Bitch, Then You Die

Godwin's Law

2007-09-05T16:42:00.000-04:00

First they throttled the AzNs, and I did not reconfigure my BitTorrent client -
because I did not download Korean soap operas.

Then they came for the furries, and I did not build a Linux gateway to actively bounce errant RST packets -
because furries creep me out.

Then they came for the n00bs, and I did not provide them tech support -
because I was 1337.

Then they came for me - and there was no one left in my swarm and all my downloads were stuck at 87%.

180 Degrees

2007-05-29T17:08:00.001-04:00

It's summer. Beards and long hair are out. Looking like everyone else is in.

Before: "You dirty fucking hippie, get the hell out of our caucus!"

After: The hair says "Republican" but the goatee screams "iconoclast". Or at least "graphic designer".

RIP Robert Beard

Tom Waits - One Night Stand

2007-05-20T01:21:00.000-04:00

One Night Stand
Skydisc Records (USA) 1995
SCD2300 CD Length: (61:43)
Live from "Agora Ballroom": Cleveland, Ohio
August 25, 1976 and December 3, 1976

1. Standing On The Corner (5:45)
2. I Never Talk To Strangers (3:40)
3. The One That Got Away (5:16)
4. Depot Depot (3:42)
5. Jitterbug Boy (5:44)
6. Fumblin' With The Blues (2:40)
7. The Piano Has Been Drinkin' Not Me (9:53)
8. Depot Depot (3:26)
9. Jitterbug Boy (4:48)
10. Emotional Weather Report (5:54)
11. San Diego Serenade (6:07)
12. The One That Got Away (4:50)

Hi, Grimes and Mr. Meaner

2007-04-25T22:28:00.000-04:00

"My mother says I'm handsome and my heart tells me I'm right."

Representative Dennis "Not taken seriously because he's not very attractive, in that WASPy kind of way that is for some reason a prerequisite for being an effective political leader" Kucinich filed Articles of Impeachment against Vice President Cheney yesterday (110th Congress, Session 1, House Resolution 333, comments from Kucinich). You all read the news, and the case for impeachment doesn't really need much introduction. However, for you lawyerly types, the High Crimes and Misdemeanors include:

Claiming that Iraq possessed WMD's before and during the Second Iraq War when he knew there were none (article 1)
Asserting a link between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein when he knew there was none (article 2)
Threatening war with Iran without just cause, in violation of the UN Charter (article 3)

"I'm a rich old white man. I have your best interests at heart and I would never dream of enslaving you."

I'm frequently very cynical about the potential for individuals to effect genuine political change in a system tainted by corporate lobbyists and so-called "special interest groups". In that respect, I view this as an opportunity for us to see if Our Democracy can still be saved. More importantly, it's a chance for us to speak up on something that is really a no-brainer. We may disagree on tax cuts, drug laws or the war in general, but this is about Cheney in particular. At this point, the least we should require of him is to defend his actions in a court of law. If he's a criminal, he shouldn't be Vice President. Plain and simple.

Here's a link to the House web site where you can email your Congressperson: http://www.house.gov/writerep/

You don't need to write an essay; chances are that your email won't make it past a lowly staffer. But those staffers tally the email that they read all day and report the results to their Rep. If enough of us make our opinions heard, they will have to listen. (Or, our country and way of life are doomed forever. -cynical radrik) Here's a short sample email:

On Tuesday, Representative Kucinich introduced H.Res. 333 to begin impeachment proceedings against Vice President Cheney. As one of your constituents, I urge you to vote in favor of impeachment. Thank you.

Sincerely,
Dirk Americanner, Private Investigator

"As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master." -Commissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Declaration of Rights", Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri

Keep on rockin' in the free world.

P.S. - Ironically, the number 333 (666/2) is the number of Choronzon, the beast who guards the last gate to enlightenment, devouring the minds of unprepared mystics. (See Wikipedia - Choronzon and Erowid - Ego Loss)

Now You Can Blog In Hindi!

2007-04-24T16:00:00.001-04:00

Adblock

Things I Don't Do

2007-02-08T04:27:00.000-05:00

I don't write poetry
Because the only thing I know about poetry is
Poetry doesn't have to rhyme.

Also, I don't read books. If you're like me and prefer movies to books, watch Factotum instead of reading Factotum or being a factotum.

America's Attempts at Space Flight Begin to Resemble American Foreign Policy

2007-01-31T18:13:00.000-05:00

(Click the link for the full story. Thanks to Lyndon for bringing this to my attention.)

Lyndon: it was kind of like a golf club hitting a lighter
Me: it's like hitting a lighter with a golf club when what you were expecting was more mentos and diet coke

As Seen on 1980s TV!

2007-01-27T18:03:00.001-05:00

Using only a paperclip, MacGyver relieved Pete's anal blockage. Apparently Pete was having difficulty passing an explosive bicycle.

A Christmas Story

2007-01-04T00:22:00.002-05:00

Twas the sixth afore Year'gin and all through the manger,
nothing was stirrin', not friend, pal or stranger.
But all those 'round knew something holy was 'bout;
When Santa came due, babies popped out.
'S the time o' th' year fer good chillin' a'go sleepin'
Cause lil' baby Jesus' head be a'peekin'.

And, lo!, three wise men looked upon the baby Jesus as he lie in the manger and said, "Yea, what is that before our eyes?" An angel of the Lord had appeared above their heads, and in his hands he carried a tree that would be forever green. The angel spake, "Do this in memory of me." Speaking thusly, he flew to the top of the tree, and there he sat, until New Years Day when he placed the tree by the curb for the lepers to take away.

As the angel departed, he swung back towards the Lord
So G-d above struck him down for his vanity.
The shepherds turned when they heard the crackle of de-existence
And were similarly crackled.
For the god that had awoke was an angry god
Who smote cities and damned His children who dared mix cheeses and meats,
and forbid the digestion of strange sea creatures
and destroyed Creation with water
(although he promised to never do that again)
and rarely He spoke clearly
and rarely He answered prayers,
but when he did
the small group
who listened right
were added to The Book.
And so it continued until the book was full. Then, H-s miracles were ignored, because they weren't as impressive as his earlier works.

Then Men found Reason,
Saw Structure in Universe
What was left for God?

"He is Truth!" they cried.
"Always Undefinable!"
In a way, they're right.

We'd eaten Apple.
Aware of the Consequence?
Nothing like This. Please.

When Man died, He died as slowly as possible, because He could afford the best doctors. He considered this a victory because it proved that money can buy a day at the end of a man's life, and if that's not worth the price, what is? All He could think, though, was of a hundred days he would have done again a million times and the other hundred that he would have changed in a million ways. His Son never came, and he died with the TV on, blaring something.

My Labels

2006-11-29T18:39:00.000-05:00

Starbucks
iPod
Jim Beam
Banana Republic
Nike
Fossil
Razr
Tissot
Gap
Dell
Camel
Johnny Walker
Tivo

Why David Byrne is Cool

2006-09-06T02:21:00.000-04:00

David Byrne was the lead singer of the Talking Heads. He gave the band a distinctive sound and soul. He never outshoned his fellow band members, but made everyone shine brighter. Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain killed themselves to secure their places in history. David Byrne made a band. He makes music to this day. His web page is www.davidbyrne.com/, says Google. I think he's on MySpace. Tina, too. Qu'est que c'est?

-Mark, 3rd grade

P.S. - Ms. Sabo, did Kurt Cobain die yet?

Google Page Creator: Cool? ...or Gay?

2006-08-28T18:00:00.000-04:00

I'm testing to see if I can use my Google Page Creator account to host images for this site. Here goes:

e: it works.

What's an Internet?

2006-08-09T08:43:00.000-04:00

Al-Manar, widely considered a mouthpiece for Hizballah and categorized as a terrorist group by the U.S., linked to the small cable company's IP (Internet Protocol) address, which can be thought of, in simple terms, as a telephone number. Hizballah essentially added an extension on that telephone line allowing their traffic to flow. Hizballah then gets the word out through e-mail and blogs that it can be found at that IP address and the hijack is complete. If the hijack is not detected, the IP address can be linked to a new domain name and that opens up the site to anyone who might search online for Al-Manar content. Hizballah uses these Web sites to run recruitment videos and post bank account numbers where supporters can donate funds.

Source: Time.com

It's a series of tubes.
And if you don't understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and its going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material.

Source: Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) via Wired

I don't know which quotation is more ignorant. But since I have to choose (I asked the question, after all) I'll go with Ted Stevens', because Time readers aren't supposed to be smart.

