lennys February 09, 2025

Aaand we're back, sort of...

So I received my replacement phone for my broken Pixel 5a a couple of days ago. It's a Pixel 7, and gladly I was able to restore it from the 5a's backup online so I didn't lose anything. That saved me a lot of time, because I had like 80 apps on the phone I would have had to reinstall one at a time. So far the transition has went well, except for one thing - I can't seem to get Android Auto to work in my truck now. I've tried messing with the settings on the phone and the truck, and even tried a different high-quality USB cable, but no luck. It's strange because when I plug in the phone, the little Android Auto icon shows up along the top of the phone's screen like it should, but it never actually connects to the truck and I cannot figure out why. I'm going to file a bug report later today about it and hope that I get some answers or advice that way. Other than that, the phone's fine so far. I got a good case for it so if I drop it it won't break. Also Google emailed me and let me know they received the old phone from FedEx, so they removed the $600 hold on my credit card they had put in place when I first placed the replacement request. They are going to bill me a $69 deductible charge for the Pixel 7 next month, but I'm okay with that. I figure if I can't get Android Auto to work I'll keep this phone until the end of the year, then trade it in on a Pixel 9 or whatever kind of Pixel is on sale at that time. It's rained all week so I haven't got any painting done. Today is supposed to be a clear day, so I'm going to try and get some painting done when I get home from work today. I'm sick and tired of looking at this disassembled toolbox, I want to get it finished. I think it'll be a long time before I try on a project like this again, as much of a hassle as it's been. But once I get the toolbox done, I can take my tools out of the cardboard boxes they're all in right now and clean up the living room, which will give me some room to move things around. I might finally get some new furniture once I have a place to put it all. A new sofa would be nice, as would a new bed. The futon I'm sleeping on is fine, but I'd still like a new queen-size mattress instead. In other news, I submitted an application for a job at Amazon yesterday. They have a sort-of work study program for working at their data centers which I applied for. My resume isn't so great-looking, but I figured I'd try for it anyway and see what happens. The job would still have me working odd hours, evenings, weekends and such but there'd be a little bit more money coming in, and having Amazon in my work experience would be good for the future. I hope I hear back from them, but I'm not holding my breath over it. There are other jobs out there, I just have to find the right one. I started looking outside of the Bay area too, so a move might be in the cards for me at some future point, who knows?

lennys February 01, 2025

My phone broke

So yeah, my phone isn't working as of about as of about 43 hours ago, by now. One minute everything was fine, I used it to take a couple of pictures. But the next time I took it out of my pocket 10 minutes later, the screen was dead. Pressing the buttons does nothing. I know it's still powered on because if I press and hold the power button for a couple of seconds the phone vibrates, but other than that it's a brick. The alarm clock still works, but to turn the alarm off I have to hold down the power button for 15 seconds until the phone reboots. I have a device protection plan for it, so I opened a case with Google about it and took it to an authorized repair shop. After a couple of hours they said the motherboard was bad, and that I might as well get another phone because it would cost more to fix it than a new phone would cost. Today I heard back from Google, they are going to replace it with a Pixel 7 that should be shipped to me and arrive sometime between the 7th and 10th. So until then I'm stuck without a phone. It's like I had my right arm cut off. It's amazing how dependent we become on the technology we use regularly, such that when something fails it becomes a crisis. Now if I want to pay any of my bills I have to physically go to the bank because I can't login even with a laptop due to the 2 factor authentication - I can't get any text messages or use the authenticator app. Sigh. In other news, I finally got started with the final coats of paint on my toolbox project. I had to bring everything inside yesterday because of rain, but if the weather cooperates I think I'll be finishing up this project soon. I just need to put a couple more coats of paint on the drawers, then put everything back together and I'll finally have a decent toolbox rig. For the record, don't do what I did and try to restore anything, buy new instead. This project was too long, too expensive and too much of a pain in the neck. Of course I didn't know that at the outset, so it's been a learning experience, but not one I'd care to repeat any time soon. You really, really should have your own garage for stuff like this. Doing it on the patio like I've been doing just carries a lot of problems along with it, such that all the fun gets taken out of it at the end.

lennys January 20, 2025

lennyshort.com and general web design stuff

So I have the new lennyshort.com design up and running now. It's been in the works since November, so it's a relief to have it up and done. I started out with just a basic HTML and CSS template, plus some basic "Hello World!" content from the original lennyshort.com website. From that I gradually put together a new Django project, grafted the content into it, and tweaked it until I was satisfied with the result. This last week or so I've been working on getting the blogging feature running, which I finished for the most part yesterday. I haven't made any blog posts yet, so that's something I'll have to do soon. I can do them through the admin interface, and I can use Markdown to make it look pretty and stuff. I used some AI agents to help me with the code, which saved a lot of time and frustration. Today I spent some time reading through some stuff about building Django + JavaScript projects on a site I found a few days ago. From there I found some "boilerplate" Django designs on GitHub that I might try to use in the future. There's so much stuff available online that it almost doesn't seem like its worth it to write basic HTML and CSS any more, as you can create some pretty slick looking web designs with a running backend baked in. A lot has changed since I first learned HTML in college. Website design and development has changed so much over the years I'm having to learn how to do it all over again.

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