Empty head, full screen

In which another mouth must be fed

2009-05-23T19:09:01Z

People buy cute things, even during recessions. If you had a machine which, with minimal investment, would churn out unique, interactive, cute things, on a regular basis, for years, you could build a tidy profit quickly.

Laverne was such a machine, breeding chihuahua puppies for a puppy mill for the first five years of her life. She lived in a cage and had little in the way of exercise or socialization. When she (or her sister Shirley -- the story's fuzzy) delivered a stillborn litter, the mill decided to approach professionals to euthanize them both. Said professionals said "no" to that, and suggested putting them up for adoption. ladymajor works in a vet hospital where there are weekly adoption events, and shortly thereafter we became the owners of our second dog.

Sadly, Laverne didn't learn some basic things that one assumes a five-year-old dog would know. Example 1: house training. She's done her duty in our carpeted home a few times in the past few weeks. Example 2: playing. She still doesn't recognize what it means when Punk (our older, larger, smarter, crankier dog) drops into a play bow and tries to chase her. Example 3: knowing her own name. It's better now, but for the first week or so, saying "Laverne" was roughly equivalent to saying "border patrol", "harmonica", or "kosher deli". I'm pretty sure Punk learned Laverne's name before she did.

Also, she's not very bright. Chihuahuas are hardly the apex of reasoned discourse, and Laverne hews close to the norm on that front. On the down side, this means she's harder to train (see above, re: poop under my desk). On the plus side, it means she's largely unscarred by the first five years of her life. Had she been a much smarter dog, she would be much more of a mess now. As it stands, she's just behind the class a bit.

And, really, there's not much intersection between the set of people who would be interested in adopting a cute, chubby, chihuahua, and the set of people who can competently deal with socializing and training an older dog. So we're probably one of the better households for her to land in.

So that's the news on our front. I'm sure ladymajor will provide pictures at some point. Suffice it to say, she's cute, chubby, bug-eyed, and has very pronounced nipples.

In which i'm a cynical bastard

2008-12-09T22:19:58Z

Ok, so Governor Rod (D-IL) has been seized by the G-Men.

He's been seized because he wanted to sell the now-vacant Senate seat.

Obama apparently wanted a specific person to fill that seat ("Candidate 1" in the reports).

Gov. Rod was under the impression that he wouldn't get any money from Obama, called him various indiscreet names, and held out the possibility of putting himself in the Senate seat ("Candidate X", maybe?).

Rahm Emanuel may have been the one to prompt action on this.

So, am i the only one thinking that if Gov. Rod had been leaning towards "Candidate 1", perhaps he might not have been arrested until after that appointment happened? Rahm knows how to play hardball, after all.

Links and Laws

2008-12-09T03:51:49Z

This first link goes out to all those computer gamers who've been at it since the mid-90s: An actively-developed, client/server, increasingly functional rewrite of Master of Magic. If you need your fix, dosbox is still the better option, but i look forward to watching this come to fruition.

Second, of general artistic and/or computing interest, Mona Lisa, in 50 polygons or less.

And, for long- (long-) time readers, proof positive that Melesky Law of the Internet #4 is still valid.

That is all.

Teach me, friends. Teach me of pie.

2008-11-20T19:42:27Z

Within a matter of days, a pie must be made. And i must make that pie.

Yet, when i make pie, the middle, it is not pie, but soup. Flour have i added, and cornstarch, and sugar. This yields naught but floury soup.

So, to the beginning i must go. When one would make a non-soup pie, whence begins one?

LiveJournal auto-post

2007-08-30T05:13:34Z

A couple days ago, i walked home from work. This morning, i walked to the train.

My handkerchief lies bent in my pocket. I won't use it again today.

Bow to your partner, now bow to your corner

2007-07-13T19:50:02Z

In a couple hours (at 6pm, to be exact), I will be learning me some square-dancing at Chicago SummerDance. Y'all should come down and join me.

It's in the Spirit of Music Garden, which is part of Grant Park. The nearest train is the Harrison stop (Red line).

It's free.

Also, square dancing is fun.

Dark shows and weird stuff

2007-05-02T22:43:12Z

A few weeks back, ladymajor and i finished the last episode of the last season of "The X-Files". There were good seasons (4 and 8, for example), and bad seasons (7 and 9), but even the bad seasons had good episodes.

Season 7, for example, had an episode entitled "Millennium", which was a crossover with the (then-canceled) series of the same name. And i enjoyed that episode. So it was a pretty logical conclusion to start NetFlixing "Millennium", the series.