By the way: To our most loyal readers, the hijack is complete. Send money to Bank of America account #45424545433##three333#33. Just google "Al-Manar content" and you'll find the package. Love, Hezballah

On Examining

2006-08-03T20:52:00.000-04:00

It's quarter to 9 on a Thursday. This will be the third night in a row that I've stayed at work past midnight. I was riding up the elevator reflecting on the 3-4 cases I still have to do before Monday morning. An idea bubbled up from my subconscious mind and was promoted to "thought" by my consciousness. The thought was, "This job really isn't that bad."

8:43 PM on Thursday, August 3, 2006: the moment that the job won.

Things could be a lot worse. Sure, the workload sucks. Sure, we get shit on by management, the media and attorneys. Sure, I am in some small way complicit in the horrors being perpetuated by my government at home and abroad. Sure, my function is to grant monopolies to impersonal, faceless, oppressive multinationals.

On the other hand, I get to spend all day telling lawyers that they're wrong. I work with cutting-edge technologies in a high-profile area of law (alright, cutting-edge technologies of two years ago). My hours are supremely flexible, my boss is cool and my co-workers almost universally smell better than I do, particularly when I go to the Old Town Cafe for lunch. I always get paid on time, and I can dick around online all day long if I want.

The sun has shined (shone? sheened? shinned?) every day for the last month. The earth has yet to be consumed by a Biblical, ecological or nuclear apocalypse. George Bush is a month closer to retirement. Bill and Melinda Gates are throwing money at all kinds of diseases that I could one day contract. On my own time, I'm free to undermine the intellectual property of the very corporations I aided during the day. There's a roof over my head, food on my table and a well-broken-in pair of Nike's on my feet.

Did I mention all the tail I bag?

A Pirate is a Duck

2006-07-21T18:47:00.000-04:00

Thanks to YouTube for hosting.

I should have called it "Global Warming? Now that's an impending apocalype I can accept as a rational individual!"

2006-07-21T03:17:00.000-04:00

I just went meta.

I shall go idle no more forever

2006-07-11T00:10:00.000-04:00

After years of being staunchly anti-idle-time-blocking ("anti-idle time blocking"? I love punctuation! In this case, changing punctuation changes the way you read it and the way you say it. I prefer the heavily-hyphenated version on both counts.), I've decided to begin hiding my idle time. For those of you not versed in the lingo, I won't "go grey" (gray?) any more on your buddy list. I had always said such a move was "anti-social" (there's that pesky hyphen again. Since it's usually punctuated "anti-social behavior", one is led to believe that the appropriate hyphenation rule for hyphenating multi-word phrases is to hyphenate only the first prefix/word pair. The problem is "social" is used as an adjective modifying the noun "behavior." The relationship between the words in idletimeblocking (this is why hyphens are important) is not so clear. None of the words is oft-used as an adjective. The words are three pieces of clay (nouns -> tangible -> earth) pounded into a name. "Idle time blocking" becomes brick into which no punctuation (hyphens included!) can be inserted.). (Or should I have put the period before the parenthesis?) After careful evaluation of my recent AIMing, I've realized that I'm no longer a polite instant messenger ("instant message" being another inseparable block of word). Therefore, so as not to cause undue feelings of inadequacy should I ignore your instant message (If each word was loaded onto the page by a crane, "instant message" would be one cranefull.), I will equalize your level of disappointment when I ignore you when I'm "not grey" ("not gray"? 2 cranefulls.) and when I'm "grey" (just "grey").

May all your chats be filled with smilies! (& give more love to <({[punctuation]})>! :-)

American Psycho - Crossword

2006-07-02T17:00:00.000-04:00

American Psycho - Crossword, originally uploaded by radrik.

An Inconvenient Post

2006-06-11T16:51:00.000-04:00

Because I am an obedient hippy liberal douche, I saw An Inconvenient Truth with Sam last night. I know my opinion on the film won't make any of you go see it if you weren't going to already, so I'll get my opinion on the film out of the way right now: If you're one of the sheep who is convinced that there is no scientific consensus on "questions" like global warming, evolution or gravity, you owe it to yourself to see this movie or do some research on your own. Reading CNN (or Fox News or MSNBC or WSJ or even NYT) headlines does not make you an informed member of society. Scientists have a very strict concept of "fact" and scientific progress requires us to constantly reexamine our commonly-held ideas. That doesn't give politicians the right to treat any aspect of science as an emerging debate with no clear course of action for our leaders.

Now that I've gotten that out of the way, I'd like to comment on the audience reaction to the movie. It's reasonable to assume that anyone who would pay $9.50 to attend a 2-hour PowerPoint presentation narrated by Al Gore at 11:10 PM on a Saturday night in Georgetown falls somewhere between "card-carrying member of the ACLU" and "3rd-party voter" on the liberal/conservative spectrum. This was the exact target audience for the movie, so you would expect the film to strike a chord. After 2 hours of bone-chilling charts, graphs and nature photographs, the natural reaction of a rational individual would be to ask "Ok, so what do I do about it?" Al Gore was ready to answer that question.

As the former President-elect faded from the screen, the house lights rose slightly. I assumed the credits would start to roll, but instead several suggestions for reducing our individual impact on the environment started appearing. Some of the ideas everyone's heard before: recycle, take public transportation and stop farting so much. Many of the ideas were new; I never knew that lots of electric companies sell green power, which is the consumer equivalent buying energy credits.

Surprisingly, most of the people in the theater decided that they had better things to do at that moment in time than sit through 5 minutes of suggestions on changing their lifestyles. Keep in mind that these were the same people who mocked Tom Ridge for telling us to buy duct tape to prevent terrorism. They've been itching for a politician to ask them to become part of the solution instead of politicking our way out of our problems. They say that they want to be asked to make sacrifices. But they can't sacrifice a few minutes to even hear Al Gore out. What gives?

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe these people had to leave to get their Priuses serviced and attend a "Save the Pandas" rally on The Hill. Then again, what am I doing differently today?

Things that make you go Hmmmm

2006-06-04T23:58:00.000-04:00

Saying "No pun intended," automatically intends the pun.

Chapter 77: Pragmatism and the End of the World, cont.

2006-05-12T14:54:00.000-04:00

Sam's brain just crapped out an existential turd (burn!). He talks about mankind's stupidity and the ultimate pointlessness of it all. It concluded with this thought:

Requiring no effort on my part, I’ve found a single thing that suddenly brings back meaning to my life.
A smile from a girl.

Pathetic? Maybe. Monumental? Yes. The fields of cosmology and politics don’t seem as important compared to a passing look from a girl on the street.

I think Sam missed an important point, or rather didn't take his point far enough. He implies that the feelings associated with positive attention from the fairer sex give life meaning and purpose. Love, perhaps, is our greatest purpose. But love is as much a biological and social construct as it is a holy experience. (I'd probably go as far as to say it's more biological and social than anything else. These parenthesis indicate that this isn't a critical step in the my argument.) You feel warm and fuzzy when attractive people give you attention because they emit the right kind of pheromone, look like your favorite TV stars, or own the only stone axe in the village.

Since Pandora opened her box (I hope that the symbolism becomes pretty obvious when placed in that context), pretty girls have been a source of chaos. Many men fall in love with them; they fight and posture for their attention. Wars are fought. Bombs are detonated. Potential energy is released. Entropy increases. The universe moves one step closer to its death.

So, unless you want to hasten the destruction of the universe, don't fall in love.

Verbing of the Week

2006-04-08T21:52:00.000-04:00

fluff (fluf) v. - 1. To perform the duties of a fluffer. 2. To conspiciously show support for, pejorative. [root: verbing of "fluffer"].

[21:47] Bill Kell: im not doing it to fluff my heritage

Translation: "I'm not doing it to show everyone how cool my heritage is."

You may begin using this word immediately. Now you try using it in a sentence.

Uncomfortable Hyperbole!

2006-03-02T01:00:00.000-05:00

``I had a grin on my face like I just got blown by the Dalai-freakin'-Lama!"

Would Buddhists all over the world respond by lighting themselves on fire?

No, and that's why they're cool.

Edit: As you might guess, I wrote this about two months ago.

Question

2006-02-28T15:49:00.000-05:00

Was Jesus happy?

Brighten Your Day

2006-02-28T15:05:00.000-05:00

Protip: Sprinkle a little heroin on your oatmeal every morning (after you microwave it, of course!) and all day you can feel God shine his shiny light on the halo of serenity which surrounds you.

Thanks, Sam!

2006-02-16T13:40:00.000-05:00

Gee, Sam. Thanks for sending me a link to a website that talks about pedophilia while I'm at work. Very professional.

Edit: Don't let me forget to thank George. I'm sure gag-ball isn't on the firewall's list of watchwords.

Kids Say the Darndest Things: Spring Break Edition

2006-02-14T01:32:00.000-05:00

``My Mom better not see this!"

Your favorites?

Bored

2006-01-31T16:31:00.000-05:00

I am amazingly bored.

