(no subject)

It's amazing how far some people will twist the truth and rewrite history to try and make themselves look better, or cover up mistakes they made. I didn't think grown adults went in for that sort of thing much, but I suppose I was naive to think so!

Linux gripes

Sometimes I forget just how awkward to use Linux is, or at least Mandriva Linux at any rate. I wanted to transfer some files from that Linux pc to my Windows PC. Simple, you'd think, but no.

Approach 1: Set up a Windows shared directory on the Linux box. Would probably work but the graphical manager tool crashes every time I try to add a new share. And I can't be bothered fooling around with smb.conf or whatever text file it is to get it to work normally.

Approach 2: USB memory stick. Windows notices these when you plug them in and handles them automatically. Linux-out-of-the-box sometimes does, sometimes doesn't, depending on which distribution you have and how they're deciding to mount new drives and media this week. The version I have downstairs notices that I have attached the device, but doesn't mount it anywhere, so actually getting anything onto it appears to be impossible without more time wasted.

Approach 3: Send them to myself via Gmail. Foolproof, right? Wrong. The Konqueror web browser on there seems strangely unable to upload the files to the service, and truncates them all to 0Kb in the process, meaning they didn't get sent.

Now to find Approach 4...

And one more thing!

Writing music is hard. :( I know I've said this before and I'm sure I'll say it again. I've been trying to force this song out for weeks now and it's just not happening. I need some sort of method but I never seem to find one, and I have no idea how others do it. Bits and pieces get written but there's no flow or structure. It's like coming up with some great descriptions or witty one-liners for a screenplay or book, but having no plot. I don't know if it's because I don't do enough writing, or don't listen to enough music, or don't practice improvising enough, or I don't understand music as well as I should. Very frustrating. It's also very bizarre when you have people you barely know saying that they love what you've written, and to urging you to "never stop writing music", yet I barely feel like I've even started!