My Gateway FPD 2185W, Gateway FPD 2185W Widescreen High-Definition – LCD 2121″, just DIED 3 months after the warranty expired. I was so shocked (literally) that I got sick.

I ordered it in 2006 at the same time as my Gateway computer. I’m a tough shopper, and love to do research and understand everything. One thing I knew I wanted was a very quiet computer – and 3 years later, this is the quietest computer I’ve ever heard, even with a 500g hard drive and 2 gig of RAM (did I say that right?) Although it gets a little noisy, when the fans start going when I use Photoshop… I’m still not sure if a better video card or more memory would help me out there.

I also wanted a widescreen super-sharp dealie monitor, and  if you got a monitor with the Gateway computer you got a good deal. The FPD 2185W was the best or 2nd best monitor at the time, and it cost $600, and $100 less with the computer so I happily chose that one.  I loved that monitor – -crisp and sharp, with never a problem. I told everyone how great it was!

But what kind of crap monitor just blows like that?! No warning, nothing at all. The reviews here at Amazon Gateway FPD 2185W Widescreen High-Definition – LCD display – TFT – 21 say it all:

DO NOT BUY THIS MONITOR!

As has happened to many others, my monitor went dead (blank screen / can’t turn it off) a little after the warranty expired (after a year and a half). This was a very expensive monitor and Gateway knows that this model is defective, yet they refuse to admit this or do anything about it. Also, like many others, this is definitely the last Gateway product of any type that I will ever buy. I hope others follow suit.

He’s right on that. I’m not even looking at Gateway for my next one. (Turns out Gateway is now owned by Acer anyway.)

Of course, once it breaks, you’re dead if you don’t have another monitor just lying around the house. There was no warning, just black. I couldn’t get online to even find anything out. Used a neighbor’s computer and right away found this blog on Gateway Monitors (which should have been called Gateway Monitors Suck.) Anyway, turns out it is 8 cheapie capacitors that go bad, pfft. Easy to fix, IF YOU KNOW HOW TO SOLDER. Oh, yeah, just get my solder iron out from under my drawing table here…I’m so screwed!

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Remember when I wrote a couple of months ago that Google decided it hated me, sent me to my room, and took away my traffic? I had read on one of the sites I researched there that it could be because of one squiffy iffy comment that appeared in his site when he was out of town and couldn’t monitor it. I thought that was strange. I couldn’t find anything iffy on my site besides my political cartoons. I don’t even have hardly any swear words. But today I found out why!

Quick, go to this post about the power of chocolate chip cookies. It’s one of my most popular pages, because it has a cartoon about Freudian Slips. (It’s my 5th most popular page this month. Even more popular is my post on Glee, because every one in the universe wants to know if it’s a gay show! ) Now, you tell me, would anyone reading that post think it was some kind of “pron” site? Yet I just discovered tonight, while checking out something else on the blog, that there are no adsense ads there! It’s totally blank!

Now, it originally had a couple of different words there. I’ll hyphenate them here, just to be safe. The title was, She needs therapy, or good s-ex, take your pick. Who in their right mind would say that is suggestive?!

Also, instead of asshat, I had A##h… and a couple more symbols. Does Google think that is swearing?! Has it never read cartoons before?

I am not changing any more words until I see what happens next on that page. The word s-ex is still in the title on the headline of the title bar, if you’ll notice. I might have to change the permalink to take the se-x word out. Can you believe this?!

This proves that Google is really Big Brother, condemning the most innocent ideas as trash. It really is a horrible monopoly, stealing the copyright of images everywhere, orphan books, out of print books, and anything else it thinks it can get away with.

I’ve known Marty ever since I started cartooning. I was in some of Sam Gross’s books and Sam emailed me asking if I knew Marty and Fred Lucky, two great cartoonists out here. At that time, I knew NO other cartoonists, anywhere! Alone, all alone, in a wide wide sea. (There was a cartoon group, that had meetings, CAPS, but I didn’t find them for years because they didn’t advertise or have notices anywhere. They FINALLY have a website, nicely done, but no info about what happens at the meetings, to insure that they don’t get any new members, or any ex-members (like me) interested in coming back.)

Anyway, I had lunch with Marty and Fred, who were best buddies, and that was the beginning! Of course, they were very sweet and appreciative of my work – very kind of them!- but I was a little intimidated. They used to get together with all the successful guys, like Sergio Aragones, and with the animation guys, (animation was still going well then), etc  at extremely expensive meals that I couldn’t afford. There was always a handful of wannabes at these gatherings, and afterwards Marty and Fred would happily flame them and warn me that these were the guys who followed cartoonists, wanted to be them, and yet…never were. I never saw Marty be rude to anyone, but he always avoided sitting next to them!

Marty was the best mentor anyone could ask for, and he taught me more about cartoons than anyone or any book. Sure, he was grumpy a lot – especially after Fred Lucky passed away a couple years after I met him. I think he never quite got over that. But he was very positive about a lot of things I tried: greeting cards, syndication, my books, and even my political cartoons, which very sadly, he never saw, since they are mostly online. He was curious and supersmart, and we talked for hours about art and even more, what was going on in the rest of our lives. I would like to say he was like a second father to me, but my own father might be hurt. In any case, he was like an older brother, giving me advice about my car, editors, how to go into the outside world (we were both loners!), parties, his Chicago background, just about anything. It brings tears to my eyes to remember all that we shared.   Read more »

WORST. MOD. ON Television Without Pity. I’ve said it before, and Barnes certainly wears this mantle proudly this month. Unfortunately for the popular Bachelorette forum, she’s there to bug all the time. Also, WTH is wrong with Bravo, that they hire someone on their lucrative TWOP forum whose proclaimed purpose in being there is to delete, complain, and close down the forum? Interesting way to run a business.

Here you go – and she’s off:

Aug 15, 2009 @ 8:27 pm

Closing the thread temporarily, because people aren’t really using it to discuss media, anyhow.

Word to the wise, if you see yourself as a contestant’s defense attorney or prosecutor, you should probably post elsewhere. I’ll clean things up and open the thread tomorrow or Monday — as time allows. Everyone go have a weekend or something.

Aug 24, 2009 @ 12:42 pm

The nagging me just makes me contrary, in case you didn’t notice. And to be clear, one request isn’t nagging; it’s the pile on that’s the problem.

Aug 27, 2009 @ 10:30 pm

Thread closed. Again.

19 posts deleted. 1 person banned.

Look, this isn’t the Ed thread. Reality Steve isn’t media. If he’s reporting on a contestant, take it to that contestant’s thread.

When there’s actual news about this show, please send me a PM and let me know. The thread is closed until then.

Is she a freaking control freak, or what?!!! I can see why being a mod attracts copy editor types, but how about little people like this?

And don’t you love that Reality Steve isn’t the media?! Ummm – (they don’t allow this word in TWOP, so I’m glad I don’t comment there -:)) – it’s called a BLOG. Is she going to claim USW, ET, and all the other blogs aren’t media, too? I don’t read him – not interested in someone who apparently delights in ruining the surprise in a show- but I think he does his research, and I did hear part of his Deanna interview, and he is a pro.

More later on my view of the latest news.