Entertain me.

post

2006-01-26T13:10:00.000-05:00

title

2006-01-20T09:18:00.000-05:00

post

God Bless Ronald

2006-01-17T17:04:00.000-05:00

Figure 1: "What's up, guys?" "Shut up, Roosevelt."

Some right-wing ideologues (and, no doubt, viewers of The Factor) think Ronald "Star Wars and Jelly Beans" Reagan should be added to Mt. Rushmore. To them I emphatically say "P'shaw!" Mt. Rushmore is meant to remind us of the great Americans who not only guided our country through difficult times, but were also Renaissance men far ahead of their time. Lincoln is up there for being able to envision a country where men are not judged by the color of their skin, but by their accents and religion (because Arabs look so damn much like Indians). Teddy Roosevelt's visage reminds us that no matter how powerful corporate interests may be, we'll be able to break them up and place a minor roadblock in their way until they can reorganize themselves a few years down the line. And Jefferson is there to remind us that Lincoln was wrong.

Figure 2: Proof of God's existence?

Who, then, (and by "who," I mean "what," because corporations are people, too) best symbolizes the most significant progressive reform of the last 100 years? Would any of the forefathers who grace the face of Rushmore Mountain have been able to imagine a world where corporations had the same legal status as people? Would any of them responded with anything less than a "P'shaw!" at the notion that corporations would one day cast off the bonds of non-personhood and earn the legal rights that their Creator (Intelligent Designer?) endowed them with -- without the pesky moral and ethical structures imposed on lesser "natural" ("other")people? "No," I say. "Fuck naw."

Figure 3: Taken moments before he was gunned down by authorities. The hamburgers in question have never been located, and supporters believe new DNA evidence may clear his name.

If the new American Dream is the idea that any corporation with the drive to succeed can rise from obscurity to an existence outside the laws of any particular country, what is a more appropriate face for such a dream than a bumbling clown who can't even stop a retarded hamburger thief? If you truly believe in all that America represents in the world today, you'll sign this petition.

This blog is not dedicated to Google, despite appearances

2006-01-13T10:19:00.000-05:00

You read it here first.

Eventually, says Mr Saffo, "they're trying to build the machine that will pass the Turing test"—in other words, an artificial intelligence that can pass as a human in written conversations. Wisely or not, Google wants to be a new sort of deus ex machina.

Stoned ramblings, eh Sherwin? Go back to designing e-cards or whatever the hell you do.

Google's Not-So-Secret Strategy

2006-01-10T17:32:00.000-05:00

There's been a lot of speculation about Google's plan to take over your life and make money doing it. Some people have theorized that they'll do this by vertical integration: first by releasing a browser to compete with IE, then a desktop suite to compete with Office and finally an entire operating system. Such an approach would hardly be novel to industry. IBM did it before Microsoft cleaved the OS from the hardware and AOL and Time-Warner did it back when Content was king. Heck, Standard Oil did it a hundred years ago (see also: Teapot Dome Scandal). The suggestion that Google would enter the PC or OS market leaves a lot of people scratching their heads. Why would Google start selling consumer electronics when the majority of households already own a PC? Why control the (historically free-as-in-beer) browser when you can control every site that the user visits and sell usage statistics and advertising? Why declare war on Microsoft's uber-established Office suite when the next big battle for productivity software will be fought using AJAX? Why make Mom and Dad go through the headache of installing and learning a new operating system? What would Google's gaggle of geniuses be able to contribute to these areas of technology that a bunch of second-rate engineering school grads couldn't accomplish at less innovative companies? It just doesn't make sense.

The company's well-known and oft-repeated goal is to organize all the world's information, and they still have a long way to go in that respect. If you look at Google's expansion in the last year or two, you'll see that they've managed to grab a large (horizontal) chunk of the world. Blogs, photo galleries, shopping, advertising, email; all of the web's most popular (and for that matter, populist) trends have Google's fingerprints on them. They've been able to enter all of these formerly disconnected areas of technology and demonstrate that, ultimately, they're all problems in information organization and retrieval. Start with a design methodology that celebrates simplicity and usefulness over bells and whistles and combine that with the worlds most powerful backend, and you've got a company that can enter into any emerging Internet trend in a matter of months instead of years.

This plug-and-play company concept can't be an accident, and it may be Google's greatest business secret. Their fun and flexible corporate image allows them to enter unsuspecting markets without upsetting investors. If a project fails, so what? It was only a beta test of an unofficial program started by one of their employees in his spare time. If it takes off, then plug in advertising and watch the cash roll in.

But where does Google go from here? The short answer is: wherever the eyeballs go. The long answer was announced last week at CES. Precious few months after the quiet (I might even say "disappointing") launch of Google Video, Google announced an online video store and an important alliance with CBS. In the time between the original launch of Google Video and last week's sales pitch, Google got the infrastructure in place to

store and index video files of arbitrary size,
stream them efficiently and in as platform-independent a way as possible (using Flash, an plug-in which has been ported to every OS and browser where users may need to find out who all their base belong to, play Tetris at work, or shoot a monkey for a chance to win an iPod), and
implement the long-awaited Google Wallet to charge users for content.

This last point is one of the most overlooked announcements of CES. Until now, almost all of Google's revenue has come from advertising. For the first time, Google will be collecting money directly from consumers. This opens up a whole host of issues for the company. For the first time, they'll have to worry about customer service. It's one thing to have technical support staff in place to explain to an experienced Unix admin how to defrag a drive on a Google Search Appliance, but it's a whole different can of worms to try to tell my mom why her license for the latest episode of General Hospital expired after 24 hours. Additionally, the growth of relatively unskilled support staff could cause low-grade retardation in a company which is historically full of geniuses. At the very least, it will make Google's organizational structure look a lot more like the companies on the Fortune 500 and a lot less like a novel start-up full of great ideas and looking to change the world.

So it's clear that Google's aims are not at conquering the desktop, but conquering the Internet itself. Of course individuals and corporations will be able to build and host their own sites, but they'll find these sites on Google's search engine, talk to their friends about them using Google Talk and blog about them here on Blogger. No company can control all the content on the Internet, but the company that can control the delivery of the content will be the most successful one. The only way to accomplish that is to be at the forefront of emerging Internet trends. Google has grown so rapidly because they've embraced rapid development, real-world testing and emerging standards.

The battle to control the world's information is only now beginning to heat up. "Real-world" content (movies, music and television) is finally finding its way onto the web and Google is the one company who is positioned to deliver it all, so don't expect them to become a hardware manufacturer any time soon.

Blonde joke

2006-01-04T16:08:00.000-05:00

I usually try not to just post links here, but this is a pretty clever blonde joke.

The death of a Yankee's Fan

2005-12-21T17:20:00.000-05:00

Maybe conversion is a better word than death, but quoting my friend since first grade who has always been a Yankees fan, who was pushed too far when they signed Damon.

From Adam's Profile:

[quote]

Well, thats it. It's come to this. Somehow I knew this day would come. I can't say I'm happy to make this decision, but I made myself a promise and I'm a man of my word. I can no longer support an organization with such a lack of decency. In the past, I've defended such atrocities, but this time they crossed the line. Don't Steinbrenner and Cashman remember this? I told myself, the day I see this man in pinstripes is the day I give up my allegiance. So it is with a heavy heart and a teary eye that I say without further ado...
..............YANKEES SUCK! :'(

R.I.P. Yankee Fandom 12/21/2005

[/quote]

Words I thought I would never hear out of his mouth. So here is to a new Mets fan and hopefully a good Mets year. Hopefully there will be more to follow. And if the Yankee's don't win this year, they can always spend 50 million on another contract!

Simple pleasures

2005-12-20T00:38:00.000-05:00

Holding the refrigerator door open with one leg while you pour a drink because turning on the kitchen light would hurt your eyes
Farting when no one else is around
Throwing something into the trash can from across the room and hearing a "swish" sound from the garbage bag

What are your favorite simple pleasures?

Bush to American people, "Whateva, I do what I want"

2005-12-19T13:24:00.000-05:00

Selected excerpts from Bush's press conference today. All quotes are taken from the Washington Post transcript.

As president and commander in chief, I have the constitutional responsibility and the constitutional authority to protect our country. Article 2 of the Constitution gives me that responsibility and the authority necessary to fulfill it.

Bush is referring to the Oath of Office, which actually says that it is the President's duty "to the best of [his] Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution." He failed to disclose what he has done during his term in office to "form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, [...] promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity" (from the preamble to the Constitution).

The Patriot Act tore down the legal and bureaucratic wall that kept law enforcement and intelligence authorities from sharing vital information about terrorist threats.

Apparently, the Patriot Act also tore down the legal and bureaucratic boundaries that stopped the government from wiretapping American citizens who may have any ties to terrorism, capturing them, sending them overseas to be tortured by countries which support terrorism and holding them indefinitely without charges or access to legal council (ahem).

