Category: Uncategorized

Special guest blogger

Meow. Hello! I’m Biscuit, the official Complaint Hub cat. I have a little story to tell you. Last Thursday, I was wandering around the house, hungry. I thought I’d make some noise so someone would feed me, but that didn’t work. Those two people who live in my house were nowhere to be found. People are always disappearing like that. Never around when your food dish needs refilling.

So I decided to go look for them, to make sure they weren’t hiding somewhere. I jumped up on the table, and . . . Oh! Something shiny! And string! I played with the shiny thing and the string for a little while. I love playing with string. It just never gets old.

Well, eventually it gets old. And I was still hungry. So I thought, why not eat the shiny thing? That seems reasonable. I mean, if I wasn’t supposed to play with it and then eat it, why would it be on the table?

It didn’t really agree with me, though. And it wasn’t satisfying at all. In fact, it was kind of pointy. I couldn’t really swallow it all the way.

I spent the next day whining about it so those dumb people would fix it, but they just ignored me. And then they disappeared for two days! No one was there to sit with me on the couch. And my neck hurt. If I’d had anything to eat in the last few days since that shiny thing, I would have left them a little surprise, let me tell you.

Finally they got back! But still, they ignored me. “Poor Bis,” they said. “What’s wrong, Biscuit?” They said. My dang neck hurts, that’s what’s wrong! Can’t you see that? But they couldn’t.  The next day, I was still hungry.  The people came home, and I could smell something delicious!  My stomach was growling.  They were cooking shrimp!  I rushed to the kitchen, meowing as best I could to let them know that I, too, would like some shrimp.  They didn’t give me any, though.  But they did give me some other food from a can, so I ate that.  The shiny thing kind of got in the way, but not too much.

Then, the people thought I was getting better.  I tried to tell them I wasn’t, but you know how people are.

Finally, the next day I’d had enough.  My neck really hurt, and I was really hungry.  That’s when they grabbed me and put me in that little box.  I hate that box.  Whenever I get in that box, I’m always somewhere I don’t want to be when I get out.  Sure enough, they opened the box, and I was at the vet!  I hate the vet.  You wouldn’t believe where she sticks a really cold thermometer.  And she put me in this strange, noisy machine, but I guess it wasn’t too bad.  It didn’t hurt.  But then, I had to go to a new place.  It seemed a lot like the vet, so I hid under a desk until they made me come out.

After that, they took me into another room, and they shaved my ankle!  The nerve!  I don’t remember too much after that.  I’m home now, though.  I think I’m going to stay under the couch this week, though.  That seems safest.

Can I forgive Sony in order to buy this?

Sony Reader: Gizmodo’s Hands All Over, $350 in October (Really!) – Gizmodo

So, Sony sucks.  After their insistence on their stupid proprietary flash memory, their rootkit fiasco and subsequent refusal to take responsibility, and a general “Our customers are criminals who must be stopped” mentality, I wrote off the company.  But, damn, this is a sexy gadget.  Have you ever wished you could take your whole book collection with you?  Tired of paper cuts?  Want a real step forward in the whole book-reading experience?  This thing is it.  I really want one, and I don’t know if I can buy one.  I’m really, really hoping that someone, soon, puts out a similar device that runs on Linux or something.  I don’t think it will happen, though.  Book publishers will almost certainly reject anything that doesn’t help implement their DRM, and a Linux device isn’t likely to satisfy them.

What should happen, at the very least, is the electronic ink technology their using should become more common.  The cool thing about electronic ink is that it only uses power when the screen changes.  Excellent applications include the preview on the outside of your cell phone, or advertising billboards.

So, we’ll see if the cool factor outweighs the Sony sucks factor.  And if it does, the next hurdle is wife-approval.  But I think I can handle that.

Time magazine is on notice

TIME.com: Do Newspapers Have a Future? — Oct. 2, 2006 — Page 2

But there is room between the New York Times and myleftarmpit.com for new forms that liberate journalism from its encrusted conceits while preserving its standards, like accuracy.

I was just about ready to remove Time magazine from my Google homepage because they were disappointing me with thin articles, but this one is a little better. It whines a little about the blogosphere and how the bad bloggers are getting treated like journalists without having to pay their dues as whatever journalists are before they get a job with a big paper. But then it goes on to talk about the need for old school media to find the spot between bloggers and where they are now where people want to read them, and they still make money.

I do have to take issue with this quote:

The Brits have never bought into the American separation of reporting and opinion. They assume that an intelligent person, paid to learn about some subject, will naturally develop views about it. And they consider it more truthful to express those views than to suppress them in the name of objectivity.

American papers objective? I don’t know what American paper he’s reading, but if it’s really objective, I’d love a subscription. I have yet to find a news source in between “OMG Bush is a jerk” and “Fight terrorism at all costs!”.

I’d like to see old media compete. I think that established newspapers have a place alongside blogs, and it’s an important place. They just need to figure out what that place is, and how to monetize it.

Pope a liar

CNN.com – Pope: ‘Total and profound respect for Muslims’ – Sep 25, 2006

Pope Benedict XVI expressed “total and profound respect for all Muslims” at a meeting Monday with ambassadors from Muslim nations and other Islamic leaders.

