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a lack of power
Friday, December 19, 1997

those PC magazines seem to be arriving with even more frequency this holiday season. I remember subscribing to one or two, but when I get dozens each week, I assume they're somehow multiplying in my mailbox, just before I retrieve them. Maybe the postal delivery person doesn't know that. In any case, the mags are whetting my appetite for replacing my two current systems with bigger, faster, better hardware and software. I quickly tire of same-o, same-o stuff. My new specifications for two new systems have grown by factors, since all I'm replacing are the drive units. There's now so many, many options and configurations to choose from. I'm trying to resist until Spring-Summer 98, but it's tough. There's bound to be some more major developments that will make the 300mhz units now proliferating, obsolete.

Bigger, Faster, Better.
I'm amazed at what I'm seeing in the newspapers and on TV: PCs — both Wintel and Mac — at song-and-dance prices just before Christmas, like I've never seen before. There's a glut on the market; manufacturers want to dump the hardware before it becomes totally obsolete. Better to have the consumer own it when it becomes a door stop or boat anchor than to have it weighing down inventory and damaging quarterly profits. Sure thing.
Huge amounts of HD space, gobs of memory available (up to 328k!), SCSI instead of AIDE, Jaz and Zip drives, huge monitors, digital cameras; the list goes on and on as to what options are available from manufacturers. These are not chincy systems, but rather full and robust hardware sets.
My home system is a Pentium 586/150mhz-64ram w/ 4.2gb HD, 17" ViewSonic. The office machine is a Pentium 586/ 200mhz-96ram w/ 4.8gb HD, 20" ViewSonic. Both were leading-edge systems when I finished upgrading them; unfortunately, each was obsolete before my final modifications were finished. That's how fast things change in that industry, due to technology's rapid pace. The keyboards, mice and monitors are fine as is; the HD, drive and memory are what I want to replace. I'm lusting after memory and mhz.
After seeing what the manufacturers are now offering — 200mhz is now just about the smallest cpu offered by most — what I'm using seems puny and weak, although they run fine. Time for some serious replacements. The 300mhz units are all over the place; I'm waiting for the 400mhz cpu (or preferably more) units to be unveiled and then I'll make my move on the hardware. 233-266-300mhz cpu's are now commonplace among every manufacturer. Boring stuff.
I'll wind up swapping several of the office machines out: my home unit will be set-up at my parent's home for my Dad to use, the office unit will go to the front counter to run GardenWare and other Win95 retail programs, and one or both of the two existing front counter systems will be retired from duty and kept in reserve as back-up to the new front counter units.
Since I'm buying new cpu and memory in new mini-towers, the monitors, keyboards and mice are okay as is. 400mhz, 328k RAM and all SCSI is what I'm shooting for in the office unit; 300mhz, 128k RAM and SCSI will be fine for home. Maybe by next Summer.

Power Shift.
The Asian powerhouse economies — Thailand, Indonesia, South Korea, Philippines — are in the economic dumper and begging the International Monetary Fund and China for even more help for their faltering association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
China is undergoing a vast capitalist economic revolution and will soon replace little Hong Kong as the seat of economic power and prowess. The struggle is tipping sides already, but their political system may only tolerate it to a point, just short of civil war.

Things are starting to slide and fall apart over in Asia now. Once prosperous nations, like South Korea are in big trouble. And China is laughing quietly to itself all the way to the soup kitchen lines. The I told you so syndrome will be played to maximum effect by China.

The Gore Whore.
He's about as personable as a wart, as smart as a roadwhack and as attractive a political candidate since the KKKs David Duke made his bid several years ago: Al — "I didn't do anything wrong and I won't do it again" — Gore.
He's one of the true pieces of liberal shit remaining on the earth who can seriously damage the US by quietly sliding left-wing-nut liberal welfare programs right through congress and helping to bankrupt all of us who actually work for a living. Gore has no idea of what it means to work for a living, since his criminal daddy senator gave everything to him all of his pathetic life.
Gore is planning a run for presidential office in 2000, on the basis of environmentalistic and technological issues alone, with a healthy dose of socialistic-communistic welfare thrown in just to placate the hard-liner leftists. But he's such a boring, do-nothing scumbag that he's had to invent part of his past to make himself look attractive. He's a liar.
He even thought that his lard-ass, hippo-wife and he were the models for the movie, Love Story, and told the newspapers so. Some imagination, Al. Again, the question begs asking: where the hell is Lee Harvey Oswald when his country really needs him? Uh, probably in hell.