Other key points:

Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11
Senators who question the damage done to our civil liberties over the last five years will be the ones responsible when Bush ignores memos like "Al Quaeda determined to strike in US" the next time
Cutting taxes for the richest 1% of Americans while cutting programs which benefit the poorest 25% is a "wise" use of tax dollars

When will we stop equating Iraq with Al Quaeda and self-proclaimed piety with righteousness?

Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official, save exactly to the degree in which he himself stands by the country. It is patriotic to support him insofar as he efficiently serves the country. It is unpatriotic not to oppose him to the exact extent that by inefficiency or otherwise he fails in his duty to stand by the country. In either event, it is unpatriotic not to tell the truth, whether about the president or anyone else. -Teddy Roosevelt

The most wonderful time of the year

2005-12-15T13:56:00.000-05:00

I came into work today to find this in my email box (I've cleaned up the horrible spacing, but left the colors intact):

Subject: FW: This is NOT a Holiday Tree!

I LOVE IT!!!

This is a Christmas tree. It is not a Hanukkah bush, it is not an Allah plant, it is not a Holiday hedge. It is a Christmas tree. Say it... CHRISTmas , CHRISTmas , CHRISTmas Yes. CHRISTmas - celebrating the Birth of Jesus Christ!!! If this offends you...too bad.

Get over it ~ Take a stand and pass this on !!

The sender of this email is right. It's time we show those Jewpublicans that we're not going to sit back and let our government be controlled by anti-religion nutjobs. Our motto is "One nation, under G-d" -- not Allah, not Ginesh, not even the god of the Jews and the Catholics. Christmas is strictly the domain of the G-d-fearing WASPs who made this country great, and so in their memory do we force this Protestant (strictly excluding the gay-priest-loving parishes of Episcopalians) orgy of commercialism on those immigrants who haven't yet melted into the great Christian U S of fuckin-A.

And fuck Bill O'Reilly, too.

Mark your (Mayan) calendars

2005-12-14T13:26:00.000-05:00

On December 21, 2012, the Long Count of the Mayan calendar will "turn over" like the odometer in an old Volkswagen. The mushroom evangelist/philosopher Terrance McKenna interpreted the I Ching in such a way as to conclude that 12/21/12 will be the dawning of a new age of Novelty. The date also corresponds with our Sun crossing the Galactic Equator. Some New Age thinkers have suggested that this will be the day when the world ends, or we contact aliens and so on. If something significant is to happen on the date in question, my guess is that it would be related to the tremendous growth of the Internet in recent years. I've come up with a few possibilities:

Google becomes self-aware, the first real AI. Mankind will suddenly have not only all relevant information at its fingertips instantaneously, but will be able to use Google to probe new questions about the Universe. Scientific research will consist of asking the right questions, and Google will find the correct answers after the requisite data is gathered. Mankind will enter a golden age of leisure and all of our needs will be taken care of by machines. Or perhaps something more sinister will happen if Google takes over. I, for one, welcome our new Google overlords.
The mind-machine interface is perfected. Thoughts will flow back and forth between our fleshy brains and our semi-conductor-based computers. The work of pattern recognition and random data generation which our brains are so suited for will combine with the raw computing power of our machines to create a world which is practically equivalent to the one mentioned in the previous bullet-point, the main difference being the existence of a direct symbiotic relationship between ourselves and the machines. The logical extent of this technology would be the development of a universal consciousness where "we" becomes "I." See The Last Question and Buddhism for more.
Skynet

To celebrate this most spectacular occasion, I'll be throwing the greatest party the world has ever seen (since Newmanium). It will begin at 1 PM EST on the 12th, and the doors will close at 2. That will give everyone plenty of time for the drugs to kick in. At 11:11 GMT (4:11 PM EST -- although the time zone is not set in stone), something huge will happen. If it doesn't, then shit, we're really fucked.

Please RSVP below.

Freud on Artists

2005-12-12T00:12:00.000-05:00

The hat doesn't make the artist, the artist makes the hat

``There is a means of return from fantasy to reality, and that is art. To begin with, the artist is an introvert, almost a neurotic. Constrained by abnormally strong impulses, he desires honor, power, wealth, fame, and the love of women; but he lacks the means to attain these satisfactions, as so, like any other unsatisfied person, turns away from reality and transfers all of his interest, together with his libido, to the wishful fantasies of his imagination, through which he may be carried actually to neurosis. Several factors must coincide if he is not to follow this course to its conclusion. In fact, it is well known how frequently artists suffer partial impairment of their powers through neurotic applications. Their constitution probably includes a strong capacity for sublimation along with a certain degree of laxity in the repressions decisive for a conflict. The artist finds the road back to reality, however, in the following way.

He is, of course, not the only one living a life of fantasy. The realm of fantasy is in fact a generally patronized resort, to which every sufferer from disappointments turns for refreshment and consolation. Those who are not artists are extremely limited, however, in their ability to derive pleasure from the wells of fantasy. The ruthlessness of their repressions compels them to make do with whatever meager daydreams they may dare to allow to become conscious. The genuine artist has more at his disposal. In the first place, he knows how to rework his daydreams in such a way that everything too personal, such as others might find offensive, is eliminated, and they become thus generally enjoyable. He knows, also, how to modify them, so that their origin in the forbidden wells is not immediately betrayed. And he possesses, further, the mysterious ability to shape some particular material into a likeness of the model drawn from his fantasy. And finally, he knows how to render so much pleasure through these figurations from his unconscious that repressions are for the moment overcome and dispelled. The one who can achieve all this, thus making it possible for others to derive against refreshment and consolation from those wellsprings of their own unconscious which had become for them inaccessible, gains their thanks and admiration, and he has thus won through his fantasy what he had originally achieved only in his fantasy; namely, honor, power, and the love of women." -Sigmund Freud, Vorlesungen zur Einfuhrung in die Psychoanalyse. Qtd. in Joseph Campbell, The Inner Reaches of Outer Space

On Scarves

2005-12-06T09:40:00.000-05:00

Figure 1: A homosexual wearing a scarf

For the first time in my life, I am a scarf-wearing member of society. Until now, I thought that only homosexuals wore scarves. This belief was based mostly off the observation that I, a heterosexual, did not wear scarves, whereas my metrosexual acquaintances did. I never realized that the history of the scarf predates in-your-face homosexuality by thousands of years. Consider as well the Shroud of Turin:

Figure 2: His Scarf

Once I overcame my aversion to wearing a scarf, I had to come up with a compelling reason to wear one. I didn't even step on the bus before I realized the simple joy of throwing one end of your scarf over your shoulder in a haughty, aristocratic way. Then, I realized the vast number of configurations for a scarf. Here are a few I came up with so far:

1) Ninja (entire head and face wrapped, slight slot for vision)
2) Old Lady (hanging down over the head)
3) Rabbi (behind the head, two halves of scarf hanging down in front)
4) Pirate (tied in a knot around the neck, excess is stuffed down the front of the shirt, a la a "puffy shirt")

Cool-O-Meter ranking:
Scarves - 4/10

Gay-O-Meter rating:
Scarves - 3/10

Scarves recieve a Radikel coolness rating of 1 (out of a possible 10). That's a "barely cool," equivalent to "getting a new pen."

The Rochester Garbage Plate

2005-12-05T11:10:00.000-05:00

If you know me, you know that whenever I am visiting a place for the first time, especially with somebody who knows the area, I LOVE to do the things that people in the area always do, and more importantly must try any food that is specific to where I am.
My friend since first grade went to RIT and had always talked about a garbage plate. Naturally I inquired and was a little thrown off by his response. I trusted his judgment although very skeptical and moved on. Here I am visiting Rochester with him, and I must try one. After his input and about 2 hours researching on Google, I learned quite a bit about the famous plate.

The ingredients: There are a few variations but I will stick with the most popular plate. First, a square styrofoam take out container is filled with one half cold macaroni salad (but you have to say mac salad to be on the in) and hot home fries. Then, two hamburger patties with melted cheese are placed on top of the pile. A few small raw onions are added, then (and I probably should have looked away) the preparer dips a ladle into a huge vat and dumps the contents all over the top. This is the spicy sauce. Two slices of italian bread are put on the side, with butter.

First impressions: My researched revealed that there are two Nick Tahou's in Rochester. One that is riddled with crack whores, gang members, hoboes, and a lot of drunk people. Many stories prepared me for normal gunshot and muggings. This one now closes after 8pm. Luckily there is a 24 hour one in a nicer part of town filled with drunk and stoned kids. First arrival reminded me of any other popular food place (such as Pat's in Philly) with angry chefs, a unique ordering style, and a quick pace. The place was full of people all eating the same thing, a plate of what looked like garbage..... covered in about a half bottle of ketchup.

