Gods, I hope that wasn't prophetic

[annathepiper]

Those of you in the PNW who were watching the fireworks at the Space Needle, either on KING-5 or in person, witnessed what I'm talking about: the Epic Fail of the fireworks display tonight. Man, somebody is so very, very fired. I hope they're fired with at least a little ease, though. 'Cause I mean, I can't think of too many things more embarrassing than arranging a big fireworks show for a city's New Year's Eve celebration and having computer failure make it spectacularly fail.

I hear rumors that the mall fireworks in Everett went off without a hitch. seattle has been snarking on Seattle getting shown up by Everett. ;)

I'm not going to post resolutions--just because the whole concept has begun to give me the heebie-jeebies. One goes back and looks at last year's resolutions only to see how many weren't fulfilled, and that's just asking for a downer on top of a final quarter of a year that's been plenty down-inducing enough.

I'm going to think about goals instead. And not even goals necessarily for all of 2008. I'm going to think in terms of oh, say, January. So here's some January goals I want to hit:

• Get through the rest of the radiation treatment
  
• Begin editing Queen of Souls before February 1
  
• Get a query letter out for Lament of the Dove
  
• Read five books
  

That'll do for a start. I think I'll take 2008 much better if I take it a month at a time.

And here's to a lack of Epic Fail for us all. Happy New Year, folks.

Comments

[wingedelf.livejournal.com]

damashita, maighdeanmara and i were watching it on KING-5- and almost simultaneously, about twenty seconds after the fireworks stopped noted "You know there's some poor bastard frantically trying to ctrl+alt+delete after the programme crashed on him."

[annathepiper]

*nodnod* I saw this morning that we (the Times) had an article up saying there was a "corrupt computer file". The techie in me wonders what the heck happened!

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

the whole concept has begun to give me the heebie-jeebies.

*hugs* I just hope you kick the BBFN's furry little butt straight back to Mars, and bury it under sixteen tons of red rock. That will make me happy. (Well, OK, I'm looking forward to making more music together, and just generally hanging out, too, but first things first...)

[annathepiper]

Aww, well, thank you and likewise! About the music and hanging out, that is. The cancer part, not so much.

[casirafics.livejournal.com]

So. Much. Fail.

*facepalm*

[annathepiper]

That was indeed a stunning amount of Fail. We knew something was amiss two seconds after midnight and nothing was going splody, and we started boggling even before the announcer did!

[firni.livejournal.com]

hahahahaha we outdid youuuuuuuuu

[annathepiper]

I could argue that Kenmore != Seattle, but then again, meh, we're close enough it doesn't make much difference. ;)

[stickmaker.livejournal.com]

Now, see, that's the problem: they used a computer. Whatever happened to time fuses and electromechanical timers? (Or at least use Unix. ;-)

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Or at least use Unix.

Unix, Linux, MacOS X, anything that has a hash prompt...

zen:/home/technoshaman(0)> uptime
09:27:45 up 189 days, 19:54...

Six freakin' months, and I think that last was a power out...

[annathepiper]

Not that I shoot off fireworks professionally or anything, but I'd think that yeah, they'd practice the routine manually in case of, y'know, computer failure or something. And they did indeed start firing off the fireworks by hand when it became obvious that something was wrong. But they weren't getting them all, and stuff was clearly out of sync with the expected music.

I can, however, understand why they would do it by computer usually. I expect that it makes it easier for fewer people to do bigger, more complex displays.

[lmarley.livejournal.com]

Good health to you in 2008!

[annathepiper]

Thank you kindly! And good health and many book sales to you. :)

Re: HNY

[annathepiper]

Har! Yeah, we made the Vista joke too. ;) *snorfles at the rest*

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

We can peer across at the Seattle fireworks from our window, being up on the hill, and we did notice that there was something of an absence of them from behind Queen Anne Hill. And then we carried on drinking and didn't worry about it :-)

[annathepiper]

*snicker* Oh, we weren't worried, we were mocking!

Even mostly without the b00zeah0l. Since most of those in attendance had to drive home and/or had little ones with 'em, we handed out token champagne. I had me a Strongbow cider, though. :9

[ssha.livejournal.com]

Everyone should just trek over to Medina next holiday in protest of Seattle's failure to be more competent than Bill Gates. At least he gets his fireworks right every year. Or at least hires someone capable, which is apparently more than the city is capable of.

[annathepiper]

Well, to be fair, this is the first time since solarbird and I moved here that the fireworks got screwed up. :)

And the tech in me really wonders exactly what went wrong and when, especially if things were fine when they were testing prior to the show.

[ssha.livejournal.com]

Bah! First time?! There is no first time! There is no last time! There is only FUCK UP!

Ahem. Right.

Anywho, yeah, I guess you can let them lean on the old 'getting the kinks worked out' excuse.

[annathepiper]

*giggle* I don't feel strongly enough about it one way or another, but just out of general intellectual curiosity I do actually kind of wonder what the hell happened. But that didn't make it into any of the local news stories on the topic. Oh well.

I suspect there will be different parties running the fireworks this next July Fourth. ;)

[ssha.livejournal.com]

I suspect that they did what even Bill Gates won't do, and ran it using Vista, as previously suggested. ;)

Speaking of gigantic piles of crapfest...

[annathepiper]

Har! Yeah.

I shall take this moment to be extra pleased I'm on a Mac now.

[ssha.livejournal.com]

I think more and more of the world is joining is in that every day. I think, also, that if you took a daily poll of Microsoft employees, you would see a steadily increasing population now using Macs. Also, in reverse proportion, you would note the failing of the company as a whole. ;)