EndNote and Other Antiquated, Specialized Software

For my workstudy at George Mason I am using a piece of software called EndNote which I found to be emblematic of antiquated, specialized software.  While not always true it tends to have the following traits:

1. Expensive
2. Deal-breaker because it has some feature(s) that some niche needs.
3. Poorly laid out GUI.
4. Feature bloat with functions laid out all over the place.  Give you the feeling that functionality was shoehorned into the program with each upgrade.
5. Seems as if it is the standard in its niche; see "Deal-breaker" above.

The funny thing is I just saw a listing on Slashdot that the Center for History and New Media School in George Mason is being sued for reverse engineering EndNote and introducing it as an open source, free, and much easier to use plugin for Firefox entitled Zotero .

Trying to get used these weekends on my own.

I haven't been on my own in a number of years. My daughter is back in school for the year and as you know my love Elise has left me for a new life in California. Someone at the D.C. Divorce Support Meetup group asked me what I do for fun and what came to mind was spending time with my family. Hmm, leaves me kinda stuck. Of course there are a lot of diverse and esoteric interests that I have but the foundation of most of it was the Kevin, Elise, & Helen power treo. To be honest it is intimidating to go out on my own in this still new and strange city and get involved. I am going meetup.com crazy and volunteered for an ACLU training next weekend. The reality is that my time is limited after studies, work, and oh yea that mental health thing. I don't know what to say except this is not what I expected. I expected to be married to Elise Burrows, buying a house, starting a career, a couple of pugs Pretty boring. It makes me sad, it makes me lonely. So I try to remain positive, focused and involved. To rememeber the important things I have like friends and family (wish they were closer), reasonable financial security and comfort, and making positive changes in my life.

Any comments, thoughts, and especially hugs sent my symbolically or in person would make a world of difference.

Take a DEEP, DEEP Breath

Holy crap the secondary student loan came through. I want to do pirouettes in my ballet slippers across the floor!! Screeeecccccchhhhhh, holy crap I look at the fine print and realize this is like a small freaking mortgage. Now this is just one of three and they are talking about 20 year repayments and by the time I pay it off I will have almost paid back twice the original loan amount. Breath Kevin breath at least you will be able to buy groceries and rent for the next year. Repeat after me, debt is good, debt drives the economy, debt is good.....