 1:45 just to get home. Then I pack up my clothes (might as well do laundry) and gather my things and drive to my parents. But Chris isn't there -- he'd already gone to Davis that very day and apparently he didn't want to come back to see his brother.

Not that I blame him. I remember my second year in college -- moving in to my own apartment. Exciting time and I wouldn't have wanted to go back home just on the threshhold of such a momentous adventure. Of course that meant that it was just me and my parents all weekend. Considering how much we argue -- especially mom and I -- I didn't have much hoped for a quiet weekend.

But it was surprisingly nice. We didn't argue at all, didn't talk much but then again we never do. I just hung out and read and worked on mom's computer and played Angband. And ate a lot. Probably just as much as last time I was there, but not quite as much during meals. I snacked a heck of a lot, easier to do when you don't have a couple of siblings around to rat on you.

It was actually quite a bit of trouble to set up my mom's computer. Install Mac OS 7.6 (with Internet Connect!) which has Netscape 2 (Chris had 7.5.3 installed and bunch of pirated software -- maybe not intentionally pirated since most of it he installed form the backup disks of software I already gave away; anyways initializing the hard drive fixed that problem). Should update to 7.6.1 but it crashes on the Apple site JavaScript.

Download Netscape 4.78 from Netscape but it requires Mac OS 7.6.1. Go back to the Apple site (not easy to find software and manuals and such. It's too "friendly" so there are no powerful search functions.). Found an Apple old software page which is just a plain page with hundreds of links to Apple updates -- anything released in 1998 or earlier. Quite cool. I got the update there and updated the computer and installed Netscape.

The I got Adobe Acrobat Reader (there are a lot of PDF files out there), also an older version that runs on 7.6 and Stuffit Expander that runs on an old OS. It's nice since otherwise I would get the most up-to-date version that I can and that would most likely be a bloated version of the software. Keeping up with computer progress is tough when you don't have a newer computer.

Mom wanted a printer but the old one we have doesn't work. It's a StyleWriter 2400, hardly used. But it doesn't recognize that it has an ink cartridge installed. So for now she doesn't have a printer. I'm probably going to lend her the Epson 850ne that Dave bought. We don't use it and Epson hasn't given any indication that they'll put out a driver for that printer and it's just getting old sitting there.

So, it was a nice, relaxed weekend for me. Perhaps too relaxed since I didn't write any journals, but I tend not to anything constructive when I go home. It's just the atmosphere -- lack of oxygen I always say. Now if I can only just keep my mouth shut and stop making stupid comments the next time I go home can be just as smooth.