Ordering: The proper quick, dont hold back that stoned guy behind you, dont look like a fool, dont piss off the chef way to order for me was "Cheeseburger plate mac salad home fries everything" where the everything indicated the onions and the sauce. I nailed it and let out a huge sigh of relief. The alcohol helped me get over the fear of embarassment and the urge to have Adam order for me. I think the anxiety made me speak so fast that it was overdone, but done nonetheless.

Speed: The pile of home fries as high as the chefs neck (no joke), the already heated burger patties, and the huge sauce vat made for a very speedy delivery of our orders. I did not see where the mac salad came from due to my angle.

Delivery: This is a "before" picture. Unfortunately mine was lost or corrupt on the cell phone, so I found one online.

Prep: I sat down with Adam and his old roommate and was so happy that the time had finally come. Adam had a little trouble finding a ketchup bottle with much left in it, but he managed. I chose to skip out on the ketchup because I was afraid the taste would be too overpowering. Adam instructed me to dice up my burger patties and mash everything together. At first I wanted to try everything individually. Each of which was average on taste, and I wanted the full effect, so I diced and mixed it all up.

Ingestion: Wow. At first I was a little hesitant to mix in the cold macaroni salad. The home fries and burger I could deal with along with the onions and sauce. Somehow it all just goes together in a way that makes the plate the staple that it is. Every bite was pretty much the same. I made sure to grab a piece of burger, some mac, and some hash browns on each. The tase was amazing. Other than that I can't really describe it. Let me just say that the urge to think "gross" is premature. There was a definite spice to it that came from the sauce. This sauce is made of god knows what, but it was a thin spicy sauce with lots of ground beef chunks in it. There was a slight mustard taste that either came from the sauce or the home fries. This is where things got interesting. After eating about 70% of the plate, something weird started to happen. Usually you will get full, stomache maybe starts to hurt, maybe some gas, and the desire to just lean back and stop eating. For me... I felt like my muscles didn't want to move anymore. I felt like my heart was straining to beat. I didn't understand. I have overeaten many times, but I expected it would take a lot more food to get to this point. I could have fallen asleep at the booth if I wanted to. But my stomache didn't hurt, nor did I feel full. I took a breather and kept on going, it was just too good. After eating more the effect was getting overwhelming. I also noticed that the sauce was really just a lot of grease, and that it was starting to harden and turn its natural solid color. At this point I decided to take my "after picture."

How did I do?: Well, the typical saying is that you can't leave until you are done, but this just was not going to happen. Although I would say I was only maybe 3 forkfulls away, I was just too SCARED. I had no idea what effect this was going to have on my stomache and toilet use for the rest of the night. Here is the after pic.

I would give myself about a 90-93% completion on the plate. I got all of the burger and meat pieces but couldnt handle any more mac or home fries. What a great food.

Aftermath: I have to say I was extremely happy with the after effects. I did sit on a recliner and put a movie on and not move for a few hours and shuttered at the thought of food, but lets just say that everything else I was fearing "came out normal."

Final thoughts: The garbage plate is a must have if you are ever in the area. Use a tour guide and don't be scared. Overall a magnificent experience. I would love to have another one, but I agree with Adam's recommendation of no more than 1 per month.

I can not give an overall 1-10 or 5 star rating on this. There is nothing you can compare it to, and I just recommend trying one if you ever get the chance.

"i.e." vs. "e.g."

2005-12-02T15:53:00.000-05:00

Like most people, I use the abbreviations "i.e." and "e.g." interchangably. As far as I'm concerned, "i.e." stands for "in example" and "e.g." stands for "egzample." Clearly, I didn't give much thought about the periods in the terms; I think I assumed that if "et cetera" is shorted to "etc.", then Latin isn't worth squat, and the true origin of "i.e." and "e.g." are a mystery. Apparently, that's not the case.

After extensive GOOGing (this is a case where the "I'm feeling lucky" button can be used), I learned that "e.g." is a shortened form of exempli gratia, or, "for the sake of example." "I.e." means id est, "that is." The difference is that what comes after an "e.g." must be specific, whereas what follows "i.e." is general.

Two examples:

The the recording industry (e.g., the RIAA and MPAA) comprises heartless philistines who have no interest in art, only profit.
Groups like the RIAA (i.e., faceless, impresonal consortiums representing the desires of faceless, impersonal corporations) are destroying the spirit that makes this country great and stifling innovation in the arts and sciences.

Have a good weekend (i.e., the brief period of liberation from the weary workaday world) (e.g., get drunk and puke on something unexpected).

Wappingers Falls REPRESENT!

2005-12-02T08:38:00.000-05:00

According to this slashdot article, the first case to go to trial over downloading and sharing music will be happening right here in Wappingers Falls NY. Holy shit. This is going to be a very interesting case and I will be eager to follow it to the best of my abilities. I love to read comments on the slashot forum, and two struck me as very (as they like to use) insightful. First was a comment "it's too bad that a common citizen can not afford to defend themselves against a large company." Take a moment to think about this. If you have ever paid for legal services, you can imagine how much she will need. The other comment was simply "where is the paypal donation button for her legal fund?" and that got me thinking. I would love to set up a paypal donation button for her defense fees and spread it around the nerd community. Here is my proposed breakdown:

Me: I will find this woman in Wappingers Falls, become her contact for the donations.

Radrik: Set up a paypal account and use your mystical darknet powers to spread that button to the depths of the internet.

Sherwin: Set up a very simple domain, and a very simple website (because we all know how expensive your artistic services are) with a short description of the donation. With the button of course.

Surfer: Get wasted and post drunken 60% funny comments that get a 20% bonus modifier that brings it to laughter level, only because we imagine you standing there in shorts, with a PBR in your hand.

Does anybody feel like actually doing something, that could help somebody fight the recording industry, help possibly determine some case law, or should we all wish her good luck and move on to the next news article?

Possibly gathering thousands of bucks to fight the recording industry: Cool

----------UPDATE----------

After reading Transcript of May 6th court appearance, the general feeling that I get from the judge is leaning towards the side of the defendant. This doesn't say much for how the case will turn out, but it was nice to see that the judge seemed irritated with certain things about the Plaintiff. A favortie quote of mine from the judge:

THE COURT:  Okay.  Well, I think it would be a really good idea for you to get a

lawyer, because I would love to see a mom fighting one of these.

Being referred to as "THE COURT" when quoted in a transcript: DAMN COOL

Can We Ever Be Stopped?

2005-11-28T11:08:00.000-05:00

When I say "we" I really mean pirates of any kind. Be it movies, software, music, etc. For all of my computer nerd life, I have been able to find 99% of any of the above for free, with little work. Sometimes I would run into roadblocks but asking around the community and real life friends would usually do the trick. It just seemed that no matter what the security industry would try, it just wouldn't work. Music on CDs can be ripped perfectly, the CSS encryption on DVDs was cracked, leaving any DVD capable of being played in a normal player with its pants down. Any computer game can be had in a variety of ways. Even the online capabilities of Half Life 2 have been duped! But I must say I am starting to fear the worst. I am completely aware of the fact that I don't dedicate nearly enough time to stay on top of this hobby. The fact that I have money now compared to when I was 13 sometimes makes me bypass the hassle of digging for information and I end up shelling out money to avoid the trouble. Here is my reasoning...

Exhibit A: Broadband internet

Now that almost everybody is "always on" this gives sneaky, slimy companies the option to phone home about what people are doing on their computers. This also gives the option to use online verification before a program will run, DVD will play, etc. I just downloaded Half Life 2 after paying 40 bucks. I had my game in about 2 hours. I knew the game would be worth 40 bucks, but I find it odd that I need an internet connection before the game will run so it can check its integrity. With the speed of internet only getting faster, I will forecast that most games will be delivered in this way. I for one am lazy enough to download a game rather than go to a store and buy it. Will game creators scrap the disc creation and eliminate ISO distribution? It wont be too long before interet speeds will overpower disc drive speeds.

Exhibit B: Companies learning from mistakes

Well, I just read that the newer forms of Discs (meaning HD-DVD, Blu-Ray, HVD) will have types of encrption that changes. This means that if the scheme is cracked, not every disc from then on will be comprimised. I guess somebody will just have to crack the step before that in the updating process. Lets just pray that we never see the day that a DVD player will require an internet connection.

Exhibit C: Improving Encrpytion schemes

I am no expert on which encrpytion is feasible in which application, but it seems as everytime I read about it, encryption is improving. Look at the cracking of RSS encryption. It is taking supercomputers months at a time to crack the lower level RSS primes.

Final Note 1: Kids, punks, keep up the hard work.
Final Note 2: I should not be allowed to write.

