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04:11 pm
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Public notification
Not News:
Damned with faint praise is far better than Microsoft Windows Vista deserves.
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02:38 pm
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Musical Headache
I seem to have somehow wound up with the Flash Gordon theme, as performed by Queen in the early 80s, stuck in my head for the past two days.
There are worse songs to be sure, but still ... this is getting to be a bit much.
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01:02 pm
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Nom nom nom
Some of you may have previously heard me griping about a lack of viable lunch options near work that don't involve driving to either Diamondhead or Bay St. Louis.
I am pleased to discover that this is not actually the case. There's a little side-of-the-road place sandwich shop that is quite literally a five minute drive (at most) from the end of the airstrip. Very tasty, reasonable quantity for the money, and above all something other than Subway that doesn't require spending at least 90 minutes on lunch on days you don't bring it with you to work.
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04:09 pm
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New toy at work
http://www.3dconnexion.com/3dmouse/spacenavigator.php
It's not quite the holographic design tank that the inimitable Mr. Stark uses ... but it's a hell of an improvement over using just a straight keyboard-and-mouse for CAD work.
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09:43 am
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Z-day Arrives
I'm not normally one for this sort of thing, but it's too entertaining to resist.
( Zombie Apocalypse, George Romero style? )
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09:50 am
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Maybe I should become a fire elementalist and be done with it ...
How the hell do I keep ending up having to deal with heat transfer and thermal effects no matter where I'm working or what I'm doing there? I know it comes with the territory of high power lasers but even when I was doing PC tech support to pay bills I got handed everything that even vaguely resembled heat-related crap.
Much more of this and I'm swearing off all forms of plasma weaponary in favor of strictly kinetic-kill systems.
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07:39 pm
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Thwarted!
Or why bookstores are dangerous to my wallet even when I can't find what I'm looking for.
I hit the nearest Barnes & Noble in an attempt to procure the sage cooking advice of Alton Brown en route home from work. Unfortunately, their search database lied about the book being on the shelf of the store, which means I'm going to either see if there's a Borders in this general area, or else just order it off of Amazon.
So why was it dangerous to my wallet? Well, despite not finding what I was looking for, I walked out with three new-to-me SF paperbacks (two David Drake, one Spider Robinson) and a copy of God Created the Integers anyway. And I damn near added a biography of Howard Hughes to the stack on my way out. Not that I didn't bring plenty of reading material with me anyway, but these are ones I haven't read -yet-. Integers is an admittedly very unsual selection for me in that it's nominally scientific, which you'd think I get enough of from work. But it's also Stephen Hawking waxing literary on the subject of higher mathematics over the past 2.5 millenia (if the cover is to be believed) and I expect it to be interesting if only because the subject material is, quite literally, what makes my job possible in the first place.
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12:09 pm
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Speaking of unholy unions ...
Reading through an ANSI standard publication is like reading a strange dialect of a familiar language. Almost as if it's the bastard offspring of technical jargon and legalese.
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01:35 pm
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Connected again
I have landline (kinda) phone and internet access at home again.
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09:11 am
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The Shrike hath Landed
Finally have a place to live long-term in Saucier, MS. It's a little too generic, predesigned-rubber-stamp development for my taste, but it's a roof with electricity and water so it'll do for now.
Tempted to come up with a name for the place, but I'm not sure I want to grant it power given the level of workmanship. (i.e. acceptable, but only because it wasn't built on my dime.)
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08:19 pm
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Going off-grid
Well, at this point all that's left is to dismantle the PC and load up the car before hitting the road tomorrow.
Still going to be playing it somewhat by ear in terms of finding a place to stay long term once I arrive, but that's far from an unsolveable problem. Otherwise, alles in ordenung as they say in Germany.
See everyone on the other side.
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10:22 pm
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Beware the Penguin, Indeed!
Inspired by sighting "WWGRD?" adorning the Civic Mellon Arena during tonight's playoff game broadcast. (GR = Gary Roberts, #10)
Answers, in order of observed occurance:
1> Score goal.
2> Punch out someone on the other team.
3> Score, then punch someone out.
And this from a guy who was out the entire second half of the regular season with a broken leg plus a high ankle sprain. Heh heh heh.
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06:23 pm
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Hilarity ensues
I can't take credit for finding this one.
But if you want amusement, http://bureauofcommunication.com/ strikes me as having much potential for discordian-esque hilarity.
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11:16 am
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Impending Departure
Work Location: Kiln, MS
Start Date: 01 May 2008
Time to try and nail down exactly where I'm going to live down there. And catch as many of the first round playoff games as possible before I hit the road.
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01:14 am
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QOTD
"My father once wrote a monograph on how to communicate in the workplace. All seven Popes ordered it burned."
-Gilgamesh Wulfenbach
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03:04 pm
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Wait, what?
Armstrong and Christiansen, plus another player I don't recognize and a first round draft pick?
Okay, at first it sounded like they only had one player in return. But even with two players in return still, I'm a bit dubious of what Therien/Pens Management is planning with this trade. This seems like a rather one-sided deal, and not in favor of Pittsburgh, unless they know something I don't. Which is entirely possible at this point.
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04:54 pm
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Boo-Yahh!
Pens are now in first in the Atlantic. With Sid the Kid and several other guys out with injuries no less.
Philly, I believe the time for a reckoning has come.
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05:06 pm
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The Device Has Been Modified
I fly to Gulfport, MS on Tuesday. Why, you ask?
JOB INTERVIEW. For LIDAR related stuff.
Muahaha! LASERS!
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01:13 am
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XKCD
I'm not normally one to rave over webcomics, but today's XKCD is incredibly amusing to me.
For in a revelation that will likely suprise nobody, the more than slightly evil, perenially inimitable Black Hat is my favorite recurring caricature in the strip by far. And today? He has Met His Match.
Muahahahaha!
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11:29 am
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Politics and Media
So, am I the only one who is taking a perverse degree of amusement in how the press is wailing about how the presidential nominations are still wide open?
Seriously. I'm almost convinced the national media concluded that every primary past Iowa and New Hampshire was just a vestigial formality. Sort of a "let the peons think they have a voice while the pope determines the next king" mindset. Sure, there's flaws with the de-facto two party system. But I for one will be THRILLED if the press has to wait until after the national conventions to announce who goes on the ticket in November.
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alathaniel's journal