This'n'That

So the new store going in at the U-Pillage is SonyStyle. I’m not sure what they’re going to sell there besides Discmen (Discmans?) and maybe mp3 players. Sony made a Palm OS handheld a few years ago. Now they don’t.

In related electronics news, here’s why you should never ever buy anything at Bes*Bu*. MSH and I went there last night to buy network cables aka Ethernet cables. Their selection was poor, and when we got to the checkout there were like 20 people in line and despite the several employees we’d seen hanging around the store shooting the bull with each other, only one checkstand was open. We left the cables there and went upstairs to Target. They were sold out, but their price on a 14’ network cable was $7.99, whereas the one at Bes*Bu* was $20!! I am never setting foot in that store again so help me retail god. (BB, not Target.) So we had no network cable, and we couldn’t find the right vacuum filter either. So we ended up with: Cold-Eez zinc lozenges. I told MSH: “We never should have left the house.”

So, I got my new computer! Just for me! (at home) It came so quickly!

BOSS: Do you like the way it looks?
ME: […pause…thinking…don’t care…] I don’t dislike it….

I was home at lunch today trying to set it up (after finally picking up a network cable) and learned the following: A network hub is not the same as a network router. The person on the phone at Comcast, where I was on hold for less than five minutes, explained this in language I can understand! Let’s see if I can explain it to you: A hub is stupid. A hub can only pass on information. So when two computers try to connect through the internet using a hub and only one IP address, it doesn’t work because the hub will only allow access for one computer. But a router is smarter, and says: “Aha! These [up to five] computers want to connect to the internet using the same IP address, and that is cool. I will spin a magic spell on the information going to and from these computers, to make it work.” And that is why I am going after work to:

1. The post office (damn you, 2 cent increase! Shoulda bought a bunch of two-centers off the internet a week ago!)
2. Office Depot to get a router
3. Home to make sweet, sweet virtual love to my new computer aka Geek Out, to the extent possible for some who just anthropomorphized a network router and had it talk about magic spells