Yao Ming Mania - Latest Comments in A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

David — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 19:14:49 -0000

Its been a little while since the theft. Of course there is no looking back; only pressing forward; but that's very little compensation. If you woulda seen the "guy" taking it, I wonder if you'd a jumped on him and wrestled him to the ground. Taken some punches. The guy coulda been desperate and poked you with something sharp. It is very hard to believe nobody saw anything; more likely they didn't want to get involved. Probably didn't run off, just acted like one of the dolts that saw "nuthin'". Coulda had it tucked under his 'hoodie' and just not moving. I'm sure you've played all the scenarios in your mind. Try not to let it control you, or it'll own you. Just not worth it. You're too good a guy. --Bro.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 25 May 2009 15:09:14 -0000

Thanks. You may have something there.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

guest — Mon, 25 May 2009 13:30:01 -0000

Sorry to hear about your stuff being stolen. Here In L.A. a lot of the police are crooked and often steal things because they can get away with it.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

YaoFan — Wed, 20 May 2009 19:51:33 -0000

Dude, that sucks. Unfortunately, I had to deal with a few criminal situations like that in the past and it's no fun. Some people are ignorant to the violence and crime out there, but they just need to open up a news paper and see that we are surrounded by tons of criminals. I'd be really pissed too if that happenned to me. It was probably more than one person involved like pick pockets working in teams handing off the goods to each other in case one gets caught. Hope they find some video footage to help you at least give you an idea who took your phone and laptop. Next time try to get an encryption login set-up along with your OS login and maybe even set-up a BIOS login.

Thanks for the whole season of coverage and maybe the Rockets will go even further next season.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 21:07:59 -0000

The "boom" I guess was the sound of someone slamming their hand down on it and taking it, but I didn't see anyone running away, which was odd.

I don't know if there is much that anyone can do, other than maybe keeping an eye on eBay or Craig's List in LA for it. If you see anyone selling a titanium uni-body Mac Book (not a Mac Book Pro, or a white one), and in very good shape, but they can't tell you the applications on it, send me a link and I'll look at it. I'll also be looking at Craig's List in LA, but I could probably use some help there. Thanks.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 20:57:13 -0000

Thanks for the words. I had just bought my Mac Book because I was getting rid of an old Dell, so I had already "upgraded." I never let this thing out of my site, and in this case, it was in my peripheral vision for just a few seconds. The odds of this happening for the 15 seconds I set it down next to me out of the 3 1/2 hours I was going to have it in my hands or lap at all other times had to be a million to 1. As much publicity backing up data gets, there's still no promoted standard.
So it's up to everyone to figure out on their own what works for their
machine and budget. For example, I had Windows and Mac OS running on it using Parallels, so I guess it was kind of partitioned, which is unusual.

That puts a twist into it that makes one think if all the solutions out
there can cover that kind of setup, and when people are busy like myself covering all the Rocket games and having a full-time job, it makes that research a lesser priority.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

none — Mon, 18 May 2009 20:42:34 -0000

John, I'm sorry to hear about your stuff getting taken. If there's anything really secret on the macbook disk, I don't think the password protection will stop anyone knowledgeable and determined to get at the data. But most likely it was just some idiot wanting to peddle the hardware. So think of it as an opportunity to get an upgrade that you wanted anyway.

For various reason I don't use Apple stuff myself, but several of my co-workers really like Apple's Time Machine backup system. You should get it once you have a new computer. It makes backups completely automatic. You just plug it into a wall socket at home, and configure it, and leave it there. And (if I understand it right) anytime you turn on your computer at home (i.e. within wifi range of the Time Machine) all your stuff gets mirrored to the Time Machine's hard drive without your having to do anything. I really want to set up something like that for my Linux systems.