The Results Are In

2005-11-22T17:02:00.000-05:00

After over a week of staring at a "Data will be available within 24 hours" message on Google Analytics, I was finally able to access our blog analysis today. Some interesting nuggets:

We've had one international visitor (Fontainhas, Portugal)
43 unique visitors
67% of visits are from returning readers
1 person viewed the site from the yantra.com domain. Google cryptically added, "Russian" in parenthesis after that visitor.

So, there are a few things we can conclude from all this.

First and foremost, it's time to start turning a profit on this sucker. In the next few days, you can expect to see pop-up ads, pop-under ads, and an original kind of fund-raising where the site operators make updates while they're working on someone else's dollar. These three revenue streams should provide enough cash to allow myself and billkell to live comfortably and continue to make our car payments. If all else fails, fuck it, we're making this a warez site.

Second and secondmost, we're making serious headway into the hard-to-reach Northern Portuguese demographic. We'll exploit this by making approximately 1 out of every 3 posts in Portuguese, starting with the remainder of this one:

Todo o mundo é estágio, e todos os homens e jogadores das mulheres meramente.

Adios, zapatos.

NYT - The Center No Longer Holds

2005-11-21T19:15:00.000-05:00

Illustration by Project Projects

The article doesn't add a whole lot to the debate, but this nugget was interesting:

Consider a G.O.P. tactic that has come to be called "catch and release." After the leadership has assured itself that a controversial bill will pass, moderate Republicans are released to cast highly publicized votes of "conscience." This is one reason why so many big bills end up magically squeaking through with no votes to spare.

Kafka dreams

2005-11-20T22:18:00.000-05:00

Last night I had a dream where I was in a scummy part of town with a few people. I had to sleep, so me and one of the other people laid down against a wall on a really sketchy street (or inside a sketchy house). I woke up to find that there were rats covering my hands. They started biting me, leaving my hands with lots of bite-marks; they looked almost like snake-bites. I was freaking out, and implored the people I was with (who knew the area) to take me to a hospital. They told me not to worry about it, and that I'd be fine. The last thing I remember is worrying about catching The Black Plague, but they still wouldn't help me.

Google turned up some instances where people have had similar dreams (rats biting hands being the important motif). The only thing I was able to find was the obvious analysis that a rat represented a deceitful person in my midst, and that being bitten means I've gotten screwed over. Forgive me for thinking that's a little lame. It's not nearly as interesting as the meaning behind the dream where all my teeth crumble.

Maybe the important part of the dream wasn't the rats (although it was the most vivid). Perhaps what was important was the fact that none of the people I was with were helping me.

Where's Jung when you need him?

I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords

2005-11-18T17:44:00.000-05:00

Nerds, check out this chat on the Post's site. There was an online Q&A with the author of a book on how to survive a robot uprising. The thing is, the guy's got a PhD in robotics from Carnegie Mellon. And he's a funny, funny dork. The discussion degenerated into a series of pop-Internet-culture reference. He's definitely "with it." A snippet:

Reston, Va.: I remember seeing a commercial on an old Saturday Night Live with Sam Waterson pitching "robot attack insurance" to elderly people. Do you believe this would be a wise investment?
Daniel H. Wilson: Heck yeah it's a wise investment. Didn't you see the pie chart!?
43% of old people die from heart disease, and 57% die from robot attack.
A wise investment indeed!

Google screws up

2005-11-15T17:27:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I signed up for Google Analytics, a new tool provided by everybody's favorite verb. The idea of the service is that you paste a little snippet of JavaScript on all your pages, and then Google tracks information about the people who visit your site. There's plenty of software already out there that does this kind of thing (I run one on my home web server that provides plenty of interesting reports and graphs), but since I get a boner for all things Google, I thought I'd check it out. The only problem is that the site's been working slower than a government bureaucrat during a fire drill.

When I signed up (on my lunch break yesterday), I was told that Google was scanning this blog and preliminary results would be available by midnight. 31 hours later, still nada. Their site seems slower every time I visit it. Maybe it's the /. effect, maybe I'm a low priority, maybe their code is really inefficient. Whatever the case, I want my money back.

Is Google getting sloppy?

Your tuition hard at work

2005-11-14T14:03:00.000-05:00

If Silber makes $1.25 million a year, then there are at least 42 BU students whose tuition pays for nothing but his salary.

If there are 25,000 undergrads, then there's a .2% chance you're one of them.

If you went to school for 4 years (assuming they rotate the students who pay Silber off each year), then there's more than a 1 in 100 chance your check went directly into his pocket.

If a typical person has 100 friendly aquaintences at school, then at least one of you is a sucker.

Of course, I doubt the survey took into account the value of his wood-panelled office on the top of SMG. There are certain things a university president just expects.

On Gambling...

2005-11-11T19:45:00.000-05:00

Some people do it for profit...
Some people do it because for that moment, they predicted the future...

Im out...

~Drunk

A Move in the Right Direction

2005-11-10T10:38:00.000-05:00

THANK YOU California. California is going to sue SONY for filling CD's with virii. I am not going to get into it too deep, but SONY was putting CD protection that was changing the way Windows operates. Users were never told this, and the people who found out and tried to delete the virus, some lost use of their CD drives. I am very happy to hear that this issue was not ignored. I hope DRM gets a lot of bad publicity. I hope they lose a lot of money for trying to pull this shit. I find it funny that in class actions the "victims" usually receive about 10-20 bucks, and a law firm will make millions (taken from a comment on /. ) One day I would like to be that lawyer.

Tomorrow's estimated mega millions jackpot: 265 million.
My gift list still applies.

M5: Cool
Snow soon: Gay

Political cartoons are a riot

2005-11-09T16:52:00.000-05:00

Thanks ImageShack

This week's sign that the apocalypse is upon us

2005-11-08T23:03:00.000-05:00

Here's a sample of some of the ballot initiatives voted on today and their outcomes. See if you can guess what the fuck is wrong with our country. (Source: The Boston Globe)

OHIO:
- Rejected: Shifting redistricting powers from state legislators and top statewide officeholders to a commission.
- Rejected: Reducing limit on individual contributions to political candidates.
- Rejected: Shifting oversight of elections from secretary of state to a bipartisan, nine-member board.
- Rejected: Allowing all voters to cast ballots early by mail.

TEXAS:
- Approved: Amending state constitution to ban gay marriage.

WHITE SETTLEMENT, Texas:
- Rejected: Changing town's name to West Settlement.

Erection Day

2005-11-08T17:44:00.000-05:00

I call this next one, "The Disappearing Mayor" (courtesy of the Washington Post and Imageshack)

A common motif in office life is "that guy with the accent who is always talking to me." In my case, he's about 40, Pakistani, and always making "I'm shooting at you, cowboy!" gestures. When I started working, I tried returning with my own attempts at humor. It quickly became apparent that, although he can dish it out, it's more mimicry than a genuine appreciation for the finer points of American office culture. Since then, I've just kind of taken it in stride, albeit sometimes with a very forced smile or laugh.

Yesterday, I was talking to a friend about an Indian buffet lunch in celebration of Diwali. This guy walked up and asked if we went to the buffet. I hadn't, but my friend had. Because it seemed like a reasonable thing to ask, he went off on a rant explaining that he worships the same God we do (assuming, I suppose, that we were Christian or Jewish) and how ridiculous it is "this day and age" to worship "a cow and a God of Wisdom and a Creator" at the same time. One God, he asserted, was the only type of worship that made rational sense. Awkward moment number one. But that wasn't the end of it.

In what is surely the most awkward moment I've experienced since I've started working, this character came into my office moments ago and told me to look up a certain category of patent. (600/38, for those in the know.) Lo and behold, it's a list of thousands of patents for "sexual appliances." As if it wasn't bad enough to be looking at low-grade pornography in your office with a co-worker you're not that into, he told me to click on a particular application. After spending 5 minutes explaining the finer points of the diagrams ("You see, element 125 is inserted into slot 212. But it also lines up with slot 214, so you can use them in multiple configurations!"), he thankfully left.

I feel dirty and I want to keep my office door closed from now on.

Oh, God, I think I hear him walking down the hall...

One thought, two links and a video game recommendation

2005-11-07T17:50:00.000-05:00

Why do we (or is it just me?) say "a universe" and not "an universe," but we say "an urchin"? Is it because "uni-" sounds like it starts with a "y"?

Now with the links:
- Damn Interesting: news for nerds, stuff that matters
- Did the Middle Ages Really Exist?: I say "yes." Certain people disagree with me.

That being said, if you've ever enjoyed Sid Meiers Civilization games, go out and buy the new one. I think it's probably the best one yet (including Alpha Centauri). Perhaps I've spoken too soon. I'll find out this evening when I play it for hours on end.