After the first few episodes, i thought: Wow, this is pretty neat, if occasionally incredibly sanctimonious. Why didn't i watch this ten years ago (when such sanctimony would have gone unnoticed)?

After the first few disks, i'm thinking: Holy crap, this is a dark series. I'm still enjoying it, but, criminy, it's tough to watch more than an episode a day without dragging me down.

We could churn through 3-4 episodes of the "X-Files" in a single night, partly because some episodes were crap, and partly because the ones that weren't crap didn't tend to take themselves too seriously. "Millennium"'s a different story. It doesn't fall back on the supernatural, so we're routinely confronted with dark human impulses. And it ruminates on them relentlessly, for the duration of the episode.

When i say "we're confronted", i really mean "i'm confronted", since ladymajor refuses to watch with me. Probably because i showed her the evil clown from the child's nightmare in episode 3.

In other thoughtlines, i've recently been unable to shake the notion that, should a modern, live-action movie version of "The Jetsons" be made, Jon Polito should be Mr. Spacely. I've been unable to cast the rest of the roles, though.

I've also been playing too much Desktop Tower Defense (for all you RTS turtlers).

And, finally, i assume there's some deeper meaning to game, game, and again, game, but i have yet to find it.

Our first promotion

2007-04-24T15:40:24Z

Sorry for the rapid-fire entries. And sorry for my shameless pandering.

HowToOpenThings launched late last night/early this morning. And we have a bunch of contests, all of which have actual money attached to them.

But we're low on entries.

So, we're incentivizing. We'll give you $5 just for entering a contest. Which isn't much, but it's more than nothing, and an entry might win the contest prize, too.

We pay via PayPal, and we'll happily pay the first 100 entries that come in, provided they follow these incredibly strict rules:

1) You must have the rights to the video you submit (you can’t just use any old video from YouTube).
2) The video needs to be a legitimate effort at winning the contest you enter (of course it can be a bad effort – just please make sure the video pertains to the contest).
3) After posting the video, drop us an email at info@howtoopenthings.com – we’ll confirm the above steps and drop the $5 into your Paypal account.

It would help us out a great deal, and you get some cash in the process.

Or, if you're not interested, please pass this on to someone you know who wants to make short videos about opening stuff. For money. Or buy some votes and contribute to the evaluation process. That's cool, too.

If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, let me know.

And thanks for your help.

Holy Crap (in which our Hero needs to brush up on his C# skills)

2007-04-01T14:45:28Z

As most of you know, i left my last full-time position a few weeks ago. My stated intention was to do some independent contracting work for a while. As is so often the case with me, though, plans change.

Almost exactly three months ago, now, i was contacted by a recruiter -- a complete cold call, really (though it was email, not phone contact). The job wasn't really my area of expertise, but the company had its own type of prestige. On a complete lark, i responded to it. I didn't figure it would go anywhere.

Then the first phone interview happened. And i realized 1- this was for real, and 2- despite my reservations about this particular place, it might be a fun company to work for.

All in all, it took five extended (hour-and-a-half or more) phone interviews, about a dozen more shorter phone conversations, and one grueling day-long in-person interview (with 15 people total). I was moved from department to department, as they tried to find the best fit for me. All over the course of eight weeks.

And then i stopped hearing from them.

So i figured that it was off. The anticipation of leaving my former position had built up enough that i had to get out anyway. So i did. And i hooked myself up with a couple contract gigs, and there we go.

Until Friday afternoon, when i got a call. And with a call, a verbal offer. And shortly thereafter, i got an electronic copy of that offer in an email, and a promise that the written one was already in the mail. I should probably wait till the paper shows up at my door, but i'm too excited, and this place has too good a reputation to not follow through.

ladymajor, at the end of the month, we're moving to Redmond!

I can only describe this as the coolest job that's ever been offered to me. I'll be working on semantic and statistical textual analysis (which, for those who don't know, is one of my academic interests), improving the document classification algorithms that power the upcoming Microsoft Word Document Assistant. I think i'm allowed to say that. But probably not much more. It will be pretty sweet.

In the meantime, i'm going to be sending this LJ into retirement, and starting up a new blog at Spaces (i'm not required to by company policy, but it seems like a good "team player" move). I'll provide a link when it's set up, and then you'll be able to catch my updates there.

Alright. I'm off to a celebration brunch. And then i have to figure out how to install Vista on my G4 PowerBook.

The interview game

2007-03-15T18:49:47Z

* Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."
* I respond by asking you five personal questions so I can get to know you better. If I already know you well, expect the questions may be a little more intimate!
* You will update your LJ with the answers to the questions.
* You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.
* When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Courtesy of sigerson.

