Operations at El Rancho Pendejo are sketchy, as always.
It’s only Dec. 11, but it seems my work for 2019 is pretty much done.
I wrapped the “Quick Spin” video on the Cannondale Topstone 105 for Adventure Cyclist on Monday, and yesterday I actually got a jump on 2020, scribbling a “Shop Talk” cartoon for Bicycle Retailer and Industry News.
Today I’m contemplating some overdue computer maintenance — backups, updates, the poking with sharp sticks of things better left unmolested.
It struck me the other day that I’m a few iterations of operating systems off the back. The MacBooks are all running Sierra, but the kool kidz have long since moved on to macOS Catalina. So I thought I’d tiptoe up to High Sierra, see what the weather’s like up there. After all, I have the installers on all three ’Books.
Ho, ho. Pull off those hiking boots, Sir Edmund. The installers are all damaged, which is to say their certificates are probably expired. ’Cause, like, y’know, dude, sir, everyone else has, like, moved on to Catalina, an’ shit.
So I’m downloading a fresh installer as we speak. Shouldn’t take more than a couple-three days at Duke City DSL speeds. Then if I feel like getting the “two” in the ol’ one-two I can think about setting up the “new” iPhone 5.
Tags: Apple, iPhone 5, iPhone SE, Macbook Air, MacBook Pro
Mad Blog Media 
December 11, 2019 at 10:02 am |
I’m down to two bad days in a row and I pull the plug on this gig. I’ll officially be of full social security age in January. Ooohh. Free stuff (actually, stuff I’ve been paying into for the last 48 yrs.)
December 11, 2019 at 10:35 am |
Congrats! I can’t dig into Uncle Sammy’s pocket until March. And I’ll still keep “working” for BRAIN and Adventure Cyclist, so I guess I’m not officially “retired,” though it’s mos def part-time work.
December 11, 2019 at 2:21 pm |
I’ve been officially part time since last summer, working 3 days a week. It was a compromise between retiring and working. But the office is getting staffed up again so in a few months I’ll be irrelevant and can, as MacArthur might say, just fade away…
December 12, 2019 at 12:54 am |
Pop the cork on something to celebrate!!! I took my meager SS checks starting at 62, hoping the immigration folks might consider me not a candidate for panhandling or taking a job away from a citizen. Next visit with them is February – dunno yet if we’ll have to pay the big euros out to have documents translated by an official type translator yet – but I’m sure they’ll tell us!
Gotta tell ya, time flies when you can do whatever you want, whenever you want, at least based on my ‘sperience.
December 11, 2019 at 10:27 am |
I have been running High Sierra (10.13) for over a year on a 6 year old iMac without problems. Sandy has a new laptop, Macbook Air, that is running Mojave 10.14. So far, so good.
December 11, 2019 at 10:41 am |
The 2012 Air is first to summit High Sierra. It’s perfect for a test drive, as it’s the MacBook I use the least, unless you count the black-plastic 2006 MacBook, which peaked at Snow Leopard (10.6.8). The 2000 G4 PowerBook hit the OS ceiling at 10.4.11 (Tiger).
Both of those old rascals still work, too. Like me, kinda, sorta.
December 11, 2019 at 10:50 am |
Trump was in the list for Time Person of The Year. Loser! Guess he will need to print up some more of his fake ones. Wait, another law broken. Copyright infringement, right Patrick?
https://time.com/person-of-the-year-2019-greta-thunberg/
December 11, 2019 at 12:19 pm |
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with Mojave. In fact, it works quite well. Catalina, on the other hand, is not ready for prime time yet, despite what Apple will tell you. There are some great features, but I wouldn’t go there right now. For example, Firefox and Catalina do not play well together, again, despite what Apple will tell you. Firefox crashes, regularly, in Catalina. There’s finger pointing going on as to who is to blame, and who is fixing it, but in any case now, you won’t be able to use it.
Also, all your applications will need to be 64-bit; no 32-bit applications will load or run. To find which apps are using 32-bit do this: Go to Apple logo top left -> About This Mac -> System Report -> scroll to Software -> Legacy Software.
Also, if you’re still using iPhoto, the migration over to Photos (which I’m in the middle of right now) is painful and very, very slow. It’s also mandatory as iPhoto is no longer supported. It’s my fault really as I should have made the move years ago, but I’m paying the price now.
December 11, 2019 at 2:33 pm |
Thanks, David. I’ve been hinky about updates since Mavericks helped do in my 2009 iMac. Some days it seems Apple throws them sumbitches out like beads at Mardi Gras.
These days I use mostly Apple software. The major exceptions are Shirt-Pocket’s SuperDuper! (for backups) and Rogue Amoeba’s Audio Hijack (whenever I’m podcasting, which lately I’m not).
Never liked iPhoto or Photos. I edit pix in Preview, and for anything requiring more manipulation I boot up the ’06 MacBook and its copy of Photoshop Elements.
Dern computers anyway. Where’s my Royal manual typer at?
December 11, 2019 at 3:55 pm |
My old green Hermes 3000 (from maybe 1967/68?) still gets used occasionally. Fired the thing up about a month ago to send a letter to an old friend in the UK, who appreciates things like that. You can still buy ribbon for ’em too!
December 11, 2019 at 4:00 pm |
Ooo la la la la. I still have a big ol’ Underwood manual. I think the ribbon even has a bit of ink left. I should give ’er a go. Blogging old-school, yo!
December 11, 2019 at 9:00 pm |
Did I read backups? All I can say is, “the cloud, man, the cloud!”
