Hurrah

Finally finished the Toshiba debacle. It ended with a short call to Toshiba level 3 tech support. That was bliss. I wish I always talked to level 3 tech support.

The guy started explaining to me how to take out my battery and I said look... I know about computers. You don't have to do this in baby steps with me. Give me a second and I will have it set up. Then he asked me to try to turn it on a few times. I gave him my observations. And he said ok... I am writing a note here that it is a hardware issue with the system board. Then I apologized for being so ubrupt. He says he understood. He could understand my frustrations. God finally a tech support person who knows more about computers than me. It was wonderful.

So now that hurdle is cleared. The customer service rep will call me and arrange for the new computer to be shipped to my folks!

HURRAH!!!!!

On another note another strange interpersonal thing in my life is getting royally screwed up the ass by miscommunication. You know what I am through with being diplomatic or worrying about people's feelings anymore. I tried it for awhile and it sux. Essentially my new outlook is the same as my old one... Tell the truth. All of it. Disclosure is key. And then sort out the feelings.

Office hours... fun

Ok so I had a very weird day. Got little work done but helped many people.

One of the students in the class I am TAing came by with gifts of ouzo and candy from greece. This I really appreciated from her. I don't know why but I think that she really appreciates the help I have been giving her.

Anyway I am still amazed that they let these students into this program. They are so screwed. They know nothing about statistics or anything else that I would consider general knowledge necessary for this program. For example... one of the things we went over today in my office hours was genetic algorithms. I had to teach the students how to represent numbers in binary.

Ok so readers of this lj.... do you feel that being able to represent numbers in binary is reasonable to expect. Bear in mind I learned this in fifth grade.