Everybody's working for the weekend

2005-11-04T17:44:00.000-05:00

Sun Glare Patch

2005-11-04T09:13:00.000-05:00

% This patch relieves traffic congestion due to sun glare

While Driving != 0

If (Sun is in your eyes)
Flip Down Sun Visor
End If

Keep Driving
GoTo 10

Slam on Brakes

10: Wend

% GoTo Used for Comedy and not Good Programming Practice

Open Your Eyes

2005-11-03T21:35:00.000-05:00

Do this for me. Close your eyes. Imagine a few times where you have taken advantage of somebody because they didn't really care. Maybe gained a little something because you didn't think they would mind. Now expand that person to a whole bunch of people. Now put yourself in a government position. Weird....

Note to self: Don't send jokey emails through my gov't-issued Blackberry

2005-11-03T09:34:00.000-05:00

On August 29, the day of the storm, Brown exchanged e-mails about his attire with Taylor, Melancon said. She told him, "You look fabulous," and Brown replied, "I got it at Nordstroms. ... Are you proud of me?"

An hour later, Brown added: "If you'll look at my lovely FEMA attire, you'll really vomit. I am a fashion god," according to the congressman.

And vomit, the American people did.

A Weekend to Forget

2005-10-31T17:46:00.000-05:00

The secret of the hookah bar is that all the chicks are upstairs.

Half Baked is a movie about Dave Chappelle, not Jim Breuer. That simple realization makes the entire thing much more enjoyable.

How big does a wooded area have to be to be considered a forest?

Grey Goose and Gatorade is about as classy as a brass monkey made with Tropicana. And both have similar outcomes.

Life is worth living and God loves you.
Cool: Empanadas
Cool: Sunrise
Cool: Crash
Gay: Rock-It
Gay: Bumping BillKell's post down

A Weekend to Remember

2005-10-31T10:41:00.000-05:00

What was hopefully a first of many leaves me still hurting on Monday morning. I visited Radrik in DC after hearing that (lets just call him) TheAverageD would also be there. The $30 cab rides remind you that you are no longer in Boston but how else are you going to get your friends to throw up in public? The strip we partied on was very active and very young. We were able to find loud bars with dance floors, indian bars with hookahs upstairs, and lots of types in between. It was funny to hang out with crazy people from the patent office. I get a kick out of thinking about people putting so much time and money into a patent and having it land on a desk of theirs. Jumbo slices and Jamaican empinadas. Yum.

Jumbo slice: Cool
$30 cab rides: Gay
Jamaican Empinada: Cool

Evolution is for the Birds

2005-10-27T18:22:00.000-04:00

At least once a week, one of this site's fine readers will email me with something along the lines of, "Radrik, you're so smart, but you're never willing to tell other people what you think. So, please clarify the issue on everyone's mind: is Intelligent Design 'cool' or 'gay'?"

Fair reader, wonder no more. Intelligent design is gay. That's right... Gay.

I hope I wasn't too real for you there.

WAFFLE MAYO

2005-10-25T23:02:00.000-04:00

fobkk (11:00:08 PM): so i went to bed last night before mel
fobkk (11:00:26 PM): and when mel went to bed, i was already asleep
fobkk (11:00:38 PM): and i was mumbling something in my dream
fobkk (11:01:06 PM): she asked me this morning, is your computer ok?
fobkk (11:01:11 PM): im like why
fobkk (11:01:23 PM): she said last night i was saying "....no space, need new hard drive"

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love John Dudas

2005-10-24T17:16:00.000-04:00

I wrote a few days ago about the problems and criticisms facing the USPTO today. I identified two of the two major problems facing the Office, namely quality and timeliness. Today, I would like to explain (if it isn't immediately obvious) why these two goals are mutually exclusive.

A hundred years ago (back when the Commisioner of the Office was alledged to have said, "Everything that can be invented has been invented."), it was fairly straightforward to search a patent. An examiner would go into a basketball court-sized room, find the cabinet containing all of the patents in a given field, and look at them, one by one, until he found something useful. If he reached the end of the search and didn't find anything, he would be able to say with reasonable certainty that the invention was patentable.

Things aren't that simple today. There are over 7,000,000 issued patents and an art could easily have thousands of patents worthy of consideration. In addition, the ever-increasing breadth and detail of technology means that finding that needle in the haystack is sometimes a matter of luck. Gone are the days of paper files; today everything is digital. Although examiners are given a good set of search tools, finding prior art is now a matter of crafting good search string and flipping through abstracts for hundreds of hits. Patent examining today is much closer to Googling than it is to indexing.

What then, if we were to expect absolute quality from prior art searches? If a skilled person can skim 1,000 patents a day (I'm sure that there are old statistics floating out there somewhere, but just go with it here), it could easily take weeks for one person to search a patent. But, a typical workload for an examiner is 3-10 applications every two weeks. Even an experienced examiner who was familiar with commonly cited patents could only compose two or three office actions (see Step 3) every biweek.

So, then, absolute quality is impractical or even impossible. What, then, about increasing the pace of work (timeliness)? Obviously, there is an inverse relationship between the time to complete a task and the quality of the resulting work. However, another important relationship is the direct correlation between the amount of time allotted and the number of critical errors. This would mean that with less time to examine, more low-quality patents (in the eyes of critics -- I make no claim as to the quality or patentability of issued patents) will be issued, and the public perception of the PTO will decrease.

What, then, can be done to improve the situation at the Patent Office? The obvious solution is to hire more examiners. In all likelihood, this is the only viable option short of drastic patent reform (which, if you're lucky, I'll address later). By doubling the size of the patent corp., it could reasonably be expected to start cutting down on the backlog after four years. Why four years, you ask? Well, that's typically the amount of time before an examiner reaches his maximum productivity and begins to make up for the time spent by other examiners during the training process. Also, such growth at the bottom rungs of the ladder will require additional managers and executive staff. These aren't positions that can be filled overnight.

That is how we come to the PTO's current long-term strategy. Over the next 10 years, the PTO anticipates hiring 1,000 new examiners every year. After attrition (another major problem in a field as hot as IP law), this will probably double the number of examiners to around 14,000. Assuming there isn't a spike in filed applications, the PTO is in a position to begin processing more applications than are filed within 8 years. The additional two years of new hires will begin cutting into the backlog. How long it will take to eliminate the backlog is anyone's guess. How realistic the idea of doubling the workforce is rests with Congress. In the end, that means it's up to voters.

The moral of the story? Study engineering.

Democrats don't understand politics and other bombshells

2005-10-24T09:22:00.000-04:00

On Sunday, Republicans appeared to be preparing to blunt the impact of any charges. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas, speaking on the NBC news program "Meet the Press," compared the leak investigation with the case of Martha Stewart and her stock sale, "where they couldn't find a crime and they indict on something that she said about something that wasn't a crime."

Yes, she's right. It's silly to try to destroy someone's political career for something as silly as perjury when no real crime was committed.

Happy Monday.

On the Patent Office and Other Problems Facing the Country

2005-10-20T17:35:00.000-04:00

There are two common complaints about the current state of the USPTO:

Quality -- This is exemplified by the cases you read about every day such as Amazon's One-Click patent and the Eolas web plug-in patent. Critics charge that examiners don't do a good job searching for prior art, and allow lots of applications that should be rejected.
Timeliness -- The current backlog at the USPTO is about 3 years, and growing by about 85,000 this year. That means that an application filed today won't be seen by an examiner until the end of 2008, if the situation doesn't continue to worsen. This makes it hard for businesses to seek protection for their innovations because technologies will make it to the market a year or two before the review process begins, and three or four years before the patent is issued. In the technology industry, that is typically beyond the lifespan of a product. What good is a patent on an obsolete technology?

The purpose of patents is to provide a limited monopoly for inventors (typically 20 years) in exchange for disclosing the detailed workings of the invention to the public. After the limited monopoly expires, anyone can read the patent and use the invention without paying a license. The Founding Fathers believed this limited protection would provide an incentive to inventors to share their ideas and serve the public interest by facilitating the free flow of information. Many people agree that the patent system has served those functions well, and some even attribute to patent process (combined with good 'ole American ingenuity) the US's economic dominance. However, the patent process must be modernized if it is to continue to be useful.

Hopefully, this brief write-up has explained the problems facing the PTO. My next entry will explore some potential solutions. But for now, I've got a bus to catch. (Then, all-I-can-eat sushi!)

Jean-Paul Sartre walks into a bar

2005-10-17T17:56:00.000-04:00

Sartre walks into a bar. The bartender says, "Hey, Jean-Paul, what's happenin'? Can I get you a beer?" Sartre says, "I think not." Then he disappears.

Yeah, that kinda sucked.

On Saturday, I called my mom on the telephone. I told her about poker the night before, and mentioned how annoying our host was. First, a word about him. He's (allegedly) had a girlfriend for a few years, but they've decided to stay celebate until marriage (or maybe longer). If you'll permit me to analyze him for a second, I believe he suffered some kind of parental trauma when he was very young (possibly related to a strict Christian upbringing) that has caused him to become stuck in Freud's anal phase (not that I know what that means). Basically, everything turns into one big, obnoxious gay joke.