December 12, 2019 at 5:50 am |
I back up the iPhone to the cloud, but that’s it. Our upload speeds here are atrocious. You wouldn’t believe how long it takes to send a 1.5 MB cartoon to BRAIN, or a two-minute video to Adventure Cyclist. I can see each and every individual pixel as it goes pop! up the pipe.
For the main Mac I back up via SuperDuper! to a two-drive RAID setup (belt and suspenders) and via Time Machine to a third drive. Everything else gets its own SuperDuper! backup.
I suppose I should have some sort of off-site backup in case of fire or flood, but I don’t think my collected works are a matter of national security.
December 12, 2019 at 6:21 am |
What kind of bass-ackward place do you live in? Here in the most primitive/backward place (according to many) in Italy we have fiber optic connection options from 2 or 3 providers for around $30 a month.
The only internet issues we have is with Italian TV shows but even they are pretty good now. Watched a couple episodes of I Medici the other night with no interruptions at all.
The way Don the Con is going: cutting food stamps, healthcare, ditching pollution standards, etc, the next US prez’ candidate is gonna need hats with MAAFWCA (Make America A First World Country Again) printed on them!
December 12, 2019 at 6:30 am |
Our DSL connection is robust but slow. About half the upload/download speed we got in Bibleburg, and from the same company, too.
Streaming video is solid. We haven’t had cable since Floyd rang the Dope-O-Meter® in Le Tour and watch all manner of stuff via the Apple TV box or a 2010 Mac Mini, which is also hooked up to the TV.
But stuffing a few gigs of data upstream is like paddling the USS Abraham Lincoln against the tide. It’s one reason ’Burque has trouble luring those “clean” tech companies everyone wants in their communities.
The other reason is the murder rate. Not even the local blat knows how many stiffs the bad guys have stacked up this year because the coppers can’t keep their numbers straight. We do know that it’s somewhere around 75, which is another record. Winning!
December 12, 2019 at 12:31 pm |
As far as I know, Verizon had ceased expanding Fios some years ago. I suspect there was some sort of quid pro quo with Comcast, or a fear that a widespread subscriber fiber network would mean that they had more union workers under the CWA contract.
December 12, 2019 at 12:51 pm |
We’re on CenturyLink here, as in B-burg. God only knows what deals with the devil they’ve struck. But the service is comparatively trouble free. Now and again the modem/router hiccups and I have to unplug it for a minute and then plug it back in. Easy peasy.
December 12, 2019 at 6:20 am |
I use a thumb drive for small files and DVD for larger files like video, very few, and photos. Then again, I don’t use my computer for work anymore and don’t have much to back up. The DVD and thumb drive go in a fire resistant safe with important documents.
December 12, 2019 at 6:36 am |
I’ve had a couple thumb drives go south on me lately, which is irksome. I used them for SneakerNet® file transfers.
One of these days I need to tackle a big job, which is archiving all the cartoons and columns I’ve got stored on various drives around here. I think there are three HDs in the old Power Mac plus duplicate SuperDuper! backups.
Fresh copies might be useful if I ever decide to do a Mud Stud book, or a collection of greatest hits from my “Friday’s Foaming Rant” and “Mad Dog Unleashed” columns. Hard drives fail, especially these old muthas.
December 12, 2019 at 12:19 am |
Y’all are on newer Mac updates than my most recent 10.6.8. Was working just fine a couple months ago, until the HD decided it was too tired to continue helping me navigate the political shenanigans out of DC. Oh well. Catalina doesn’t play well with any of my Canon utilities, so I will wait a while longer to move up to another $$$Mac. Until then, I’m on a borrowed Win10 system and I hate it.
BTW, how come I can’t find Shop Talk/Mud Stud anywhere on the BRAIN site? I sure miss reading those.
December 12, 2019 at 5:55 am |
Man, I loved Snow Leopard. For my money that was the best OS ever. Simple yet effective. The 2006 MacBook still ticks along nicely with that one with 2 MB of RAM and an aftermarket SSD.
If you’d like to bring your Mac back to life, check out Other World Computing. They have everything you need, along with videos showing you how to install/repair bits of this and that. I’m mechanically challenged, but have used their tools and tips to replace hard drives in the 1999 G4 Power Mac (easy), the ’06 MacBook (also easy) and Herself’s 2012 MacBook Pro (less easy). I’m thinking about replacing the drive in my 15-inch 2014 MacBook Pro but that’s more challenging still, so for now I’m just offloading stuff I don’t need every day to an external drive.
They also sell new and used setups. They’re how I keep all this old gear up and running.
As regards those BRAIN cartoons, I’m delighted to hear you like them and miss them. As to why they’re not archived, I suspect it’s a manpower issue. The op’ is down to two full-time journos and a shared IT guy and there just aren’t enough hours in the day.
They don’t archive the old “Mad Dog Unleashed” columns either.
December 13, 2019 at 5:11 am |
Good morning! How are the updates going at Rancho Pendejo? I figured out yesterday that our iMac and iPad Air are worth about $300 to $350 in trade towards a new MacBook Air. I guess that’s better than recycling them. I think I will let them limp along to their final conclusion. Kinda like 2020 will with Boris in charge GB and the dems eating their own young here. DT jr for king anyone?
December 13, 2019 at 5:17 am |
Limping along to the final conclusion and I look like shit.
December 13, 2019 at 9:46 am |
I’ve seen three of Loudon’s short concerts in Annapolis at the Ram’s Head. I enjoyed them all, but he’s more of a social commentator than a musician.