You're something of a globehopper. Are there countries that you would never consider visiting? Why?

There are a couple different ways of interpreting that question. One is "are there any countries that i strongly don't want to visit?" I don't know that there are, really. There are some countries that make it very hard to visit (e.g. Bhutan, North Korea), or are just dangerous to visit (e.g. Afghanistan, Somalia), but that doesn't mean i don't want to so much as it may mean i won't be able to.

And certainly there are the countries that are unpopulated barren wastelands. But even barren wastelands usually have something interesting going for them. They're just quite low on the priority list.

Another way of taking the question is at face value. In that case, i'd have to say i would never consider visiting countries that i don't know about. But that's a snarky literalist answer (not that you expected otherwise).

You once told me that you'd thought about becoming a priest. What would have to have changed in your life for you to take up that vocation?

Whew, that's a doozy.

Ultimately, i realized that not having faith in the Catholic god was a barrier to entry. Or at least a barrier to being useful in that role. So the biggest change in my life would have to be faith: having it, or not losing it (it's unclear to me at this point whether i really had faith to lose in the first place).

One thing that is clear is that my path of questioning, once started, had an inevitable conclusion. So it's possible that failing to question my faith in the first place would have been enough. I would have to have been a very different person for that to come to pass.

However, i didn't seriously consider the priesthood until after i had started questioning. So failing to question may not be enough. It may be that i would have needed to believe in the ability to be a priest without faith. Well, in my ability to be a priest without faith. Faith in my faithlessness, in a way.

Describe the ideal neighborhood.

Urban. Low-rises, not more than, say, five or six stories. Commercial space mixed in with the residential -- not just stores, but restaurants, pubs, salons, office space, etc.. Parks. Front porches or stoops where people actually hang out. Wide demographics: age, racial, economic, etc. Everyone knows who the local alderman/city councilor/whatnot is.

Low crime would be nice, too, though that's a tough one to construct at the neighborhood level.

You're given the opportunity to make three bills (state or federal) and have them automatically signed into law. What do you legislate?

Ooh! The Legislative Genii! Can i draft a bill that gives me the ability to draft infinite bills which are automatically signed into law?

Right, anyhow. That's a good question.

First, i would pass a bill which rolls back all increases to executive power that have been enacted since the beginning of the twentieth century. In the absence of a nation with significant preemptive strike power, we can afford to have a reactive executive. We would probably have a few years of chaos inside the beltway, as congress suddenly needs to be competent again, but it would even out soon enough, and we'd be a more stable republic at the end of it.

Next, i would end the War on Drugs (though this is partly accomplished by the rollback of executive power above). This would entail the legalization or decriminalization of all currently criminal substances (repeal of the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, withdraw or reexamine our party status in the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961 and the Convention on Psychotropic Substances of 1971), dismantle the DEA, stop federal drug-enforcement-related funding of local law enforcement agencies, establish the lack of federal ability to legislate on matters of substance abuse, and encourage state and local legislatures to repeal any increase in police powers granted under the aegis of drug enforcement.

Wow, i get one more. This one would have to be state-level, not federal, but it would hopefully serve as a model for other states. Establish approval voting as the voting method for all state and local elections. While we're at it, require any and all electronic voting devices to either 1- operate only fully open-source software, or 2- record each and every ballot on a separate paper voting receipt which will be visible and verifiable by the voter and used for audits and recounts.

What part of your current life did you never expect?

I never expected to be unemployed as often, regularly, profitably, or enjoyably as i have been in my adult life. It's a remarkable thing to have the right and ability to leave a work situation, and not one which i would have thought of fifteen years ago.

Also, i never really expected to live in Chicago for as long as i have. When i moved here, i figured i'd be in for a couple years, and then off to another locale, whether midwest, west coast, or expatriated. But i seem to have settled in a bit. It's a good city.

здравствунте!

2007-03-14T17:14:03Z

The world is a strange, strange place.

I left work. Friday was my last day. I'm already bored, though i have a couple freelance gigs starting up, so that is conveniently timed.

The strange, strange part is the letter i received yesterday. From a woman in Skokie, whom i don't know.

It was hand-written. In cyrillic.

It included a pamphlet (the headline of which is "конец ложной религии блнзок!"). Judging from an illustration inside (a seven-headed red leopard with ten horns ridden by a lascivious woman), it's a religious tract¹. Which presumably means the hand-written letter is expressing concern about the state of my immortal soul.

Which is a sweet thing, really, but what the heck? I don't even know which cyrillic-based language this is. The only such language i've ever had significant exposure to is Mongolian, but i can barely remember enough to count to ten.

