Archive for January, 2007

Hmmm…

Tuesday, January 30th, 2007

…this is getting a lot more LiveJournal-y than I like, but I haven’t had a chance to find out what’s going on the world since I left home yesterday.
So, updates:

My luggage was found, and was indeed waiting for me at the castle when I finally closed my workday at 10PM EST last night. (19 hours [...]

It gets better.

Monday, January 29th, 2007

Luggage lost–not the two laptops that I carried on, but just all my clothes and toiletries.
Also, I took the wrong rental company bus (totally my fault–very tired) and had to navigate between rental car encampments aux pieds.
I did eventually arrive at the office at 8:55AM EST.
More news, including thrilling “did they find my underwear in [...]

I really hate airports.

Sunday, January 28th, 2007

(Warning: This is essentially a long whine.)
So, I heading off to Boston in the morning for a week of meeting with my potential new bosses. The whole situation is a little complicated, and I might expand on it later in the week if I get a chance to blog from the hotel, but the short [...]

HGPA January Tournament.

Saturday, January 27th, 2007

I suspect the time is nigh for Mangy Jesus and his reign of terror, since portents are amassing: cats lying down with dogs, the night tearing asunder, and Cracker Sean playing aggressively at a tournament.
Which is to say: I didn’t even make it into the top half of the ranks on this month’s tourney (after [...]

I Am So Tired…

Thursday, January 25th, 2007

You never realize just how scary a two-year old is until you are awoken at 2:30 AM by an ice-cold touch on your shoulder, open your eyes, and see a bright-eyed, happy face approximately one inch from your face.
“Daddy, I want Cheerios. Get up, Daddy. It’s time for breakfast.”
Thinking about it now makes me smile.
But [...]

A very lazy post.

Wednesday, January 24th, 2007

I just don’t have anything interesting of my own to say today. I shall let others say interesting things and be on my way.

“There’s a hell of a distance between wisecracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wisecracking is simply calisthenics with words.” — Dorothy Parker
“Those who dream by day are cognizant of [...]

Wordpress 2.1

Wednesday, January 24th, 2007

I’ve upgraded the site. If anything wonky happens, let me know in the comments.

The Why of asking why.

Sunday, January 21st, 2007

To make up for posting stuff from my “million words you write and bury under a tree” yesterday, I’m going to post some Russell today.
Specifically, here’s Russell on why philosophy is worth studying:
Philosophy is to be studied, not for the sake of any definite answers to its questions, since no definite answers can, as a [...]

The Watchman

Saturday, January 20th, 2007

Today’s entry will be a little bit of a blast from the past; a little story, partly in epistolary form, that I wrote more than eight years ago.
It was the result of one of those creativity exercises: in this case something along the lines of “write something based on the title of the next [...]

My day today

Friday, January 19th, 2007

00:00 – 01:00 Still Thursday for me. Watch DVR’d Earl episode (recorded while I was on a conference call with Australians) while debugging some object scoping code on the laptop.
01:00 – 02:00 Daughter wakes up, is unhappy. Requires help with bathroom, and calming from Daddy. I go to bed and start reading the new G. [...]

And now from the “huh I didn’t know that” file…

Thursday, January 18th, 2007

So, you’ve heard about this “Last King Of Scotland” movie?
I was doing a little reading on it today, which lead me to discover that Idi Amin named four of his sons McKenzie, Campbell, Mackintosh, and McLaren–but he had something like 45 kids, so maybe he was just short of names. Apparently he often wore a [...]

Two in two days?

Wednesday, January 17th, 2007

HBO turns ‘Fire’ into fantasy series
HBO has acquired the rights to turn George R.R. Martin’s bestselling fantasy series “A Song of Fire and Ice” into a dramatic series to be written and exec produced by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.

The series will begin with the 1996 first book, “A Game of Thrones,” and the intention [...]

Universal Health Care: Take That Harpocrats!

Wednesday, January 17th, 2007

Well, that graph by itself should go a long way towards answering the “received wisdom” from Canada’s right wing that “health care is broken”. And, it should also go a long way in helping the US left in justifying universal health care.
The graph comes from a fairly detailed article on the results of a study [...]

Today’s Rage Aneurisym

Wednesday, January 17th, 2007

I’m not sure which of these two straws are going to break the camel’s back, but…
Over at Kos, they’re highlighting this segment of the NYT article headed “Pressure Builds Over Plan for Troop Increase“:
Mr. Bush’s National Security Adviser, Stephen J. Hadley, said in an interview on “Meet the Press” on NBC that the White [...]

I almost don’t believe that

Tuesday, January 16th, 2007

SCI FI Wire | The News Service of the SCI FI Channel
Diamond Age, based on Neal Stephenson’s best-selling novel The Diamond Age: Or a Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer, is a six-hour miniseries from Clooney and fellow executive producer Grant Heslov of Smokehouse Productions.
When a prominent member of society concludes that the futuristic civilization in which [...]