More Clinton Criminals.
Slick Willie The Bubba Clinton really knows how to pick 'em. He's hired every con man and woman, lowlife, scumbag and petty-criminal to work in his so-called administration's cabinet. This makes seven either now indicted or convicted. Some administration: criminals all. Look for several more before the Clinton idiot finally leaves office in 3 years. shit: three more f*cking years of this moron? Maybe we could pay Clinton to take a very early retirement and get out of our lives for good.
Clinton, stupid redneck that he is, likened his legal and financial problems to a non sequitur analogy that helps other liberal idiots think it's a (Republican) conspiracy against Clinton, rather than a result of his continuous crimes over the years now coming to the surface. Read this for yourself and bask in the stupidity of Clinton's non-logic. He's still not able to take responsibility for his own life. Even a puppy can't help his image.
Another one of the liberal scum, a crooked, little weasel named Mike Espy, ex-Secretary of Agriculture who resigned in disgrace, has escaped prison for his crimes, so far. It ain't over 'till it's over Mikey boy, someone once said.

More Scandal.
Isn't it amazing what the Clinton minions, in their paranoid quest for re-election, did for money? They went so far as to screw a group of American Indians over some casino gambling deal. Favors for money.
But as long as White House Defense Counsel Reno is on the job, most likely nothing will come of it; she'll find another way to excuse the criminal Clinton lowlifes from any culpability.
I'm almost becoming used to reading about these Clinton criminals on a daily basis now; so much is coming out that has been well hidden through the past several years. If I ever get to the point of saying, so what?, like the liberal filth do, I'll seriously consider literary suicide: no more electronic or printed news. The barrage of shit about Clinton's lying, criminal scumbag friends is overwhelming as a steady diet. No wonder Vince Foster whacked himself.
Forget the reform shit; it won't happen to any meaingful degree. That would gut the system. And a politician, above all, does not slap the hand that feed him/her.

Whose Rights?
A very bad precedent was set in a New Jersey Court that lets gay or unmarried couples adopt — or more correctly buy a child — the same way heterosexual and married couples do.
Neither group should be allowed to have anything to do with children. Neither is a fit example or image for a child. Another liberal scumbag judge has desecrated the institition of family and marriage in deference to so-called politically correct prejudice.
I have no problem with anyone's choice of a lifestyle, I do have a big problem when it affects children's lives, and they are not given any choice in the matter. The child has no rights? Especially an implied right to a normal life as a starting point? Apparently not anymore.
Leave it to liberal lowlifes to f*ck up more peoples lives.

You Can Dress Her Up.
But you can't take her anywhere. It seems that Hitlery just loves to open her big, fat mouth and get into trouble everywhere she goes. Well, nothing new here.
Getting thrown out of New York's posh University Club is one sign that Hitlery needs a leash. Sure, it's a bit stodgy, but there's real wealth there, and they like their privacy. Of course, there are rules to enforce that. Being a criminal, liberal bitch, she doesn't understand rules.
Years ago, when I worked in NYCs Madison Ave advertising industry, I had lunch and dinner at The University Club several times. We used to take out-of-town clients there for business meetings, among other famous restaurants. Someone would have to be a real moron to be thrown out of that place. I guess Hitlery and her gossipy, nasty-bitch friend qualify in spades for that dubious honor.