Anyone able to tell me what the language is, based on my (possibly incorrectly) transcribed words? Anyone up for a translation challenge?

¹ There's an additional hint, though i didn't find it till later. In the "fill this out and send it in" section, there's an English-language reference to the Jehovah's Witnesses. That still doesn't explain why the hell anyone would send me such a thing.

Link for console geeks

2007-01-27T17:44:07Z

"If disaster were made of strawberries, we'd all be drinking a lot of smoothies right now."

Some things

2006-12-17T02:04:56Z

A couple of times this week, just south of Union Station, there has been a "come visit Mexico" truck. This truck is ingeniously designed with transparent walls and a heater, so bikini-clad women can frolic with beachballs in the middle of the Chicago chill. There's also a bundled-up guy outside the truck who hands out fliers.

2005 go down in history as the year they perfected "inflatable snow globe" technology. 2006 will go down in history as the year we all got tired of them.

ladymajor, who claims to be my significant other, now has a LiveJournal. She was tired of being left out of the party.

Shortly after Thanksgiving, somebody vomited outside our workplace. It stayed for several days until two days of rain washed away a small fraction of it. Then December hit Illinois like a punch in the face -- weather in the 60s the last few days of November, several inches of snow on top of a couple inches of slush on December 1st. This Wednesday, it warmed back up again and rain came to wash away the snow. Yesterday, i noted that the concrete had actual splatter stains which had somehow persisted throughout the weeks of weather.

What the hell did he eat?

A brief poll-ish request for answers

2006-10-17T20:30:26Z

With all the stuff that's going on in the world today, the question i find myself most concerned with is:

What should i be for Halloween?

Please keep in mind that it's gotten cold early here in Chicago, so short skirts are out of the question.

Brief bit about my head

2006-09-25T15:53:41Z

Just a few moments ago, i spotted a truck. On that truck was a logo, which i immediately deemed similar to the logo of Seattle's Best Coffee, to which i generally refer as "SBC". Then my mind drifted to other things.

A moment and a half later, i spotted the same truck again, and thought "Ah, yes. That logo's similar to SBC's logo." When i tried to think of SBC's logo, i wondered what the heck i was thinking when i first spotted the truck.

It took me another moment to backtrace my thought processes.

Hm.

In other news, i'm back from Portland and the ICFP conference. I'm sifting through a great backlog of email. And i'm at work, doing crappy work stuff.

Question

2006-09-07T18:56:21Z

Do i know anyone in Portland, OR?

a brief travelogue

2006-07-04T03:33:03Z

Hanover, Massachusetts
Forty Fort, Pennsylvania (Wyoming Avenue)
Forty Fort (Owen Street)
Dauphin, Pennsylvania (Vesta Drive)
The Old I, Williams College
One of the Greylock dorms (summer housing)
Tyler Annex, Williams
Currier (summer again, Williams again)
Somerville, Massachusetts (apartment 1, with Jasper)
Somerville, Massachusetts (apartment 2, again with Jasper)
back at Williams, Wood
Mill Street, Williamstown
Greenview and Byron, Chicago
Grace and Hermitage, Chicago
Greenview and Blackhawk, Chicago

And, come Saturday, my sixteenth home at Superior and Ashland. That's an average of one move every two years. No wonder i was feeling wanderlustig after staying in one spot for five.

In which our hero pluralizes

2006-06-20T00:27:28Z

I am pleased to announce that i will be moving again in fairly short order. Staying in the city, near where i currently am. However, i am officially upgrading my romantic counterpart to cohabitator. This means i may spontaneously use the first person plural (e.g. "we have a dog").

The new place is a bit south, near Chicago and Ashland. It's a bit further out of the way, L-wise, but still eminently within the public transit domain. Also, the place we found is quite, quite cute. With a view.

There was some conflict with another couple over the lease. Needless to say, we defeated them in the ancient rite of "getting our check in first".

Housewarming to be announced at a later time.

We're moving in together. She's psyched. I'm psyched and scared to the bowel voiding point. I haven't had a roommate, romantic or otherwise, since, what, '98?

Ah, it will be fine. And fun.

Hrm

2006-05-30T15:19:56Z

The bird.

It pooped.

On my head. This morning. While i walked to the train.

My handkerchief lies bent in my pocket. I won't use it again today.

Knock, knock on my window

2006-05-17T22:38:22Z

Hailstorm!