Really?  Is that why you said something insulting and inflammatory, then apologized for the reaction of the Muslim community?  If I punch you in the face, then say, “I’m sorry you were hurt”, that’s not a sincere apology for my actions.  That is saying, “I didn’t do anything wrong.  It’s unfortunate that you had a negative reaction to what I did.”  It places the blame on the injured or offended party, and it does not show respect for anyone.

Oh, thats encouraging

TIME.com: Why The Democratic Wave Could Be A Washout — Oct. 2, 2006 — Page 1

Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, says the opposition hasn’t sold a vision for handling terrorism, Iraq or jobs. He also cites a drop-off in turnout for most Democratic primaries this year as one sign that the Dems aren’t strong enough to mount a takeover of power on Capitol Hill.

This article is a little short on content, but it speaks to what I can’t figure out about the Democratic party. People are abolutely livid about the way things are going with our Republican-led government. All the Democrats have to do is say, “Hi, we’re not Republicans, and we have a plan.” And then demonstrate with a few talking points that they might, in fact, actually have a plan. That’s all they have to do to win just about every contested election in the country.

But they can’t seem to do that. I haven’t seen a poll anywhere that suggests the Democrats are going to win any big battles. It’s disgraceful. Democrats, this is why Republicans make fun of you. You’ve been handed half the elections in the country on a silver platter, and you’ve done nothing at all.

I’ve said it before – if the Democrats don’t take the Presidency and a strong majority in Congress, the party should be disbanded for absolute and utter incompetence.

Up yours, Peter Angelos

ESPN.com – MLB – ‘Free the birds’: Fans walk out in protest

“When you get down to facts, putting together a team that can compete in the AL East means having a payroll between $100 million-$110 million. That money comes from the consumer, and I have chosen to keep ticket prices to a minimum.

Let’s just see how many teams have a lower payroll than the Orioles, and a better record. Toronto, San Diego, Texas, Minnesota, Oakland, Cincinnati, Arizona, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Colorado, and Florida. Hmm. And look at that, Toronto is in the AL East. They made huge free agent signings over the winter to not win the division. It might take $100 million to win the division, but it doesn’t take $100 million to finish above .500.

For the record, I know it’s hard to compete with the Yankees and Red Sox. I understand that. But spending a ton of money is NOT the answer.

I’m not sure how I feel about the staged walkout at Camden Yards to protest Angelos. It doesn’t seem like it’s going to get anyone anywhere. Is Angelos going to sell the team because 1000 fans walked out? I’m going to have to say that’s unlikely. Is he going to change the way he does things? Well, if nine straight losing seasons hasn’t changed him, I don’t think 1000 angry fans will, either.

Stupid computer

So, I’m at work right now, and I was about to actually do some work, and apparently my server died overnight, which isn’t that unusual.  It’s just a local server running on my machine so I can test our Java web app.  It dies a lot, it’s not a big deal.  Except that this morning, it wouldn’t come back up.  So I tried rebuilding it, and got this error: “creation was not successful for an unknown reason”.  Now, we use Eclipse as our IDE, and for the most part I love it.  It works well, it has a lot of nice conveniences built in, and an active developer community writing plugins.  But when I get error messages that say, “Like, um, something’s wrong, but, um, we don’t know what it is, or how you might fix it”, then I start to get a little annoyed.

Now, I know it’s tough to write good error messages.  Believe me, I’ve written some bad ones myself.  But, damn it, I’m actually trying to get some stuff done here, and Eclipse is not cooperating.  Stupid Eclipse.  If I hadn’t already gone to get coffee, I’d do that now.  That’s how mad I am.  Instead, I’ll probably waste some time until some coworkers get here, and then waste some more time, and then maybe try to fix my server.  Maybe.

Dont take a picture of this

Top Ten Things NOT Safe To Photograph | DSLRBlog

  1. Underground/Tube/Buses
  2. Refineries or other Industrial plant
  3. Police
  4. Government buildings
  5. Bridges
  6. Tunnels
  7. Shopping malls
  8. Airports
  9. Office Buildings
  10. Houses
    When I see things like this, it makes me want to go photograph the Metro, industrial plants, the White House . . .  The story in the post is about a guy detained in France, so I can hardly blame that on our current administration and their civil rights == terrorism campaign.  But if I were one of those sites with, you know, readers, I’ll bet one of them would do it.  As everyone knows, as the number of readers goes up, the probability of stupid trolls increases exponentially.  I’d do the math, but I don’t know they keyboard codes for limits and integrals.  I’m sure you understand.

How accurate is your forecast?

Weather Forecast Accuracy for Falls Church, Virginia via Lifehacker This website not only gives you a current forecast, but it also tells you which of the other forecasting sites are most accurate. If you haven’t lived under a rock your entire life, you probably know that weather forecasters are generally regarded to be on about the same level as used car salesmen in terms of honesty. I’m often surprised at how angry people get at the weatherman, as if it’s his or her fault that either the weather is bad, or that the prediction was off.

What I’m really curious about, though, is how accurate the accuracy-checkers’ forecast is.