Harley Whores.
I've always disliked the slow, noisy, Harley-Davidson motorcycle marque. The Japanese bikes blow it away, and BMWs super-bikes make the American and Jap bikes look like a little toy.
In the 80s, Harley whined and begged then president Reagan to institute protective tariffs against the Jap and German manufacturers, so Harley wouldn't go bankrupt. They couldn't compete on a world scale, yet they somehow thought they were a quality company.
Reagan saved the lumbering, noisy Harleys from going into the sshit piles, and as a result, H-D is a healthy company today. Still pathetic, but financially healthy.
Now, Harley's dealer network is into making porno movies; I guess sales must be pretty bad to make such movies for income.
It's sad all the way around: York, PA, where I live and near my own business, is corporate home to Harley-Davidson Corp., still a bunch of losers in the eyes of the world market. They should have been left to either succeed or fail, like Darwin's natural selection process. The unnatural subsidy and propping-up process makes for a financially unhealthy company in the long-term, as well as causes the world markets to lose respect for that business.

Digital Landscaping.
The software has been around for several years; the hardware really needed to run the software is now a reality. Digital landscape design, along the lines of this CAD. I've followed the ads, stories, reviews and too-gradual evolution of hardware and software. Well, it'll be a while until the user friendly term is included in those packages, but I have to make the move for 1998.
I go to several industry-only trade shows each year; one in Baltimore over Winter, another in mid-Summer in King-of-Prussia, PA., are the two main shows for the mid-Atlantic Region. There are 5-6 booths showcasing the Landscape CAD systems, with eager people ready and willing to convert us all to this way of doing business.
Actually, I used a very early version of Landscape CAD in 1983; something called GardenView v1.1, which operated on DOS and was slow and clumsy, due to both software and hardware limitations. I've been reticent about tackling the whole subject since. It would have to really scream to make me want to labor under CAD limitations again.
Next month, at the MANTS (Maryland Area Nursery Trade Show) in Baltimore, I will spend an inordinate amount of time reviewing the CAD competitors for my undivided attention to see what's new. I'll need to make at least a $12,000 investment in both hardware and software if this thing is to become a reality.
After contacting the five leading Landscape CAD companies in North America, the CDs are arriving for the 30-day trial periods. I'll get my Landscape Foreman and Landscape Designer together after the holidays — and especially after I've had plenty of time to become proficient with the program — for some reviews and evaluations. Then I'll decide.

Digital Camera
Monday, I picked up a Kodak DC-25 digital camera to experiment with in relation to the digital landscaping software. There was a minor glitch right off: no COM PORT available on the back of the office Pentium. With some hardware workarounds, that was fixed and the application loaded and works effortlessly.
The resolution is a mere 393x473 pixels, but it's fine as a starter camera for my use, at least until some of the better units get some more features attached and their prices lowered.
It works like a dream and also affords me the opportunity of up-to-date pictures on the website, without having to wait for film developing and scanning on the HP ScanJet 3p.
I'm working on a Winter Edition of the 20acre complex, as well as Spring through Fall views.

Get Started.
Here's a good resource and the world's largest horticultural database to start planning the Spring Garden all by yourself.
Or, you can contact Michelle Wood directly; she's an excellent Landscape Designer whom I frequently use. She will spend copious amounts of time designing your property and residence and do 24" x 36" full-color plans. Her fees are more-than-reasonable, as compared with some of the hacks I've seen in the business for the past eight years. She's a true professional.
Michelle has her own design business, so you'd become her client. Her fee ranges from $75 to $500, depending upon complexity of the plan. If you purchase the plant material from us to do the work yourself, or have us do the work, I'll then refund the cost of that plan you purchased from Michelle, so in effect, the plan costs nothing. And that's as it should be: I don't sell landscape plans; I sell rare, unusual and hard-to-find plant material and innovative, quality installations.
Don't wait until Spring; start the planning now.

Merry Christmas.
No bah humbug! here. Just a heartfelt wish to all for some much-deserved peace and goodwill on this poor, bedeviled, blue orb called Earth.
Drive safely, don't drink and drive, remember your family and see you at the Company Christmas Party. Watch that miseltoe...

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