So, I explained this to my mom, and said that I needed to: a) forceably remove him from my social circle or b) stop hanging around him. My mom agreed that was probably a good idea. We talked a little while longer, and then she hung up. I sat down at my computer, and got a *DING* from AIM. In what is quickly becoming a weekly ritual, Michelle (my old roommate/BillKells significant other) suggested I come hang out in Delaware. While I was debating making the 2 1/2-hour trek, my mom called me back.

"Mark," she said, "I just wanted to add something. One thing I've lived by that has served me well is that you shouldn't hang out with people who make you feel bad. ...Let me rephrase that in a more positive light... You should be around people who make you feel good."

Well, that made my Saturday night plans an easy call. And I had a hell of a good time. Moms, you gotta love 'em.

Two Chairs Please

2005-10-16T12:13:00.000-04:00

I can't even begin to explain how I felt when I took this picture. I woke up at 5 in the morning and wasn't angry about anything. My alarm didn't get smashed; the snooze button not pressed once. Energy provided by exploration of the unknown instead of a large coffee with cream and sugar. I wasn't counting down hours for anything. My only responsibility for the day was to catch a bus. My cell phone was long forgotten. I brought a camera, a change of clothes, lots of curiosity, and of course good company. Now you may be reading this in a hurry, already planning on what you will be doing as soon as you read the last sentence, so for you, I prescribe a trip of your own. Fuck the computer, fuck the cell phone, fuck a watch, fuck a fancy car, fuck expensive clothes, fuck the image you strive to give off to others. Give me some chairs, some good company, a democracy, all the time I have left, and I will die a happy man. My life goal is to be back here, with all the friends and family who already know that they'll be next to me. I will use the U.S. to get there, and leave all worry behind.

And one more thing.... "Tropical Climates" bring many wonderful things.

Beating chicks off with a stick

2005-10-15T15:26:00.000-04:00

Last night was poker night. The most memorable part of the evening didn't have to do with the game, though. The music was being played off of Dave's computer, so when people would spend a few minutes in Dave's bedroom picking out a song, they'd return with an obligatory joke about the quantity or persuasion of the porn on his computer. The new guy in the room, who will be played by Philip Seymour Hoffman in the movie version, was noticeably quiet during the ball-breaking. After two or three rounds of jokes along the lines of, "I don't know how you get [object] in [hole]," Capote finally spoke up.

"Do you really have a big porn collection?" Nervous laughter. Then, the nervousness turns to fright when we realize that, no, this guy isn't kidding. In the midst of the laughter, he mumbles something about "200 gigs" and how he hasn't seen that much porn "since back in college."

Mysteriously, a few hands after all the talk about massive porn collections, he made a lame attempt at an all-in and slipped out the door.

On Dogs and Life After College

2005-10-14T08:52:00.000-04:00

There you are Fob2k (yes, he has two thousand keychain trinkets), my all time favorite picture of Taylor. That ends the portion of this post dedicated to dogs. Radrik, I feel ya man. I come home from work every day, go online for a little while, eat dinner, and then there is the void. Some people fill this void with going to the gym, reading something somewhere, playing sports, you name it. My parents do what I assume that the majority of the U.S. does and they fill this void with watching TV. Of course I admit that I like to watch Lost and a reality show from time to time, but 6 days of the week I am left craving much more. Those that are not in college, what do you do in this time? I have been working for almost 3 months now and have tried a lot of ways to fill this time. It's too bad the market closes before I get home. I am starting to consider shifting my work day an hour early so I can "play" with stocks for an hour when I get home. My short term plans are to shift my career to the USPTO and hopefully me and Radrik will be able to drive each other towards our long term goal of again drinking green tea, wearing flip flops, and the only decision of the day will be what to stuff into a new hamburger creation. For those of you who know me, you may say I like to complain. Well I don't LIKE it, I do it when I don't think things aren't good enough. I don't like to just accept the way they are. I am hoping that one day I can use this bored, not good enough attitude to do something great. Who the fuck knows.

If you think it can't be done, go watch TV. I heard "so you think you can dance" was great.

"We were meant to live for so much more" ~Switchfoot, Meant to Live

If I have a mid-life crisis at 22, does that mean I'll be dead by 44?

2005-10-13T12:48:00.000-04:00

The summer is fading. I awoke to an electronic buzzing sound and the sun shining in my eyes. I sat on a public bus and read a mediocre book about a guy who's struggling to reconcile the intelligent child that he once was with the unexceptional life he has lived. Spent the morning reading a document I didn't understand. Ate a slice of pizza for lunch. Passing the time until 2, when I can meet the directors. Some day, maybe I can be a director.

29 years, 11 months, 6 days until retirement

If you enjoyed this post, the author would highly recommend checking out Vinnie's blog. (Link in sidebar)

Well then, on with Wednesday

2005-10-12T10:06:00.000-04:00

I will keep this short as it appears that Radrik almost used up all the space on the internet with that post. "Hump day" (for those of us not in school or working for the government) of this week brought some excitement to work. I am taking my first stab at day trading. Talk about actually being awake at work. I guess my love for gambling extends further than poker and craps. I signed up for Ameritrade and am now counting down the days until my IT department logs my activity on Ameritrade at 80% of my day. They have a java applet that streams quote data. Doesn't sound so hot, until the green and red lights of buys and sells start making your heart beat. Top that with a yellow light for new daily highs and buy and sell power at your fingertips, and you've got a jump off your roof cocktail that rivals an engineering education that sets you up to fail. I still feel that with a small amount of research and any foresight, you can turn the odds much better than even the pass line in craps.

If any BU Princes or Princesses come across this post and and were told by their Daddy that they can finally get their new Mercedes this week because of a deal he will be making at work, please let me know.

Final thoughts,

What the fuck is up with the name of this blog?
Did I break some sort of Blogging rule by not linking to Ameritrade when I mentioned it?

The First Day of the Rest of My Blog

2005-10-12T00:30:00.000-04:00

Once upon a time, there was a wise king who ruled his kingdom justly. All of his subjects loved him, and every year on his birthday, the bakers from the towns near the castle would devote an entire day to baking his cake. The entire process was carefully monitored by the queen, who gave final approval to the cake's design and construction. She was also in charge of of choosing the type and placement of candles on the cake. Frequently, the court alchemist would build miniature but complex firework displays instead of ordinary wax candles. Of course, there was always one simple candle, for good luck.

The cake had so many layers that all of the ovens within a day's walk of the castle were used to make this spectacular feet of bakery. (I suppose that the townspeople went Atkin's that day. It was a small price to pay to honor their beloved leader.)

As the king's 50th birthday approached, the anticipation grew to a fever pitch. How would the queen top the previous year's cake? The cake was so big, not just one, but all of the king's 25 concubines jumped out of it to surprise him.

When the big day finally arrived, the scale of the cake remained a well-guarded secret. Strangely, none of the bakers' ovens were commandeered by the royal family. Rumors began to run rampant. The queen hadn't been seen for weeks. Some people suggested that the queen and king were fighting, or even on the verge of divorce. (This would not be a wise move for the queen, who witnessed the execution of the king's previous wife after she was caught copulating with one of the kingdom's most highly-decorated knights. The knight, curiously, wasn't punished; he was just sent into battle. He died several days after reaching the front, of syphilis.)

As was tradition, the celebration began with a vast parade of exotic animals. There were rhinoceropsis, llamadons and all manor of fantastic creatures, many of which were created especially for the event. Still, the queen and the cake were nowhere to be seen. The young children reveled in the carnival atmosphere, but many of the adults were too concerned with the future of the royal family to enjoy themselves. To make matters worse, the weather was unseasonably warm, and several people passed out from exhaustion (although it would perhaps be better called frustration).

After the parade, the king spoke to the assembled. "I can see many of you are concerned. Don't be. My wife has assured me that this year's cake will be the most memorable one yet. So, without further ado, THE CAKE!"

With that, a large banner behind the king opened to reveal a giant white box, 20 meters high and easily twice as wide. The only thing adorning the box was a handle which ran vertically along the left-hand side. A wave of cold air swept over the sweaty (and quite bothered) mob. Two of the king's servants pulled the door open, and everyone stared in anticipation into the box. For the first few seconds, all they could see was a cloud of air so cold that even the people who had fainted from the heat during the parade began to shiver. The queen stepped out of the cloud clad in fine and expensive furs. With an overly dramatic flourish, she said to her husband, "Let them eat ice cream cake!"

And it was good.

This blog, however, is not the story of the king and his kingdom. It is about a life much more ordinary. Although we will probably return to our friends the king and queen now and again. Perhaps they will even top his 50th birthday ice cream cake. Cupcakes, anyone?