We're having thunderstorms in Chicago right now, and i got to witness what i think is the first hailstorm of the season. First we had half-inchers come down, till the ground had probably a dozen or so per square foot. Then the rain picked up, and within thirty seconds, they were all gone (save for the less meltable places, like our doormat or the woodchips at the base of the sidewalk trees).

Then, about a minute later, smaller ones (about a quarter inch) started coming down. They were accompanied shortly by much larger ones (over three-quarters of an inch), the latter of which persisted for a while in the rain, before finally melting away about two minutes later.

Weather is weird. That is all.

I think i've figured out the problem with this administration

2006-05-16T18:59:21Z

Bush is like an SNL skit -- he's only got three years of material that he's trying to stretch to eight.

Not an update

2006-05-11T15:53:30Z

Political news: Senator Clinton introduced a bill which connects congressional pay and the minimum wage.

Is this an election year? Yes. At the same time, forcing congressfolk to think about broader economic issues when giving themselves pay boosts is a mighty nice ploy.

Footnotes from a true but non-existent update post

2006-04-21T16:32:37Z

¹ Earlier, the mother of that same family had asked me if i spoke their language. Of course i didn't. The ensuing discussion revealed that the son and daughter had failed to pay attention to the loudspeaker system and had thus missed their flight. Had the mother spoken fluent English, i doubt they would have missed it.

² This is reconstructed from rumors. Alternate versions have the father-in-law hitting the child, both with and without lasik surgery involved. I can't claim actual knowledge here.

³"What happens when a UChicago student transfers to Northwestern? Both schools' average IQ goes up five points." In Northwestern's defense, he told the joke in a truly UChicago manner -- he had to repeat it twice and was delivered unfunnily each time.

⁴ Recognized, actually, by the tattoo on her inside right forearm -- her hair had grown significantly and the weariness on her face rendered her not immediately recognizable.

⁵ This is the A who dropped me for a Glamour magazine, not the A who broke up with me via email. At this point in the walk, though, it would not have surprised me to see her, too, and S, who lives nearby.

⁶ The logistics of this are complicated but, i think, possible. The question is less the weight (fairly negligible in comparison) than the bulk. And, well, whether there's a place to change.

A conversation, abridged. A liar is made of the hero. And a prophet, too.

2006-04-03T16:31:32Z

First, a conversation, between our hero (OH), and My Romantic Counterpart (MRC), edited for content, length, and content:

Thursday...
MRC: I have Friday and Saturday off. Want to do something?
OH: Sure! I've been feeling spring feverish. I haven't traveled in a while. Want to fly somewhere? Just for the two days? Or maybe take a train! Or perhaps drive! Or something travel-ish, perhaps!
MRC: Bwuh?

Later, Thursday...
OH: Well, we can fly to Portland, but not direct, so it's six hours each way. Same with Memphis. We can fly to Omaha, but there are no return flights available, so we'd be stuck. There's Pittsburgh...
MRC: Wait, huh? You were serious?
OH: ...and all the trains are just waaaay slow. So it's pretty much Pittsburgh or Oakland, or drive somewhere, because anywhere that's quick enough to get to by train is just as easy to drive to, or maybe take a bus, but...
MRC: You're serious! And apparently hyper! This is neat!

Friday morning (early)...
OH: Okay. Driving. Wisconsin or Michigan?
MRC: Michigan!
OH: Excellent. Turn east at the compass rose.

And that's how we ended up spending a couple days in Saugatuck, which, for my east-coast readers, is like Bar Harbor, only for the midwest, and on a lake instead of the ocean. Nice beach, though. Got back yesterday morning, in time for MRC to get to work (and for me to watch a local production of The Skin of Our Teeth, which is much more, well, not crappy when you're not reading it in high school english class.

Second, i interviewed at a company almost two months ago. I was excited about them, they were excited about me, and they failed to contact me for weeks at a time. I had given up on hearing from them again. But, of course, shortly after i announced my impending lazy lifestyle, they made me an actual offer. And i took it. Start a week from today, making it an even two months of lounging and freelance. I'll be back in the self-employment world again, no doubt, but it might be closer to the couple more years i was expecting.

Third, and only for the Chicagoans out there, i shall be reading runes and tarot at a fundraiser for a local theatre company, located at the Four Moon Tavern, Roscoe and Wolcott, starting tonight (Monday, April 3rd) at 7pm. Swing on by and come to the realization that i actually can see your soul from here.

phaedrusdeinus @ 2006-03-21T22:07:00

2006-03-22T04:08:57Z

This is an odd sort of question, but is anyone reading this in any way personally familiar with Apple Computer co-founder Steve Wozniak? Perhaps enough so to provide an intro?

Just checking.