Remember there are two kinds of computer users: those who have lost a hard drive full of important un-backed-up data, and those who will. It takes a few experiences like that to drive in the importance of backing up.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 19:49:59 -0000

Thanks. Yup, changed access to accounts. I checked credit card benefits, and reimbursement for stolen goods isn't covered, which makes sense since most expensive items are purchased with credit cards. -- John

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

yj — Mon, 18 May 2009 19:30:58 -0000

john - if you bought computer and ipod through credit card, you might be able to get them to reimburse you. definitely change relevant financial access info just to double make sure. best luck

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 19:23:48 -0000

Thanks, and absolutely.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 19:16:41 -0000

Thanks, the next time I get one (if I do), I'll learn how to use Time
Machine and get an external hard drive.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

koensayr — Mon, 18 May 2009 18:17:33 -0000

Oh man, John, so sorry to hear that. I hope they can get some more information from those security videos. It's hard to imagine that all those people standing behind you didn't see what happened. What did the "boom" that you heard sound like? I can't imagine what I would do if I lost my laptop with all the data on there. Let us know if there's anything we can help with. I live in West LA, and I'm sure there are quite a few other frequent visitors of this website from the LA area.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:19:45 -0000

I want to thank everyone who is commenting here expressing their sympathy. I know it's just a laptop and phone, but the information on that Macbook will never be able to be replaced, which is a sad thing for me, and I'll always have in the back of my mind that someone may have access to my financial data, which is unsettling.

The other part about this is that if someone is so brazen to steal something in broad daylight with me standing right next to it, and with dozens of people who could witness it, then it makes me think that people could get mugged or killed pulling cash out of an ATM with cameras recording the whole thing, which I've heard of happening. What has this world come to?

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Josh — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:19:00 -0000

Sorry to hear about this, John!
Hopefully everything will work out for you!
So ... another reason to dislike L.A. huh?

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Staff — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:08:51 -0000

I'm willing to try anything. It's a silver Macbook and the serial number is the following:

W88485GB1B0

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Bobby — Mon, 18 May 2009 15:28:15 -0000

I've enjoyed your work, but never posed here before. I feel so sorry for you. I hope you can find your Mac or iPhone and cheer up soon!

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Kai — Mon, 18 May 2009 14:49:13 -0000

John, Sorry about that mate! Not sure what we can do to help. Hang in there.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Jason — Mon, 18 May 2009 14:47:37 -0000

Dude, this is fml worthy. But anyway im seroiusly sry about what happened to you in LA. You didn't miss much of a game.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Ree — Mon, 18 May 2009 14:40:36 -0000

Wow, I thought I was having a bad day because the Rockets lost, but it didn't come close to your fiasco. Best wishes to you, man. Let me share with you, I was having a really bad day and quite a bad several weeks when I found out you decided shut down the Yaomingmania site earlier this year. When I found out you decided to restart blogging, that brightened my life and I suspect quite a few others.

One of these days, when Yao Ming decides to retire, you can turn this site into a Rockets page or whatever sports topic you decide to follow, I for one will keep reading your posts.

Hopefully this will help your mood =)

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

IK — Mon, 18 May 2009 13:52:09 -0000

John, feel very bad for you too. It would happen to me exactly the same way if I were in your position...

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Esteban from CA — Mon, 18 May 2009 12:54:48 -0000

That's a great idea Phi. Sorry to hear about that, I live in LA and unfortunately there real shady folks here. Nevertheless, thanks for a great season and I wish you the best in retrieving your items.

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Jay K — Mon, 18 May 2009 12:13:47 -0000

John

I am sorry to hear about your things being snatched and the red tape you have to cut through and cut through some more. As a personw ho converted to Mac it is understandeable that the device is not just a machine to type, write, edit. So I am very sorry once again. I truly hope you get your things back.

May i suggest buying an external hdd(not necessarily the wireless one) and jsut backup everything thru time machine. the software itself is very easy to use so no hassle.

best wishes
Jay

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Bernie H. — Mon, 18 May 2009 12:12:55 -0000

John, that's awful. That kind of stuff ruins your whole week. Keep telling yourself things're bound to look up soon - they always do. In the meantime, I'm feelin' for ya.

Also know that your work on the blog is appreciated!

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Phi Hwang — Mon, 18 May 2009 11:12:17 -0000

Hey John,
I live outside Los Angeles and I've been checking Craigslist pretty frequently for a Mac. Perhaps you could post some details i.e. model/ color/ serial number/ special software installed and if someone sees it for sale, we could call the police?

Re: A terrible day for the Rockets, and yours truly

Kevin — Mon, 18 May 2009 09:55:58 -0000

John,

Really bad to hear this tragedy. The loss to the Lakers is another tragedy.

You don't deserve this. I wish that the Rockets official can see this and provide some help.

Kevin